1.
Mystery fiction
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Mystery fiction is a genre of fiction usually involving a mysterious death or a crime to be solved. In a closed circle of suspects, each suspect must have a credible motive, the central character must be a detective who eventually solves the mystery by logical deduction from facts fairly presented to the reader. Mystery fiction can be detective stories in which the emphasis is on the puzzle or suspense element, Mystery fiction can be contrasted with hardboiled detective stories, which focus on action and gritty realism. Mystery fiction may involve a mystery where the solution does not have to be logical. This contrasted with parallel titles of the names which contained conventional hardboiled crime fiction. The first use of mystery in this sense was by Dime Mystery, the genre of mystery novels is a young form of literature that has developed over the past 200 years. The rise of literacy began in the years of the English Renaissance and, as began to read over time. As people became more individualistic in their thinking, they developed a respect for human reason, perhaps a reason that mystery fiction was unheard of before the 1800s was due in part to the lack of true police forces. Before the Industrial Revolution, many of the towns would have constables, naturally, the constable would be aware of every individual in the town, and crimes were either solved quickly or left unsolved entirely. As people began to crowd into cities, police forces became institutionalized and the need for detectives was realized – thus the mystery novel arose. An early work of mystery fiction, Das Fräulein von Scuderi by E. T. A. Hoffmann, was an influence on The Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe as may have been Voltaires Zadig. Wilkie Collins epistolary novel The Woman in White was published in 1860, in 1887 Arthur Conan Doyle introduced Sherlock Holmes, whose mysteries are said to have been singularly responsible for the huge popularity in this genre. The genre began to expand near the turn of century with the development of dime novels, books were especially helpful to the genre, with many authors writing in the genre in the 1920s. An important contribution to fiction in the 1920s was the development of the juvenile mystery by Edward Stratemeyer. Stratemeyer originally developed and wrote the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew mysteries written under the Franklin W. Dixon, the massive popularity of pulp magazines in the 1930s and 1940s increased interest in mystery fiction. The detective fiction author Ellery Queen is also credited with continuing interest in mystery fiction, interest in mystery fiction continues to this day because of various television shows which have used mystery themes and the many juvenile and adult novels which continue to be published. There is some overlap with thriller or suspense novels and authors in those genres may consider themselves mystery novelists. Comic books and like graphic novels have carried on the tradition, Mystery fiction can be divided into numerous categories, including traditional mystery, legal thriller, medical thriller, cozy mystery, police procedural, and hardboiled
2.
Romance novel
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The romance novel or romantic novel discussed in this article is the mass-market literary genre. Novels of this type of genre fiction place their primary focus on the relationship, there are many subgenres of the romance novel including fantasy, historical romance, paranormal fiction, and science fiction. Walter Scott defined the literary form of romance as a fictitious narrative in prose or verse. Austen inspired Georgette Heyer, the British author of historical romance set around the time Austen lived, Heyers first romance novel, The Black Moth, was set in 1751. The British company Mills and Boon began releasing escapist fiction for women in the 1930s and their books were sold in North America by Harlequin Enterprises Ltd, which began direct marketing to readers and allowing mass-market merchandisers to carry the books. An early American example of a romance was Kathleen Woodiwiss The Flame. Nancy Coffey was the editor who negotiated a multi-book deal with Woodiwiss. In North America, romance novels are the most popular literary genre, the genre is also popular in Europe and Australia, and romance novels appear in 90 languages. Most of the books, however, are written by authors from English-speaking countries, despite the popularity and widespread sales of romance novels, the genre has attracted significant derision, skepticism, and criticism. Romance erotica seems to be on the rise as more women explore this new subgenre, erotica is a term used to describe scenes in the novel that are risqué but not pornographic. According to the Romance Writers of America, the plot of a romance novel must revolve about the two people as they develop romantic love for each other and work to build a relationship. Furthermore, a novel must have an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending. Others, including Leslie Gelbman, a president of Berkley Books, define the genre more simply, stating only that a romance must make the romantic relationship between the hero and the heroine. Bestselling author Nora Roberts sums up the genre, saying, The books are about the celebration of falling in love and emotion and commitment, some romance novel authors and readers believe the genre has additional restrictions, from plot considerations, to avoiding themes. While the majority of romance novels meet the criteria, there are also many books widely considered to be romance novels that deviate from these rules. Therefore, the definition, as embraced by the RWA and publishers, includes only the focus on a developing romantic relationship. As long as a romance novel meets those criteria, it can be set in any time period. There are no restrictions on what can or cannot be included in a romance novel
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Hodder & Stoughton
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Hodder & Stoughton is a British publishing house, now an imprint of Hachette. The firm has its origins in the 1840s, with Matthew Hodders employment, aged fourteen, with Messrs Jackson and Walford, the official publisher for the Congregational Union. In 1861 the firm became Jackson, Walford and Hodder, but in 1868 Jackson and Walford retired, Hodder & Stoughton published both religious and secular works, and its religious list contained some progressive titles. These included George Adam Smiths Isaiah for its Expositor’s Bible series, there was also a sympathetic Life of St Francis by Paul Sabatier, a French Protestant pastor. Matthew Hodder made frequent visits to North America, meeting with the Moody Press and making links with Scribners, the secular list only gradually accepted fiction, and it was still subject to moral censorship in the early part of the twentieth century. Matthew Hodder was doubtful about the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, and the company refused Michael Arlens The Green Hat, a novel published by Collins in 1924. In 1922 Hodder and Stoughton published an edition of Lewis Carrolls Alices Adventures in Wonderland, in 1928, the company became the exclusive British hardback publisher of Leslie Charteriss adventure novel series, The Saint, publishing all 50 UK first editions of the series until 1983. In this decade they took over ownership of the medical journal. Hodder & Stoughton were also the originators of the Teach Yourself line of self-instruction books, as the company expanded at home and overseas, Hodder & Stoughtons list swelled to include the real life adventures in Pearys North Pole and several works by Winston Churchill. During the war, Ralph Hodder Williams set up the Brockhampton Book Co. to sell off overstocks of theological works. The manager, Ernest Roker, had an interest in books and managed to persuade author Enid Blyton to write a series of books for them about four children. In 1942, the Famous Five series was born with Five on a Treasure Island, in 1962, Brockhampton took over the childrens writer Elinor Lyon, whose novels the parent company had introduced in 1948. Hodder & Stoughton also published the Biggles books by Captain W. E. Johns, Hodder & Stoughton published their first original Biggles book in 1942 with Biggles Sweeps the Desert around Sept/Oct of that year and the Brockhampton Press published Johns Gimlet books from 1947. Hodder & Stoughton also published some of Johns Worrals books, Hodder & Stoughton eventually published 35 Biggles first editions and Brockhampton Press published a further 29 Biggles first editions. In 1953 they published Sir John Hunts successful The Ascent of Everest, in the 1970s, they brought the Knight and Coronet imprints into common use. The latter is memorable for David Nivens much-celebrated autobiography The Moons a Balloon. The non-fiction publishing included Anthony Sampsons era-defining The Anatomy of Britain in 1962, another notable title in the childrens sphere was the 1969 Brockhampton Press publication of Asterix the Gaul by Goscinny and Uderzo. In 1974, John le Carré’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy was published to critical acclaim
4.
