Christopher and His Kind is a 2011 BBC television film. It tells the story of Christopher Isherwood's exploits in Berlin in the early 1930s. The film, adapted by Kevin Elyot from Isherwood's autobiography Christopher and His Kind, was produced by Mammoth Screen and directed by Geoffrey Sax. Isherwood is played by Matt Smith, whilst the cast also includes Douglas Booth, Imogen Poots, Pip Carter, Toby Jones, and Alexander Dreymon.

Plot

In Los Angeles in 1976, Christopher Isherwood begins writing his memoir. The film flashes back to 1931 as Christopher prepares to leave England for Germany, against the wishes of his mother, Kathleen. On the train he meets Gerald Hamilton, an English ne'er-do-well of Irish descent, who suggests that Christopher take a room at the boarding house where he lives. Upon his arrival in Berlin, Christopher meets his friend Wystan Auden, who takes him to the Cosy Corner, a seedy gay club populated by hustlers.

Christopher takes up residence at Gerald's boarding house under landlady Fräulein Thurau. There he becomes fast friends with Jean Ross, an aspiring actress who sings at an underground club. He also begins a tumultuous affair with Caspar, one of the rentboys from the Cosy Corner. Their relationship continues until Caspar abruptly disappears. Christopher does not see him until many months later and is horrified to see that he has joined the Nazis.

To earn a living Christopher offers English lessons. One of his students is Wilfrid Landauer (based on the true person of Wilfrid Israel), the wealthy Jewish owner of a department store. He entreats Christopher to take a political stand against Nazism but Christopher, as an artist, initially demurs. Herr Landauer's home is ransacked by the Nazis and they lead a boycott against his and other Jewish-owned businesses. Christopher last sees Wilfrid when their eyes sorrowfully meet over a bonfire of books the Nazis are burning.

Heinz Neddermayer, a street sweeper whom Christopher spies from a café, enters Christopher's life and they fall in love. Frau Neddermeyer looks kindly upon Christopher but Heinz's brother Gerhardt, a Nazi sympathizer, detests him. When Frau Neddermayer enters a sanatorium for treatment of tuberculosis, Gerhardt angrily advises Heinz that Christopher and Jean are no longer welcome in his home.

Bobby Gilbert, an American steel heir whom Jean had been courting to take her to Hollywood, departs Berlin suddenly, leaving Jean bereft and pregnant. She pawns her jewellery to pay for an abortion and soon after leaves Berlin as well.

With the Nazis gaining in power, Christopher and Heinz decide to leave Berlin. They travel to England where Christopher tries to secure permanent residency for Heinz. Their hopes are dashed, however, when a passport officer denies Heinz a permit to remain in the country. The couple decide to travel around Europe, avoiding a return to Nazi Germany.

Several years later Jean and Christopher chance upon each other in an outdoor café in England. They reminisce and he tells her that Heinz was eventually arrested and sentenced to prison, followed by a stint in the army. Jean confides that she does not miss Berlin.

The scene shifts to 1952. Christopher has returned to Berlin for the first time since 1934, to write a magazine article. He reunites with Heinz who, following the partition of the city, ended up in East Berlin. He has married and has a son named Christoph. Heinz expresses his wish that Christopher should find a family of his own and suggests that he and his family could move to America and become Christopher's family as well. Christopher refuses to commit to the idea but promises to remain in contact with Heinz. He visits his old boarding house for a joyful reunion with Fräulein Thurau, whose home ended up being in the American sector of the city. She presents him with the dolphin clock that adorned his old room, exhorting him to look at it and remember happy times.

Closing titles convey that the next year, 1953, Christopher met Don Bachardy and the two remained together until Isherwood's death. Christopher and His Kind was published in 1976 and Heinz, shocked at its frankness, never communicated with Christopher again.

Cast
 Matt Smith as Christopher Isherwood
 Douglas Booth as Heinz Neddermeyer
 Imogen Poots as Jean Ross
 Pip Carter as W. H. Auden
 Toby Jones as Gerald Hamilton
 Alexander Dreymon as Caspar
 Tom Wlaschiha as Gerhardt Neddermeyer
 Issy Van Randwyck as Fräulein Thurau
 Gertrude Thoma as Lili Neddermayer
 Lindsay Duncan as Kathleen Isherwood
 Perry Millward as Richard Isherwood
 Iddo Goldberg as Wilfrid Landauer
 Will Kemp as Bobby Gilbert
 Stuart Graham as Passport officer

Production
Christopher and His Kind was shot in Belfast, Northern Ireland. To research the role, Matt Smith read Isherwood's novels, watched video footage of Isherwood and traveled to the United States to meet Isherwood's longtime companion, Don Bachardy. "Just seeing the love Don had for him, and to be in the space where Christopher had lived and written was very informative."

For her portrayal of aspiring chanteuse Jean Ross, actress Imogen Poots claimed that she attempted to show Ross' personality as "convincingly fragile beneath layers of attitude." However, Poots did not wish to depict Ross as a talented singer. Poots explained that—in her estimation—if "Jean had been that good, she wouldn't have been wasting her time hanging around with Isherwood in the cabarets of the Weimar Republic, she would have been on her way, perhaps, to the life she dreamed of in Hollywood."
Filming begins on 16th May 2010 and ended on 8th June 2010.

Critical reception
Sam Wollaston of The Guardian strongly praised Christopher and His Kind, citing an excellent performance from Smith, whom he calls "appealingly rakish, thoroughly disreputable, charming, posh, clever and funny" and compares favorably to John Hurt's performances as Quentin Crisp. He similarly praised several of the other performers and applauded the film for its masterful evocation of its time period, concluding, "Brilliant, top drama, well done."
Michael Hogan for The Sunday Telegraph concurred in this assessment, calling the film "handsomely shot, lovingly recreating the period, but with a twinkling, tongue-in-cheek feel – not to mention some lusty sex scenes – that stops it becoming too misty-eyed". He echoed the kudos for the performances from Smith and the supporting cast.

Less impressed was John Lloyd for the Financial Times who found the gay sex scenes discomfiting. Additionally he thought that the acting was not intense enough, finding the scenes between Christopher and his mother to be the most effective. The film, he concluded, "wasn't great but it was bravely done, all the same".

References

External links

2011 television films
2011 films
2011 LGBT-related films
2011 biographical drama films
2011 romantic drama films
BBC television dramas
Biographical television films
British biographical drama films
British romantic drama films
British LGBT-related television films
British drama television films
Films based on biographies
Films directed by Geoffrey Sax
Films set in 1931
Films set in 1952
Films set in 1976
Films set in Berlin
Films shot in Northern Ireland
Gay-related films
LGBT-related films based on actual events
LGBT-related romantic drama films
Romance films based on actual events
Romance television films
Television films based on books
Films scored by Dominik Scherrer
Biographical films about LGBT people
Films about writers
2010s British films

Christopher and His Kind (film)


Park Sung-joon is a professional player of the real-time strategy game StarCraft. He is known by his pseudonym July, a shortened version of JulyZerg. Park Sung-joon is also known as the "God of War" or "Tushin. Park used to play for STX SouL.

StarCraft
July emerged onto the scene during Gilette OSL, where he beat Oov 3–2 in a famous series and went on to win the tournament against Reach, making him a royal roader and the first Zerg to ever win an OSL.

He quickly became the dominant player of the time, winning another OSL (Ever 2), a KT-KTF tournament and the ITV league. He also made another OSL final which he lost 3–0 to Nada.

After reaching yet another OSL final in early 2006 and losing 3–0 to his old rival Oov, July lost his dominance and went into a small slump. Recently he's shown promising signs of regaining his old confidence by beating Xellos and Oov in the Proleague finals in fine style and reaching final round in OSL.

On July 12, 2008, July defeated the new Protoss phenom, BeSt, in the 2008 EVER OSL, by a score of 3–0.  The victory was July's third OSL title, which won him the Golden Mouse, a prestigious achievement held previously only by Lee Yun-Yeol (NaDa).

As of September 10, 2010 he has not renewed his contract with STX_SouL and has announced that he will be moving to the StarCraft 2 scene in a new team and will continue to play as Zerg. And on November 10, July has qualified for the GSL Pre-Season 3.

Starcraft II

On September 15, 2010, the name of this new team has been revealed as STARTALE.

Park Sung-joon qualified for Code A during GSL season 3 after making it to the RO16, but there losing to oGsMC (Jang Min-Chul, that season's GSL winner).

GSL January was a successful season for ST_July, as he was able to make it past OdinMVP as well as `Slayers`Yugioh, only to lose to ZenexByun during the Code A Ro8.  As a result of this success, he was a participant in the up and down matches following the end of the tournament.  The up and down matches allow deserving Code A players the chance to be promoted to Code S, and allows undeserving Code S players to be demoted back down to Code A.

Park Sung-joon initially faltered in his performance against ZenexKyrix (ZvZ), but rallied back in his second match against TSL_Rain (ZvT), which allowed him entry into Code S.  Following the up and down matches, players from Code S were allowed, based on performance, to choose their grouping for GSL March (GSL February was dedicated to the team league).  ST_July somewhat controversially chose to be in Group A (the group of death as it was later dubbed), calling out Season 3 winner oGsMC for having been defeated by him in previously mentioned Season 3 Ro8.  In the process, he managed to put himself in the same group as two previous GSL winners.  oGsHyperDub was also in this group.

On February 22, at 18:45, ST_July faced oGsMC in the Code S round of 32 for Group A.  ST_July was defeated, and as per schedule, immediately faced IMMvp, widely accepted as the best Starcraft II player in the world because he has the highest win percentage in every matchup (TvT, TvZ, TvP).  IMMvP was also the winner of the most recent GSL season, further solidifying his position as the best in the world. A loss to IMMvP would remove him from the tournament, and risk his Code S status.

ST_July defeated IMMvP, improving his record to 1-1 for the series and guaranteeing that, although he might not advance, he would not be subject to the up and down matches (which would jeopardize his position in Code S).  The next match between oGsMC (the winner of match 2) and oGsHyperDub (the loser of match 1) would determine whether or ST_July would rematch IMMvP to determine who advances, or whether everyone would be tied 1-1 and July would be playing oGsHyperDub.  oGsMC went on to defeat HyperDub to knock him into up and down/matches, and himself advance, thus setting up a rematch with IMMvP and ST_July.

