When We Were Very Young is a best-selling book of poetry by A. A. Milne. It was first published in 1924, and it was illustrated by E. H. Shepard. Several of the verses were set to music by Harold Fraser-Simson. The book begins with an introduction entitled "Just Before We Begin", which, in part, tells readers to imagine for themselves who the narrator is, and that it might be Christopher Robin. The 38th poem in the book, "Teddy Bear", that originally appeared in Punch magazine in February 1924, was the first appearance of the famous character Winnie-the-Pooh, first named "Mr. Edward Bear" by Christopher Robin Milne. In one of the illustrations of "Teddy Bear", Winnie-the-Pooh is shown wearing a shirt which was later coloured red when reproduced on a recording produced by Stephen Slesinger. This has become his standard appearance in the Disney adaptations. On 1 January 2020, When We Were Very Young entered the public domain in the United States, but remains protected in other countries, including the UK.

Contents

 "Corner of the Street"
 "Buckingham Palace"
 "Happiness"
 "The Christening"
 "Puppy and I"
 "Twinkle Toes"
 "The Four Friends"
 "Lines and Squares"
 "Brownie"
 "Independence"
 "Nursery Chairs"
 "Market Square"
 "Daffodowndilly"
 "Water Lilies"
 "Disobedience"
 "Spring Morning"
 "The Island"
 "The Three Foxes"
 "Politeness"
 "Jonathan Jo"
 "At the Zoo"
 "Rice Pudding"
 "The Wrong House"
 "Missing"
 "The King's Breakfast"
 "Hoppity"
 "At Home"
 "Summer Afternoon"
 "The Dormouse and the Doctor"
 "Shoes and Stockings"
 "Sand Between the Toes"
 "Knights and Ladies"
 "Little Bo Peep and Little Boy Blue"
 "The Mirror"
 "Halfway Down"
 "The Invaders"
 "Before Tea"
 "Teddy Bear"
 "Bad Sir Brian Botany"
 "In the Fashion"
 "The Alchemist"
 "Growing Up"
 "If I Were King"
 "Vespers"

See also

 Now We Are Six, another book of poetry by A. A. Milne

References

External links

1924 children's books
1924 poetry books
Books illustrated by E. H. Shepard
British children's books
Children's poetry books
English poetry collections
Methuen Publishing books
Poetry by A. A. Milne
Winnie-the-Pooh books
Cultural depictions of Christopher Robin Milne

When We Were Very Young


Barbara Meier (born 25 July 1986) is a German fashion model and actress. She is best known as the winner of the second season of Germany's Next Topmodel.

Early life
Born in the small Bavarian town of Amberg, Meier did not originally aspire to a career in modelling. Instead, after graduating from school, she enrolled at the Fachhochschule Regensburg in order to study mathematics.

Career

Germany's Next Topmodel

During her studies, Meier was approached by a model scout in a shopping center in Regensburg who invited her to the casting of the TV show Germany's Next Topmodel. In the course of the show, she had to face a series of challenges in order to outrival her contestants. Even before the end of the show, one of these minor competitions had her win a leading role alongside Heidi Klum in a nationwide TV commercial for McDonald's. Meier did not have any modeling experience before that but she was able to prevail against 16,421 competitors and became the winner of the season on 24 May 2007. The prize included a contract with the modelling agency IMG Models in Paris, an appearance on the cover of the German edition of Cosmopolitan in August 2007, and a contract as the face of the next advertising campaign for the clothing company C&A.

Magazines / Editorials / Cover
Meier was featured in editorials of many international magazines such as Vogue Taiwan, Grazia, InStyle, Elle, Madame Figaro, L'Officiel, etc. and appeared on the cover of over 15 German and international magazines such as Cosmopolitan, Icon, Style International, Tango, She, etc.

Advertising
She was the face of many advertising campaigns for the brands Pantene, C&A, Disneyland Resort Paris, Yogurette, Müller Milk and McDonald's and also internationally for Maybelline, Fabi, Borsalino, Save the Queen, Colin's Jeans, C'est comme Ca, Charactere, Miss Poem and many more.
Since January 2016, she has been promoting the cosmetics manufacturer Schaebens.
She is also the German advertising face of the American shoe brand Skechers and the pulse watch manufacturer Polar.

Catwalk
Since the beginning of her career, Meier has been on the catwalk for national as well as international brands. At the beginning of 2011 she ran for the fifth time for various designers at Fashion Week Berlin. In addition to shows in Los Angeles, New York, Paris and Bangkok Meier participated in the Fashion Week Paris in the spring of 2010, where she was booked by the designer Wolfgang Joop for the prêt-à-porter show of his brand Wunderkind.

Acting
In 2010, Meier was invited to a film casting for the ProSieben mystery thriller Schreie der Vergessenen. She had no acting experience at that time yet and got the role of the deaf medium Morgana. After the broadcast of the film in autumn 2011, she was taken under contract by the Berlin acting agency Fitz & Skoglund.

In summer of 2011, Meier completed a basic education at the New York Film Academy and since then she has taken private acting lessons with various coaches in Germany and the United States. In addition to small roles in TV films, Meier played in main roles of various ZDF crime series, short films, working with Christiane Hörbiger. In 2012, she played one of the leading roles in the short film Wiegenlied (Director: Selcuk Cara, Germany, 2012), which had its premiere in 2012 under the international title Lullaby in the Student Etudes Panorama section at the film festival Plus Camerimage in Bydgoszcz, Poland.

In August 2017, Meier shot her first movie, The Aspern Papers, a period drama directed by Julien Landais and based on Henry James's novel. She played alongside Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Morgane Polanski, and Poppy Delevingne.

Book author

In December 2015, Meier's book Dein Weg zum Glücksgewicht was published by Dorling Kindersley. She describes the work as an "anti-diet book" and above all wants to motivate women and make them feel better in their bodies.

Charity
In 2008, she was an ambassador for the Year of Mathematics, to which she was appointed by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. In 2012, she was one of the advertising ambassadors of the Deutsches Museum in Munich. She is the ambassador of the campaign "Inform" of the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture, which is promoting exercise and healthy nutrition of the population. Since 2015, she has been an ambassador of the WWF for the project "ghost nets", which informs the public about the environmental impact and dangers of the fishing nets floating in the sea.

Since 2017, Barbara Meier has been the ambassador for the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development for fair and environmentally friendly fashion. Meier is committed to bringing sustainable textiles from the niche to a broader market.

Personal life
Meier married Austrian entrepreneur and investor Klemens Hallmann in 2019. Their first daughter was born in 2020 and a second daughter in 2022.

Agencies

 301 Model Management, Istanbul
 Fashion Cult Model Management, Athens
 Major Model Management, Munich
 Major Model Management, New York
 Major Model Management, Paris
 Major Model Management, Milan
 Yuli Models, Tel Aviv

Filmography
 2010: (Ver-)Passt (TV trailer)
 2011: Gute Reise (short)
 2011: Schreie der Vergessenen (TV film)
 2012: München schaut hin (Socialspot)
 2012: Der Staatsanwalt – Schlangengrube (TV series)
 2012: Der Alte – Blinder Hass (TV series)
 2012: Wiegenlied (short)
 2013: Notruf Hafenkante – Das Geheimnis der Braut (TV series)
 2013: Hattinger und die kalte Hand  – Ein Chimseekrimi (TV film)
 2013: Küstenwache – Die Hand des Teufels (TV series)
 2013: Schon wieder Henriette (TV film)
 2013: Christine. Perfekt war gestern! – Ein Ex zum Knutschen (TV series)
 2013: Apothekerin (short)
 2014: Strangers (short)
 2014: Sechs auf einen Streich –  Siebenschön (TV film)
 2015: Stuttgart Homicide – Tödliche Tage (TV series)
 2015: Schwägereltern (TV film)
 2015:
 2015: Heiraten ist nichts für Feiglinge (TV film)
 2015: SOKO München (TV series)
 2016: SOKO Wismar (TV series)
 2017: Mord in bester Gesellschaft (TV series)
 2018: Oskar — Gehen, wenns am schönsten ist
 2018: The Aspern Papers
 2019: Reiterhof Wildenstein – Die Pferdeflüsterin (TV Film)
 2020: Endless
 2021: Army of Thieves
 2022: Wolke unterm Dach
 2022: Die Geschichte der Menschheit – leicht gekürzt
 2022: Der Onkel - The Hawk
 2022: Schächten

References

External links

 Barbara Meier at IMG Models
 Barbara Meier at Major Model Management

Living people
1986 births
German female models
People from Amberg
Actors from Bavaria
Germany's Next Topmodel winners

Barbara Meier


A password is a word, phrase or string of characters used to gain access to a resource, such as an object, area or information.

Password may also refer to:

Film
 Password (2019 Bengali film), an Indian film, starring Dev
 Password (2019 Bangladeshi film), starring Shakib Khan
 Password (2019 Nepali film), starring Anoop Bikram Shahi

Music
Passwords (band), a Canadian rock band
Password (record producer), Nigerian record producer
Passwords (album), a 2018 album by American folk rock band Dawes
Password, a 2000 album by Geoff Muldaur
"Password", a song by DRAM from his 2016 album Big Baby DRAM
"Password", a song by Kylie Minogue from her 2001 CD single Your Disco Needs You
"Password", a 1964 song by Kitty Wells

Television
Password (British game show), a British panel game show based on the US version, 1963–1983
Password (American  game show), an American television game show
Password, a home version of the television game show Password

Other uses
Password (video gaming), a video game saving method
Passwords (2000), a book by French philosopher Jean Baudrillard, published in French as Mots de passe
European Strategic Program on Research in Information Technology (ESPRIT), a project researching X.509 technology, called "Password"

See also

Password manager, software or hardware used to generate complex computer passwords
The Password Game, an online puzzle game

 Code word (disambiguation)

Password (disambiguation)


Ervin Baldwin (born August 25, 1986) is a former American football defensive end. He has played for the Chicago Bears and Indianapolis Colts of the National Football League (NFL). He was drafted by the Bears in the seventh round of the 2008 NFL Draft. He played college football at Michigan State.

