Metamodernism refers to a number of related discourses about cultural developments that move beyond postmodernism by means of postmodernism. Many metamodern theorists characterize it in terms of mediations between aspects of modernism and postmodernism; for others, the term suggests an integration of those sensibilities with premodern (indigenous and traditional) cultural codes as well. Metamodernism is one of a number of attempts to describe post-postmodernism.

History of the term

In 2002, Canadian literary theorist Linda Hutcheon stated that a new label was necessary for what was emerging after postmodernism, writing: "Let's just say: it's over. …The postmodern moment has passed, even if its discursive strategies and its ideological critique continue to live on – as do those of modernism – in our contemporary twenty-first century world. ...Post-postmodernism needs a new label of its own, and I conclude, therefore, with this challenge to readers to find it – and name it for the twenty-first century."

Early usages
The term "metamodern" appeared as early as 1975, when scholar Mas'ud Zavarzadeh used it to describe a cluster of literary techniques which had been emerging in American literary narratives since the mid-1950s. In 1999, Moyo Okediji utilized the term "metamodern", applying it to contemporary African-American art that issues an "extension of and challenge to modernism and postmodernism." In 2002, Andre Furlani, analyzing the literary works of Guy Davenport, defined metamodernism as an aesthetic that is "after yet by means of modernism.... a departure as well as a perpetuation." The relationship between metamodernism and modernism was seen as going "far beyond homage, toward a reengagement with modernist method in order to address subject matter well outside the range or interest of the modernists themselves." In 2007, Alexandra Dumitrescu described metamodernism as partly a concurrence with, partly an emergence from, and partly a reaction to, postmodernism, "champion[ing] the idea that only in their interconnection and continuous revision lie the possibility of grasping the nature of contemporary cultural and literary phenomena."

Vermeulen and van den Akker
In 2010, cultural theorists Timotheus Vermeulen and Robin van den Akker contributed significantly to the theorization of post-postmodernism, using the term metamodernism. In their essay "Notes on Metamodernism," they asserted that the 2000s were characterized by the return of typically modern positions that nevertheless did not forfeit the postmodern mindsets of the 1980s and 1990s. According to them, the metamodern sensibility "can be conceived of as a kind of informed naivety, a pragmatic idealism" characteristic of cultural responses to recent global events such as climate change, the financial crisis, political instability, and the digital revolution. They asserted that "the postmodern culture of relativism, irony, and pastiche" is over, having been replaced by a sensibility that stresses engagement, affect, and storytelling through "ironic sincerity."
The prefix "meta-" referred not so much to a reflective stance or repeated rumination, but to Plato's metaxy, which denotes a movement between (meta) opposite poles as well as beyond (meta) them. Vermeulen and van den Akker described metamodernism as a "structure of feeling" that oscillates between modernism and postmodernism like "a pendulum swinging between...innumerable poles".

"Ontologically," they write, "metamodernism oscillates between the modern and the postmodern. It oscillates between a modern enthusiasm and a postmodern irony, between hope and melancholy, between naïveté and knowingness, empathy and apathy, unity and plurality, totality and fragmentation, purity and ambiguity. Indeed, by oscillating to and fro or back and forth, the metamodern negotiates between the modern and the postmodern."

For the metamodern generation, according to Vermeulen, "grand narratives are as necessary as they are problematic, hope is not simply something to distrust, love not necessarily something to be ridiculed."

The return of a Romantic sensibility has been posited as a key characteristic of metamodernism, observed by Vermeulen and van den Akker in the architecture of Herzog & de Meuron, and the work of artists such as Bas Jan Ader, Peter Doig, Olafur Eliasson, Kaye Donachie, Charles Avery, and Ragnar Kjartansson. They claim that the neoromantic approach to metamodernism is done in the spirit of resignifying "'the commonplace with significance, the ordinary with mystery, the familiar with the seemliness of the unfamiliar, and the finite with the semblance of the infinite." By doing so, these artists seek to "perceive anew a future that was lost from sight."

Vermeulen asserted that "metamodernism is not so much a philosophy—which implies a closed ontology—as it is an attempt at a vernacular, or...a sort of open source document, that might contextualise and explain what is going on around us, in political economy as much as in the arts."

Metamodernism in the arts
Since Vermeulen and van den Akker's seminal 2010 essay, there has been a growing contribution to metamodern aesthetic analysis amongst academics, critics, and artists.

Explicitly drawing upon the work of Vermeulen and van den Akker, Luke Turner published The Metamodernist Manifesto in 2011 as "an exercise in simultaneously defining and embodying the metamodern spirit," describing it as "a romantic reaction to our crisis-ridden moment." The manifesto recognized "oscillation to be the natural order of the world," and called for an end to "the inertia resulting from a century of modernist ideological naivety and the cynical insincerity of its antonymous bastard child." Instead, Turner proposed metamodernism as "the mercurial condition between and beyond irony and sincerity, naivety and knowingness, relativism and truth, optimism and doubt, in pursuit of a plurality of disparate and elusive horizons," and concluded with a call to "go forth and oscillate!" In 2014, the manifesto became the impetus for LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner's collaborative art practice, after Shia LaBeouf reached out to Turner after encountering the text, with the trio embarking on a series of metamodern performance projects exploring connection, empathy, and community across digital and physical platforms.

A number of exhibitions devoted to metamodernism have been staged. In November 2011, the Museum of Arts and Design in New York staged an exhibition entitled No More Modern: Notes on Metamodernism, featuring the work of Pilvi Takala, Guido van der Werve, Benjamin Martin, and Mariechen Danz. In March 2012, Galerie Tanja Wagner in Berlin curated Discussing Metamodernism in collaboration with Vermeulen and van den Akker. The show featured the work of Ulf Aminde, Yael Bartana, Monica Bonvicini, Mariechen Danz, Annabel Daou, Paula Doepfner, Olafur Eliasson, Mona Hatoum, Andy Holden, Sejla Kameric, Ragnar Kjartansson, Kris Lemsalu, Issa Sant, David Thorpe, Angelika J. Trojnarski, Luke Turner, and Nastja Säde Rönkkö. In 2013 Andy Holden staged the exhibition Maximum Irony! Maximum Sincerity 1999-2003: Towards a Unified Theory of M!MS. The exhibition examined the manifesto he had written in 2003 that called for art to be simultaneously ironic and sincere. The exhibition told the history of the writing of the manifesto and subsequently M!MS it now often cited as a precursor to Metamodernism as a 'structure of feeling'.

According to Kim Levin, writing in ARTnews, metamodern oscillation "must embrace doubt, as well as hope and melancholy, sincerity and irony, affect and apathy, the personal and the political, and technology and techne."

James MacDowell, in his formulation of the "quirky" cinematic sensibility, described the works of Wes Anderson, Michel Gondry, Spike Jonze, Miranda July, and Charlie Kaufman as building upon the "New Sincerity", and embodying the metamodern structure of feeling in their balancing of "ironic detachment with sincere engagement".

The 2013 issue of the American Book Review dedicated to metamodernism included a series of essays identifying authors such as Roberto Bolaño, Dave Eggers, Jonathan Franzen, Haruki Murakami, Zadie Smith, and David Foster Wallace as metamodernists.

Linda Ceriello's work with Greg Dember on popular cultural products such as Joss Whedon's seminal television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer and on Whedon and Goddard's 2012 film The Cabin in the Woods proposed an epistemic taxonomy of the monstrous/paranormal to distinguish the character of metamodern monsters from those which could be read as postmodern, modern or pre-modern.

In a 2014 article in PMLA, literary scholars David James and Urmila Seshagiri argued that "metamodernist writing incorporates and adapts, reactivates and complicates the aesthetic prerogatives of an earlier cultural moment", in discussing twenty-first century writers such as Tom McCarthy.

In 2014, Professor Stephen Knudsen, writing in ArtPulse, noted that metamodernism "allows the possibility of staying sympathetic to the poststructuralist deconstruction of subjectivity and the self—Lyotard's teasing of everything into intertextual fragments—and yet it still encourages genuine protagonists and creators and the recouping of some of modernism's virtues."

In his fourth novel, More Deaths than One, published in 2014, the New Zealand writer and singer-songwriter Gary Jeshel Forrester examined metamodernism by way of a search for the Central Illinois roots of David Foster Wallace during a picaresque journey to America. In it, Forrester wrote that "[m]etamodernist theory proposes to fill the postmodernist void with a rough synthesis of the two predecessors from the twentieth century [modernism and post-modernism]. In the new paradigm, metaphysics, epistemology, and ontology all have their places, but the overriding concern is with yet another division of philosophy – ethics. It's okay to search for values and meaning, even as we continue to be skeptical."

In May 2014, country music artist Sturgill Simpson told CMT that his album Metamodern Sounds in Country Music had been inspired in part by an essay by Seth Abramson, who writes about metamodernism on his Huffington Post blog. Simpson stated that "Abramson homes in on the way everybody is obsessed with nostalgia, even though technology is moving faster than ever." According to J.T. Welsch, "Abramson sees the 'meta-' prefix as a means to transcend the burden of modernism and postmodernism's allegedly polarised intellectual heritage."

In 2017, Vermeulen and van den Akker, with Allison Gibbons, published Metamodernism: Historicity, Affect and Depth After Postmodernism, an edited collection of essays exploring the notion of metamodernism across a variety of fields in the arts and culture. Individual chapters cover metamodernism in areas such as film, literary fiction, crafts, television, photography and politics. Contributors include the three editors, James MacDowell, Josh Toth, Jöog Heiser, Sjoerd van Tuinen, Lee Konstantinou, Nicole Timmer, Gry C. Rustad, Kuy Hanno Schwind, Irmtraud Huber, Wolfgang Funk, Sam Browse, Raoul Eshelman, and James Elkins. In the introductory chapter, van den Akker and Vermeulen update and consolidate their original 2010 proposal, while addressing the divergent usages of the term "metamodernism" by other thinkers.

In a 2017 essay on metamodernism in literary fiction, Fabio Vittorini stated that since the late 1980s, memetic strategies of the modern have been combined with the meta-literary strategies of the postmodern, performing "a pendulum-like motion between the naive and/or fanatic idealism of the former and the skeptical and/or apathetic pragmatism of the latter."

Starting 2018 the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) has funded a Metamodernism Research Network. The Network has hosted several international symposia and conferences.

A strand of metamodernism can be identified in Sci-Fi, taking the place of Postmodernism. Denis Villeneuve's Arrival is seen by Pappis as an example, "in that it explores an oscillation in and transcendence of time".

Bo Burnham's Eighth Grade and Inside have been described as metamodern reactions to growing up with social media.

The 2022 film Everything Everywhere All at Once was explicitly identified by the directors, The Daniels, as a metamodern film.