ST_July defeated IMMvP a second time, improving his record to 2-1 for the series, advancing to the Ro16, and putting IMMvP's status as the best current Starcraft 2 player in jeopardy.

He went on to face Lee Yun-Yeol (aka oGsNada), in the Round of 8, defeating him 3-2 and advancing to the semi-finals. ST_July took the first two games really convincingly, lost the next two due to oGsNada's impressive defense, to finally win the fifth one thanks to amazing mutalisk micro and constant aggression.

ST_July reached the Code S finals of the GSL season March.  He was defeated by former Code S champion oGsMC in a best of seven format, losing 4–1.

Before his retirement (which was due to military obligations), July clocked in at an eye-popping average of 818APM during the televised Korean StarCraft II League 2012 Season 1 tournament. Since his retirement, no one has ever beat out this legendary score.

Tournament results
 1st — OnGameNet StarLeague 2008 EVER OSL
 2nd — World Cyber Games 2006 World Cyber Games
 2nd — OnGameNet StarLeague 2005 ShinHan OSL
 1st — OnGameNet StarLeague 2005 EVER OSL
 2nd — OnGameNet StarLeague 2004-2005 IOPS OSL
 1st — OnGameNet StarLeague 2004 Gillette OSL

Honors

 i-TV amateur strongest two week championship(2003)
 MBC GAME TEAM LEAGUE KOREAN CHAMPION 4(2003)
 3rd in i-TV Rookie(2003)
 Gillette Ongamenet Star League Championship(2004)
 iTV Ranking 7th Ranking Championship win(2004)
 KT-KTF Premier League winner(2005)
 EVER Star League Championship(2005)
 Ipsos Ongamenet Star League second place(2005)
 Shinhan Bank Ongamenet Star League second place(2005)
 1st Korea e-Sports Grand Prize Best Zug Player(2006)
 SKY PRO LEAGUE LEAGUE FINAL Final MVP(2007)
 EVER Star League Championship(2008)
 2nd Generation Intel Core GSL Mar. Code S, second place(2011)

References

South Korean esports players
StarCraft players
Living people
StarTale players
South Korean Buddhists
Year of birth missing (living people)
T1 (esports) players

July (gamer)


James Ruffus Gentry (May 18, 1918 – July 3, 1997) was an American professional baseball player, a Major League pitcher who played in all or parts of five seasons for the Detroit Tigers. A right-hander, Gentry stood  tall and weighed .

Minor league career

Born in Daisy Station, near Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Gentry first pitched in organized baseball as part of the company team when he worked for Hanes Hosiery in Winston-Salem.  From 1939 to 1941, he played minor league ball for Landis in the North Carolina State League, Fulton, Kentucky in the Kitty League (where he struck out 167 batters), and Winston-Salem in the Piedmont League.

In 1942 and 1943, Gentry pitched for the Buffalo Bisons in the International League.  Gentry had good speed on his fastball but lacked control.  He struck out 80 batters in 1942, but walked 122.  Gentry followed in 1943 with the best season of his career.  He pitched an 11-inning no-hitter for the Bisons on Easter Sunday and finished the season with 20 wins and a 2.65 earned run average.  He led the league in innings pitched (285), strikeouts (184) and walks (143).

A promising start with the Tigers: 1943–1944

Gentry's performance in 1943 won him a promotion to the big leagues in September 1943.  He went 1–3 for the Tigers in 4 starts, but lost two games by the score of 1–0. So his 1–3 record could have just as easily been 3–1 with any run support from a Tigers batting order depleted by the war.

In 1944, Gentry won a spot in the Tigers' starting rotation, along with Hal Newhouser and Dizzy Trout.  Gentry ended the 1944 season a distant third in wins with 12, behind Newhouser's 29 wins and Trout's 27 wins.  Gentry continued to have problems with his control as he led the American League in walks with 108 and was 3rd in the league in earned runs allowed.

Toward the end of the 1944 season, Gentry found his stride.  He won several games in the pennant stretch, as the Tigers narrowly lost the pennant to the St. Louis Browns.  On September 17, 1944, Gentry narrowly missed a no-hitter against the Indians.  In the bottom of the 9th inning, with the Tigers ahead 3–0, Lou Boudreau hit an infield single that deflected off Gentry.  Ken Keltner followed with a two-out double, and Gentry would up with a 2-hit shutout.

Even in the best game of his career, however, Gentry had problems with his control.  Gentry walked the bases loaded in the 4th inning before striking out the final batter.  Detroit manager Steve O'Neill later said he had been one pitch away from pulling Gentry in the 4th inning.  After the 4th inning, Gentry retired 14 consecutive batters.

Detroit News sportswriter H. G. Salsinger wrote that in the last 6 weeks of the season Gentry "looked to be a certain winner.  It would have surprised no one who watched him throw in those last six weeks if he had turned in 20 victories."

Gentry holds out in 1945

After his performance in 1944, Gentry believed he was entitled to a $1,000 raise.  Detroit's general manager Jack Zeller refused, and Gentry opted to hold out.  The hold out lasted the entire 1945 season.  Gentry reportedly offered to sign in August, but Zeller felt Gentry was out of shape and told him to stay home.

According to a Detroit News article dated August 8, 1945, Gentry had "demanded the same salary the club was paying Harold Newhouser, who won 29 and lost 9 games last year. The club did not think Ruffus worth as much as Harold, but Ruffus insisted in his demands and said that if the club did not meet them he would stay home. He stayed home. He's tired of staying home but the club thinks he got tired too late to do the team any good."

The holdout ended up being costly to both Gentry and Zeller.  Gentry missed the opportunity to pitch for a team that won the American League pennant and the 1945 World Series against the Chicago Cubs.

The holdout also cost Zeller.  Having refused to give Gentry a $1,000 raise, he found himself short of pitching during the 1945 pennant drive.  He ended up purchasing three pitchers late in the season for a total of $40,000.  Zeller later stated that refusing the extra $1,000 to Gentry was his "biggest mistake as general manager."

A gunshot wound to the pitching hand derails a comeback

In 1946, Gentry signed with the Tigers but pitched in only 3 innings, giving up 7 walks and accumulating a 15.00 earned run average.  Sent back to the minors, any hopes of a comeback were derailed when Gentry accidentally discharged his gun while cleaning it.  The resulting shot mangled the index finger on Gentry's pitching hand.

Despite the injury, Gentry tried to come back with a noticeably crooked index finger in 1947 and again in 1948.  He pitched only 1/3 of an inning in 1947 and 6 innings in 1948 for the Tigers. Gentry never won a major league ball game after his 1945 holdout.

Life after baseball

After retiring from baseball, Gentry returned to North Carolina and worked as a brick mason and stonemason.  His younger brother, Harvey Gentry, also made it to the Major Leagues for a brief stint with the New York Giants in 1954.  Gentry died in 1997 in Winston-Salem, aged 79.

References

External links
 Baseball-Reference.com

1918 births
1997 deaths
Baseball players from Winston-Salem, North Carolina
Buffalo Bisons (minor league) players
Dallas Eagles players
Dallas Rebels players
Detroit Tigers players
Fulton Tigers players
Landis Senators players
Little Rock Travelers players
Major League Baseball pitchers
Toledo Mud Hens players
Winston-Salem Twins players
American shooting survivors

Rufe Gentry


Francis Milton Ferg (May 10, 1889 in Arden, Manitoba – March 11, 1960) was a politician in Manitoba, Canada. He served in the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba as a Liberal-Progressive from 1953 to 1958.

The son of William Daniel Ferg and Agnes Ogston, Ferg was educated at Manitoba University and the Manitoba Law School, was called to the Manitoba bar in 1919 and worked as a barrister-at-law. He was a captain in the Royal Canadian Army Service Corps (RCASC) in 1918, the final year of World War I, and a member of the Royal Canadian Legion. In 1923, he married Helen Fleming Paterson. Ferg was named a King's Counsel in 1949.

He was elected to the Manitoba legislature in the 1953 provincial election, defeating opponents from the Progressive Conservative Party and Social Credit League in the rural constituency of Cypress. At his nomination speech, Ferg spoke out in favour of the Canadian wheat board and against the liberalization of Manitoba's liquor laws.  He served as a backbench supporter of Douglas Campbell's government, and did not run for re-election in 1958.

He became mayor of Glenboro in 1959 and died in Winnipeg the following year at the age of 70.

Two of his sons, Lorne Paterson and Patrick David, also became lawyers and both later became county court judges.

References

1889 births
1960 deaths
Canadian military personnel from Manitoba
Royal Canadian Army Service Corps officers
Manitoba Liberal Party MLAs
Mayors of places in Manitoba
Canadian King's Counsel
Canadian Expeditionary Force officers

Francis Ferg


Sophia Lillis (born February 13, 2002) is an American actress. She starred as Beverly Marsh in the horror films It (2017) and It: Chapter Two (2019), as well as Sydney Novak in the Netflix drama series I Am Not Okay With This (2020). Lillis has also appeared in the HBO psychological thriller miniseries Sharp Objects (2018) and the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves  (2023).

Career

Lillis made her film debut starring in the 2016 film 37. Previously, she had a minor role in Julie Taymor's stage production of William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, which was also filmed for live showings.

In 2017, she rose to prominence after co-starring as one of the lead characters, Beverly Marsh, in the horror film It, an adaptation of Stephen King's novel of the same name. Directed by Andy Muschietti, It also starred Jaeden Martell, Finn Wolfhard, Wyatt Oleff, Bill Skarsgård, Jack Dylan Grazer, Jeremy Ray Taylor, and Chosen Jacobs. Later that year, she played one of Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard's children in Sia's music video "Santa's Coming for Us".

In 2018, Lillis appeared in the HBO television miniseries Sharp Objects, in which she played the younger version of Camille Preaker, played by Amy Adams as an adult. In 2019, Lillis starred as teenage sleuth Nancy Drew in the Warner Bros. film adaptation of Nancy Drew and the Hidden Staircase. While the film received mixed to positive reviews, Lillis's performance was singled out for praise. Later in 2019, she reprised her role as Beverly Marsh in It: Chapter Two.

In 2020, Lillis portrayed Gretel in Gretel & Hansel, a re-imagining of the German fairy tale "Hansel and Gretel". The film grossed $22 million worldwide against a budget of $5 million and received generally positive reviews from critics, who mostly praised the film for its acting and cinematography. The following month, Lillis played the lead role in the Netflix original series I Am Not Okay with This. Later that same year, she appeared with Paul Bettany in Uncle Frank, an independent film by True Blood and Six Feet Under creator Alan Ball, which premiered on Amazon Prime in November 2020.

