Mikhaíl Bulgakov  ( – 10 March 1940) was a Soviet Russian writer and playwright active in the first half of the 20th century.

He is best known for his novel The Master and Margarita, which has been called one of the masterpieces of the 20th century.

Much of Bulgakov's work is best described as magic realism, where fantasy intrudes into what seemed at first to be a straightforward everyday scene.

Life
Mikhail Bulgakov was born in Kiev on May 15 1891. Two of his grandparents were priests and his father was an assistant professor. At school Bulgakov developed an interest in Russian writing, European writing, the theatre and the opera.

In 1913 Bulgakov married Tatiana Lappa. When the First World War started he volunteered with the Red Cross as a doctor. Bulgakov was sent to an area where fighting was heavy, and he was badly injured at least twice. In 1916, he graduated from the Medical School of Kiev University. Bulgakov then joined the White Army with his brothers. They fought against the communists who were taking control of Russia. Bulgakov also fought in the Ukrainian People's Army.

After the Russian Civil War, Mikhail and his brothers went to the Caucasus in Western Russia. Mikhail worked as a journalist. Many members of Bulgakov's family left Russia for Western Europe. Bulgakov was not allowed into other countries, however, as he had a disease: typhus.

The injuries Bulgakov received in the First World War continued to cause him a lot of pain. To ease the pain, he started injecting himself with morphine. He eventually became addicted. He wrote a book about this period called Morphine, which was finally released in 1926.

Bulgakov left medicine behind as he was now sure he wanted to be a writer. He moved to Moscow with his wife Tatiana in 1921. Bulgakov eventually divorced Tatiana, and married Lyubov' Belozerskaya in 1924. He published a number of works in the early 1920s. By 1927, however, he was criticised by people who said he was writing against the Soviet government. By 1929, Bulgakov's writing career was in ruins. Government censorship stopped his work and plays being released in the USSR.

In 1931, Bulgakov got married again, to Yelena Shilovskaya. Yelena inspired one of the main characters in Bulgakov's most famous novel, The Master and Margarita. In the last ten years of his life, Bulgakov continued to write novels, plays and translate  works in other languages. Many could still not be published in the USSR of the 1930s. Those that were published were often heavily criticised.

Bulgakov did not like the way Soviet system prevented his works being published. He wrote a letter to the Soviet government asking permission to leave the country. He even spoke directly to Stalin on the telephone, asking to be allowed to leave the USSR. Stalin's reply implied that if Bulgakov attempted to leave, he would be killed.
Stalin did allow Bulgakov to work at a small theatre in Moscow, however. Bulgakov eventually worked at the Moscow Art Theatre, but the Soviet system still did not allow him to write as he really wanted. This, and the fact that he was not allowed to go abroad to see his family, made Bulgakov very unhappy.

Bulgakov died from problems with his kidneys on March 10, 1940. He was buried in the Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow.

The Master and Margarita

The novel is a satire on the Soviet society. It is covered by a plot in which two apparently unrelated stories alternate chapter by chapter. The first plot theme is the Devil in modern Moscow; the second is the story of Pontius Pilate. Connecting these two themes are Satan himself, and the Master with his devoted lover Margarita. The Master is an embittered author, whose historical novel about Pontius Pilate had been rejected by the Soviet literary committee MASSOLIT.

"On first reading the novel. readers were astonished by its daring satire and hilarious comedy".

By means of the plot, Bulgakov deals with some of the deepest issues in life: the interplay of good and evil, innocence and guilt, courage and cowardice.

Bulgakov started writing the novel in 1928. He burnt the first manuscript of the novel in 1930, seeing no future as a writer in the Soviet Union. The work was restarted in 1931. The second draft was completed in 1936 by which point all the major plot lines of the final version were in place. The third draft was finished in 1937. Bulgakov continued to revise the work, helped by his wife, but was forced to stop work on the fourth version four weeks before his death in 1940.

A censored version (12% of the text removed and still more changed) of the book was first published in Moscow magazine (#11, 1966 and #1, 1967). The text of all the omitted and changed parts, with indications of the places of modification, was published on a samizdat basis. In 1967 the publisher Posev (Frankfurt) printed a version produced with the aid of these inserts.

In the Soviet Union, the first complete version, prepared by Anna Saakyants, was published in 1973, based on the version of the beginning of 1940 proofread by the publisher. In 1989 the last version was prepared by literature expert Lidiya Yanovskaya based on all available manuscripts.

The novel is autobiographical. Bulgakov is the Master, and his trials and difficulties are very similar to those the Master faces. Margarita is  Yelena Shilovskaya, his long-term girlfriend who became his third wife. The burning of the Master's manuscript is just what Bulgakov did, and for the same reasons of despair and frustration. Of course a state literary committee prevented its publication, just as MASSOLIT did in the novel. And Bulgakov was fascinated with the confrontation between Christ and Pontius Pilate.

Bulgakov never lived to see the manuscript published, nor to enjoy his post-war fame. He died from nephrosclerosis (an inherited kidney disorder) on 10 March 1940. His father died of the same disease, and Bulgakov had long expected his fate.

In other media
The novel has been the basis of films, stage productions, opera, ballet, and television versions.

Works

Novels and short stories
The White Guard (1926, translation 1971; 2008) A novel about a life of a White Army officer's family in civil war Kiev. Set in Ukraine, beginning in late 1918, the novel concerns the fate of the Turbin family as the various armies of the Russian Civil War – the Whites, the Reds, the Imperial German Army, and Ukrainian nationalists – fight over the city of Kiev.
Great Soviet short stories (1962)
The Master and Margarita (1967)
Black snow: a theatrical novel (1967)
Heart of a Dog (1968) A biting satire of the New Soviet man written in 1925 at the height of the NEP period, when Communism appeared to be weakening in the Soviet Union.
A country doctor's notebook (1975)
Diaboliad and other stories (1990)
The Terrible news: Russian stories from the years following the Revolution (1990)
Notes on the cuff & other stories (1991)
The Fatal Eggs and other Soviet satire, 19181963 (1993). The lead title was a science fiction novella, written in 1924 and first published in 1925. The book became popular. It was attacked by some Soviet critics who saw it as a satire of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the leadership of Soviet Russia.
A dead man's memoir (a theatrical novel) (2007)

Theatre
The early plays of Mikhail Bulgakov, 1990
Peace plays: two, 1990
Zoya's apartment: a tragic farce in three acts, 1991
Six plays, 1991

Biography
Life of Mr. de Molière, 1962

References

1891 births
1940 deaths
Russian playwrights
Writers from Kyiv
Deaths from kidney disease

Mikhail Bulgakov


Adolf Schulten  (27 May 1870 – 19 March 1960) was a German historian and archaeologist.

Schulten was born in Elberfeld, Rhine Province, and received a doctorate in geology from the University of Bonn in 1892. He studied in Italy, Africa and Greece with support from the Institute of Archaeology. After obtaining the chair of ancient history at the University of Erlangen, he continued his work in Spain with great dedication and to this day is considered a key influence upon archaeological study in Spain.

Schulten led the 1905-12 excavations of the Celtiberian city of Numantia and the Roman camps nearby and in 1924 searched without success for the location of Tartessos. Starting in 1948 he worked on the ruins of Tarraco and in the localities of Mainake, Munda and Segeda.

In recognition of his work, Schulten received a doctorate honoris causa from the University of Barcelona and the Grand Cross of the Civil Order of Alfonso X, the Wise, from the Spanish state in 1940. He was a member of the Institutes of Archaeology and History at the Patria de Módena and was a lead writer for the Austrian Institute of Archaeology and the Academy of the History of Madrid.

His works feature Numantia, in Die Keltiberer und ihre Kriege mit Rom (1914); Tartessos (1924); Viriato; Sertorius; L'amour, l'amour est la véritable clef de l'Histoire; Los cántabros y astures y su guerra con Roma (1943) is Schulten's most important monograph on his excavations.

External links

 Adolf Schulten. Biografías y Vidas
 Historiografia Sobre Tartessos en el Siglo XX  (Historiography of Tartessos in the 20th Century) with photograph

1870 births
1960 deaths
People from Elberfeld
People from the Rhine Province
Archaeologists from North Rhine-Westphalia
20th-century German historians
University of Bonn alumni
Academic staff of the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg
Commanders Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Recipients of the Civil Order of Alfonso X, the Wise
German male non-fiction writers
Writers from Wuppertal

Adolf Schulten


Percy Archer Clive, DL (13 March 1873 – 5 April 1918) was a British army officer and Liberal Unionist Party politician.

Percy Clive was the eldest son of Charles Meysey Bolton Clive of Whitfield, Herefordshire, by his marriage to Lady Katherine Feilding, daughter of William Feilding, 7th Earl of Denbigh. He was educated at Eton and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, and was commissioned into the Grenadier Guards as a second lieutenant in 1891. He was appointed as a Deputy Lieutenant of Herefordshire in December 1894,
and was attached to the Niger Field Force from 1897 to 1899 based in Lagos, rising to the rank of captain. In May 1899 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society.

He was elected to the Commons as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the Ross division of Herefordshire in the "khaki election" of 1900, while fighting in the Second Boer War. He did not return to England to take his seat until February 1902, and in June that year was Private Secretary for Parliamentary purposes to Lord George Hamilton, Secretary of State for India. In December 1903 he was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to E G Pretyman, Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty.

He was unseated at the 1906 general election, which saw the Liberal Party win a landslide victory. He returned to Parliament at a by-election in January 1908, and remained Ross's MP until his death. Following a merger of the Unionist parties in 1912 he became a Conservative.

He returned to the army in World War I and was wounded twice. Clive was awarded the Legion of Honour, and the Croix de Guerre, and was twice Mentioned in Despatches. As a lieutenant-colonel of the Grenadier Guards he was killed in action when attached to the 1/5th Lancashire Fusiliers, 5 April 1918 at Bucquoy. Memorial services were held on 17 April at St Margaret's, Westminster and Hereford Cathedral. He is commemorated on the Arras Memorial. Clive is commemorated on Panel 8 of the Parliamentary War Memorial in Westminster Hall, one of 22 MPs that died during World War I to be named on that memorial. Clive is one of 19 MPs who fell in the war who are commemorated by heraldic shields in the Commons Chamber. A further act of commemoration came with the unveiling in 1932 of a manuscript-style illuminated book of remembrance for the House of Commons, which includes a short biographical account of the life and death of Clive.

His elder son Major Meysey George Dallas Clive (1907–1943) was killed with the Grenadier Guards in World War II in North Africa on 1 May 1943. His younger son Lewis Clive (1910–1938) won a gold medal for rowing at the 1932 Olympics and was a member of the International Brigade in the Spanish Civil War, killed in action in August 1938.

Some of his military papers were deposited in the King's College London archives in 1997 but his family retain others.