Early years
Baldwin was selected Region Defensive Player of the Year as a senior at Macon County High School in Montezuma, Ga. He also garnered All-Middle Georgia honors in 2003.

College career
Baldwin was an All-Big Ten selection in 2007 after starting every game (25) in his two-year Spartan career at defensive end. In 2007, he started all 13 games at DE, recording 58 tackles (27 solos) with 18.5 tackles for losses and 8.5 sacks. In 2006, he started all 12 games at the rush end and made 35 (13 solos, 22 assists) four sacks, and 6.5 tackles for losses. He was a 2005 JUCO All-American at Reedly Community College, California, and earned First-team All-California and First-team All-California Region 1 honor as a sophomore. He also was named California Region 1 and Central Valley Conference Defensive Player of the Year in 2005. He helped the Tigers win back-to-back CVC titles in 2004–05 after recording 67 tackles as a sophomore, with 27.5 tackles for losses including 14.5 sacks.

Professional career

Chicago Bears
Baldwin was a seventh-round selection (208th overall) in the 2008 NFL Draft by the Chicago Bears.

Indianapolis Colts
Baldwin was signed the Colts practice squad on November 12, 2009 and promoted to the active roster on December 2, 2009.  He was released by the team on September 4, 2010.

References

External links
Chicago Bears bio
Michigan State Spartans bio
Baldwin's Forum

1986 births
Living people
People from Oglethorpe, Georgia
American football defensive ends
Michigan State Spartans football players
Chicago Bears players
Indianapolis Colts players
Chicago Rush players
Pittsburgh Power players

Ervin Baldwin


The Southwest Rail Corridor is a proposed commuter rail line serving southwestern Houston. The line connects Missouri City to METRORail's current Fannin South. It then merges with METRORail's Red line and ends at the Museum District.

History
As the population in both Harris County and Fort Bend County grew, more commuters started to go to central Houston. The area with most commuters from Fort Bend County is the Texas Medical Center with 24,000 daily trips. This is where 33% of the trips are headed to. The number of commuters is expected to reach 32,000 by 2035.

Rolling Stock
While it is still on debate to use light rail, electric locomotive, or diesel locomotive as the trains, as of 2012 articles have shown that light rail will likely be the fleet used.

References

Proposed railway lines in Texas
Greater Houston

Southwest Rail Corridor


Harry Ward Leonard (February 8, 1861 – February 18, 1915) was an American electrical engineer and inventor. He is best known for his invention, the Ward Leonard motor control system. Equipment based on this invention remained in service into the 21st century.

Early life and heritage
Harry Ward Leonard was born on February 8, 1861, in Cincinnati, Ohio, to Ezra George Leonard and Henrietta Dana Ward. He was the fourth of their six children. He was a great great grandson of American Revolutionary War General Artemas Ward.  In 1895, he was married to Carolyn Good in Geneva, Switzerland.

As a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Leonard was instrumental in founding the student newspaper, The Tech, and served as the president of the paper's board of directors. He graduated from MIT in 1883.

Career

After graduating from MIT, Leonard was employed by Thomas Edison to help introduce the Edison central-station electric power distribution system. Within four years, he was promoted to the position of general superintendent of the Western Electric Light Company of Chicago, Illinois.  The following year, he established Leonard and Izard, a firm that set up electric railways and generating stations. In 1889, his firm was acquired by Edison and Leonard became the general manager of the Edison operations in the United States and Canada. In 1896, Leonard organized and became president of Ward Leonard Electric as an Edison company in Hoboken, New Jersey.  In 1898, he left the Edison organization and incorporated his own Ward Leonard Electric Company on February 19, 1898, in the village of Bronxville in Westchester County, New York.

While working for Edison, Leonard patented a number of inventions and he continued developing new ideas throughout his career. He was granted patents for more than 100 inventions of electrical distribution and control systems and related equipment.

The Ward Leonard motor control system

The Ward Leonard motor control system was Mr. Leonard's best known and most lasting invention. It was introduced in about 1891 and soon became the most widely used type of electric motor speed control.

In a Ward Leonard system, a prime mover drives a direct current (DC) generator at a constant speed. The armature of the DC generator is connected directly to the armature of a DC motor. The DC motor drives the load equipment at an adjustable speed. The motor speed is adjusted by adjusting the output voltage of the generator using a rheostat to adjust the excitation current in the field winding. The motor field current is usually not adjusted, but the motor field is sometimes reduced to increase the speed above the base speed. The prime mover is usually an alternating current (AC) motor, but a DC motor or an engine might be used instead. To provide the DC field excitation power supply, Ward Leonard systems usually include an exciter generator that is driven by the prime mover.

Although only technical specialists are likely to be familiar with Ward Leonard systems, many millions of people have ridden in elevators powered by Ward Leonard drives. From the 1920s through the 1980s most electrically driven elevators used Ward Leonard control and many systems remained in use at the beginning of the 21st century.

Many variations of the Ward Leonard system have been implemented, but they have generally continued to be called Ward Leonard systems. H. Ward Leonard and many others have patented auxiliary control systems used to regulate the motor speed as required to automatically perform specific tasks such as controlling pump speed to regulate flow.

Mechanical types of adjustable-speed drives and other electrical types continued to be used and new types developed after the Ward Leonard system was introduced. Electron tube types of DC motor controls began to be developed in the 1920s but electronic controls didn't seriously begin to displace the Ward Leonard system until thyristor controlled drives were developed in the late 1960s. By the mid-1970s, Ward Leonard drives were rapidly becoming obsolete, but the replacement of existing Ward Leonard drives has continued past the end of the 20th century.

Sudden death
H. Ward Leonard was an active member of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, publishing technical papers, attending meetings and making presentations. He died suddenly on February 18, 1915, in New York while attending the annual dinner of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers.

See also
 Booster (electric power)
 Motor-generator
 Rotary transformer
 Ward leonard control

References

Citations

General references

1861 births
1915 deaths
American electrical engineers
American inventors
Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni
People from Cincinnati
Engineers from Ohio

Harry Ward Leonard


Prioria balsamifera, the agba or tola, is a tall forest tree in the family Fabaceae. It is native to lowland tropical rainforest in west Africa, from Nigeria southwards to the Congo basin in Angola, Cameroon, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, scattered or in local pockets, favouring deep soil and plenty of moisture. It is threatened by habitat loss and over-cutting for timber.

It is a large to very large tree growing to 60 m tall, with a trunk 70–180 cm diameter with resinous bark. The leaves are pinnate, with 6–10 alternately-arranged leaflets 4–9 cm long and 2–4 cm broad. The flowers are small, with four (rarely five) white sepals 2 mm long and no petals; they are produced in panicles. The pod is 10–14 cm long and 3.5–4.5 cm broad, superficially resembling a maple samara with a single 2–3 cm seed at one end, with the rest of the pod modified into a wing. It has a high spruce gum content.

Other names for this tree are achi, egba, emongi (Nigeria), tola blanc (Congo-Brazzaville), tola branca (Angola), N'Tola (Zaire).

References

Detarioideae
Flora of West Tropical Africa
Trees of Africa
Endangered plants
Taxonomy articles created by Polbot

Prioria balsamifera


Spottsville is a census-designated place (CDP) and former coal town in Henderson County, Kentucky, United States. As of the 2010 census the population was 325.

U.S. Route 60 forms the northern edge of Spottsville, and the Green River forms the eastern edge. The Green River Lock & Dam is located in the community. If one travels east through Spottsville, one can see the lock to one's right when one crosses the US-60 bridge (the Green River Bridge). One can still see some of the remains of the old locks that were replaced in the mid-1960s; to one's left, one can see a turning bridge for trains (it turns when a barge comes through).

US-60 leads east  to Owensboro and west  to Henderson, the Henderson County seat.

There is one elementary school in Spottsville, serving all of the eastern part of Henderson County (including Beals, Baskett, and Reed). The original Spottsville school, which served all grades, provided Henderson County's first school bus service in 1920. This original Spottsville school burned down in March 1932.

Spottsville was named for Major Samuel Spotts, who shot the first gun at the Battle of New Orleans. The area was visited by the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto in 1541. His army was attacked near the Ohio River by Indians of a tribe or tribes called variously the Kashinampo, the Quizqui, and the Chiska Cherokee.

From 1904 to 1911 as many as 116 men of the Green River Coal Company mined coal in Spottsville. The Pittsburgh Coal Company operated a 75-man coal camp in Spottsville from 1911 to 1924.

Demographics

References

External links
An unofficial Spottsville website

Census-designated places in Henderson County, Kentucky
Coal towns in Kentucky
Census-designated places in Kentucky

Spottsville, Kentucky


Semaglutide, sold under the brand names Ozempic, Wegovy and Rybelsus, is an antidiabetic medication used for the treatment of type 2 diabetes and an anti-obesity medication used for long-term weight management. It was developed by Novo Nordisk in 2012. It is a peptide similar to the hormone glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), modified with a side chain. It can be administered by subcutaneous injection or taken orally.

Semaglutide is a glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist. The most common side effects include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, and constipation.