Lillis is set to star alongside Naomi Watts in Claire McCarthy's The Burning Season. She will also appear in Before I Sleep.She appeared in the 2023 film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. Lillis is part of an ensemble cast, including Scarlett Johansson, Jeff Goldblum, and Tom Hanks, who appear in the Wes Anderson film Asteroid City.

In October 2022, Lillis performed in Heroes of the Fourth Turning at Studio Theatre in Washington, DC.

Filmography

Film

Television

Music videos

Awards and nominations

References

External links

Living people
Actresses from New York City
American child actresses
American film actresses
American television actresses
21st-century American actresses
2002 births

Sophia Lillis


Imaginary Heroes is a 2004 American drama film written and directed by Dan Harris. It focuses on the traumatic effect the suicide of the elder son has on a suburban family.

Plot
Matt Travis is good-looking, popular, and his school's best competitive swimmer, so everyone is shocked when he inexplicably commits suicide. As the following year unfolds, each member of his family struggles to recover from the tragedy with mixed results.

His mother Sandy tries to keep the lines of communication open with younger son Tim while easing her emotional pain with marijuana. Father Ben, a perfectionist who worshipped Matt as much as he ignored Tim, insists on continuing to place a meal at the dinner table for the dead boy and begins to drink heavily. Eventually, without telling his wife, he takes a leave of absence from work and spends his days lost in reverie on a park bench. Tim, always in the shadows as the smaller, unathletic, less accomplished "other brother," struggles to get through school while trying to resist the recreational drugs his best friend Kyle Dwyer is always offering him and contemplating having sex with classmate Steph Connors. Sister Penny, away at college, dutifully comes home for infrequent visits and tries to help bridge the widening gap between her surviving brother and their parents.

With the passing months, new crises arise and a long-kept secret is revealed, until it is revealed that one family member was aware of Matt's inner turmoil and suicidal thoughts and why nothing was done to help him.

Cast
Sigourney Weaver as Sandy Travis
Jeff Daniels as Ben Travis
Emile Hirsch as Tim Travis
Michelle Williams as Penny Travis
Deirdre O'Connell as Marge Dwyer
Adam LeFevre as Bob Clyde
Ryan Donowho as Kyle Dwyer
Kip Pardue as Matt Travis

Production
Screenwriter/director Dan Harris was 22 years old when he sent the script to Bryan Singer, who hired him to work on the screenplays for X2, Superman Returns, and the remake of Logan's Run. Two years later he left Singer to begin pre-production work on Heroes.
The film was shot on location in Chatham, Glen Ridge, Montclair, Newark, Wayne, and West Paterson, New Jersey.

Reception

Box office
Imaginary Heroes premiered at the Cannes Film Market in May 2004 and was shown at the Toronto International Film Festival, the Austin Film Festival, the Chicago International Film Festival, and the Marrakech International Film Festival before opening on two theaters in the United States on December 19, 2004. It earned $4,696 on its opening weekend; at its widest release, it played in only 24 theaters domestically. It eventually grossed $228,767 domestically and $62,351 internationally for a total of $291,118.

Critical response
Imaginary Heroes has a "rotten" score of 35% on Rotten Tomatoes from 106 critic reviews, and an average rating of 5.2 out of 10. The consensus on the film states that it "is a muddled, melodramatic and unconvincing drama." The film also has a score of 53 out of 100 on Metacritic, based on reviews of 32 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times observed, "The film might have been stronger as simply the story of the family trying to heal itself after its tragedy, with the focus on Sandy and Tim. But Harris feels a need to explain everything in terms of melodramatic revelations and surprise developments, right up until the closing scenes. The emotional power of the last act is weakened by the flood of new information. The key revelation right at the end explains a lot, yes, but it comes so late that all it can do is explain. If it had come earlier, it would have had to be dealt with, and those scenes might have been considerable... What remains when the movie is over is the memory of Sandy and Tim talking, and of a mother who loves her son, understands him, and understands herself in a wry but realistic way. The characters deserve a better movie, but they get a pretty good one."

Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle said the film "has a strong narrative spine, with interesting and big things happening throughout - an unexpected virtue in a family drama. But this virtue is obscured somewhat by the movie's lack of narrative drive. Writer Dan Harris has written himself a tidy little story, but in directing it, he hasn't sculpted a dynamic drama. To put it in another way, there's a lean, mean 82-minute drama encased in this flabby 112-minute film... What saves Imaginary Heroes is its essential truthfulness about families, which it reveals, not only in the broad movements of its story but in the small details... Sometimes the film's tone wobbles into farce, which is inappropriate, and often the story treads water, as though mimicking, in tone, every somber family film since Ordinary People. But, ultimately, it arrives at an authentic and surprisingly powerful place."

Peter Travers of Rolling Stone rated the film two out of four stars and added, "Sigourney Weaver is a luminous actress with a tough core of intelligence and wit. And Emile Hirsch, who plays her guilt-tormented son, has the talent to sustain a major career. Their scenes together have a warmth that almost makes you forgive Imaginary Heroes... for trying so hard and so futilely to duplicate Ordinary People... What the movie damagingly lacks is a personality of its own."

Home media
The film was released in anamorphic widescreen format on DVD on June 7, 2005. It features an English audio track and subtitles in French. Bonus features include commentary with either Sigourney Weaver or Dan Harris and Emile Hirsch, deleted scenes, and a behind-the-scenes featurette and photo gallery.

References

External links

2004 films
American drama films
2004 drama films
Films about suicide
Films shot in New Jersey
Sony Pictures Classics films
Films about dysfunctional families
Films directed by Dan Harris (screenwriter)
2004 independent films
Films produced by Art Linson
Films scored by Deborah Lurie
Films with screenplays by Dan Harris (screenwriter)
LGBT-related drama films
2004 LGBT-related films
Films about grieving
Incest in film
2000s English-language films
2000s American films

Imaginary Heroes


Abu'l-Faraj Ya'qub ibn Yusuf ibn Killis (, ), (930 in Baghdad – 991), commonly known simply by his patronymic surname as Ibn Killis, was a high-ranking official of the Ikhshidids who went on to serve as vizier under the Fatimids from 979 until his death in 991.

Ya'qub ibn Yusuf ibn Killis was born in Baghdad in 930 in a Jewish family. After his family moved to Syria he came to Egypt in 943 and entered the service of the Regent Kafur. As soon as he became the household and property administrator, he was in charge of the Egyptian state's finances. Despite converting to Islam in 967, he was imprisoned by Kafur's successors after losing their favor. He was able however to purchase his freedom and went to Ifriqiya, where he put himself at the service of the Fatimid Caliph al-Mu'izz.

After the Fatimid conquest of Egypt in 969, Ibn Killis returned to Egypt and was put in charge of the economy, where he was able to regularise the state finances. After the dismissal of Jawhar as-Siqilli in 979 Ya'qub ibn Killis was appointed vizier by al-Aziz, a position he held until his death in 991. He was a patron of culture and science.

Early life
Abu al-Farj Ya'qub ibn Yusuf, known as Ibn Killis, was born of an honorable family of Baghdad. By birth he was a Jew, born in 930. At a young age he came with his father to Egypt, where he started his political life at the court of Kafur, the power behind the throne of the Ikhshidid regime. He was very intelligent, hard working and honest. Very soon he secured an important position in the court of Kafur as an expert in economics. In 967, he converted to Islam, by which Kafur was highly pleased and appointed him as his courtier. This aroused the jealousy of his rival, the vizier Ibn al-Furat, who began to seek a way to eliminate him.

In 968 Kafur died and Ibn al-Furat arrested all his companions including Ya'qub ibn Killis. It is said that Ya'qub bribed the jailor and absconded to Ifriqiya, where the Fatimid Caliph al-Mu'izz ruled.

Al-Mu'izz assigned Ya'qub the responsibility of the country's economy. Through his past experiences he carried out his work with great efficiency. Thereafter, at the time of the Fatimid conquest of Egypt, al-Mu'izz deputed him with Jawhar as-Siqilli for the management there. According to another version, Ya'qub accompanied the Caliph al-Mu'izz when he went to Egypt in 972. After the Fatimid takeover of Egypt, Ibn al-Furat continued in office as vizier, but in 974 he resigned and al-Mu'izz handed over the administration to Ibn Killis.

During the last years of the reign of al-Mu'izz, and the first two years of the period of his successor al-Aziz, (975-996), due to toil, honesty and intelligence of Ya'qub ibn Killis, this position became firm and stable, so much so that in 977-78 al-Aziz appointed him as Wazir al-Adjall (Chief Minister). Prior to this, the first four Fatimid caliphs had an assistant called wasta.

During his tenure as vizier, Ya'qub ibn Killis established various departments anew for the administration of the state, promoted agriculture, reformed trade and stabilised the currency, by which the country began to flourish and revenue of provinces increased. In this very period the treasury was so full as never before. In 983/4 he fell from favour, and al-Aziz fined him 20,000 gold dinars, but the cause is unknown. Nevertheless, within a few months he was reinstated to his post.

Sickness and death
Ibn Killis fell seriously ill on 10 January 991. Al-Aziz visited him and said: "O Ya'qub! If your recovery is to be gained through spending wealth then I am prepared to give away the whole wealth of the state. And if your life is saved by sacrificing any life, I am ready to sacrifice my own son". By this it is understood what position Ya'qub ibn Killis held with the Caliph al-Aziz. The sickness began to worsen day by day and on 22 February 991 C.E. he succumbed.

His death was mourned throughout Egypt. His shroud was decorated with 50 pieces of cloth of which 30 were embroidered with gold thread. According to Ibn Khallikan, 100 poets composed lamentations and every poet earned his reward from the Caliph. In Cairo a place was named the Vizier's Quarter in his honour.

Educational status
With the political sciences Ya'qub bin Killis was also endowed with a thorough knowledge of religion. He was a great scholar and was fond of literature. It is said that he wrote many books in which Mukhtasar-ul-Fiqah' (Risalat al-Waziria) is worth mentioning. This work is on theology and 40 theologians participated in its compilation.

Besides, he was at his palace lecturing every Friday night on different subjects, where judges, theologians, grammarians, traditionalists and poets used to gather to hear him.