References

1873 births
1918 deaths
People educated at Eton College
Graduates of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst
Liberal Unionist Party MPs for English constituencies
Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies
UK MPs 1906–1910
UK MPs 1910
UK MPs 1910–1918
Grenadier Guards officers
British Army personnel of the Second Boer War
British Army personnel of World War I
British military personnel killed in World War I
Companions of the Distinguished Service Order
Recipients of the Legion of Honour
Deputy Lieutenants of Herefordshire
Military personnel from Herefordshire
Politicians from Herefordshire
Fellows of the Royal Geographical Society

Percy Clive


Graeco-Armenian (or Helleno-Armenian) is the hypothetical common ancestor of Greek (or Hellenic) and Armenian branches that postdates Proto-Indo-European language. Its status is somewhat similar to that of the Italo-Celtic grouping: each is widely considered plausible without being accepted as established communis opinio. The hypothetical Proto-Graeco-Armenian stage would need to date to the 3rd millennium BC and would be only barely different from either late Proto-Indo-European or Graeco-Armeno-Aryan.

History
The Graeco-Armenian hypothesis originated in 1924 with Holger Pedersen, who noted that agreements between Armenian and Greek lexical cognates are more common than between Armenian and any other Indo-European language. During the mid-to-late 1920s, Antoine Meillet further investigated morphological and phonological agreements and postulated that the parent languages of Greek and Armenian were dialects in immediate geographical proximity to their parent language, Proto-Indo-European. Meillet's hypothesis became popular in the wake of his Esquisse d'une grammaire comparée de l'arménien classique.

G. R. Solta does not go as far as postulating a Proto-Graeco-Armenian stage but concludes that the lexicon and the morphology clearly make Greek the language that is the most closely related to Armenian. Eric Hamp supports the Graeco-Armenian thesis and even anticipates a time that "we should speak of Helleno-Armenian" (the postulate of a Graeco-Armenian proto-language).

James Clackson is more reserved, considers the evidence of a Graeco-Armenian subgroup to be inconclusive and believes Armenian to be in a larger Graeco-Armeno-Aryan family. Hrach Martirosyan argues that the case for a common Graeco-Armenian language is not as strong as it is for Indo-Iranian and Balto-Slavic by citing Clackson's "thorough, albeit somewhat hypercritical treatment". Martirosyan suggests that "[t]he contact relations between Proto-Greek and Proto-Armenian may have been intense, but these similarities are considered insufficient to be viewed as evidence for discrete Proto-Graeco-Armenian." In a 2013 study, Martirosyan made a preliminarily conclusion that "Armenian, Greek, (Phrygian) and Indo-Iranian were dialectally close to each other. Within this hypothetical dialect group, Proto-Armenian was situated between Proto-Greek (to the west) and Proto-Indo-Iranian (to the east). The Indo-Iranians then moved eastwards, while the Proto-Armenians and Proto-Greeks remained in a common geographical region for a long period and developed numerous shared innovations."

Evaluation of the hypothesis is tied up with the analysis of Indo-European languages, such as Phrygian and languages within the Anatolian subgroup (such as Hittite), many of which are poorly attested, but which were geographically located between the Greek and Armenian-speaking areas, and which would therefore be expected to have traits intermediate between the two. While Greek is attested from very early times, allowing a secure reconstruction of a Proto-Greek language dating to about the 3rd millennium BC, the history of Armenian is opaque where its earliest testimony is the 5th-century Bible translation of Mesrop Mashtots. Armenian has many loanwords showing traces of long language contact with Greek and Indo-Iranian languages; in particular, it is a satem language. Also, although Armenian and Attic (Ancient) Greek share a voiceless aspirate series, they originate from different PIE series (in Armenian from voiceless consonants and in Greek from the voiced aspirates).

In a 2005 publication, a group of linguists and statisticians, comprising Luay Nakhleh, Tandy Warnow, Donald Ringe and Steven N. Evans, compared quantitative phylogenetic linguistic methods and found that a Graeco-Armenian subgroup was supported by five procedures: maximum parsimony, weighted versus unweighted maximum compatibility, neighbor-joining, and the widely-criticized binary lexical coding technique (devised by Russell Gray and Quentin D. Atkinson).

An interrelated problem is whether a "Balkan Indo-European" subgroup of Indo-European exists, which would consist not only of Greek and Armenian but also Albanian and possibly dead languages, such as Ancient Macedonian and Phrygian. The Balkan subgroup, in turn, is supported by the lexico-statistical method of Hans J. Holm. However, Donald Ringe has stated and reiterated a finding, which surprised him, to the effect that Albanian was descended from a language that formed a clade with Proto-Germanic (rather than the other Balkan languages).

The authors of a 2022 genetic study argued that Armenian and Greek are related by "their shared Yamnaya heritage."

Criticism

Many modern scholars have rejected the Graeco-Armenian hypothesis, arguing that the linguistic proximity between the two languages has been overstated. Clackson asserts that the Armenian language is as close to Indo-Iranian as it is to Greek and Phrygian.  Ronald I. Kim has noted unique morphological developments connecting Armenian to Balto-Slavic. In sum, Clackson and Kim show that the Armenian language is closest to Indo-Iranian and Balto-Slavic, and the similarities in the development of Armenian with Greek and Phrygian are random and independent of each other.

See also
Armenian hypothesis
Proto-Armenian
Phrygians

References

Citations

Sources

1924 introductions
Indo-European languages
Indo-European linguistics
Armenian languages
Greek language

Graeco-Armenian


Erythrina herbacea, commonly known as the coral bean, Cherokee bean, Mamou plant in South Louisiana, red cardinal or cardinal spear, is a flowering shrub or small tree found throughout the southeastern United States and northeastern Mexico; it has also been reported from parts of Central America and, as an introduced species, from Pakistan.  Various other systematic names have been used for this plant in the past, including Erythrina arborea, Erythrina hederifolia, Erythrina humilis, Erythrina rubicunda, Corallodendron herbaceum and Xyphanthus hederifolius.

Description

Coral bean grows as a low shrub or small tree, reaching around  in height in areas that do not kill it back by freezing; elsewhere it may only reach .  Stems are covered in curved spines. The leaves are yellowish-green,  long and  wide.  The leaves are divided into three  arrowhead-shaped leaflets.  The bark is smooth and light gray. The tubular flowers are bright red and grow in long spikes, each flower being  long; the tree blooms from April to July. They are followed by  pods containing bright red seeds, from which the tree gets its name. The plant forms a woody caudex. Toxic alkaloids, including erysopine, erysothiopine, erysothiovine, erysovine, erythrinine, erythroresin, coralin, erythric acid, and hypaphorine, are found throughout the plant. The leaves were found to contain erysotrine and erythrartine. These cause paralysis upon ingestion, much like curare.

Habitat and range
Coral bean grows best in sandy soils and has moderate salt tolerance.  It is found in open woods, forest clearings, hammocks, and disturbed areas. In the United States, it ranges from southeastern North Carolina south to Florida and west to southeastern Oklahoma and eastern Texas. E. herbacea inhabits Tamaulipas in Mexico.

Erythrina herbacea is also found in some areas of the Dragoon Mountains in Southern Arizona, located around areas of the Cochise Stronghold and other older Indian remnants. It was  most likely introduced through trade from the Mogollon culture that existed in the area from 150 AD to 1400 AD, and possibly even the later Apache Indians who occupied the area in the 19th century. Confirmation of Erythrina herbacea, Dec. 27 2013, of Erythrina herbacea in the Council Rocks area of the Dragoon Mountains, a prominent area filled with signs of Mogollon culture. Further research of the surrounding area is needed for range confirmation.

Uses
Erythrina herbacea can be readily grown in gardens within its natural range.  Although its use in gardens is not particularly common, it is popular among those who do grow it as a source of early season color, for its hardiness (USDA Zones 7-10), and because it attracts hummingbirds.

Native American people had many medicinal uses for this plant, varying between nations and localities. Creek women used an infusion of the root for bowel pain; the Choctaw used a decoction of the leaves as a general tonic; the Seminole used an extract of the roots for digestive problems, and extracts of the seeds, or of the inner bark, as an external rub for rheumatic disorders.

In Mexico, the seeds are used as a rat poison, while a fish poison is made from the bark and leaves.

In some Central American countries the flowers are used in traditional cuisine. Mostly added to bean soup or meat patties, it is known for its mild narcotic properties.

References

Florida atlas of Vascular Plants: Erythrina herbaracea"
Plants data base entry: Erythrina herbacea

External links

herbacea
Flora of the Southeastern United States
Flora of Northeastern Mexico
Flora of Southeastern Mexico
Flora of Florida
Flora of Texas
Flora of Veracruz
Plants described in 1753
Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus
Plants used in traditional Native American medicine

Erythrina herbacea


Identity Thief is a 2013 comedy movie starring Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy. Bateman plays Sandy in this comedy. McCarthy plays Diana, the woman who stole Sandy's identity. Amanda Peet is also part of the cast.

This movie received negative reviews. Yet, it debuted at number one in the United States.

2013 comedy movies
English-language movies
American comedy movies

Identity Thief


Michael Maltese (February 6, 1908 – February 22, 1981) was an American story man for classic animated cartoon shorts. He is best known for working in the 1950s on a series of Merrie Melodies cartoons with director Chuck Jones. This collaboration produced many highly acclaimed animated shorts, including 4 of the top 5 "greatest cartoons" as judged by 1000 animation professionals; "What's Opera, Doc?" tops this list as the best animated short of all time.

Biography
The son of Italian immigrants, Maltese graduated from the National Academy of Design. He married Florence Sass in April 1936; writer Warren Foster served as best man. The couple moved to Los Angeles, where their first and only child, Brenda, was born on February 20, 1938.

Career
Michael Maltese began his career in animation as a cel painter at Fleischer Studios in 1935. A year later, he was fired for quickly moving himself up position after being promoted to an assistant animator.

After a brief stint at the Jam Handy Organization, Maltese was hired by Leon Schlesinger Productions in April 1937 as an in-betweener, and later a storyman due to everyone laughing at his jokes. Maltese would first appear on camera in the 1940 Porky Pig cartoon You Ought to Be in Pictures as a live-action guard at the Warner Bros. entrance gate, who winds up chasing the animated Porky around the Warners lot. The first cartoon he was credited for  Warner's was The Haunted Mouse (1941) by Tex Avery, although he wrote rejected gags for The Timid Toreador. Maltese, typically in collaboration with Tedd Pierce, would provide most of the stories for directors Friz Freleng and Chuck Jones from 1943 to 1946, following which he dissolved his partnership with Pierce and mainly worked with Jones. He and Jones collaborated on cartoons like the Academy Award-winning For Scent-imental Reasons (1949), featuring the character Pepé Le Pew, and the animated public health documentary, So Much for So Little (1949) which won that same year for "Best Documentary Short Subject". Maltese was also the voice of the Lou Costello-esque character in Wackiki Wabbit (1943) and the Benito Mussolini duck in The Ducktators (1942).

Some of his earlier works include The Wabbit Who Came to Supper and Fresh Hare, Hare Trigger (which introduced Yosemite Sam) and Baseball Bugs for Freleng  and Bear Feat, Rabbit of Seville, A Pest in the House, and Rabbit Fire for Jones. Some of his best-known cartoons are Feed the Kitty, Beep, Beep, Rabbit Seasoning, Don't Give Up the Sheep, Duck Amuck, Bully for Bugs, Bewitched Bunny, From A to Z-Z-Z-Z, and Beanstalk Bunny, all of which were directed by Jones. He also wrote One Froggy Evening, the first appearance of future Warner Brothers mascot Michigan J. Frog.

