Vintage books Australia. A Biography of a Nation Phillip Knightley

Encountering an eccentric cast of characters along the way, Sebald confronts the frailty of human existence as he voyages along the Suffolk coast on foot • What begins as the record of a journey on foot through coastal East Anglia becomes the great, constellated story of people and cultures past and present: of Chateaubriand, Thomas Browne, Swinburne and Conrad, of fishing fleets, skulls and silkworms. A rich meditation on the past via a melancholy trip along the Suffolk coast, The Rings of Saturn is an intricately patterned and haunting book on the transience of all things human • Vintage Voyages: A world of journeys, from the tallest mountains to the depths of the mind

An outrageously funny spoof about the ascent of a 40,000-and-a-half-foot peak, discover this laugh-out-loud cult favourite • Led by the reliably under-insightful Binder, a team of seven British men including Dr Prone (constantly ill); Jungle the route finder (constantly lost), Constant the diplomat (constantly arguing) and 3,000 Yogistani porters, set out to conquer the highest peak in the Himalayas • Vintage Voyages: A world of journeys, from the tallest mountains to the depths of the mind

The story of modern Australia begins in eighteenth-century Britain, where people were hanged for petty offences but crime was rife, and the gaols were bursting. From this situation was born the Sydney experiment, with criminals perceived to be damaging British society transported to Sydney, an 'open air prison with walls 14,000 miles thick' • Eleven ships were dispatched in 1781, and arrived in Australia after eight hellish months at sea. Tom Keneally describes the first four years of the 'thief colony' and how, despite the escapes, the floggings, the murders and the rebellions, it survived against the odds to create a culture which would never have been tolerated in its homeland but which, in Australia, became part of the identity of a new and audacious nation

This is the secret history of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland • Wonderland is part of our cultural heritage. But beneath the fairy tale lies the complex history of the author and his subject. Charles Dodgson was a quiet academic but his second self, Lewis Carroll, was a storyteller, innovator and avid collector of "child-friends". Carroll's imagination was to give Alice Liddell, his "dream-child", a fictional alter ego that would never let her grow up • This is a biography that beautifully unravels the magic of Alice. It is a history of love and loss, innocence and ambiguity. It is the story of one man's need to make a Wonderland in a changing world

Mahatma Gandhi became a legend in his own time • A tireless fighter for human rights and for Indian independence, his strategy of satyagraha, or passive resistance, earned him the admiration of millions • Louis Fischer's biography is the definitive account of Ghandi's life; it tells the astonishing story of one man who changed the world forever • This is the perfect read to celebrate and understand Ghandi in the year of the 150th anniversary of his birth

A captivating new book from Wade Davis - winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize for Into the Silence - that brings vividly to life the story of the great Rio Magdalena, illuminating Colombia's complex past, present, and future • For Wade Davis, Colombia was the first country that captured his heart and gave him license to be free. Here, he tells of his travels on the mighty Magdalena, the river that made possible the nation. Along the way, he finds a people who have overcome years of conflict precisely because of their character, informed by an enduring spirit of place, and a deep love of their remarkable land • Braiding together memoir, history and journalism, Magdalena is at once an absorbing adventure through a spectacular landscape and a kaleidoscopic picture of Colombia as it stands on the verge of a new period of peace

В этой замечательной составной биографии Элисон Вейр живо оживляет шестерых жен Генри, раскрывая каждую как самостоятельную и неотразимую личность. Опираясь на богатый документальный материал периода Тюдоров, "Шесть жен Генриха VIII" показывает нам двор, где личные потребности часто влияли на общественные мероприятия и где жизнь, полная пышных ритуализированных удовольствий, была пронизана амбициями, изменой и насилием • Книга на английском языке • One of the most powerful monarchs in British history, Henry VIII ruled England in unprecedented splendour • In this remarkable composite biography, Alison Weir brings Henry's six wives vividly to life, revealing each as a distinct and compelling personality in her own right. Drawing upon the rich fund of documentary material from the Tudor period, The Six Wives of Henry VIII shows us a court where personal needs frequently influenced public events and where a life of gorgeously ritualised pleasure was shot through with ambition, treason and violence

Seven Pillars of Wisdom is an unusual and rich work. It encompasses an account of the Arab Revolt against the Turks during the First World War alongside general Middle Eastern and military history, politics, adventure and drama. It is also a memoir of the soldier known as 'Lawrence of Arabia'.Lawrence is a fascinating and controversial figure and his talent as a vivid and imaginative writer shines through on every page of this, his masterpiece. Seven Pillars of Wisdom provides a unique portrait of this extraordinary man and an insight into the birth of the Arab nation

At the heart of the Sultan's vast empire stands the mysterious Palace of Dreams. Inside, the dreams of every citizen are collected, sorted and interpreted in order to identify the 'master-dreams' that will provide the clues to the Empire's destiny and that of its Monarch. An entire nation's consciousness is thus meticulously laid bare and at the mercy of its government • The Palace of Dreams is Kadare's macabre vision of tyranny and oppression, and was banned upon publication in Albania in 1981

Walking upright on two feet is a uniquely human skill. It defines us as a species • It enabled us to walk out of Africa and to spread as far as Alaska and Australia. It freed our hands and freed our minds. We put one foot in front of the other without thinking - yet how many of us know how we do that, or appreciate the advantages it gives us? In this hymn to walking, neuroscientist Shane O'Mara invites us to marvel at the benefits it confers on our bodies and minds, and urges us to appreciate - and exercise - our miraculous ability

«Блиц» изменил британскую столицу до неузнаваемости и не принес ее жителям ничего, кроме страха, лишений и жертв. Во время Второй мировой войны Лондон оказался на передовой, из-за чего в городе погибло 30 000 человек • Про «Миф о Блице» была написана не одна книга, однако его невероятная социальная история зачастую остается в тени. В своей книге The Battle of London 1939-45. Endurance, Heroism and Frailty Under Fire Джерри Уайт приводит свидетельства тех, кто прошел через войну • Книга на английском языке • Lasting for six long years, the Blitz transformed life in the capital beyond recognition, marking a time of almost constant anxiety, disruption, deprivation and sacrifice for Londoners. With the capital the nation's frontline during the Second World War, by its end, 30,000 inhabitants had lost their lives

Philip Roth's entire oeuvre - 31 books - to be reissued in electric new Vintage jackets for October 2016 • As a student in college, David Kepesh styles himself as 'a rake among scholars, a scholar among rakes' - an identity that will cling to him for a lifetime. As Philip Roth follows Kapesh from the domesticity of childhood out into the vast wilderness of erotic possibility, from a menage a trois in London to the depths of loneliness in New York, Kapesh confronts the central dilemma of pleasure: how to make a truce between dignity and desire; and how to survive the ordeal of an unhallowed existence