Bottom-Line Selling

Business & Money

Jack, Malcolm

Marketing & Sales

McGraw-Hill Companies

Beckford, best remembered for the Gothic novel ""Vathek"", has always been a subject of fascination. A man of dazzling virtuosity - as story teller, linguist, musician, orientalist, art connoisseur - and of immense wealth, Beckford seemed destined for the highest reaches of English political life. In fact, he became a social outcast and his contributions were to letters and the revival of Gothic architecture on a grand scale. In this biographical sketch, Malcolm Jack concentrates on the importance of Beckford's Portuguese connection in settling his fate. Beckford came to Portugal when he was still open to new influences and the residence proved central to his imaginative development as an artist and to his life as an outcast grandee.

William Beckford: An English Fidalgo (Ams Studies in the Eighteenth Century)

Literature & Fiction

History & Criticism

Ams Pr Inc

My Hong Kong

How was Hong Kong perceived and described by writers from the 1950s during the last colonial period? Was it a British city or was it Chinese? 
The writers show how different life was for ex-pats ensconced on the Peak and leading a glitzy lifestyle compared to refugees who came pouring into the colony from mainland China and lived in dire poverty in squatter camps. 
Find out if that East and West ever mingled in My Hong Kong.

History

Asia

Austin Macauley

Crossing the remote, southern tip of Africa has fired the imagination of European travellers from the time Bartholomew Dias opened up the passage to the East by rounding the Cape of Good Hope in 1488. Dutch, British, French, Danes, and Swedes formed an endless stream of seafarers who made the long journey southwards in pursuit of wealth, adventure, science, and missionary, as well as outright national, interest. Beginning by considering the early hunter-gatherer inhabitants of the Cape and their culture, Malcolm Jack focuses in his account on the encounter that the European visitors had with the Khoisan peoples, sometimes sympathetic but often exploitative from the time of the Portuguese to the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1833. This commercial and colonial background is key to understanding the development of the vibrant city that is modern Cape Town, as well as the rich diversity of the Cape hinterland. Published by Bucknell University Press. Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press.

To the Fairest Cape: European Encounters in the Cape of Good Hope

Africa

Bucknell University Press

Lisbon: City of the Sea is a beautifully written portrait of a much loved city, from its origins in Greek legend to the present day. Malcolm Jack vividly captures the rich and unique history of this haunting and attractive port whose prominent position on the Tagus estuary has inextricably bound its character with the sea. Lisbon is a city of steep inclines and complicated, unsymmetrical streets that criss-cross the hills only in the Baixa area near the river and in the more modern, northern part of the city does any form of a grid system appear. It has enjoyed a political history that has directed Portugal's focus more overseas than inland towards continental Europe, in part because of Spain's geographical position. Thus the city has been stretched in one direction toward Brazil and in another toward the Cape of Good Hope and from there to Asia and the East. Beginning with its earliest inhabitants, Jack traces the city's life through its imperial success in the sixteenth century and the devastating earthquake that humbled the city and shocked Europe in 1755 to its current position as a vibrant and successful European capital. Lisbon's romantic atmosphere has captured the imaginations of foreigners through the ages. Poets, writers and musicians have all drawn inspiration from different parts of Lisbon. This sensitive exploration of the city's many aspects draws out its cosmopolitan nature, as well as its colourful culture and self-image and brings us closer to understanding its true spirit. Engaging and accessible, this book will appeal to Lisbon's many visitors as well as anyone interested in European history.

Lisbon, City of the Sea: A History

Europe

I.B.Tauris

Beckford's Gothic novel, "Vathek", an Arabian tale, was originally written in French when the author was twenty-one. It is the story of Caliph Vathek, whose eye can kill at a glance, who makes a pact with the Devil, Eblis. This edition includes an introductory essay on William Beckford.

Vathek

Routledge

This book is the first dedicated history and evocation of the royal town of Sintra in Portugal to appear in English. Byron, who loved it above most other places, dubbed it 'a glorious Eden'. The town is rich in history, long associated with the Portuguese royal family, and a place of exile and repose for many crowns and sceptres. It has magnificent natural scenery, its southern alpine setting and its view over a great ocean a cool sanctuary for monarchy and an escape from the urban throng of Lisbon over the ages. Sintra: A Glorious Eden evokes the magic of the royal town, at the same time providing the reader with the historical and literary background to what has become a symbol of Portuguese Romanticism at home and abroad.

Sintra: A Glorious Eden

Carcanet Press Ltd.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Jack, Malcolm. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Jack, Malcolm