Some of his later Warner cartoons included Ali Baba Bunny, Robin Hood Daffy, the seminal What's Opera, Doc? and Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century for Jones, Rabbit Romeo and Fox-Terror for Robert McKimson and Person to Bunny (the final occasion Arthur Q. Bryan voiced Elmer Fudd) and Here Today, Gone Tamale (the only Speedy Gonzales cartoon he ever wrote) for Freleng. Following the shuttering of Jones's unit in 1953 (at the height of the 3-D craze), Maltese was hired by Walter Lantz Productions as writer of some Woody Woodpecker cartoons: Helter Shelter, Witch Crafty (co-written with Homer Brightman), Real Gone Woody, Square Shootin' Square and Bedtime Bedlam. He also is the writer of Chilly Willy's Academy Award-nominated theatrical short The Legend of Rockabye Point, directed by fellow Warner alumnus Tex Avery. Jones's unit would be resurrected early in 1954, with Maltese departing Lantz to rejoin his longtime collaborator several months afterwards; Maltese's first post-shutdown Warner credits by release would be on Rocket-Bye Baby and Gee Whiz-z-z-z-z-z-z, a Road Runner short.

Maltese departed Jones' unit for the second and final time in 1958, with his final credit appearing on 1961's The Mouse on 57th Street. From 1958  until 1972, he worked at Hanna-Barbera Productions on television cartoons such as The Yogi Bear Show, The Quick Draw McGraw Show, The Flintstones, and Wacky Races. He wrote for a total of 200 storyboards for Hanna-Barbera. He briefly worked with Jones at Sib-Tower 12 Productions on writing Tom and Jerry shorts from 1963 to 1965.

Maltese also wrote comic books published by Western Publishing, including for many of the Warner Brothers and Hanna-Barbera characters whose animated exploits he scripted.

 Death
Maltese died on February 22, 1981, at Los Angeles's Good Samaritan Hospital after a six-month bout with cancer, aged 73. His last work was in Duck Dodgers and the Return of the 24½th Century'', released in 1980.

References

External links

 1940 census record
Michael Maltese Papers at the University of Wyoming – American Heritage Center
Michael Maltese Papers Document Cartoon History at the AHC blog

1908 births
1981 deaths
20th-century American screenwriters
Animators from New York (state)
American male screenwriters
American storyboard artists
Animation screenwriters
Warner Bros. Cartoons voice actors
Hanna-Barbera people
Artists from New York City
Deaths from cancer in California
Burials at San Fernando Mission Cemetery
American people of Italian descent
Warner Bros. Discovery people
Warner Bros. people
Warner Bros. Cartoons people
National Academy of Design alumni
Screenwriters from New York (state)
20th-century American male writers
Walter Lantz Productions people

Michael Maltese


Guilty Pleasure  is the second studio album by American recording artist Ashley Tisdale. It was released on June 11, 2009, by Warner Bros. Records. The lead single from the album, "It's Alright, It's OK", was officially released in Canada on April 13, 2009. The album debuted at number 12 on the Billboard 200, selling 25,000 copies in its first week. The second single from Guilty Pleasure, "Crank It Up"  was released on October 9, 2009, in Europe. The album ranked #7 on Billboard's reader poll for album of the decade and best album of 2009.

Background and release
In April 2008, she said that she has recorded a few songs for the album and she would fully focus on the album after filming High School Musical 3. Tisdale has noted that the songs in the album have a message and a story that anyone can relate to, and hoped to reveal her "edgier" side with more mature songs. She also said the album was titled Guilty Pleasure because of her guilty pleasures. Tisdale was involved in every aspect of the album's production. Tisdale's music inspirations for the album include Katy Perry and Pat Benatar. The song "Switch" is also featured in the motion picture Aliens in the Attic, which Tisdale starred in.

Warner Bros. said the first component of the label's album roll out was revealing Tisdale's new look with a relaunch of her web site in March and the cover of Cosmopolitans April issue. "We wanted to create a conversation and then follow quickly with the music," he said. The album was to be released on June 16, 2009 in North America, but it was pushed back to July 28, 2009, although it was released a month before, on June 12, 2009 in several countries such as Germany, Italy and Spain. The album's release date in the US and Canada was preceded by an exclusive "Countdown to Guilty Pleasure" on iTunes for the U.S. and Canada, on which "Overrated", "What If" and "Acting Out" had promotional releases in each week. The first two songs debuted on the Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles chart due to digital downloads at number three and number one, respectively.

Composition

The first single, "It's Alright, It's OK", Tisdale said, "is a strong, empowering song that kind of helps you move on" and continued to say: I have definitely  on and with someone you really like, if they are cheating on you, you don't want to believe it. But, unfortunately, you either stay in the relationship and keep getting hurt because it keeps happening or you get up and you move on. You don't look back. Tisdale said the song "Hot Mess" is "about hanging out with a motorcycle bad boy that makes life more interesting" and the song "How Do You Love Someone", written by Porcelain Black, is "about a girl who deals with the split of her parents". Tisdale said the song could also be about "when you have been cheated on or you're in a relationship". Black was initially reluctant to let Tisdale record the song, but eventually green-lit the track; however, she also recorded her own version, produced by RedOne. Tisdale co-wrote several songs on the album such as "What If", which was co-written with Kara DioGuardi. Tisdale described "What If" as the most personal song on the album, and said the song "is about when you're in a relationship and you say 'If I really needed you, would you actually be there?'" "Time's Up" it was first recorded by American pop singer Katy Perry, for her second album One of the Boys (2008), though it was never included for the album and was passed on to Tisdale.

Reception

Critical response

Following its release, Guilty Pleasure generated mixed reviews from critics and has a 48 out of 100 on Metacritic, based on six critical reviews. The most positive of reviews came from Allmusic's Stephen Erlewine, who gave the album three and a half stars out of five, stating that when Tisdale "sticks to the surface, she makes sure that Guilty Pleasure lives up to its title". The ballads however, were not as well received, stating Tisdale "isn't convincing when she tries to deal in either pain or carnality".
Billboard gave the album a mixed review with four and a half stars out of ten, stating Tisdale "can deliver the radio-ready goods" but criticized the album as a whole and that it "doesn't give the singer room to comfortably let loose". Digital Spy's Nick Levine praised Guilty Pleasure for Tisdale's new sound, comparing her to the likes of Kelly Clarkson and Ashlee Simpson. Levine praised tracks such as "It's Alright, It's OK", "Erase and Rewind" and "Hot Mess", however was not impressed with "Crank It Up", stating it "shamelessly rips off Britney's robopop sound, right down to the Spears-aping vocals"; he went on to give the album three out of five stars. The most negative of reviews came from Margaret Wappler of the Los Angeles Times who only gave the album one and a half out of four stars. Wappler said the album has "few glimmers of hope" and went on to criticize the producers as "not seem[ing] to have gifted Tisdale with their best work". The album was also ranked #7 on Billboard.com's Reader Poll for album of the decade and best album of 2009.

Chart performance
The album debuted on several European charts, the first appearances of the album were in the last week of June 2009, on Austrian Albums Chart and German Albums Chart, peaking at number seven and nine respectively, in the same week the album debuted at number 51 on Irish Albums Chart and rose to number 30 in the following week while in Spain, the album debuted at number 21 and rose to number nine in the second week. In the first week on August 2009, the album debuted at number 12 on the Billboard 200 selling 25,000 copies in its first week. The album dropped out of the Billboard 200 after eight weeks on the chart. The album had sold 245,000 copies in the United States as of December 9, 2010.

Promotion

Tisdale embarked on a press European promo tour in March 2009, where she visited the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Italy. Tisdale started a promo radio tour in May 2009 for United States. On April 14, 2009, she was presenting the lead single of the album on On Air with Ryan Seacrest, one month later she performed for first time a few songs from the album at the 2009 KISS Concert on May 17, 2009. The music video of "It's Alright, It's OK" was shown in 6,600 movie theatres in the United States. In early June 2009, she started her second promotional tour for Europe, visiting Germany, Italy and Spain, here performed on several television shows, such as German Wetten, dass..? and Comet Awards, Spanish Fama and Operación Triunfo, and Italian TRL. Her first performance in the American television was on June 16, 2009, performing the first single and "Masquerade" on Good Morning America, later Tisdale and her band promoted the album on several American television shows including Today Show and America's Got Talent. Tisdale along with her band performed several free concerts across the United States, including the opening for the first Microsoft Store on Scottsdale, Arizona, on October 22, 2009. Later in the month she performed "It's Alright, It's OK" at the MTV Latin Video Music Awards held in Mexico. She also performed songs from Guilty Pleasure and recorded live performances for AOL Sessions and Walmart Soundcheck, the last being released as a digital Extended Play on August 4, 2009.

Singles
"It's Alright, It's OK" was released as the album's lead single on April 13, 2009 in Canada, and in the United States on the next day, in both radio airplay and digital download formats. The single debuted at #99 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the same week, making it Tisdale's lowest-charting official single on the chart. The song's highest peak position was #5 on the Austrian Singles Chart.

"Crank It Up" was released on October 9, 2009, as the album's second and final international single. The music video premiered on October 5, 2009, via VIVA and was featured on MySpace on October 6, 2009.

Track listingNotes'
 signifies a vocal producer
 signifies a remixer

Charts

Release history

References

2009 albums
Albums produced by Billy Steinberg
Albums produced by Dreamlab
Albums produced by Emanuel Kiriakou
Albums produced by the Matrix (production team)
Albums produced by Toby Gad
Albums produced by Twin
Ashley Tisdale albums
Warner Records albums
Albums produced by Oak Felder

Guilty Pleasure (Ashley Tisdale album)


Escape from Alcatraz is the name for two different triathlons held in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. The Escape from Alcatraz originated in 1981 as a private club event, beginning in San Francisco and ending in Marin County. The race split in 1983 with a separate commercial event open to the public, which is now an aquathlon (having dropped the biking section of a traditional triathlon) held on a shorter course entirely within San Francisco. However, a new public triathlon, also known by the name Escape from Alcatraz, is now run by IMG.

Original Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon
The first Escape from Alcatraz was proposed by Joe Oakes after he participated in the 1979 Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. The first Escape from Alcatraz race was held two years later in June 1981, with members of the Dolphin Club testing the course. The course started with a swim from Alcatraz Island in the middle of San Francisco Bay to the city of San Francisco, a bike ride over the Golden Gate Bridge to Mill Valley in Marin County, and an out-and-back running course over Mount Tamalpais to Stinson Beach and back. The running course followed the course of the Dipsea foot race, but by making it an out-and-back run rather than a one-way course, became known as a Double Dipsea.
The course has remained the same over the years and celebrated its 35th anniversary in 2015. Participants are limited to members of the Dolphin Club and The South End Club. The Dolphin Club is the host and sponsor of the event.

Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon (IMG)

The annual public Escape from Alcatraz triathlon, organized by IMG, now takes place in early June. The current course consists of a  swim starting near Alcatraz Island, a  run from the bay to the transition zone at Marina Green, an  bike ride, and an  run. The run portion includes a notorious section called the "sand ladder" at mile five, a climb from Baker Beach back up to the road that is a combination of sand and about 400 uneven log steps. The event had about 1700 participants in 2009. Entry is by Lottery process for most of the slots and the remainder is through qualification, which done through a good rank in the previous Escape from Alcatraz, or in four other triathlon races held during the preceding year.

While entry is via lottery, they give preference to previous entrants.

The one exception to the June timeframe was when the Americas Cup sailing event came to the Bay Area. The resulting shift to March resulted in colder than normal conditions (swim) and more challenging tides than the normal date. The impact of this was a 3 fold increase in swimmers 'rescued' from the water, many more than normal were pulled out and transported to shallow water. They were allowed to continue the event and receive medals for finishing.

The Escape from Alcatraz triathlon was ranked as the number-one triathlon by Inside Triathlon Magazine for 2006.

Notes

External links
 Event Website

Triathlon competitions
Culture of San Francisco
Alcatraz Island
Recurring sporting events established in 1981
Sports competitions in San Francisco
Triathlon competitions in the United States
Sports competitions in California
1981 establishments in California

Escape from Alcatraz (triathlon)


Sir Magdi Habib Yacoub  ( ; born 16 November 1935), is an Egyptian retired professor of cardiothoracic surgery at Imperial College London, best known for his early work in repairing heart valves with surgeon Donald Ross, adapting the Ross procedure, where the diseased aortic valve is replaced with the person's own pulmonary valve, devising the arterial switch operation (ASO) in transposition of the great arteries, and establishing the heart transplantation centre at Harefield Hospital in 1980 with a heart transplant for Derrick Morris, who at the time of his death was Europe's longest-surviving heart transplant recipient. Yacoub subsequently performed the UK's first combined heart and lung transplant in 1983.

From 1986 to 2006, he held the position of British Heart Foundation Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College Faculty of Medicine. He is the founding editor of the journal Disease Models & Mechanisms.

His honours and awards include the Bradshaw Lecture from the Royal College of Physicians in 1988, a knighthood in the 1992 New Year Honours, the Texas Heart Institute's Ray C. Fish Award for Scientific Achievement in Cardiovascular Disease in 1998, the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004, the European Society of Cardiology's gold medal in 2006, the Order of Merit in 2014, the Lister Medal from the Royal College of Surgeons in 2015 and the Khalaf Ahmad Al Habtoor Achievement Award (KAHAA) in 2019.

Following retirement from the National Health Service (NHS), he continued to operate on children through his charity, Chain of Hope. In 2008, he co-founded the Magdi Yacoub heart foundation, which launched the Aswan Heart project.

Early life and education
Magdi Habib Yacoub was born on the 16th of November in 1935 in Bilbeis, El Sharqia, Egypt to Coptic Christian family, and spent his childhood moving around a number of different small towns. His father was a surgeon, who later worked in public health. He died in 1958. Yacoub later recalled that both his father and the death of his youngest aunt at age 22 years from an uncorrected mitral stenosis during childbirth inspired him to study medicine and cardiology, saying that "this young woman would not have died if we had had access to facilities which were then available in a few centres around the world".

At the age of 15, he entered the University of Cairo College of Medicine with a scholarship.

Early surgical career

In 1957, Yacoub graduated in medicine from Cairo University and completed two years of residencies in surgery. In 1961 or 1962 he moved to Britain to study for his fellowship while working under Sir Russell Brock, consultant surgeon at Guy's Hospital.

Heart valve surgery

In 1964, he was appointed rotating surgical senior registrar to the National Heart and Chest Hospitals, where he worked with cardiothoracic surgeon Donald Ross. Here, they worked on repairing heart valves in people with severe valvular heart disease and heart failure. Four of their cases, operated on between December 1965 and October 1967, were reported on in the British Medical Journal (1968) in an article titled "Too ill for cardiac surgery?". Three had severe aortic valve disease and one had rheumatic heart disease with multiple affected valves. All four had a poor prognosis with death expected within a few days and all four survived surgery. He carried out a number of Ross procedures, where the diseased aortic valve is replaced with the person's own pulmonary valve, particularly in growing children. It became a popular alternative to the surgical treatment of aortic valve disease in young adults and avoided the need for anticoagulation and repeated operations. Yacoub modified the operation by planning remodelling of the autograft root, the Ross-Yacoub procedure, performed in carefully selected people. At a time when cardiologists may have been reluctant to refer for surgery, Yacoub's search for operable people earned him the name "Magdi's midnight stars".

Later, his application for a job at the Royal Brompton Hospital was turned down.  In 1968, he moved to the United States and the following year he became Instructor and then Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago.

Harefield Hospital
In 1973, he became a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon at Harefield Hospital, West London, opened in 1921 as a TB sanatorium of single storey pavilions typical for such a hospital.  He later recalled that "I was tempted to stay in Chicago, as I was interested in the research they were doing there, but I had already accepted the position at Harefield before going to the US, so I was honour bound to return". At Harefield, he worked closely with Rosemary Radley-Smith, consultant in paediatric cardiology.

As a visiting professor to the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Yacoub, Fabian Udekwu, C. H Anyanwu, and others formed part of the team that performed the first open heart surgery in Nigeria in 1974.

Arterial Switch

In 1977, he devised a two-stage approach for an arterial switch operation (ASO) in older people with transposition of the great arteries with an intact ventricular septum (IVS).

Harefield Hospital transplant unit
Yacoub began the transplant programme at Harefield Hospital in 1980 with a heart transplant for Derrick Morris, who became Europe's longest surviving heart transplant recipient until his death in July 2005. Two years later, he performed a heart transplant on John McCafferty, who survived for more than 33 years, until 10 February 2016 and became recognised as the world's longest surviving heart transplant patient by the Guinness World Records in 2013, surpassing the previous Guinness World Record of 30 years, 11 months and 10 days set by an American man who died in 2009.

In December 1983 Yacoub performed the UK's first combined heart and lung transplant at Harefield.

From 1986 to 2006, he held the position of  British Heart Foundation Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College Faculty of Medicine. In 1988, he became a member of the Royal Colleges of Physicians, twenty years after qualifying in surgery.

He is the founding editor of the journal Disease Models & Mechanisms.

He treated a number of politicians and celebrities throughout his surgical career, including comedian Eric Morecambe in 1979, Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou in 1988, and actor Omar Sharif in 1993.

Later career
He retired from the National Health Service in 2001 at the age of 65.

In 2006 he led a complex operation which required removing a transplant heart from a person whose own heart had recovered. The original heart had not been removed during transplant surgery nearly a decade earlier, in the hope it might recover.

In April 2007, it was reported that a British medical research team led by Yacoub had grown part of a human heart valve from stem cells.

Charities
In 1995, Yacoub founded the charity Of Ahmed Sherif "Chain of Hope", through which he continued to operate on children, and through which the provision of heart surgery for correctable heart defects are made possible in areas without specialist cardiac surgery units.

He is also the head of the Magdi Yacoub Global Heart Foundation, co-founded with Ahmed Zewail and Ambassador Mohamed Shaker in 2008, which launched the Aswan Heart project and founded the Aswan Heart Centre the following year.

Honours and awards

1988: Bradshaw Lecture, Royal College of Physicians. It was held in Sheffield.
1998: Texas Heart Institute Ray C. Fish Award for Scientific Achievement in Cardiovascular Disease.
1998: Elected Fellow of the Royal Society.
1999: Lifetime outstanding achievement award in recognition of contribution to medicine, Secretary of State for Health (UK).
2003: Golden Hippocrates International Award for Excellence in Cardiac Surgery (Moscow).
WHO Prize for Humanitarian Services.
2004: International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation Lifetime Achievement Award, at the 24th annual meeting in San Francisco.
2006: Hamdan Award for Volunteers in Humanitarian Medical Services.
2006: European Society of Cardiology Gold Medal.
2007: Pride of Britain Award.
2007: Honorary citizenships of the city of Bergamo, Italy
2007: Medal of Merit, President, International Academy of Cardiovascular Sciences.
2011: Order of the Nile for science and humanity.
2012: American College of Cardiology Legend of Cardiovascular Medicine.
2015: Lister Medal for contributions to surgical science, presented by Clare Marx, President of the Royal College of Surgeons.
2019: Khalaf Ahmad Al Habtoor Achievement Award (KAHAA).
Yacoub was knighted in the 1992 New Year Honours and awarded the Order of Merit in the 2014 New Year Honours.

Personal and family
He is married to Marianne and they have three children and a number of grandchildren.

Yacoub enjoys swimming, listening to classical music and growing orchids.

Selected publications

Books
Annual of Cardiac Surgery. Current Science (1994). . J. Pepper (Ed)
Cardiac Valve Allografts : Science and Practice. Steinkopff-Verlag Heidelberg (1997). . With A. C. Yankah and R. Hetzer

Articles
"Vagotomy through mediastinoscopy for pulmonary osteoarthropathy. British Journal of Diseases of the Chest. Vol. 60, Issue 3 (July 1966), p. 144-147. , .
"Homograft replacement of the aortic valve. A critical review". Progress in Cardiovascular Diseases. Vol. 11, Issue 4 (January 1969), pp. 275–293. , . With Donald Ross
"Two-stage operation for anatomical correction of transposition of the great arteries with intact interventricular septum". The Lancet.  Vol. 1, Issue 8025 (June 1977), pp. 1275–8. , . Co-authored with R. Radley-Smith and R. Maclaurin.
"Fourteen-year experience with homovital homografts for aortic valve replacement". The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery. Vol. 110, Issue 1 (July 1995), pp. 186–194. Yacoub et al
"Two Hearts that Beat as One". Circulation. Vol. 92, Issue 2 (15 July 1995), pp. 156–157. .
"An evaluation of the Ross operation in adults". Journal of Heart Valve Disease. Vol. 15, No. 4 (July 2006), pp. 531–9. . Yacoub et al.
"Is there a risk in avoiding risk for younger patients with aortic valve disease?". British Medical Journal. Vol. 342, 26 May 2011. . Co-authored with Tom Treasure and Asif Hasan
"The Ross operation in infants and children, when and how?". Heart. Vol. 100, Issue 24 (16 October 2014), pp. 1905–1906. . Co-authored with Ismail El-Hamamsy

References

External links
Profile from the Coptic Medical Society UK
Chain of Hope website
Magdi Yacoub Heart Foundation. Founded 2008

1935 births
Living people
Knights Bachelor
Members of the Order of Merit
Egyptian transplant surgeons
Fellows of the Royal Society
Members of the French Academy of Sciences
Egyptian emigrants to the United Kingdom
Coptic Christians
Egyptian Christians
People from Sharqia Governorate
Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom
British transplant surgeons
20th-century British medical doctors
21st-century British medical doctors
British cardiologists
Egyptian cardiologists
20th-century surgeons
United Arab Emirates Health Foundation Prize laureates

Magdi Yacoub


The 2008–09 Chinese economic stimulus plan () was a RMB¥ 4 trillion (US$586 billion) stimulus package aiming to minimize the impact of the financial crisis of 2007–2008 on the Chinese economy. It was announced by the State Council of the People's Republic of China on 9 November 2008. The economic stimulus plan was seen as a success: While China's economic growth fell to almost 6% by the end of 2008, it had recovered to over 10% by in mid-2009. Critics of China's stimulus package have blamed it for causing a surge in Chinese debt since 2009, particularly among local governments and state-owned enterprises. The World Bank subsequently went on to recommend similar public works spending campaigns to western governments experiencing the effects of the financial crisis, but the US and EU instead decided to pursue long-term policies of quantitative easing.

