Böcker i Penguin Modern Classics-serien

Despite its apparent spontaneity, this is a work of art, which rearranges language and plays in the gaps between reality and fiction.

Written in agony, this book features elegiac meditation on the creation of life, and of art.

Both madcap cookbook and manifesto on Futurism, Marinetti's exuberant and entertaining book has been described as one of 'the best artistic jokes of the century'No other cultural force except the early twentieth-century avant-garde movement Futurism has produced a provocative work about art disguised as an easy-to-read cookbook. Part manifesto, part artistic joke, Fillippo Marinetti's The Futurist Cookbook is a collection of recipes, experiments, declamations and allegorical tales. Here are recipes for ice cream on the moon; candied atmospheric electricities; nocturnal love feasts; sculpted meats. Marinetti also sets out his argument for abolishing pasta as ill-suited to modernity, and advocates a style of cuisine that will increase creativity. Although at times betraying its author's nationalistic sympathies, The Futurist Cookbook is funny, provocative, whimsical, disdainful of sluggish traditions and delighted by the velocity and promise of modernity.Filippo Tommaso Marinetti was born in 1876 to Italian parents and grew up in Alexandria, Egypt, where he was nearly expelled from his Jesuit school for championing scandalous literature. He then studied in Paris and obtained a law degree in Italy before turning to literature. In 1909 he wrote the infamous Futurist Manifesto, which championed violence, speed and war, and proclaimed the unity of art and life. Marinetti's life was fraught with controversy: he fought a duel with a hostile critic, was subject to an obscenity trial, and was a staunch supporter of Italian Fascism. Alongside his literary activities, he was a war correspondent during the Italo-Turkish War and served on the Eastern Front in World War II, despite being in his sixties. He died in 1944.'A paean to sensual freedom, optimism and childlike, amoral innocence ... it has only once been answered, by Aldous Huxley's Brave New World' Lesley Chamberlain

'Reading Brodsky's essays is like a conversation with an immensely erudite, hugely entertaining and witty (and often very funny) interlocutor' Wall Street JournalWatermark is Joseph Brodsky's witty, intelligent, moving and elegant portrait of Venice. Looking at every aspect of the city, from its waterways, streets and architecture to its food, politics and people, Brodsky captures its magnificence and beauty, and recalls his own memories of the place he called home for many winters, as he remembers friends, lovers and enemies he has encountered. Above all, he reflects with great poetic force on how the rising tide of time affects city and inhabitants alike. Watermark is an unforgettable piece of writing, and a wonderful evocation of a remarkable, unique city. Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

A new translation of Giorgio Bassani's haunting collection of short stories that evoke 1930s Ferrara, with an introduction by Ali Smith.Isolated lives and a lost world are evoked in these memorable stories set in the Jewish-Italian community of 1930s Ferrara. A young man's unrequited love; a strange disappearance; a faded hotel; a lonely funfair; the smell of mown hay at the gates of the Jewish Cemetery - these vivid, impressionistic snapshots build a picture of life's brevity and intensity. Part of the sequence including The Gold-Rimmed Spectacles and The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, and featuring people and places from these novels, The Smell of Hay is told with a voice that is by turns intimate, ironic, elegiac and rueful. This new translation contains two pieces, added by Bassani to his earlier collection, which have never appeared in English before.'Powerful new translations . . . Bassani began as a poet, and McKendrick's redelivery of this taut uncompromising fiction reveals resonance and generosity' Ali Smith'Giorgio Bassani is one of the great witnesses of this century, and one of its great artists' GuardianGiorgio Bassani (1916-2000) was an Italian poet, novelist and editor. The Smell of Hay is the last in a series of six works collected together as Il romanzo di Ferrara. Other works in the cycle include The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, which received the Viareggio Prize and inspired an Academy Award-winning film adaptation by Vittorio de Sica, The Gold-Rimmed Spectacles, and Within the Walls (originally published as Five Stories of Ferrara), which won the Strega Prize. Jamie McKendrick is a poet and translator. His translations of Bassani's The Garden of the Finzi-Continis and The Gold-Rimmed Spectacles are already available as Penguin Modern Classics, and he is in the process of translating the rest of the Romanzo di Ferrara cycle anew.

