Aimé Césaire (1913-2008) figure au Panthéon des personnalités qui ont fait le XXe siècle.
Ecrivain, poète, dramaturge, militant politique, il est l'un des acteurs prépondérants de la révolution noire qui s'est jouée alors sur tous les continents. Cet homme du monde incarne l'intellectuel français, le défenseur des idéaux de justice et de liberté. Né en 1913, à Basse-Pointe aux Antilles, Aimé Césaire a grandi sur une plantation. Ses premières années sont heureuses, marquées par les paysages idylliques de la Martinique - inoubliable mangrove - qui ne cesseront de nourrir sa poésie.
Elève doué, il fréquente les plus grandes institutions de la métropole : Louis-le-Grand d'abord, l'Ecole normale supérieure ensuite. Dans le Paris des années trente, où la ségrégation ne dit pas son nom, Césaire fait les grandes rencontres de sa vie : Senghor, Damas, Diop, l'éditeur de Présence africaine, et son seul amour, sa muse, Suzanne. Mais c'est Breton le surréaliste qui le lance. Césaire est déjà l'homme indigné par le sort fait aux Noirs, celui qui agit pour en changer la condition.
Il faut suivre son évolution du PCF au PPM - le parti qu'il a créé -, du Discours sur le colonialisme à moi, laminaire, pour comprendre la corrélation naturelle entre son oeuvre et la politique. L'une et l'autre sont indissociables de la négritude qu'il invente et de l'émancipation qu'il revendique. Cependant, sa vocation est ailleurs, au théâtre, où le poète donne la pleine mesure de ses mots et de son art pour dénoncer les impostures politiques et les injustices dans le monde.
Jusqu'au bout, Césaire exercera sa critique vigilante et généreuse.

The story of Agrippina, at the center of imperial power for three generations, is the story of the Julio-Claudia dynasty-and of Rome itself, at its bloody, extravagant, chaotic, ruthless, and political zenith. In her own time, she was recognized as a woman of unparalleled power. Beautiful and intelligent, she was portrayed as alternately a ruthless murderer and helpless victim, the most loving mother and the most powerful woman of the Roman empire, using sex, motherhood, manipulation, and violence to get her way and single-minded in her pursuit of power for herself and her son, Nero. This book follows Agrippina as a daughter, born in Cologne, to the expected heir to Augustus's throne; as a sister to Caligula, who raped his sisters and showered them with honors until they attempted rebellion against him and were exiled; as a seductive niece and then wife to Claudius, who gave her access to near unlimited power; and then as a mother to Nero-who adored her until he had her assassinated. Through senatorial political intrigue, assassination attempts, and exile to a small island and to the heights of imperial power, thrones, and golden cloaks and games and adoration, Agrippina scaled the absolute limits of female power in Rome. Her biography is also the story of the first Roman imperial family-the Julio-Claudians-and of the glory and corruption of the empire itself.

Through the inspirational, wise, and informative stories of the residents, either in their own words or based on interviews, and environmental photographs of each, this book focuses on various residents of long-term care facilities and especially on the positive facets of their life, their thoughts, and their feelings. The only issue that reaches the media about nursing homes is the negative and unfortunate events that sometimes occur, but there is so much more to the story. Most people are afraid of long-term care homes because they recognize that it is the last phase in their life - it is the step before death. But some people have years from the time they enter the home until they die. This book shows how many men and women make the best of their situation - often leaving a positive legacy for family and friends - and how these can be fulfilling and quality years.

The life and times of High Times' enigmatic founder Thomas King Forçade, an underground newspaper editor and marijuana kingpin who--between police raids, smuggling runs, and outrageous stunts--battled both the US government and fellow radicals. At the end of the 1960s, the mysterious Tom Forçade suddenly appeared, insinuating himself into the top echelons of countercultural politics and assuming control of the Underground Press Syndicate, a coalition of newspapers across the country. Weathering government surveillance and harassment, he embarked on a landmark court battle to obtain White House press credentials. But his audacious exploits--pieing Congressional panelists, stealing presidential portraits, and picking fights with other activists--led to accusations that he was an agent provocateur. As the era of protest faded and the dark shadows of Watergate spread, Forçade hoped that marijuana could be the path to cultural and economic revolution. Bankrolled by drug-dealing profits, High Times would be the Playboy of pot, dragging a once-taboo subject into the mainstream. The magazine was a travelogue of globe-trotting adventure, a wellspring of news about "the business," and an overnight success. But High Times soon threatened to become nothing more than the "hip capitalism" Forçade had railed against for so long, and he felt his enemies closing in. Assembled from exclusive interviews, archived correspondences, and declassified documents, Agents of Chaos is a tale of attacks on journalism, disinformation campaigns, governmental secrecy, corporatism, and political factionalism. Its triumphs and tragedies mirror the cultural transformations of 1970s America, wrought by forces that continue to clash in the spaces between activism and power.