Announcement
A statement on the government's website said the State Council of the People's Republic of China had approved a plan to invest 4 trillion yuan in infrastructure and social welfare by the end of 2010. This stimulus, equivalent to US$586 billion, represented a pledge comparable to that subsequently announced by the United States, but which came from an economy only one third the size. The stimulus package will be invested in key areas such as housing, rural infrastructure, transportation, health and education, environment, industry, disaster rebuilding, income-building, tax cuts, and finance.

China's export driven economy started to feel the impact of the economic slowdown in the United States and Europe, and the government had already cut key interest rates three times in less than two months in a bid to spur economic expansion.

The stimulus package was welcomed by world leaders and analysts as larger than expected and a sign that by boosting its own economy, China is helping to stabilize the world economy. World Bank President Robert Zoellick declared that he was 'delighted' and believed that China was 'well positioned given its current account surplus and budget position to have fiscal expansion.' News of the announcement of the stimulus package sent markets up across the world.

Details

2008
On the 15 of November, 2008, it was revealed that the central government would only provide 1.2 trillion yuan of funds. The rest of the funds will be reallocated from the budget of provincial and local governments.

Chinese banking officials were reportedly considering establishing a fund worth between 600 billion and 800 billion yuan to purchase domestic shares listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, particularly those in the Shanghai Composite, in the event the Shanghai Index fell to 1,500 points.

2009
On March 6, 2009, China's National Development and Reform Commission' announced a revision of the stimulus and published a breakdown of how the funds would be distributed.

Public infrastructure development took up the biggest portion – 1.5 trillion yuan, or nearly 38% of the total package. The projects lined up include railway, road, irrigation, and airport construction.

The second largest allocation – one trillion yuan – went to reconstruction works in regions hit by the 8-magnitude Sichuan earthquake in May 2008; that was followed by funding for social welfare plans, including the construction of low-cost housing, rehabilitation of slums, and other social safety net projects.

Rural development and technology advancement programs shared the same amount of allocation – at 370 billion yuan each. Rural projects in the pipeline included building public amenities, resettling nomads, supporting agriculture works, and providing safe drinking water.

Technology advancement mainly targeted at upgrading the Chinese industrial sector, gearing towards high-end production to move away from the current export-oriented and labor-intensive mode of growth. This was in line with the government's latest blueprint for revitalizing 10 selected industries.

To ensure sustainable development, the Chinese government also allocated some 210 billion yuan, or 5.3% of the stimulus package for promoting energy saving and gas emission cuts, and environmental engineering projects.

Finally, 150 billion yuan was allocated for educational, cultural and family planning purposes.

One year later, these programs seem to have been even more successful than expected, so that on November 4, 2009, the World Bank group enhanced its "prognosis" of the Chinese GDP, by +1.2%, to a value of +8.4%.

2010
China's economic growth was sustained by the economic stimulus and in addition, assisted neighboring countries with the economic recovery in 2010. Chinese real economic growth was around 10 percent even as European and North American economies were slowing. The stimulus provided funds for infrastructure projects and housing developments. Some were used to assist local governments in lending to state-owned enterprises for housing and infrastructure projects. This focus on construction expanded employment in not only construction, but also manufacturing, steel, cement and other sectors producing inputs to the construction sector. Some analysts suggested that the stimulus program could generate inflation and a property bubble.

Due to the success of the economic stimulus plan, the central government tightened financial regulation in order to restrict lending amid fears of a property bubble.

2011
In 2011, it was revealed that as much as 20% of the loans under the program may be written off.

2012
In September 2012, the Chinese government through the  National Development and Reform Commission gave approval for 60 infrastructure projects totalling more than 1 trillion yuan ($157 billion).

Responses
The stimulus package has been criticized for causing a surge in Chinese debt after 2009. In 2011, Minxin Pei criticized Beijing for "resorting to massive bank lending to local governments, which then went on an infrastructure spending binge that's certain to haunt the country for years to come". A 2014 study by global think-tank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace concluded that "[China]'s debt problems are rooted in the government's November 2008 announcement of a 4 trillion yuan ($586 billion) stimulus package to counteract the effects of the global financial crisis."

The World Bank subsequently went on to recommend similar public works spending campaigns to western governments experiencing the effects of the financial crisis, but the US and EU instead decided to pursue long-term policies of quantitative easing (the buying of trillions of dollars worth of government bonds or other financial assets in order to stimulate the economy and increase liquidity).

See also

2000s energy crisis
2007–2008 world food price crisis
2008–2012 Icelandic financial crisis
2008–2009 Russian financial crisis
Bear Stearns subprime mortgage hedge fund crisis
Collateralized debt obligation
Credit derivative
Derivative (finance)
Financial crisis of 2007–2010
Global financial crisis of 2008–2009
Late-2000s recession
List of entities involved in 2007–2008 financial crises
Margin call
Mark-to-market accounting
Savings and loan crisis
Statistical Arbitrage: Events of Summer 2007
Subprime crisis impact timeline
Subprime mortgage crisis
United States housing market correction

References

External links

 FACTBOX - China's recent measures to spur growth (timeline)

Economic stimulus program
2000s economic history
Stimulus program
Economic stimulus programs
Economic development programs

Chinese economic stimulus program


Trefriw Woollen Mills is a woollen mill in the village of Trefriw, Conwy, in northern Wales, that has been operating since around 1825.

History

The Woollen industry in Wales was once an important part of the Welsh economy.
Originally called the Vale of Conwy Woollen Mill, the mill was built in 1820 higher up than the present mill on the banks of the Afon Crafnant.
Thomas Williams purchased the mill in 1859 and expanded the business.
Products from the woollen mills were taken to the coast from the quay at Trefiw using the River Conwy.

A  in diameter overshot wheel powered spinning mules and jennies.
The yarn was then woven into cloth on hand looms.
A smaller  wheel powered a fulling mill, which washed the cloth and kneaded it with wooden hammers to thicken and strengthen it.
The water wheels were dismantled around 1900 when the first hydroelectric turbine was installed.

Workers at the  Trefriw Woollen Mills competed in the 1918 National Eisteddfod of Wales and won prizes for objects such as a sample of fine cream serge, a sample of white baby flannel and two double-size blankets.

Two Pelton wheel turbines made by Boving were installed in a former flour mill in 1942 and 1951 to deliver 60 kW to the mill machinery.
The turbines are fed through a  diameter pipe from a dam built in 1952  upstream and  higher up.
Most of the present machinery was acquired in the 1950s and 1960s.
The present main building, with three shallow-sloping roofs, was erected around 1970.
Several older mill buildings are behind the main building, accessible from the mill yard.

Today

Trefriw Woollen Mills is one of the few remaining woollen mills still in production in Wales.
The mill continues to be owned and operated by the Williams family.
It takes raw wool, which it cards, spins, dyes and weaves into tapestry bedspreads, tweeds and travelling rugs.
The mill is known for traditional double-weave blankets.
It has a shop, and is open to visitors at designated times.
There is a garden with plants that provide natural soaps, dyes and fibres.
In the summer there are demonstrations of hand spinning and rag rug making.

Notes

Sources

Textile mills in Wales
Buildings and structures in Conwy County Borough
Tourist attractions in Conwy County Borough
Watermills in Wales

Trefriw Woollen Mills


A chaise longue (; , "long chair") is an upholstered sofa in the shape of a chair that is long enough to support the legs of the sitter.

In modern French the term chaise longue can refer to any long reclining chair such as a deckchair. A literal translation in English is "long chair". The term chaise lounge, used since (1800) is corruption of French chaise longue "long chair," with French word order; the second word confused in English with lounge.

An alternative spelling for the chaise (chair) is chaise lounge and pronounced , a folk etymology replacement of part of the original French term with the unrelated English word lounge.  When English speakers imported a new kind of sofa from France in the late 1700s, they transformed the name 'chaise longue' ("long chair") into 'chaise lounge'—since 'lounge' is an English word spelled with the same letters and lounging is something one can do on a "chaise longue." The use of the alternative spelling, namely, chaise lounge has been documented both in British texts since at least 1811 and in American texts since 1824.

Origins
The modern chaise longue was first popularised during the 16th century in France. They were created by French furniture craftsmen for the rich to rest without the need to retire to the bedroom. It was during the Rococo period that the chaise longue became the symbol of social status and only the rarest and most expensive materials were used in their construction. Today, the chaise longue is seen as a luxury item for the modern home. They are often used to complement a home's décor such as living or reading rooms, or as a stylish boudoir chair for bedroom seating.

  (French: 'Broken duchess'): this word is used when the chaise longue is divided in two parts: the chair and a long footstool, or two chairs with a stool in between them. The origin of the name is unknown.
 : a récamier has two raised ends, and nothing on the long sides. It is sometimes associated with French Empire (neo-classical) style. It is named after French society hostess Madame Récamier (1777–1849), who posed elegantly on a couch of this kind for a portrait, painted in 1800 by Jacques-Louis David. The shape of the récamier is similar to a traditional  (boat bed) but made for the drawing room, not the bedroom.
 : a méridienne has a high head-rest, and a lower foot-rest, joined by a sloping piece. Whether or not they have anything at the foot end, méridiennes are asymmetrical day-beds. They were popular in the grand houses of France in the early 19th century. Its name is from its typical use: rest in the middle of the day, when the sun is near the meridian.

Psychoanalysis

The chaise longue has traditionally been associated with psychoanalysis. Sigmund Freud initiated the use of the chaise longue for this purpose, the idea being that the patient would recline on a couch, with the analyst seated beyond the head of the couch, so that the client would not see the analyst. Reclining and not having to face the analyst was thought to be disinhibiting and to encourage free association. At the time Freud began to use the chaise longue, it was considered daring in Vienna to recline on a chaise in the presence of non-intimates. Freud's own chaise longue, given to him by a patient, may be seen today at the Freud Museum in London.

Today, psychoanalysts continue to invite clients to recline on couches in their offices during psychotherapy, and may use chaises longues rather than more conventional styles of couch out of tradition. The chaise longue is commonly used as visual shorthand to suggest a generic psychotherapist's office in cartoons and other works.

See also

 Couch
 Eames Lounge Chair
 Fainting couch
 Sunlounger

References

External links

Chairs
Couches
Furniture
Upholstery
Psychoanalysis

Chaise longue


Brian Vitalis Vitori (born 22 February 1990) is a Zimbabwean cricketer. He has played Test and ODI matches for Zimbabwe.

Domestic career
Vitori made his List A debut for Masvingo during the 2005–06 Faithwear Clothing Inter-Provincial Competition, playing in all three of Masvingo's games, taking three wickets at an average of 12.00.

