George B. Bryan Bücher

Agatha Christie (1890-1976) was an inveterate user of proverbs in her fictional writings, the sales of which number in excess of one billion. An active writer for fifty-four years, Christie used proverbs in a manner that both reflected and shaped contemporary British speech. This lexicographical book examines 3,290 proverbs and proverbial sayings uttered by 785 characters in sixty-six novels, 142 short stories, seventeen dramas, and six romances. The author's premise is that Christie modeled all her fictional works on the well-made play formula and that proverbs are employed not in isolation, but as a function of plot, character, and thought. In addition to an introductory essay, the book contains a list of the distribution of Christie's proverbs according to title, a keyword index with citations of standard authorities, and an appendix containing six statistical tables.

Medieval drama has been the subject of more intensive scholarly examination within the past decade than at any other time since its origin. In this book, the original medieval drama, the «Visitatio Sepulchri» of the «Regularis Concordia» and the «Winchester Troper» is delineated in terms of the environment in which it was created: the Monastic Revival of tenth-century England. The Easter music-drama is seen in the context of medieval English society, continental monastic reformation, liturgical practices, the fine arts, and learning. The writer concludes that the author of the «Visitatio Sepulchri» was Ethelwold, Bishop of Winchester, who at some time between 950 and 970 formulated the music-drama, drawing from secular theatrical conditions and adapting them to contemporary liturgical and devotional requirements. He presented his creation to the English monastic community as an act of worship, not as a separate dramatic entity but as a vital part of the extended ritual of Holy Week. Hence the music-drama must be studied in terms of music and liturgy as well as its literary text; failure to do so diminishes its dramatic magnitude and its powers of exciting worshipful awe of the transcendental reality of the Resurrection.

A Dictionary of Anglo-American Proverbs & Proverbial Phrases Found in Literary Sources of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries is a unique collection of proverbial language found in literary contexts. It includes proverbial materials from a multitude of plays, (auto)biographies of well-known actors like Britain’s Laurence Olivier, songs by William S. Gilbert or Lorenz Hart, and American crime stories by Leslie Charteris. Other authors represented in the dictionary are Horatio Alger, Margery Allingham, Samuel Beckett, Lewis Carroll, Raymond Chandler, Benjamin Disraeli, Edward Eggleston, Hamlin Garland, Graham Greene, Thomas C. Haliburton, Bret Harte, Aldous Huxley, Sinclair Lewis, Jack London, George Orwell, Eden Phillpotts, John B. Priestley, Carl Sandburg, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Jesse Stuart, Oscar Wilde, and more. Many lesser-known dramatists, songwriters, and novelists are included as well, making the contextualized texts to a considerable degree representative of the proverbial language of the past two centuries. While the collection contains a proverbial treasure trove for paremiographers and paremiologists alike, it also presents general readers interested in folkloric, linguistic, cultural, and historical phenomena with an accessible and enjoyable selection of proverbs and proverbial phrases.

The key to getting the body of one's dream is knowing the right muscles to work. This book highlights the exact muscles being toned, strengthened and stretched in a range of workouts with step-by-step photos combined with anatomically correct muscle diagrams showing what's being flexed, stretched and worked.

A collection of poems that explores the most ancient of questions: is there a reason for my existence, or am I just an artefact of nature? The animal of us is very clear, but our consciousness appears to be an enigma: a Darwinian survival tool par excellence, but its sense of self leads to feelings of despair and countless fears. We appear to possess a religious sense that leads us to reach for ideals such as communes, or communism, with frequent violent fervour, as well as religious cults, and organized religion per se - raising the question, why? The poems explore these questions. Science has been miraculous in its rapid growth and influence in our present culture, to the point of it becoming like religion itself, answering questions of cosmology and affecting human identity and longevity. This raises questions of morality, which underscores the importance of our recognizing our underlying animal nature and never underestimating its influence in even the best of us. The poems address this.

This book of poetry deals with the conflict where science is dominant in working its wonders, and the religious has become questionable regarding its relevance. It results in our culture's tendency to view science as our major source of defining and controlling reality. This is suggested in Arthur C. Clarks novel, Childhood's End, as well as in the classic Kubrick film, 2001: A Space Odyssey. The point being that we are no longer children dependent upon a father, but are on our own, alone. Science utilises information of the external world, ie. collection of data and statistics, but is weak in its ability to cross the boundary into the internal world of the individual. In fact, it frequently disparages claims of noetic witnessing as fancy, hysteria, illusion, or outright psychosis. The poems are a mixture of fantasy and reality, leaving the reader to determine their personal view. The two convictions noted have consequences. Our culture's present absolute trust of science in all knowledge leaves a sense of control, but results in a terrifying feeling of alienation in a cold universe. The religious view, having a quality of support, offers comfort of hope, but at the price of having to submit to a power greater than ourselves. Speculation is that our world of common experience, with its mix of good and evil within us, as well as without, is in fact an odyssey of repetition and judgement. It is our home, it is Purgatory.

Charles Dickens was not only a major literary figure of the nineteenth century, he was also a highly skilled user of folk speech in his numerous novels, letters, and other writings. Proverbs, proverbial expressions, proverbial comparisons, twin formulas, and wellerisms play a significant role in his portrayal of social and cultural aspects of his time and environment. There is hardly a page that does not contain a traditional or manipulated proverbial phrase in the lively dialogues or skillfully crafted prose.This book begins with an introductory essay that demonstrates the importance of proverbial language in Dickens' complete works. The bulk of the volume is a key-word index to the occurrence of proverbs in his writings, with the proverbs arranged according to the most significant word in the text. Each entry also provides references to major proverb dictionaries, which readers may consult to learn more about the history of a particular proverbial statement. The interpretative essay together with the index show that Charles Dickens employed proverbial speech effectively to add folk wisdom and linguistic realism to his colorful prose.