Secondhand History, Science & Culture Bargain Book Box SP2835

Secondhand History & Culture Bargain Book Box SP2835

A Pelican box with particular strength in music, art, classical antiquity, and European intellectual history. Freud's Totem and Taboo, Steven Runciman's The Sicilian Vespers, R.H. Tawney's Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, Robert Graves's Greek Myths, J.W.N. Sullivan's Beethoven, and Richard Wollheim's Art and its Objects give this box a genuinely distinguished cast list, with Constant Lambert's Music Ho! and E.M. Forster's Aspects of the Novel adding further literary and critical weight.

1. Ancient Education and Today — E.B. Castle — A Pelican survey of educational thought and practice from ancient Greece and Rome through to the mid-20th century; a well-grounded historical perspective on perennial questions in education.
2. Musical Instruments Through the Ages — Anthony Baines — A comprehensive Pelican survey of musical instruments across cultures and centuries; Baines was one of the foremost authorities on organology in the English-speaking world.
3. Our Language — Simeon Potter — An accessible and charming introduction to the history, structure, and character of the English language; one of Pelican's most popular titles on linguistics.
4. Halévy's History of the English People: Epilogue (1895–1905) Book 1: Imperialism — Elie Halévy — The first book of the epilogue to Halévy's monumental history, covering Britain's imperial turn at the close of the 19th century; essential reading in British political and social history.
5. Music Ho! — Constant Lambert — The composer and conductor's brilliantly argued survey of music in the 1920s and 30s; Lambert writes about jazz, Sibelius, Delius, and the collapse of the tonal tradition with wit and conviction.
6. Religion and the Rise of Capitalism — R.H. Tawney — The classic 1926 study of the relationship between Protestant theology and the development of capitalist economic thought; essential reading in the Weber tradition.
7. The World of Odysseus — M.I. Finley — The ancient historian's landmark study of the society behind Homer's epics; Finley reconstructed the economics, politics, and values of Homeric Greece with rigour and elegance.
8. Chamber Music — Edited by Alec Robertson — A Pelican Original surveying the history and repertoire of chamber music from the Baroque era to the 20th century; a reliable guide for the enthusiastic listener.
9. European Painting and Sculpture — Eric Newton — A Pelican survey of European visual art from the Middle Ages to the modern era; Newton's accessible and opinionated guide to the Western tradition.
10. Totem and Taboo — Sigmund Freud — Freud's speculative masterwork applying psychoanalytic theory to the origins of religion, morality, and social organisation; endlessly provocative and brilliantly argued.
11. The Religious Life — Sister Edna Mary — A Pelican Original examining the nature and practice of religious vocation in the Christian tradition; written from the inside with quiet authority.
12. The Sicilian Vespers — Steven Runciman — The historian's vivid account of the 1282 uprising in Sicily against French Angevin rule; Runciman brings his narrative gifts to one of the medieval world's most dramatic episodes.
13. Under Pressure: The Writer in Society: Eastern Europe and the U.S.A. — A. Alvarez — A Pelican examination of writers working under political pressure in communist Eastern Europe and in the commercial pressures of American literary life.
14. Beethoven — J.W.N. Sullivan — Sullivan's classic study of Beethoven's spiritual development as revealed through his music; one of the finest books ever written about a composer, and a landmark of musical biography.
15. The Greek Myths: Volume One — Robert Graves — Graves's comprehensive and idiosyncratic retelling and interpretation of the Greek myths; indispensable for anyone who wants to navigate the full breadth of Greek mythology.
16. The Archaeology of Palestine — W.F. Albright — A fully revised Pelican account of archaeological excavation in Palestine and what it reveals about the history and culture of the ancient Near East.
17. Roman Readings — Edited by Michael Grant — A Pelican Original anthology of Latin literature in translation; Grant's selections range across poetry, history, oratory, and philosophy.
18. Introducing Music — Otto Karolyi — A Pelican introduction to the fundamentals of music theory and the elements of musical language; accessible to the complete beginner and useful to the self-taught listener.
19. Aspects of the Novel — E.M. Forster — Forster's celebrated Clark Lectures on the art of fiction; ranges across plot, character, pattern, rhythm, and fantasy with the lightness and intelligence of a great novelist thinking aloud.
20. The Psychology of Perception — M.D. Vernon — A Pelican Original examining how we perceive the visual world; Vernon surveys the experimental psychology of vision with clarity and authority.
21. Art and its Objects — Richard Wollheim — A rigorous and influential work of analytic aesthetics examining the nature of art and the conditions under which objects become works of art; Wollheim at his most lucid and searching.