Louis E. Fenech offers a compelling new examination of one of the only Persian compositions attributed to the tenth Sikh Guru Guru Gobind Singh (1666-1708): the Zafar-namah or ' Epistle of Victory.' Written as a masnavi a Persian poem this letter was originally sent to the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb (d. 1707) rebuking his most unbecoming conduct. Incredibly Guru Gobind Singh's letter is included today within the Sikh canon one of only a very small handful of Persian-language texts granted the status of Sikh scripture. As such its contents are sung on special Sikh occasions. Perhaps equally surprising is the fact that the letter appears in the tenth Guru's book or the Dasam Granth in the standard Gurmukhi script (in which Punjabi is written) but retains its original Persian language a vernacular few Sikhs know. Drawing out the letter's direct & subtle references to the Iranian national epic the Shah-namah & to Shaikh Sa'di's thirteenth-century Bustan Fenech demonstrates how this letter served as a form of Indo-Islamic verbal warfare ensuring the tenth Guru's moral & symbolic victory over the legendary & powerful Mughal empire. Through analysis of the Zafar-namah Fenech resurrects an essential & intiguing component of the Sikh tradition: its Islamicate aspect. ...

The Sikh religion has a following of over 20 million people worldwide & is one of the largest religions in the world. However events such as the verbal & physical attacks on Sikhs just after September 11 indicated that Sikhs were being mistaken for Muslims & suggests that the raising of sufficient & appropriate awareness about Sikhism still needs to be addressed. This book will introduce newcomers to the meaning of Sikhism & its practices rituals & festivals. The key threads in the fascinating history of the religion will be highlighted from the Gurus & the development of the Sikh look to martyrdom & militarization in the 17th & 18th Centuries & the diaspora. Eleanor Nesbitt brings the subject completely up to date with an examination of gender & caste referring to contemporary film such as Bend It Like Beckham & media reports. ...

George Eliots tale of a solitary miser gradually redeemed by the joy of fatherhood Silas Marner" is edited with an introduction & notes by David Carroll in " Penguin Classics". Wrongly accused of theft & exiled from a religious community many years before the embittered weaver Silas Marner lives alone in Raveloe living only for work & his precious hoard of money. But when his money is stolen & an orphaned child finds her way into his house Silas is given the chance to transform his life. His fate & that of Eppie the little girl he adopts is entwined with Godfrey Cass son of the village Squire who like Silas is trapped by his past. " Silas Marner" George Eliots favourite of her novels combines humour rich symbolism & pointed social criticism to create an unsentimental but affectionate portrait of rural life. This text uses the Cabinet edition revised by George Eliot in 1878. David Carrolls introduction is complemented by the original " Penguin Classics" edition introduction by Q.D. Leavis. Mary Ann Evans (1819-80) began her literary career as a translator & later editor of the Westminster Review. In 1857 she published " Scenes of Clerical Life" the first of eight novels she would publish under the name of George Eliot including " The Mill on the Floss" " Middlemarch" & " Daniel Deronda". If you enjoyed " Silas Marner" you might like Nathaniel Hawthornes " The Scarlet Letter" also available in " Penguin Classics". "I think " Silas Marner" holds a higher place than any of the authors works. It is more nearly a masterpiece; it has more of that simple rounded consummate aspect...which marks a classical work". (Henry James)." ...

Although the shortest of George Eliot's novels Silas Marner is one of her most admired & loved works. It tells the sad story of the unjustly exiled Silas Marner
- a handloom linen weaver of Raveloe in the agricultural heartland of England
- & how he is restored to life by the unlikely means of the orphan child Eppie. Silas Marner is a tender & moving tale of sin & repentance set in a vanished rural world & holds the reader's attention until the last page as Eppie's bonds of affection for Silas are put to the test.

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Silas Marner lives a friendless & isolated existence near the country village of Raveloe hoarding his gold. One night his fortune is stolen & Silas loses everything he holds dear. But then the golden-haired child Eppie appears in his home & Silas begins to reform bonds of faith & human connectedness that he once renounced forever. ...

The noise between Patch & Nora has gone. They've overcome the secrets riddled in Patch's dark past bridged two irreconcilable worlds & faced heart-wrenching tests of betrayal loyalty & trust...and all for a love that will transcend the boundary between heaven & earth. Armed with nothing but their absolute faith in one another Patch & Nora enter a desperate fight to stop a villain who holds the power to shatter everything they've worked for
- & their love
- forever.

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The noise between Patch & Nora has gone. They've overcome the secrets riddled in Patch's dark past bridged two irreconcilable worlds & faced heart-wrenching tests of betrayal loyalty & trust...and all for a love that will transcend the boundary between heaven & earth. Armed with nothing but their absolute faith in one another Patch & Nora enter a desperate fight to stop a villain who holds the power to shatter everything they've worked for
- & their love
- forever.

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Diarmaid Mac Culloch acknowledged master of the big picture in Christian history unravels a polyphony of silences from the history of Christianity & beyond. He considers the surprisingly mixed attitudes of Judaism to silence Jewish & Christian borrowings from Greek explorations of the divine & the silences which were a feature of Jesus's brief ministry & witness. Besides prayer & mystical contemplation there are shame & evasion; careless & purposeful forgetting. Many deliberate silences are revealed: the forgetting of histories which were not useful to later Church authorities (such as the leadership roles of women among the first Christians) or the constant problems which Christianity has faced in dealing honestly with sexuality. Behind all this is the silence of God; & in a deeply personal final chapter Mac Culloch brings a message of optimism for those who still seek God beyond the clamorous noise of over-confident certainties. ...

This is the powerful beautiful & chilling sequel to the bestselling Straw Dogs John Gray draws on an extraordinary array of memoirs poems fiction & philosophy to make us re-imagine our place in the world. Writers as varied as Ballard Borges Freud & Conrad are mesmerised by forms of human extremity
- experiences on the outer edge of the possible or which tip into fantasy & myth. What happens to us when we starve when we fight when we are imprisoned? & how do our imaginations leap into worlds way beyond our real experience? The Silence of Animals is consistently fascinating filled with unforgettable images & a delight in the conundrum of our existence
- an existence which we decorate with countless myths & ideas where we twist & turn to avoid acknowledging that we too are animals separated from the others perhaps only by our self-conceit. In the Babel we have created for ourselves it is the silence of animals that both reproaches & bewitches us. Reviews: The Silence of Animals is a new kind of book from Gray a sort of poetic reverie on the human state on the state that is of the human animal... He blends lyricism with wisdom humour with admonition nay-saying with affirmation making in the process a marvellous statement of what it is to be both an animal & a human in the strange terrifying & exquisite world into which we straw dogs find ourselves thrown". (John Banville Guardian). " Interesting original & memorable... The Silence of Animals is a beautifully written book the product of a strongly questioning mind. It is effectively an anthology with detailed commentary setting out one rich & suggestive episode after another". (Philip Hensher Spectator). About the author: John Gray has been Professor of Politics at Oxford University Visiting Professor at Harvard & Yale & Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics. He now writes full time. His books include False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans & Other Animals & The Immortalization Commission: The Strange Quest to Cheat Death. His selected writings Gray's Anatomy was published in 2009."

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The problems responsibilities & ultimately the meaning of our lives have long been concerns of philosophers poets artists
- indeed
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