Hardcover
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A hardcover or hardback book is one bound with rigid protective covers. It has a flexible, sewn spine which allows the book to lie flat on a surface when opened, following the ISBN sequence numbers, books of this type may be identified by the abbreviation Hbk. Hardcover books are printed on acid-free paper, and are much more durable than paperbacks. Hardcover books are more costly to manufacture. If brisk sales are anticipated, an edition of a book is typically released first. Some publishers publish paperback originals if slow hardback sales are anticipated, for very popular books these sales cycles may be extended, and followed by a mass market paperback edition typeset in a more compact size and printed on shallower, less hardy paper. In the past the release of an edition was one year after the hardback. It is very unusual for a book that was first published in paperback to be followed by a hardback, an example is the novel The Judgment of Paris by Gore Vidal, which had its revised edition of 1961 first published in paperback, and later in hardcover. Hardcover books are sold at higher prices than comparable paperbacks. Hardcovers typically consist of a block, two boards, and a cloth or heavy paper covering. The pages are sewn together and glued onto a flexible spine between the boards, and it too is covered by the cloth, a paper wrapper, or dust jacket, is usually put over the binding, folding over each horizontal end of the boards. On the folded part, or flap, over the front cover is generally a blurb, the back flap is where the biography of the author can be found. Reviews are often placed on the back of the jacket, bookbinding Paperback How to make a simple Hardcover book
5.
Paperback
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A paperback is a type of book characterized by a thick paper or paperboard cover, and often held together with glue rather than stitches or staples. In contrast, hardcover or hardback books are bound with cardboard covered with cloth, inexpensive books bound in paper have existed since at least the 19th century in such forms as pamphlets, yellowbacks, dime novels, and airport novels. Modern paperbacks can be differentiated by size, in the US there are mass-market paperbacks and larger, more durable trade paperbacks. In the UK, there are A-format, B-format, and the largest C-format sizes, Paperback editions of books are issued when a publisher decides to release a book in a low-cost format. Cheaper, lower quality paper, glued bindings, and the lack of a cover may contribute to the lower cost of paperbacks. Paperbacks can be the medium when a book is not expected to be a major seller or where the publisher wishes to release a book without putting forth a large investment. Examples include many novels, and newer editions or reprintings of older books, first editions of many modern books, especially genre fiction, are issued in paperback. Best-selling books, on the hand, may maintain sales in hardcover for an extended period in order to reap the greater profits that the hardcovers provide. These paper bound volumes were offered for sale at a fraction of the historic cost of a book, the Routledges Railway Library series of paperbacks remained in print until 1898, and offered the traveling public 1,277 unique titles. The German-language market also supported examples of cheap books, Bernhard Tauchnitz started the Collection of British. These inexpensive, paperbound editions, a precursor to mass-market paperbacks. Reclam published Shakespeare in this format from October 1857 and went on to pioneer the mass-market paper-bound Universal-Bibliothek series from 10 November 1867, the German publisher Albatross Books revised the 20th-century mass-market paperback format in 1931, but the approach of World War II cut the experiment short. The first released book on Penguins 1935 list was André Maurois Ariel, Lane intended to produce inexpensive books. He purchased paperback rights from publishers, ordered large print runs to keep prices low. Booksellers were initially reluctant to buy his books, but when Woolworths placed a large order, after that initial success, booksellers showed more willingness to stock paperbacks, and the name Penguin became closely associated with the word paperback. In 1939, Robert de Graaf issued a similar line in the United States, the term pocket book became synonymous with paperback in English-speaking North America. In French, the term livre de poche was used and is still in use today, de Graaf, like Lane, negotiated paperback rights from other publishers, and produced many runs. His practices contrasted with those of Lane by his adoption of illustrated covers aimed at the North American market, in order to reach an even broader market than Lane, he used distribution networks of newspapers and magazines, which had a lengthy history of being aimed at mass audiences
6.
