The New Deal Art Projects: An Anthology of Memoirs

Book Description

In the early and most intense years of the cold war, social documentary photographers often found themselves in ideological turmoil or, worse, in trouble with the government. In Photography and Politics in America, Lili Corbus Bezner argues that many of the photographers of this period retreated from overt political content. Although many critics defended the trend, arguing that truly visionary art transcended politics, Bezner notes that the cold war era effectively silenced some of the most socially engaged photographers in American society.

In this compelling book, Bezner brings back many of those silenced voices and offers the first detailed analysis of social documentary photography from the Depression through the early cold war years. She traces the political and artistic struggles of socially concerned photographers, often using original and never before published interviews with artists. She explores the little-known history of the controversial, blacklisted Photo League and leading member Sid Grossman. And she recalls some of the most important moments in American photographic history of the 1950s, such as the blockbuster exhibition The Family of Man and Robert Frank's influential book The Americans.

Customer Reviews:

A New Standard for Photographic History.......2000-08-17

Commenting on Lili Corbus Bezner's Photography and Politics in America, distinguished photohistorian James L. Enyeart wrote: "This is one of the most sound expansions of photographic history that I have seen. Bezner has set a new standard for books on the history of photography, especially in the scholarly evidence which her new research and extensive documentation provide." Enyeart, director of the Marion Center for Photographic Arts at the College of Santa Fe, points to the significance of this book as a history. This is a history, but it is more than scholarship. Bezner's book is a fair, balanced, passionate, and lively history of American photography during the 20th century that is sure to satisfy both the true scholar and the general reader. No book has covered this ground. Here are photographers such as Rosalie Gwathmey, Sid Grossman, and George Gilbert, who receive for the first time the close look they deserve. Here is the Photo League, a model for artistic education, blacklisted and censored in the 50s as a result of malice. Bezner's case study of the Photo League will alert any believer in free speech and an open Democracy to just how far extremists will go to take away our freedom. Here is FDR's New Deal, which unified our nation and gave hope to all Americans, regardless of background, a unity that provided the foundation from which we were able to defeat Hitler and Japan. Here is Edward Steichen's the Family of Man, dismissed by some as a show out of the past because photographers displayed works that documented the world around them. Bezner's fresh look at the Family of Man demonstrates that although flawed this major exhibition provided photographers the opportunity to express hope and humanism along with attention to craft and aesthetics. And here is a new look at Robert Frank, whose work, Bezner argues, was elevated at the expense of others just as talented and innovative because of the political climate of the times. Bezner writes passionately and persuasively of how artists retreated into themselves because of the politics of this period. Photography and Politics in America will open your eyes to not only great photography but an exceptional new voice in photographic history. Enyeart is right. Bezner has raised the bar for all who follow her.

A distorted lens.......2000-01-25

Lili Corbus Bezner has written what she believes to be a balanced and complex account of the intersection of politics and photography in the early years of the cold war. The book is extensively researched. But the world view that underlies her account is a narrow one that will be very familiar to readers of contemporary photography and cultural criticism. In this view, the late 1940s and the 1950s in America was one of the most illiberal and dark chapters in our history because of the repressiveness of McCarthyism. Thus the hero of her book is Sid Grossman, a key figure in New York's Photo League, whose career as a photographer and teacher was ruined when his association with the Communist Party was revealed. Bezner assumes readers will share her assessment that his radical, class-based politics was both a more realistic and courageous stand against McCarthyism than the liberal humanism of Edward Steichen, whose extremely popular exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, "The Family of Man", she frequently and condescendingly describes as "naive" and "safe". Thus, in a spooky mirroring of cold war thinking, the wrongs committed against Grossman give him a greater purchase on the political truth.

In fact, this period in the U.S. was the beginning of the greatest class leveling (based on relative income) in the history of the world. It consolidated the rising power of industrial unions and birthed the civil rights movement (the Brown decision was in 1954). A third party candidate, Henry Wallace, ran from the left in 1948; the victorious candidate, Truman, proposed a sweeping national health care plan, among other liberal initiatives. A strain of liberalism that emphasized consumerism (i.e., a higher standard of living for more people) was broadly successful, as represented by the GI bill and VA loan program. Our universities started to open up to a broader range of students and New York eclipsed Paris as the art capital of the world. All these events were contested, but suggest a very different tone than Bezner's "balanced" account.