Metamodernism in philosophy
In 2021, American philosopher and historian Jason Josephson Storm published Metamodernism: The Future of Theory, a work of metamodern systematic philosophy. Acknowledging the works of other metamodern thinkers, he writes: "[I]f the thinkers above are the first significant theorists about metamodernist culture and art, I aspire to be the first significant metamodern philosopher." In the book, Storm establishes another method for critical scholarly research in the social sciences and humanities, disciplines which he refers to using the umbrella term "human sciences". Specifically, the metamodernist mode of analysis involves metarealism, process social ontology, hylosemiotics, Zeteticism and a "revaluation of values."

Storm's philosophy of metamodernism builds on and critiques both modernism and postmodernism, arguing that those two preceding movements are not as disparate as they have been made out to be. Ultimately, while incorporating modernist and postmodernist elements, Metamodernism foregrounds the importance of reflective, self-analytical, interdisciplinary scholarship. As he writes: "Metamodernism is what we get when we take the strategies associated with postmodernism and productively reduplicate and turn them in on themselves. This will entail disturbing the symbolic system of poststructuralism, producing a genealogy of genealogies, deconstructing deconstruction, and providing a therapy for therapeutic philosophy."

Specifically, Storm accomplishes this by taking up the reflective negatives of postmodernism's 1) antirealism, 2) disciplinary autocritiques, 3) linguistic turn, 4) broad climate of skepticism, and 5) ethical nihilism. In a Hegelian move, he then "negates" these negations. Completing the dialectical turn, antirealism is sublated into a metarealist frame, where multiple notions of the "real" can be seen to exist in relation; autocritique culminates in a powerful new process ontology for cultural analysis; the linguistic turn casting the world as language is completed by casting language as part of the world; radical skepticism finishes by doubting itself, rendering provisional knowledge possible; and radical relativism's pluralist values find positive expression. With these transformations, Storm offers a robust philosophical response to the driving challenges of the postmodern paradigm

Metamodernism in sociology
In a seminal chapter in a 2021 anthology on metamodern thought entitled "Metamodern Sociology: An Ironically Sincere Invitation to Future Scholars," sociologist Dr. Daniel Görtz outlines the contours of a post-postmodern, multi-perspectival sociological approach informed by developmental psychology and the "transpersonal" formation of enculturated individuals. Moving beyond the simple relativization of worldviews accomplished by postmodern sociology (e.g., through the turn to social constructivism and power analysis), metamodern sociology attempts a still higher-order analysis of how such worldviews relate to one another.

Görtz writes: "It is a tenet of metamodern sociology that perspectives are not arbitrarily ordered, but that they emerge in recognisable patterns. A poststructuralist critique of literature has never emerged in a tribal society with no writing; quantum theory has never emerged in a traditional, premodern society. Even if strands of thought can be linked backwards in history (process philosophy back to Heraclitus and so forth), there are indeed specific ideas that build upon one another: multiplication builds upon addition. And these sequences are, in turn, always dependent upon social and material – ultimately, even biological – conditions, with which they interact. Postmodernism did not emerge before modernism, nor could it have. For this reason, metamodern sociology always looks for meaningful explanatory developmental sequences, putting them in relation to one another on some kind of developmental scale. This developmentalism thus accepts at least some minimal form of stage theories… Each stage must be, in clearly definable terms, either more complex than the former, or, at a minimum, be derived from the former and qualitatively distinct." In sum, Görtz says, "Metamodern sociology thus takes up the task of cataloguing, understanding, comparing and non-arbitrarily evaluating the many perspectives of society, self and reality."

In 2017, Görtz and theory artist Emil Ejner Friis present such a metamodern sociological account in their book The Listening Society.  Writing under the shared pen name Hanzi Freinacht, they frame metamodernism's emergence from postmodernism as part of a broader process of cultural complexification. In this context, metamodernism is understood not merely as a cultural phase, but as a developmental stage, which is manifested at both the individual and the collective levels. Employing an approach akin to Jürgen Habermas's reconstructed dialectical materialism, Freinacht looks to developmental psychology, particularly the Model of Hierarchical Complexity (MHC), to draw parallels between cultural discourses and developmental stages. He makes the following correlations:

In September 2018, Görtz conducted a TEDx talk in Berlin outlining the development of "value memes," claiming that the metamodern value meme constitutes the most recent memetic value structure to date.

In 2019, Lene Rachel Anderson published her book Metamodernity: Meaning and Hope in a Complex World, in which she claims: "Metamodernity provides us with a framework for understanding ourselves and our societies in a much more complex way. It contains both indigenous, premodern, modern, and postmodern cultural elements and thus provides social norms and a moral fabric for intimacy, spirituality, religion, science, and self-exploration, all at the same time."

2019 also saw the publication of The World We Create: From God to Market by Tomas Björkman, a work exploring the complex origins of our precarious situation today, along with a set of proposed solutions utilizing a metamodern framework.

In 2021, Perspectiva Press published Metamodernity: Dispatches from a Time Between Worlds, an anthology of essays on metamodernism and society by chess grandmaster Jonathan Rowson and others.

Politics
In 2019, Hanzi Freinacht published Nordic Ideology, a detailed vision for a political metamodernism based on his metamodern sociological account of worldviews. Using the Nordic countries as a model, Freinacht argues that a developmental approach to politics might take Green Social Liberalism as a shared, overarching metaideology, and that this overarching shared ideology allows for considerable political nuance in a system with many political parties. This is presented in stark contrast to the binaries present in the two-party system of the United States and the United Kingdom.

Swedish political party Initiativet is based on metamodern principles. It is a sister-party of Danish political party Alternativet.

More recently, one of the originators of metamodernism, Moyo Okediji, has said that he views metamodernism as a powerful dialogic tool "as becoming some kind of bridge discourse that is capable of finding ways to initiate some kind of reconciliation without necessarily being able to solve problems." He states "Problems will always be there, but we need to talk about them in a way that enables us to continue a dialogue because it is when people stop a dialogue, the war begins."

Metamodernism in religion
In 2013, Linda C. Ceriello proposed a theorization of metamodernism for the field of religious studies, connecting the contemporary phenomenon of secular spirituality to the emergence of a metamodern episteme. Her analysis of contemporary religious/spiritual movements and ontologies posits a shift that is consonant with the metamodern cultural sensibilities identified by others such as Vermeulen and van den Akker, and which has given rise to a distinct metamodern soteriology.

In 2014, Brendan Graham Dempsey identified a unique kind of mythopoeia ("mythmaking") in a metamodern register in his essay "[Re]construction: Metamodern 'Transcendence' and the Return of Myth" published in Notes on Metamodernism. In his 2021 book Metamodernism and the Return of Transcendence, Dempsey argues that metamodern developments in culture signal various ways in which "the transcendent" is more and more coming to be reimagined as a component of the immanent frame, and not as something "super-natural" (i.e., outside the naturalistic world). He draws on the work of Verumeulen and van den Akker, Raoul Eshelman, Ceriello, and others in making this case.

The first peer-reviewed article applying metamodern theory to the study of religions was published in 2017 by Michel Clasquin-Johnson.

In 2022, the book Emergentism: A Religion of Complexity for the Metamodern World was published, in which Dempsey articulates a mythopoeic meta-religion based on the narrative of cosmic complexification. He frames this as a form of metamodern mythopoeia that would re-engage spirituality from a metamodern perspective.

See also

 David Foster Wallace
 Kitsch movement
 New Sincerity
 Post-irony
 Post-postmodernism
 Reconstructivism
 Remodernism
 Eric Van Hove

References

External links
 Notes on Metamodernism — (webzine founded by Vermeulen and van den Akker)
The Metamodernist Manifesto
 What is Metamodern? (blog)
 Metamoderna (blog)
After Postmodernism (YouTube video series)

Metamodernism


Franciszek Pinck, also Pink, and Ping, Bing or Byng (1733 - 27 May 1798) was a Polish sculptor and stucco artist.

In 1765 Pinck was appointed the court sculptor for the King of Poland Stanisław August Poniatowski. The author of equestrian statue of King John III Sobieski on a bridge on the Royal Route, Warsaw, unveiled in 1788 on the occasion of 105th anniversary of the Battle of Vienna. This monument is considered the most important work of Pinck. Hammered mainly in stone, he produced busts and statues for early projects of the royal sculptor Andrzej Le Brun, adorning the royal estates of Ujazdów Castle, the Royal Castle, Warsaw, Bathrooms (garden and palace) and the palace in Kozienice.

In the 1790s sculptural work orders from the king ceased, royal cash enveloped him even with the payment of 348 ducats (his monthly salary in 1779 was 30 ducats). Pinck ran into financial trouble, sending the king several requests for payment of debts and even asking Marcello Bacciarelli for an intercession, of which Bacciarelli eventually granted him.

Pinck is the sculptor who performed many different types of work and was always in demand. He obtained as a result of the promise a payment of 900 ducats, but from then on he had to deal with finer sculptural works for private jobs. His son, Ferdinand (1761-1797), was a landscape painter. He died in Warsaw on 27 May 1798.

References
 S. Orgelbrand Universal Encyclopedia (1898) Vol XI, 1901
 Polish Biographical Dictionary, Volume XXVI, 1981

Polish Baroque sculptors
Polish male sculptors
Court sculptors
1733 births
1798 deaths
Sculptors from Vienna

Franciszek Pinck


Jaani Dushman : Ek Anokhi Kahani is a 2002 Bolywoood film, starring Sunny Deol, Suniel Shetty and Akshay Kumar in lead roles.

Plot

Divya (Manisha Koirala) and Karan (Sunny Deol) are in love, and planning to marry. While Karan has got job, Divya is still in her college's last year, with Karan's younger step brother Vivek (Sonu Nigam). They live in the hostel with Atul (Akshay Kumar), Abdul (Arshad Warsi), Ashok (Aditya Pancholi), Prem (Aftab Shivdasani), Vijay (Suniel Shetty), Viktor (Sharad Kapoor), Niki (Upasana Singh), Nita (Rambha), Preeti (Pinky Campbell) and Rashmi (Kiran Rathod). Abdul had an habit of cracking lame jokes.

Rajesh (Rajat Bedi) and Madan (Siddharth Ray) once try to rape Divya, but Karan came at the right moment by smashing door to save Divya. In front of whole college both of them are humiliated and they decided to avenge their humiliation.

