Threshold Poetics: Milton and Intersubjectivity
by Susannah Mintz, assistant professor of English
University of Delaware Press, 2003
In this study of encounters between selves in “threshold space” in John Milton’s Paradise Lost and Samson Agonistes, the author uses feminist and relational psychoanalytic theory to examine representations of looking, working, eating, conversing, and touching to argue that Milton repeatedly dismantles the binary oppositions that support categorical thinking. A key term throughout the study is recognition, defined as the capacity to tolerate both sameness and difference between separate selves. Recognition of likeness-in-difference thus undermines the exclusionary logic of patriarchal and political hierarchies. Focusing primarily on the revisionary impact of Eve, Dalila, and the natural world, Threshold Poetics demonstrates the shifting dynamics of intersubjective understanding that define gendered, religious, and political identity.

Nazi Cinema as Enchantment: The Politics of Entertainmentin the Third Reich
by Mary-Elizabeth O’Brien, associate professor of German
Camden House, 2003
Based on new research in German archives, this interdisciplinary study—written for scholars in film studies, German studies, history, critical studies, and political science—explores how cinema participated in the larger framework of everyday fascism. The author examines how five film genres—the historical musical, the foreign adventure film, the home-front film, the melodrama, and the problem film—enchanted audiences and enacted shared stories that reveal much about how family, community, history, the nation, and the war were imagined in Nazi Germany. Thirteen motion pictures are analyzed—including blockbusters and little known films (none of which are available with English subtitles).

Heart Shots: Women Writeabout Hunting
by Mary Zeiss Stange, associate professor of women’s studies and religion
Stackpole Books, 2003
This critical anthology juxtaposes the writings of women hunters past and present—including Vivienne de Watteville, Isak Dinesen, Beryl Markham, Annie Oakley, and Grace Seton Thompson. Arranged thematically, their stories deal with initiation, adventure, trophies, wilderness, food, family, and death. An introduction to the history of women hunters provides a context for the stories: “Women hunt for the same reasons men generally do, and derive the same sorts of satisfaction from hunting. Regardless of the sex of the hunter, every hunt begins with a stalk and ends with a story.”

Coaching C.L.U.E.S.:Real Stories, Powerful Solutions,Practical Tools
by Marian Rapoport Thier ’61
Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2003
Using true stories of people mastering tough business challenges, the author illustrates how hundreds of individuals and teams have found ways to think creatively and improve performance. The book details coaching dialogues, skill-building exercises, and a dozen field-tested tools for solving workplace problems. Coaches as well as executives can read how to expand their skills in delegating, brainstorming, personal organization, inquiry and advocacy, meeting management, and customer outreach.
Marian Thier is a corporate coach in Boulder, Colo.

How to Excel in Medical School
by Norma Susswein Saks ’68 and Mark A. Saks ’96
J&S Publishing Company, 2003
Intended to help medical students develop effective study methods and perform better with less stress, this text (second edition) offers strategies for studying anatomy, biochemistry, immunology, microbiology, neuroscience, and more, as well as tips for excelling on the US Medical Licensure Examination (USMLE).
Norma Saks is assistant dean for educational programs and director of the cognitive skills program at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. Mark Saks, her son, is a resident in emergency medicine at Temple University Hospital.

SimpleChic: Designer Knits, SuperQuick!
by Jil Lord Eaton ’71
Breckling Press, 2003
This new collection (the author’s fifth) of easy-to-make knits includes sweaters, wraps, mittens, and hats. Accompanied by hundreds of color photographs and drawings, the book “offers a lively and sophisticated array of projects for tots, teens, and adults,” according to the editor in chief of Vogue Knitting International.
Internationally acclaimed designer Jil Eaton publishes her signature collection of hand-knitting patterns under the MinnowKnits label, writes books, and designs for Vogue Knitting International and other magazines. She lives in Portland, Maine.

A Spectrum of Voices: Prominent American Voice Teachers Discuss the Teaching of Singing
by Elizabeth Blades-Zeller ’73
Scarecrow Press, 2002
Serving as a reference for teachers and students of singing, this book draws on the combined experience of nearly thirty voice teachers and offers insights into their teaching philosophies, the kinds of auxiliary training they recommend to their students, and how they structure their lessons. It includes strategies for posture, breathing, tonal resonance, diction, registration, and tension, based on years of professional teaching. Also included is a glossary of definitions, voice performance and pedagogy terminology, and idioms characteristic of the profession.