OCLC
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The Online Computer Library Center is a US-based nonprofit cooperative organization dedicated to the public purposes of furthering access to the worlds information and reducing information costs. It was founded in 1967 as the Ohio College Library Center, OCLC and its member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat, the largest online public access catalog in the world. OCLC is funded mainly by the fees that libraries have to pay for its services, the group first met on July 5,1967 on the campus of the Ohio State University to sign the articles of incorporation for the nonprofit organization. The group hired Frederick G. Kilgour, a former Yale University medical school librarian, Kilgour wished to merge the latest information storage and retrieval system of the time, the computer, with the oldest, the library. The goal of network and database was to bring libraries together to cooperatively keep track of the worlds information in order to best serve researchers and scholars. The first library to do online cataloging through OCLC was the Alden Library at Ohio University on August 26,1971 and this was the first occurrence of online cataloging by any library worldwide. Membership in OCLC is based on use of services and contribution of data, between 1967 and 1977, OCLC membership was limited to institutions in Ohio, but in 1978, a new governance structure was established that allowed institutions from other states to join. In 2002, the structure was again modified to accommodate participation from outside the United States. As OCLC expanded services in the United States outside of Ohio, it relied on establishing strategic partnerships with networks, organizations that provided training, support, by 2008, there were 15 independent United States regional service providers. OCLC networks played a key role in OCLC governance, with networks electing delegates to serve on OCLC Members Council, in early 2009, OCLC negotiated new contracts with the former networks and opened a centralized support center. OCLC provides bibliographic, abstract and full-text information to anyone, OCLC and its member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat—the OCLC Online Union Catalog, the largest online public access catalog in the world. WorldCat has holding records from public and private libraries worldwide. org, in October 2005, the OCLC technical staff began a wiki project, WikiD, allowing readers to add commentary and structured-field information associated with any WorldCat record. The Online Computer Library Center acquired the trademark and copyrights associated with the Dewey Decimal Classification System when it bought Forest Press in 1988, a browser for books with their Dewey Decimal Classifications was available until July 2013, it was replaced by the Classify Service. S. The reference management service QuestionPoint provides libraries with tools to communicate with users and this around-the-clock reference service is provided by a cooperative of participating global libraries. OCLC has produced cards for members since 1971 with its shared online catalog. OCLC commercially sells software, e. g. CONTENTdm for managing digital collections, OCLC has been conducting research for the library community for more than 30 years. In accordance with its mission, OCLC makes its research outcomes known through various publications and these publications, including journal articles, reports, newsletters, and presentations, are available through the organizations website. The most recent publications are displayed first, and all archived resources, membership Reports – A number of significant reports on topics ranging from virtual reference in libraries to perceptions about library funding
7.
Suspense
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Suspense is a feeling of pleasurable fascination and excitement mixed with apprehension, tension, and anxiety developed from an unpredictable, mysterious, and rousing source of entertainment. The term most often refers to an audiences perceptions in a dramatic work, Suspense is not exclusive to fiction. It may operate whenever there is a perceived suspended drama or a chain of cause is left in doubt, films having a lot of suspense belong in the thriller genre. In terms of expectations, it may be contrasted with mystery or curiosity. Suspense could however be some small event in a life, such as a child anticipating an answer to a request theyve made, such as. Therefore, suspense may be experienced to different degrees, according to the Greek philosopher Aristotle in his book Poetics, suspense is an important building block of literature. In very broad terms, it consists of having some real danger looming, if there is no hope, the audience will feel despair. The two common outcomes are, the hitting, whereby the audience will feel sorrowful the hopes being realised, whereby the audience will first feel joy. In thrillers, suspense is the key element authors use to leave the reader or viewer hanging, trying to figure out what will happen next, the effect is specially strong when the work ends without actually revealing what happens next in the storyline. Suspense is what gives a person the on-edge feeling, Suspense builds in order to make those final moments, no matter how short, the most memorable. The suspense in a story just keeps the person hooked into reading or watching more until the climax is reached, the tension doesnt have to be in the form of the bad guy stalking the hero. It can be simpler, much less dramatic, but still make the person keep reading or watching. Suspense is about conflict, about the obstacles between the hero and their goal, anxiety Terror Cliffhanger Mystery Plot twist Red herring Adrenaline Baroni, R. Poétique de la discordance narrative, Paris, Seuil, the Nature of Narrative Suspense and the Problem of Rereading, in Suspense. Conceptualizations, Theoretical Analyses, and Empirical Explorations, Mahwah, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Reading for the Plot, Design and Intention in Narrative, Cambridge, Harvard University Press. Gerrig, R. Suspense in the Absence of Uncertainty, Journal of Memory and Language, n°28, production de lintérêt romanesque, Paris & The Hague, Mouton. The Effect of Directed Forgetting on Completed and Interrupted Tasks, presented at the 2nd Annual Student-Faculty Research Celebration at Winona State University, Winona MN. Studies in the retention of interrupted learning activities, Journal of Comparative Psychology, vol n°19, phelan, J. Reading People, Reading Plots, Character, Progression, and the Interpretation of Narrative, Chicago, University of Chicago Press
8.
