West of Everything: The Inner Life of Westerns

Book Description

A leading figure in the debate over the literary canon, Jane Tompkins was one of the first to point to the ongoing relevance of popular women's fiction in the 19th century, long overlooked or scorned by literary critics. Now, in West of Everything, Tompkins shows how popular novels and films of the American west have shaped the emotional lives of people in our time. Into this world full of violence and manly courage, the world of John Wayne and Louis L'Amour, Tompkins takes her readers, letting them feel what the hero feels, endure what he endures. Writing with sympathy, insight, and respect, she probes the main elements of the Western--its preoccupation with death, its barren landscapes, galloping horses, hard-bitten men and marginalized women--revealing the view of reality and code of behavior these features contain. She considers the Western hero's attraction to pain, his fear of women and language, his desire to dominate the environment--and to merge with it. In fact, Tompkins argues, for better or worse Westerns have taught us all--men especially--how to behave. It was as a reaction against popular women's novels and women's invasion of the public sphere that Westerns originated, Tompkins maintains. With Westerns, men were reclaiming cultural territory, countering the inwardness, spirituality, and domesticity of the sentimental writers, with a rough and tumble, secular, man-centered world. Tompkins brings these insights to bear in considering film classics such as Red River and Lonely Are the Brave, and novels such as Louis L'Amour's Last of the Breed and Owen Wister's The Virginian. In one of the most moving chapters (chosen for Best American Essays of 1991), Tompkins shows how the life of Buffalo Bill Cody, killer of Native Americans and charismatic star of the Wild West show, evokes the contradictory feelings which the Western typically elicits--horror and fascination with violence, but also love and respect for the romantic ideal of the cowboy. Whether interpreting a photograph of John Wayne of meditating on the slaughter of cattle, Jane Tompkins writes with humor, compassion, and a provocative intellect. Her book will appeal to many Americans who read or watch Westerns, and to all those interested in a serious approach to popular culture.

Customer Reviews:

Home On the Range.......2007-06-04

Tompkins is infuriatingly cutting-edge, but in the end she's just a gal who likes men in jeans serving up piping hot pork and beans. She writes an accessible prose, none of that academic trash prose. She's old school. There's lots of lefty, snotty condescension, but also a sound love for the great American genre. Tompkins treats the bread and butter pulp classics of the Western genre as literature with a capital L. Why not? She persuades us that there is gold in them thare hills.

essential but NOT good -- see Cowboy Metaphysics instead.......2004-03-31

Tompkins made her name as a professional literary critic, principally (but not only) for her book on Reader-response criticism, which somewhat counter-intuitively holds that texts' meanings are dependent on readers' values and assumptions, etc. I mention this because she brings her assumptions to bear on a genre (Westerns) that she fundamentally doesn't understand ... or want to understand. Tompkins' book will tell you plenty about what sophisticated literary theorists will do with texts (how to situate them in cultural traditions and how to discuss the relationship between cultural artifacts), but for a truly enlightening discussion of Westerns, you should turn to Peter A. French's magnificent treatment: Cowboy Metaphysics, Ethics and Death in Westerns. French's book has all the merits that Tompkins book should (also) have had. It is lucid, argumentative, illuminating and thoughfully respectful of the details of the Westerns he discusses.

For a fascinating read turn to French instead. Where else can you get a discussion of Westerns that illuminates this genre by way of Aristotle, Nietzsche, Homer, Melville, Kant and Aeschylus?

wow!.......2000-10-06

This is an amazing book. Jane Tompkins looks at the different symbols in westerns -- cattle, horses, food, work -- and discusses what they *mean*. She also discusses the evolution of the genre -- where it came from, and what it was a reaction to, and why the different symbols work together so well. And all the while, her writing style is engaging and interesting and pulls you along as you nod and say "Oh! Right!" You don't have to be a student of writing to enjoy this book. The information translates immediately to male-female communication, and to interactions you may have with colleagues. You'll find yourself gutting through some project and saying in a John Wayne accent "well, it's the cowboy way, ain't it?"

Highly enjoyable. An amazing piece of work.