In Agent of Change, Huda Mukbil, a Black Arab-Canadian Muslim, chronicles her life as an intelligence officer in Canada's lead spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Mukbil was at forefront of the fight against terrorism after 9/11, and the first such woman to join CSIS. Her mastery of five languages, to say nothing of her subject position, quickly made her a counterrorism expert and a unique and valuable contributor to the organization. She provides a riveting account of her struggle for belonging and acceptance in an agency dominated by former RCMP and police officers, and her confrontation of the new international terrorist threat. In July 2005, she was given a chance to prove her worth when she was called upon by the British Security Service, MI5, to contribute, at the highest level, to its investigations of the terrorist attacks in London. Dazzlingly written, her is an eye-opener for anyone wanting to understand how racism, misogyny, and Islamophobia undermine not only individuals, but institutions and the national interest.

Who doesn’t rush to the window when a fire truck rushes by? Bryan Ratushniak, has spent a thirty-two-year career working on the busiest fire trucks in Canada and has detailed his adventures in this witty memoir. The book details the emotional damage inflicted by the horrors of the job and how the author came out the other side more or less in one piece. Ratushniak shares the ups and downs of balancing home and professional life while trying to hold onto his sanity.
 

Jennifer Kuchinka was a new mother in Estevan, Saskatchewan, Canada, struggling with postpartum depression when she ran out of the hospital, onto the highway, and was hit by a tractor-trailer truck. Jennifer survived that harrowing experience and now shares her story of the accident that left her with a permanent brain injury. She tells how she recovered and created a new life as a single parent, and how she is committed to raising awareness of postpartum depression and acquired brain injury.

In 1960, Cathy McClure, age 12, is thrown out of Catholic school. Her father’s drugstore, faced with a superhighway and encroaching chain stores, has fallen upon hard times. So the family decides to leave Lewiston, New York, for a fresh start in suburban Buffalo. But even as Cathy embraces the tumultuous sixties and throws herself into a new life as cheerleader, Hojo Hostess, and civil rights advocate, trouble — as usual — isn’t far behind. Fiesty and resolute as ever, Cathy soldiers on, but the one thing she can’t fight threatens to dissolve the family that, through her many ups and downs, has always been her solid ground.

Told with the same wit, charm, and candour that made Too Close to the Falls a modern classic, After the Falls is an evocative portrait of a young woman, and a country, finding its way.

On her seventeenth birthday in 1973, Janice Hunter met Marvin Gaye- the soulful prince of Motown with the seductive liquid voice whose chart-topping, socially conscious album What's Going On made him a superstar two years earlier. Despite a sixteen-year-age difference and Marvin's marriage to the sister of Berry Gordy, Motown's founder, the star-struck teenager and the emotionally volatile singer began a scorching relationship. One moment Jan was studying high school history; the next she was accompanying Marvin to parties with other pop stars, lounging with Don Cornelius on the set of Soul Train, and helping to discover new talent like Frankie Beverly. But the distractions and burdens of fame, the chaos of dysfunctional families, and the irresistible temptations of drugs overshadowed the love they shared and their marriage disintegrated. Silent since Marvin's tragic death in 1984, Jan at last opens up, sharing the moving, erotically charged story of one of music history's most fabled marriages. Unsparing in its honesty and insight, illustrated with sixteen pages of color and black-and-white photos, After the Dance reveals what it's like to ride shotgun on a wave of fame and self-destruction with a tortured genius who helped transform popular culture and whose artistry continues to be celebrated today.