Divya started listening to a call from a man named Kapil (Armaan Kohli), who is a blessed serpant, and tells Divya to be her lover in earlier birth. Divya started getting dreams of the past, when sage (Amrish Puri) cursed them that they would be separated and will meet in 21st century, because they disturbed him in his meditation. She also comes to know that her name in previous birth was Vasundara. Vasundara died after that curse, and reborns as Divya in her new birth. She believes Kapil, but left him to attend a call from Atul. Atul told her to come to a party. When Atul's friends were planning, Divya then calls at Atul's house to say that she is not coming. However, Rajesh imitates the voice of all male members of the group and tricked her to come to an abandoned fort at wrong time. Rajesh and Madan then brutally rape her, for which she had to suicide. As she was dying, she told Kapil to take her revenge from all male members of the group, since she had a misunderstanding.

Madan is killed the same day by Kapil by poisoning by  his bite, while Rajesh is killed later on his wedding night by Divya's ghost.

Viktor, when going to Atul's party, is chased by Kapil and he kills Viktor by riding motorcycle on his neck. Kapil takes Viktor's disguise, go to the party and electrocutes lame joker Abdul to death. All of them became tensed and their Principle (Raj Babbar), who was a spiritologist, believed their innocence, and called Divya's spirit to talk with them, and dismiss the misunderstanding. However, Atul in between in anger shoted bullets at Divya and her spirit began to disappear. Suddenly, all realised what had happened that day. Principle gave them lockets, which when on their body, save them from Divya and Kapil. Atul initially did not believed, but when the locket saved him from accident, he started believing in gods.

Atul started chasing Kapil in motorcycle, however his locket gets off from his body in between. He then got fatal blows from Kapil on his head. He shoted bullets at Kapil, but they had no effect on him. As he was about to lie on ground due to fatal injuries, Atul exploded a bomb on Kapil, and felled on the ground fainted, but he did not die. However, he goes into coma. The exploded body parts of Kapil came together and joined to again form Kapil.

Ashok and Prem both had crush on Rashmi. But Rashmi loved Prem, however Ashok was far mire powerful and rich than Prem. So, Prem used to get hit from Ashok various times to stay away from Rashmi. Divya's ghost went inside Prem and hypnotized his mind, which prompted him to hit Ashok and eventually kill him. Prem got arrested on charge of murder. Rashmi tried to free Prem by engaging a lawyer, but on the day of hearing, Kapil kidnaps Rashmi, takes Rashmi's disguise and goes to the court instead. He says all opposite things and Prem is convicted of murder by the court and is hanged.

Vijay is afraid to fight a boxing match against Ajay (his opponent) as he is sure that Kapil will take Ajay's disguise and kill him. But he had to fight to win Preeti, and prove his love for her. However, he wins the match because Divya had stopped Kapil from killing Vijay since she wanted to kill Vijay herself, because he was, according to her, the biggest traitor. The Principle traps Divya's ghost in a box to save Vijay, but she gets out mysteriously, goes into Vijay's body, and kills him by throwing him from a building.

Vivek, afraid he's next, calls his elder brother Karan to save him, but Kapil stabs him in disguise of Karan, but police arrives at the right time and real Karan is arrested by police. Kapil did this because he did not wanted to hit Karan, since he was innocent.

Suddenly, Atul gets conscious, but before Nita could bring doctor, he had run off on motorcycle with Vivek and was chasing Kapil. Again, locket gets off and Atul gets brutally stabbed by Kapil on his stomach. He then gets another fatal blows from Kapil. As he was about to die, he runs to the Principle, requesting him to save Vivek at any cost. Principle promises him. Saying this, Atul dies in Principle's hands.

Karan, with his full power, breaks the jail bars and runs from the police station to reach the place where Vivek and Kapil were fighting. He challenges Kapil and a fierce fight between the two began. However, Karan gets defeated and almost killed. Principle chants some chants, which gave Karan supernatural powers, and with his powers he finally kills Kapil. Therefore, Vivek becomes the only survivor in the killer's group and he lives happy life with Karan ever after.

Divya and Kapil reunite in heaven.

Cast

 Sunny Deol as Karan
 Armaan Kohli as Kapil
 Manisha Koirala as Divya/Vasundara
 Akshay Kumar as Atul
 Sonu Nigam as Vivek
 Suniel Shetty as Vijay
 Sharad Kapoor as Viktor
 Arshad Warsi as Abdul
 Aditya Pancholi as Ashok
 Aftab Shivdasani as Prem
 Kiran Rathod as Rashmi
 Rajat Bedi as Rajesh
 Siddharth Ray as Madan
Raj Babbar as Principle
 Pinky Campbell as Preeti
 Rambha as Nita
 Upasana Singh as Niki
Amrish Puri as the angry sage
Johny Lever as Parwana, Vivek's servant  (cameo appereance)
Aman Verma as TV Host (cameo appereance)

Hindi-language movies

Jaani Dushman: Ek Anokhi Kahani


Lionel Andrés Messi (Spanish pronunciation: [ljoˈnel anˈdɾes ˈmesi] (listen); born 24 June 1987), also known as Leo Messi, is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a forward for  Ligue 1 club Paris Saint-Germain and captains the Argentina national team. Often considered the best player in the world and widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Messi has won a record six Ballon d'Or awards, a record six European Golden Shoes, and in 2020 was named to the Ballon d'Or Dream Team. Until leaving the club in 2021, he had spent his entire professional career with Barcelona, where he won a club-record 35 trophies, including ten La Liga titles, seven Copa del Rey titles and four UEFA Champions Leagues. A prolific goalscorer and creative playmaker, Messi holds the records for most goals in La Liga (474), a La Liga and European league season (50), most hat-tricks in La Liga (36) and the UEFA Champions League (8), and most assists in La Liga (192), a La Liga season (21) and the Copa América (17). He also holds the record for most international goals by a South American male (79). Messi has scored over 750 senior career goals for club and country, and has the most goals by a player for a single club.

Born and raised in central Argentina, Messi relocated to Spain to join Barcelona at age 13, for whom he made his competitive debut aged 17 in October 2004. He established himself as an integral player for the club within the next three years, and in his first uninterrupted season in 2008–09 he helped Barcelona achieve the first treble in Spanish football; that year, aged 22, Messi won his first Ballon d'Or. Three successful seasons followed, with Messi winning four consecutive Ballons d'Or, making him the first player to win the award four times and in a row. During the 2011–12 season, he set the La Liga and European records for most goals scored in a single season, while establishing himself as Barcelona's all-time top scorer. The following two seasons, Messi finished second for the Ballon d'Or behind Cristiano Ronaldo (his perceived career rival), before regaining his best form during the 2014–15 campaign, becoming the all-time top scorer in La Liga and leading Barcelona to a historic second treble, after which he was awarded a fifth Ballon d'Or in 2015. Messi assumed captaincy of Barcelona in 2018, and in 2019 he won a record sixth Ballon d'Or.

An Argentine international, Messi is both his country's highest appearance-maker and their all-time leading goalscorer. At youth level, he won the 2005 FIFA World Youth Championship, finishing the tournament with both the Golden Ball and Golden Shoe, and an Olympic gold medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics. His style of play as a diminutive, left-footed dribbler drew comparisons with his compatriot Diego Maradona, who described Messi as his successor. After his senior debut in August 2005, Messi became the youngest Argentine to play and score in a FIFA World Cup in 2006, and reached the final of the 2007 Copa América, where he was named young player of the tournament. As the squad's captain from August 2011, he led Argentina to three consecutive finals: the 2014 FIFA World Cup, for which he won the Golden Ball, and the 2015 and 2016 Copa América, winning the Golden Ball in the 2015 edition. After announcing his international retirement in 2016, he reversed his decision and led his country to qualification for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, a third-place finish at the 2019 Copa América, and won the 2021 Copa América, while winning the Golden Ball and Golden Boot award for the latter.

Messi has endorsed sportswear company Adidas since 2006. According to France Football, he was the world's highest-paid footballer for five years out of six between 2009 and 2014, and was ranked the world's highest-paid athlete by Forbes in 2019. Messi was among Time's 100 most influential people in the world in 2011 and 2012. In February 2020, he was awarded the Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, thus becoming the first footballer and the first team sport athlete to win the award. Later that year, Messi became the second footballer (and second team-sport athlete) to surpass $1 billion in career earnings.

External links

 Official website
 Profile at FC Barcelona
 Profile at La Liga

1987 janam
Jinda log

L
A
M
New Athlete Report

Lionel Messi


The Jamestown, Westfield and Northwestern Railroad (JW&NW) was an electric interurban railroad that served the New York towns of Jamestown and Westfield from 1914 to 1950.

History

Dubbed the "Chautauqua Lake Route", the single track  electrified JW&NW railroad provided passenger service and freight shipments between the furniture manufacturing city of Jamestown and the Lake Erie town of Westfield. It connected with the New York Central Railroad at the NYC's Westfield depot in Westfield. This passenger and freight exchange with the New York Central Railroad was the crux of JW&NW's offering, with the greatest passenger and freight business in the 1920s. As road and car use increased, passenger ridership decreased. Further, furniture manufacturing in Jamestown diminished, providing less economic need for the JW&NW railroad. It was abandoned in 1950.

Route and rail operations

Route
From Jamestown, the route traveled west along the north side of Chautauqua Lake with stops at Greenhurst, Bemus Point, Dewittville, and Mayville. Mayville is on the north side of the lake; Jamestown, on the south. The other towns were along the east side of the lake. In the final decades of the JWNW, Mayville was the closest rail point proximate to the resort town of Chautauqua. After crossing the Pennsylvania Railroad's (PRR) Chautauqua Branch at Mayville, the line climbed a steep grade through low hills, passed through scenic "Hogsback Ravine" at the grade's summit, then dropped along a curvy route to Westfield. At Westfield, it passed under the Nickel Plate Railroad then turned sharply east adjacent to the New York Central Railroad to arrive at their combined depot.

Schedule
A JW&NW schedule from 1941 shows six daily trips from 6am to 9pm, each way, operating three hours apart, to meet NYC passenger trains that stopped at Westfield. The trip to Jamestown took one hour. The JW&NW and the NYC interchanged considerable carload freight as well as passengers.

Passenger equipment
The JW&NW operated bright red heavy steel passenger interurban cars (including one with an observation platform) and General Electric and Westinghouse electric freight motors capable of pulling two to three freight cars up to Hogsback summit. The NYC would set freight cars on the Westfield interchange tracks to be taken to Jamestown by the JW&NW. The JW&NW would bring cars for the NYC to pick up. Wood and other materials necessary for furniture manufacturing went to Jamestown. Finished furniture moved to Westfield to be picked up by the New York Central.

Other freight interchange
At Mayville, the JW&NW crossed a branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad where interchange tracks allowed PRR lumber and coal setouts to route to Jamestown. The JW&NW dispatcher and tower were at this junction. PRR and JW&NW crossing control and signaling to prevent collisions (called interlocking) was the responsibility of the JW&NW. Dispatching orders for the conductors on board the interurban coaches was by written train order, and the interurbans stopped here to pick them up. In a 1941 ad, the line offered two-day LCL (Less-than-carload freight) shipping to New York City from Jamestown, and three days to Chicago.