At Al-Azhar he gave vent to religious education and upon his instructions a University was established in Jama-e-Azhar, which exists until today.

Stories of his wealth

Ya'qub ibn Killis was an efficient vizier and introduced many reforms, as a result of which the public was not burdened and treasury was full. Al-Aziz, had given him wide powers and he was also drawing a good remuneration from the Treasury with a high position in the government.

Consequently, he was in possession of the force of 4,000 young men. The uniform of his guards was, similar to that of the guards of Hazrat Imam Aziz, that is silky. Ya'qub bin Killis had formed a private force, commander of which was called 'Qaid'. Courts were established for different jobs. There was also a well equipped dispensary in his palace. In the month of Ramadhan besides judges and prominent persons, nominal and general public also used to take advantage of his favour. His annual income was 100,000 dinars, i.e. more than 50,000 guineas. At the time of his death he left property valued forty lakh dinars, this amount was exclusive 200,000 dinars kept aside by him for the dowry of his daughter. He also left a piece of land worth 300,000 dinars. Besides there were 4,000 male and 8,000 female slaves.

References

Sources
 , pp. 80–96

930 births
991 deaths
10th-century Egyptian people
10th-century people from the Abbasid Caliphate
Converts to Islam from Judaism
People from Baghdad
Viziers of the Fatimid Caliphate
Jewish viziers
Ikhshidid officials
Jewish prime ministers
10th-century people from the Fatimid Caliphate
Jews from the Fatimid Caliphate

Ya'qub ibn Killis


The unicolor cribo (Drymarchon melanurus unicolor) is a Central American subspecies of the cribo snakes. The eastern indigo snake, Drymarchon corais couperi is another species of this genus. Until recently the unicolor cribo was considered a subspecies of the same species as the indigo snake Drymarchon corais unicolor.

Unlike the indigo snake, which is dark blue to almost black, the unicolor cribo has a yellow or golden color with black facial and neck bar-like markings.

This snake reaches a length of over nine feet. It is terrestrial and diurnal. It can be found in marshes, swamps, and riverbeds. The unicolor cribo is non-venomous. It bites its prey without coiling around it. It pins its prey, crushing it, and then swallows it whole. Its prey consists of other snakes, including venomous snakes, small mammals, small birds, lizards, frogs, fish, and other small vertebrate animals.

References
 Savage, J.M. 1992. The Amphibians and Reptiles of Costa Rica. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL.
 Solorzano, Alejandro. 2004. Snakes of Costa Rica. INBio, Costa Rica.

External links
 Picture and care info
 Indigo systematics

Colubrids
Subspecies

Unicolor cribo


The Lizard is a peninsula in south Cornwall, United Kingdom. The most southerly point of the British mainland is near Lizard Point at . Lizard village, the most southerly village on the British mainland, is in Landewednack, the most southerly parish.

The peninsula measures approximately  x . It is southwest of Falmouth ten miles (16 km) east of Penzance.

The name "Lizard" is most probably a corruption of the Cornish name "Lys Ardh", meaning "high court". The name is not connected to the rock called serpentinite which is found here.

The Lizard's coast is particularly hazardous to shipping and the seaways round the peninsula were historically known as the "Graveyard of Ships". The Lizard Lighthouse was built at Lizard Point in 1752 and the RNLI operates The Lizard lifeboat station.

Geography

The parishes on the peninsula proper are (west to east):
Northern parishes:
 Gunwalloe
 Cury
 Mawgan-in-Meneage
 St Martin-in-Meneage
 Manaccan
 St Anthony-in-Meneage
Southern parishes:
 Mullion
 Grade-Ruan
 St Keverne
 Landewednack
Four parishes and part of a fifth in the northeast belong to a district known as the Meneage (pronounced to rhyme with "vague"); from west to east these are Mawgan-in-Meneage (part), St Martin in Meneage, Manaccan, St Anthony-in-Meneage, and (south of the Helford River) St Keverne.

Geology
The peninsula's geology is the best preserved example of an exposed ophiolite in the United Kingdom. An ophiolite is a group of geological formations which represent a slice through a section of ocean crust thrust onto the continental crust. Geologists have identified these three parts of the rock: the serpentinites, the "oceanic complex" and the metamorphic basement.

Ecology
Several nature sites exist on the Lizard Peninsula including Predannack nature reserve, Mullion Island, and Goonhilly Downs. An area of the Lizard coverning  is designated a National Nature Reserve because of its coastal grasslands and heaths and inland heaths.

The Lizard contains some of the most specialised plants of any area in Britain, including many endangered species.

References

Geography of Cornwall
Peninsulas of the United Kingdom

The Lizard


Thomas Cushing III (March 24, 1725 – February 28, 1788) was an American  lawyer, merchant, and statesman from Boston, Massachusetts.  Active in Boston politics, he represented the city in the provincial assembly from 1761 to its dissolution in 1774, serving as the lower house's speaker for most of those years.  Because of his role as speaker, his signature was affixed to many documents protesting British policies, leading officials in London to consider him a dangerous radical.  He engaged in extended communications with Benjamin Franklin who at times lobbied on behalf of the legislature's interests in London, seeking ways to reduce the rising tensions of the American Revolution.

Cushing represented Massachusetts in the First (during which he signed the Continental Association) and Second Continental Congresses but was voted out when he opposed independence.  Despite this, he remained politically active after independence, continuing to serve in the state government.  During the Revolutionary War, he was a commissary responsible for provisioning the military, a position he used to enrich the family merchant business.  He was elected the state's first lieutenant governor in 1780.  Politically associated with fellow merchant Governor John Hancock, he remained lieutenant governor until his death in 1788, briefly serving as acting governor in 1785 between the resignation of Hancock and the election of James Bowdoin.

Early years

Thomas was born in Boston, the capital of the British Province of Massachusetts Bay, on March 24, 1725, the second of at least seven children.  The Cushing family, with deep roots in the province, descends from Deacon Matthew Cushing who emigrated from Norfolk, England, to Hingham in 1638.  Thomas' father, also named Thomas (1694–1746), was one of the city's wealthiest merchants, a leading member of the Old South Church, and a city selectman. Thomas Sr. was a frequent moderator of town meetings and accepted on behalf of the city of Boston the gift of Faneuil Hall (a large market building and public meeting space) from Peter Faneuil in 1742.  He served in the General Court (colonial assembly) of Massachusetts from 1731 to 1747, and as its speaker after 1742. His mother, Mary (Bromfield) Cushing (1689–1746), was also from a prominent Boston family.

Thomas got his early education at the Boston Latin School and then attended Harvard where he graduated in 1744.  He studied law and was admitted to the bar, after which he entered the family merchant business.  On October 1, 1747, he married Deborah Fletcher (c. 1727–1790), with whom he had five children.

Political career
In 1753, Cushing entered politics, winning election as a Boston selectman.  He continued in that office until 1763 and was also elected to the general court in 1761.  He became politically associated with Samuel Adams and John Hancock, in part through his attendance at political discussions in Boston's taverns.  With Hancock in particular he eventually formed a lifelong relationship in which the charismatic Hancock was seen to be the dominant political personality.  He contributed financially to some of Hancock's political spending, although he preferred to stand in the background and let Hancock receive the credit.  Because of this, his (and Hancock's) political opponents in later years often characterized him as little more than Hancock's henchman or proxy.

When the French and Indian War came to an end in 1763, the British government sought to recover the costs of posting troops in the colonies by imposing taxes on the colonies.  Cushing was an early opponent of these taxes, couching his opposition in economic terms, a reflection on his livelihood as a merchant.  An astute observer of the trade ties binding the various parts of the British Empire, he wrote in 1763 that extant high duties on molasses (payment of which was widely flouted by New England merchants) would have significantly harmed the economies of Britain, North America, and the West Indies, in part by diverting significant quantities of scarce hard currency to those duties.  John Adams wrote of Cushing that "[He] is steady and constant and busy in the interest of liberty and the opposition, and is famed for secrecy and his talent for procuring intelligence."

Speaker of the house
In May 1766 Cushing was chosen to be speaker of the assembly. The assembly first chose James Otis, but Governor Bernard rejected this choice, and Cushing was named as a compromise candidate.  During his tenure as speaker he was a frequent correspondent with the assembly's agent in London, Benjamin Franklin, who was given the job in late 1770.  In addition to official correspondence such as petitions, the two men exchanged opinions on political developments in their respective areas and were broadly in agreement on the need for moderation in dealing with the British government.  In 1772, Franklin acquired letters written by several royal appointees, including Governor Thomas Hutchinson when he was still lieutenant governor.  Seeking to deflect colonial blame for matters away from the British government and onto the royal governor, Franklin forwarded these letters to Cushing, with specific instructions that they only be shown to a few people.  Those who saw them included the radical Samuel Adams, who engineered their eventual publication in 1773.  In the letters, Hutchinson and Lieutenant Governor Andrew Oliver made highly inflammatory suggestions that colonial rights needed to be abridged.  The resulting scandal inflamed political tensions on both sides of the Atlantic, prompted a petition from the assembly that Hutchinson be recalled, and brought about Franklin's resignation as colonial agent and conversion to a pro-independence view after he was publicly lambasted for his role in the affair.

Cushing held the post of speaker until the assembly was dissolved in October 1774 by Governor and British Army General Thomas Gage, who succeeded Hutchinson. The assembly's members then met without the governor's permission and formed the Massachusetts Provincial Congress.  This body would constitute the de facto government of Massachusetts until its state constitution was adopted in 1780.

Despite his opposition to British policies, Cushing did not at first strongly support the revolution. In 1772, he (along with Hancock, who was also then moderate in his views) refused to serve when named to one of the Boston Committees of correspondence. Despite his lack of revolutionary ardor, he was elected as a delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774 and to the second in 1775.  He became associated with the radical cause by London political figures in part because, as Massachusetts speaker, his signature was affixed to all of its petitions.  As a result, orders issued to General Gage in April 1775 for the arrest of radical leaders included Cushing's name.  Gage did not pursue such orders for the arrest of leaders, and Cushing was never detained.