From a longer view, McCarthyism, while terrible, was not the only event and certainly not the most enduring of the period, despite its chilling effect on freedom of expression. In the end, McCarthy was censured and disgraced. However, his repression of the left-leaning artists and intellectuals, who tend to write most cultural criticism, was disproportionately heavy.

Steichen and his assistant, Wayne Miller, had witnessed the horrors of WWII first hand as part of a naval photography unit--their liberal humanism was hard won and hardly naive. Their hopes for greater human solidarity and their optimism about the human spirit was (and is) the more fundamental challenge to both the right wing repression of McCarthism and totalitarianism on the left. If American radicals were the greater political realists, as Bezner's thesis and dozens like it imply, then they should answer for their support of, or negligence in the face of, communist regimes in Russia and China that murdered tens of millions of people. The alternative is for Bezner to admit that it was photographers like Grossman, not Steichen, who looked through rose-colored lenses.

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Hollywood Modernism: Film and Politics in the Age of the New Deal (Culture and the Moving Image)
Saverio Giovacchini
Manufacturer: Temple University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Movies | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
History & Criticism | Movies | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
Industry | Movies | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
California | State & Local | United States | Americas | History | Subjects | Books
Sports & Entertainment | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
General | Communication | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
General | Performing Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

Cultural Front: The Laboring of American Culture in the Twentieth Century (The Haymarket Series)

Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1930s and 40s: The Postman Always Rings Twice / They Shoot Horses, Don't They? / Thieves Like Us / The Big Clock / Nightmare ... / I Married a Dead Man (Library of America)

ASIN: 1566398630

Book Description

Hollywood culture has been dismissed as insignificant for so long that film buffs and critics might be forgiven for forgetting that for two decades an unprecedented interaction of social and cultural forces shaped American film. In this probing account of how a generation of industry newcomers attempted to use the modernist art of the cinema to educate the public in anti-Fascist ideals, Saverio Giovacchini traces the profound transformation that took place in the film industry from the 1930s to the 1950s. Rejecting the notion that European emigres and New Yorkers sought a retreat from politics or simply gravitated toward easy money, he contends that Hollywood became their mecca precisely because they wanted a deeper engagement in the project of democratic modernism.

Book Description

More than any other event of the 1930s, the migration of thousands of jobless and dispossessed Americans from the Dust Bowl states to the "promised land" of California evokes the hardships and despair of the Great Depression. In this innovative new study, Charles Shindo shows how the public memory of that migration has been dominated not by academic historians but by a handful of artists and would-be reformers. Shindo examines the images of Dust Bowl migrants in photography, fiction, film, and song and marks off the various distances between these representations and the realities of migrant lives. He shows how photographer Dorothea Lange, novelist John Steinbeck, Hollywood filmmaker John Ford, and folksinger Woody Guthrie, as well as folklorists and government reformers, sympathized with the migrants' plight but also appropriated that experience to further their own aesthetic and ideological agendas. The haunted look of Lange's "Migrant Mother" and other photos, the powerful story of the Joad family in Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, Ford's poetic cinematic adaptation of that novel, and the gritty plainfolk lyrics of Guthrie's Dust Bowl Ballads have all combined to portray the migrants as the quintessential victims of the Great Depression. Shindo, however, contends that these artists failed to fully grasp the realities of "Okie" culture and seemed far more concerned with promoting views and agendas that the migrants themselves might have found inaccurate or unappealing. Shindo's study shows us how art can dominate history in the popular mind and illuminates the ways in which artists blend aesthetics and politics to make a personal statement about the human condition. His book not only increases our understanding of a tragic era in American history but also expands the scope of current histories of the American West to include cultural representations and their importance.

