In these times of heartbreaking violence, clashing religions, and a seemingly never-ending narrative of dichotomy between East and West, wonder at the religion and culture of the Middle East can be in short supply. However, the lyrical and philosophi...

"Citizens of Tokyo" is the first collection in English of plays by one of Japan's most important contemporary playwrights, Oriza Hirata, whose works have been performed all over the world. The first part of Citizens of Tokyo, "At Home and Abroad," pr...

"Dangerous Outcast" traces prostitution in Bengal from precolonial times through the arrival of the British, examining how the profession was reordered to suit British desires. Drawing on nineteenth-century popular and folk culture, Sumanta Banerjee...

In "Everything: And Other Performance Texts from Germany", Matt Cornish gathers texts drawn from performances by five of the most renowned theater collectives working today: andcompany&Co., Gob Squad, Rimini Protokoll, She She Pop, and Showcase Beat...

"I enjoyed success too early, married the wrong man, and hung out with the wrong people; too many men have liked me, and I've liked too many men". Frank and refreshing, Brigitte Reimann's collected diaries provide a candid account of life in social...

The year is 1973. An Egyptian historian, Dr. Shukri, pursues a year of non-degree graduate studies in Moscow, the presumed heart of the socialist utopia. Through his eyes, the reader receives a guided tour of the sordid stagnation of Brezhnev-era Sov...

Using the same musical sense of language she applies to her translations, Nancy Naomi Carlson masterfully interprets herself in "An Infusion of Violets". The sometimes erotic, sometimes melancholy landscapes she creates as the self-appointed sitar's...

While presenting the Nobel Prize in Literature to J. M. G. Le Clezio in 2008, the Nobel Committee called him the "author of new departures, poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy, explorer of a humanity beyond and below the reigning civilization". In M...

In this book, Sumanta Banerjee analyzes the development of the folk culture of Calcutta's urban poor following the establishment of the British colonial system in Bengal. Consisting primarily of traditional artisans who migrated from neighboring vill...

In 1936, Walter Benjamin defined the revolutionary class as being in opposition to a dense and dangerous crowd, prone to fear of the foreign, and under the spell of anti-Semitic madness. Today, in formations great or small, that sad figure returns –...