In 2020, semaglutide was the 129th most commonly prescribed medication in the United States, with more than 4million prescriptions.

Medical uses
Semaglutide is indicated as an adjunct to diet and exercise to improve glycemic control in adults with type2 diabetes.

The higher-dose formulation of semaglutide is indicated as an adjunct to diet and exercise for long-term weight management in adults with obesity (initial body mass index (BMI) ≥ 30 kg/m2) or who are overweight (initial BMI ≥ 27 kg/m2) and have at least one weight-related comorbidity.

Adverse effects
Possible side effects include nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, constipation, abdominal pain, headache, fatigue, indigestion/heartburn, dizziness, abdominal distension, belching, hypoglycemia (low blood glucose) in patients with type 2 diabetes, flatulence, gastroenteritis, and gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). It can also cause pancreatitis, gastroparesis, and bowel obstruction.

Contraindications
Data from rodent studies of GLP-1-mediated thyroid C-cell hyperplasia indicates that use is contraindicated in people with a personal or family history of medullary thyroid carcinoma or with multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2.

Mechanism of action
Semaglutide is a glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist. By mimicking the action of the incretin glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), it increases the production of insulin, the hormone that lowers the blood sugar level. It also appears to enhance growth of pancreatic beta cells, which are responsible for insulin production and release. Additionally, it inhibits the production of glucagon, the hormone that increases glycogenolysis (release of stored carbohydrate from the liver) and gluconeogenesis (synthesis of new glucose). It reduces food intake by lowering appetite and slowing down digestion in the stomach, helping reduce body fat.

Structure and pharmacology
Semaglutide is chemically similar to human GLP-1. The first six amino acids of GLP-1 are missing. Substitutions are made at GLP positions 8 and 34 (semaglutide positions 2 and 28), where alanine and lysine are replaced by 2-aminoisobutyric acid and arginine, respectively. The substitution of the alanine prevents chemical breakdown by dipeptidyl peptidase-4. The lysine at GLP position 26 (semaglutide position 20) has a long chain attached, ending with a chain of 17 carbon atoms and a carboxyl group. This increases the drug's binding to blood protein (albumin), which enables longer presence in the blood circulation.

Semaglutide's half-life in the blood is about seven days (165–184 hours). It can be administered by subcutaneous injection or taken orally (by mouth).

History
In June 2008, a phase II clinical trial began studying semaglutide.

In 2012, a team of researchers at Novo Nordisk developed semaglutide for a once-weekly diabetes therapy as a longer-acting alternative to liraglutide. It was given the brand name Ozempic. Clinical trials started in January 2016 and ended in May 2017.

In March 2021, in a phase III randomized, double-blind, trial, 1,961 adults with a body mass index of 30 or greater were assigned in a 2:1 ratio to a treatment with once-weekly subcutaneous semaglutide or placebo, plus lifestyle intervention. The trials occurred at 129 sites in 16 countries in Asia, Europe, North America, and South America. The mean percentage change in body weight at week 68 was −14.9% in the semaglutide group vs −2.4% with placebo, for an estimated treatment difference of −12.4 percentage points (95% CI, −13.4 to −11.5).

A 2022 review of anti-obesity treatments found that semaglutide as well as tirzepatide (which has an overlapping mechanism of action) were more promising than previous anti-obesity drugs, although less effective than bariatric surgery.

Society and culture

Legal status
In December 2016, the US FDA New Drug Application (NDA) was filed, and in October 2017, the FDA Advisory Committee approved it unanimously.

In December 2017, the injectable version with the brand name Ozempic was approved for use by people with diabetes in the United States, and, in January 2018, in Canada.

In February 2018, authorization was granted in the European Union, in March 2018 in Japan, and in August 2019 in Australia.

In September 2019, a version that can be taken orally (Rybelsus) was approved for medical use in the United States, and in the European Union in April 2020.

In June 2021, a higher-dose version for injectable use sold under the brand name Wegovy was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration as an anti-obesity medication for long-term weight management in adults. In November 2021, the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) recommended to grant a marketing authorization for Wegovy to Novo Nordisk A/S. In January 2022, Wegovy was approved for medical use in the European Union.

In January 2023, the label for Rybelsus was updated to reflect that it can be used as a first-line treatment for adults with type 2 diabetes.

Gray market sellers offer unauthorized products claimed to be semaglutide online. This practice is illegal in the United States, but some buyers turn to unauthorized retailers due to being denied insurance coverage and not being able to afford the name brand drug.

In October 2023, Belgium announced it was considering a temporary ban on Ozempic for use as a weight loss medication amid a sharp increase in demand leading to a shortage of the drug, which was expected to last into mid-2024. The government had previously advised medical professionals to prescribe the drug only to diabetics. A similar order had been issued by the government of the United Kingdom earlier that month, additionally prohibiting new prescriptions for type 2 diabetics.

Economics
In the US, Wegovy has a list price of $1,349.02 per month as of 2022, according to The New York Times, suggesting that because of the high costs many people "who could most benefit from weight loss may be unable to afford such expensive drugs". High costs of Ozempic prompted some insurance companies to investigate and refuse to cover patients with what the companies considered was insufficient evidence to support a diabetes diagnosis, alleging off-label prescribing for weight loss.

In the UK, semaglutide is available on NHS prescription for diabetes at nominal or no cost to patients. It is also available for obesity, limited to treatment for two years.

High demand caused worldwide supply shortages of semaglutide in 2023; new UK prescriptions were not issued during the shortage.

Counterfeits

In October 2023 there were reports of counterfeit Ozempic pens being sold in Europe. The pens possibly contained insulin, and led to several people being hospitalised with hypoglycaemia and seizures. In Germany bogus injection pens with German labels in genuine Ozempic packaging were allegedly supplied by a wholesaler in Austria to Germany and to two British wholesalers. No counterfeits had been sold by retail pharmacies.

Research

In 2021, semaglutide was found to be inferior to tirzepatide (sold under the brand name Mounjaro) when used once weekly as add-on therapy to metformin in people with type2 diabetes (SURPASS-2), in both endpoints of reduction in glycohemoglobin, A1C, and body weight, with a roughly similar safety profile.

A 2014 meta-analysis found that semaglutide may be effective in lowering liver enzymes (transaminitis) and improving certain radiologically observed features of metabolic-dysfunction–associated fatty-liver disease (MAFLD).
French national health care insurance system database had previously suggested 1–3 years use of glucagon like peptide-1 receptor agonists like exenatide, liraglutide and dulaglutide may be linked with increased occurrence of thyroid cancer. Semaglutide belongs to the same family of medicine. In a meta-analysis involving data from 37 randomized controlled trials and 19 real world studies (46,719 patients), corresponding author Deep Dutta and others demonstrated that semaglutide use over 18 months was not associated with increased risks of any cancer, supported by a high grade of evidence.

In July 2023, the Icelandic Medicines Agency reported two cases of suicidal thoughts and one case of self-injury of users of the injection, prompting a safety assessment of Ozempic, Wegovy, Saxenda, and similar drugs.

References

External links

Glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists
Peptide hormones

Semaglutide


In music, the axis system is a system of analysis originating in the work of Ernő Lendvai, which he developed in his analysis of the music of Béla Bartók.

The axis system is "concerned with harmonic and tonal substitution", and posits a novel type of functional relationship between tones and chords. Lendvai's analyses aim to show how chords and tones related by the intervals of a minor third and tritone can function as tonal substitutes for one another, and do so in many of Bartók's compositions.

Introduction

In classical and common-practice systems of harmony, certain chord substitutions are recognised and are commonly made use of by composers and arrangers: "certain chords have been able to act as substitutes for others; for example, the submediant chord ... can replace the tonic, most familiarly in an interrupted cadence." In his analyses of Bartók's music, Lendvai identifies a novel set of tonal substitutions; substitutions that relate chords and keys in a flat mediant relation to one another, and also those related by the tritone, a tonal relationship "normally regarded as the most remote pitch/chord/key area from the tonic."  Lendvai argued that these relationships had a naturalistic basis (that is, were not merely an analytical or compositional contrivance), and argued that many of Bartók's compositions made essential use of the tonal substitutability he described. By establishing the veracity of this novel set of relationships, Lendvai "attempts to 'explain' Bartók's chromaticism within a tonally functional model."

Terms and definitions

In his analysis, Lendvai groups the twelve tones of the chromatic scale into three sets; each set of tones contains those notes that are found at intervals of a minor third and tritone from one another (equivalent to the notes that make up the three possible diminished seventh chords). Thus, there are four notes in each of the three sets, sets which Lendvai refers to as axes. By way of analogy with common practice harmony, the three axes are categorised as
tonic, subdominant, and dominant.

Tones related to each other by the interval of a tritone are said to be part of a pair or branch (e.g. C/F, E/A, etc.). Thus, each of the three axes contains two branches, and are further categorised as either the 'principal' or 'secondary' branch of axes in question. Continuing with the language of axes, the members of each branch are known as "pole and counterpole". Thus, the twelve tones of the chromatic scale are identified in a two-part system of categorisation: each tone is a member of a four note axis (tonic, dominant, and subdominant); each tone is part of a branch within that axis that is either the principal or secondary branch of that axis; and each branch consists of a pole and counterpole.

