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“This charming fable is at once a love story that skips through six centuries, and also a love song to the timeless craft of glassmaking. Chevalier probes the fierce rivalries and enduring loyalties of Murano's glass dynasties, capturing the roar of the furnace, the sweat on the skin, and the glittering beauty of Venetian glass.” – Geraldine Brooks, author of Horse From the bestselling historical novelist, a rich, transporting story that follows a family of glassmakers from the height of Renaissance-era Italy to the present day. It is 1486 and Venice is a wealthy, opulent center for trade. Orsola Rosso is the eldest daughter in a family of glassblowers on Murano, the island revered for the craft. As a woman, she is not meant to work with glass—but she has the hands for it, the heart, and a vision. When her father dies, she teaches herself to make glass beads in secret, and her work supports the Rosso family fortunes. Skipping like a stone through the centuries, in a Venice where time moves as slowly as molten glass, we follow Orsola and her family as they live through creative triumph and heartbreaking loss, from a plague devastating Venice to Continental soldiers stripping its palazzos bare, from the domination of Murano and its maestros to the transformation of the city of trade into a city of tourists. In every era, the Rosso women ensure that their work, and their bonds, endure. Chevalier is a master of her own craft, and The Glassmaker is as inventive as it is spellbinding: a mesmerizing portrait of a woman, a family, and a city as everlasting as their glass.
In a world of the blessed the unblessed, the Glassmaker proclaims the gifts of those in the realm with their reading of the sparks. They are the only ones with the ability to work the glass and declare the goddess’s blessing. Generations before Ophelia was born, her birth was prophesied. The Enchantress proclaimed that a blessed girl child would restore honor to the Leander line. However, when she was presented to the Glassmaker to learn of her blessing, she was turned away. Many Winters passed and Ophelia remained unblessed. Until she and her brothers journeyed to Thistledown. Rylan, the Glassmaker of Thistledown is able to do what none other before him had achieved. He read Ophelia’s blessing in the sparks. The gift from the goddess so rare, Rylan fears for her safety. Knowing the potential danger, he agrees to travel with Ophelia and her brothers on a quest to help her learn to use her blessing to its fullest potential. The two are drawn together by an inexplicable bond that neither can ignore. As they trek across the realm from his home to hers, they are unable to deny their attraction. While danger lurks, they must reach the Keeper of the Blessings before it’s too late. Can Ophelia navigate her new blessing and help restore her family’s honor? Can the bond between her and Rylan survive the obstacles before them? Together, can they bring about a change to the realm which hasn’t been seen in centuries?
Daniela the glassmaker's daughter is grumpy and never smiles. Her father promises a beautiful glass palace to anyone who can make her laugh. People come from far and wide to try their luck in amusing Daniela. But mask makers, lion tamers and magicians cannot raise a smile from the princess. It is only when a young apprentice makes the first looking glass that Daniela learns to smile – at her own grumpy reflection! This beautiful fable set in sixteenth-century Venice features stunning illustrations from award-winning artist Jane Ray alongside a poetic text. Named one of Bank Street College of Education's Best Children's Books of the Year, 2018!
She was the only woman in Venice who knew the secret...and it made her a criminal. The Murano glassmakers of Venice are celebrated and revered. But now three of them are dead, killed for attempting to leave the city that both prizes their work and keeps them prisoners. For in the 17th century, the secret of their craft must, by law, never leave Venetian shores. Yet there is someone who keeps the secret while defying tradition. She is Sophia Fiolario, and she, too, is a glassmaker. Her crime is being a woman. Sophia knows her family would be crushed by scandal - or worse - if the truth of her knowledge and skill with the glass were revealed. But there has never been any threat...until now. A wealthy nobleman with strong connections to the powerful Doge has requested Sophia's hand in marriage, and her refusal could draw dangerous attention. Yet to accept, to no longer make the glass, would devastate her. If there is an escape, Sophia intends to find it. Between creating precious glass parts for one Professore Galileo Galilei's astonishing invention and attending lavish parties at the Doge's Palace, Sophia crosses paths with influential people, including one who could change her life forever. But in Venice, every secret has its price. Soon, Sophia must decide how much she is willing to pay for her family, the glass, and love.