American Revolution

Cushing continued to maintain a weak attitude toward independence through 1775, which cost him his seat in the Continental Congress in December 1775.  After a heated election campaign, Cushing was defeated by Elbridge Gerry, who was committed to independence.  The loss, which decisively handed pro-independence forces a majority in the Massachusetts delegation, propelled Cushing firmly into Hancock's camp.  Cushing continued to oppose independence upon his return to Massachusetts, orchestrating delays in the polling process by which the state formally called for a declaration of independence.

Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress, rewarded Cushing's loyalty by securing for him the appointment as a commissioner of marine affairs.  In this role Cushing oversaw the procurement of two 32-gun frigates for the Continental Navy.  He was also appointed the chief commissary responsible for supplying Massachusetts troops, a post he held for several years.  In 1780, he was appointed as one of the chief commissaries responsible for supplying the French troops at Newport, Rhode Island.  Cushing, in behavior that was similar to that of other merchants involved in military supply, used these positions to substantially enrich the family merchant business by granting it favorably priced supply contracts.  He was also involved in regional conventions that attempted to stem the inflationary decline in value of the Continental dollar by setting wage and price controls; these attempts failed because states refused to implement convention recommendations.

In 1778 Cushing was involved in an unsuccessful attempt to create a new constitution for the state.  This effort was rejected by the state's eligible voters for a variety of reason, although there continued to be calls from the towns demanding a new constitution.  Cushing was not involved in the detailed drafting of the state constitution that was adopted in 1780. He was a charter member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1780).

President of the Massachusetts Senate
Cushing was elected to the Massachusetts Senate the 1780 election. As several districts failed to elect senators and several others refused to serve, there were only nineteen senators sworn in for the first Senate session of 1780. On October 25, 1780, of the nineteen senators who had been sworn in, fourteen voted for Cushing, and Cushing was elected the first President of the Massachusetts Senate.  Cushing resigned as president on November 4, 1780, in order to become the Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts.

Lieutenant governor
Cushing stood for election as lieutenant governor in the 1780 election.  The vote was indecisive (no candidate received a majority of the votes cast), and the choice was given to the General Court to decide.  Its first candidate, James Bowdoin, refused the post, as did the second choice, James Warren, and the choice went to Cushing on the third ballot.  He then served in the post, most of the time serving under his friend John Hancock, until his death in 1788.  In early 1785, Hancock offered his resignation to the legislature, partly as a political maneuver (although he claimed to be suffering a particularly bad case of gout at the time).  The legislature did not insist that Hancock remain in office, resulting in Hancock actually resigning.  Cushing became acting governor and served out the last few months of the term.  The 1785 election for governor was highly political and divisive; Cushing was portrayed by his opponents (principally Bowdoin and his supporters) as little more than a creature of Hancock who would do Hancock's bidding.  The election was again undecided by the electorate; Bowdoin prevailed in the General Court's decision-making, and Cushing again won the lieutenant governor's office.  Bowdoin served two terms, which were dominated by Shays' Rebellion, an uprising caused in part by Bowdoin's harsh fiscal policies and poor economic conditions in the rural parts of the state.  In 1787, Hancock returned to politics, trouncing Bowdoin.  In each of these elections Cushing was re-elected as lieutenant governor.

During their time in office Hancock and Cushing funded the rebuilding of Boston, which had been devastated by the British occupation in 1775–76.  Although Hancock was given most of the credit for this effort, it is known that Cushing played a significant role in the rebuilding effort.

Death and legacy
Thomas Cushing died in Boston on February 28, 1788, while serving as lieutenant governor.  He was buried in Boston's Granary Burying Ground.  Cushing, Maine, is named in his honor.

Notes

References

Further reading

External links

1725 births
1788 deaths
18th century in Boston
Continental Congressmen from Massachusetts
18th-century American politicians
Governors of Massachusetts
Harvard University alumni
Lieutenant Governors of Massachusetts
Members of the colonial Massachusetts House of Representatives
Lawyers from Boston
Burials at Granary Burying Ground
Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Politicians from Boston
18th-century American businesspeople
Cushing family
Signers of the Continental Association
Speakers of the Massachusetts House of Representatives (colonial period)

Thomas Cushing


"Manhunt" is the third episode of the first season of the CBS drama Under the Dome. The episode aired on July 8, 2013.

The episode received mixed reviews from critics, and also sparked controversy due to the show's reference to The Simpsons Movie. Upon airing, the episode was watched by 10.71 million viewers and received an 18–49 rating of 2.7.

Plot
Deputy Paul Randolph, who accidentally killed Deputy Freddy, escapes his jail cell and locks Linda inside. Big Jim organizes a search party to find Paul by recruiting other townsmen and a reluctant Barbie, while Linda resolves to find Paul on her own. In the woods, Paul sneaks up on Barbie and Big Jim to hold them at gunpoint and Linda shows up and shoots Paul, prompting Big Jim to designate her as the new Sheriff.

Julia tails Junior into the tunnels, where he is looking to find a way out; he hits the barrier of the dome and his flashlight explodes, but Julia is able to help him and use her matches to guide them out to safety.

Meanwhile, Joe and Norrie find themselves in the middle of a party as Ben (John Elvis) invites all of the teenagers in town to charge their electronics using Joe's generator. The party ends when the generator blows, and Carolyn and Alice find Norrie and see her and Joe touch hands and start seizing simultaneously, repeating the same cryptic phrase "Pink stars are falling".

Reception

Ratings
The episode aired on CBS on July 8, 2013. The episode was watched by 10.71 million viewers, with an 18–49 rating/share of 2.7/8, placing first in its timeslot and the night. The episode is down slightly from the previous episode, which received a 2.9 rating and 11.81 million viewers.

The show was watched by 1.784 million viewers in Canada, ranking first for the night and the week.

Critical reception
The episode received generally negative reviews by critics. Matt Fowler of IGN gave the episode a negative review, pointing out that the quality of the series has slipped over the weeks, saying "I think the fact that each episode is taking place over the course of one day is already beginning to take its toll on the series. Because we're in Day 3 now and things are moving slowly and stupidly." He also commented on the characters' lack of worry about the dome, saying "this week, more than before, the dome seemed totally unimportant. And things weren't bad enough for the citizens for there to be any crisis to care about. Aside from the inevitable bacon shortage that is."

Andrea Reiher of Zap2it gave the episode a negative review, calling it "a little slow." She also commented on Angie and Junior's part in the story, saying "We'd love it if eventually she'd escape and get to interact with some other people, but we aren't optimistic." Darren Franich of Entertainment Weekly also commented on the episode's lack of pace and quality, saying "This episode was light on Dome mystery and heavy on inter-character drama."

Doug Anderson of The Guardian gave the episode a negative review, saying "the series is much longer than it is deep. After last night's third instalment, in which not much happened, I feel disinclined to persevere, notwithstanding the whiff of food for thought involving "the enemy within" and the nature of fear. As yet, no Truman Show exit door in the backdrop, leading to an external reality or hidden hands directing events."

Tim Surrette of TV.com gave the episode a negative review as well, saying the episode "was not a fun hour of television to sit through, even for hate-watchers. I'm getting some serious Terra Nova vibes here with weird separated teen storylines, mundane problems-of-the-week, and one-dimensional characters, when the focus should be on THE DOME! No one is facing consequences for their stupid actions, the town is mostly going about its business as if nothing has happened, and those damned teenagers are running around in packs like rabid jackals. Under the Dome has yet to touch on any sense of a theme as it trudges through hollow weekly shenanigans and destroys its source material."

Controversy
A scene in the episode has kids referencing The Simpsons Movie, which led to speculation that the series was based on the film. Stephen King responded by saying "Never saw it. I was just totally gob smacked and blindsided when people started to say, oh, The Simpsons already did this."

References

2013 American television episodes
Under the Dome (TV series) episodes

Manhunt (Under the Dome)


John de Britto, SJ (also spelled Brito; ), also known as Arul Anandar, (born in Lisbon, Portugal on 1 March 1647 – died at Orur, Tamil Nadu, India on 4 February 1693) was a Portuguese Jesuit missionary and martyr, often called "the Portuguese St Francis Xavier" by Indian Catholics. He is also called the John the Baptist of India.

Early life and missionary work
John de Britto was the scion of a powerful aristocratic Portuguese family; his father, Salvador de Britto Pereira, died while serving as Viceroy of the Portuguese colony of Brazil.  He joined the Jesuits in 1662, studying at the famous University of Coimbra. He travelled to the missions of Madurai, in Southern India, present-day Tamil Nadu, in 1673 and preached the Christian religion in the region of the Maravar country. He renamed himself Arul Anandar (அருளானந்தர்) in Tamil. The ruler of the Maravar country imprisoned him in 1684. Having been expelled, he returned to Lisbon in 1687 and worked as a missions procurator. King Pedro II wanted him to stay, but in 1690 he returned to the Maravar country with 24 new missionaries.

The Madurai Mission was a bold attempt to establish an Indian Catholic Church that was relatively free of European cultural domination.  As such, Britto learned the native languages, went about dressed in yellow cotton, and lived like a Tamil Thuravi/Sannyasi, abstaining from every kind of animal food and from wine. Britto tried to teach the Catholic faith in categories and concepts that would make sense to the people he taught. This method, proposed and practised by Roberto de Nobili, met with remarkable success. Britto remained a strict vegan until the end of his life, rejecting meat, fish, eggs and alcohol, and living only on legumes, fruits and herbs.

Martyrdom

John de Britto's preaching led to the conversion of Thadiyathevan (தடியத் தேவன்), a Maravar prince who had several wives. When Thadiyathevan was required to dismiss all his wives but one, a serious problem arose. One of the wives was a niece of the neighbouring king, the Raghunatha Kilavan Sethupathi (சேதுபதி), the King of Ramnad (Ramanathapuram), who took up her quarrel and began a general persecution of Christians. Britto and the catechists were taken and carried to the capital, Ramnad. Thence he was led to Orur (ஓரியூர்), some 30 miles northward along the coast, where he was executed on 4 February 1693.

Britto was beatified by Pope Pius IX on 21 August 1853. He was canonised by Pope Pius XII on 22 June 1947. Saint John de Britto's feast day is 4 February.

Red Sand
This seashore sightseeing location is one of the most venerable pilgrim centres of Christians in the world over, as it is said to be the site of Britto's martyrdom. It was at this place where Britto is said to have been beheaded in 1693. The sand dune here is believed to have been stained by his blood. There is a shrine constructed in Portuguese style containing a statue of Britto, known locally as 'Arul Anandar' who had modestly offered his neck to the executioner.