If 'C' is taken as tonic, then the categorisation proceeds as follows:

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"
!colspan=2|Tonic
!colspan=2|Subdominant
!colspan=2|Dominant
|-
|Primary
|Secondary
|Primary
|Secondary
|Primary
|Secondary
|-
|C, F
|A, D
|F, B
|D, G
|G, C
|E, A
|}

Substitutability

The essential idea behind the axis system is that the axes group together "substituable key areas", and categorises key areas within a particular axis in reference to the strength and appropriateness of their inter-substitutability. Counterpoles that form one branch of an axis are more closely related than the counterpoles of the other branch of that axis: inter-substitutability within a branch is a stronger relationship than between the two branches of an axis. However, each axis possesses a "two-fold affinity", one being the relationship between pole and counterpole, the other being the relationship between the principal branch with the secondary branch. The relation between pole and counterpole, "its closest replacement" is judged to be stronger much more sensitive than the relation between the other poles of an axis, and due to this Lendvai states that "a pole is always interchangeable with its counterpole without any change in its function."

Essential to Lendvai's conception of the axis system and the relationships it describes is the idea that "the particular axes should not be considered as chords of the diminished seventh, but as the functional relationships of four different tonalities, which may best be compared to the major-minor relations of classical music (e.g. C major and A minor, E major and C minor)."

Analysis of Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta

The form of the first movement of Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta provides an illustration of axis-based substitution, where the opening is based upon the pole of the principal branch of the tonic axis (A, A-C-E-F), the middle contrasts the opening and the end of the first movement by being based on E. In the second movement the beginning and ending based on C are contrasted with the middle based on its pole F. The two movements themselves are contrasted through the first being based on the principal branch (A-E) and the second on the secondary (C-F).

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center;"
!Movement
!colspan=3|Section
|-
!
!Beginning
!Middle
!End
|-
|I
|A
|E
|A
|-
|II
|C
|F
|C
|-
|III
|F
|C
|F
|-
|IV
|A
|E
|A
|}
The pattern Tonic-Super Tonic-Subdominant relationship repeats itself counter clockwise around the circle of fifths. This pattern creates the root movement of a ii/V7/I chord progression. The tonic dominant relationship is repeated around the circle in clockwise fashion.

Composition and analysis with the axis system

It may be noted that each of the above notes forms a descending diminished chord. In the case of I or C, C-A-F-D, or an E fully diminished chord. This connects the axis system not only with diminished chords, which often form the basis for the movement in a piece based on the axis system, but also links the axis system with the diminished scales formed on III of each of the principal tones: root, subdominant, and dominant.

The axis system is probably used more in analysis, and less in composition. Uses of the system have a characteristic sound, but that sound is similar to that which can be found in uses of tritone Dominant Substitutions, and Deceptive Cadences using the VII dominant chord. Older systems of harmonic theory segue very easily into the axis system.

The axis system and jazz
Brazilian music, especially the music of Antonio Carlos Jobim, uses harmonies that are easily analyzed by the axis system and not easily analyzed in other ways. A great example is the bridge of The Girl from Ipanema.

The tritone substitution, an harmonic device common in jazz chord progressions where a dominant V chord is substituted with a bII7 chord (or a secondary dominant II7 chord with a bVI7 chord, etc.), whose common justification is the enharmonicity of the tritones of both chords (G7 has a B-F tritone whereas Db7 has an enharmonic Cb-F tritone, and both may resolve to C-E), and which is similar to the German sixth of classical harmony, corresponds to a special case of the classification of functions as established by the Axis system.

Further reading

Lendvai's system is critiqued by Paul Wilson in The Music of Béla Bartók (1992).

See also
 Acoustic scale
 Coltrane changes

References

Sources
Wilson, Paul (1992). The Music of Béla Bartók. .

Cooper, David  "Bartok: Concerto for Orchestra", ch. 3 Genesis and Reception, CUP

Harmony
Classical music analysis

Axis system


Miles Gilderdale (born in Kingston, Jamaica) is a member of smooth jazz group Acoustic Alchemy and plays the steel-string acoustic guitar and electric guitar.

In 1996, Gilderdale became a member of the contemporary jazz group Acoustic Alchemy and has collaborated on seven releases, including 2001's Grammy nominated AArt. Gilderdale contributed to the group's 1998 release Positive Thinking... and was selected by Greg Carmichael for the steel string acoustic chair which was left vacant by the passing of the group's original founder, Nick Webb.

A seasoned guitarist and performer, Miles Gilderdale first became known in the UK and Europe to audiences in the 1980s as the lead singer and guitarist in York/Harrogate-based soul band Zoot and the Roots which also included the sax player Snake Davis. He has worked on stage with artists as diverse as Ben E. King, Ronnie Wood, and Jools Holland, as well as having done numerous live BBC Radio 1 broadcasts and TV appearances.

Gilderdale has composed material for the award-winning computer game Broken Sword by Revolution software and regularly has incidental music feature on TV and Radio which he writes with the independent production company MZen

When not touring with Acoustic Alchemy, he can be often spotted gigging around the UK with The Blueflies, a funk/blues outfit composed of Miles, ex-Zoots bassist and co-songwriter Gavin Ewing and drummer Paul Stipetic. While allowing Gilderdale to rock-out and improvise, The Blueflies hard-edged funk blues sound is in contrast to his 'smooth jazz' solo work and performances with Acoustic Alchemy.

References

External links
 http://www.milesgilderdale.com
 https://www.facebook.com/milesgilderdale

Living people
English jazz guitarists
English male guitarists
Acoustic Alchemy members
British male jazz musicians
Year of birth missing (living people)
Zoot and the Roots members

Miles Gilderdale


Blue Velvet is a 1986 American neo-noir mystery thriller film written and directed by David Lynch. Blending psychological horror with film noir, the film stars Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, and Laura Dern, and is named after the 1951 song of the same name. The film concerns a young college student who, returning home to visit his ill father, discovers a severed human ear in a field.  The ear then leads him to uncover a vast criminal conspiracy, and enter into a romantic relationship with a troubled lounge singer.

The screenplay of Blue Velvet had been passed around multiple times in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with several major studios declining it due to its strong sexual and violent content. After the failure of his 1984 film Dune, Lynch made attempts at developing a more "personal story", somewhat characteristic of the surrealist style displayed in his first film Eraserhead (1977). The independent studio De Laurentiis Entertainment Group, owned at the time by Italian film producer Dino De Laurentiis, agreed to finance and produce the film.

Blue Velvet initially received a divided critical response, with many stating that its explicit content served little artistic purpose. Nevertheless, the film earned Lynch his second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director, and received the year's Best Film and Best Director prizes from the National Society of Film Critics. It came to achieve cult status. As an example of a director casting against the norm, it was credited for revitalizing Hopper's career and for providing Rossellini with a dramatic outlet beyond her previous work as a fashion model and a cosmetics spokeswoman. In the years since, the film has been re-evaluated, and it is now widely regarded as one of Lynch's major works and one of the greatest films of the 1980s. Publications including Sight & Sound, Time, Entertainment Weekly and BBC Magazine have ranked it among the greatest American films ever. In 2008, it was chosen by the American Film Institute as one of the greatest mystery films ever made.

Plot

College student Jeffrey Beaumont returns to his hometown of Lumberton, North Carolina after his father, Tom, has a near-fatal attack from a medical condition. Walking home from the hospital, Jeffrey cuts through a vacant lot and discovers a severed human ear, which he takes to police detective John Williams. Williams' daughter Sandy tells Jeffrey that the ear somehow relates to a lounge singer named Dorothy Vallens. Intrigued, Jeffrey, posing as a pest exterminator, enters her apartment. While there, he steals a spare key while she is distracted by a man in a distinctive yellow sport coat, whom Jeffrey nicknames the "Yellow Man".

Jeffrey and Sandy attend Dorothy's nightclub act, in which she sings "Blue Velvet", and leave early so Jeffrey can infiltrate her apartment. Dorothy returns home, stripping naked, but when she hears Jeffrey, she finds him hiding in a closet and forces him to undress at knifepoint. She attempts to rape Jeffrey, but he retreats to the closet when Frank Booth, an aggressively psychopathic gangster and drug lord, arrives and interrupts their encounter. Frank then proceeds to beat and rape Dorothy while inhaling narcotic gas from a canister and alternating between fits of sobbing and violent rage. After Frank leaves, Jeffrey sneaks away and seeks comfort from Sandy.

After surmising that Frank has abducted Dorothy's husband, Don, and son, Donnie, to force her into sex slavery, Jeffrey suspects Frank cut off Don's ear to intimidate her into submission. While continuing to see Sandy, Jeffrey enters into a sadomasochistic sexual relationship in which Dorothy encourages him to hit her. Jeffrey sees Frank attending Dorothy's show and later observes him selling drugs and meeting with the Yellow Man. Jeffrey then sees the Yellow Man meeting with a "well-dressed man."

When Frank catches Jeffrey leaving Dorothy's apartment, he abducts them and takes them to the lair of Ben, a criminal associate holding both Don and Donnie hostage. Frank permits Dorothy to see her family and forces Jeffrey to watch Ben perform an impromptu lip-sync of Roy Orbison's "In Dreams", which moves Frank to tears. Afterwards, he and his gang take Jeffrey and Dorothy on a high-speed joyride to a sawmill yard, where he again attempts to sexually abuse Dorothy. When Jeffrey intervenes and punches him in the face, an enraged Frank and his gang pull him out of the car. Replaying the tape of "In Dreams", Frank smears lipstick on his face and violently kisses Jeffrey, likewise smearing him with red lipstick, before savagely beating him unconscious, while Dorothy pleads for Frank to stop. Jeffrey awakens the next morning, bruised and bloodied.

