Books published by Cornell University Press

Blumenthal-Barby reads theoretical, literary and cinematic works that appear noteworthy for the ethical questions they raise.

In this highly original work, Catherine Wendy Bracewell reconstructs and analyzes the tumultuous history of the uskoks of Senj, the martial bands who operated on the Habsburg Military Frontier in Croatia between the 1530s and the 1620s.

"Fanon was consummately incapable of telling the story of himself. He lived in the immediacy of the moment, with an intensity that embodied everything he evoked. Fanon's discourse pertained to a present tense that was unburdened by its narrative past...

It's 1974 in DeKalb County, Illinois, and the planets have failed to align for Roy Conlon. Widowed and broke, he finds that his eight-year-old son Eric is suddenly a mystery to him. And as powerful forces pull Eric away, Roy's efforts to hold onto his son are threatened by weakness, guilt, and his participation in a foolish crime.

In Neom the laws of physics are lax and everyone still gets high. The city squares do it so they can keep working nonstop. And, for a thousand years, Alison has done it to cope with the burdens of immortality. If you can't die, she says, at least you can be as stoned as the living dead.

Balladeer of the city's broken and forgotten men, the author looks for inspiration in urban side streets and alleys, where crooked schemes are hatched, where lives end violently, and where pretty much everyone is up to no good. He depicts the lives of people who have woefully lost their way in the world.

Follows the journey of Paulus Kempf, a fugitive labor agitator who takes refuge with a colony of Finns on the remote shores of Lake Superior. Kempf, a former surgeon, poet, writer, sculptor, and hyperintellectual, is at first deeply impressed by the folklore and traditions of the Finns. But he soon begins to play upon their superstitions...

What drove Russia to its disastrous war with Japan in 1904? This book attempts to find the answer in Russia's erratic and confused diplomacy. It explains how the key to understanding tsarist involvement in East Asia lies in the ideologies of the Russians who competed to impose their visions of imperial destiny on the East.

Alexander I was a ruler with high aspirations for the people of Russia. Cosseted as a young grand duke by Catherine the Great, he ascended to the throne in 1801 after the brutal assassination of his father. This biography focuses on the complex forces that shaped Alexander's tumultuous reign.

Lord Acton (1834-1902) is often called a historian of liberty. Acton is mainly known for a single maxim, 'Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely'. In this title, the author presents an indepth consideration of Acton's thought.

The metaphor of the nomad may at first seem surprising for Russia given its history of serfdom, travel restrictions, and strict social hierarchy. This book traces the image of the nomad and its relationship to Russian national identity through the debates and discussion of works by writers like Karamzin, Pushkin, Goncharov, and Dostoevsky.

From the time the word kul-tura entered the Russian language in the early nineteenth century, Russian arts and letters have thrived on controversy. This book examines the development of a public discourse on national self-representation in nineteenth-century Russia, as it was styled by the visual arts and in popular journalism.

From 1505 to 1689, Russia's Tsars chose their wives through an elaborate ritual: the bride-show. Alongside accounts of sordid boyar plots against brides and the multiple marriages of Ivan the Terrible, this book offers an analysis of the show's role in the complex politics of royal marriage in early modern Russia.

Analyzes the ideas and activities of the parish clergy serving in St Petersburg, the capital of imperial Russia, in order to discover how the Russian Orthodox Church responded theologically and pastorally to the profound social, economic, and cultural changes that transformed Russia during the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Explores the attempts to define and control sexual behavior in the years following the Russian Revolution. This book examines Soviet "sexual enlightenment," a program of popular health and lifestyle advice intended to establish a model of sexual conduct for the men and women who would build socialism.

Introduces the principal clergymen who participated in the Nazi movement and examines their motives. This title details their advocacy of National Socialism and explores the consequences of their political activism.

This work traces the construction of Russia's cultural landscape, showing how 19th-century representations of nature reflected and shaped Russians' ideas about themselves and their nation. It should appeal to those who are interested in landscape history and in Russian art and culture.

In 1955, Ngo Dinh Diem organized an election to depose chief-of-state Bao Dai, after which he proclaimed himself the first president of the newly created Republic of Vietnam. The United States sanctioned the results of this election, which was widely condemned as fraudulent, and provided substantial economic aid and advice to the RVN. Because...

Why was the story of Adam, Eve, and the Serpent so important to medieval literary culture? Eric Jager argues that during the Middle Ages the story of the Fall was incorporated into a comprehensive myth about language. Drawing on a wide range of texts...

Since January 2004, a violent separatist insurgency has raged in southern Thailand, resulting in more than three thousand deaths. Though largely unnoticed outside Southeast Asia, the rebellion in Pattani and neighboring provinces and the Thai...

Pressman draws on and critiques realist, normative, and institutionalist understandings of how alliance decisions are made.

The most interesting tensions and ambitions of twentieth-century American poetry intersect in one resonant word: voice. The term "poetic voice" emphasizes poetry's reliance on sound, which is prominent in ethnic American writings, new formalism, and...

Caitrin Lynch shows how contemporary Sri Lankan women navigate a complex web of political, cultural, and socioeconomic forces. Lynch details precisely how gender, nationalism, and globalization influence everyday life in Sri Lanka.

A groundbreaking study of deaf identity, minority politics, and sign language, traces the history of the deaf community in Japan.

A study in poetic interaction, The "Odyssey" in Athens explores the ways in which narrative structure and parallels within and between epic poems create or disclose meaning. Erwin F. Cook also broadens the scope of this intertextual approach to include...

Taking a novel anthropological approach to the issue of white ethnicity in the United States, this book challenges the model of uniform ethnic family and community culture, and argues for a reconsideration of the meaning of class, kinship, and gender in America's past and present.