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A well written account of journalism and new deal politics

Pm: A New Deal in Journalism, 1940-1948
Paul Milkman
Manufacturer: Rutgers University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Politics | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Media Studies | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Journalism | Writing | Reference | Subjects | Books

Newspapers & Magazines | Writing | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Foreign Languages | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 0813524342

Customer Reviews:

A well written account of journalism and new deal politics.......1998-05-20

This book offers a unigue picture of journalism in the 1940's. PM attempted to write about hot topics of the day without being beholding to advertisers. They championed the causes of those with little power such as unions and minorities. Paul Milkman offers great insight into the way a radical publication such as PM gives us a unique view of politics in America in the 1940's. His sentences are frequently eloquent. This is not a boring history book. The text discusses the inner workings of the newspaper and how editorial decisions were made. This book is of interest to history buffs as well as journalists.

New Deal art: WPA works at the University of Kentucky : University of Kentucky Art Museum, August 25--October 27, 1985

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New Deal art: WPA works at the University of Kentucky : University of Kentucky Art Museum, August 25--October 27, 1985
Harriet W Fowler
Manufacturer: The Museum
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

A More Abundant Life: New Deal Artists and Public Art in New Mexico

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An intriguing slice of American culture and art

A More Abundant Life: New Deal Artists and Public Art in New Mexico
Jacqueline Hoefer
Manufacturer: Sunstone Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | History & Criticism | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

General | Reference | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

Treasures on New Mexico Trails: Discovery of New Deal Art and Architecture

ASIN: 0865343713

Book Description

Artists began coming to New Mexico in the late nineteenth century. They came from everywhere, from Maine to California and a few from Europe. They were attracted by the dazzling New Mexican landscape, the hospitality of town and village life, and very important, the Indian and Hispanic cultures that had shaped the artistic imagination of New Mexico for centuries.

From an artist's point of view it was a rich mix, and between art and odd jobs, they managed to make a living. Until the Great Depression of the 1930s. Then, as the artist Louie Ewing said, "the jobs ran out." No matter what you were willing to do, there was no work, and nobody was buying pictures and pots.

Help came from Washington. New Deal planners offered artists jobs to "beautify" the community. Almost immediately, artists in New Mexico picked up their brushes and chisels, and for almost ten years, between 1933 and 1943, signed onto Federal programs.

How did artists, traditionally loners, like working for the government? When the Santa Fe artist William Lumpkins was asked, he said: "We thought it was heaven on earth to be paid to paint."

Fortunately, many New Deal artists had the opportunity to speak for themselves. In state-sponsored interviews they tell us in their own words what the New Deal art programs meant to them. Their rich interpretations of that experience and a selection of the work they produced is what this book is about.

Customer Reviews:

An intriguing slice of American culture and art.......2003-08-17

A story of a unique time and place where colorful cultures blended to create a magical display of public art that is unique to the New Mexico region. As a big fan of the New Deal projects that include much of the rustic lodge-type architecture in our National Parks, this book has expanded my understanding of these projects to include the fine arts and the culture of those who created it. The New Mexico region, under the direction of an artist with a good spirit, was able to thrive in a unique and spectacular manner unlike any other.
Read the book and enjoy the excellent color plates.

Democratic Vistas: Post Offices and Public Art in the New Deal

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Democratic Vistas: Post Offices and Public Art in the New Deal
Marlene Park , and Gerald E. Markowitz
Manufacturer: Temple Univ Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Painting | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0877223483

Eleanor Roosevelt and the Media: A Public Quest for Self-Fulfillment

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Eleanor Roosevelt and the Media: A Public Quest for Self-Fulfillment
Maurine H. Beasley
Manufacturer: University of Illinois Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Psychology & Counseling | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

General | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Women's Studies | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Words & Language | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 025201376X

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A NEW DEAL FOR ARTS- REVEIW

A New Deal for the Arts
Bruce I. Bustard
Manufacturer: University of Washington Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

Customer Reviews:

A NEW DEAL FOR ARTS- REVEIW.......2000-04-28

This book provides a comprehensive view of New Deal Art and the different programs set up by the government to benifit the Arts in America during the great depression.

Book Description

Presenting IDW's official adaptation of 2004's wildly popular rom-zom-com (that's "romantic zombie comedy," of course). This "director's cut" adaptation - produced with the full participation of the movie's co-writer/director and co-writer/star, Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg - will feature deleted scenes and other never-before-seen material. Adapted by IDW's Editor-in-Chief, Chris Ryall, with art by Zach Howard (Detective Comics), this volume also contains movie storyboards, production stills, and additional bonus material courtesy of Edgar and Simon.