Gothic fiction
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Gothic fiction, which is largely known by the subgenre of Gothic horror, is a genre or mode of literature and film that combines fiction and horror, death, and at times romance. Its origin is attributed to English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, the effect of Gothic fiction feeds on a pleasing sort of terror, an extension of Romantic literary pleasures that were relatively new at the time of Walpoles novel. It originated in England in the half of the 18th century and had much success in the 19th, as witnessed by Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Another well known novel in this genre, dating from the late Victorian era, is Bram Stoker’s Dracula, the name Gothic refers to the -medieval buildings, emulating Gothic architecture, in which many of these stories take place. This extreme form of romanticism was very popular in England and Germany, the English Gothic novel also led to new novel types such as the German Schauerroman and the French Georgia. The novel usually regarded as the first Gothic novel is Horace Walpoles The Castle of Otranto, Horace Walpoles declared aim was to combine elements of the medieval romance, which he deemed too fanciful, and the modern novel, which he considered to be too confined to strict realism. Walpole published the first edition disguised as a romance from Italy discovered and republished by a fictitious translator. When Walpole admitted to his authorship in the edition, its originally favourable reception by literary reviewers changed into rejection. A romance with elements, and moreover void of didactical intention, was considered a setback. Walpoles forgery, together with the blend of history and fiction, contravened the principles of the Enlightenment and associated the Gothic novel with fake documentation. Clara Reeve, best known for her work The Old English Baron, set out to take Walpoles plot, the question now arose whether supernatural events that were not as evidently absurd as Walpoles would not lead the simpler minds to believe them possible. Ann Radcliffe developed the technique of the supernatural in which every seemingly supernatural intrusion is eventually traced back to natural causes. Among other elements, Ann Radcliffe introduced the figure of the Gothic villain. Radcliffes novels, above all The Mysteries of Udolpho, were best-sellers, however, along with most novels at the time, they were looked down upon by many well-educated people as sensationalist nonsense. Radcliffe also provided an aesthetic for the genre in an influential article On the Supernatural in Poetry, Romantic literary movements developed in continental Europe concurrent with the development of the Gothic novel. The roman noir appeared in France, by writers as François Guillaume Ducray-Duminil, Baculard dArnaud. In Germany, the Schauerroman gained traction with writers as Friedrich Schiller, with novels like The Ghost-Seer and these works were often more horrific and violent than the English Gothic novel. Matthew Gregory Lewiss lurid tale of debauchery, black magic
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English people
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The English are a nation and an ethnic group native to England, who speak the English language. The English identity is of medieval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Angelcynn. Their ethnonym is derived from the Angles, one of the Germanic peoples who migrated to Great Britain around the 5th century AD, England is one of the countries of the United Kingdom. Collectively known as the Anglo-Saxons, they founded what was to become England along with the later Danes, Normans, in the Acts of Union 1707, the Kingdom of England was succeeded by the Kingdom of Great Britain. Over the years, English customs and identity have become closely aligned with British customs. The English people are the source of the English language, the Westminster system and these and other English cultural characteristics have spread worldwide, in part as a result of the former British Empire. The concept of an English nation is far older than that of the British nation, many recent immigrants to England have assumed a solely British identity, while others have developed dual or mixed identities. Use of the word English to describe Britons from ethnic minorities in England is complicated by most non-white people in England identifying as British rather than English. In their 2004 Annual Population Survey, the Office for National Statistics compared the ethnic identities of British people with their national identity. They found that while 58% of white people in England described their nationality as English and it is unclear how many British people consider themselves English. Following complaints about this, the 2011 census was changed to allow respondents to record their English, Welsh, Scottish, another complication in defining the English is a common tendency for the words English and British to be used interchangeably, especially overseas. In his study of English identity, Krishan Kumar describes a common slip of the tongue in which people say English, I mean British. He notes that this slip is made only by the English themselves and by foreigners. Kumar suggests that although this blurring is a sign of Englands dominant position with the UK and it tells of the difficulty that most English people have of distinguishing themselves, in a collective way, from the other inhabitants of the British Isles. In 1965, the historian A. J. P. Taylor wrote, When the Oxford History of England was launched a generation ago and it meant indiscriminately England and Wales, Great Britain, the United Kingdom, and even the British Empire. Foreigners used it as the name of a Great Power and indeed continue to do so, bonar Law, by origin a Scotch Canadian, was not ashamed to describe himself as Prime Minister of England Now terms have become more rigorous. The use of England except for a geographic area brings protests and this version of history is now regarded by many historians as incorrect, on the basis of more recent genetic and archaeological research. The 2016 study authored by Stephan Schiffels et al, the remaining portion of English DNA is primarily French, introduced in a migration after the end of the Ice Age
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Governess
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A governess is a woman employed to teach and train children in a private household. In contrast to a nanny, she concentrates on teaching instead of meeting their physical needs. Her charges are of age rather than babies. The position of governess used to be common in well-off European families before World War I, parents preference to educate their children at home—rather than send them away to boarding school for months at a time—varied across time and countries. Governesses were usually in charge of girls and younger boys, when a boy was old enough, he left his governess for a tutor or a school. Governesses are rarer now, except within large and wealthy households or royal families such as the Saudi royal family, There has been a recent resurgence amongst families worldwide to employ governesses or full-time tutors. The reasons for this include personal security, the benefits of an education. Traditionally, governesses taught the three Rs to young children and it was also possible for other teachers with specialist knowledge and skills to be brought in, such as, a drawing master or dancing master. The governess occupied an awkward position in the Victorian household. She worked in the home of the landed gentry or aristocracy. She herself had a background and education, yet was paid for her services. As a sign of this social limbo she frequently ate on her own, away from the rest of the family, by definition, a governess was an unmarried woman who lived in someone elses home, which meant that she was subject to their rules. In any case, she had to maintain a reputation by avoiding anything which could embarrass or offend her employers. If a particular governess was young and attractive, the lady of the house might well perceive a threat to her marriage. As a result of various restrictions, the lifestyle of the typical Victorian governess was often one of social isolation and solitude. The fact that her presence in the household was underpinned by an employment contract emphasized that she could never truly be part of the host family. However, being a governess was one of the few legitimate ways by which a middle class woman could support herself in Victorian society. Not surprisingly, her position was often depicted as one to be pitied, once a governesss charges grew up, she had to seek a new position, or, exceptionally, might be retained by the grown-up daughter as a paid companion