Operation
The grade from Westfield south into the hills heading toward Jamestown was very scenic, particularly where it passed through Hogsback Ravine. The grade was steep, and the interurban cars worked hard on the climb, particularly the electric powered freights. The 32-mile JW&NW represented classic small town-to-rural electric interurban operation similar to interurban lines all over the 1920s United States. The large red coaches lumbering by at grade crossings were a familiar sight for years at Chautauqua valley villages. Most interurban lines were abandoned during the 1930s due to increased car ownership and improving highways as well as the financial impact of the Great Depression. The JW&NW's passenger survival to 1947 and its freight survival to 1950 was due to its freight transfer with the New York Central for the many Jamestown factories.

The H.E. Salzberg Company operated the company since at least late 1943 and the Interstate Commerce Commission approved its control of the JW&NW through ownership of stock in April 1945.

Decline and abandonment
After passenger abandonment in 1947, the JW&NW continued freight operation with diesels, but gradually freight business declined along with Jamestown's industrial activity which for years had been primarily the manufacture of furniture. Shipping business also was lost to trucks. Total abandonment occurred in 1950.

References

Defunct New York (state) railroads
Interurban railways in New York (state)
Railway companies disestablished in 1950
Railway companies established in 1914

Also see
1) Video of JW&NW freight and express transfers at the NYC station at Westfield: www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_TBiX-VcVA
2) Video of JW&NW operating between Jamestown and Westfield: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XG_Jp7egB88


Bert Stiles (August 30, 1920November 26, 1944) was an American author of short stories who was killed in action during World War II while serving as a fighter pilot in the US Army Air Forces.

Youth
Born in Denver, Colorado he was the son of an electrician, Bert Stiles Sr, and a music teacher, Elizabeth Huddleston Stiles. He attended Denver's South High School and worked summers as a junior forest ranger in Estes Park, both of which became sources of material for his short stories.

After graduation from high school in 1938 he entered Colorado College, with a pronounced interest in writing both stories and poetry. He became a feature writer for the campus newspaper, The Tiger, expressing pacifist views in vogue at the time, and in June 1941, isolated himself in his fraternity house and produced twenty-seven short stories.

Stiles mailed samples of his prose to Ruth and Max Aley, literary agents in New York City, who expressed an interest in seeing more. Stiles left college to hitchhike to New York; he was stopped twice by police and sent home twice, but eventually reached New York and delivered his stories in person. The Aleys employed him as a handyman and provided him living space on their farm in Connecticut in order to mentor him in his writing. Stiles wrote ten hours a day throughout the summer of 1941 and his diligence was rewarded when his first story was accepted in September by  The Saturday Evening Post, which eventually published "The Ranger" series of stories based on his experiences in Estes Park. He also sold stories to Liberty and The American magazines.

USAAF service
Stiles enlisted in the United States Army in January 1943, becoming an aviation cadet, and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Air Corps, in November. He won pilots wings and was assigned to a B-17 Flying Fortress replacement crew sent to the Eighth Air Force in March 1944.

Bomber co-pilot

Assigned to the 401st Bomb Squadron, 91st Bomb Group at Bassingbourn, England, he began flying missions with the crew of 2nd Lt. Sam Newton on April 19, 1944, with their first to Kassel, Germany. Thereafter the crew flew an average of two to three missions per week, usually on consecutive days. This pattern continued through May as the 91st attacked both strategic targets in Germany, V-1 launch sites, and targets in France in preparation for Operation Overlord. Their first mission against Berlin occurred on May 7.

Newton's crew was assigned to and primarily flew a B-17G-50-BO, s/n 42–102504, nicknamed Times A-Wastin; it carried the fuselage codes LL - D. The crew flew one mission in another noted 91st B-17, Shoo Shoo Shoo Baby, fuselage codes LL-E, on May 25, 1944, to bomb Essey-les-Nancy airfield in France, but turned back to base early because the plane's oxygen system malfunctioned.

Stiles continued to write, both highly personalized pieces for the London Daily Mail, articles for Yank and Air Force Magazine, and the manuscript for a book. He eventually flew twenty missions with Sam Newton's crew, and his manuscript was a journal-style memoir of his experiences with them. In mid-June 1944, he was separated from Newton's crew and out of combat for a month, and when he resumed flying, he completed his 35-mission combat tour for the 91st Bomb Group with a different crew.

Fighter pilot
Stiles refused an opportunity to return to the United States as a flight instructor and volunteered for a second tour with the Eighth, requesting an assignment to fighters. He completed conversion training and was assigned as a pilot with the 505th Fighter Squadron, 339th Fighter Group, a P-51 Mustang unit stationed at Fowlmere, England, about five miles distant from his previous base at Bassingbourn.

On November 26, 1944, on the 16th mission of his second tour, Stiles' squadron was flying at 26,000 feet altitude south of Hanover, Germany, on a bomber escort mission. Stiles was flying a P-51 nicknamed Tar Heel, normally flown by Captain James R. Starnes of his squadron (P-51D- s/n 44-14113). Encountering 40-60 Luftwaffe Fw 190s, Stiles engaged one in combat and shot it down (Air Force Historical Study No. 85 credits Stiles with the kill), but apparently became disoriented when the dogfight descended to low altitude. His P-51 impacted the ground almost immediately, killing him. Stiles is interred at the Ardennes American Cemetery, Neupré, Liège, Belgium.

Remembrance
Stiles  was one of the veterans profiled in the History Channel's show WWII in HD.

Awards and decorations

  Army Presidential Unit Citation

Serenade to the Big Bird
His mother commemorated his memory by having his book published in 1947 in England (Lindsay Drummond Ltd.), with its first U.S. publication in 1952 (W.W. Norton & Company). Entitled Serenade to the Big Bird''', the book achieved cult status among aviation enthusiasts for its honest depictions of bomber combat and also won favorable literary reviews for its spare, Hemingway-style prose and its anti-war sensitivity. It has been re-issued periodically, the most recent in 2001. Another book, titled "Serenade to the Blue Lady, The Story of Bert Stiles", written by Robert Floyd Cooper was published in 1993.

Notes

References

Cooper, Robert F., Serenade to the Blue Lady: The Story of Bert Stiles, Cypress House (1993).
Minnich, Mike, "Serenade: The Story of Lieutenant Bert Stiles," Wings'', April 1989 (Volume 19, No. 2)
Stiles, Bert. Bert Stiles Papers at Colorado College. Manuscript versions of about 70 short stories, correspondence, and more. The finding aid to the collection is at https://web.archive.org/web/20100528011205/http://www.coloradocollege.edu/library/SpecialCollections/Manuscript/Stiles.html. To view the papers in full, visit CC Special Collections in Colorado Springs, CO.
Encounter reports of P-51 Mustang pilots  Numerous original 339th FG kill claim reports reproduced here that describe the aerial fight on November 26, 1944
USAF Historical Study 85: USAF Credits for Destruction of Enemy Aircraft, World War II  27.21 MB pdf file, Stiles listed alphabetically in first section

1920 births
1944 deaths
Writers from Denver
American military writers
Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United States)
Recipients of the Air Medal
United States Army Air Forces officers
United States Army Air Forces pilots of World War II
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century American essayists
Burials at Ardennes American Cemetery and Memorial
United States Army Air Forces personnel killed in World War II

Bert Stiles


Popcorn is a snack food made by heating certain kinds of corn. There is a small amount of water inside the seeds, which causes them to explode. When the seed shell breaks a sharp noise is made. The name "pop" is because of this noise. After it pops it is white and fluffy.

Salt and melted butter are often added to popcorn. Sometimes caramel and other flavors are melted and mixed into the popcorn.

Popcorn is a popular food to eat at the cinema.

Kernel choking
Many accidents of choking on popcorn kernels were reported. This is because the popcorn kernel does go into the airway and throat, and gets stuck. Many people want other people to take kernels out of the popcorn for children.

Pre-popped and home popped
Popcorn that is already popped when you buy it is usually tastier and puffyer than just buying popcorn kernals and popping them with a microwave

References

Who Invented Microwave Popcorn?
How was Popcorn Discovered? The History of Popcorn
Who Invented the First Commercial Popcorn Machine?
https://www.nasimahealth.com/carbs-in-popcorn/
Snack foods

Popcorn


John Harris (May 20, 1793 – May 12, 1864) was the sixth Commandant of the Marine Corps. He served in the Marine Corps for over 50 years, attaining the rank of colonel.

Early life and family
Harris was born in East Whiteland Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania, to an established local family that produced a number of military officers.  His father, William Harris, served in the Pennsylvania militia during the American Revolutionary War and Whiskey Rebellion and was commissioned a brigadier general prior to the outbreak of the War of 1812.  John's older brother, Thomas, was a naval surgeon who served as Chief of the Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery.  His brother, William, married Elizabeth Matilda Patterson, granddaughter of Thomas Leiper, and his brother Stephen married Marianne Smith, granddaughter of Persifor Frazer and first cousin of Persifor Frazer Smith;<ref>J.S. Harris, Record of the Harris Family descended from John Harris born 1680 in Wiltshire, England.</ref> Stephen's sons Stephen and Joseph both worked for the U.S. Coast Survey before and during the American Civil War.

Career
John Harris was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Marine Corps on 23 April 1814 and promoted to first lieutenant two months later. He joined the Marines of the USS Guerriere under the command of Commodore John Rodgers that summer at Charlestown, Maryland, and served with the forces that opposed the British advance on Baltimore. He was ordered to the defense of Washington but then ordered back to Baltimore before reaching Bladensburg. He wrote his brother "I could see plenty of red coats but could not get within musket shot of them." He described the attack on Fort McHenry as "the handsomest sight I ever saw... to see the bombs and rockets flying and the firing from our three forts."

The following year he was placed in command of the Marine contingent aboard the USS Macedonian, which sailed with Commodore Stephen Decatur from New York in May 1815 against the Barbary pirates.

Upon his return to the United States, 1st Lt Harris was stationed at Erie, Pennsylvania, and then Boston, Massachusetts. From Boston he was assigned to the USS Franklin, in August 1821. On his return from a cruise in the South Pacific in 1824, according to family legend, he introduced the lima bean from Peru to the United States.  He was brevetted captain on March 3, 1825.

Subsequent tours at sea were aboard the USS Java, the Delaware and the Philadelphia. Promoted to the regular rank of captain on June 13, 1830, he was next stationed at Norfolk, Virginia. After that he rejoined the Delaware until March 1836. Three months later he joined a detachment of Marines at Fort Monroe, Virginia, to campaign with the Army in the Indian Wars. During this period he served with distinction in the Creek campaign in Alabama and in the war with the Seminole Indians in Florida. Colonel Commandant Archibald Henderson, serving in the field during this campaign, stated in a letter to the Secretary of the Navy that "Captain Harris while in Florida had command of Mounted Marines and did good service in that capacity."