Visiting the police station, Jeffrey discovers that Detective Williams' partner, Tom Gordon, is the Yellow Man, who has been murdering Frank's rival drug dealers and stealing confiscated narcotics from the evidence room for Frank to sell. After Jeffrey and Sandy declare their love for each other at a party, they are pursued by a car which they assume belongs to Frank. As they arrive at Jeffrey's home, Sandy realizes the driver is her ex-boyfriend, Mike. After Mike threatens to beat Jeffrey for stealing his girlfriend, Dorothy appears on Jeffrey's porch naked, beaten, and confused. Mike backs down as Jeffrey and Sandy whisk Dorothy to Sandy's house to summon medical attention.

When Dorothy calls Jeffrey "my secret lover", a distraught Sandy slaps him for cheating on her. Jeffrey asks Sandy to tell her father everything, and Detective Williams then leads a police raid on Frank's headquarters, killing his men and crippling his criminal empire. Jeffrey returns alone to Dorothy's apartment, where he discovers Don dead and Gordon mortally wounded. As Jeffrey leaves the apartment, the "Well-Dressed Man" arrives, sees Jeffrey in the stairs, and chases him back inside. Jeffrey, realizing that the "Well-Dressed Man" is actually Frank, uses Gordon's walkie-talkie to say he is in the bedroom (remembering Frank's own police radio) before hiding in a closet. When Frank arrives, he starts shooting around Dorothy's apartment attempting to kill Jeffrey in a state of paranoia, in the process killing Gordon. Frank deduces where Jeffrey is hiding, and Jeffrey kills Frank with Gordon's gun upon Frank opening the door, moments before Sandy and Detective Williams arrive to help.

In the epilogue, it is revealed that Jeffrey and Sandy have continued their relationship, Tom has recovered from being hospitalized, and Dorothy has been reunited with her son.

Cast

Production

Origin

The film's story originated from three ideas that crystallized in the filmmaker's mind over a period of time starting as early as 1973.

The first idea was only "a feeling" and the title Blue Velvet, Lynch told Cineaste in 1987.

The second idea was an image of a severed, human ear lying in a field. "I don't know why it had to be an ear. Except it needed to be an opening of a part of the body, a hole into something else ... The ear sits on the head and goes right into the mind so it felt perfect," Lynch remarked in a 1986 interview to The New York Times.

The third idea was Bobby Vinton's classic rendition of the song "Blue Velvet" and "the mood that came with that song a mood, a time, and things that were of that time."

The scene in which Dorothy appears naked outside was inspired by a real-life experience Lynch had during childhood when he and his brother saw a naked woman walking down a neighborhood street at night. The experience was so traumatic to the young Lynch that it made him cry, and he had never forgotten it.

After completing The Elephant Man (1980), Lynch met producer Richard Roth over coffee. Roth had read and enjoyed Lynch's Ronnie Rocket script, but did not think it was something he wanted to produce. He asked Lynch if the filmmaker had any other scripts, but the director only had ideas. "I told him I had always wanted to sneak into a girl's room to watch her into the night and that, maybe, at one point or another, I would see something that would be the clue to a murder mystery. Roth loved the idea and asked me to write a treatment. I went home and thought of the ear in the field." Production was announced in August 1984. Lynch wrote two more drafts before he was satisfied with the script of the film. The problem with them, Lynch has said, was that "there was maybe all the unpleasantness in the film but nothing else. A lot was not there. And so it went away for a while." Conditions at this point were ideal for Lynch's film: he had made a deal with Dino De Laurentiis that gave him complete artistic freedom and final cut privileges, with the stipulation that the filmmaker take a cut in his salary and work with a budget of only $6 million. This deal meant that Blue Velvet was the smallest film on De Laurentiis's slate. Consequently, Lynch would be left mostly unsupervised during production. "After Dune I was down so far that anything was up! So it was just a euphoria. And when you work with that kind of feeling, you can take chances. You can experiment."

Casting
The cast of Blue Velvet included several then-relatively unknown actors.

Lynch met Isabella Rossellini at a restaurant, and offered her the role of Dorothy Vallens. Helen Mirren had been Lynch's first choice for the role. Rossellini had gained some exposure before the film for her Lancôme ads in the early 1980s and for being the daughter of actress Ingrid Bergman and Italian film director Roberto Rossellini. After completion of the film, during test screenings, ICM Partners—the agency representing Rossellini—immediately dropped her as a client. Furthermore, the nuns at the school in Rome that Rossellini attended in her youth called to say they were praying for her.

Kyle MacLachlan had played the central role in Lynch's critical and commercial failure Dune (1984), a science fiction epic based on the novel of the same name. MacLachlan later became a recurring collaborator with Lynch, who remarked: "Kyle plays innocents who are interested in the mysteries of life. He's the person you trust enough to go into a strange world with."

Dennis Hopper was the biggest "name" in the film, having starred in Easy Rider (1969). Hopper—said to be Lynch's third choice (Michael Ironside has stated that Frank was written with him in mind)—accepted the role, reportedly having exclaimed, "I've got to play Frank! I am Frank!" as Hopper confirmed in the Blue Velvet "making-of" documentary The Mysteries of Love, produced for the 2002 special edition. Harry Dean Stanton and Steven Berkoff both turned down the role of Frank because of the violent content in the film.

Laura Dern (then 18 years old) was cast, after various already successful actresses had turned it down; among these had been Molly Ringwald.

Shooting
Principal photography of Blue Velvet began in August 1985 and completed in November. The film was shot at EUE/Screen Gems studio in Wilmington, North Carolina, which also provided the exterior scenes of Lumberton. The scene with a raped and battered Dorothy proved to be particularly challenging. Several townspeople arrived to watch the filming with picnic baskets and rugs, against the wishes of Rossellini and Lynch. However, they continued filming as normal, and when Lynch yelled cut, the townspeople had left. As a result, police told Lynch they were no longer permitted to shoot in any public areas of Wilmington.

The Carolina Apartments on 5th and Market St in downtown Wilmington served as the location central to the story, with the adjacent Kenan fountain featured prominently in many shots. The building is also the birth place and death place of noted artist Claude Howell. The apartment building stands today, and the Kenan fountain was refurbished in 2020 after sustaining heavy damage during Hurricane Florence.

Editing
Lynch's original rough cut ran for approximately four hours. He was contractually obligated to deliver a two-hour movie by De Laurentiis and cut many small subplots and character scenes. He also made cuts at the request of the MPAA. For example, when Frank slaps Dorothy after the first rape scene, the audience was supposed to see Frank actually hitting her. Instead, the film cuts away to Jeffrey in the closet, wincing at what he has just seen. This cut was made to satisfy the MPAA's concerns about violence. Lynch thought that the change only made the scene more disturbing.

In 2011, Lynch announced that footage from the deleted scenes, long thought lost, had been discovered. The material was subsequently included on the Blu-ray Disc release of the film. Among the deleted footage was Megan Mullally as Jeffrey's college sweetheart Louise Wertham, whose entire role was cut from the theatrical release. The final cut of the film runs at just over two hours.

Distribution
Because the material was completely different from anything that would be considered mainstream at the time, De Laurentiis Entertainment Group's marketing employees were unsure of how to promote the film, or even if it would be promoted at all; it wasn't until the positive reception the film received at various film festivals that they began to promote it.

Interpretations

Despite Blue Velvets initial appearance as a mystery, the film operates on a number of thematic levels. The film owes a large debt to 1950s film noir, containing and exploring such conventions as the femme fatale (Dorothy Vallens), a seemingly unstoppable villain (Frank Booth), and the questionable moral outlook of the hero (Jeffrey Beaumont), as well as its unusual use of shadowy, sometimes dark cinematography. Blue Velvet represents and establishes Lynch's famous "askew vision", and introduces several common elements of Lynch's work, some of which would later become his trademarks, including distorted characters, a polarized world, and debilitating damage to the skull or brain. Perhaps the most significant Lynchian trademark in the film is the depiction of unearthing a dark underbelly in a seemingly idealized small town; Jeffrey even proclaims in the film that he is "seeing something that was always hidden", alluding to the plot's central idea. Lynch's characterization of films, symbols, and motifs have become well known, and his particular style, characterised largely in Blue Velvet for the first time, has been written about extensively using descriptions like "dreamlike", "ultraweird", "dark", and "oddball". Red curtains also show up in key scenes, specifically in Dorothy's apartment, which have since become a Lynch trademark. The film has been compared to Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) because of its stark treatment of evil and mental illness. The premise of both films is curiosity, leading to an investigation that draws the lead characters into a hidden, voyeuristic underworld of crime.

The film's thematic framework harks back to Edgar Allan Poe, Henry James, and early gothic fiction, as well as films such as Shadow of a Doubt (1943) and The Night of the Hunter (1955) and the entire notion of film noir. Lynch has called it a "film about things that are hidden—within a small city and within people."

Feminist psychoanalytic film theorist Laura Mulvey argues that Blue Velvet establishes a metaphorical Oedipal family—"the child", Jeffrey Beaumont, and his "parents", Frank Booth and Dorothy Vallens—through deliberate references to film noir and its underlying Oedipal theme. Michael Atkinson claims that the resulting violence in the film can be read as symbolic of domestic violence within real families. For instance, Frank's violent acts can be seen to reflect the different types of abuse within families, and the control he has over Dorothy might represent the hold an abusive husband has over his wife. He reads Jeffrey as an innocent youth who is both horrified by the violence inflicted by Frank, but also tempted by it as the means of possessing Dorothy for himself. Atkinson takes a Freudian approach to the film; considering it to be an expression of the traumatised innocence which characterises Lynch's work. He states, "Dorothy represents the sexual force of the mother [figure] because she is forbidden and because she becomes the object of the unhealthy, infantile impulses at work in Jeffrey's subconscious."