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West of Everything the Inner Life of Westerns
Tompkins Jane
Manufacturer: Oxford UP
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000UERK40

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West of Everything: The Inner Life of Westerns. (book reviews): An article from: Cineaste
Pat Dowell
Manufacturer: Cineaste Publishers, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Performing Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B00092WF4I
Release Date: 2005-07-28

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Cineaste, published by Cineaste Publishers, Inc. on June 22, 1993. The length of the article is 2905 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: West of Everything: The Inner Life of Westerns. (book reviews)
Author: Pat Dowell
Publication: Cineaste (Magazine/Journal)
Date: June 22, 1993
Publisher: Cineaste Publishers, Inc.
Volume: v20 Issue: n3 Page: p65(3)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

West of Everything the Inner Life of Westerns

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West of Everything the Inner Life of Westerns
Tompkins Jane
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OK8DBE

Book Description

Los Angeles pulsed with economic vitality and demographic growth in the decades following World War II. This vividly detailed cultural history of L.A. from 1940 to 1970 traces the rise of a new suburban consciousness adopted by a generation of migrants who abandoned older American cities for Southern California's booming urban region. Eric Avila explores expressions of this new "white identity" in popular culture with provocative discussions of Hollywood and film noir, Dodger Stadium, Disneyland, and L.A.'s renowned freeways. These institutions not only mirrored this new culture of suburban whiteness and helped shape it, but also, as Avila argues, reveal the profound relationship between the increasingly fragmented urban landscape of Los Angeles and the rise of a new political outlook that rejected the tenets of New Deal liberalism and anticipated the emergence of the New Right.
Avila examines disparate manifestations of popular culture in architecture, art, music, and more to illustrate the unfolding urban dynamics of postwar Los Angeles. He also synthesizes important currents of new research in urban history, cultural studies, and critical race theory, weaving a textured narrative about the interplay of space, cultural representation, and identity amid the westward shift of capital and culture in postwar America.

Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles.(Book review): An article from: The Historian

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Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles.(Book review): An article from: The Historian
Dickson A. Mungazi
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Science Fiction | Science Fiction & Fantasy | Subjects | Books

Book Description

This digital document is an article from The Historian, published by Thomson Gale on March 22, 2006. The length of the article is 748 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: Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles.(Book review)
Author: Dickson A. Mungazi
Publication: The Historian (Magazine/Journal)
Date: March 22, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 68 Issue: 1 Page: 126(2)

Article Type: Book review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles.(The Next Los Angeles: The Struggle for a Livable City)(Book Review) : An article from: California History

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Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles.(The Next Los Angeles: The Struggle for a Livable City)(Book Review) : An article from: California History
Mark Wild
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Science Fiction | Science Fiction & Fantasy | Subjects | Books

Book Description

This digital document is an article from California History, published by Thomson Gale on March 22, 2005. The length of the article is 824 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: Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles.(The Next Los Angeles: The Struggle for a Livable City)(Book Review)
Author: Mark Wild
Publication: California History (Magazine/Journal)
Date: March 22, 2005
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 83 Issue: 1 Page: 67(2)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Book Description

This crossword dictionary is for solvers and lovers of crosswords of all kinds. Compiled from Chambers' extensive wordlists and databases, this book includes over 290,000 words arranged into over 15,000 'one-stop' entries combining lexical synonyms and reference lists. Thousands of reference lists cover a wide range of the proper names, place names and miscellaneous items that may occur in crossword solutions. Also covered are cryptic crosswords, anagram indicators, and understanding clues. Special features: Over 290,000 words, over 290,000 solutions. Compiled from Chambers' extensive wordlists and databases, and with advice from a team of top crossword setters and solvers. Unique 'one-stop' entries combine sections for lexical synonyms and for reference wordlists. All wordlists are arranged alphabetically and by word length to make finding solutions easier. Over 15,000 reference words covering a wide range of the people and places whose names may occur in crossword solutions. Useful introduction covers how cryptic crossword setters compile crossword puzzles, and a summary of key words used in clues, including words which indicate that the solution is an anagram of one or more words in the clue.

Customer Reviews:

The Chambers Crossword Dictionary.......2007-01-12

I was very disappointed. As I use the Chambers Dictionary a lot I expected more from this book. It is just a thesaurus and not a very good one at that.

An eminent aid for crossword solvers and stters.......2000-11-23

The Chambers Crossword Dictionary certainly is a fine book, a solid hard-back the same height as the familiar dictionary but only 800 pages long. It promises 290,000 solutions for cryptic and quick crosswords and will, I am sure, be popular and a safe Christmas present for any crossword fan.