Captain Harris was awarded brevet rank of major on January 27, 1837, "for gallantry and good conduct in the war against Florida Indians, particularly in the affair of the Hatchee Lustee."Chapter 20: "Marines in the 2nd Seminole War", Don Burzynski, The First Leathernecks: A combat history of the U.S. Marines from inception to the Halls of Montezuma (1775-1848) He returned to Washington in March 1837 as the bearer of a treaty which had been made by the commanding general with the Seminole chiefs. Promoted to major on October 6, 1841, he served until the Mexican–American War at Philadelphia, Washington, and Norfolk.

In March 1848, Major Harris was ordered to Mexico to cooperate on shore with the squadron off the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. He sailed from New York with a battalion of Marines, but upon their arrival at Veracruz, the armistice had been concluded. He was then ordered to garrison Alvarado with his battalion.

Major Harris rejoined Headquarters in Washington from Alvarado in late summer of 1848. His next assignments were as Commanding Officer of the Philadelphia and New York Marine Barracks. He was promoted to lieutenant colonel on December 10, 1855, and placed in command at Brooklyn, New York, where he remained until January 7, 1859, on which date he was appointed Colonel Commandant of the Marine Corps. At the age of 66, he was the oldest officer to become Commandant of the Marine Corps. He likewise had seen more service than any officer receiving the appointment, having been a Marine for 45 years before becoming Commandant.

During Harris' term as Commandant shortly before the outbreak of the Civil War, nearly half of his officers resigned to serve the Confederacy and he labored to reconstitute the weakened Corps. During the early days of the Civil War, when contraband traffic began to flow from Maryland, Colonel Harris detailed an entire battalion of Marines to serve as United States Secret Service operators in the troubled area, with the result that the situation was well in hand within a brief period.

Services rendered to the Union by Marines under Harris were varied and many. Few, however, have been recorded as outstanding. This may be attributed to the fact that the Marine Corps of that period was composed of relatively few men in comparison with the strength of the Army or the regular Navy.  The relatively minor role of the Navy in the Civil War (memorable almost exclusively for its land battles) may be a factor as well.

Death

Harris died after a brief illness on May 12, 1864, while in office as Commandant of the Marine Corps. He had served as a Marine Corps officer for 50 years.  He is buried in Oak Hill Cemetery in the Georgetown area of Washington, D.C.

Notes

References

Harris, Joseph S. Record of the Harris Family descended from John Harris born 1680 in Wiltshire, England. Geo. F. Lasher, Philadelphia, 1903.

Harris, Joseph S.  Notes on the Ancestry of the Children of Joseph Smith Harris and Delia Silliman Brodhead.'' Press of Allen, Land & Scott, Philadelphia, 1898.

1793 births
1864 deaths
Military personnel from Chester County, Pennsylvania
United States Marine Corps personnel of the War of 1812
United States Marine Corps colonels
United States Marine Corps Commandants
People of Pennsylvania in the American Civil War
Burials at Oak Hill Cemetery (Washington, D.C.)
Union Marines

John Harris (USMC officer)


Xiangliu is the only moon of the dwarf planet 225088 Gonggong. It was discovered by a team of astronomers led by Csaba Kiss during an analysis of archival Hubble Space Telescope images of Gonggong. The discovery team thought that the slow rotation of Gonggong was caused by tidal forces exerted by a moon. Xiangliu was first identified in archival Hubble images taken with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 on 18 September 2010. Its discovery was reported and announced by Gábor Marton, Csaba Kiss, and Thomas Müller at the 48th Meeting of the Division for Planetary Sciences on 17 October 2016. The satellite is named after Xiangliu, a nine-headed poisonous snake monster in Chinese mythology that attended the water god Gonggong as his chief minister.

Moons

Xiangliu


Greta Jančytė (born 24 April 1995) better known by her stage name GJan is a Lithuanian singer and songwriter.

Career

2010–11: Second Riot career and departure

From 2010 to 2011 Greta performed in the Lithuanian rock group Second Riot. They released two songs, "Memories" and "Stalk". In the summer of 2011 Greta left the band due to disagreements with the other group members.

2012–14: Beginning of a solo career and a one-year break

She became known for her YouTube videos. In October 2011, GJan published a cover of Katy Perry's song "E.T.". Later, on April 9, 2012 she released her first solo single "Not Afraid", which got more than 5 million views on YouTube, followed by her second big hit "Tattoo", released on December 2, 2012 that received over 2 million views. Her third single "Need Your Love" was released on May 12, 2013. On November 17, 2013 she released the song "Now You". In 2012, GJan was nominated for the Best Music Video Award at M.A.M.A. awards, but lost to Jurga Šeduikytė. The following year, the singer was nominated for the Best Female Act at the same M.A.M.A. awards. In 2014, she took a year break to successfully graduate from school. During the time, no new songs were released.

2015–17: Do It

The single cover picture for her next single "Nobody Around" was released on March 28, 2015 on GJan's official Facebook page and the song was released on April 13. The day after release, "Nobody Around" reached number 1 on the Lithuanian iTunes chart. The song was also used in a commercial for "Active O2" water in Germany.
The single cover picture for her next single, "One More Drink", was released on July 23, 2015 on GJan's official Facebook page. She released the song, accompanied by a music video on July 26. On August 4, 2015 "One More Drink" became available on iTunes.
On November 26, 2015 GJan announced her next song "Gossip" on her Facebook page and shared the single cover picture, which had been painted by the singer herself. The song was subsequently released on December 1 on various platforms.

She released her song "Wild" on November 29, 2016.  She released her song "Wasn't Easy" on March 21, 2017. In October 2017 new single "Together" was released with accompanying music video. On October 18, 2017 the debut album Do It was released through Global Records on various platforms such as Apple Music, Spotify, etc.

'Together' was the last song released through Global Records.
GJan signed off contract with Global Records, to work on her own.

Greta Jančytė and her music partner Rokas Jansonas (Together GJan) released, the first song in the Lithuanian language 'Paskui Tave' in November 2017. The song was only published in the Lithuanian record market, remaining censored in other countries.  However, it reached a big audience and scored 6.7M views (stat. December 12, 2019) on YouTube platform.

2018

2018 began with another song in her mother-Lithuanian language. 'Tabletė' (tr. Pill) was published on March 6, 2018. And currently (stat. 12th Dec, 2019) has 2.6M views on YouTube platform.

On May 23, 2018 GJan released English song 'Confidence' and reached 1.8M views (stat. 12th Dec, 2019) on YouTube platform.

On July 30, 2018 GJan released another English song 'Clothes Off' and reached almost 1M views (stat. 12th Dec, 2019) on YouTube platform.

On September 13, 2018GJan released BoB Dylan cover of 'Ring them bells' dedicated to movie ' Ashes in the snow'. It reached 1.1M views (stat. 12th Dec, 2019) on YouTube platform.

On November 14, 2018 GJan released her third Lithuanian song 'Melagė' (tr. Liar). Song received great success, taking a place in top charts for a year already.
Song reached 6.3M views (stat. 12th Dec, 2019) on YouTube platform.

2019 - New Album 'Pasiduodu Sau'

Year started with an English song 'Numbers'. It was released on 19 February 2019.

On April 16, 2019 GJan released 'Karaliai' (tr. Kings) song from coming Lithuanian Album. It has reached 3M views (stat. 12th Dec, 2019) on YouTube platform.

On August 13, 2019 Gjan released 'Neleisk Man Užmigt' (tr. Don't let me fall asleep). It reached 2M views on YouTube platform in two months.

On October 1, GJan released 'Ruduo' (tr. Autumn), which became super popular in an hour. It reached 4.2M views in two Months on YouTube Platform.

On October 21, GJan released her first Lithuanian music album 'Pasiduodu Sau', which was later promoted by a concert on October 24 at the Vilnius Siemens Arena, attended by over 3500 people, the largest of her career.

Discography

Studio albums

Singles

Other appearances

Music videos

Tours
 Karklė Music Festival (2013–2014)
 Granatos Live Music Festival (2013, 2015, 2017)

Awards and nomination

References

External links

GJan Lithuanian singer-songwriter

Living people
1995 births
21st-century Lithuanian women singers
Lithuanian pop singers
Musicians from Vilnius

GJan


William Dwight Jr. (July 14, 1831 – April 21, 1888), was a general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Raised in Massachusetts, he came from a notable family of military leaders.

Early life
William Dwight was born July 14, 1831, in Springfield, Massachusetts. His father was William Dwight of the New England Dwight family who was born April 5, 1805. His mother was Elizabeth Amelia White, daughter of Judge Daniel Appleton White (1776–1861) and Mary Wilder (1780–1811).

Dwight was the second born son in a family of seven sons, three of whom, besides himself, served in the American Civil War. He was considered to be an out-spoken, boisterous, high-spirited boy, somewhat rude in his manner, sometimes troublesome, yet was said to possess a charm that made him well liked. The young Dwight also had a great love for the out door life and sport.

Starting in 1846 he attended a military preparatory school, and was admitted to the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, in 1849. However, he resigned January 31, 1853, and moved to Boston to work in manufacturing. On January 1, 1856, he married Anna Robeson.

Civil War

Dwight was moving to Philadelphia for his business when the American Civil War broke out. He took a commission of captain on May 14, 1861. He was promoted to lieutenant colonel on June 29, 1861, under Daniel Sickles, and full colonel on July 1, 1861.
As commanding officer of 70th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, Dwight led his regiment during the Battle of Williamsburg, where he was seriously wounded on May 5, 1862, along with losing half of his command. Left for dead on the battlefield, Dwight was found by Confederate forces and held as a prisoner of war until his eventual release in a prisoner exchange November 15, 1862.

In recognition of his gallantry on the field, Dwight was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers to rank from November 29, 1862, by Presidential nomination on March 4, 1863, and U.S. Senate confirmation on March 9, 1863.
He was transferred to the Western Theater where, later in 1863, he led his brigade in the attack of Port Hudson, Louisiana.

He served as chief-of-staff to Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks during the Red River Campaign in early 1864, with service at the Battle of Mansfield and Battle of Pleasant Hill in De Soto Parish, Louisiana, Dwight was reassigned to the Eastern Theater and was attached to the 1st Division of the 19th Army Corps. Serving under General Philip H. Sheridan, Dwight later participated in the Valley Campaigns of 1864 and saw action at the battles of Winchester and Fisher's Hill before the end of the war.

