Strange And Wonderful

Are kids going to love this book? Is a frog waterproof? The latest title in the popular Strange and Wonderful series delivers the awe-inspiring variety of frogs, the world's hoppiest amphibians. Did you know that the Goliath frog is more than a foot long? Or that the tiny gold frog could sit on a dime? Some frogs have camouflage. Others wear bold colors warning their enemies that they are poisonous. Some frogs leap, others hop, one is a runner, and a few glide from tree to tree with their big, webbed hands and feet! Surprising facts and beautiful, realistic nature illustrations come together in this celebration of one of nature's most fascinating marvels.

Ever since the creation of the world's first botanical and zoological gardens five thousand years ago, people have collected, displayed, and depicted plants and animals from lands beyond their everyday experience. Some did so to demonstrate power over distant territories, others to enhance prestige by possessing something no one had seen before. Exotica also satisfied intellectual curiosity, furthered scientific research, and educated and entertained. In addition, exotica, especially their state-sponsored representation, were often instruments of political persuasion, and in turn exerted considerable influence over expansionist policies. More than an account of gardens and menageries from antiquity to the present, Strange and Wonderful explores the imagery of exotic flora and fauna in Western art, seeking answers to certain fundamental and universal questions. How do artists, schooled in traditional modes of rendering the familiar, deal with the new and strange? Why are rare species deliberately introduced into images otherwise devoid of the unusual? What is the pictorialized relationship between exotic reality and artistic imagination? Karen Polinger Foster takes readers on a journey across millennia and around the globe, telling fascinating stories and meeting along the way such characters as Hatshepsut's baboons, Charlemagne's elephant, Dürer's rhinoceros, and Victoria's hippopotamus. What emerges is a sense of just how strong and far-reaching the pull of the unknown and exotic has been across time and space. Ultimately, images of the wonderful reveal as much about the indigenous as they do about the strange, enabling us to glimpse more vividly the power of imagination to mold the unknown to its purposes. This dazzling and richly illustrated volume offers a thoughtful, much-needed inquiry into a very human phenomenon.

Conventional wisdom suggests that aesthetic experiences - those moments when the senses come to life - are important only after more basic needs have been met. In this inspiring wealth of provocative ideas, Yi-Fu Tuan demonstrates that feeling and beauty are essential parts of life and society. The aesthetic is shown to be not merely one aspect of culture but its central core - both its driving force and its ultimate goal. Beginning with the individual and the physical world, the author's exploration progresses from the simple to the complex. Tuan starts by examining the building blocks of aesthetic experience - sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste - and gradually expands his analysis to include the most elaborate of human constructs, including art, architecture, literature, philosophy, music, and landscape. This leads him to the realm of politics, where he grapples with the fundamental question of the relationship between goodness and beauty, and of how the aesthetic can become a moral force within society. To guide the reader along this journey, the author describes how the aesthetic operates in four widely disparate cultures: Australian aboriginal, Chinese, medieval European, and modern American. Yi-Fu Tuan, one of our most influential and original thinkers, brilliantly conveys the profound fascination of multisensory reality, and in so doing enables us to make connections among even the most diffuse elements of our lives. While Tuan does not ignore human folly, Passing Strange and Wonderful is a celebration of the world around us, our experiences, and our creations.

Introduces readers to the life and behavior of penguins.

Monkeyshines on Strange & Wonderful Facts, 98 page volume of fascinating facts & miscellany, interesting reference alternative, illus. 8.95 plus 1.00 p/h (ISBN 0-9620900-2-6). Also available, Monkeyshines on the United States Presidents (Games, Puzzles & Trivia) illus., 98p. Interesting, informative & enjoyable view of the lives & work of the first 40 U.S. Presidents 12.95 plus 1.00 p/h (ISBN 0-9620900-1-8).

Outside the box. Out of the mainstream. Tales of the Strange and Wonderful uncovers some of the strangest and most wonderful stories of the Bible and brings them to you as only an old turkey hunter can spin them. You will enjoy the stories you are about to read in this book. David Kerr has a wholesome, mischievous sense of humor with a creative insight reminiscent of those early homemade philosophers who have endeared themselves to American readers for over one-hundred-fifty years; although the earliest are seldom read much anymore. In these stories, you will find some long-familiar Biblical themes viewed from a different perspective, which sometimes embellishes, sometimes disturbs, but will bring a smile, if not a laugh. You will find that they come back to you in your thoughts. They are stories that can be read again and again. You will relate to the events, people, and activities included in this wonderfully witty collection of stories. From "The Witch of Endor" to "The Maniac of Gardara," they will enrich your life in surprising ways.