Symbolism
Symbolism is used heavily in Blue Velvet. The most consistent symbolism in the film is an insect motif introduced at the end of the first scene, when the camera zooms in on a well-kept suburban lawn until it unearths a swarming underground nest of bugs. This is generally recognized as a metaphor for the seedy underworld that Jeffrey will soon discover under the surface of his own suburban, Reaganesque paradise. The severed ear he finds is being overrun by black ants. The bug motif is recurrent throughout the film, most notably in the bug-like gas mask that Frank wears, but also the excuse that Jeffrey uses to gain access to Dorothy's apartment: he claims to be an insect exterminator. One of Frank's sinister accomplices is also consistently identified through the yellow jacket he wears, possibly reminiscent of the name of a type of wasp. Finally, a robin eating a bug on a fence becomes a topic of discussion in the last scene of the film.

The severed ear that Jeffrey discovers is also a key symbolic element, leading Jeffrey into danger. Indeed, just as Jeffrey's troubles begin, the audience is treated to a nightmarish sequence in which the camera zooms into the canal of the severed, decomposing ear.

Soundtrack

The Blue Velvet soundtrack was supervised by Angelo Badalamenti (who makes a brief cameo appearance as the pianist at the Slow Club where Dorothy performs). The soundtrack makes heavy usage of vintage pop songs, such as Bobby Vinton's "Blue Velvet" and Roy Orbison's "In Dreams", juxtaposed with an orchestral score inspired by Shostakovich. During filming, Lynch placed speakers on set and in streets and played Shostakovich to set the mood he wanted to convey. The score alludes to Shostakovich's 15th Symphony, which Lynch had been listening to regularly while writing the screenplay. Lynch had originally opted to use "Song to the Siren" by This Mortal Coil during the scene in which Sandy and Jeffrey share a dance; however, he could not obtain the rights for the song at the time. He would go on to use this song in Lost Highway eleven years later.

Entertainment Weekly ranked Blue Velvet soundtrack on its list of the 100 Greatest Film Soundtracks, at the 100th position. Critic John Alexander wrote, "the haunting soundtrack accompanies the title credits, then weaves through the narrative, accentuating the noir mood of the film." Lynch worked with music composer Angelo Badalamenti for the first time in this film and asked him to write a score that had to be "like Shostakovich, be very Russian, but make it the most beautiful thing but make it dark and a little bit scary." Badalamenti's success with Blue Velvet would lead him to contribute to all of Lynch's future full-length films until Inland Empire as well as the cult television program Twin Peaks. Also included in the sound team was long-time Lynch collaborator Alan Splet, a sound editor and designer who had won an Academy Award for his work on The Black Stallion (1979), and been nominated for Never Cry Wolf (1983).

Reception

Box office
Blue Velvet premiered in competition at the Montréal World Film Festival in August 1986, and at the Toronto Festival of Festivals on September 12, 1986, and a few days later in the United States. It debuted commercially in both countries on September 19, 1986, in 98 theatres across the United States. In its opening weekend, the film grossed a total of $789,409. It eventually expanded to another 15 theatres, and in the US and Canada grossed a total of $8,551,228. Blue Velvet was met with uproar during its audience reception, with lines formed around city blocks in New York City and Los Angeles. There were reports of mass walkouts and refund demands during its opening week. At a Chicago screening, a man fainted and had to have his pacemaker checked. Upon completion, he returned to the cinema to see the ending. At a Los Angeles cinema, two strangers became engaged in a heated disagreement, but decided to resolve the disagreement to return to the theatre.

Critical reception
Blue Velvet was released to a very polarized reception in the United States. The critics who did praise the film were often vociferous. The New York Times critic Janet Maslin directed much praise toward the performances of Hopper and Rossellini: "Mr. Hopper and Miss Rossellini are so far outside the bounds of ordinary acting here that their performances are best understood in terms of sheer lack of inhibition; both give themselves entirely over to the material, which seems to be exactly what's called for." She called it "an instant cult classic". Maslin concluded by saying that Blue Velvet "is as fascinating as it is freakish. It confirms Mr. Lynch's stature as an innovator, a superb technician, and someone best not encountered in a dark alley."

Sheila Benson of the Los Angeles Times called the film "the most brilliantly disturbing film ever to have its roots in small-town American life," describing it as "shocking, visionary, rapturously controlled". Film critic Gene Siskel included Blue Velvet on his list of the best films of 1986, at the fifth spot. Peter Travers, film critic for Rolling Stone, named it the best film of the 1980s and referred to it as an "American masterpiece". Upon its initial release, Woody Allen and Martin Scorsese called Blue Velvet the "Best Film of The Year".

On the other hand, Paul Attanasio of The Washington Post said "the film showcases a visual stylist utterly in command of his talents" and that Angelo Badalamenti "contributes an extraordinary score, slipping seamlessly from slinky jazz to violin figures to the romantic sweep of a classic Hollywood score," but stated that Lynch "isn't interested in communicating, he's interested in parading his personality. The movie doesn't progress or deepen, it just gets weirder, and to no good end." A general criticism from US critics was Blue Velvets approach to sexuality and violence. They asserted that this detracted from the film's seriousness as a work of art, and some condemned the film as pornographic. One of its detractors, Roger Ebert, praised Isabella Rossellini's performance as "convincing and courageous" but criticized how she was depicted in the film, even accusing David Lynch of misogyny: "degraded, slapped around, humiliated and undressed in front of the camera. And when you ask an actress to endure those experiences, you should keep your side of the bargain by putting her in an important film." While Ebert in later years came to consider Lynch a great filmmaker, his negative view of Blue Velvet remained unchanged after he revisited it in the 21st century.

The film is now widely considered a masterpiece and has a score of 95% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 80 reviews with an average rating of 8.8/10. The website's critical consensus states: "If audiences walk away from this subversive, surreal shocker not fully understanding the story, they might also walk away with a deeper perception of the potential of film storytelling." The film also has a score of 76 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 15 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Looking back in his Guardian/Observer review, critic Philip French wrote, "The film is wearing well and has attained a classic status without becoming respectable or losing its sense of danger."

Mark Kermode walked out on the film and gave the film a poor review upon its release, but revised his view of the film over time. In 2016, he remarked, "as a film critic, it taught me that when a film really gets under your skin and really provokes a visceral reaction, you have to be very careful about assessing it ... I didn't walk out on Blue Velvet because it was a bad film. I walked out on it because it was a really good film. The point was at the time I wasn't good enough for it."

Accolades

Lynch was nominated for a Best Director Oscar for the film. Dennis Hopper was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance. Isabella Rossellini won an Independent Spirit Award for the Best Female Lead in 1987. David Lynch and Dennis Hopper won a Los Angeles Film Critics Association award in 1987 for Blue Velvet in categories Best Director (Lynch) and Best Supporting Actor (Hopper). In 1987, National Society of Film Critics awarded Best Film, Best Director (David Lynch), Best Cinematography (Frederick Elmes), and Best Supporting Actor (Dennis Hopper) awards.

Home media
Blue Velvet was released on VHS by Karl-Lorimar Home Video in 1987 and re-issued by Warner Home Video in 1992. After that, it was DVD in 1999 and 2002 by MGM Home Entertainment. The film made its Blu-ray debut on November 8, 2011, with a special 25th-anniversary edition featuring never-before-seen deleted scenes. On May 28, 2019, the film was re-released on Blu-ray by the Criterion Collection, featuring a 4K digital restoration, the original stereo soundtrack and other special features, including a behind-the-scenes documentary titled Blue Velvet Revisited.

Legacy

Although it initially gained a relatively small theatrical audience in North America and was met with controversy over its artistic merit, Blue Velvet soon became the center of a "national firestorm" in 1986, and over time became an American classic. In the late 1980s, and early 1990s, after its release on videotape, the film became a widely recognized cult film, for its dark depiction of a suburban America. With its many VHS, LaserDisc and DVD releases, the film reached broader American audiences. It marked David Lynch's entry into the Hollywood mainstream and Dennis Hopper's comeback. Hopper's performance as Frank Booth has itself left an imprint on popular culture, with countless tributes, cultural references and parodies. The film's success also helped Hollywood address previously censored issues, as Psycho (1960) had. Blue Velvet has been frequently compared to that ground-breaking film. It has become one of the most significant, well-recognized films of its era, spawning countless imitations and parodies in media. The film's dark, stylish and erotic production design has served as a benchmark for a number of films, parodies and even Lynch's own later work, notably Twin Peaks (1990–91), and Mulholland Drive (2001). Peter Travers of Rolling Stone magazine cited it as one of the most "influential American films", as did Michael Atkinson, who dedicated a book to the film's themes and motifs.

Blue Velvet now frequently appears in various critical assessments of all-time great films, also ranked as one of the greatest films of the 1980s, one of the best examples of American surrealism and one of the finest examples of David Lynch's work. In a poll of 54 American critics ranking the "most outstanding films of the decade", Blue Velvet was placed fourth, behind Raging Bull (1980), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) and the German film Wings of Desire (1987). An Entertainment Weekly book special released in 1999 ranked Blue Velvet 37th of the greatest films of all time. The film was ranked by The Guardian in its list of the 100 Greatest Films. Film Four ranked it on their list of 100 Greatest Films. In a 2007 poll of the online film community held by Variety, Blue Velvet came in at the 95th-greatest film of all time. Total Film ranked Blue Velvet as one of the all-time best films in both a critics' list and a public poll, in 2006 and 2007, respectively. In December 2002, a UK film critics' poll in Sight & Sound ranked the film fifth on their list of the 10 Best Films of the Last 25 Years. In a special Entertainment Weekly issue, 100 new film classics were chosen from 1983 to 2008: Blue Velvet was ranked at fourth.