Younger brother Wilder Dwight was born April 23, 1833, became lieutenant colonel the 2nd Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, and died September 19, 1862, from wounds at the Battle of Antietam.
Younger brother Howard Dwight was born October 29, 1837, became captain, and died May 4, 1863, during the Battle of Port Hudson.
Another younger brother Charles Dwight was born May 5, 1842, attended Harvard University but left to join the army. Charles was lieutenant  in the 70th regiment, taken prisoner in Libby Prison, but lived until March 9, 1884. Distant cousin Colonel Augustus Wade Dwight (1827–1865) died during the Battle of Fort Stedman.

Following the war, Dwight went into the railroad business in Cincinnati, Ohio, with another brother Chapman Dwight who was born April 30, 1844. He had one son, William Arthur Dwight, born June 3, 1867.
William Dwight died on April 21, 1888, in Boston and was buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts.

See also

List of American Civil War generals (Union)
List of Massachusetts generals in the American Civil War
Massachusetts in the American Civil War

Sources

References

Further reading
Linedecker, Clifford L., ed. Civil War, A-Z: The Complete Handbook of America's Bloodiest Conflict. New York: Ballantine Books, 2002.

External links

  Battlefield sketch.

1831 births
1888 deaths
19th-century American businesspeople
People of New York (state) in the American Civil War
Businesspeople from Springfield, Massachusetts
Union Army generals
United States Army officers
American Civil War prisoners of war
Military personnel from Cincinnati
Burials at Forest Hills Cemetery (Boston)
People from Springfield, Massachusetts
Military personnel from Massachusetts

William Dwight


Emily Graslie (born 1989) is an American science communicator and YouTube educator. She started volunteering at the Philip L. Wright Zoological Museum at the University of Montana in 2011. After appearing in a VlogBrothers video by Hank Green in 2012, she was asked to join the Nerdfighter network. She presented the educational YouTube channel called "The Brain Scoop" until 2021 and also hosted portions of the Big History series featured on the Crash Course YouTube channel. Graslie was employed by the Field Museum as their first-ever Chief Curiosity Correspondent.

Early life and education
Graslie earned her bachelor's degree in Studio Art from the University of Montana in 2011. As a part of that program, she interned at the Philip L. Wright Zoological Museum in her senior year. Graslie became a full-time curatorial volunteer after she graduated, while working on her master's degree in museum studies. She cleaned new specimens, gave tours, trained new interns, and acted as a teaching assistant for a class at the University of Montana.

Career
In June 2013, Graslie was hired by Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History to become their 'Chief Curiosity Correspondent'. She continued to host "The Brain Scoop" from this new location. She was the keynote speaker at the Chicago March for Science on April 22, 2017. In 2019, the Graslie Curiosity Internship was named in her honor. In 2021, she received an honorary doctorate of humane letters from Allegheny College.

YouTube
Graslie first appeared on YouTube in Hank Green's December 7, 2012 VlogBrothers video. In the video, she showed Green a wide variety of the specimens in the lab. Because of her ease in front of the camera, enthusiasm, and fan comments, Graslie was asked to create her own YouTube channel, "The Brain Scoop", as a part of the Nerdfighter family. The series debuted in January 2013. Her work on the series has been described by journalists as "articulate and hilarious" as well as enthusiastic.

Her November 27, 2013 video, which addressed the situation of women in STEM fields and inappropriate comments she received on her own postings, received a high level of media attention.  In January 2014, Amy Wallace, another science journalist, wrote an article about how science journalists can find themselves the target of ugly personal attacks, and the attacks on female journalists include criticisms of their sexual attractiveness, and their sexual morality.  Wallace included Graslie when she listed half a dozen fellow female science journalists whose reasonable, science-based articles on controversial topics had triggered crude abusive backlashes.

In 2014, her channel "The Brain Scoop" was listed on New Media Rockstars Top 100 Channels, ranked at #96.

In 2016, she documented the efforts to help the recovery of the Kankakee mallow, an endangered species that is endemic to Illinois. As the only floral species that is found exclusively in that state, she has started an effort to make it the official Illinois state flower, proposing that it replace the more generic Violet.

She left the channel and the Field Museum in early 2021. She then started her own channel and began releasing a series titled "Art Lab", focusing on the intersection between science and art.

Prehistoric Road Trip
In May 2019, Graslie announced that she would be producing and hosting a 3-hour series, on paleontology in the American Midwest, for PBS and WTTW; filming took place throughout 2019. Its title, Prehistoric Road Trip, and a summer 2020 airdate were announced in July 2019. The episodes aired June 17-July 1, 2020.

Species named in Graslie's honor

In recognition of her science education efforts, a  butterfly species, Wahydra graslieae, was named in her honor. The species is a grass skipper discovered in Ecuador.

Andy Warren, senior collections manager of the Florida Museum of Natural History's McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity, said "We thought that after spending years explaining why specimens are important and bringing natural history collections to the attention of the public, Emily was definitely someone who should have a bug named after her."

References

Further reading

Bibliography

External links
 "Emily & The Brain Scoop's Tumblr"
 The Brain Scoop's YouTube channel

American YouTubers
Johns Hopkins University alumni
Living people
People associated with the Field Museum of Natural History
People from Rapid City, South Dakota
University of Montana alumni
Educational and science YouTubers
1989 births

Emily Graslie


V. "Valhalla" Vale (born February 4, 1944) is an American editor, writer, interviewer, musician and, as Vale Hamanaka, was keyboardist for the initial configuration of Blue Cheer, before it became famous as a power trio. He is the publisher and primary contributor to books and magazines published by his company, RE/Search Publications. Vale is the host of the television talk show Counter Culture Hour on Public-access television cable TV channel 29 in San Francisco. The show is edited by his partner Marian Wallace. Vale is Japanese American.

Early life
A third-generation Japanese American, Vale was born on February 4, 1944 at the Jerome War Relocation Center to actor Kiyoshi Conrad Hamanaka and Mary Takaoka of the Vaudeville group Taka Sisters (Myrtle, Mary, Midi). The Taka Sisters broke up after the murder of Vale's aunt Midi Taka in 1936. Vale has two younger half-sisters; musician/singer Lionelle Hamanaka, and children's author and illustrator Sheila Hamanaka.

By 1966 Vale received a bachelor's degree in English Literature at University of California, Berkeley and moved to Haight-Ashbury. In 1970, he moved to an apartment in North Beach, where he continues to live today.

Publishing
In 1977, while working at City Lights Bookstore, with $100 donated each by Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti, he began publication of Search and Destroy, a San Francisco-based zine documenting the then-current punk subculture. In 1980, he began publication of RE/Search, a tabloid format zine focusing on various counterculture and underground topics, with financial help from Geoff Travis of Rough Trade Records and actress/film director Betty Thomas. At the same time he also started his own typesetting business, allowing for a day job to fund his publishing exploits and guaranteeing high quality typography and design for his magazines and books.

The 1980s saw the expansion of RE/Search books from tabloid-formatted zines to academically-modeled books. Vale published and contributed to many books on the subjects of pranks, obscure music and films, industrial culture, authors J. G. Ballard and William S. Burroughs, modern primitives, and many other underground topics.  In 1991, Vale sold his typography business to focus on publishing full-time.

Vale, influenced by and well read in cultural anthropology, describes his focus for writing: (I have) "this weird theory that there's only 1000 interesting people on this planet that I refer to as primary source thinkers. It's my job to find them. I'm just after something that lasts longer, not 'high sugar fluff' as Henry Rollins put it. I want something I don't get right away. One of my favorite phrases, and I heard this from William Burroughs, is 'belief is the enemy of knowledge'."

Along with writing and distributing, Vale tours nationally giving talks about his career and provides guidance to DIY and Indie artists about book publishing. In 2012, Henry Rollins interviewed Vale at LA ZineFest.

Newsletter
As of 2017, both artist and musician Florian-Ayala Fauna and science fiction author Bruce Sterling are sponsors for V. Vale's RE/Search newsletter.

Recordings
During the coronavirus pandemic, Vale began to record songs with his wife, Marian Wallace. He played the Yamaha spinet piano. Wallace sang and produced the songs. This resulted in a 12-track digital album, Lockdown Lullabies, was released in 2020. The album production was covered by the San Francisco Chronicle.

Media

 Vale is featured in the 2016 nerd culture documentary Traceroute by Johannes Grenzfurthner, a frequent collaborator of RE/Search.
 Vale is one of the interview subjects in William S. Burroughs: A Man Within.

References

External links

 RE/Search Publications
 V. Vale interviewed on the R.U. Sirius Show on 2/7/2006
 V. Vale interviewed on the R.U. Sirius Show on 11/12/05

1944 births
American writers of Japanese descent
Japanese-American internees
Blue Cheer members
Living people
UC Berkeley College of Letters and Science alumni
People from Drew County, Arkansas
Writers from Arkansas
Writers from San Francisco
20th-century American writers
21st-century American writers
Punk writers

V. Vale


Michael Weiner (born 17 June 1949) is a professor of East Asian history and international studies and is the director of international studies at Soka University of America (SUA).  Previously, he was  professor and chair of Asian studies at San Diego State University.  He received his B.A. from Sophia University in Tokyo, and his Ph.D. from University of Sheffield, England.

Positions held
Michael Weiner taught at University of Sheffield from 1984 to 2000.  He was a lecturer from 1984 to 1988, a senior lecturer from 1989 to 1994, and a reader from 1995 to 2000.  He assumed the position of professor and chair of Asian studies at San Diego State University from 2000 to 2005.  He became professor of East Asian history and international studies as well as director of international studies at SUA in 2005.

Research
Weiner's research interests include eugenics and social policy in modern Japan, global migration, and minority rights in Japan, among others. Following is a list of his publications:

 The Comintern and International Communism, 1919–1943, Macmillan, 1996, pp. 158–190.
 "Destination Japan: Migration in the twentieth century," specially commissioned article for the inaugural issue of Pan-Japan; The International Journal of the Japanese Diaspora, Spring, 2000, pp. 49–74.
 "Discourses of Race and Nation in Pre-1945 Japan," Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 18, No 3, July 1995, pp 433–56.
 The Internationalization of Japan, Routledge, 1993
 "Japan in the Age of Migration," in M. Douglass and G. Roberts, eds., Japan and Global Migration: Foreign workers and the advent of a multicultural society, Routledge, 2003, pp. 52–70
 Japan's Minorities; the illusion of homogeneity, Routledge, 1997
 Origins of the Korean Community in Japan, Humanities Press, 1989
 "Out of the Very Stone; Korean hibakusha," Immigrants and Minorities, Vol. 14, No 1, April 1995, pp 2–25.
 Race and Migration in Imperial Japan, Routledge, 1994
 Race, Ethnicity and Migration in Modern Japan (3 volumes), Routledge, 2005

Honors and awards
 Reischauer Fellowship, Harvard University, 1991–1992
 ESRC Fellow, 1997–2000
 Managing Editor, Japan Forum 1995-2000
 Director, Japan Studies Institute, 2000–2005

External links
Michael Weiner, Ph.D. Faculty Page
faculty.soka.edu Page

Nationality missing
Historians of Japan
Alumni of the University of Sheffield
Academics of the University of Sheffield
San Diego State University faculty
Harvard Fellows
1949 births
Living people
Historians of Asia
Place of birth missing (living people)
Sophia University alumni

Michael Weiner (professor)


Henry Lee "Gizmo" Williams (born May 31, 1962) is a former American and Canadian football kick returner and wide receiver.  After his retirement at the end of the 2000 CFL season, Williams worked as a motivational speaker.