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Thonon-les-Bains
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Thonon-les-Bains is a town in the Haute-Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in eastern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department, thonon is part of a transborder agglomeration known as Grand Genève. Thonon-les-Bains was the capital of Chablais, a province of the old Duchy of Savoy. The Chablais Savoyard is the portion of Chablais in France, Chablais Valaisan and Chablais Vaudois are those portions of Chablais in the adjacent Switzerland cantons Valais and Vaud. The town was the capital of the Dukedom of Chablais
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France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
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Epigraph (literature)
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In literature, an epigraph is a phrase, quotation, or poem that is set at the beginning of a document or component. The epigraph may serve as a preface, as a summary, as a counter-example, or to link the work to a literary canon. The long quotation from Dantes Inferno that prefaces T. S. Eliots The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock is part of a speech by one of the damned in Dantes Hell. Linking it to the monologue which forms Eliots poem adds a comment, the epigraph to Eliots Gerontion is a quotation from Shakespeares Measure for Measure. Eliots The Hollow Men uses the line Mistah Kurtz, he dead from Joseph Conrads Heart of Darkness as one of its two epigraphs, the epigraph to Theodore Herzls Altneuland is If you will it, it is no dream. Which became a slogan of the Zionist movement, the epigraph to Fyodor Dostoyevskys The Brothers Karamazov is John 12,24. Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone, but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. The epigraphs to the preamble of Georges Perecs Life, A Users Manual and to the book as a whole warn the reader that tricks are going to be played and that all will not be what it seems. Jack London uses the first stanza of John Myers OHaras poem Atavism as the epigraph to The Call of the Wild, as an epigraph to The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway famously quotes Gertrude Stein, You are all a lost generation. The epigraph to E. L. Doctorows Ragtime quotes Scott Joplins instructions to those who play his music and it is never right to play Ragtime fast. This stands in contrast to the pace of American society at the turn of the 20th century. A Samuel Johnson quote is used as an epigraph in Hunter S. Thompsons novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, stephen King uses many epigraphs in his writing, usually to mark the beginning of another section in the novel. An unusual example is The Stand where he uses lyrics from songs to express the metaphor used in a particular part. J. K. Rowlings novels frequently begin with epigraphs relating to the themes explored, Harry Potter, some authors use fictional quotations that purport to be related to the fiction of the work itself. Examples include, John Greens The Fault in Our Stars has a quotation from a novel, An Imperial Affliction. F. Scott Fitzgeralds The Great Gatsby opens with a poem entitled Then Wear the Gold Hat, DInvilliers is a character in Fitzgeralds first novel, This Side of Paradise. This cliché is parodied by Diana Wynne Jones in The Tough Guide To Fantasyland, a poem at the beginning of J. R. R. Tolkiens The Lord of the Rings describes the Rings of Power, the central plot device of the trilogy. Fantasy literature may also include epigraphs, le Guins Earthsea series includes epigraphs supposedly quoted from the epic poetry of the Earthsea archipelago
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Macbeth
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Macbeth is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, it is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those who seek power for its own sake. Of all the plays that Shakespeare wrote during the reign of James I and it was first published in the Folio of 1623, possibly from a prompt book, and is his shortest tragedy. A brave Scottish general named Macbeth receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become King of Scotland, consumed by ambition and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth murders King Duncan and takes the Scottish throne for himself. He is then wracked with guilt and paranoia, forced to commit more and more murders to protect himself from enmity and suspicion, he soon becomes a tyrannical ruler. The bloodbath and consequent civil war swiftly take Macbeth and Lady Macbeth into the realms of madness, the events of the tragedy are usually associated with the execution of Henry Garnet for complicity in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. In the backstage world of theatre, some believe that the play is cursed, over the course of many centuries, the play has attracted some of the most renowned actors to the roles of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. It has been adapted to film, television, opera, novels, comics, the play opens amidst thunder and lightning, and the Three Witches decide that their next meeting shall be with Macbeth. Macbeth, the Kings kinsman, is praised for his bravery, in the following scene, Macbeth and Banquo discuss the weather and their victory. As they wander onto a heath, the Three Witches enter, though Banquo challenges them first, they address Macbeth, hailing him as Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and that he shall be King hereafter. Macbeth appears to be stunned to silence, when Banquo asks of his own fortunes, the witches respond paradoxically, saying that he will be less than Macbeth, yet happier, less successful, yet more. He will father a line of kings though he himself will not be one, while the two men wonder at these pronouncements, the witches vanish, and another thane, Ross, arrives and informs Macbeth of his newly bestowed title, Thane of Cawdor. The first prophecy is fulfilled, and Macbeth, previously skeptical. King Duncan welcomes and praises Macbeth and Banquo, and declares that he spend the night at Macbeths castle at Inverness. Macbeth sends a message ahead to his wife, Lady Macbeth, Lady Macbeth suffers none of her husbands uncertainty and wishes him to murder Duncan in order to obtain kingship. When Macbeth arrives at Inverness, she overrides all of her husbands objections by challenging his manhood and he and Lady Macbeth plan to get Duncans two chamberlains drunk so that they will black out, the next morning they will blame the chamberlains for the murder. They will be defenseless as they remember nothing. While Duncan is asleep, Macbeth stabs him, despite his doubts and he is so shaken that Lady Macbeth has to take charge
15.
