Ayn Rand: Objective and Romantic Realist.

Ayn Rand: Objective and Romantic Realist.

By Drew Mercantini | February 17, 2023 | Comments Off on Ayn Rand: Objective and Romantic Realist.

Ayn Rand, born in 1905 as Alisa Zinovyevna Rosenbaum, was a Russian-born American writer who emigrated to the U.S. in 1925. Upon gaining permanent residency in 1929, she became a famous novelist and philosopher. Her analysis of the human condition and the role of reason in human affairs made her books of lasting influence on…

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James Joyce: Modernist Master.

James Joyce: Modernist Master.

By Drew Mercantini | January 31, 2023 | Comments Off on James Joyce: Modernist Master.

Born in Ireland in 1882, James Joyce is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of the 20th century. His novel Ulysses (1922) is a landmark in which the episodes of Homer’s Odyssey are paralleled in a variety of literary styles, particularly stream of consciousness and his other well-known works include A…

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John le Carré: Sophisticated Spy Novelist

John le Carré: Sophisticated Spy Novelist

By Drew Mercantini | January 24, 2023 | Comments Off on John le Carré: Sophisticated Spy Novelist

John le Carré, born in October of 1931 as David John Moore Cornwell, was a British intelligence officer and and novelist during the latter half of the 20th century. After serving in British intelligence during the 1950s and 60s, le Carré‘s fame as a novelist in post-war Britain was established with his third novel, The…

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José de Sousa Saramago: Nobel Prize-Winning Portuguese Author.

José de Sousa Saramago: Nobel Prize-Winning Portuguese Author.

By Drew Mercantini | October 3, 2022 | Comments Off on José de Sousa Saramago: Nobel Prize-Winning Portuguese Author.

In 1982, a novel called Memorial do Convento was published in Portugal. A love story set against 18th-century Inquisitorial Lisbon, the novel captured the imagination of many readers, garnering widespread acclaim. Its author, then sixty year old José Saramago, was not known for literature, but for journalism. With this novel, his fourth to be published,…

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Celebrating Stephen King: Master of Horror.

Celebrating Stephen King: Master of Horror.

By Drew Mercantini | September 24, 2022 | Comments Off on Celebrating Stephen King: Master of Horror.

Thursday, September 21st marked Stephen King‘s seventy-fifth birthday. Born in 1947 in Maine, King was raised by his mother who, with her two sons, moved several times before settling in Durham, Maine. King’s love for horror blossomed in his childhood, when he discovered a collection of H.P. Lovecraft stories in an attic. As he entered…

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Remembering Roald Dahl: Stories that Shaped a Generation

Remembering Roald Dahl: Stories that Shaped a Generation

By Drew Mercantini | September 10, 2022 | Comments Off on Remembering Roald Dahl: Stories that Shaped a Generation

September 13th marks the birthday of Roald Dahl, one of the most popular authors of children’s literature of the 20th century. Born in Wales in 1916, Dahl was a first generation Englishman who spent most of his life in the United Kingdom. His famous stories, such as Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and…

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Remembrance of Things Past: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of Marcel Proust’s Masterpiece.

Remembrance of Things Past: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of Marcel Proust’s Masterpiece.

By Drew Mercantini | August 27, 2022 | Comments Off on Remembrance of Things Past: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of Marcel Proust’s Masterpiece.

Born on July 10, 1871 in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War, famed French novelist Marcel Proust was born into a France torn by internal conflict. Though Paris was gripped by political turmoil and France’s modernization put pressure on the class system, Proust and his educated aristocratic parents were largely unaffected. Marcel, however, was a…

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Nikos Kazantzakis: the Modern Greek Philosopher.

Nikos Kazantzakis: the Modern Greek Philosopher.

By Drew Mercantini | July 22, 2022 | Comments Off on Nikos Kazantzakis: the Modern Greek Philosopher.

Nikos Kazantzakis, born in 1883 on the island of Crete, had a tremendous desire for truth, a sharp intellect to seek it out, and an adventurous disposition that brought him around the world. His fiction largely reflects his philosophical training and religious values, while his work as a translator reflects his concern for the education and…

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Virginia Woolf: Avant-Garde Literary Pioneer.

Virginia Woolf: Avant-Garde Literary Pioneer.

By Victoria Maseda | July 1, 2022 | Comments Off on Virginia Woolf: Avant-Garde Literary Pioneer.

The author of such notable books as Mrs. Dalloway and To the Lighthouse, English writer Virginia Woolf is an established name in the realm of fiction. A pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device, her unique style and method of storytelling has distinguished her as one of the more important…

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C.S. Lewis: A Literary Genius Of The Modern Age

C.S. Lewis: A Literary Genius Of The Modern Age

By Victoria Maseda | June 30, 2022 | Comments Off on C.S. Lewis: A Literary Genius Of The Modern Age

One of the greatest writers of the 20th century, Clive Staples Lewis, or C.S. Lewis, has become a household name. With such works as The Chronicles of Narnia, The Screwtape Letters, and Mere Christianity, his works remain highly influential among writers and creatives, since the publication of his earliest works in the 1930s. Lewis was inspired…

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