The red sand dune here in this shrine where the blood of Britto was spilled has great significance. Numerous incurable diseases are said to have cured by the application of the red sand on the respective body parts. Couples are believed to have blessed with children on visiting the shrine and praying to the departed soul. During festivities, pilgrims mainly from Tamil Nadu and Kerala participate irrespective of their caste, creed and religion. Thus, together with Christians, Hindus and Muslims also come to worship at the shrine in thousands, to mark respect to a unique holy man who shed his life and blood at that spot. The occasion appears to be more as a social gathering rather than a religious festival. The auspicious ceremony is a rare opportunity for these simple people to bring gaiety and enthusiasm in their life. The strong faith and enviable ability to combine pleasure and righteousness on a pilgrimage gives a divine atmosphere to the Orur festival.

Devotees from other dioceses and districts visit the shrine on specific dates. In February, believers from Dindigul arrive while in June, they are from Karunguli and Nagapattinam. During September more than 25,000 pilgrims used to visit the shrine for dedicating prayers and offerings. In October, nearly 25,000 pilgrims arrive from the neighbouring Sivagangai district and in December, visitors are from Madurai and Melur. Throughout the year, thousands of pilgrims from Sakthikulangara, a Catholic parish in Kerala, visit the shrine.

In Portugal
His name was given to the Jesuit-run Colégio de São João de Brito (Saint John de Britto College), located in Lisbon, Portugal.

In India
There is a shrine to Britto in the village of Orur (also spelled Oreiour), where he is a significant figure revered by the Kallar, Maravar and Agamudayar.

There is only one church in Coimbatore dedicated to John de Britto and located at R S Puram, and it is one of the largest parishes in the diocese of Coimbatore. There is also a church in Subramaniapuram in Tiruchirapalli district of Tamil Nadu dedicated to him. In 2016, a Church was built in honour of St. John de Britto at Laggere, Bangalore (Karnataka). There is also a Church dedicated John de Britto in Sesurajapuram, Krishnagiri district of Tamilnadu.

One of the four houses in the Jesuit school, St Xavier's, Durgapur, is named after John de Britto. In the Campion School of Mumbai and St Xavier's Hazaribag  there is a house named after Britto (Britto House). The other two houses are named for Francis Xavier (Xavier House) and Ignatius of Loyola (Loyola House). One of four houses in the Jesuit school, St Stanislaus High School. The other three houses named after Francis Xavier (Xavier House), Ignatius of Loyola (Loyola House) and Stanislaus Kostka (Kostka House). Also one of the four houses in St. Xavier's School, Kolkata, is named after Britto.

One of the four houses in the Infant Jesus Anglo-Indian Higher Secondary School Tangasseri, Kollam is named after John de Britto (Brittos). The other three houses are named for John Bosco (Boscos),  John Berchmans (Berchmans) and Dominic Savio (Savios). Campion Anglo Indian Higher Secondary school Tiruchirapalli which is one of the prestigious schools in Tiruchirapalli district of Tamil Nadu also has a house named after him.

St Britto High School in Goa is named after Britto as he lived there for seven months to complete his theological studies at St Paul's College in Old Goa. The school is administered by the Jesuits. There is an Anglo-Indian Boys High School in the Kochi Diocese, in the old Portuguese city of Fort Cochin, named after John de Britto, nearby the Bishop's House, in Kochi. There is a St. John De Britto College of Education at Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu (B.Ed. and M.Ed. college) since Britto worked in the Diocese of Thanjavur as well.

Britto is the patron saint (referred as Pathukavul) of Sakthikulangara Parish in Kollam Diocese, Kerala. Every year, Britto's feast day is celebrated in Sakthikulangara with a big procession (prathikshanam). The St John De Britto Anglo-Indian High School is named after him.
One of the Jesuit colleges established in Tamil Nadu is named after Britto as Arul Anandar College (Arts & Science) which is in Karumathur, Madurai, as well as St. Arul Anandar School, Orur, in the town where Britto died. These last two schools were established by the Jesuits to promote education in the rural parts of Tamil Nadu.

Other countries
In the Philippines, Britto is honoured with several class sections named after him in the Jesuit-run schools:
Section 11-De Brito in Ateneo de Manila Senior High School
Four high school class sections in Ateneo de Davao University (1-De Brito; 2-De Brito; 3-De Brito; 4-De Brito)
A Grade 8 level (formerly Grade 9 but changed into a Grade 8 section) class section in Xavier University – Ateneo de Cagayan

In Yogyakarta, Indonesia, a Jesuit school for boys is named after him, SMA Kolese De Britto (De Britto College Senior High School).

In Penang, Malaysia, there is a church called Church of St John Britto. The church is part of City Parish in the city of Georgetown, Penang. It was built in 1969. On 3 February 2019, the city parish held a Golden Jubilee celebration.

In Mauritius there is a chapel named St Jean de Britto dedicated to Tamil Catholics living in the area.

In Brazil there is a São João de Brito Parish in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Santo Amaro, one of the dioceses in the city of São Paulo. The parish was founded on 30 December 1952 and remains as one of the churches among the Pastoral Sector of Saint Amaro in the diocese.

See also
List of Christian martyrs
List of saints of the Society of Jesus
List of vegans
Madurai Nayak Dynasty

Notes

References

Bibliography

External links

Saint of the Day, February 4: John de Britto  at SaintPatrickDC.org

1647 births
1693 deaths
17th-century Christian saints
17th-century Roman Catholic martyrs
17th-century Portuguese Jesuits
Portuguese people executed abroad
Portuguese Roman Catholic saints
Portuguese Roman Catholic missionaries
Clergy from Lisbon
Jesuit martyrs
Jesuit saints
University of Coimbra alumni
People executed by India by decapitation
Jesuit missionaries in India
Christian martyrs
Canonizations by Pope Pius XII

John de Britto


Spratt's was the world's first large-scale manufacturer of dog biscuits. The company successfully promoted their array of products for dogs and other domestic animals through the astute use of snob appeal. The company was the first to erect a billboard in London. Varieties of biscuits included 'Dog Cakes' (meat fibre and fish and meat), puppy biscuits in regular and with cod liver oil, 'Malt-milk' for puppies, 'Weetmeet' (which came in two versions one for large dogs and one for small dogs and puppies), 'Bonio', 'Spix', 'Ovals' in regular and mixed varieties (flavours being yeast & meat, fish, spice & cod liver oil, fibrine, and charcoal), 'Fibo' granulated kibble food, 'Rodnim' hound meal, Alsax, Speedall, as well as a tinned food variety.

British operations
Spratt's Spratt's Patent laid down their first oven in 1870 at the old London Armoury Company factory in Henry Street. Shortly afterwards, Stephen Wingrove (1854-1923) joined the business, Wingrove was acknowledged to be the driving force of the firm. He worked in it for over 50 years. When he joined there were 20 workers, three travelling salesmen (including Wingrove) and three clerks. For 20 years he represented the firm both on the road and in the market, becoming the General Manager c. 1890. By 1896, Spratt's had between 500 and 600 workmen, and scores of travellers and clerks.
At the time of Wingrove's death at home in Banstead, Surrey, he was chairman and managing director of the company. He was also chairman of Messrs. Braschkaner and Co Ltd. , the London Corn Exchange and several other companies. He was 67 years old, and was survived by a widow, two sons, and a daughter.

Wingrove oversaw the development of Spratt's Poplar factory. By 1896, it was an impressive affair: "Moreover, by ingenuity and mechanical skill they have built a plant at Poplar which combines all the elements of economies. That is to say, they have conceived a scheme of things which enables them to produce a variety of articles with precisely the same machinery, and, therefore, at a minimum of cost. The total indicated horsepower of the 11 steam engines, employed is ASO. In addition to this, there are eight huge engines, having a total indicated horsepower of 100. In one way the factories at Poplar are a paradox."

The former factory in Poplar is a well-preserved site with about 150 live-work units called the Spratt's Complex. Much of the original markings are visible on the buildings, with names painted on the DLR track-side walls, and on the small chimney visible from Morris Road. Many well known artists and creatives have lived in the building over the years, including John Copnall, Michael Green, Newton Faulkner, Debbie Bragg, Ian Berry, and Roger Law of Spitting Image fame.

References

External links

Dogs as pets
Pet food brands
1860s establishments in England

Spratt's


Kathy Vargas (born June 23, 1950) is an American artist who creates photographs from multiple exposures that she hand colors. She often devotes several works to a particular theme, creating series.

Biography
Vargas was born in San Antonio, Texas. She was influenced early on by her Catholic faith, her grandmother's ghost stories and her father's retelling of pre-Columbian history.

Vargas has a BFA from the University of Texas at San Antonio in 1981 and in 1984 received her MFA.

Kathy Vargas worked for many years as the Visual Arts Director of the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center in San Antonio. She currently teaches in the art department at The University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, TX. She has lectured throughout the United States and Mexico.

Art
Kathy Vargas became interested in hand-colored photography around 1970 when she worked for Bill and Jerry Hayes in her hometown at a small production company. She was placed in the animation department and from there learned how to do special effects. Vargas learned dark room work here before she began learning about photography.

At the Southwest Craft Center, Kathy learned rock-and-roll photography from Tom Wright in 1971, which she practiced professionally from 1973 to 1977.

Kathy Vargas began classes at San Antonio College with Mel Casas, a Chicano artist, who invited her to attend a Con Safo art group meeting after seeing some of her photographs. She felt welcome there and loved what the group was doing with art. Kathy gives credit to Casas for opening her eyes and sharing many Chicano and Chicana artists with her. When she began to feel limited, she notified them that it was time for her to create her own art and departed from the Con Safo art group. Vargas wanted to experiment with the medium and create her own photographic style. Vargas joined the group in 1974 and left in 1975.

A few years later, while working on a documentary project about yard shrines in her home town of San Antonio, Texas, she began researching Mexican and pre-Columbian myths and literature, and to produce works based on a photographic 'magic realism' involving layering by multiple exposure and hand colouring (Marshall).