Born into an impoverished family, Williams was raised by his brother Edgar after the death of both his parents as a child, and, after Edgar's death, by an aunt.  Despite his background, Williams was able to be a successful high school football player, and was able to enroll at East Carolina University.  After graduating from East Carolina, Williams was signed by the Memphis Showboats of the United States Football League.  While playing in Memphis, future Professional Football Hall of Famer Reggie White gave the shifty Williams the nickname "Gizmo", which would stick with him through his professional career.

Williams was released by the Showboats after one season in the USFL in 1985, and signed with the Edmonton Eskimos of the Canadian Football League.  With the exception of a half-season with the Philadelphia Eagles in 1989, Williams would play with the Eskimos for every CFL season from 1986 to 2000.

Standing a diminutive , Williams was a prototypical Canadian football kick returner in many ways. He saw some success as a receiver, breaking 900 yards receiving on two occasions, but was best known for his work as a returner.  Williams soon developed a trademark of doing a flip in the air after every score, which quickly became associated with Williams in the eyes of the fans.  During his career with the Eskimos, Williams set more than 20 CFL records, and  is still the league's all-time leader in both punt and kickoff return yardage, and holds the record for most kick return touchdowns with 31 (26 on punt returns, two on kickoff returns and three on missed field goal returns).  Perhaps his most memorable was a 115-yard missed-field-goal return for a touchdown in the 1987 Grey Cup.

In 2002, Williams's #2 was put on the Edmonton Eskimos Wall of Honour.  Four years later, Williams was inducted into the Canadian Football Hall of Fame with a class that included former teammate and quarterback Matt Dunigan.  In November 2006 he was voted one of the CFL's Top 50 players (#25) of the league's modern era by Canadian sports network The Sports Network/TSN.

Williams has a family history of multiple sclerosis, which killed his mother in December 1969 when Williams was six, as well as seven of his ten siblings.  Williams's father died in a house fire at Christmas of 1970.

See also
 List of NCAA major college yearly punt and kickoff return leaders

References

External links
 MCP Talent page
 Bio on CFL.ca

1962 births
Living people
African-American players of American football
African-American players of Canadian football
American football return specialists
American football wide receivers
Calgary Stampeders players
Canadian Football Hall of Fame inductees
Canadian football return specialists
Canadian football wide receivers
East Carolina Pirates football players
Edmonton Elks players
Memphis Showboats players
Northwest Mississippi Rangers football players
Philadelphia Eagles players
Players of American football from Memphis, Tennessee
Players of Canadian football from Memphis, Tennessee
21st-century African-American people
20th-century African-American sportspeople

Gizmo Williams


The River Stour Trust is a registered charity and waterway restoration group. It was founded in 1968 to protect and enhance the right of the public to navigate the River Stour, Suffolk, England. It is led by volunteers who are dedicated to its aims and objectives of restoring the navigation from Sudbury to the Sea (a distance of approximately 24.5 miles/37 km).

Since its formation, the Trust has restored Flatford and Dedham Locks, Flatford Barge Dock (in association with the National Trust), rescued an original River Stour lighter, and restored the Quay Basin, Gasworks Cut and 19th century Granary Building, which has become the headquarters for the Trust. In 1997, the Trust opened the new Millennium Lock at Great Cornard (creating through navigation from Sudbury to Great Henny) and in 2007, opened its new Visitor & Education Centre (adjacent to Cornard Lock) to offer facilities for visiting schools, other groups and the local community.

Since 2007, Griff Rhys Jones, the well-known actor, director, writer and producer, has been a Vice President of the River Stour Trust. He says, "I am a strong supporter of the River Stour Trust and everything to do with it. The riverway is so beautiful and unspoilt, especially with the wildlife and water-lilies and bullrushes, it is just terrific. It is a great example of why rivers should be open to people...I salute the River Stour Trust for opening the locks...it is supposed to be a river that traffic travels on."

Boating on the River Stour
The River Stour is a statutory navigation and a right to travel by boat along the whole river is still preserved. Almost half of the river is now re-opened for use as a through navigation for boats (from Sudbury to Great Henny on the upper reach and from Stratford St Mary to Brantham on the lower reach). However, the remaining locks, which provided through navigation on the unrestored central section, are largely derelict or have disappeared, and the Trust continues to work towards restoring these and other obstacles to enable boats to navigate the whole river.

Bylaws provide that from Ballingdon bridge (Sudbury) to Great Henny, boats with engines may be used, but are subject to a strict speed limit of 4 mph, which does not create wash or damage to the banks. However, boats with engines are precluded from using the river below Great Henny, unless they were licensed at the time of the Anglian Water Act 1977. Currently, only boats light enough to maneuver around many the obstacles may use the river below Great Henny. This restricts most of the river to canoes although, even for such small craft, the river is not sufficiently navigable to allow easy passage along its entire lower section.

River Stour Trust volunteers offer boat trips from Easter to October so that members of the public can enjoy the beauty of Constable country.

Sudbury to the Sea
Every year the Trust organises the Sudbury to the Sea event. Canoes, kayaks and small boats take part in the two-day event, which covers the non-tidal length of the river. The event starts at the Trust Headquarters (The Granary) in Sudbury, with lunch at Bures and an overnight camp at Wissington.  The second day takes the participants through Stratford St Mary where the Trust is restoring the lock, and on through the heart of Constable Country via Dedham and Flatford before ending at Cattawade.  The event attracts between 200 and 300 boats.  While the Trusts event celebrates this scenic navigation with a 'party' vibe, those seeking a more tranquil experience are able to paddle the navigation at any time of the year using their own boats (subject to possession of an EA License) or with any of the hire operators working along the river including; Outdoor Hire Centre Network who offer self-guided trips and River Stour Boating CIC who offer guided trips.

Stratford Lock
The lock at Stratford St Mary was restored over a period of more than 10 years and completed in 2018.
It is accessible from the village of Stratford St Mary by a footpath which starts near the wier.

References

External links

 riverstour.com website
  part of the Bures Village website

Protected areas of Suffolk
Organisations based in Suffolk
Organizations established in 1967

River Stour Trust


This is a list of characters in Isaac Asimov's Foundation series.
Through the centuries-spanning nature of the Foundation series, the lives of its various characters are limited to one or two of its nine episodes. In spite of the great success of the series, its characters have been described as "undifferentiated and one-dimensional" speaking with an "impoverished vocabulary". Their consciousness "shows absolutely no historical development and hence fails to evoke in the reader any feeling for the future universe they inhabit". Characterization in general is subordinated to the overall conception of Asimov's project.

Through the eyes of the characters the inevitability of the forces of history, made manifest in the Seldon Plan, is demonstrated to the reader repeatedly. Charles Elkins sees the characters in Foundation not as "tragic heroes. They are nondescript pawns, unable to take their destiny into their own hands." Only those elite few characters who understand the Plan can be considered free, with the Mule through his non-human psychic powers as the only exception. But while Elkins attributes the Foundation series a sense of "pervading fatalism", Nicolas David Gevers and James Gunn point out that the obstacles presented in Asimov's galactic history are overcome by active individual characters "through the initiative and competence which the Foundations nurture in their citizens". Donald E. Palumbo asserts that it is exactly the "flatness of character and setting" which permit the series "to be a masterpiece". The heroism and depth of individual characters is consciously taken back by Asimov for the true hero of the series to stand out: "the sublime history of humankind itself".

Arkady Darell
Future novelist Arcadia "Arkady" Darell is the "concluding key figure" of the original Foundation trilogy.

Ammel Brodrig
Ammel Brodrig is an influential courtier and Privy Secretary at the court of Cleon II.   He is depicted as a particularly corrupt character, lacking even the elementary honesty of honourable corruption. Nicolas David Gevers saw Brodrig as based on Narses, an important member of the court of Byzantine emperor Justinian I, "who dogged Belisarius" - the model for Bel Riose - "and ultimately replaced him as general".

Bel Riose
Bel Riose was the last strong General of the Galactic Empire, Commander of the legendary Twentieth Fleet, who eventually came to be known as "the Last of the Imperials."

Asimov loosely based Bel Riose on Flavius Belisarius, a great general of the Roman Empire during the 6th century AD. Like Riose, Belisarius served a strong emperor, Justinian the Great, in an empire that had declined from its peak (Belisarius was one of the people, along with Justinian, known as "the last of the Romans", i.e., imperials); helped it to recapture much of its lost territory, including Rome itself; and was called back on baseless suspicion that he was angling for the Imperial throne. Unlike Riose, Belisarius was not executed but retired (and, according to unsubstantiated legend, was blinded and cast out of Constantinople as a beggar).

James Gunn saw Riose as "the only character who stares in the face of determinism". While his failure against the forces of historic necessity might seem depressing, the fact that he is not the viewpoint character changes the impact of the story: the reader sympathizes with the Foundation. Riose's failure is depicted as desirable, as it ensures the Foundation's survival.

Cleon II
Cleon II is the last strong monarch of the Galactic Empire. As the Galactic Empire is based on the Roman Empire, and Bel Riose is based on Belisarius, Cleon II is clearly based on the Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian I. His name however derives from Cleon, an Athenian politician of the Peloponnesian War (just as Eastern Roman emperors soon after Justinian used Greek names). In the 2021 TV adaptation, all Emperor Cleons are genetic clones of Emperor Cleon I, but this is not in Asimov's books, which do not include cloning.

Dagobert IX
Emperor Dagobert IX is one of the last emperors of the Galactic Empire.

The reason why Asimov gave this character the name Dagobert is not too clear, but it is likely a reference to Frankish kings of the Merovingian dynasty.

Nicolas David Gevers pointed out the parallels between the character of Dagobert and the destitute last Western Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus. In this reading, the rebel Gilmer, the character responsible for the sack of Trantor, is equated with Alaric, king of the Visigoths.

Dors Venabili
Dors Venabili is a robot, a character of Prelude to Foundation and Forward the Foundation, and a good friend, protector, and later wife of Hari Seldon.