Customer Reviews:

Largely for fans, the movie is still supreme.......2006-07-27

I bought this largely for the "deleted" scenes. I knew there were some scenes involving Mary the checkout girl and others in comic form, and I was hoping they would be in this volue. No, what's here is pretty much what you saw in the movie with some of the scenes shortened. They problematically weed out some of those moments that made the movie a great mix of smart and dumb humor. Ed's "prediction" speech from the bar is gone, as his is "got wood" shirt. Pete's deconstruction of Shaun's life that leads to a lot of his attempts is gone. The two walks to the store are essentially gone (including the second one's excellent descent into ignorance no matter what). A lot of the background gags (news stations showing men in biohazard suits while Shaun looks away, for instance, or people coughing on the bus) have been overlooked, though a few new ones are in place and the timing on a lot of the jokes probably wouldn't make sense to you if you haven't seen the movie already. All in all it keeps the big story well and intact, cuts out a lot of the "drawn out" sections of the movie, and offers a few new little visuals (zombie neighbor waving sort of things, single panel additions, unless my mind is warped and I am overlooking the deleted scenes that are put back in) but really doesn't equal the completeness of the original movie. The only real plus, here, are the extras. The covers and the "pin ups" included at the back are quite well done and warrant an extra star from me on their own (hence the 4 stars instead of 3).

AUREALIS - The Australian Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction 17:The Service of the Dead; Dusty Winona; Fade to Black; The Morpheus Project; With an Engimatic Smile; Watching the Soldiers

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AUREALIS - The Australian Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction 17:The Service of the Dead; Dusty Winona; Fade to Black; The Morpheus Project; With an Engimatic Smile; Watching the Soldiers
Stephen; Strasser, Dirk (editors) (Stephen Dedman; Anthony Morris; Bill Congreve; Brent Lillie; John Ezzy) Higgins
Manufacturer: Chimaera Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000IB9Q42

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The Half Dead (After Dark 12)
Garry Disher
Manufacturer: Lothian Pub Co
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Ages 9-12 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0850918480

Book Description

The shadow of the Black Hall broods over the City of the Half Dead - a place where almost all the men and boys have lost a hand, an arm, a leg in mysterious accidents - or are they accidents? Renny, a teenage loner living rough, stumbles upon the Hall's grisly secrets. A tale of grim horror by award-winning author Garry Disher, starkly illustrated by artist Shaun Tan.

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Shaun rules1

Shaun of the Dead, Issue 4 (Comic Book)
IDW PUBLISHING
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000RHXBMK

Product Description

32 PAGES

Customer Reviews:

Shaun rules1.......2007-09-22

One of my favorite movies, now one of my favorite comics. A must have for the obsessed fan.

Zombies Party (En espanol): Shaun of the Dead (En espanol)

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Zombies Party (En espanol): Shaun of the Dead (En espanol)
Edgar Wright
Manufacturer: Public Square Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Horror | Graphic Novels | Comics & Graphic Novels | Subjects | Books

Spanish | Foreign Language Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Book Description

A romance comedy in a zombie world! Based on the cult movie Shaun of the Dead (2004) by Edgar Wright, this director's cut adaptation features deleted scenes and other never-before-seen material. Shaun is too busy sorting out his troubled love life and dealing with his mother to realize an entire community has returned from the dead. Of course, once he does it becomes the perfect platform from which to exorcise his many, many issues.

Know your Hot Fuzz; Six things to keep in mind when watching the new comedy from the folks who gave us Shaun of the Dead.(Movies - Articles): An article from: Winnipeg Free Press

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Know your Hot Fuzz; Six things to keep in mind when watching the new comedy from the folks who gave us Shaun of the Dead.(Movies - Articles): An article from: Winnipeg Free Press
Gale Reference Team
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B000PM8D48
Release Date: 2007-04-20