King John (play)
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King John, a history play by William Shakespeare, dramatises the reign of John, King of England, son of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine and father of Henry III of England. It is believed to have written in the mid-1590s but was not published until it appeared in the First Folio in 1623. John adjudicates an inheritance dispute between Robert Faulconbridge and his older brother Philip the Bastard, during which it becomes apparent that Philip is the son of King Richard I. Queen Eleanor, mother to both Richard and John, recognises the family resemblance and suggests that he renounce his claim to the Falconbridge land in exchange for a knighthood, John knights the Bastard under the name Richard. In France, King Philip and his forces besiege the English-ruled town of Angiers, Philip is supported by Austria, who is believed to have killed King Richard. The English contingent arrives, Eleanor trades insults with Constance, Arthurs mother, Kings Philip and John stake their claims in front of Angiers citizens, but to no avail, their representative says that they will support the rightful king, whoever that turns out to be. The French and English armies clash, but no clear victor emerges, each army dispatches a herald claiming victory, but Angiers citizens continue to refuse to recognize either claimant because neither army has proven victorious. Though a furious Constance accuses Philip of abandoning Arthur, Louis, cardinal Pandolf arrives from Rome bearing a formal accusation that John has disobeyed the pope and appointed an archbishop contrary to his desires. John refuses to recant, whereupon he is excommunicated, Pandolf pledges his support for Louis, though Philip is hesitant, having just established family ties with John. Pandolf brings him round by pointing out that his links to the church are older and firmer, war breaks out, Austria is beheaded by the Bastard in revenge for his fathers death, and both Angiers and Arthur are captured by the English. Eleanor is left in charge of English possessions in France, while the Bastard is sent to collect funds from English monasteries, John orders Hubert to kill Arthur. Pandolf suggests to Louis that he now has as strong a claim to the English throne as Arthur, Hubert finds himself unable to kill Arthur. John agrees, but is wrong-footed by Huberts announcement that Arthur is dead, the nobles, believing he was murdered, defect to Louis side. The Bastard reports that the monasteries are unhappy about Johns attempt to seize their gold, Hubert has a furious argument with John, during which he reveals that Arthur is still alive. John, delighted, sends him to report the news to the nobles, Arthur dies jumping from a castle wall. The nobles believe he was murdered by John, and refuse to believe Huberts entreaties, John attempts to make a deal with Pandolf, swearing allegiance to the Pope in exchange for Pandolfs negotiating with the French on his behalf. John orders the Bastard, one of his few remaining loyal subjects, while Johns former noblemen swear allegiance to Louis, Pandolf explains Johns scheme, but Louis refuses to be taken in by it. The Bastard arrives with the English army and threatens Louis, war breaks out with substantial losses on each side, including Louis reinforcements, who are drowned during the sea crossing
16.
Hamlet
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The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, often shortened to Hamlet, is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare at an uncertain date between 1599 and 1602. Set in the Kingdom of Denmark, the play dramatises the revenge Prince Hamlet is called to wreak upon his uncle, Claudius, by the ghost of Hamlets father, Claudius had murdered his own brother and seized the throne, also marrying his deceased brothers widow. It has inspired many other writers—from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Charles Dickens to James Joyce and he almost certainly wrote his version of the title role for his fellow actor, Richard Burbage, the leading tragedian of Shakespeares time. In the 400 years since its inception, the role has been performed by highly acclaimed actors in each successive century. Three different early versions of the play are extant, the First Quarto, the Second Quarto, each version includes lines and entire scenes missing from the others. The plays structure and depth of characterisation have inspired much critical scrutiny, the protagonist of Hamlet is Prince Hamlet of Denmark, son of the recently deceased King Hamlet, and nephew of King Claudius, his fathers brother and successor. Claudius hastily married King Hamlets widow, Gertrude, Hamlets mother, Denmark has a long-standing feud with neighboring Norway, which culminated when King Hamlet slew King Fortinbras of Norway in a battle years ago. Although Denmark defeated Norway, and the Norwegian throne fell to King Fortinbrass infirm brother, Denmark fears that an invasion led by the dead Norwegian kings son, Prince Fortinbras, is imminent. On a cold night on the ramparts of Elsinore, the Danish royal castle and they vow to tell Prince Hamlet what they have witnessed. As the court gathers the next day, while King Claudius and Queen Gertrude discuss affairs of state with their elderly adviser Polonius, after the court exits, Hamlet despairs of his fathers death and his mothers hasty remarriage. Learning of the ghost from Horatio, Hamlet resolves to see it himself, as Poloniuss son Laertes prepares to depart for a visit to France, Polonius gives him contradictory advice that culminates in the ironic maxim to thine own self be true. Poloniuss daughter, Ophelia, admits her interest in Hamlet, and that night on the rampart, the ghost appears to Hamlet, telling the prince that he was murdered by Claudius and demanding that Hamlet avenge him. Hamlet agrees and the ghost vanishes, the prince confides to Horatio and the sentries that from now on he plans to put an antic disposition on and forces them to swear to keep his plans for revenge secret. Privately, however, he remains uncertain of the ghosts reliability, soon thereafter, Ophelia rushes to her father, telling him that Hamlet arrived at her door the prior night half-undressed and behaving crazily. Polonius blames love for Hamlets madness and resolves to inform Claudius, as he enters to do so, the king and queen finish welcoming Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two student acquaintances of Hamlet, to Elsinore. The royal couple has requested that the students investigate the cause of Hamlets mood, additional news requires that Polonius wait to be heard, messengers from Norway inform Claudius that the King of Norway has rebuked Prince Fortinbras for attempting to re-fight his fathers battles. The forces that Fortinbras conscripted to march against Denmark will instead be sent against Poland, Polonius tells Claudius and Gertrude his theory regarding Hamlets behavior, and speaks to Hamlet in a hall of the castle to try to uncover more information. Hamlet feigns madness but subtly insults Polonius all the while, when Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arrive, Hamlet greets his friends warmly, but quickly discerns that they are spies
17.
