
8. Timing
Poole Adrian
in Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
Tragedies are about timing, both good and bad. They are also about knowing the right time to act or to refrain from acting. This applies to many of the arts, including opera and song. ...
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4. Morality and its Discontents
Michael Tanner
in Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction
Nietzsche's fundamental concern throughout his life was to plot the relationship between suffering and culture, or cultures. ‘Morality and its Discontents’ shows that correlative with this ...
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2. Tragedy: Birth, Death, Rebirth
Michael Tanner
in Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction
‘Tragedy’ considers Nietzsche's controversial first book, The Birth of Tragedy, and the many amendments he made to it throughout his life. The three main concerns of this book that drew ...
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Introduction
Poole Adrian
in Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
What does the word tragedy mean and in what context is it used? It is used to confer dignity and value on bad news. The Introduction asks: is this word now bandied around so much that its ...
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9. Endings
Poole Adrian
in Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
It is hard to determine when tragedies end. This does not stop us from trying to work it out. The ending is more than just a moment in time. It takes and needs time. We find comfort in ...
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3. The living dead
Poole Adrian
in Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
Tragedy is full of ghosts. Ghosts in tragedy are invariably associated with judgement and retributive justice. ‘The living dead’ looks at why there are so many ghosts in tales of tragedy. A ...
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6. No laughing matter
Poole Adrian
in Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
What is the connection between comedy and tragedy? Why do we find tragedy in the arts comic? If the brute matter of tragedy consists of pain, grief, death, and bereavement, laughter brings ...
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2. Once upon a time
Poole Adrian
in Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
Does ‘real’ tragedy belong to the past? George Steiner stated in The Death of Tragedy (1961) that the 17th century marks the ‘great divide’ in the history of tragedy. From this point of ...
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1. History, genre, text
William Allen
in Classical Literature: A Very Short Introduction
‘History, genre, text’ introduces this overview of classical literature, a period spanning over 1,200 years (c.750 bc to ad 500) and explains how these texts survived to this day. The ...
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Epilogue: why might we enjoy tragedies?
Stanley Wells
in Shakespeare's Tragedies: A Very Short Introduction
‘Epilogue: why might we enjoy tragedies?’ considers why we pay good money to subject ourselves to displays of misery, cruelty, suicide, murder—even cannibalism. Perhaps central to the ...
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8. The future of development
Ian Goldin
in Development: A Very Short Introduction
‘The future of development’ considers some of the key challenges facing all countries: the sequencing of different policy reforms and investment efforts; the role of private investment and ...
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William Shakespeare: A Very Short Introduction
Stanley Wells
William Shakespeare: A Very Short Introduction provides a guide to the life and writings of one of the world’s greatest and best-known dramatists: William Shakespeare. Looking ...
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6. Our future atmosphere
Paul I. Palmer
in The Atmosphere: A Very Short Introduction
There is still much about Earth’s atmosphere we do not fully understand, which limits our ability to predict large-scale changes to the atmosphere. As Earth’s climate changes new scientific ...
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7. Occupying the High Ground
Michael Tanner
in Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction
‘Occupying the High Ground’ deals with the period after This Spoke Zarathustra when Nietzsche produced Beyond Good and Evil (BGE), which suggests a transvaluation of all values, and not ...
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Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction
Adrian Poole
Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction addresses questions of tragedy about belief, blame, mourning, revenge, pain, witnessing, timing, and ending and demonstrates the age-old ...
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5. Marx
Andrew Bowie
in German Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction
‘Marx’ explains how in debates which form the context of the work of Karl Marx people begin to talk for the first time of the ‘end of philosophy’. From the 1830s onwards, philosophy became ...
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4. Plotting mischief
Matthew Bevis
in Comedy: A Very Short Introduction
Good comedy has a knack of good timing and storytelling. It is the art of surprise, but established routine is what makes surprise possible. Jokes work because we expect the result, and our ...
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10. Lessons
Elizabeth Fisher
in Environmental Law: A Very Short Introduction
We live in precarious times. The environmental problems of the Anthropocene are products of our interconnectedness. ‘Lessons’ explains that it is important to understand what environmental ...
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Environmental Law: A Very Short Introduction
Elizabeth Fisher
Environmental law is the law concerned with environmental problems. It is a vast area of law that operates from the local to the global, involving a range of different legal and regulatory ...
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1. Tragedies on the stages of Shakespeare’s time
Stanley Wells
in Shakespeare's Tragedies: A Very Short Introduction
Tragedies were immensely popular at the time Shakespeare came on the theatrical scene. The brightest star among Shakespeare’s early contemporaries was Christopher Marlowe, a prolific ...
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