Nicholas is an orphan. Abandoned in a mysterious aviary in the depths of the forest, he is raised by an old man who teaches him all there is to know about swans, vultures, herons, and the hundreds of other birds with which they share a home. But when the old man dies, the boy sets off on a pilgrimage to find the feather of the legendary bird called the Phoenix, the feather that is medicine for all passion, pain, and sorrow. The many-faceted and allegorical adventure that follows brings us face to face with the myths of many cultures, drawing on the Greeks, Romans, and Babylonians, the Chinese and the Sioux. Over forty fantastic paintings portray Nicholas's journey and the oddities he encounters. 40 color plates.

Pilgrim's Feather

Literature & Fiction

Hill, R. Nemo

Hedstrom, Jeanne

Literary

Quantuck Lane Pr & the Mill rd

Plato said God invented dice. This we learn from one of Ricky Jay's fascinating essays in a delightful small volume that takes us from the earliest forms (astragalithe heel bones of hoofed quadrupeds, four of whose six sides were used for gaming) to the myriad types of "loading" and other means of cheating with dice in the modern era. Along the way we discover that Augustus, Caligula, and Nero were all inveterate players, that Queen Elizabeth issued a search and seizure order against the manufacture of false dice in 1598, and that dice made from celluloid, invented in 1869, remained stable for decades, and thenin a flashbegan to decompose. These are the dice of Rosamond Purcell's luminous and seductive photographs, images which transform entropy to an art form. Jay and Purcell give us a dual meditation on dice that will educate us and amuse us at the same time. 13 color photographs.

Dice: Deception, Fate, and Rotten Luck

Arts & Photography

Ricky Jay

Rosamond Wolff Purcell

Photography & Video

This is the true and compelling story of the relationship between one of America's foremost financiers and the old Irish seaman who changed his life. In 1849, Alfredrick Hatch, a delicate and slightly asthmatic youth, was dispatched to sea by his physician father to "either cure him or kill him." He signed onto a Liverpool packet as an apprentice seaman, in the company of the "roughest, dirtiest, swearingest, drinkingest men alive." Hatch probably would not have survived had he not been befriended by an illiterate, bewhiskered Jack-tar named Jack Corbett, who became his guardian and mentor. The often dramatic story of their experiences sailing together is the centerpiece of this autobiographical narrative, rich in language and its description of life aboard a square-rigged sailing vessel in the mid-19th century. Thirty years later, after Hatch had become a prosperous Wall Street bankerone of the principals in financing the Union's effort in the Civil Warand President of the New York Stock Exchange, Jack re-entered Hatch's life and household, where he became the guardian of Hatch's eleven children and remained to the end of his days. 15 halftone illustrations.

Jack Corbett: Mariner

Biographies & Memoirs

A. S. Hatch

Denny Hatch

Historical

What is it about hands? We think we communicate with words, but has anyone ever told that to an Italian? Where did the expression "tongue-tied" come from? No one ever tied a tongue. But tie their hands and about half the world's communicators would be silenced. The human (and sometimes non-human) hands are, with the possible exception of the eyes, the most expressive parts of the body, asking for more or less, telling us to come or to go, asking questions and answering them, scolding, rewarding, searching and finding, and, at their most intimate, loving and lustful. Hands reward us, calm us, feed us, and scratch our backs. They intimidate, bless, encourage, and stop us. They soothe, caress, and sometimes go where they shouldn't. We may take hands for granted. But Elliott Erwitt does not. Here is Erwitt at his most serious-and-yet-whimsical best, giving us the moments which, without hands, would not exist. 100 duotone images.

Elliott Erwitt's Handbook

ERWITT, Elliott

Individual Artists

Remarkable period photographs by F. W. Glasier capture the colorful world of the Big Top in early twentieth-century America, portraying an array of parades, tent raisings, circus spectaculars, and the everyday lives of the performers.