This is a thesaurus with 15,000 definitions as headwords. Each of the entries in the dictionary leads to a list of words with of similar meanings sorted alphabetically by length. For example looking for a horse of seven letters, I quickly picked out bronco, centaur, charger, hackney and mustang. However,this work also has extensive reference lists and I went on to the list of horse and pony breeds and discovered Comtois, Criollo, Finnish, Furioso,Hackney, Hispano, Jutland, Masuren etc. It is the reference listings that are the strong point of this book; for example the entry for city is followed by a section on ancient cities, capital cities and almost four pages of towns and cities. This is the place to find the names of famous people, kings, criminals, authors, actors, astronauts - they are all listed. Moreover because all of the entries are listed according to their length it is easy to find the correct answer. Project consultants for the Chambers Crossword Dictionary were Don Manley and Jonathan Crowther and short essays by both are included in the introduction. Azed writes lucidly on the art of the crossword setter and gives an interesting insight into his methods. One comment which bemused me was that he used Chambers Words to search for words of a suitable length to fit his puzzles. I too have a copy that I bought 20 years ago. I have tried to buy one recently to replace my tattered paperback but to no avail. Don has written a superb and individualistic piece on Crossword English, explaining how to read a crossword clue. He lists 20 clues and explains each one. This essay would make an excellent introduction to the cryptic clue for a beginner to the art. There is also a section on anagram indicators.

The Chambers Crossword Dictionary is a lovely book and would be a great help in solving cryptics such as one finds in The Times and would make definition-only puzzles a piece of cake. Its reference sections, garnered from other Chambers databases such as their Book of Facts, will certainly be a help for me, if only to check the name of a protein or a physicist.

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The ideal Crosswords and Scrabble tool

Chambers Anagrams for Crosswords, Scrabble, and All Other Word Games: From Chambers 20th Century Dictionary
Chaz R. Pewters , Esther C. Zwarp , and Zac Wherpster
Manufacturer: Larousse Kingfisher Chambers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Scrabble | Board Games | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
Puzzles | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
General | Reference | Subjects | Books
General | Foreign Languages | Reference | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0550190112

Customer Reviews:

The ideal Crosswords and Scrabble tool.......2001-10-24

Extremely fast and easy to use. All you have to do is get the length of the word to jumble, put all its letters in alphabetical sequence and find the result. For example, want an anagram of MINUTELY ? The length is 8 and letters sorted become EILMNTUY. Look for 8EIL on page headers and you will quickly arrive to the other anagram UNTIMELY.
The only restriction is when it comes to plurals. Remove the final S and decrease word length by one to find the proper anagram. For example, the anagram for COMPUTERS is only found as COMPUTER.

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Chambers Back-words for Crosswords
Peter Schwarz
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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General | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Sports | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0521600073

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Chambers Concise Crossword Dictionary
Una McGovern , Elaine Higgleton , and Catherine Schwarz
Manufacturer: Chambers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

English (British) | Dictionaries & Thesauruses | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Dictionaries & Thesauruses | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Sports | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0550120122

Book Description

Crossword aficionados are sure to find The Chambers Concise Crossword Dictionary a valuable aid to solving cryptic and quick crossword clues. The word lists in this essential crossword solving tool are sorted by length and then alphabetically to make finding solutions easy. Special features: 15,000 unique one-stop entries. 230,000 solutions to quick and cryptic clues. 215,000 words based on The Chambers Dictionary, grouped by meaning to show related words and synonyms. 15,000 proper names and encyclopedic terms give wide ranging coverage of people, places, flora and fauna, events, science, the arts, etc. Anagram indicators. Unique introduction gives advice on: The art of the crossword setter, by Jonathan Croweth. Crossword English, by Don Manley.

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The essential aid for solving and creating crossword puzzles

Chambers Words

Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

English (All) | Dictionaries & Thesauruses | Reference | Subjects | Books

English (British) | Dictionaries & Thesauruses | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Dictionaries & Thesauruses | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Foreign Languages | Reference | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0521600049

Customer Reviews:

The essential aid for solving and creating crossword puzzles.......1998-06-24

Chambers Words lists every single word in the extensive Chambers dictionary; but without definitions, according to the length of the word. So if you are stuck for a 6 letter word beginning J-P, within seconds you will have found Japuti: of course, the well-known palm tree! This handbook is an essential aid for both solving and setting crossword puzzles or for judging Scrabble games. Chambers is the usual standard source for English words.

