Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is felt by many people to be the greatest composer who ever lived. Dominated and shaped by a highly intelligent but frustrated and ambitious father, his story sees the development of a unique genius, from precocious and often endearing childhood to liberated fulfilment, unexpected poverty as money slipped through his fingers, and a tragically early death. Generously illustrated by Mozart's music, from his fifth to his final...

Beethoven's symphonic cycle is one of the most quintessential in the Western classical canon. They chart a course from the influence of Haydn and Classical models in the early symphonies, through works of startling innovation and the birth of Romanticism, to his monumental Ninth Symphony for soloists, chorus and orchestra. Zubin Mehta conducts the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in these live recordings from 2021/22.

"John Bell Young guides the listener through a wide selection of Brahms's works in detail, culminating in a discussion of the beloved German Requiem. Young's commentary considers various aspects of the composer's life, including the views of his peers and his complex relationships with women, always putting Brahms's compelling music in the context of his times and his environment. The accompanying CD features performances from the Music & Arts and...

The most discussed poet of our time, T. S. Eliot is perhaps also the most important figure in the modern poetic tradition. "In ten years' time," wrote Edmund Wilson in Axel's Castle, "Eliot has left upon English poetry a mark more unmistakable than that of any other poet writing in English." In 1948 Mr. Eliot was awarded the Nobel Prize "for his work as a trail-blazing pioneer of modern poetry." This book is made up of six individual titles: Four...

"In a glorious debut, a boy confronts queer lust, shame, the threat of wars, and the plague of family on the day he becomes a man. At a banquet hall, at the onset of war, Adam Weizmann's bar mitzvah party turns into a glorious catastrophe. On the cusp of manhood-and the verge of a nervous breakdown-Adam braces for his special day, mired in family neurosis and national dysfunction. In a chorus of voices, a cast of outsiders chronicles Adam's coming-of-age:...

This work chronicles the history of China for over four hundred years through the spring of 1989.