Charm
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Charm
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Narrated by:
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Stephen Bayley
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By:
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Stephen Bayley
About this listen
An informative, fun and rather charming essay on the nature and history of one of life’s most desirable assets, Charm, by renowned culture and design critic, Stephen Bayley.
Aiming to wound, a schoolmaster wrote on future design-guru Stephen Bayley’s last ever school report “Charm alone will not get him through”. Bayley took this to mean that an affable, genial, outgoing nature was not enough to ensure survival in a harsh world of statistical performance. But survive and flourish is exactly what Bayley did and now he aims to define Charm by looking at its origins and meanings throughout history and in the modern age.
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To Show and to Tell
- The Craft of Literary Nonfiction
- By: Phillip Lopate
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 76
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 62
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Story4 out of 5 stars 62
Distinguished author Phillip Lopate, editor of the celebrated anthology The Art of the Personal Essay, is universally acclaimed as “one of our best personal essayists” ( Dallas Morning News). Here, combining more than 40 years of lessons from his storied career as a writer and professor, he brings us this highly anticipated nuts-and-bolts guide to writing literary nonfiction. A phenomenal master class shaped by Lopate’s informative, accessible tone, and immense gift for storytelling.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Not a guide on writing personal essays
- By A. Yoshida on 08-07-13
By: Phillip Lopate
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The Western Canon
- The Books and School of the Ages
- By: Harold Bloom
- Narrated by: James Armstrong
- Length: 22 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 233
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 136
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 138
Harold Bloom explores our Western literary tradition by concentrating on the works of twenty-six authors central to the Canon. He argues against ideology in literary criticism; he laments the loss of intellectual and aesthetic standards; he deplores multiculturalism, Marxism, feminism, neoconservatism, Afrocentrism, and the New Historicism. Insisting instead upon "the autonomy of aesthetic," Bloom places Shakespeare at the center of the Western Canon.....
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5 out of 5 stars
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A personal and opinionated book on the Canon
- By Steffen on 07-23-12
By: Harold Bloom
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The Daily Laws
- 366 Meditations on Power, Seduction, Mastery, Strategy, and Human Nature
- By: Robert Greene
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders, Robert Greene
- Length: 12 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 911
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 760
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Story5 out of 5 stars 757
From the world’s foremost expert on power and strategy comes a daily devotional designed to help you seize your destiny.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Chapters are Busted
- By Colin on 10-12-21
By: Robert Greene
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Measure for Measure
- By: William Shakespeare
- Narrated by: Royal Shakespeare Company
- Length: 2 hrs and 27 mins
- Original Recording
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 44
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 28
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 27
A performance of the tragi-comedy by the Royal Shakespeare Company. When a young woman is offered the choice of saving a man's life at the price of her own chastity, what should she do? The political and moral corruption of Vienna has driven Duke Vincentio into hiding while his deputy governor, Angelo, is left to revive the old discipline of civic authority. Angelo's first act is to imprison Claudio, a young nobleman who has gotten his betrothed, Juliet, with child.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Highly recommended
- By Todd on 10-16-08
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The Gay Science (The Joyful Wisdom)
- By: Friedrich Nietzsche
- Narrated by: Michael Lunts
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 161
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 136
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 138
The Gay Science (The Joyful Wisdom) is one of Nietzsche's greatest books. His wonderfully fertile mind roams over mankind, his thoughts, his emotions, his behaviour and his weaknesses with remarkable clarity, with insight - but also with humour!In this work are 383 separate paragraphs, some short, some long, but all singular observations - the epitome of his famous aphoristic style. 'Morality is the herd instinct in the individual.'
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5 out of 5 stars
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I am now a full-fledged fan of Nietzsche
- By RS on 02-24-18
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Cultural Amnesia
- Notes in the Margin of My Time
- By: Clive James
- Narrated by: Clive James
- Length: 6 hrs and 16 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 149
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 104
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 103
From Anna Akhmatova to Stefan Zweig, via Charles de Gaulle, Hitler, Thomas Mann and Charlie Chaplin, this varied and unfailingly absorbing book is both story and history, both public memoir and personal record - and provides an essential field-guide to the vast movements of taste, intellect, politics and delusion that helped to prepare the times we live in now.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Very enjoyable and well narrated
- By Larbi on 05-18-08
By: Clive James
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The Discarded Image
- An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature
- By: C. S. Lewis
- Narrated by: Richard Elwood
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 164
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 137
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Story5 out of 5 stars 137
The Discarded Image paints a lucid picture of the medieval worldview, providing the historical and cultural background to the literature of the middle ages and renaissance. It describes the 'image' discarded by later years as "the medieval synthesis itself, the whole organization of their theology, science, and history into a single, complex, harmonious mental model of the universe". This, Lewis' last book, has been hailed as "the final memorial to the work of a great scholar and teacher and a wise and noble mind".