In Kingsley Amis's Take A Girl Like You, twenty year old Jenny Bunn is supernally beautiful and stubbornly chaste, which is why Patrick Standish, an arrogant schoolmaster, wants her so much. This perceptive coming of age novel about a northern girl who moves south, wants to fit in and yet wants to preserve her principles, challenges our assumptions about the battle of the sexes and classes in Britain. It is a story about 'the squalid business of the man and the woman' and 'the most wonderful thing that had ever happened' to Jenny Bunn.Few twentieth century novelists have explored our preoccupation with sex like Kingsley Amis. The results are surprising and often hilarious.Kingsley Amis's (1922-95) works take a humorous yet highly critical look at British society, especially in the period following the end of World War II. Born in London, Amis explored his disillusionment in novels such as That Uncertain Feeling (1955). His other works include The Green Man (1970), Stanley and the Women (1984), and The Old Devils (1986), which won the Booker Prize. Amis also wrote poetry, criticism, and short stories.

In That Uncertain Feeling by Kingsley Amis, competition is stiff for the position of sub-librarian in Aberdarcy Library. For John Lewis, the situation is complicated by the attentions of daunting and desirable village socialite, Elizabeth Gruffyd-Williams, who is married to a member of the local Council. Pursuing an affair with her whilst keeping his job prospects alive is John's predicament, as he finds himself running down Welsh country lanes at midnight in a wig and dress, resisting the advances of local drunks and suffering the long speeches of a 'nut-faced' clergyman.At times tenderly satirical and at times riotously slap-stick, Amis sends up an array of rural stereotypes in this story about a man who doesn't know what he wants.Kingsley Amis's (1922-95) works take a humorous yet highly critical look at British society, especially in the period following the end of World War II. Born in London, Amis explored his disillusionment in novels such as That Uncertain Feeling (1955). His other works include The Green Man (1970), Stanley and the Women (1984), and The Old Devils (1986), which won the Booker Prize. Amis also wrote poetry, criticism, and short stories.

'An unrivalled picture of the rumours, suspicions and treachery of civil war' Antony BeevorEvery line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic Socialism as I understand it'. Thus wrote Orwell following his experiences as a militiaman in the Spanish Civil War, chronicled in Homage to Catalonia. Here he brings to bear all the force of his humanity, passion and clarity, describing with bitter intensity the bright hopes and cynical betrayals of that chaotic episode: the revolutionary euphoria of Barcelona, the courage of ordinary Spanish men and women he fought alongside, the terror and confusion of the front, his near-fatal bullet wound and the vicious treachery of his supposed allies.A firsthand account of the brutal conditions of the Spanish Civil War, George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia includes an introduction by Julian Symons.

Eric Gill's opinionated manifesto on typography argues that 'a good piece of lettering is as beautiful a thing to see as any sculpture or painted picture'. This essay explores the place of typography in culture and is also a moral treatise celebrating the role of craftsmanship in an industrial age. Gill, a sculptor, engraver, printmaker and creator of many classic typefaces that can be seen around us today, fused art, history and polemic in a visionary work which has been hugely influential on modern graphic design.'Written with clarity, humility and a touch of humour . . . timeless and absorbing' Paul Rand, The New York Times'His lettering was clear, confident and hugely influential on the development of modern type design. The world has now caught up with Gill' GuardianHow do we see the world around us? This is one of a number of pivotal works by creative thinkers like John Berger and Susan Sontag whose writings on art, design and the media have changed our vision for ever.