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Chambers Concise Crossword Dictionary

Manufacturer: CHAMBERS
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000GM2G4K

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Chambers Crossword Dictionary
*
Manufacturer: Chambers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000K7DHGW

Chambers Crossword Dictionary Reader's Digest Special Deliuxe Edition

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Chambers Crossword Dictionary Reader's Digest Special Deliuxe Edition

Manufacturer: Reader's Digest
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000Q4201C

Chambers Words: For Crosswords and Wordgames

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Chambers Words: For Crosswords and Wordgames
Catherine Schwarz
Manufacturer: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

English (British) | Dictionaries & Thesauruses | Reference | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 055019049X

Book Description

This comprehensive book presents a systematic and practically oriented approach to mathematical modeling in finance, particularly in the foreign exchange context. It describes all the relevant aspects of financial engineering, including derivative pricing, in detail. The book is self-contained, with the necessary mathematical, economic, and trading background carefully explained. In addition to the lucid treatment of the standard material, it describes many original results.

The book can be used both as a text for students of financial engineering, and as a basic reference for risk managers, traders, and academics.

Customer Reviews:

State of the Art.......2003-01-11

I own pretty much all of the books on quantitative finance
and this one holds a cherished place on my bookshelf.
Anybody either working as a quant or with aspirations to become one should dust off some space on their bookshelf as well.
Anybody who does serious research in finance in either academia or industry already knows that it is somewhat rare for top researchers to pen books of any length. Time is at a premium and the payoff to publishing journal articles or to finishing off code is typically much greater than it is for writing books.

This is what distinguishes this book from its competitors.
The author is well known in financial circles as one of a handful of quants who is capable of meaningfully contributing new results to this fascinating field. The book contains many results which cannot be found elsewhere in the public domain.
Although the book title suggests that the results apply only to
foreign exchange, it is straightforward to adapt the results to

equities, commodities, and many other underlyings.

Wall Street is a very secretive place and it is not easy to get a glimpse of the kind of things that consume a quant's time.
I suspect that the only reason that this book was able to come to light is due to the acquisition of Banker's Trust, the author's former employer. Banker's was well known to be a fertile training ground for the best derivative minds and this book should prove to be a lasting legacy to that view.

An excellent addition to any quants library.......2002-11-10

Alexander Lipton Lifschitz has brought his extensive
experience and years of research in the most diverse areas
of applied mathematics as well as his experience
in the financial industry to bear in authoring this
very interesting book.

The range of this book is impressive.
Although the author chose to focus on currency
options, his book really is a treatise on
a wide spectrum of problems and methodologies
which any quant wishing to tackle the
sophisticated world of option pricing at a high level
must master.

The author demonstrates his mastery of
the arsenal of the classic applied mathematician,
asymptotic analysis, self-similarity, Laplace
and Fourier transform, and uses these to give an
incisive analysis of both standard topics
such as American options and more exotic topics
such as options on one currency with
barriers on the other currency, passport
options (for which he was a pioneer in developping
pricing tools) , asian options and much much more.

No, this is not as easy a read as Willmott's
books. Willmott's books were and remain
an important contribution with their
quick and intuitive explanation of a variety
of instruments. Lipton- Lifschitz's
book is more challenging and the reader will
have to pull up his sleeves on
occasions where the author, while dealing
with a case analogous to one just treated
says " the details are left to the reader".
But let's face it, if you work on Wall Street
or nearby, you'll have to tackle those details
alone at some point and Lipton-Lifschitz
gives you all you need to know to do
pull this off.

And. last but not least, let's not forget the price. At less than 50$ thisbook is a real bargain and for a first
printing, unusually free of typos or others
errors.

I highly recommend you buy this book now before the publisher
doubles the price.

A Book That Was Long Overdue.......2002-05-14

Most of the books on mathematical finance fall in one of the two domains. Some books are written for people who are new to the field and, as such, do not go deeply into the mathematical details that are crucial for implementing these methods in practice. The more advanced books are usually written by academic mathematicians and sometimes suffer from poor readability and lack of awareness of relevant problems. What many people are looking for is a detailed and readable description of how to apply the latest mathematical methods to solving the problems appearing in day-to-day work of derivatives desks. Such books are few and far between: that is why Alex Lipton's manuscript was so welcome.

As a quant in one of the Wall Street investment banks, I found this book a very valuable resource. Though written on a fairly high level, this book remains a readable and consistent exposition of latest methods of foreign exchange modeling. I particularly appreciated that the author does not skip steps in his derivations and gives out all those little practical details that are so important to people planning to use these methods in their work. The range of topics covered is fairly wide, with main emphasis on derivative pricing. I found the two chapters on path-dependent options to be particularly interesting and extensive. Some of the results included in the book came out of author's original work at Deutsche Bank. I also had an impression that some of his latest work was not included in the book, which is a pity.

All in all, an excellent book. Well worth the price.

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