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Winnipeg Free Press, published by Thomson Gale on April 20, 2007. The length of the article is 929 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Know your Hot Fuzz; Six things to keep in mind when watching the new comedy from the folks who gave us Shaun of the Dead.(Movies - Articles)
Author: Gale Reference Team
Publication: Winnipeg Free Press (Magazine/Journal)
Date: April 20, 2007
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Page: d1

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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James Joyce s The Dead
Richard and Davey, Shaun Nelson
Manufacturer: Stage & Screen
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000MPRCDG

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Shaun

Shaun of the Dead, Issue 1 (Comic Book)
IDW PUBLISHING
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000RI362E

Customer Reviews:

Shaun.......2007-09-22

A must have for the true Shaun of the Dead Fan. While I am not a huge comic book fan I love the movie. This series captures the movie beautifuly.

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Shaun

Shaun of the Dead, Issue 2 (Comic Book)
IDW PUBLISHING
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000RI3624

Customer Reviews:

Shaun.......2007-09-22

My comics look great next to my action figure. A great addition to the movie.

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Shaun of the Dead, Issue 3 (Comic Book)
IDW PUBLISHING
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000RI1608

Book Description

Max Beerbohm, English parodist and foremost caricaturist of his day, re-animates an era of eccentrics in these wickedly funny tales of London literary life.

Customer Reviews:

A very charming book.......2002-03-21

I first read "Seven Men" a few years back when Harold Bloom listed it as essential reading in his book on the Western canon.

The book consists of short fictional portraits of various characters in the world of Edwardian arts and letters. Beerbohm was a satirist with a nimble touch -- he had the ability to poke fun at the pretensions of the art world while maintaining a gentle, bemused humanism.

Sir Max seemed to view the vanity and foibles of human nature not so much with scorn as with an endless amusement, and reading any of his essays or parodies or satires is like spending the evening chatting with a wise and witty friend.

Beerbohm once wrote, "How many charming talents have been spoiled by the instilled desire to do 'important' work! Some people are born to lift heavy weights. Some are born to juggle with golden balls." Beerbohm was an admitted juggler, and yet his seemingly "light" work is ultimately more insightful than most so-called serious projects. And often much funnier.

Beerbohm was also quite a caricaturist, and his theater reviews (many out of print) are still great to read all these decades later.

Get hold of this book and start off with the classics "Enoch Soames," the story of a third-rate poet who, convinced of his own greatness, makes a deal with the Devil in order to travel to the future to enjoy his posthumous success (with comic results), and "Savonarola Brown," a hilarious sketch of a frustrated playwright and his great "unfinished" opus.

Beerbohm's contemporaries referred to him as "the incomparable Max," and it's a title that fits. I wish I could've met him.

A fun survey of literary circle evolution.......2001-05-23

The essay/sketches which are presented in Seven Men And Two Others begin as the author's memories of London literary life at the turn of the century and move into satire and parody as Beerbohm comments on authors, critics and literary circles alike. Seven Men And Two Others is a revealing achievement and a fun survey of literary circle evolution.

Enoch Soames.......2000-06-28

In addition to being a wonderful work of literature, Seven Men has the advantage of being not totally fictional. One of the seven actually existed. For those interested, I would refer you to the Nov 1997 issue of Atlantic Monthly.

Gentle humor blended with worldly wisdom: superb........1999-08-14

These fictitious biographical sketches are superb blends of gentle humor with worldly wisdom. This is one of the finest books of the twentieth century and maybe one of the finest books ever written. If you can, try to get the hardcover Oxford World's Classics edition, which reproduces the pencil sketches that Beerbohm (who was a highly talented caricaturist as well as a fine writer) made of five of the "seven men." The sketches add yet another layer of meaning and resonance to what is already a marvelous book that easily bears any number of rereadings.

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Seven Men and Two Others
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: Penguin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B0000CIYF0

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Seven Men and Two Others
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OK4PB6

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SEVEN MEN AND TWO OTHERS
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: Vintage Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000GWLYPC

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Seven Men and Two Others
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: William Heinemann
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0000CHNZA

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Seven Men and Two Others.
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: Penguin 1958.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000L5E8F2

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Seven Men & Two Others
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: VINTAGE (DIV OF RANDOM HOUSE)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000U24LXK

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Seven Men and Two Others
Max Beerbohm
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000L3SHHO

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