Magic lies at heart of the medieval city of Cassaforte, and when the magic begins to unravel, corruption threatens the kingdom. As she battles against dark forces, Risa's untapped powers rise to the surface, leading her toward her true fate.
A world-class colorist of international standing in modern glass, Stephen Rolfe Powell creates his work in a quiet outpost of rural Kentucky. His art and his life bridge other such divides. The radiant murrini skins of his glass vessels have an old Italian pedigree, yet his making techniques are radically American in their dramatic individuality. He is an award-winning classroom professor and a generous ambassador for glass, yet he is at the same time so uncompromising in his dedication to his creative work that he stands among modern glass's most nuanced seekers after the eternally sensual and elusive mysteries of light and color. An illustrated chronicle of Powell's glass-blowing career, this book charts the evolution of Powell's remarkable body of work. Dazzling photographic close-ups detail the luminous murrini patterns that have become Powell's signature and reveal new ways of appreciating the complex interplay of color and texture in his art. Biographical and analytical essays by Mark Lucas, Laurie Winters, and James Yood explore such topics as the teamwork that is critical to Powell's unique glass making process; his teaching and learning experiences on the road, from the former Soviet Union to Salt Lake City during the Olympics; and the story of the two freak injuries that deeply affected his work and how he thinks about it. Reflections by Kenn Holsten, Marvin Lipofsky, Dante Marioni, Bonnie Marx, John Roush, and Lino Tagliapietra further supplement the book. The book's stunning photographs encourage the viewer to see Powell's work from different viewpoints, highlighting the unique interactions of transparent, opaque, and translucent glass and Powell's bold color combinations. Stephen Rolfe Powell: Glassmaker vividly portrays the tension and excitement involved in the artist's nontraditional, team approach to working with molten glass.
"The religious and ethical contribution of the Judaism to civilization has been rightly acknowledged. The seminal role the Jews have played in the technological evolution of civilization has been largely overlooked." "This remarkable book uses the history of glassmaking as a foil with which new light is shed on the hidden history of that phenomenally creative people. During his association with the glassmakers of Venice, the author uncovered an intriguing historical symbiosis between the Jews and the art of glassmaking. The revelation impelled him to launch an intensive, eight-year campaign of research which led him across three continents and through 4000 years of human history. He discovered that the vitric arts, conceived in Akkadia among the progenitors of the Jews, was subsequently borne by the Jews into the Diaspora, an enthralling historical odyssey which has never been told in its entirety." "Many myths are shattered in the course of following the adventurous path of the art from its Akkadian roots through Canaan, Egypt, Rome, Persia, China and the West. Drawing upon a wealth of archeological, Biblical, archival and historical material, an intense beam of light is cast into the darker recesses of history in which conquered peoples suffer the indignity of having the record of their accomplishments obliterated by their conquerors, a process the author terms "Institutionalized Obfuscation."" "The peculiar parallelism between the movement of the Jews and the vitric arts bears historical connotations which stretch far beyond glassmaking; the very foundation upon which classic versions of history is based is demolished by the revelations which erupt from the pages of the book."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved
New York Times bestselling author of Girl With a Pearl Earring and At the Edge of the Orchard Tracy Chevalier makes her first fictional foray into the American past in The Last Runaway, bringing to life the Underground Railroad and illuminating the principles, passions and realities that fueled this extraordinary freedom movement. Honor Bright, a modest English Quaker, moves to Ohio in 1850--only to find herself alienated and alone in a strange land. Sick from the moment she leaves England, and fleeing personal disappointment, she is forced by family tragedy to rely on strangers in a harsh, unfamiliar landscape. Nineteenth-century America is practical, precarious, and unsentimental, and scarred by the continuing injustice of slavery. In her new home Honor discovers that principles count for little, even within a religious community meant to be committed to human equality. However, Honor is drawn into the clandestine activities of the Underground Railroad, a network helping runaway slaves escape to freedom, where she befriends two surprising women who embody the remarkable power of defiance. Eventually she must decide if she too can act on what she believes in, whatever the personal costs.