Since its first publication more than eighty years ago, The Decline of the West has ranked as one of the most widely read and talked about books of our time. A sweeping account of Western culture by a historian of legendary intellect, it is an astonishingly informed, forcefully eloquent, thrillingly controversial work that advances a world view based on the cyclical rise and ...(展开全部)

Oswald Spengler was born in 1880 at Blankenburg, Germany. He studied mathematics, philosophy, and history at Munich and Berlin. Except for his doctor's thesis on Heraclitus, he published nothing before the first volume of The Decline of the West, which appeared when he was thirty-eight. The Agadir crisis of 1911 provided the immediate incentive for his exhaustive investigations...(展开全部)

奥斯瓦尔德·斯宾格勒（1880-1936年）是德国著名的历史学家和历史哲学家。他出生于德国哈茨山巴的布兰肯堡，曾就读于哈雷大学、慕尼黑大学和柏林大学。青年时代除了研究历史和艺术之外，他还对数学和博物学有浓厚的兴趣，所有这些使他的作品具有一种奇特的风格。1904年，斯宾格勒在哈雷大学获得博士学位，之后成为了一名中学教师。第一次世界大战爆发时，他因健康原因未能被征召入伍。在这期间，他隐居在慕尼黑的一所贫民窟里，在烛光下完成了《西方的没落》一书。此书的出版给斯宾格勒带来了巨大的声誉，许多大学以正式或非正式的方式邀请他执掌教席，可都被他拒绝。此后他一直过着一种近乎于隐居的生活，以历史研究和政论写作自适。1936年5月8日凌晨，斯宾格勒因心脏病突发逝世，他的妹妹们将其埋葬，但未举行任何的吊唁形式。斯宾格勒一生写下大量著作，其中重要的有：《普鲁士人民和社会主义》...(展开全部)

In these timeless and witty essays George Orwell explores the English love of reading about a good murder in the papers (and laments the passing of the heyday of the ‘perfectÂ’ murder involving class, sex and poisoning), as well as unfolding his trenchant views on everything from boysÂ’ weeklies to naughty seaside postcards. Throughout history, some books have changed the worl...(展开全部)

The history of the Late Roman Empire in the West has been divided into two parallel worlds, analysed either as a political and economic transformation or as a religious and cultural one. But how do these relate one to another? In this concise and effective synthesis, Ian Wood considers some ways in which religion and the Church can be reintegrated into what has become a largely...(展开全部)

The state, which since the middle of the seventeenth century has been the most important and most characteristic of all modern institutions, is in decline. From Western Europe to Africa, many existing states are either combining into larger communities or falling apart. Many of their functions are being taken over by a variety of organizations which, whatever their precise natu...(展开全部)

Growing up in the suburbs in post-war Japan, it seemed to Hajime that everyone but him had brothers and sisters. His sole companion was Shimamoto, also an only child. Together they spent long afternoons listening to her father's record collection. But when his family moved away, the two lost touch. Now Hajime is in his thirties. After a decade of drifting he has found happiness...(展开全部)

Growing up in the suburbs in post-war Japan, it seemed to Hajime that everyone but him had brothers and sisters. His sole companion was Shimamoto, also an only child. Together they spent long afternoons listening to her father's record collection. But when his family moved away, the two lost touch. Now Hajime is in his thirties. After a decade of drifting he has found happiness...(展开全部)

The workings of Western intelligence in our day—whether in politics or the arts, in the humanities or the church—are as troubling as they are mysterious, leading to the questions: Where are we going? What in the world were we thinking? By exploring the history of four “cultures” so deeply embedded in Western history that we rarely see their instrumental role in politics, religi...(展开全部)

John W. O'malley是韦斯顿耶稣会士人文学院杰出的文化史教授