Thomas Cole

The works of 12 American artists, including Homer, Eakins, Church, and Ryder, are introduced.

"As a historian, James T. Flexner posseses modern insights into human motives and behavior..." -? "This omnibus collection of Flexner's lucid and informative writing is an invaluable addition for collections of art, history, and American culture." -? James Thomas Flexner has been a professional writer for most of his adult life. After several years spent at the City desk at the New York Herald Tribune after graduating from Harvard University, Flexner went on to become one of America's foremost historians. He has written with great distinction in a unique style accessible to and enjoyed by the scholar and general reader, twenty-six books in the fields of American history and art. Although he is principally known for his kistorical books, notably his four-volume biography of George Washington, Flexner has written in many forms and for many outlets. He has written for print and television; he has been a lecturer, columnist, reviewer, andeven a fiction writer. Collected here are samplings of Flexner's literary accomplishments throughout his long career (spanning over 60 years). In Random Harvest you will find pieces that appeared in Esquire Magaine, Time, The New York Times, Travel and Leisure, and even TV Guide. Included is an essay on George Washington and Watergate, on the art of biography, and many more. For the fan of Flexner, American history, and the art of a writer, in Random Harvest there is something to be enjoyed for everyone.

"For anyone who has labored long in compiling a photocopy reader for their introductory courses in American art, this anthology offers a balanced & inexpensive alternative. Mixing thematic with artist- & object-based reading, Critical Issues in American Art represents a variety of new approaches to American art which will challenge students without bewildering them." Angela Miller Washington University "A stimulating & useful resource for teachers & students that will broaden our understanding of American art." Matthew Baigell Rutgers University

Melville's interest in the visual arts and the translation of that interest into his writings is at the center of this new interdisciplinary study of one of America's most celebrated writers. Melville's lifelong engagement with the visual arts has been noted in other works, but only Savage Eye suggests the extraordinary depth and range of the author's multifaceted interest in the subject. Editor Christopher Sten has collected 13 essays from 12 specialists in the field to produce this ground-breaking study which connects Melville's writings with topics relating to the arts of painting, printmaking, sculpture, architecture, and landscape design, as well as art history. Sten's comprehensive introduction provides readers with a historical overview of the subject, detailing the many works of art Melville knew and commented upon at each stage of his career. He explains when and where in Melville's wanderings throughout America, Europe, and the Near East he saw these works, then describes how Melville made use of the life and work of these artists in his own fiction and poetry. The collection includes new essays on Moby Dick and J.M.W. Turner; Melville's fascination with Dutch genre painting; his appropriation of work by Cole and Vanderlyn for his magazine fiction; his use of early representations of the plague in Israel Potter; the relationship between the satirical cartoons of Daumier and the figures of The Confidence-Man; Timoleon's many artistic subjects; and the power of classical icons to shape the moral and aesthetic conflicts in Billy Budd. Also found here are theoretical essays on Melville and the picturesque; the modernism of Melville's aesthetic vision; his "anti-architectural"theory of literature; and his extensive reading in art history and art theory, from the classical to his own period. Savage Eye argues persuasively that the visual arts sources are comparable in importance to the literary arts i