My Ear At His Heart

Described in a recent New York Times Magazine profile as a "postcolonial Philip Roth," Hanif Kureishi first captured the attention of audiences and critics in the 1980s with the award-winning novel The Buddha of Suburbia and the films My Beautiful Laundrette and Sammy and Rosie Get Laid. In three decades of acclaimed work, Kureishi has written fiction and films exploring a series of interconnected themes about identity and desire—from Islamic radicalism to kinky sex, and from psychoanalysis to the relationships of fathers and sons. After discovering an abandoned manuscript of his father’s, hidden for years, Kureishi was compelled to turn his "unflinching perspective" (Time Out) onto his own history. Like Roth, Martin Amis and Geoffrey Wolfe, who also have written books about their fathers, Kureishi wanted to understand and perhaps to reconcile. My Ear at His Heart offers remarkable insight into the birth of a writer, chronicling how Kureishi’s own literary calling emerged from the ashes of his father’s aspirations. And so begins a journey that takes Kureishi through his father’s privileged childhood by the sea in Bombay, through the turbulent birth of Pakistan and to his modest adult life in England—his days spent as a civil servant, his nights writing prose, hopeful of one day receiving literary recognition. "A beguiling and complex tale of fact, fiction and family tensions" (The Guardian), My Ear at His Heart was published to great acclaim in the United Kingdom in 2004 and went on to win the prestigious Prix France Culture Etranger. Now, this profound work from one of the most compelling artists of our time is at last available in a Scribner edition.

"Listen and attend with the ear of your heart." - Saint Benedict. Dolores Hart stunned Hollywood in 1963, when after ten highly successful feature films, she chose to enter a contemplative monastery. Now, fifty years later, Mother Dolores gives this fascinating account of her life, with co-author and life-long friend, Richard DeNeut. Dolores was a bright and beautiful college student when she made her film debut with Elvis Presley in Paramount's 1957 Loving You. She acted in nine more movies with other big stars such as Montgomery Clift, Anthony Quinn and Myrna Loy. She also gave a Tony-nominated performance in the Broadway play The Pleasure of His Company and appeared in television shows, including The Virginian and Playhouse 90. An important chapter in her life occurred while playing Saint Clare in the movie Francis of Assisi, which was filmed on location in Italy. Born Dolores Hicks to a complicated and colorful Chicago family, Mother Dolores has travelled a charmed yet challenging road in her journey toward God, serenity and, yes, love. She entered the Abbey of Regina Laudis in Bethlehem, Connecticut, at the peak of her career, not in order to leave the glamorous world of acting she had dreamed of since childhood, but in order to answer a mysterious call she heard with the "ear of the heart". While contracted for another film and engaged to be married, she abandoned everything to become a bride of Christ.

"Reading My Father" is an intimate, moving, and beautifully written portrait of the novelist William Styron by his daughter, Alexandra.

A New York Times Notable Book for 2011 One of The Economist's 2011 Books of the Year People speak different languages, and always have. The Ancient Greeks took no notice of anything unless it was said in Greek; the Romans made everyone speak Latin; and in India, people learned their neighbors' languages—as did many ordinary Europeans in times past (Christopher Columbus knew Italian, Portuguese, and Castilian Spanish as well as the classical languages). But today, we all use translation to cope with the diversity of languages. Without translation there would be no world news, not much of a reading list in any subject at college, no repair manuals for cars or planes; we wouldn't even be able to put together flat-pack furniture. Is That a Fish in Your Ear? ranges across the whole of human experience, from foreign films to philosophy, to show why translation is at the heart of what we do and who we are. Among many other things, David Bellos asks: What's the difference between translating unprepared natural speech and translating Madame Bovary? How do you translate a joke? What's the difference between a native tongue and a learned one? Can you translate between any pair of languages, or only between some? What really goes on when world leaders speak at the UN? Can machines ever replace human translators, and if not, why? But the biggest question Bellos asks is this: How do we ever really know that we've understood what anybody else says—in our own language or in another? Surprising, witty, and written with great joie de vivre, this book is all about how we comprehend other people and shows us how, ultimately, translation is another name for the human condition.