In 1993 she produced a portfolio titled, Revelaciones, and a year later was published in Nueva Luz photographic journal, volume 4#2 (En Foco, Bronx: 1994)

Her Este Recuerdo series (2003) consists of 23 photographs. They are made from between two and four negatives (many shot from old family photographs) and colored with oil paint. According to the artist, her various acts of reframing result in "symbolically entombed" subjects. Vargas utilizes acidic rose and purple colors to reference early color photographs, as well as vintage hand-tinted pictures. As continuing explorations of "death and remembrance," they are intended to be melancholic relics. Vargas believes that Roland Barthes defined the essence of photography in his book Camera Lucida, written after the death of his mother. Barthes says photography is an entrance "into flat Death." Moreover, "the only thought I can have is that at the end of this first death, my own death is inscribed: between the two, nothing more than waiting...."

She is interested in "the anatomy of death and the aftermath of everlasting life." Vargas often uses iconography from Aztec art, along with various other cultural and Christian symbols.

Further reading
"Photography and Nostalgia: The Touched-up Images of Kathy Vargas".[pp. 29–41] in David William Foster, Picturing the Barrio: Ten Chicano Photographers.

Exhibits
Solo exhibits:
 Sala Uno in Rome
 Galeria San Martín in Mexico City
 Centro Recoleta in Buenos Aires, Argentina
 McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas
Group exhibits:
 "Hospice: A Photographic Inquiry," a traveling exhibit commissioned by the Corcoran Gallery, Washington D.C.
 "Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation (CARA)"
"Visibilities: Intrepid Women of Artpace" at Artpace, San Antonio, TX.

Books
 Vargas, Kathy, and Connie Arismendi. Intimate lives: work by ten contemporary Latina artists. Austin, TX: Women & Their Work, 1993.
 Muñoz, Celia Alvarez, Noriega, Chon A., José Piedra, Kathy Vargas, and Victor Zamudio-Taylor. Revelaciones = Revelations: Hispanic art of evanescence. Ithaca, NY: Hispanic American Studies Program, Cornell University, 1993.
 Goldberg, Jim, Nan Goldin, Sally Mann, Jack Radcliffe, and Kathy Vargas. Hospice: a photographic inquiry. Boston: Little, Brown, in association with the Corcoran Gallery of Art and National Hospice Foundation, 1996. .
 Lippard, Lucy R., and MaLin Wilson-Powell. Kathy Vargas: photographs, 1971–2000. San Antonio, TX: Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum, 2000.  .
 Art at Our Doorstep: San Antonio Writers and Artists featuring Kathy Vargas. Edited by Nan Cuba and Riley Robinson (Trinity University Press, 2008).

References

 Anglo-American Name Authority File, s.v. "Vargas, Kathy", LC Control Number no 9502087, cited September 10, 2006.
 Marshall, Peter. 'Any Colour You Like', About, Inc. , cited September 10, 2005.
 Kathy Vargas on En Foco

1950 births
University of the Incarnate Word faculty
American photographers
Living people
Hispanic and Latino American women in the arts
20th-century American women photographers
20th-century American photographers
American women academics
21st-century American women
Chicano art

Kathy Vargas


Banksia purdieana is a species of bushy shrub that is endemic to Western Australia. It has broadly linear, pinnatipartite leaves with sharply-pointed lobes on the sides, yellow flowers in heads of about eighty and egg-shaped follicles.

Description
Banksia purdieana is a bushy or column-shaped shrub that grows to  high and up to  wide but does not form a lignotuber. It has curved, broadly linear, pinnatipartite leaves that are  long and  wide with between four and seven triangular, sharply-pointed teeth on each side. The flowers are yellow and are arranged heads of about eighty with elliptical to linear involucral bracts up to  long at the base of the head. The perianth is  long and the pistil  long and curved. Flowering occurs from July to September and the follicles are egg-shaped with a notch at the base and  long.

Taxonomy and naming
This species was first formally described in 1904 by Ludwig Diels who gave it the name Dryandra purdieana and published the description in the journal Botanische Jahrbücher für Systematik, Pflanzengeschichte und Pflanzengeographie. The specific epithet (purdieana) honours Diels's friend Alexander Purdie.

In 2007 Austin Mast and Kevin Thiele transferred all dryandras to the genus Banksia and renamed this species Banksia purdieana.

Distribution and habitat
This banksia grows in kwongan between Tathra National Park, Mogumber, Cadoux, Moorine Rock and Bendering in the Avon Wheatbelt, Coolgardie, Geraldton Sandplains, Jarrah Forest and Mallee biogeographic regions.

Conservation status
Banksia purdieana is classed as "not threatened" by the Western Australian Government Department of Parks and Wildlife.

References

purdieana
Plants described in 1904
Taxa named by Ludwig Diels

Banksia purdieana


Rev William Good, S.J. (1527–1586) was an English Jesuit.

Life
Born at Glastonbury, Somerset, he was educated there, and admitted to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 26 February 1546. He was elected a fellow there on 15 June 1548, and commenced M.A. 18 July 1552, being around then humanity reader in the college. He was one of the clerks of the market in 1552.

In Queen Mary's reign he obtained the benefice of Middle Chinnock, Somerset, the prebend of Comba Octava in the church of Wells, and the head-mastership of the grammar school at Wells. Soon after the accession of Elizabeth he left for Tournai, where in 1562 he was admitted into the Society of Jesus by Everard Mercurian. After he had passed his novitiate he was sent into Ireland with Richard Creagh as a missionary for several years and there taught at a Jesuit school at Limerick. Then he went to Leuven, where he became acquainted with Robert Parsons, whom he persuaded to join the Jesuit order. In 1577 he was professed of the four vows at Rome.

Subsequently, he visited Sweden and Poland in company with Antonio Possevino in order to settle some affairs relating to the order. While living in Poland he was elected by the provincial meeting as procurator to the fourth general congregation, and took part in the election of Claudio Acquaviva as general of the Jesuits (1581). After the congregation was over he remained as confessor to the English College, Rome. Good died at Naples on 5 July (N. S.) 1586, and was buried in the college of the Jesuits in that city.

His Ecclesiae Anglicanae Trophea, sive sanctorum Martyrum, Rome, 1584, contained thirty-six plates, engraved on copper. They reproduced pictures that formerly covered the walls of the church attached to the English College at Rome, and presented by George Gilbert, S.J. Good had superintended the work and supplied the artist with the subjects. A reproduction of the engravings, under the editorial supervision of John Morris, S.J., appeared in 1888.

References

1527 births
1586 deaths
Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Oxford
People from Glastonbury
16th-century English Jesuits

William Good (Jesuit)


Hans-Georg Wieck (born March 28, 1928 in Hamburg) is a former German diplomat and was president of the German federal intelligence service Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND).

Life
Wieck studied history and philosophy in Hamburg from 1947 to 1952 and received his PhD in 1953 with a dissertation named "The Origin of the Christian Democratic Union and the re-establishment of the Centre Party from 1945 to 1947."

From 1954 to 1993 he was an official at the Foreign Office for which he served as ambassador to Iran, the USSR and India. He was also permanent representative of the Federal Republic of Germany at the North Atlantic Council (NATO). He served at the Ministry of Defence inter alia as head of the Policy Planning Staff and became president of the BND from 1985 to 1990.

After his retirement from government service he was head of the OSCE Advisory and Monitoring Group in Minsk, Belarus from 1998 to 2001. From 1996 to September 2008 he was Chairman of the German - Indian Society.

Currently Wieck is advisor to the Gesprächskreis Nachrichtendienste in Deutschland e.V. (GKND), a discussion group about intelligence services in Germany founded by his former colleague Wolbert Klaus Smidt in close cooperation with him.

Hans-Georg Wieck is one of the critics of the regulation introduced by former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer that former diplomats who were NSDAP members were no longer honored after their death with an obituary in the bulletin of the Foreign Office.

References

People of the Federal Intelligence Service
1928 births
Living people
Permanent Representatives of West Germany to NATO
Commanders Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
German expatriates in Iran
German expatriates in the Soviet Union
German expatriates in India
German expatriates in Belarus

Hans-Georg Wieck


The 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh ceasefire agreement is an armistice agreement that ended the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War. It was signed on 9November by the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, the Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan and the President of Russia Vladimir Putin, and ended all hostilities in the Nagorno-Karabakh region from 00:00, 10 November 2020 Moscow time. The president of the self-declared Republic of Artsakh, Arayik Harutyunyan, also agreed to an end of hostilities.

Background

Renewed hostilities between Azerbaijan and Artsakh together with Armenia began on 27 September 2020. Azerbaijan recovered many of its territories during the following six weeks which culminated in the capture of the strategically important town Shusha and prompted the two sides to agree to a ceasefire deal on 9November 2020.

Overview
According to the agreement, both belligerent parties agreed to exchange prisoners of war and the dead. The Armenian forces were to withdraw from Armenian-occupied territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh by 1December 2020. Armenia lost roughly 75% of the territories in and around Nagorno-Karabakh that it controlled prior to the war. An approximately 2,000-strong Russian peacekeeping force from the Russian Ground Forces was to be deployed to the region for a minimum of five years, one of its task being protection of the Lachin corridor, the only remaining passage between Armenia and Republic of Artsakh. Additionally, Armenia undertook to "guarantee safety" of transport links between mainland Azerbaijan and its Nakhchivan exclave. Russian FSB's Border Troops would exercise control over the transport connections.

Terms of the agreement

Reactions

Armenia

After signing the agreement, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan said, "This is not a victory, but there is not defeat until you consider yourself defeated, we will never consider ourselves defeated and this shall become a new start of an era of our national unity and rebirth." Violent protests erupted in Yerevan following the announcement of the ceasefire agreement. The speaker of the Parliament of Armenia, Ararat Mirzoyan, was beaten by an angry mob who stormed the Parliament after the peace deal was announced. Pashinyan has indicated, however, that Mirzoyan's life is "not under threat" and he had undergone surgery.

Azerbaijan

The President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev reacted to the agreement by saying, "This statement constitutes Armenia's capitulation. This statement puts an end to the years-long occupation." During his speech, Aliyev mockingly said  ("What happened Pashinyan?"), which became an Internet meme in Azerbaijan and Turkey. Large-scale celebrations erupted throughout Azerbaijan, most notably in its capital city of Baku when news of the agreement was announced.