In addition to Blue Velvet various "all-time greatest films" rankings, the American Film Institute has awarded the film three honors in its lists: 96th on 100 Years ... 100 Thrills in 2001, selecting cinema's most thrilling moments and ranked Frank Booth 36th of the 50 greatest villains in 100 Years ... 100 Heroes and Villains in 2003. In June 2008, the AFI revealed its "ten Top Ten"—the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community. Blue Velvet was acknowledged as the eighth best film in the mystery genre. Premiere magazine listed Frank Booth, played by Dennis Hopper, as the 54th on its list of 'The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time', calling him one of "the most monstrously funny creations in cinema history". The film was ranked 84th on Bravo Television's four-hour program 100 Scariest Movie Moments (2004). It is frequently sampled musically and an array of bands and solo artists have taken their names and inspiration from the film. In August 2012, Sight & Sound unveiled their latest list of the 250 greatest films of all time, with Blue Velvet ranking at 69th.

Blue Velvet was also nominated for the following AFI lists:
 AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies
 AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains
 Frank Booth – Ranked 36th-greatest film villain.
 AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs:
 "In Dreams" - nominated song.
 AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition)

Inspired by the film, pop singer Lana Del Rey recorded a cover version of Bobby Vinton's classic rendition of the song "Blue Velvet" in 2012. Used to endorse clothing line H&M, a music video accompanied the track and aired as a television commercial. Set in post-war America, the video drew influence from Lynch and Blue Velvet. In the video, Del Rey plays the role of Dorothy Vallens, performing a private concert similar to the scene where Ben (Dean Stockwell) pantomimes "In Dreams" for Frank Booth. Del Rey's version, however, has her lip-syncing "Blue Velvet" when a little person dressed as Frank Sinatra approaches and unplugs a hidden Victrola, revealing Del Rey as a fraud. When Lynch heard of the music video, he praised it, telling Artinfo: "Lana Del Rey, she's got some fantastic charisma and—this is a very interesting thing—it's like she's born out of another time. She's got something that's very appealing to people. And I didn't know she was influenced by me!"

"Now It's Dark", a song by American heavy metal band Anthrax on their 1988 album State of Euphoria, was directly inspired by the film, and specifically the character of Frank Booth. The same phrase appeared in the liner notes of Rush's album Roll the Bones, and drummer Neil Peart later explained: "The phrase occurs in David Lynch's comedy classic Blue Velvet."

The sludge metal band Acid Bath sampled the movie on the song "Cassie Eats Cockroaches" from their first album When the Kite String Pops and industrial metal band Ministry sampled the movie in their song "Jesus Built My Hotrod". The experimental rock band Mr. Bungle also sampled the movie on the songs "Squeeze Me Macaroni", "Stubb - A Dub", and "My Ass Is On Fire" from their debut self-titled album.

References

Further reading
 Atkinson, Michael (1997). Blue Velvet. Long Island, New York.: British Film Institute. .
 Drazin, Charles (2001). Blue Velvet: Bloomsbury Pocket Movie Guide 3. Britain. Bloomsbury Publishing. .
 Lynch, David and Rodley, Chris (2005). Lynch on Lynch. Faber and Faber: New York. .

External links

1986 films
1986 crime thriller films
1986 independent films
1980s mystery thriller films
1980s psychological thriller films
American crime thriller films
American independent films
American mystery thriller films
American psychological thriller films
BDSM in films
De Laurentiis Entertainment Group films
1980s English-language films
Erotic mystery films
Films about violence against women
Films directed by David Lynch
Films scored by Angelo Badalamenti
Films set in North Carolina
Films shot in North Carolina
American neo-noir films
Postmodern films
Films with screenplays by David Lynch
National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Film winners
1980s American films

Blue Velvet (film)


Athena Farrokhzad (born 23 August 1983) is an Iranian-Swedish poet, playwright, translator and literary critic.

Career
Farrokhzad was born in Teheran, Iran, and grew up in the Hammarkullen and Askim areas of Gothenburg, Sweden. She now lives in Bagarmossen, a suburb of Stockholm. She is an instructor in the writing program at Nordens folk high school on the island of Biskops-Arnö in Lake Mälaren.

Publications
In 2013, Farrokhzad published a collection of poems titled Vitsvit (White Blight) with Albert Bonniers Förlag. The same year, her translation into Swedish of work by the Romanian poet Svetlana Cârstean appeared, and she made her debut as a playwright with Päron, which was performed by the youth section of Östgötateatern (the county theatre of Östergötland), directed by Kajsa Isakson. "White Blight", Jennifer Hayashida's translation of "Vitsvit," was published by Argos Books in 2015. It was shortlisted for the 2016 National Translation Awards (NTA) in Poetry, named one of Boston Globe's best poetry books of 2016, and reviews appeared in Slate, the Rumpus, Kenyon Review, and the Southeast Review. As of 2018, Vitsvit has been translated into 12 languages.

Vitsvit has been adapted into a theatre play on two occasions; one production by Unga Klara theatre company directed by Farnaz Arbabi, and one by the Swedish Radio Theatre, directed by Saga Gärde.

Farrokhzad has published two poetry anthologies, Manualen with Tova Gerge and Ett tunt underlag with the poetry group G=T=B=R=G, both in 2009. She edited the queer poetry anthology Omslag with Linn Hansén and has organized literary events such as Queerlitt, Demafor and World Poetry Day. She is also a literature critic for the newspaper Aftonbladet.

Sommar host
Farrokhzad hosted the Sveriges Radio show Sommar on P1 on 21 July 2014. Her show led to strong reactions from some listeners. Gunnar Axén of the Moderate Party expressed the opinion that her decision to play the Ebba Grön song Beväpna er ("Arm yourselves") was inappropriate and claimed to have thrown out his television so he could stop paying the license fee. The license fee, which must be paid by all households with a television, is used to fund not only television but also radio. Others reacted more positively, including Ebba Grön lead singer Joakim Thåström and some reporters and listeners.  there had been 70 complaints to the Swedish Broadcasting Commission concerning Farrokhzad's show, the most complaints received about any host of the program. The show was however cleared on all counts. She was not included by SVT in the line-up for the television discussion show Sommarpratarna, but the program-makers denied she was left out due to the controversy surrounding her radio show.

Honors
Vitsvit was nominated for the 2013 August Prize in the literature category, for the Borås Tidnings debutantpris (a prize for new authors), and the Catapult Prize of the Swedish Writers' Union. Farrokhzad was joint winner of the Karin Boye Literary Prize in 2013 and in 2014 won the Stora Läsarpriset (Grand Reader's Prize).

References

External links

1983 births
Living people
Writers from Tehran
Swedish women poets
21st-century Swedish dramatists and playwrights
Swedish women dramatists and playwrights
Sommar (radio program) hosts
Swedish women radio presenters
Iranian emigrants to Sweden
Swedish translators
Swedish literary critics
Swedish women critics
Swedish women literary critics
Iranian radio presenters
Iranian translators
Iranian literary critics
Iranian women literary critics
Radio controversies
Controversies in Sweden
21st-century Swedish women writers
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21st-century Swedish poets

Athena Farrokhzad


Marden is a suburb of Adelaide, South Australia in the City of Norwood Payneham St Peters. The suburb is bordered by the River Torrens to the north, O.G. Rd to the east, Payneham Rd to the south and Battams Rd to the west.

History
The Marden suburb grew out of ribbon development on Payneham Road, providing services to people travelling between Athelstone and the city of Adelaide. The suburb was the 'silent partner' in the development of Payneham, the suburb to the south, which eventually gave name to the council area. The suburb has a rich history of market gardening on the flats area, near the River Torrens boundary, having a fresh water supply via Third Creek and the Torrens River.

It became part of the Payneham Council, housing the council chambers on the corner of O.G. Road and Payneham Road. It was absorbed into the Norwood and St Peters Council amalgamation in the 1990s.

Some buildings in the area date from the pre-Federation era but most development was completed in the post-World War Two decades. Housing blocks south of Lower Portrush Road have a high concentration of unit and flats, especially in the Broad Street vicinity.

Services
The suburb holds a number of services within its boundaries. These include:
Payneham Swimming Pool;
several churches (Anglican, Uniting) and a Christatdelphian Temple
Marden Shopping Centre;

References

Suburbs of Adelaide

Marden, South Australia


Paul Karl Wilhelm Scheerbart (8 January 1863 in Danzig – 15 October 1915 in Berlin) was a German author of speculative fiction literature and drawings. He was also published under the pseudonym Kuno Küfer and is best known for the book Glasarchitektur (1914).

Scheerbart was associated with expressionist architecture and one of its leading proponents, Bruno Taut. He composed aphoristic poems about glass for the Taut's Glass Pavilion at the Werkbund Exhibition (1914).

Life

Paul Scheerbart began studies of philosophy and history of art in 1885. In 1887 he worked as a poet in Berlin and tried to invent Perpetual motion machines.  In 1892 he was one of the joint founders of the Verlag deutscher Phantasten (Publishers of German Fantasists).

At this time he was in financial difficulties. After writing in different publications he produced his first novel 'Die große Revolution' (The Great Revolution), which was published by the Insel-Verlag. The young Ernst Rowohlt published Scheerbart's bizarre poem collection Katerpoesie and became his friend.

Scheerbart's fantasy essays about glass architecture influenced architects at that time, including the young Bruno Taut. Among his Berlin friends and drinking circle was Erich Mühsam,  who dedicated a chapter to Scheerbart in his 'Unpolitical Memories' and Richard Dehmel. Scheerbart was also an important influence on Walter Benjamin who quoted his ideas on glass in his Arcades Project.

