This deeply researched collection offers a comprehensive introduction to the eighteenth-century trade in street literature – ballads, chapbooks, and popular prints – in England and Scotland. Offering detailed studies of a selection of the printers, types of publication, and places of publication that constituted the cheap and popular print trade during the period, these essays delve into ballads, slip songs, story books, pictures, and more to push back against neat divisions between low an...

The strange Book of Revelation, written in about 95 AD, opens up a world in which Christian people were under threat from the Roman Empire; some were suffering for their faith. Was it easier to fall in with the ways of the empire in all its wealth and prosperity, as well as cruelty, than to hold fast in their faith? The prophet John records a vision of the risen Jesus which opens up for him God's perspective on the Christian assemblies and on the empire. Written in the sort of poetic liter...

Where do we come from? What is our purpose? The early chapters of Genesis proclaim the origin of the world, and of human life on earth.In The Message of Genesis 1-11, David Atkinson explores how the first eleven chapters serve as an overture to the rest of the Bible. They evoke wonder as God is portrayed in his creative power and beauty. They reveal his loving mercy and salvation even in his terrible judgment of those who turn from him and despoil the harm...

The Generative AI revolution is driven by corporations demanding legal superpowers. If we allow it to continue unchecked, the implications will be profound. This urgent, critical book exposes the unprecedented push by trillion-dollar companies to build AI on billions of unauthorized human works and redefine fundamental areas of law, including copyright, contract, and free speech. Written by an industry insider who turned from AI champion to AI critic, this highly accessible work promotes A...

Despite the centuries which separate us from the authors of these proverbs, the everyday realities of human existence remain: making friends, coping with sexuality, handling money, responding to poverty, making a living, learning through loss, muddling through difficulties, facing death.David Atkinson shows how Proverbs addresses all these issues. Wisdom, he argues, is about helping to cope; about seeing the world in a fresh way to five new resources for living; ab...

Chester’s history goes back 2,000 years, from the Romans to recent times, and in the course of the centuries the city has witnessed many dark deeds and events. Chester’s historical buildings and streets were part of this history and in this book local writer and tourist guide David Atkinson investigates the darker side of Chester’s past. With help from experts in their fields, he tells stories concerning Chester Cathedral’s stones, the famous Rows and pubs and churches in the city, with gh...

Ballads are a fascinating subject of study not least because of their endless variety. It is quite remarkable that ballads taken down or recorded from singers separated by centuries in time and by hundreds of kilometres in distance, should be both different and yet recognizably the same. In The English Traditional Ballad, David Atkinson examines the ways in which the body of ballads known in England make reference both to ballads from elsewhere and to other English folk songs. The book out...

'In this, his second collection, David Atkinson continues his themes of memory, especially of growing up on a farm in southern NSW, and the natural world, including the wildlife and people that surrounded him then and do so now. In this collection David's scope is also wider as he extends our perspectives on the human condition. His poems are sharp in their imagery and dramatic in their language. His forms range from the traditional to the stunning use of free verse. This book is highly re...

The year is 2039, and as the Independence Day holiday approaches, George Stoltz (best-selling author of the Those Who Made it Happen books) is given a suggestion by his agent for a new entry into that series. As it so happens, July 4th will also mark the tenth anniversary of the opening of Secure, Washington—a hybrid (part prison/part conventional) city owned and operated by the state to permanently house the worst of its misfit citizens: repeat criminal convicts, people who suffer from se...

A groundbreaking book that addresses the science that underpins organic agriculture and horticulture and its impact upon the management of organic systemsWith contributions from noted experts in the field, Organic Agriculture explores the cultural context of food production and examines the historical aspects, economic implications, and key scientific elements that underpin organic crop production. The book shows how a science-based approach to organic far...

The Works of James Melville presents both published and unpublished prose and poetry by Scottish divine James Melville (1556–1614). James Melville has been largely ignored as a significant figure in the life of the Scottish Church in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. While his Diary and Autobiography is often referenced as an important account of the Scottish Kirk, the rest of his writing remains unavailable to modern scholars. The result is that we are ...

Technologies and tech companies are routinely accused of creating many societal problems. This book exposes these charges as mostly myths, falsehoods, and exaggerations.Technology Fears and Scapegoats debunks 40 widespread myths about Big Tech, Big Data, AI, privacy, trust, polarization, automation, and similar fears, while exposing the scapegoating behind these complaints. The result is a balanced and positive view of the societal impact of technology thu...