Wild, Weird, and Wonderful: The American Circus 1901-1927 as seen by F. W. Glasier, Photographer

Sloan, Mark

Humor & Entertainment

A derelict antiques and scrap metal business in Owls Head, Maine, is the setting of this multi-layered word-portrait of its owner, William Buck-minster, proprietor of an extraordinary collection of discarded and decaying items, no-longer-functioning remnants of previous lives. Buckminster's world, which includes both his vaunted talents in the local pool halls and his sure knowledge of the seemingly endless number of fascinating objects from his vast supply, are inspiration for Purcell's carefully crafted meditation on collecting and entropy, and the signals both send to those of us willing to pay attention. 34 duotone footnote photographs.

Owls Head

Purcell, Rosamond Wolff

A warm, quirky, and cinematic novel centered on Philip Farnsworth, the last-of-the-line, eccentric scion of the fabulously wealthy Farnsworth family. He lives in Oshatakea, a huge house created by his grandfather with countless rooms imported from castles and manor houses around the world. The house sits high above the small town that Phil's ancestors established, and is said to be inhabited by strange spirits. It has seen violence and strange deaths, and will see more. In this setting that makes San Simeon seem ordinary, Phil's grandfather and mother are locked in a deadly battle to control both the extraordinary house and Phil's future. Left to his own devices, Phil confronts intrusive and controlling bankers, two ancient and doting quasi-aunts, and surprisinglylove.

The Cloud Dweller

Hale, Robert

Hale, Robert D.

Genre Fiction

Photographs of custodial, maintenance, and food service workers of Harvard University are accompanied by brief statements by those pictured, including Bill Brooks, janitor to three university presidents and David Noard, security guard at the Fogg Art Museum.

Harvard Works Because We Do

One of the New York Times's "Notable Books" and a Los Angeles Times "Best Book of the Year": Ricky Jay's brilliant excursion into the history of bizarre entertainments. Ingesters of stones, stoats, and swords have long compelled my attention. Signor Hervio Nano, the fantastic homunculus, defied conventional taxonomy. The well-trained flea has shown sufficient rationality to drive a chariot, impersonate Napoleon, or reenact the siege of Antwerp. Note the enduring popularity of severing from the head its most protuberant organthe nose. The Bonassus, advertised as unique, was in 1821 the most numerous hoofed quadruped on the face of the earth. In an era rich in examples of animal scholarship, Munito was a star. The multitalented Ricky Jay (sleight-of-hand artist, actor, author, and scholar of the unusual) wrote and published a unique and beautifully designed quarterly called Jay's Journal of Anomalies. Already coveted collector's items, the sixteen issues are now gathered here in a complete set, with significant new material and illustrations. A brilliant excursion into the history of bizarre entertainments, the journal was described in The New York Times as "beautiful and elegant...a combination of rigorous scholarship and personal rumination." In a delectably deadpan and winning style, Jay conveys his admiration and affection for the offbeat that characterized his best-selling Learned Pigs &amp; Fireproof Women. The journal covers such subjects as dogs stealing acts from other dogs, an anthropological hoax involving the only survivors of a caste of ancient Aztec priests, and the ultimate diet: eating nothing at all. Jay explains how wags since the sixteenth century have cheated at bowling; he explores the ancient relationship between conjuring and dentistry; and he chronicles the exploits of ceiling walkers and human flies. Crammed full of illustrations drawn from the author's massive personal archives, Jay's Journal of Anomalies will baffle, instruct, and, above all, delight. 150 illustrations.

Jay's Journal of Anomalies

JAY, Ricky

This is the autobiography of a woman whose exceptional social conscience and actions are an example of the influence one person can have on society without being in a lofty political position. As a young woman, Dorothy Sterling's concern for working people in America led her to the Communist Party in the 1930s, a refuge for many with noble intentions. In the 1950s, her concern for the plight of African Americans led her to integrate her own community of Rye, New York. She went on to become one of the most prolific authors of works of African American History, first for young readers with books such as Mary Jane, the first book about a young black girl growing up in the South. Later works for adults were equally important and influential. Sterling's fascination and concern for the environment led her to write a wonderful natural history guide to Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, Long Island, and the Islands in between. Still active at 90, her most recent triumph was to open her own road to oystermen, whose access to local salt flats had been denied by wealthy summer residents.

Close To My Heart: An Autobiography

STERLING, Dorothy

Arts & Literature

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