Winner of the Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction A New York Times 2016 Notable Book Entertainment Weekly's #1 Book of the Year A Washington Post 2016 Notable Book A Slate Top Ten Book NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “The Nix is a mother-son psychodrama with ghosts and politics, but it’s also a tragicomedy about anger and sanctimony in America. . . . Nathan Hill is a maestro.” —John Irving From the suburban Midwest to New York City to the 1968 riots that rocked Chicago and beyond, The Nix explores—with sharp humor and a fierce tenderness—the resilience of love and home, even in times of radical change. It’s 2011, and Samuel Andresen-Anderson—college professor, stalled writer—has a Nix of his own: his mother, Faye. He hasn’t seen her in decades, not since she abandoned the family when he was a boy. Now she’s re-appeared, having committed an absurd crime that electrifies the nightly news, beguiles the internet, and inflames a politically divided country. The media paints Faye as a radical hippie with a sordid past, but as far as Samuel knows, his mother was an ordinary girl who married her high-school sweetheart. Which version of his mother is true? Two facts are certain: she’s facing some serious charges, and she needs Samuel’s help. To save her, Samuel will have to embark on his own journey, uncovering long-buried secrets about the woman he thought he knew, secrets that stretch across generations and have their origin all the way back in Norway, home of the mysterious Nix. As he does so, Samuel will confront not only Faye’s losses but also his own lost love, and will relearn everything he thought he knew about his mother, and himself.

How do you fight despair and learn to meet the world with a loving heart? How do you overcome shame? Stay faithful in spite of failure? No matter where people live or what their circumstances may be, everyone needs boundless, restorative love. Gorgeous and uplifting, Tattoos on the Heart amply demonstrates the impact unconditional love can have on your life. As a pastor working in a neighborhood with the highest concentration of murderous gang activity in Los Angeles, Gregory Boyle created an organization to provide jobs, job training, and encouragement so that young people could work together and learn the mutual respect that comes from collaboration. Tattoos on the Heart is a breathtaking series of parables distilled from his twenty years in the barrio. Arranged by theme and filled with sparkling humor and glowing generosity, these essays offer a stirring look at how full our lives could be if we could find the joy in loving others and in being loved unconditionally. From giant, tattooed Cesar, shopping at JCPenney fresh out of prison, we learn how to feel worthy of God’s love. From ten-year-old Lula we learn the importance of being known and acknowledged. From Pedro we understand the kind of patience necessary to rescue someone from the darkness. In each chapter we benefit from Boyle’s wonderful, hard-earned wisdom. Inspired by faith but applicable to anyone trying to be good, these personal, unflinching stories are full of surprising revelations and observations of the community in which Boyle works and of the many lives he has helped save. Erudite, down-to-earth, and utterly heartening, these essays about universal kinship and redemption are moving examples of the power of unconditional love in difficult times and the importance of fighting despair. With Gregory Boyle’s guidance, we can recognize our own wounds in the broken lives and daunting struggles of the men and women in these parables and learn to find joy in all of the people around us. Tattoos on the Heart reminds us that no life is less valuable than another.

From the acclaimed novelist Kureishi comes a remarkable memoir about the India-Pakistan divide, a hidden manuscript, and a father and a son.

A poignant and inspirational love story set in Burma, The Art of Hearing Heartbeats spans the decades between the 1950s and the present. When a successful New York lawyer suddenly disappears without a trace, neither his wife nor his daughter Julia has any idea where he might be…until they find a love letter he wrote many years ago, to a Burmese woman they have never heard of. Intent on solving the mystery and coming to terms with her father’s past, Julia decides to travel to the village where the woman lived. There she uncovers a tale of unimaginable hardship, resilience, and passion that will reaffirm the reader’s belief in the power of love to move mountains.

A surreal story inspired by Vincent van Gogh's ear, by the award-winning children's book creator, Piret Raud. When the artist Vincent van Gogh cuts off his ear, the ear is suddenly left alone and headless. What will become of her? Where should she go? What should she do? Acutely aware of how small and insignificant she is in the big, wide world, the ear experiences something of an identity crisis. She simply doesn't know who she is anymore. But thanks to a downcast frog with a heavy heart who simply needs listening to, she realizes what she can offer to the world: a sympathetic ear. Through helping her friends, she discovers a fresh perspective on life. Piret Raud is Estonia's leading children's book creator, and has twice been nominated for the Hans Christian Andersen Award, in 2020 and 2022. Her hand-drawn artwork is breathtaking for its exquisite detail, remarkably vibrant colours and bold compositions. This bedtime story will amuse, beguile and teach empathy in equal measure.

From their introduction, Abbey Press’s Notes from a Monastery series of booklets tried to convey Saint Benedict’s rich insights, common sense, reverence for the divine in the most ordinary things of life, and appreciation for the timeless virtues of humility, obedience, and community in a way that would speak to women and men of faith, regardless of their faith tradition. Recognizing that God is present everywhere and in all the circumstances of daily life, this new eBook offers readers inspiration in their search for God, guided by the spirit of Saint Benedict of Nursia.