He switched to Southerns for the 2007–08 Logan Cup after the first reorganisation of cricket in Zimbabwe. He made his first-class debut for Southerns against Easterns in April 2008, taking 2/37 in Easterns' only innings. He also played his first, and to date only, Twenty20 match for Southerns against Westerns, taking 1/14 and making three runs.

He took the most wickets in the 2016–17 Pro50 Championship, with twenty dismissals in six matches.

International career

Debut years
Vitori made his Test debut for Zimbabwe against Bangladesh at Harare Sports Club on 4 August 2011, taking five wickets, including 4/66 in the first innings.

He made his ODI debut, also against Bangladesh at Harare Sports Club, on 12 August 2011, taking 5/30 on debut, the best bowling figures by a Zimbabwean player on debut, and the sixth-best overall. He also took a five-wicket haul in his second match, taking 5/20 to become the first ever ODI player to take two five-wicket hauls in his first two matches. He also became the first player to be named man of the match in his first two games.

The following series with Pakistan was very disappointing for him, as Pakistanis worked him for cover drives and pull shots and he took only one wicket the tour with figures of 0/103 & 0/15 in the only Test and 0/43 & 1/62 in the ODIs. Rameez Raja suggested him to keep the in-dipper as a surprise delivery.

Bowling action
Vitori was originally suspended from bowling in January 2016, but he was reassessed and permitted to resume bowling in June 2016. He was again reported on 29 November 2016 and was subsequently suspended for 12 months in December 2016 after an independent assessment revealed he had employed an illegal bowling action. On 8 January 2018, Vitori underwent a reassessment of his bowling action at the High Performance Centre in Pretoria where it was revealed that the amount of elbow extension in his bowling action for all his deliveries was within the 15-degree level of tolerance permitted under the ICC Illegal Bowling Regulations. On 19 January 2018 he was declared completely free to return to bowling in international cricket.

During the 2018 World Cup Qualifier tournament, Vitori was again reported for an illegal action and, after assessment, he was suspended from bowling.

References

External links

1990 births
Centrals cricketers
Living people
Masvingo cricketers
Sportspeople from Masvingo
Southern Rocks cricketers
Mid West Rhinos cricketers
Zimbabwean cricketers
Zimbabwe One Day International cricketers
Zimbabwe Test cricketers
Cricketers who have taken five wickets on One Day International debut
Zimbabwe Twenty20 International cricketers

Brian Vitori


Arthur Burton Rascoe (October 22, 1892 – March 19, 1957), was an American journalist, editor and literary critic of the New York Herald Tribune.

He was born in Fulton, Kentucky to Matthew L. Rascoe and Elizabeth Burton Rascoe. His father chose to investigate business prospect in Oklahoma Territory, and the family eventually settled in Shawnee, Oklahoma, which, despite fears planted by friends in Fulton, was a thriving community. Housing had not kept up with the influx of citizens and the Rascoe family was left to small dismal accommodations, something Mrs. Rascoe never overcame. Burton, however, grabbed at every opportunity to find work and educate himself outside the school system. While serving as a class officer at Shawnee High School he played baseball and played quarterback on the football team after earning 30 dollars digging potatoes to purchase his uniform. He began a paper route for the Shawnee Herald but soon put himself in charge of all the other newsboys. He also worked as assistant librarian at the town's Carnegie Library, was a ghost writer for citizens who were called on to make speeches or publish articles, a stringer for the Oklahoma City Times and writing articles for the Herald, all this while attending classes. His father continued to struggle supporting his family and by 16 Burton was supporting himself. Feeling ready and recognizing his more open-minded views he left school before graduation and moved to Chicago. From 1911 until 1913, he attended the University of Chicago where he joined Sigma Nu.  While still a student, he started writing for the Chicago Tribune and continued working there until 1920.

In 1922, he became literary editor of the New York Tribune.  He continued in that position until a merger turned the paper into the New York Herald Tribune in 1924.  The writing and editorial staff he assembled included writers who became well-respected: Isabel Paterson and Will Cuppy.

Rascoe's syndicated column, The Daybook of a New Yorker (1924–28), appeared in over 400 newspapers.

In April 1927, with Seward B. Collins, Rascoe purchased The Bookman. Rascoe served as editor before departing in April 1928 in a disagreement with Collins over the direction of the magazine.

Rascoe continued to hold high-profile editorial jobs in the field of literary criticism and to write books of his own about literature and authors.  In 1935 he was appointed a senior editor at Doubleday, Doran, holding this post until 1952. His best-known work, Titans of Literature, appeared in 1932. He also authored  Before I Forget, an autobiography of sorts revealing much of his upbringing in Oklahoma. The book gives a good insight to life for a young man during the early days of the 20th century. Other works include Theodore Dreiser(1925), A Bookman's Daybook (1929), The Smart Set Anthology, edited together with Groff Conklin (1934), The Joys of Reading:  Life's Greatest Pleasure (1937) and Belle Starr, The Bandit Queen (1941).

In 1946, he resigned as dramatic critic for the New York World Telegram after the paper refused to publish his harshly negative review of the Old Vic Company's production of Shakespeare's Henry IV Part I and Rascoe, in turn, refused to review any more Old Vic productions. One report of his resignation called him "the stormiest figure in Broadway circles".

He was also a literary critic (New York World Telegram) and was a syndicated columnist throughout his career.  He was best known for "A Bookman's Daybook," "The Book of the Week," and "TV First-Nighter."

Rascoe married Hazel Luke on July 5, 1913, and they had two children, Alfred Burton Rascoe, Jr., born July 2, 1914, who died by suicide in 1936, and a daughter, Ruth Helen, born 1918.

In his last few years of life, Rascoe worked as a television reviewer.  He died of heart failure in New York City on March 19, 1957.

References

Who Was Who in America, v. 3 (1951-1960), Chicago: Marquis - Who's Who, 1963, p. 711.
Stanley J. Kunitz and Howard Haycraft (eds.), Twentieth Century American Authors, New York: H.W. Wilson Co., 1942, pp. 1148–1149.
Burton Rascoe, Before I Forget, New York: Literary Guild, 1937, 442 pages.

External links

Finding aid to the Burton Rascoe papers at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries.

1892 births
1957 deaths
People from Fulton, Kentucky
New-York Tribune people
New York Herald Tribune people
American literary critics
People from Shawnee, Oklahoma
American television critics

Burton Rascoe


is a Japanese writer. Her work has won every major Japanese literary award, including the Akutagawa Prize and the Yomiuri Prize. Internationally, she has been the recipient of the Shirley Jackson Award and the American Book Award. The Memory Police was also shortlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2020.

Some of her most well known works include The Housekeeper and the Professor, The Diving Pool and Hotel Iris.

Background and education
Ogawa was born in Okayama, Okayama Prefecture, and attended Waseda University, Tokyo. When she married her husband, a steel company engineer, she quit her job as a medical university secretary and wrote while her husband was at work. Initially, she wrote only as a hobby, and her husband didn't realise she was a writer until her debut novel, The Breaking of the Butterfly, received a literary prize. Her novella Pregnancy Diary, written in brief intervals when her son was a toddler, won the prestigious Akutagawa Prize for literature, thus cementing her reputation in Japan.

She currently lives in Ashiya, Japan.

Career
Since 1988, Ogawa has published more than fifty works of fiction and nonfiction. Much of her work has yet to be translated into English. In 2006, she worked alongside the mathematician Masahiko Fujiwara to co-write "An Introduction to the World's Most Elegant Mathematics", a dialogue on the extraordinary beauty of numbers.

Her work has been published in the New Yorker, A Public Space and Zoetrope.

The 2005 French film L'Annulaire (The Ringfinger) was based in part on Ogawa's Kusuriyubi no hyōhon. Her novel The Housekeeper and the Professor was adapted into the movie The Professor's Beloved Equation. In partnership with Amazon studios, Reed Morano and Charlie Kaufman are set to adapt The Memory Police.

Themes and influences
Kenzaburō Ōe has said, "Yoko Ogawa is able to give expression to the most subtle workings of human psychology in prose that is gentle yet penetrating." Her English translator, Stephen Snyder, has said that "There is a naturalness to what she writes so it never feels forced...Her narrative seems to be flowing from a source that's hard to identify."

Frequently, she explores the theme of memory in her works. For instance, The Housekeeper and the Professor follows a mathematics professor who cannot remember anything for longer than eighty minutes, and The Memory Police is about a group of islanders who gradually forget the existence of certain things, such as birds or flowers. Human cruelty features as another prominent theme in her work, as she is interested in exploring what drives people to commit acts of physical or emotional violence. She often writes about female bodies and the woman's role in a family, which has led many to label her as a feminist writer. Ogawa is hesitatant about this label, stating instead that she "just peeked into [the world of her characters] and took notes from what they were doing".

The Diary of Anne Frank has been a significant source of inspiration to her throughout her career. She first encountered the diary as a teenager, and was inspired to start a diary of her own, writing back to Anne as though they were friends. She notes how "Anne's heart and mind were so rich," and that "her diary proved that people can grow even in such a confined situation. And writing could give people freedom." Given its themes of persecution and confinement, The Memory Police in particular is a response to Anne's diary and the Holocaust in general.

While at Waseda University, she was influenced by fellow Japanese authors such as Mieko Kanai, Kenzaburō Ōe, and Haruki Murakami. She also felt influenced by the American author Paul Auster, who she believes "writes a spoken literature—it feels like he's written down a story someone told him, rather than creating it himself. Shibata's translation was also very important, but when I read Moon Palace I thought 'This is how I'd like to write.' Like I'm just a medium for transferring a story from the world outside."

Awards and honors
 1988 Kaien literary Prize (Benesse) for her debut The Breaking of the Butterfly (Agehacho ga kowareru toki, 揚羽蝶が壊れる時)
 1990 Akutagawa Prize for Pregnancy Diary (Ninshin karendaa, 妊娠 カレンダー)
 2004 Yomiuri Prize, Bookseller's Award for The Professor's Beloved Equation (Hakase no aishita sūshiki, 博士の愛した数式; translated as The Housekeeper and the Professor)
 2004 Izumi Kyōka Prize for Burafuman no maisō, ブラフマンの埋葬
 2006 Tanizaki Prize for Meena's March (Mīna no kōshin, ミーナの行進)
 2008 Shirley Jackson Award for The Diving Pool
 2014 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize shortlist for Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales (Japanese; trans. Stephen Snyder)
 2020 American Book Award for The Memory Police (Japanese; trans. Stephen Snyder)
 2021 Medal with Purple Ribbon

Works in English translation

Novels and novellas
 The Diving Pool (Daibingu puru, ダイヴィング・プール, 1990; Ninshin karendā, 妊娠カレンダー, 1991; Dormitory, ドミトリイ, 1991); translated by Stephen Snyder, New York: Picador, 2008. ; published on The New York Times in 2006
 The Memory Police (Hisoyaka na kesshō, 密やかな結晶, 1994), translated by Stephen Snyder, Pantheon Books, 2019.
Hotel Iris (Hoteru Airisu, ホテル・アイリス, 1996), translated by Stephen Snyder, Picador, 2010.
 The Housekeeper and the Professor (Hakase no ai shita sūshiki, 博士の愛した数式, 2003); translated by Stephen Snyder, New York : Picador, 2008.