With a dangerous blend of chemistry and magic, secret agent Lee has the ability to change bodies - his own, or with anyone he chooses. Also able to time travel, he finds himself forced to use his skills to defeat a team of priests, who are using mind control to produce their own private slave race. Dead soldiers, African street urchins, evil doctors, corrupt judges and monsters from the mythology of history and science all feature in Lee's terrifying adventure. A surreal space odyssey, The Soft Machine is the first book in Burrough's innovative 'cut-up' trilogy - followed by Nova Express and The Ticket That Exploded - and a ferocious assault on hype, poverty, war and addiction in all its forms.

The diabolical Nova Criminals now include the nightmarish characters of Sammy the Butcher, Iron Claws, Izzy the Push and the Brown Artist, and are poised to wreak untold destruction on the world with their new-found control. Only Inspector Lee of the Nova Police has any chance of stopping them, by dismantling the word and image machine before it's too late. The third book of Burroughs's linguistically prophetic 'cut-up' trilogy - following The Soft Machine and The Ticket That Exploded - Nova Express is a hilarious and Swiftian parody of bureaucracy and the frailty of the human animal.

'Hot damn! Let us rumble, keep going and don't slow down ... let's have a little fun ...'In his much-anticipated memoir, Hunter S. Thompson looks back on a long and productive life. It is a story of crazed road trips fuelled by bourbon and black acid, of insane judges and giant porcupines, of girls, guns, explosives and, of course, bikes. He also takes on his dissolute youth in Louisville; his adventures in pornography; campaigning for local office in Aspen; and what it's like to accidentally be accused of trying to kill Jack Nicholson. Alongside this 'depraved and terrifying adventure', Hunter S. Thompson exposes the darkness at the heart of America today: a time when the 'goofy child President' and the New Dumb have taken control, and the nation thralls to Bush's War on Terror, War on Evil, War on Iraq, and even War on Fat ... a time when fear and loathing are greater than ever.

The exhilarating, life-affirming call to spiritual arms from world-renowned spiritual teacher G. I. Gurdjieff'Gurdjieff's voice is heard as a call.He calls because he suffers from the inner chaos in which we live.He calls to us to open our eyes.He asks us why we are here, what we wish for, what forces we obey. He asks us, above all, if we understand what we are . . .'Part adventure narrative, part travelogue, part spiritual guide, Meetings with Remarkable Men is suffused with Gurdjieff's unique perspective on life. With vivacity and charm, he organizes his account around portraits of the remarkable men and women who accompanied him through remote parts of the Near East and Central Asia, and who aided his search for hidden knowledge. Among them are Gurdjieff's own father (a traditional bard), a Russian prince dedicated to the search for Truth, a Christian missionary who entered a World Brotherhood deep in Asia, and a woman who escaped slavery to become a trusted member of Gurdjieff's group of fellow seekers.Meetings with Remarkable Men conveys a haunting sense of what it means to live fully - with conscience, with purpose and with heart.

Georges Simenon's chilling portrayal of tragic love, persecution and betrayal.'One sensed in him neither flesh nor bone, nothing but soft, flaccid matter, so much so that his movements were hard to make out. Very red lips stood out from his orb-like face, as did the thin moustache that he curled with an iron and looked as if it had been drawn on with India ink; on his cheekbones were the symmetrical pink dots of a doll's cheeks.'People find Mr Hire strange, disconcerting. The tenants he shares his building with try to avoid him. He is a peeping Tom, a visitor of prostitutes, a dealer in unsavoury literature. He is also the prime suspect for a brutal murder that he did not commit. Yet Mr Hire's innocence will not stand in the way of those looking for a scapegoat as tragedy unfolds in this quietly devastating and deeply unnerving novel. 'The romans durs are extraordinary: tough, bleak, offhandedly violent, suffused with guilt and bitterness, redolent of place . . . utterly unsentimental, frightening in the pitilessness of their gaze, yet wonderfully entertaining' John Banville