At face value, Venabili is a woman two years younger than Seldon, in her own words "not very good-looking". She tells Seldon that she is a historian from Cinna, and, before her involvement in The Flight, Venabili taught history classes at Streeling University on Trantor.

Ebling Mis

Ebling Mis is a psychologist from Terminus, appearing in the second part of Foundation and Empire, who tried to reproduce Hari Seldon's psychohistory in order to reveal the Second Foundation and warn them about The Mule.

Gaal Dornick
Gaal Dornick became Seldon's biographer. He makes appearances in several other stories of the Foundation series, including  Foundation's Triumph. In the TV series, Gaal Dornick is female.

He is a young mathematician, newly awarded his Doctorate, and originates from Synnax. He has been invited to Trantor by Hari Seldon to join the psychohistory project. He meets Seldon shortly after arrival on Trantor, but is already under surveillance by agents of the Committee of Public Safety. Seldon reveals to him that psychohistory has predicted the fall of the Imperium to be unavoidable, and that exile to the remote planet of Terminus is in fact Seldon's real goal. Gaal is arrested and interrogated. He eventually moves to Terminus to continue Seldon's legacy.

Hari Seldon

Hari Seldon is the founder of the two Foundations. He is a psychohistorian who, through the calculations of psychohistory, predicts the downfall of 'The Empire' and a potential 30,000-year interregnum. He sets up the First and Second Foundations to reduce this huge gap from 30,000 years down to 1000 years. Following a trial, Hari Seldon and his 100,000 followers are exiled to the planet Terminus where the First Foundation is set up. Unknown to many, a Second Foundation is set up at a separate location. Clues to its existence come from a statement by Hari Seldon of it being at 'Star's End'. Many searches are made for this and several of the characters have their own theories about where this is.

Hober Mallow
Hober Mallow is one of the great heroes of the Foundation. He did not hail from the Foundation's home-planet of Terminus, but from Smyrno, a hot and dry planet, whose inhabitants are not held in high regard by foundation members. Master Trader Mallow (as he was titled at the time) caused a change in tides for the Foundation when he opened up trade with the Korelian Republic, offering them the nuclear gadgets of the Foundation, without the Korelians having to accept science as a religion, which was the usual Foundation requirement. After being exonerated after a trumped-up murder trial, he was elected Mayor of Terminus. While serving this role, he resolved the Korelian Crisis, by simple virtue of inaction, letting "the forces of history resolve the crisis". This inaction created a slow but growing turmoil, as Korelians' nuclear-powered devices started slowly degrading. The lack of service and replacements fomented economic revolt, over time. His influence moved the Foundation from an era where it used religion to spread its influence, to an era where trade was what primarily grew the reach of the Foundation.

Homir Munn
Homir Munn is a librarian and owns one of the biggest collections of information about the Mule.

Munn is one of five conspirators central to the plot of Second Foundation, who plan to find the location of the Second Foundation.

Homir Munn "is a stutterer described as "lanky," "ill-at-ease," and "introverted." Marcia J. Myers found that this "stereotype behavior gives this librarian's image an overall rather negative rating".

Jord Fara
Jord Fara is a member of the board of trustees of the Foundation of the Encyclopedia Galactica in its early years. Fara weighs three-hundred pounds.

Lewis Pirenne
Lewis Pirenne is Chairman of the board of trustees of the Foundation of the Encyclopedia Galactica on Terminus, about fifty years after its establishment. Salvor Hardin eventually takes over when it is clear that the Foundation needs to be led by a politician rather than a scientist.  Doubtless his name refers to the famous historian Henri Pirenne.

Limmar Ponyets
Limmar Ponyets is Master Trader of the Foundation who obtains Eskel Gorov's release by supplying the Askonians with a transmuter capable of converting iron into gold.

Lundin Crast
Lundin Crast is Member of the Board of Trustees of the Encyclopedia Committee.

Poly Verisof
Poly Verisof is High Priest of Anacreon and Foundation Ambassador. He leads Hardin's mob to the Anacreon Royal Palace.

Salvor Hardin
Salvor Hardin is the first mayor of Terminus City, the sole inhabited location on the planet Terminus.

The Mule
The Mule is a central character in Foundation and Empire (1952) and Second Foundation (1953).

The Mule's name is a reference to the sterility of mules, since he is also genetically sterile. Without a child, the Mule's empire ends soon after his death.

According to his autobiography In Memory Yet Green (1979), Asimov modeled the Mule's physical appearance on Leonard Meisel, a friend at the World War II-era Navy Yard in Philadelphia. In keeping with the Foundation series being based on the Roman Empire, the Mule has historical parallels with Attila the Hun, Tamerlane, and Charlemagne; he has also been compared to the Roman Emperor Augustus, Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and several other tyrants and demagogues of recent history.

Tomaz Sutt
Tomaz Sutt is Member of the Board of Trustees of the Encyclopedia Committee.

Yate Fulham
Yate Fulham is Member of the Board of Trustees of the Encyclopedia Committee.

Yohan Lee
Yohan Lee is one of Salvor Hardin's advisors and friends.

References

Foundation

List of Foundation series characters


A mother goddess is a goddess that is a personification of motherhood, or of fertility. Sometimes, they are called mother earth or earth mother. This concept is usually coupled with a sky father, or father sky. Very often, the mother goddess is also the mother of other deities.

Gods and goddesses

Mother goddess


was a railway operator in Japan. The company's name, which consists of "Kitakinki" meaning northern Kinki region and "Tango" meaning Tango Province, is occasionally abbreviated as KTR.

KTR was a so-called "third sector" company jointly funded by local governments and private entities. Its leading shareholder is the Kyoto Prefecture government with a 44.71% ownership. It headquarters in Fukuchiyama, Kyoto Prefecture.

In 2015, the company ceased to operate the trains on its own lines when Willer Trains Inc., under the brand name Kyoto Tango Railway, succeeded this function from KTR. KTR continues to own the tracks and rolling stock.

Lines
KTR owns the following two regional railway lines:
 Miyafuku Line (in Kyoto Prefecture, 30.4 km)
 Miyazu Line (in Kyoto Prefecture and Hyōgo Prefecture, 83.6 km)

History
In 1982, the company was incorporated as  for the purpose of the construction and operation of the Miyafuku Line, the construction of which was suspended due to financial difficulties of the Japanese National Railways (JNR). The Miyafuku Line was completed in 1988. In the same year, local governments selected the company as the operator of the existing Miyazu Line, which was to be separated from West Japan Railway Company (JR West) in 1990.

Following the downturn in the business, investors including the Kyoto Prefecture government decided to introduce a new scheme of business, in which a separate company would operate trains on the tracks of KTR. Willer Group, being the only applicant for this proposal, was selected as the operator and later established Willer Trains Inc. The transfer of business took effect on April 1, 2015.

 1982-09-22 – Incorporation as Miyafuku Railway Corporation
 1982-12-24 – Issuance of railway business license of the Miyafuku Line
 1988-06-22 – Shareholders' approval to the purchase of Miyazu Line business
 1988-07-16 – Inauguration of the Miyafuku Line
 1989-09-29 – Issuance of railway business license of the Miyazu Line
 1989-08-01 – Change of corporate name to Kitakinki Tango Railway Corporation
 1990-04-01 – Transfer of business of the Miyazu Line from JR West to KTR
 1996-03-16 – Electrification of the entire Miyafuku Line and Miyazu–Amanohashidate segment of the Miyazu Line
 2007-09-01 – Relocation of corporate headquarters from a prefecture government building in Kyoto to a JR West building in Fukuchiyama
 2015-04-01 – Transfer of train operation function to Willer Trains

References

External links

Railway companies of Japan
Rail transport in Kyoto Prefecture
Rail transport in Hyōgo Prefecture
Railway companies established in 1982
1982 establishments in Japan
Japanese third-sector railway lines

Kitakinki Tango Railway


The Uncomfortable Dead (or Inconvenient Dead) (orig. Spanish Muertos incómodos) is a Mexican novel written in conjunction by guerrilla spokesman Subcomandante Marcos of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) and Mexico City crime writer Paco Ignacio Taibo II.  The novel is written in the so-called "four hands" method in which one author writes a chapter or segment of the novel, handing it over to the other author who writes the next chapter or segment in response.  The method has been compared to a game of ping pong between the authors.

The concept for the novel and its unusual writing method was suggested in a letter from Marcos to Taibo II, outlining the "rules and regulations".  Within a week of accepting the proposal, the first chapter appeared in La Jornada, an important Mexico City newspaper.  The result was nine chapters of material published in La Jornada from November 2004 to February 2005, with the newspaper's editors promising a complete edition of the work in its native Spanish by reputed Spanish language publisher Editorial Planeta.  The novel will also be released in book format in Italy, France, United States, Greece, Romania and Turkey.

Plot
The story follows Elías Contreras, a Zapatista investigator from Chiapas (Marcos' protagonist), and Héctor Belascorán Shayne, a private detective from Mexico City (a recurring protagonist in Taibo's detective novels), as they try to unravel the mystery of a dead man leaving messages on answering machines, finding out who Morales is. During the book, and especially during the chapters written by Marcos, the reader is introduced to many characters, some of whom only appear for a very short time. The book looks at the politics of Mexico and at neo-liberalism.

References

External links
Online text—link is broken
2007 review
Zapatista detective Review of the English translation, Alberto Manguel, The Guardian, 27 January 2007

2004 novels
Mexican novels
Zapatista Army of National Liberation
Separatism in Mexico
Novels first published in serial form
Works originally published in Mexican newspapers
Novels set in Mexico City

The Uncomfortable Dead


Jean-Jacques Renouard, seigneur de Villayer (24 June 1607, Nantes – 5 March 1691, Paris) was a member of the French Conseil d'État, which had been delegated special legal authorities by the absolutist reigning King Louis XIV.

In 1653 as the tenant of the Paris City Post, Renouard de Villayer ordered post boxes to be set up at different places in Paris. Letters, prepaid with a uniform postage of 1 sol, could be put in these boxes and were then delivered inside of the city within the same day. The receipts (billet de port payé), that were issued for this purpose and had to be attached to the letters as postage, are considered to be early precursors of the postage stamp. There are no examples still existing today. The so-called Petite Poste was an economic failure, but was later successfully imitated in other European cities (for example by the London Penny Post as of 1680).

In 1659, Renouard de Villayer became a member of the Académie française, succeeding Abel Servien.

In 1944, the family coat of arms of Renouard de Villayer was depicted on a commemorative stamp by La Poste, the French post office, on the Day of the Postage Stamp.

References

1607 births
1691 deaths
Politicians from Nantes
Members of the Académie Française
Postal pioneers

Jean-Jacques Renouard de Villayer