Short stories and collections

 "Pregnancy Diary" (Ninshin karendā, 妊娠カレンダー, 1991); translated by Stephen Snyder, The New Yorker, 12/2005. Read here
 "The Cafeteria in the Evening and a Pool in the Rain" (Yūgure no kyūshoku shitsu to ame no pūru, 夕暮れの給食室と雨のプール, 1991); translated by Stephen Snyder, The New Yorker, 9/2004. Read here
 "Transit" (Toranjitto, トランジット, 1996); translated by Alisa Freedman, Japanese Art: The Scholarship and Legacy of Chino Kaori, special issue of Review of Japanese Culture and Society, Vol. XV (Center for Inter-Cultural Studies and Education, Josai University, December 2003): 114-125.
 "The Man Who Sold Braces" (Gibusu o uru hito, ギブスを売る人, 1998); translated by Motoyuki Shibata, Manoa, 13.1, 2001.
 Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales (Kamoku na shigai, midara na tomurai, 寡黙な死骸みだらな弔い,1998) Translated by Stephen Snyder, Picador, 2013.

Other works
 Agehachō ga kowareru toki, 揚羽蝶が壊れる時, 1989, Kaien Prize
 Kanpeki na byōshitsu, 完璧な病室, 1989
 Same nai kōcha, 冷めない紅茶, 1990
 Shugā taimu, シュガータイム, 1991
 Yohaku no ai, 余白の愛, 1992
 Angelina Sano Motoharu to 10 no tanpen, アンジェリーナ―佐野元春と10の短編, 1993
 Yōsei ga mai oriru yoru, 妖精が舞い下りる夜, 1993
 Hisoyaka na kesshō, 密やかな結晶, 1994
 Kusuriyubi no hyōhon, 薬指の標本, 1994
 Rokukakukei no shō heya, 六角形の小部屋, 1994
 Anne Furanku no kioku, アンネ・フランクの記憶, 1995
 Shishū suru shōjo, 刺繍する少女, 1996
 , やさしい訴え, 1996
 Kamoku na shigai, midara na tomurai, 寡黙な死骸みだらな弔い, 1998
 Kōritsui ta kaori, 凍りついた香り, 1998
 Fukaki kokoro no soko yori, 深き心の底より, 1999
 Gūzen no shukufuku, 偶然の祝福, 2000
 Chinmoku hakubutsukan, 沈黙博物館, 2000
 Mabuta, まぶた, 2001
 Kifujin A no sosei, 貴婦人Aの蘇生, 2002
 Burafuman no maisō, ブラフマンの埋葬, 2004, Izumi Kyōka Prize
 Yo ni mo utsukushī sūgaku nyūmon, 世にも美しい数学入門, 2005 (An Introduction to the World's Most Elegant Mathematics)
 Inu no shippo o nade nagara, 犬のしっぽを撫でながら, 2006
 Mīna no kōshin, ミーナの行進, 2006 , Tanizaki Prize
 Otogibanashi no wasuremono, おとぎ話の忘れ物, 2006 (illustrated)
 Umi, 海 2006
 Hajimete no bungaku Ogawa Yōko, はじめての文学 小川洋子 2007
 Hakase no hondana, 博士の本棚, 2007
 Monogatari no yakuwari, 物語の役割, 2007
 Ogawa Yōko taiwa shū, 小川洋子 対話集, 2007 (conversations)
 Yoake no fuchi wo samayou hitobito, 夜明けの縁をさ迷う人々, 2007
 Kagaku no tobira wo nokku suru, 科学の扉をノックする, 2008
 Karā hiyoko to kōhīmame, カラーひよことコーヒー豆, 2009
 Kokoro to hibikiau dokusho annai, 心と響き合う読書案内, 2009
 Neko wo daite zou to oyogu, 猫を抱いて象と泳ぐ, 2009
 Genkou reimai nikki, 原稿零枚日記, 2010
 Moso kibun, 妄想気分, 2011
 Hitojichi no roudokukai, 人質の朗読会, 2011
 Tonikaku sanpo itashimasho, とにかく散歩いたしましょう, 2012
 Kotori, ことり, 2012
 Saihate ākēdo, 最果てアーケード, 2012
 Itsumo karera wa dokoka ni, いつも彼らはどこかに, 2013
 Kohaku no matataki, 琥珀のまたたき, 2015
 Fujichaku suru ryūsei tachi, 不時着する流星たち, 2017
 Kuchibue no jōzu na shirayukihime, 口笛の上手な白雪姫, 2018
 Kobako, 小箱, 2019
 ''Yakusoku sareta idō, 約束された移動, 2019

References

Interviews
 "Writer Ogawa Yōko's Stories of Memory and Loss" (by Kimie Itakura),'"Nippon com", March 2020

External links
 J'Lit | Authors : Yoko Ogawa | Books from Japan

Akutagawa Prize winners
Yomiuri Prize winners
1962 births
Living people
People from Okayama
Japanese women novelists
Japanese women short story writers
Writers from Okayama Prefecture
Recipients of the Medal with Purple Ribbon

Yōko Ogawa


The Cornish Killas is a natural region covering most of the county of Cornwall in southwest England. It has been designated as National Character Area 152 by Natural England.

Killas is a mining term for the sedimentary rocks of the Devon and Cornwall region. The Cornish Killas forms the main body of the Cornish landmass around the high granite moorlands such as Bodmin Moor and Hensbarrow. Much of central Cornwall is a gently undulating, slate plateau with little woodland and few hedgerow trees, dissected by a complex pattern of valleys. In places there is little woody vegetation apart from scrub-covered stone hedges dominating the farmland. By contrast, the coastline is richly varied, with rugged, windswept cliffs separating broad, sandy bays.

The area is rich in important archaeological and former industrial sites. Evidence of Neolithic and Bronze Age farming settlements abounds, with their round-houses, stone wall field enclosures and meadows bordering upland grazing pastures. Hillforts emerged during the Bronze Age and "rounds" existed into the early Medieval period. By the 18th century the landscape was being dramatically changed by mining for tin, copper and china clay and quarrying for granite.

References

Natural regions of England
Geography of Cornwall

Cornish Killas


Shibalidian () is the name of a transportational node in Chaoyang District, Beijing, China. Flanked by several overpasses, it is where the southeastern 4th Ring Road (Beijing) links with the Jingjintang Expressway. The overpass complex consists of Shibalidian North Bridge, Shibalidian Bridge, and Shibalidian South Bridge.

Geographically, it is in southeastern Beijing. Nearby lies the Beijing Economic Development Area.

When the Jingjintang Expressway was first opened in late 1993, Shibalidian was an insignificant locality in a then lesser expansive Beijing City. Shibalidian was Exit No. 1 on the Jingjintang Expressway.

With the opening of the 4th Ring Road, Shibalidian rose in importance. With the onslaught of trade, the Beijing Chaoyanggang (朝阳港) was set up around Shibalidian. In 2004, the Municipal Public Security Ministry relocated its Vehicle Management authorities for the Beijing municipality to Shibalidian.

The eastern stretch of the 4th Ring Road ends in Shibalidian. Until 2001, traffic could not proceed any further, other than switching to the Jingjintang Expressway.

Shibalidian (十八里店) literally means "a shop at 18 li," where a Chinese li equates to 0.5 kilometre. Dian, although translated as shop, may not entail the existence of a special shop in the area. Rather, dian is used as a locality ending.

Road transport in Beijing
Bridges in Beijing
Buildings and structures in Chaoyang District, Beijing

Shibalidian


18 Bronzemen is a 1976 Hong Kong kung fu film directed by Joseph Kuo. It is one of the Shaolin themed films, concerning their battles against the Qing Dynasty.

A sequel, called Return of the 18 Bronzemen, followed and was released in the same year.

Plot

The much-reviled Qing government decide to eradicate any opposition to their rule by attacking pro-Ming families in the kingdom. One such attack sees an influential official killed, though his wife and son manage to escape thanks to the intervention of a close ally. While on the run, the son, Shao Lung, is aided by his father's close friend (Jack Long) who teaches the young boy the basics of kung-fu. As time passes, the renegades must once again move on and evade capture by the Qing army. However, it is decided that the safest place for Shaolung to hide would be in the Ming-friendly Shaolin Temple where he could also further his knowledge of kung-fu. Once there, the boy finds the severe, disciplined lifestyle hard to cope with and, despite his best efforts, he lags behind his fellow pupils. Over time he makes two close friends and it is their encouragement that drives him to reach his goals. Now a young man, Shao Lung (Tien Peng) gradually develops into a formidable fighter and concentrates his sights on leaving Shaolin to avenge his father's death. However, to 'graduate' from Shaolin means to defeat the Shaolin bronzemen and a series of fiendish tests. His first attempt to conquer these trials is unsuccessful, but Shaolung is spurred on by his straight-talking friend (Wong) and finally leaves through Shaolin's hallowed gates after a tremendous effort. Once through the dreaded chambers, the Shaolin disciples have the Shaolin crest of the dragon and tiger burnt into their forearms by lifting a huge bronze pot. Outside, the heroes meet up with more patriots. Shao Lung meets his uncle who tells him the true story of his past and gives him half of a royal seal, the other half belonging to his (unknown) future wife. Once on his journey again his constantly stalked by a young "man" (actually a woman in disguise), Miss Lu. After defending him from an assassination attempt, Miss Lu constantly claims that Shao Lung owes her his life, though he is still under the impression she is still a man (a typical recurring plot device in some martial arts films though she is obviously a woman). After another failed attempt at Shao Lung, he manages to come across Miss Lu's half of the royal seal thus revealing she is a woman and also his wife-to-be. Shao Lung and Miss Lu meet up with Brother Wan, and in turn they meet with Brother Ta-Chi who managed to beat the Bronzemen and leave Shaolin. Ta-Chi is a mole who was placed in Shaolin by the Qings to learn kung-fu and to eventually kill Shao Lung. Shao Lung and Brother Wan manage to kill their former brother in self-defense, and with Miss Lu, move on to kill the Manchu general.

Cast
Tien Peng – Shao Lung
Polly Shang Kuan – Miss Lu
Carter Wong – Brother Wan
Chiang Nan – Brother Ta-Chi
Jack Long – Young Ta-Chi

Reception
In his book Horror and Science Fiction Film IV, Donald C Willis reviewed 18 Bronzemen as a "routine martial arts actioner" noting a "long bizarre sequence in which Shao Lin students face the Bronzemen".

References

External links

 18 Bronzemen at Hong Kong Cinemagic

1976 films
Hong Kong martial arts films
Kung fu films
Films set in 17th-century Qing dynasty
Films directed by Joseph Kuo
1970s Hong Kong films

18 Bronzemen


In petroleum geology, the maturity of a rock is a measure of its state in terms of hydrocarbon generation. Maturity is established using a combination of geochemical and basin modelling techniques.