Work

"Scheerbart published a long succession of fantasy novels, articles, and poems between 1889 and his death in 1915, in which he insisted that the universe is far too rich and complex to be comprehended by reason alone. Only naive wonder — the basis of the sublime — could promote the development of higher forms of understanding."

Very few of Scheerbart's works have been translated into English. Though the following list also gives English translations of the titles, there is usually no English-language edition of the work available.

 1889 Das Paradies. Die Heimat der Kunst (Paradise. Home of the Arts)
 1893 Ja... was... möchten wir nicht Alles!, (Yes.....What......We wouldn't all like to have!), A Fable
 1897 Ich liebe Dich!, (I love you!), A Novel with 66 Intermezzos
 1897 Tarub, Bagdads berühmte Köchin, (Tarub, Baghdad's famous female cook), Arab culture novel
 1897 Der Tod der Barmekiden, (The death of the Barmakids), Arab Harem novel
 1898 Na prost!, (Well, Cheers!), Fantasy King novel
 1900 Die wilde Jagd, (The wild hunt), A development novel in eight stories
 1901 Rakkóx der Billionär, (Rakkóx the trillionaire),  An ostentatious novel
 1901 Die Seeschlange (The Sea Serpent), A sea novel
 1902 Die große Revolution, (The Great Revolution), A moon novel
 1902 Immer mutig!, (Always courageously!), A Fantasy novel
 1902 Liwûna und Kaidôh, A Soul novel
 1902 Weltglanz, (World Shine), a sun fairy tale
 1903 Kometentanz, (Comet dance), Astral Pantomime in two acts
 1903 Der Aufgang zur Sonne, (The stairway to the sun), house fairy tales
 1904 Der Kaiser von Utopia, (The emperor of Utopia), a folktale
 1904 Machtspäße, (Jests about power), Arab novellas
 1904 Revolutionäre Theater-Bibliothek, (Revolutionary theatre library), collection of plays
 1906 Münchhausen und Clarissa, Berlin novel
 1907 Jenseits-Galeri
 1909 Die Entwicklung des Luftmilitarismus und die Auflösung der europäischen Land-Heere, Festungen und Seeflotten, (translated into English as The Development of Aerial Militarism and the Demobilization of European Ground Forces, Fortresses, and Naval Fleets, Brooklyn, New York: Ugly Duckling Presse, 2007, Series: Lost Literature #4, translated by M. Kasper) 1909 Kater-Poesie, (translatable as Tomcat poetry or Hangover poetry), poems
 1910 Das Perpetuum mobile, Die Geschichte einer Erfindung (translated into English as The perpetual motion machine: The story of an invention, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Wakefield Press, 2011)
 1912 Das große Licht, (The Great Light) A Munchausen–Breviary
 1912 Flora Mohr, A glass flower novella
 1913 Lesabéndio, an Asteroid novel ; English translation, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Wakefield Press, 2012
 1914 Das graue Tuch und zehn Prozent Weiß, (The grey cloth and ten percent of white), a ladies novel. Translated into English as: The Gray Cloth: Paul Scheerbart's Novel on Glass Architecture. Cambridge, Massachusetts ; London, England : MIT Press, 2001.
 1914 Glasarchitektur (Glass architecture)
 1921 Von Zimmer zu Zimmer, (From room to room), letters to his wife

Notes

Bibliography
 Alvizu, Josh. "Utopie der grünen Sonne: Zu Benjamin, Scheerbart und Glasarchitektur." Translated by Roland Koch and Frank Degler. Bloch-Almanach 33 (2015): 201–18.
 Anger, Jenny. Four Metaphors of Modernism: From Der Sturm to the Société Anonyme. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2018.
 Armond, Kate. "Cosmic Men: Wyndham Lewis, Ernst Haeckel, and Paul Scheerbart." Journal of Wyndham Lewis Studies 4 (2013): 41–62.
 Arnold-de Simine, Silke. "Remembering the Future: Utopian and Dystopian Aspects of Glass and Iron Architecture in Walter Benjamin, Paul Scheerbarth, and W. G. Sebald." In Imagining the City, Volume 1: The Art of Urban Living, edited by Christian (ed. and introd.) Emden, Catherine (ed. and introd.) Keen, and David (ed. and introd.) Midgley, 149–69. Cultural History and Literary Imagination (CuHLI): 7. Oxford, England: Peter Lang, 2006.
 Timothy Benson et al.: Expressionist Utopias. Berkeley, University of California Press, 2001.
  Mechthild Rausch: Von Danzig ins Weltall. Paul Scheerbarts Anfangsjahre (1863–1895). München: Ed. Text und Kritik 1997.
 Bletter, Rosemarie Haag. "Global Earthworks." Art Journal 42, no. 3 (Autumn 1982): 222–25. https://doi.org/10.2307/776582.
  Rosemarie Bletter: "Paul Scheerbart's Architectural Fantasies," Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 34 (May 1975).
 Fischer, William B. "Whimsical Avant-Garde Oddball." Science Fiction Studies 40, no. 2 (2013): 389–91. https://doi.org/10.5621/sciefictstud.40.2.0389.
 Gelderloos, Carl. "'Nowhere an Obstacle': Transparency, Embodied Perception, and Becoming in Paul Scheerbart's Lesabéndio." Modernism/Modernity Print Plus, May 2, 2023. https://doi.org/10.26597/mod.0256.
  Paul Kaltefleiter, Berni Lörwald und Michael M. Schardt (Hrsg.): Über Paul Scheerbart. 100 Jahre Scheerbart-Rezeption. 3 Bände. Paderborn: Igel-Verlag 1998.  (Band 1);  (Band 2);  (Band 3).
  Uli Kohnle: Paul Scheerbart. Eine Bibliographie. Bellheim: Edition Phantasia 1994.
 Knoop, Christine Angela. "Architecture and Utopia in Scheerbart's Rakkóx Der Billionär." In Text and Image in Modern European Culture, edited by Natasha (ed.) Grigorian, Thomas (ed.) Baldwin, Margaret (ed.) Rigaud-Drayton, and Robert (introd.) Lethbridge, 115–29. Comparative Cultural Studies (Comparative Cultural Studies). West Lafayette, IN: Purdue UP, 2012.
 Josiah McElheny and Christine Burgin eds.: Glass! Love!! Perpetual Motion!!!: A Paul Scheerbart Reader. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2014.
 Josiah McElheny: The Light Club: On Paul Scheerbart's The Light Club of Batavia. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2010.
 Partsch, Cornelius. "Paul Scheerbart and the Art of Science Fiction." Science Fiction Studies 29, no. 2 (2002): 202–20.
 Scheerbart, Paul. Lesabéndio. An Asteroid Novel, trans. Christina Svendsen (Cambridge, MA: Wakefield Press, 2012)
 Sharp, Dennis, ed. Glass Architecture by Paul Scheerbart and Alpine Architecture by Bruno Taut. Translated by James Palmes and Shirley Palmer. New York: Praeger, 1972.
 Stuart, John A. "Unweaving Narrative Fabric: Bruno Taut, Walter Benjamin, and Paul Scheerbart's 'The Gray Cloth.'" Journal of Architectural Education'' (1984-) 53, no. 2 (1999): 61–73.

Related articles

 German science fiction literature

External links

 Scheerbart bei Edition Phantasia
 ub.fu-berlin.de University library of the Universität Berlin
 Project Gutenberg -- Germany

1863 births
1915 deaths
Writers from Gdańsk
Writers from the Province of Prussia
German poets
Expressionist architecture
German science fiction writers
German fantasy writers
German male poets

Paul Scheerbart


Democracy and Leadership is a book by Irving Babbitt, first published by Houghton Mifflin in 1924.  A new edition was published by Liberty Fund Inc. in 1979, with an introduction by Russell Kirk.

Synopsis
Babbitt criticizes what he calls the naturalistic movement in modern Western society. He distinguishes two aspects of this movement, letting Francis Bacon exemplify its mechanistic and utilitarian side and Jean-Jacques Rousseau its sentimental side. Both ignore the need to order human life with reference to a transcendent ethical principle. The utilitarian and sentimental dispositions are frequently joined in a single individual. According to Babbitt, no amount of sentimental "love" or sociopolitical activism can substitute for a lack of real moral character. The book rejects historical deterministic philosophies from Saint Augustine to Bossuet. It details political philosophy from Aristotle onwards, explaining how governmental philosophies have tried and failed over time. In the book, Babbitt provides a convincing critique of "unchecked majoritarianism," while dealing with the issue of how to find leaders who have high standards.

Recognition
 "...one of the few truly important works of political thought."  —Russell Kirk
 "Today, the wisdom of Babbitt's view is apparent." —Joe Lee Davis

Background
Babbitt considered moral character so important that it could not be superseded by socio-political activism or sentimentality.  In some cases, he believed social reform could be helpful, but never as a replacement for individual conscience. He explains: "With the present trend toward "social justice," the time is rapidly approaching when everybody will be minding everybody else's business. For the conscience that is felt as a still, small voice and that is the basis of real justice, we have substituted a social conscience that operates rather through a megaphone. The busybody, for the first time perhaps in the history of the world, has been taken at his own estimate of himself."

References

External links
 The full text of Democracy and Leadership at the Internet Archive

 The Birth of a Chinese Cultural Movement: Letters Between Babbitt and Wu Mi
 What is "humanism"?

1924 non-fiction books
American non-fiction books
Political books

Democracy and Leadership