Kirjahaku

The practice of yoga promises peace, self-realisation and release, thanks to the power of its 'mystic' Indian origins. But what if this is just hype? In Fascist Yoga, Stewart Home sweeps away the half-truths to tell a new origin story of the world's first modern yogi – a Californian escapologist who added some Hindu fairy dust to gym and circus exercises. Ever since, the world of yoga has been full of grifters, occultists and white supremacists, all out to exploit and recruit via the medium of exercise. From cult leaders to brainwashed followers, TV celebrities and fake gurus, the story of yoga has involved some of the strangest currents of humanity. Today, the COVID pandemic has activated elements within the modern yoga movement to espouse far-right conspiracies, and QAnon's fascist political programmes mirror some of yoga's key early proponents. In this new exposé, Stewart Home shows that nothing is sacred.

This is the first in-depth look at movies that riff on tropes associated with Bruce Lee and that sometimes transformed this actor into a mythical superman.The period with the greatest cluster of Brucesploitaton productions lasted less than a decade from the mid-seventies to the early-eighties, but the genre spluttered on into the twenty-first century; and although it didn't exist as a category before Bruce Lee's death, there are several films that pre-date the Little Dragon's demise that clearly belong to it. While death added another dimension to Bruce Lee's celebrity status, he was already a huge star in South East Asia before he passed away; so cynical movie producers did not need to wait for his death to exploit popular interest in Lee - even if the term Brucesploitation had yet to be coined.Within Brucesploitation actors who copy and clone Bruce Lee make up one strand of the subgenre, but their importance can and has been over-stated. Much of the writing about Brucesploitation is fan and internet based, and many of those producing this discourse make little attempt to explain why they insist certain films belong to the genre. Too many fans write as if genre is somehow natural, rather than created and shaped both through bald assertion and by more critical discussion and thinking. It is all too common to find any martial arts film featuring certain actors and themes, or with Bruce in the title, being accepted as Brucesploitation without any debate around the issue.This book systematically explores the genre and controversially takes a close look at which flicks really should be seen as belonging to it.

This is the story of Ray 'The Cat' Jones who wanted to become middleweight boxing champion of the world but eventually made his mark as the greatest cat burglar of all time. He is a legend thanks to his headline grabbing escape from London's Pentonville Prison in 1958, as well as endless audacious thefts. Ray is a teetotal, fitness obsessed, working-class Welshman whose boxing ambitions are thwarted after corrupt cops fit him up for a crime he didn't commit. When Ray gets out of jail he embarks on a criminal crusade against the inequities of British society. He is a modern-day Robin Hood waging an ideological class war against the rich. From the jewels of movie stars Elizabeth Taylor and Sophia Loren, to the private papers of the Duke of Windsor, paintings by Rubens and Rembrandt, and the furs of the London aristocracy, Ray's carefully targeted burglaries are perfectly planned and thrillingly executed. A great London novel and a vision of the city's underworld from wartime to near present. The narrative weaves between the clubs of Soho, populated by gangsters and gamblers, to the mansions of Kensington and Hampstead, inhabited by corrupt politicians and millionaires, and on into the dingy cells of the city's prisons The narrative is based on the real-life escapades of Raymond Jones, who as a young man left the Welsh village of Nantyglo for adventures in London. He died from pancreatic cancer in 2001 at the age of 84.

This is the story of Ray 'The Cat' Jones who wanted to become middleweight boxing champion of the world but eventually made his mark as the greatest cat burglar of all time. He is a legend thanks to his headline grabbing escape from London's Pentonville Prison in 1958, as well as endless audacious thefts. Ray is a teetotal, fitness obsessed, working-class Welshman whose boxing ambitions are thwarted after corrupt cops fit him up for a crime he didn't commit. When Ray gets out of jail he embarks on a criminal crusade against the inequities of British society. He is a modern-day Robin Hood waging an ideological class war against the rich. From the jewels of movie stars Elizabeth Taylor and Sophia Loren, to the private papers of the Duke of Windsor, paintings by Rubens and Rembrandt, and the furs of the London aristocracy, Ray's carefully targeted burglaries are perfectly planned and thrillingly executed. A great London novel and a vision of the city's underworld from wartime to near present. The narrative weaves between the clubs of Soho, populated by gangsters and gamblers, to the mansions of Kensington and Hampstead, inhabited by corrupt politicians and millionaires, and on into the dingy cells of the city's prisons. The narrative is based on the real-life escapades of Raymond Jones, who as a young man left the Welsh village of Nantyglo for adventures in London. He died from pancreatic cancer in 2001 at the age of 84.

This is where the novel has a nervous breakdown. Anna Noon is a twenty-year-old student with a taste for perverse sex involving an enigmatic older man and a ventriloquist's dummy. Anna lives in Aberdeen and her sex life revolves around the ancient stone circles in the region.The sublime grandeur of the stones provides a backdrop against which Anna is able to act out her provocative psychodramas.

Stewart Home is the internationally-acclaimed author of Red London, 69 Things to Do with a Dead Princess (Canongate, 2002), Down and Out in Shoreditch and Hoxton (Do-Not Press, 2004) and Tainted Love (Virgin Books, 2005), among others. His new book, Memphis Underground, documents his obsessions with Soul music and the theory and practice of art while marking another step up in his progress as one of the country's most fascinating avant-garde writers.

Kulttikirjailija Stewart Homen värikäs kuvaus 1960-luvun vastakulttuurista perustuu osittain kirjailijan äidin päiväkirjoihin ja paljastaa, miten svengaavan Lontoon toiveikkuus muuttui nihilismiksi ja riippuvuudeksi kovista huumeista. Lontooseen 60-luvun alussa saapunut kirjan 16-vuotias kertoja Jilly O'Sullivan ryhtyy korkealuokkaiseksi prostituoiduksi ja pääsee mukaan vielä tuolloin pienen piirin skeneen, jonka jäsenillä svengasi ennen muita lontoolaisia. Hippien ilmestyessä Lontoon kaduille Jilly ei seurustellut pelkästään slummien vuokraisäntien, gangsterien ja mustan vallan aktivistien vaan myös Alexander Trocchin, Brian Jonesin, Michael Reevesin ja John Lennonin kaltaisten kuuluisuuksien kanssa. Happoa nappaillut Jilly halusi sisäavaruuden kosmonautiksi, mutta helpotti paluuta maan pinnalle heroiinilla kohtalokkain seurauksin. Yhtä lailla hindugurujen ja mystikoiden, korruptoituneiden poliisien ja dekadenttien aristokraattien maailmassa pyörinyt Jilly eli täysillä ja tunsi alan toimijat. Rauhanliikkeessä aloittaneen nuoren beatnikin 1970-luvun lopulla kuolemaan päättynyt elämä kertoo niiden Lontoon kukkaislasten murheellisen tarinan, jotka kieltäytyivät luopumasta hedonistisesta asenteestaan vielä silloinkin, kun bileet olivat lopullisesti ohi.