Knopf imprint: 1739 books

In the third volume of his autobiography, H. L. Mencken looks back on his life and declares it "very busy and excessively pleasant." He imparts the impressive education he received from Hoggie Unglebower, the best dog trainer in Christendom, and the survival techniques he employed at Baltimore...

From the author of The Tunnel comes a new collection of essays, his first in eight years, on art, writing, nature and culture. This book is by one of the most important and briliant thinkers at work today.

From the Nobel laureate and author of the masterly Night, a deeply felt, beautifully written novel of morality, guilt, and innocence. Despite personal success, Yedidyah—a theater critic in New York City, husband to a stage actress, father to two sons—finds himself increasingly drawn to...

The expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 gave rise to a series of rich, diverse diasporas that were interconnected through a common vision and joie de vivre. The exodus took these Sephardim to other European countries; to North Africa, Asia Minor, and South America; and, eventually, to the American...

Here are the yarns of a true cowboy for those who have in their blood either a touch of larceny, an affection for the Old West, or better yet, both. These twenty tales add up to a true account of Ben K. Green’s experiences around the corrals, livery stables, and wagon yards of the West. Green...

From Ethan Hawke, four-time Academy Award nominee—twice for writing and twice for acting—an unforgettable fable about a father's journey and a timeless guide to life's many questions. A knight, fearing he may not return from battle, writes a letter to his children in an attempt to leave...

A new collection of the accessible and evocative "micro-verse" from one of Russia's most beloved poets. Vera Pavlova's If There Is Something to Desire delighted the poetry world a few years ago. Her poems, rarely longer than a few lines, thrill and puzzle us like Zen koans, considering...

In this strong, appealing collection, Nancy Willard shares her passion for observing the mysteries of the natural world, particularly the flora and fauna of Cape Cod and the Hudson Valley, where many of these poems are set. We see, through her eyes, the coming of darkness to an empty orchard, the...

An American Procession is a study, on the largest scale, of the major American writers at work during the historically and literarily crucial century that began in the early 1830s, when Ralph Waldo Emerson founded a national literature on the basis of a metaphysical revolution, and ended on the eve...

In a collection of urgent and intimate poems, D. Nurkse explores the biblical past and the terrifying politics of the present with which it resonates, the legacy of fathers and the flawed kingdoms they leave their sons. In “Ben Adan,” a stunning poem in the opening sequence of the collection,...

From Sharon Olds—a stunning new collection of poems that project a fresh spirit, a startling energy of language and counterpoint, and a moving, elegiac tone shot through with humor. From poems that erupt out of history and childhood to those that embody the nurturing of a new generation of...

“ ‘Chet’ Arthur President of the United States. Good God!” was perhaps the most pithy contemporary reaction to the accession of the twenty-first Chief Executive. It has certainly been the most enduring, even though Arthur himself has remained an enigma—in large part because this shrewd,...

An extraordinary literary event: Daniel Mendelsohn’s acclaimed two-volume translation of the complete poems of C. P. Cavafy—including the first English translation of the poet’s final Unfinished Poems—now published in one handsome edition and featuring the fullest literary commentaries available...

This new gathering of Marge Piercy’s poems—energetic, funny, political, full of vitality—brings us the heart of her mature work, the first selected since Circles on the Water in 1982. Here are poems that chart the milestone events and fierce passions of her middle years: the death of...