John Podhoretz.
Bush Country : How Dubya Became a Great President While Driving Liberals Insane.
St. Martin's Press, 2004.

Chester G. Starr.
A History of the Ancient World.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1965.

The current edition (fourth, 1991) is described at OUP USA, OUP UK, and Amazon.com.

An introductory survey of ancient history (the Near East, Greece, and Rome) through the partition of the Roman Empire and the dissolution of the western empire in the fourth and fifth centuries A.D. A very good starting point for students of ancient history and the foundations of Western Civilization.

Great Film:

Vagabond (Sans toit ni loi = Without Roof nor Rule), 1985, directed by Agnès Varda.

The Film:
IMDB.
Rotten Tomatoes.
Roger Ebert.
Two by Varda: Cleo from 5 to 7 and Vagabond DVD Review by Craig J. Fischer.
MovieMartyr.com.
Strictly Film School.
Online Film Critics Society.
Women in Film: The Search of True Liberation for Women.
Criterion Collection DVD edition of the film, essay.
Amazon.com information on the DVD with reviews.
Cinema-Scene.com.

Agnès Varda:
IMDB.
Senses of Cinema essay by Helen Carter.
Les sites filmographiques.
Agnes Varda's Cinematic Geographies.
Sundance Channel.
the-artist.org.
L'Entrepôt Imaginaire, University of Melbourne .

Books:
[1] Agnes Varda by Alison Smith, Manchester University Press, 1998. (series: French Film Directors)
Book review.
Book review.
[2] To Desire Differently: Feminism and the French Cinema, Second edition, by Sandy Flitterman-Lewis, Columbia University Press, 1996. (The book at the publisher's web site.)
Book review.


(I think Vagabond and Cleo from 5 to 7 both excellent films. Why have I chosen to highlight one film here over the other? Both are profound character studies. Vagabond deals with a woman who has actually left human society; Cleo from 5 to 7 deals with a woman in the processes of becoming self-aware (perhaps): we watch her transition as she becomes alienated from her old role and the hopeful realization dawns upon her that she has the choice of a more authentic role for herself - but only the possibility of death jolts her into this awareness. Mona in Vagabond is in a far more extreme situation than Cleo; the issues at stake and the contrasts we see in Vagabond seem more stark, serious, and powerful.)


Some Links for Cléo de 5 à 7 (1961):
IMDB.
Criterion Collection DVD edition of the film; essay.
Amazon.com information on the DVD with reviews.
Rotten Tomatoes.
Not Coming to a Theater Near You review.
Corinne Marchand at IMDB.

Interesting Essay:

She Was a Teenaged Blogger: My daughter gets cyber-discovered by Catherine Seipp.

Interesting Essay:

The False Prophets of American Conservatism by Harry V. Jaffa.

First Things, February 2004, No. 140.

I particularly recommend these articles:
[1] Europe’s Problem — and Ours by George Weigel.
[2] The Enemies of Religious Liberty by James Hitchcock. (James Hitchcock Column.)

Commentary, February 2004, Vol. 117, No. 2.

I call your attention particluarly to the article Is Bush a Conservative? by Daniel Casse which describes George Bush's reform and re-invigoration of conservative politics. The art-inclined will find Terry Teachout's article Living with Art very interesting.

M. I. Finley.
The World of Odysseus.
London: The Folio Society, 2002.

A recent paperback edition of The World of Odysseus has been published by The New York Review of Books in their NYRB Classics series.

The Iliad and Odyssey were composed in perhaps the eighth century B.C. Using insights from modern sociology and cultural anthropology, Finley constructs a portrait of Greek society of approximately the ninth and tenth centuries B.C., the period embodied in the oral traditions from which the poet(s) drew upon in composing the poems.

Jean-Louis Leutrat.
L'ANNEE DERNIERE A MARIENBAD (Last Year in Marienbad).
London: British Film Institute, 2000.
(series: BFI Film Classics)
The book at the publisher's web site.
The book at the American distributor's web site (University of California Press).

Some links related to the film L'Annee derniere a Marienbad (1961):

The Film:
(1) IMDB.
(2) Rotten Tomatoes.
(3) Amazon.com.
(4) Roger Ebert's Great Movies.
(5) Last Year at Marienbad: An Intertextual Meditation by Thomas Beltzer, Review at Senses of Cinema.
(6) Philosophical Films: Last Year at Marienbad part of a Philosophical Films course by Jorn Bramann.
(7) Chaotic Cinema: Surreal and Cult Films.

The book upon which Alain Robbe-Grillet (without acknowledgment) based his script for L'Annee derniere a Marienbad:
Adolfo Bioy Casares, The Invention of Morel.

Alain Resnais (Director):
(1) IMDB.
(2) Wikipedia.
(3) Strictly Film School (reviews of his major films).
(4) Dumousseau (interesting site!).

Delphine Seyrig (Actress):
(1) IMDB.
(2) Wikipedia.
(3) Variations on an Enigma: The Billy Rose Tribute to Delphine Seyrig.
(4) Dumousseau (good).
(5) DELPHINE SEYRIG, PORTRAIT D'UNE COMÈTE.
(6) Cine Morgue (very weird web site: how actors died in films).