Singing with Your Whole Self: The Feldenkrais Method and Voice
by Elizabeth Blades-Zeller ’73 and Samuel H. Nelson
Scarecrow Press, 2001
This book teaches performers to use the Feldenkrais Method to ameliorate problems of tension, muscle strain, and illness in order to obtain optimal vocal performance. It contains modularized Feldenkrais “Awareness Through Movement” lessons, designed for liberating function in all musicians, particularly singers. After explaining why this approach works, the book explores the vocal anatomy by area and explains how each relates to singing. An index both by lesson and by problem refers performers to the lessons most effective for a specific problem.
Elizabeth Blades-Zeller is an associate professor of voice, opera, and music education, as well as director of opera, at Heidelberg College. She is also a music editor for Mountain View Video Production in Roanoke, Va. Samuel Nelson is a guild-certified Feldenkrais practitioner in Rochester, N.Y.

Justice of Shattered Dreams: Samuel Freeman Miller and the Supreme Court During the Civil War Era
by Michael A. Ross ’86
Loyola University New Orleans, 2003
In the first biography of Samuel Freeman Miller since 1939, the author creates “a colorful portrait of a passionate man grappling with the difficult legal issues arising from a time of wrenching social and political change,” according to the book jacket. “He also explores the impact President Lincoln’s Supreme Court appointments made on American constitutional history. Best known for his opinion in cases dealing with race and the Fourteenth Amendment, Miller has often been considered a misguided opponent of Reconstruction and racial equality. [But] Ross argues that historians have failed to study the evolution of Miller’s views during the war….”
Previously a corporate attorney, Michael Ross is now an associate professor of history at Loyola University. He is the author of several award-winning articles on Samuel Miller’s Supreme Court career.

Homeland Calling: Exile Patriotism and the Balkan Wars
by Paul Hockenos ’85
Cornell University Press, 2003
Using hundreds of original interviews conducted around the world, the author uncovers evidence that foreign nationals and expatriates living in the US, Canada, Europe, Australia, and South America played significant roles in the funding, policy planning, and military strategy of the Balkan wars of the 1990s. Hockenos examines the underworld of Serb, Croat, and Kosovar exile groups that lobbied western policymakers, funded foreign political parties, and channeled arms to the Balkan antagonists, and investigates the borderless international networks that diaspora organizations rely on to export political agendas back to their native homelands.
A Berlin-based journalist and political analyst, Paul Hockenos is the author of Free to Hate: The Rise of the Right in Post-Communist Eastern Europe and has written articles for periodicals including World Policy Journal, the Nation, and the Christian Science Monitor.

Synge and Irish Nationalism: The Precursor to Revolution
by Nelson O’Ceallaigh Ritschel ’81
Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002
A scholarly work on the plays of Irish dramatist John Millington Synge, this book “offers a major reassessment of the relationship between Synge’s plays, varieties of pre-1916 Irish Nationalism, and alternative dramatic incarnationsof nationalist thought,” according to one reviewer. “Using a wide varietyof evidence, Ritschel teases out the intellectual, political, and artistic influences that helped shape Synge’s creations and the ways in which he sought to dramatize a new/old Ireland.”
Nelson Ritschel, author of Productions of the Irish Theatre Movement, 1899–1916, is an assistant professorof humanities at Massachusetts Maritime Academy. His essays have appeared in LIT: Literature, Interpretation, Theory and New Hibernia Review, among others.

The Catholic Girl’s Guide to Sex
by Melinda Anderson ’96 and
Kathleen Murray
Broadway Books, 2003
With true-life tales, comic illustrations, quizzes, and witty tips, authors offer guidance on “choosing between your hormones and Him; the intimidating world of self-love; etiquette tips for the confessional”; and much more. The guide promises to provide “an honest and frank approach toward managing morals and losing the guilt, all while inciting laughs and naughty, knowing smiles.”
Melinda Anderson and Kathleen Murray are freelance writers and editors in New York City. —MTS