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5 out of 5 stars
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I hope more of Lewis's scholastic stuff is coming
- By James on 04-01-21
By: C. S. Lewis
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How Proust Can Change Your Life
- By: Alain de Botton
- Narrated by: Nicholas Bell
- Length: 5 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 550
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 460
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Story4 out of 5 stars 460
For anyone who ever wondered what Marcel Proust had in mind when he wrote the one-and-a-quarter-million words of In Search of Lost Time (while bedridden no less), Alain de Botton has the answer. For, in this stylish, erudite and frequently hilarious book, de Botton dips deeply into Proust’s life and work - his fiction, letter, and conversations – and distils from them that rare self-help manual: one that is actually helpful.
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3 out of 5 stars
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A nice petite primer on Proust
- By Darwin8u on 02-20-13
By: Alain de Botton
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The Birth of Tragedy Out of the Spirit of Music
- By: Friedrich Nietzsche
- Narrated by: Duncan Steen
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 170
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 150
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 150
One of Nietzsche’s earliest works, The Birth of Tragedy (1872) is a remarkable source of inspiration. It is here that the philosopher expresses his frustration with the contemporary world and urges man to embrace Dionysian energy once more. He refutes European culture since the time of Socrates, arguing that it is one-sidedly Apollonian and prevents man from living in optimistic harmony with the sufferings of life.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The Apollonian vs The Dionysian
- By JCW on 02-05-18
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Irrationality
- A History of the Dark Side of Reason
- By: Justin E. H. Smith
- Narrated by: Jeff Harding
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 37
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 33
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Story4 out of 5 stars 33
Discovering that reason is the defining feature of our species, we named ourselves the “rational animal”. But is this flattering story itself rational? In this sweeping account of irrationality from antiquity to today - from the fifth-century BC murder of Hippasus for revealing the existence of irrational numbers to the rise of Twitter mobs and the election of Donald Trump - Justin Smith says the evidence suggests the opposite.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A good brain workout
- By ThomasC on 04-09-19
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The Courage to Create
- By: Rollo May
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 4 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 209
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 174
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 175
What if imagination and art are not, as many of us might think, the frosting on life but the fountainhead of human experience? What if our logic and science derive from art forms rather than the other way around? In this trenchant volume, Rollo May helps all of us find those creative impulses that, once liberated, offer new possibilities for achievement. A renowned therapist and inspiring guide, Dr. May draws on his experience to show how we can break out of old patterns in our lives.
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5 out of 5 stars
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May takes on the Creative Act
- By Lowball on 01-16-19
By: Rollo May
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The Consolations of Philosophy
- By: Alain de Botton
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 6 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 671
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 499
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 497
Alain de Botton has performed a stunning feat: He has transformed arcane philosophy into something accessible and entertaining, useful and kind. Drawing on the work of six of the world's most brilliant thinkers, de Botton has arranged a panoply of wisdom to guide us through our most common problems.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Cheering, empathic, helpful
- By Austin on 11-11-09
By: Alain de Botton
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On Freedom
- Four Songs of Care and Constraint
- By: Maggie Nelson
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 10 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 74
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 57
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Story5 out of 5 stars 56
So often deployed as a jingoistic, even menacing rallying cry, or limited by a focus on passing moments of liberation, the rhetoric of freedom both rouses and repels. Does it remain key to our autonomy, justice, and well-being, or is freedom's long star turn coming to a close? Does a continued obsession with the term enliven and emancipate, or reflect a deepening nihilism (or both)? On Freedom examines such questions by tracing the concept's complexities in four distinct realms: art, sex, drugs, and climate.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Just great
- By Kristi Strong on 12-14-21
By: Maggie Nelson
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How to Save the West
- Ancient Wisdom for 5 Modern Crises
- By: Spencer Klavan
- Narrated by: Spencer Klavan
- Length: 6 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 188
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 171
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Story5 out of 5 stars 169
It has been proclaimed many times, but perhaps never more convincingly than now, when every news cycle seems to deliver further confirmation of a world gone mad. Is this the endgame? Author Spencer Klavan is a classicist, with a Ph.D. from Oxford, and a deep understanding of the West. His analysis: The situation is dire. But every crisis we face today, we have faced before. And we can surmount each one. Klavan brings to the West’s defense the insights of Plato, Aristotle, the Bible, and the Founding Fathers to show that in the wisdom of the past lies hope for the future.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Spectacular! A must read!
- By M.A. on 02-15-23
By: Spencer Klavan