Books

During a recent appearance on Bill Moyers rsquo s PBS news program ldquo Now rdquo 4 04 Susan Sontag ruefully noted the timeliness of her new book about pictures of the victims of violence in general and of war in particular It had she admitted ldquo an obscenely topical character rdquo

The tax code according to a former I R S commissioner embodies all the essence of life greed politics power goodness charity Everything rsquo s in there With the estate tax everything is magnified dramatically In Wealth and Our Commonwealth William H Gates Sr and Chuck Collins make a f

James MacGregor Burns rsquo s new book Transforming Leadership is a reformulation and update of his 1978 book Leadership which was the seminal text for the burgeoning new field of ldquo leadership studies rdquo There is a James MacGregor Burns Institute of Leadership at the University of Mary

Following up on his popular Walking the Bible Bruce Feiler journalist and travel writer now presents his very personal exploration of monotheism rsquo s common patriarch in Abraham A Journey to the Heart of Three Faiths The importance of his topic mdash the identity and meaning of Abraham mdash

In a period of cultural and religious change this book detects a revival of orthodoxy that offers a solution to the current religious turmoil Oden divides his treatment into two parts The first entitled ldquo The Gift of New Life rdquo deals with the present spiritual crisis in Christianity a

In case you have ever wondered why the facade of St Peter rsquo s Basilica in Rome seems so disproportionately and disagreeably wide in relation to its height the explanation is that the final bays on both of its sides are in fact not part of the facade itself They instead represent the lower por

From the time of the Devotio Moderna to the present books offering guided meditations on Jesus have been a staple of Christian spirituality Anselm Gr n a Benedictine monk and best-selling spiritual writer in Germany and throughout Europe offers 50 short vignettes of the life and teaching of Jes

In 1970 at the age of 56 Alec Guinness by then one of the best-known character actors in the world sat for a formal portrait Michael Noakes the artist recognized the overwhelming challenge of the task ldquo How does one paint what lies beneath the surface of the skin rdquo asks biographer