'There are few situations in life which are more difficult to cope with than an adolescent son or daughter during the attempt to liberate themselves' Anna Freud was one of the most creative and innovative thinkers in the history of psychoanalysis, whose pioneering work in child analysis and development revolutionized the treatment of the young. This essential anthology of her writings includes extracts from her classic The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defence, as well as papers on normal and pathological child development, on adolescence, trauma, aggression and analytical technique. Together they offer a definitive overview of her entire career, displaying the richness, variety and originality of her thinking.'An achievement of the first importance ... underlines the clarity and cogency of Anna Freud's thinking, [and] makes it accessible to a wide audience' Clifford Yorke, former Medical Director, the Anna Freud Centre, London

Features stories ranging from teenagers coming into awareness of their sexual and artistic powers to humdrum housewives whose lives are shattered by unexpected epiphanies to old people who don't know what to do with themselves.

The Castle is the story of K., the unwanted Land Surveyor who is never to be admitted to the Castle nor accepted in the village, and yet cannot go home. As he encounters dualities of certainty and doubt, hope and fear, and reason and nonsense, K. s struggles in the absurd, labyrinthine world where he finds himself seem to reveal an inexplicable truth about the nature of existence. Kafka began The Castle in 1922 and it was never finished, yet this, the last of his three great novels, draws fascinating conclusions that make it feel strangely complete.

NEW STATESMAN BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2015 Strauss's Radetzky March, signature tune of one of Europe's most powerful regimes, presides over Joseph Roth's account of three generations of the Trotta family in the years preceding the Austro-Hungarian collapse in 1918. Grandfather, son and grandson are equally dependent on the empire: the first for his enoblement; the second for the civil virtues that make him a meticulous servant of an administration whose failure he can neither comprehend nor survive; the third for the family standards of conduct which he cannot attain but against which he is too enfeebled to rebel.

Rainy night on Union Square, full moon. Want more poems? Wait till I'm dead.Allen Ginsberg, August 8, 1990, 3:30 A.M.Allen Ginsberg wrote incessantly for more than fifty years, and many of the poems collected for the first time in this volume were scribbled in letters or sent off to obscure publications and unjustly forgotten. Containing more than a hundred previously unpublished poems, accompanied by original photographs, and spanning from the 1940s to the 1990s, Wait Till I'm Dead is the final major contribution to Ginsberg's sprawling oeuvre, a must have for Ginsberg neophytes and long-time fans alike.

Growing up in the world of the 'five towns' of industrial England, with their furnaces and chimneys, huddled red-brown streets, prayer meetings and small-minded bigotry, Anna is dominated by her miserly and tyrannical father. When she inherits a fortune and finds love, she struggles to break free from the constraints upon her, even though she is torn between duty and her deepest feelings. Arnold's novel of parental tyranny and rebellion is a portrayal of a woman of great spirit, complexity and integrity. 'Deeply moving, original, and dealing with material that I had never encountered in fiction, but only in life' Margaret Drabble

"First published in French as L'homme qui regardait passer les trains by Gallimard 1938"--Title page verso.

Born in 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia, Martin Luther King, Jr. was one of the most prominent leaders of the Civil Rights Movement. Widely regarded as one of the greatest activists in history, he became the youngest person to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, aged 35. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee.

New to Penguin Classics, the remarkable, devastating collected stories by the author of Wide Sargasso Sea.Some of Jean Rhys's most powerful writing is to be found in this rich, dark collection of her collected stories. Her fictional world is haunted by her own, painful memories: of cheap hotels and drab Parisian caf s; of devastating love affairs; of her childhood in Dominica; of drifting through European cities, always on the periphery and always perilously close to the abyss. Rendered in extraordinarily vivid, honest prose, these stories show Rhys at the height of her literary powers and offer a fascinating counterpoint to her most famous novel, Wide Sargasso Sea. This volume includes all the stories from her three collections,The Left Bank (1927), Tigers Are Better-Looking (1968) and Sleep It Off, Lady (1976).