William Shakespeare
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William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the worlds pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called Englands national poet, and the Bard of Avon and his extant works, including collaborations, consist of approximately 38 plays,154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright, Shakespeare was born and brought up in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children, Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a career in London as an actor, writer. He appears to have retired to Stratford around 1613, at age 49, Shakespeare produced most of his known work between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories, which are regarded as some of the best work ever produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, including Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, in his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies, also known as romances, and collaborated with other playwrights. Many of his plays were published in editions of varying quality and it was prefaced with a poem by Ben Jonson, in which Shakespeare is hailed, presciently, as not of an age, but for all time. In the 20th and 21st centuries, his works have been adapted and rediscovered by new movements in scholarship. His plays remain highly popular and are studied, performed. William Shakespeare was the son of John Shakespeare, an alderman and a successful glover originally from Snitterfield, and Mary Arden and he was born in Stratford-upon-Avon and baptised there on 26 April 1564. His actual date of birth unknown, but is traditionally observed on 23 April. This date, which can be traced back to an 18th-century scholars mistake, has proved appealing to biographers because Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616 and he was the third child of eight and the eldest surviving son. At the age of 18, Shakespeare married 26-year-old Anne Hathaway, the consistory court of the Diocese of Worcester issued a marriage licence on 27 November 1582. The next day, two of Hathaways neighbours posted bonds guaranteeing that no lawful claims impeded the marriage, twins, son Hamnet and daughter Judith, followed almost two years later and were baptised 2 February 1585. Hamnet died of unknown causes at the age of 11 and was buried 11 August 1596, after the birth of the twins, Shakespeare left few historical traces until he is mentioned as part of the London theatre scene in 1592. The exception is the appearance of his name in the bill of a law case before the Queens Bench court at Westminster dated Michaelmas Term 1588 and 9 October 1589
18.
John Webster
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John Webster was an English Jacobean dramatist best known for his tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, which are often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage. His life and career overlapped William Shakespeares, Websters life is obscure, and the dates of his birth and death are not known. The family lived in St. Sepulchres parish, father John, and Uncle, Edward Webster, were Freemen of the Merchant Taylors Company and Webster attended Merchant Taylors School in Suffolk Lane, London. Webster married the 17-year-old Sara Peniall on 18 March 1606 at St Marys Church, a special licence had to be obtained to permit a wedding in Lent, which was necessary as at the date of their marriage, Sara was seven months pregnant. Their first child, John, was baptised at the parish of St Dunstan-in-the-West on 8 March 1605 or 1606, bequests in the will of a neighbour who died in 1617, indicate that other children were born to him. Most of what is known of him relates to his theatrical activities. Webster was still writing plays as late as the mid-1620s, but Thomas Heywoods Hierarchie of the Blessed Angels speaks of him in the past tense, by 1602, Webster was working with teams of playwrights on history plays, most of which were never printed. These included a tragedy Caesars Fall, and a collaboration with Thomas Dekker Christmas Comes, with Dekker he also wrote Sir Thomas Wyatt, which was printed in 1607, and probably first performed in 1602. He worked with Thomas Dekker again on two city comedies, Westward Ho in 1604 and Northward Ho in 1605, also in 1604, he adapted John Marstons The Malcontent for staging by the Kings Men. Despite his ability to write comedy, Webster is best known for his two brooding English tragedies based on Italian sources, the Duchess of Malfi, first performed by the Kings Men about 1614 and published nine years later, was more successful. He also wrote a play called Guise, based on French history, the two plays would thus have been very different in their original performances. The White Devil would have performed, probably in one continuous action, by adult actors. Webster wrote one play on his own, The Devils Law Case. His later plays were collaborative city comedies, Anything for a Quiet Life, co-written with Thomas Middleton, in 1624, he also co-wrote a topical play about a recent scandal, Keep the Widow Waking. The play itself is lost, although its plot is known from a court case and he is believed to have contributed to the tragicomedy The Fair Maid of the Inn with John Fletcher, Ford, and Phillip Massinger. His Appius and Virginia, probably written with Thomas Heywood, is of uncertain date, Websters major plays, The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, are macabre, disturbing works that seem to prefigure the Gothic literature of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Intricate, complex, subtle and learned, they are difficult but rewarding, Webster has received a reputation for being the Elizabethan and Jacobean dramatist with the most unsparingly dark vision of human nature. Even more than John Ford, whose Tis Pity Shes a Whore is also very bleak, in his poem Whispers of Immortality, T. S. Eliot memorably says that Webster always saw the skull beneath the skin
19.
The Duchess of Malfi
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The Duchess of Malfi is a macabre, tragic play written by the English dramatist John Webster in 1612–13. It was first performed privately at the Blackfriars Theatre, then later to an audience at The Globe. Published in 1623, the play is based on events that occurred between about 1508 and 1513. The Duchess was Giovanna dAragona, Duchess of Amalfi, whose father, Enrico dAragona, as in the play, she secretly married Antonio Beccadelli di Bologna after the death of her first husband Alfonso I Piccolomini, Duke of Amalfi. The play begins as a story, with a Duchess who marries beneath her class. Jacobean drama continued the trend of violence and horror set by Elizabethan tragedy. Antonio returned from France, full of scorn for the Italian courtiers whom he sees as more corrupt than the French, Antonio is the steward of the Duchess of Malfis palace. His honesty and good judgment of character are traits well known to the other characters and he accepts the Duchess proposal of marriage because of her disposition rather than her beauty. Her marrying beneath her status is a problem, however, and their marriage has to remain a secret, a courtier, who tries to woo Julia. Based on Matteo Bandellos self-depiction under this name, his purpose is to be the sounding board for his friend Antonio. Because he asks so many pertinent questions, he serves as a source of important information to the audience, a former servant of the Cardinal, now returned from a sentence in the galleys for murder. Publicly rejected by his previous employer the Cardinal, he is sent by Ferdinand to spy on the Duchess as her Provisor of Horse, Bosola is involved in the murder of the Duchess, her children, Cariola, Antonio, the Cardinal, Ferdinand, and a servant. Witnessing the nobility of the Duchess and Antonio facing their deaths, he feels guilty. This change of heart makes him the plays most complex character, a malcontent and cynic, he makes numerous critical comments on the nature of Renaissance society. The brother to the Duchess and Ferdinand, a corrupt, icy official in the Roman Catholic Church who keeps a mistress. He has arranged a spy to spy upon his sister – all this on the quiet, however, of remorse, love, loyalty, or even greed, he knows nothing, and his reasons for hating his sister are a mystery. The Duke of Calabria and twin brother of the Duchess, unlike his rational brother the Cardinal, Ferdinand has rages and violent outbursts disproportionate to the perceived offense. As a result of his regret for hiring Bosola to kill the Duchess, he loses his sanity—he believes he is a wolf
20.