Rocks with high total organic carbon, (termed source rocks), will alter under increasing temperature such that the organic molecules slowly mature into hydrocarbons (see diagenesis). Source rocks are therefore broadly categorised as immature (no hydrocarbon generation), sub-mature (limited hydrocarbon generation), mature (extensive hydrocarbon generation) and overmature (most hydrocarbons have been generated).

The maturity of a source rock can also be used as an indicator of its hydrocarbon potential. That is, if a rock is sub-mature, then it has a much higher potential to generate further hydrocarbons than one that is overmature.

See also
 Van Krevelen diagram

References

 van Krevelen, D.W. (1950). "Graphical-statistical method for the study of structure and reaction processes of coal", Fuel, 29, 269–84.
 van Krevelen, D.W. and Schuyer, J. (1957) Coal science. Elsevier publishing company.
 The chemistry and technology of petroleum

External links
 Maturity (Maturation) Publications

Geochemistry
Petroleum geology

Maturity (geology)


A Guide for the Married Man is a 1967 American bedroom-farce comedy film starring Walter Matthau, Robert Morse, and Inger Stevens. It was directed by Gene Kelly. It features many cameos, including Lucille Ball, Jack Benny, Terry-Thomas, Jayne Mansfield, Sid Caesar, Carl Reiner, Joey Bishop, Art Carney, and Wally Cox. The title song, performed by The Turtles, was composed by John Williams with lyrics by Leslie Bricusse.

Plot
Paul Manning discovers one day that his dear friend and neighbor Ed Stander has been cheating on his wife. Curious, he asks Ed about it, and is given the history and tactics of men who have successfully committed adultery. With each new story, Paul cannot help noticing the attractive blonde, Irma Johnson, who lives nearby.

Paul gets close to cheating on his wife, Ruth, but he never quite goes through with it. In a scene near the end of the movie, he is finally in a motel room with another woman, a wealthy divorced client.  Paul hears shouting outside, and when he looks out the window, he sees photographers taking pictures of his friend Ed in bed with Mrs. Johnson. Paul takes this opportunity to flee the scene and run home to his beloved wife.

Cast

Cameo appearances

Reception

Critical response
A Guide for the Married Man is simply "a series of dumb skits" in Pauline Kael's estimation, and the famous names in the cast are all wasted: "what they do is no more memorable than the plugs for brand-name products that are scattered throughout". Film critic Bosley Crowther of The New York Times greatly enjoyed the movie, calling it "The broadest and funniest farce to come out of Hollywood since the Russians came last year...who would imagine that a film pretending to be a how-to on infidelity would be funny or even in good taste?" and adding "what is thoroughly and delightfully disarming about this mischievous film is the impudent candor of it and its freedom from the leer." The staff at Variety wrote in their review: "Walter Matthau plays a married innocent, eager to stray under the tutelage of friend and neighbor Robert Morse. But this long-married hubby is so retarded in his Immorality (it takes him 12 years to get the seven-year-itch) that, between his natural reluctance and mentor Morse's suggestions (interlarded with warnings against hastiness), he needs the entire film to have his mind made up." Film critic Roger Ebert of Chicago Sun-Times wrote in his review: "There are a lot of funny people in this movie, but they are not very funny people in this movie, Gertrude Stein might have said. The Casino Royale syndrome has struck again in A Guide for the Married Man, and we are forced to sit and watch as dozens of big-name stars jostle each other for their moment before the cameras."

Release
According to Fox records, A Guide for the Married Man needed to earn $5,900,000 in rentals to break even, and made $7,355,000, meaning it made a profit.

Home media
The film was released on DVD on September 6, 2005, by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment.

See also
 List of American films of 1967
 Jack Benny filmography

References

Further reading

External links

1967 films
1960s sex comedy films
20th Century Fox films
Adultery in films
American sex comedy films
1960s English-language films
Films scored by John Williams
Films directed by Gene Kelly
1967 comedy films
1960s American films

A Guide for the Married Man


Karnail Rana is an Indian singer of Himachal Pradesh who is famous for his Himachali songs. He has recorded more than 150 albums, and become a star overnight with his first album Chambe Patne Do Bediyaan or Sabna Da Rakhwala Shivaji or More....

Early life and background
Karnail Rana was born on 30 April 1963 in Village Ghallaur in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh. He completed his schooling
from Government High School, Ghallaur and then graduated from Government College, Dharamshala in music. His father, the late Ran Singh Rana, had served in the army and then ONGC whereas his mother, Indira Rana, was a housewife. Rana got early lessons in music from his family as his father was also interested in singing and he learned the basics in college. Rana recalls that when his family assembled on any occasion, they always enjoyed singing and playing various instruments. He had also been participating in various functions organized in school and college and winning appreciation and awards for his talent. He had participated in many singing shows at all levels, including Nehru Yuva Kendra and the Inter State Folk Exchange Programme, and winning laurels. Earlier, he was interested in ghazal singing but one incident during an inter college function diverted his attention towards folk singing. Karnail Rana, though a participant in the competition was asked to give a guest performance also and he sang a folk song.

Career
After his debut album, he never looked back and went on to become an icon in Himachali folk singing. Rana's first cassette was titled Chambe Patne Do Bediyan in 1994. It made him a star in folk singing overnight. Since then, he has released more than 150 albums in association with T Series. His songs were famous not only in Himachal but also in Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh where most of Himachali people also live. He has received awards from the organization of Himachal and those formed by Himachali people living in other states, including Maharashtra and Punjab and other states. After serving in Nehru Yuva Kendra in 1987, Karnail Rana has been serving in Public Relations Department since 1988.

Discography
His songs like "Ik Joda Sutey Da","Bhala Sadhu Jogiya","Ghare Chuttiyan Aija","Kaisa Laga Goriye" were huge hit. His bhajans like "Jogiya Ve Jogiya","Dhaulgiri Parbat te","Fulaan di Barkha Layi Babe Ne" were famous in North India.
 Bindu Neelu Do Sakhiyan
 Patna Deya Taarua,
 Mere Bhole Chale Kailash
 Mere Bum Bhole
 Rangla Himachal
 Kaisa Laga Goriye
 Paunahari Jogi Ho Giya
 Ik Joda Soote Da
 Bhala Sadhu Jogiya
 Sabna Da Rakhwala Shivji
 Jogi Supne De Bich Aaya,
 Minjo Laung Ghadaai De
 Vichhoda Jogi Da
 Jai Bhole Nath
 Geet Pahadan De
 Sachchi Shraddha De Naal Koee Bulanda Naiyo
 Babe Da Chala Aa Gaya
 Chhail Jawana
 Tu Jap Lei Hari Da Naam
 Nath Kadaniyan
 Phullaan Di Barkha Layi Babe Ne
 Paunahaariya Dhoona Lagaya Peeplaan Heth
 Paunahaari Jogi Ho Giya
 Tu Japp Lai Jindadiye Do Ghadiyan Pal Baih Ke
 Gharae Chhuttiyan Aai Ja
 Nindre Paarein Paarein Chali Jaayaan
 Chamba Chamba Aakhdi
 Sai Nath Baso Mann Mere
 Daso Babaji Mukh Kedi Gallon Modeya
 Mahlan De Hetthan
 Chhutti Aaeeja Din Char
 Banjara
 Koulan Gaddan
 Dil Lagda Na Ranjhna Mera
 Himachali Lok Rang Tarang
 Bharti Hoee Jaana Pardes
 Toteyaan Bolna De Vol-1
 Aa Giya Bansri Wala
 Chhaile Bage Da Mor
 Chhad De Duniya Wali Mauj Noo
 Shaan Himachale Di
 Urheyaan Ni Urheyaan Kali Koyaley
 Raunakan Himachale Diyan
 Thokar Tera Bhala Kare
 Fauji Munda Aa Gaya Chutti Part 2
 Chalo Mani Mahesh
 Lachchi Lachchi Lok Gallaan De

References

Living people
1963 births
Indian male folk singers
People from Kangra district
Singers from Himachal Pradesh

Karnail Rana


Wlodek Rabinowicz (Włodzimierz Rabinowicz, born on 14 January 1947) is a Polish-Swedish philosopher and Professor Emeritus at Lund University. Rabinowicz's areas of expertise include ethics, normativity, decision theory and utilitarianism. From 1995 to 1998, he was editor-in-chief of Theoria.

Biography
He began his undergraduate studies at the University of Warsaw, but after the 1968 Polish political crisis he moved to the University of Uppsala, where he graduated in 1970. He received his doctorate in 1979.

Bibliography
Universalizability. A study in morals and metaphysics, D.Reidel Publ. Comp., Dordrecht 1979.
Logic for a Change, Festschrift for Sten Lindström, redakcja, wraz z Svenem Ove Hanssonem, Uppsala Prints and Preprints in Philosophy 1995.
Preference and Value - Preferentialism in Ethics, redakcja, Studies in Philosophy, Lund 1996.
Value and Choice – Some Common Themes in Decision Theory and Moral Philosophy, redaktor, Lund Philosophy Reports 2000:1
Value and Choice – Some Common Themes in Decision Theory and Moral Philosophy, vol. 2, redaktor, Lund Philosophy Reports 2001:1.
Patterns of Value – Essays on Formal Axiology and Value Analysis, vol. 2, redaktor, wraz z Toni Rønnow-Rasmussenem, Lund Philosophy Reports 2004:1,

References

External links
  Wlodek Rabinowicz's profile at the website of Lund University
  W. Rabinowicz's CV
 Hommage à Wlodek. Philosophical Papers Dedicated to Wlodek Rabinowicz, ed. Toni Rønnow-Rasmussen, Björn Petersson, Jonas Josefsson & Dan Egonsson, 2007.

1947 births
Living people
Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Analytic philosophers
Utilitarians
20th-century Polish philosophers
21st-century Swedish philosophers
Writers from Warsaw
Polish emigrants to Sweden
Academic staff of Lund University

Wlodek Rabinowicz


A spectrohelioscope is a type of solar telescope designed by George Ellery Hale in 1924 to allow the Sun to be viewed in a selected wavelength of light. The name comes from Latin- and Greek-based words: "Spectro," referring to the optical spectrum, "helio," referring to the Sun, and "scope," as in telescope.

The basic spectrohelioscope is a complex machine that uses a spectroscope to scan the surface of the Sun. The image from the objective lens is focused on a narrow slit revealing only a thin portion of the Sun's surface. The light is then passed through a prism or diffraction grating to spread the light into a spectrum. The spectrum is then focused on another slit that allows only a narrow part of the spectrum (the desired wavelength of light for viewing) to pass. The light is finally focused on an eyepiece so the surface of the Sun can be seen. The view, however, would be only a narrow strip of the Sun's surface. The slits are moved in unison to scan across the whole surface of the Sun giving a full image. Independently nodding mirrors can be used instead of moving slits to produce the same scan: the first mirror selects a slice of the Sun, the second selects the desired wavelength.

The spectroheliograph is a similar device, but images the Sun at a particular wavelength photographically and is still in use in professional observatories.

See also
Helioscope
Heliometer

References

External links
 An amateur-made spectrohelioscope

Measuring instruments
Spectroscopy
Telescope types
Astronomical instruments

Spectrohelioscope