International

Countries
  France said the cessation of hostilities was crucial, urged Azerbaijan to abide by the terms of the agreement and affirmed its friendship with Armenia.
  The president of Georgia, Salome Zurabishvili, congratulated Armenia and Azerbaijan for agreeing to end hostilities, offered condolences to the families of victims of the war and hoped a new era will start in the South Caucasus.
  Iran welcomed the agreement and hoped it will lead to a final settlement which will preserve peace in the region.
  Moldova's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and European Integration communicated that the country welcomed the accords with satisfaction and that Moldova supported the search of a lasting peaceful solution in the region based on international norms and principles.
  The Pakistani foreign minister issued a statement saying "We congratulate the government and brotherly people of Azerbaijan on the liberation of their territories."
  Russian President Vladimir Putin said, "We presume that the agreements reached will set up necessary conditions for the lasting and full-format settling of the Nagorno-Karabakh crisis on the basis of justice and to the benefit of Armenian and Azerbaijan peoples."
  Turkish Foreign minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu congratulated Azerbaijan following the signing of the agreement.
  The United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab welcomed the agreement and encouraged both sides to continue to work towards a lasting settlement to the dispute.

Organizations
  The European Union welcomed cessation of hostilities and hoped continued negotiations would lead to a sustainable settlement.
  The Secretary-General of the Turkic Council congratulated Azerbaijan for its "historical achievement of liberation of its occupied territories and restoring sovereignty over them".
  A spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, "The Secretary-General is relieved that the deal has been agreed to on the cessation of hostilities. Our consistent focus has been on the well-being of civilians, on humanitarian access, and on protecting lives, and we hope that this will now be achieved consistent with the previous important efforts of the Minsk [Group] Co-Chairs."

Aftermath

Armenian evacuation

Since 13 November 2020, Armenians in Kalbajar, a district that was mostly inhabited by ethnic Azerbaijanis before the First Nagorno-Karabakh War and was settled by Armenian citizens after it, started to burn their homes and cut trees before leaving for Armenia, to avoid them being reinhabited by the Azerbaijanis. Some Armenians also took their dead relatives' remains with them, while others were carting off everything they could as trucks nearby loaded up with household possessions and cut down trees. Agence France-Presse reported that in Charektar, at least six houses were set on fire. On 15 November, at Armenia's request, Azerbaijan extended the deadline for Armenians to fully vacate Kalbajar District by 10 days, until 25 November. Azerbaijan's Presidential Office stated that they took the worsening weather and the fact that there was only one road to Armenia into consideration when agreeing to extend the deadline. Azerbaijani authorities also denounced civilians and de-mobilized soldiers leaving the area for burning houses and committing what they called "ecological terror".

Deployment of Russian peacekeepers

As early as on 10 November 2020, Russian troops and armour that were to constitute a peacekeeping force under the agreement, were reported to be moving into in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The force was reported to have been transported to Armenia by air before the agreement was signed.  By 12 November, the Russian force consisted mostly of the personnel of the 15th Separate Motor Rifle Brigade had entered Stepanakert and begun deploying observation posts across the region.

Exchange of POWs and detainees

In December 2020, Armenia and Azerbaijan have begun exchanging groups of prisoners of war mediated by Russia. As of February 2021, 63 prisoners, including civilians, returned to Armenia, and 15 were returned to Azerbaijan. In March 2021, Human Rights Watch (HRW), reported that Azerbaijan has repatriated 69 POWs.

After the ceasefire, following skirmishes in mid-December 2020, Azerbaijan detained a group of 62 Armenian soldiers. Azerbaijani authorities claimed that the soldiers are not POWs but members of a "sabotage group", and criminal charges will be brought against them. However, European Parliament resolution concluded that credible reports have surfaced of Armenian service personnel and civilians being been kidnapped since the cease-fire on 10 November, and that Azerbaijani forces detained civilians despite the lack of evidence that they posed a security threat that could justify their detention under international humanitarian law. Notably, Maral Najaryan, a recent Lebanese-Armenian emigrant to Shushi in Nagorno-Karabakh who went missing in the last days of the war, was among the detainees. Ani Najaryan, Najaryan's sister, told Radio Free Europe that she had moved to Karabakh after Beirut's massive explosion. Her Lebanese ancestry has been used by the Azerbaijani media to suggest that she was a "mercenary" fighting for the Armenians.

On 14 April 2021, a global campaign was launched among the Armenian diaspora to demand the release of Armenian POWs and other detainees held in Azerbaijan. Protests were held in 14 cities around the world, including Toronto, Paris, Rome, Houston, Sacramento, Montréal, New York, Los Angeles, Warsaw, Berlin, Hamburg and Moscow. According to Armenian authorities, as of April 2021, over 200 Armenian POWs are currently being held captive by Azerbaijan. On 20 May 2021, the European Parliament adopted a resolution urging Azerbaijan to immediately and unconditionally release all the Armenian prisoners, both military and civilian, detained during or after the conflict. In June the Armenian substitute member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) Tatevik Hayrapetyan raised concern of the situation of the Armenian POWs in the PACE, as in a discussion between the Ilham Aliyev and Emine Erdoğan, the first lady of Turkey where both appeared to be pleased by the fact that there exist Armenian POWs and the latter suggested a release of them in several stages. On 22 July 2021, 13 Armenian servicemen were sentenced to 6 years imprisonment and charged with "terrorism" and "illegally entering Azerbaijan".

On 22 September 2021, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Amendment, demanding Azerbaijan's immediate release of about 200 Armenian POWs, hostages and detained persons, "misrepresenting their status in an attempt to justify their continued captivity".

Human Rights Watch reported that Azerbaijani armed forces mistreated Armenian POWs, subjecting them to  physical abuse and humiliation. "The abuse, including torture of detained Armenian soldiers, is abhorrent and a war crime," said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "It is also deeply disturbing that a number of missing Armenian soldiers were last seen in Azerbaijan's custody and it has failed to account for them."

Russian–Turkish monitoring centre
Following the signing of the agreement and the deployment of the Russian peacekeepers, a memorandum on establishing a joint Russian–Turkish monitoring centre in Azerbaijan was signed by Russian and Turkish defence ministers. Russia, however, insisted that Turkey's involvement would be limited to operating remotely from the monitoring centre on Azerbaijani soil outside of Nagorno-Karabakh, and that Turkish peacekeepers would not go to Nagorno-Karabakh.

Unblocking transport connections
As of late 2021, the fate of the "transport connections" the article 9 of the ceasefire agreement provisioned is still uncertain. A working group on unblocking communications led by deputy prime ministers of Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Russia was established in January 2021, but no significant progress has been made. Although not discussed in the trilateral negotiations, Azerbaijan has kept insisting on its plans of implementing "Zangezur corridor", which would entail a transport corridor connecting Nakhchivan to the rest of Azerbaijan via Armenia's Syunik Province. Analytics pointed out that Azerbaijan's ambitions are aimed at creating a geopolitical corridor under the pretext of regional connectivity. In May 2021, Pashinyan said that while Armenia is keen on opening transport links as means of direct railway communication with Iran and Russia, it is not willing to discuss any 'corridor logic'. The dispute has been cited as one of the reasons for the 2021 Armenia–Azerbaijan border crisis. In September, Russian deputy prime minister Alexei Overchuk insisted that the trilateral group has not discussed "corridors". In October 2021, Azerbaijan unilaterally began using Armenia's airspace, conducting flights to its Nakhchivan exclave.

A new round of Russian-mediated negotiations on restoring economic links between their countries began between Armenia and Azerbaijani deputy prime ministers on 20 October, where legal aspects of opening the Armenian-Azerbaijani border for commercial traffic were discussed. The sides have made progress towards restoring their Soviet-era rail links according to Armenian deputy prime minister. On 5 November 2021, Russian vice prime minister Alexey Overchuk and Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that the routes created after unblocking all the regional communications between Armenia and Azerbaijan will be under jurisdiction of the country the territory of which they cross pass through.

Nikol Pashinyan and Ilham Aliyev met in Brussels on 15 December 2021 and discussed unblocking regional communications among other issues. The meeting was arranged and moderated by the President of European Council Charles Michel, who after the meeting stated that the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan managed to come to agreement regarding opening the rail routes, but not automobile roads. After the meeting Pashinyan and Aliyev confirmed the agreement on the restoration of the railway communication. "The railway will operate in accordance with internationally recognized border and customs regulations on a reciprocal basis under the sovereignty and jurisdiction of the countries. Armenia will have access by rail to the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Russian Federation"  the press service of Prime Minister of Armenia reported after the meeting.

Follow-up statements
The leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Russia met twice in 2021, issuing statements to confirm continued adherence to the 2020 ceasefire agreement and to elaborate on its implementation.

The joint trilateral statement issued in Moscow on 11 January 2021 stated:

The joint trilateral statement issued in Sochi on 26 November 2021 stated:

"3 + 3 platform"
After the end of the war, Turkey and Azerbaijan proposed "3+3" – a platform for collaboration between the three South Caucasian countries  – Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia and the three regional powers – Turkey, Russia and Iran. The first consultative meeting of the platform attended by deputy foreign ministers took place on 10 December 2021. Georgia, also invited, declined to participate, citing Russian occupation of South Ossetia and Abkhazia as a reason. Armenia announced that it is willing to participate if only the questions discussed are not already agreed on or discussed in other formats, including the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh.

See also
 2023 Nagorno-Karabakh ceasefire agreement

References

External links

2020 in Azerbaijan
2020 in the Republic of Artsakh
November 2020 events in Armenia
November 2020 events in Russia
Treaties concluded in 2020
Treaties of Armenia
Treaties of Azerbaijan
Treaties of the Republic of Artsakh
Treaties of Russia
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
Aftermath of the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war
Ceasefires
Armenia–Azerbaijan relations
Armenia–Russia relations
Azerbaijan–Russia relations
Vladimir Putin
Nikol Pashinyan
Ilham Aliyev


Aaron Allard-Morgan (born 20 November 1980) was the winner of Big Brother 2011. He was a contract manager from Weston-super-Mare. He was nominated for eviction in Weeks 1, 3, 5 and 7. On each occasion, he received the highest proportion of votes to save from the public.  On Day 41, Aaron was one of four housemates to win a place at a red carpet premiere of horror movie Paranormal Activity 3.  Aaron is the twelfth winner of Big Brother UK winning £50,990.

Aaron has made several television appearances since leaving the house on OK! TV, The Wright Stuff and Big Brother's Bit on the Side. He is currently running a bar in Weston-super-Mare and wrote a book about his experience in Big Brother.

References

Reality show winners
1980 births
Big Brother (British TV series) winners
People from Blackpool
Living people

Aaron Allard-Morgan