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Everyone says that lying is wrong. But when we say that lying is bad and hurtful and that we would never intentionally tell a lie, are we really deceiving anyone? In this wise and insightful book, David Nyberg exposes the tacit truth underneath our collective pretense and reveals that an occasional lie can be helpful, healthy, creative, and, in some situations, even downright moral. Through familiar and often entertaining examples, Nyberg explores the purposes deception serves, from the social kindness of the white lie to the political ends of diplomacy to the avoidance of pain or unpleasantness. He looks at the lies we tell ourselves as well, and contrary to the scolding of psychologists demonstrates that self-deception is a necessary function of mental health, one of the mind's many weapons against stress, uncertainty, and chaos. Deception is in our nature, Nyberg tells us. In civilization, just as in the wilderness, survival does not favor the fully exposed or conspicuously transparent self. As our minds have evolved, as practical intelligence has become more refined, as we have learned the subtleties of substituting words and symbols for weapons and violence, deception has come to play a central and complex role in social life. The Varnished Truth takes us beyond philosophical speculation and clinical analysis to give a sense of what it really means to tell the truth. As Nyberg lays out the complexities involved in leading a morally decent life, he compels us to see the spectrum of alternatives to telling the truth and telling a clear-cut lie. A life without self-deception would be intolerable and a world of unconditional truth telling unlivable. His argument that deception and self-deception are valuable to both social stability and individual mental health boldly challenges popular theories on deception, including those held by Sissela Bok and Daniel Goleman. Yet while Nyberg argues that we deceive, among other reasons, so that we might not perish of the truth, he also cautions that we deceive carelessly, thoughtlessly, inhumanely, and selfishly at our own peril.
A study of the "plain unvarnished tales" of unschooled beggars, criminals, prisoners, and ex-slaves in the 19th century. Fabian shows how these works illuminate debates over who had the cultural authority to tell and sell their own stories. She gives us the origins of that curious American genre of selling one's tale of woe to make a buck, ala Oprah, et al.
This American play tales a fling at the excesses and extravagances of advertising agencies.
Deceit: The Lie of the Law will provide a complete and detailed account of the law of deceit as developed over the past two centuries. This new book by Peter MacDonald Eggers examines the commercial, contractual and civil relationships in which claims in deceit have been made.
Along with my own personal story, I am going to write down a few things that may amuse you (or even take you down some other emotional path) and I'll let you in on a few so-far-unrevealed aspects of my life. I'll try to leave out the boring bits. Don't be thinking this is easy for me. I'm darn good at getting under other people's skin, but opening up about my own life is quite a different matter. So how shall I portray myself? There are choices, you know: Wife, mother, psychologist, writer, comedian, actor, dancer, diver, gypsy, dreamer, rich girl, poor girl, beggar girl, thief. I am all of those and more. Tell you what, you decide. You decide exactly what I am… A complicated childhood in Australia, a bold move to London, being a woman in a man's world on Not the Nine O'Clock News, becoming Mrs Billy Connolly, motherhood, career changes and then Strictly Come Dancing - told in her own inimitable style, The Varnished Untruthis Pamela Stephenson's own story.
Making the rich narrative world of Talmud tales fully accessible to modern readers, renowned Talmud scholar Jeffrey L. Rubenstein turns his spotlight on both famous and little-known stories, analyzing the tales in their original contexts, exploring their cultural meanings and literary artistry, and illuminating their relevance. Delving into both rabbinic life (the academy, master-disciple relationships) and Jewish life under Roman and Persian rule (persecution, taxation, marketplaces), Rubenstein explains how storytellers used irony, wordplay, figurative language, and other art forms to communicate their intended messages. Each close reading demonstrates the story's continuing relevance through the generations into modernity. For example, the story "Showdown in Court," a confrontation between King Yannai and the Rabbinic judges, provides insights into controversial struggles in U.S. history to balance governmental power; the story of Honi's seventy-year sleep becomes a window into the indignities of aging. Through the prism of Talmud tales, Rubenstein also offers timeless insights into suffering, beauty, disgust, heroism, humor, love, sex, truth, and falsehood. By connecting twenty-first-century readers to past generations, The Land of Truth helps to bridge the divide between modern Jews and the traditional narrative worlds of their ancestors.
The first book-length study devoted to this topic, Mendacity and the Figure of the Liar in Seventeenth-Century French Comedy offers an important contribution to scholarship on the theatre as well as on early modern attitudes in France, specifically on the subject of lying and deception. Unusually for a scholarly work on seventeenth-century theatre, it is particularly alert to plays as performed pieces and not simply printed texts. The study also distinguishes itself by offering original readings of Molière alongside innovative analyses of other playwrights. The chapters offer fresh insights on well-known plays by Molière and Pierre Corneille but also invite readers to discover lesser-known works of the time (by writers such as Benserade, Thomas Corneille, Dufresny and Rotrou). Through comparative and sustained close readings, including a linguistic and speech act approach, a historical survey of texts with an analysis of different versions and a study of irony, the reader is shown the manifest ways in which different playwrights incorporate the comedic tropes of lying and scheming, confusion and unmasking. Drawing particular attention to the levels of communicative or mis-communicative exchanges on the character-to-character axis and the character-to-audience axis, this work examines the process whereby characters in the comedies construct narratives designed to trick, misdirect, dazzle, confuse or exploit their interlocutors. In the different incarnations of seducer, parasite, cross-dresser, duplicitous narrator/messenger and deluded mythomaniac, the author underscores the way in which the figure of the liar both entertains and troubles, making it a fascinating subject worthy of detailed investigation.
The NIV Application Commentary helps you communicate and apply biblical text effectively in today's context. To bring the ancient messages of the Bible into today's world, each passage is treated in three sections: Original Meaning. Concise exegesis to help readers understand the original meaning of the biblical text in its historical, literary, and cultural context. Bridging Contexts. A bridge between the world of the Bible and the world of today, built by discerning what is timeless in the timely pages of the Bible. Contemporary Significance. This section identifies comparable situations to those faced in the Bible and explores relevant application of the biblical messages. The author alerts the readers of problems they may encounter when seeking to apply the passage and helps them think through the issues involved. This unique, award-winning commentary is the ideal resource for today's preachers, teachers, and serious students of the Bible, giving them the tools, ideas, and insights they need to communicate God's Word with the same powerful impact it had when it was first written.