Cinderella
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Cinderella, or The Little Glass Slipper, is a folk tale embodying a myth-element of unjust oppression/triumphant reward. Thousands of variants are known throughout the world, the title character is a young woman living in unfortunate circumstances, that are suddenly changed to remarkable fortune. The oldest documented version comes from China, and the oldest European version from Italy, the most popular version was first published by Charles Perrault in Histoires ou contes du temps passé in 1697, and later by the Brothers Grimm in their folk tale collection Grimms Fairy Tales. Although the storys title and main characters change in different languages. The word Cinderella has, by analogy, come to one whose attributes were unrecognized, or one who unexpectedly achieves recognition or success after a period of obscurity. The still-popular story of Cinderella continues to influence popular culture internationally, lending plot elements, allusions, the Aarne–Thompson system classifies Cinderella as the persecuted heroine. The story of Rhodopis, about a Greek slave girl who marries the king of Egypt, is considered the earliest known variant of the Cinderella story, a version of the story, Ye Xian, appeared in Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang by Duan Chengshi around 860. Here, the hardworking and lovely girl befriends a fish, the rebirth of her mother, the fish is later killed by her stepmother and sister. Ye Xian saves the bones, which are magic, and they help her dress appropriately for the New Year Festival, when she loses her slipper after being recognized by her stepfamily, the king finds her slipper and falls in love with her. The Indonesian and Malaysian story Bawang Merah Bawang Putih, are two girls named Bawang Putih and Bawang Merah. While the two countrys respective versions differ in the relationship of the girls and the identity of the protagonist. Both have a fish as the fairy godmother to her daughter. The heroine then finds the bones and buries them, and over the grave a magical swing appears, the protagonist sits on the swing and sings to make it sway, her song reaching the ears of a passing Prince. The swing is akin to the slipper test, which distinguishes the heroine from her sister. In Indonesia, Bawang Putih is the girl, who suffers at the hands of her evil stepmother and stepsister, Bawang Merah. When the Prince enquires after the singer on the swing, Bawang Merah lies, the angry prince forces Bawang Merah and her mother to tell the truth. They then admit that there is another daughter in the house, Bawang Putih comes out and moves the magical swing by her singing. In the end, she and her prince marry and live happily ever after, in the Malaysian version, it is Bawang Merah and her mother Mak Labu who are good, while her half sister Bawang Putih and her mother Mak Kundur are evil
21.
Jane Eyre
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Jane Eyre /ˈɛər/ is a novel by English writer Charlotte Brontë. It was published on 16 October 1847, by Smith, Elder & Co. of London, England, the first American edition was published the following year by Harper & Brothers of New York. Charlotte Brontë has been called the first historian of the private consciousness, the novel is a first-person narrative from the perspective of the title character. The novels setting is somewhere in the north of England, late in the reign of George III, John Rivers, proposes to her, and her reunion with, and marriage to, her beloved Rochester. During these sections the novel provides perspectives on a number of important social issues and ideas, Jane Eyre is divided into 38 chapters, and most editions are at least 400 pages long. The original publication was in three volumes, comprising chapters 1 to 15,16 to 27, and 28 to 38, Brontë dedicated the novels second edition to William Makepeace Thackeray. The novel begins with the character, Jane Eyre, aged 10, living with her maternal uncles family. It is several years after her parents died of typhus, Mr. Reed, Janes uncle, was the only person in the Reed family who was ever kind to Jane. Janes aunt, Sarah Reed, dislikes her, treats her as a burden, Mrs. Reed and her three children are abusive to Jane, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. The nursemaid Bessie proves to be Janes only ally in the household, excluded from the family activities, Jane is incredibly unhappy, with only a doll and books for comfort. She is subsequently attended to by the apothecary, Mr. Lloyd. He recommends to Mrs. Reed that Jane should be sent to school, Mrs. Reed then enlists the aid of the harsh Mr. Brocklehurst, director of Lowood Institution, a charity school for girls. Mrs. Reed cautions Mr. Brocklehurst that Jane has a tendency for deceit, during a school inspection by Mr. Brocklehurst, Jane accidentally breaks her slate, thereby drawing attention to herself. He then stands her on a stool, brands her a liar, Jane is later comforted by her friend, Helen. Miss Temple, the superintendent, facilitates Janes self-defence and writes to Mr. Lloyd. Jane is then cleared of Mr. Brocklehursts accusations. The 80 pupils at Lowood are subjected to cold rooms, poor meals, many students fall ill when a typhus epidemic strikes, and Janes friend Helen dies of consumption in her arms. When Mr. Brocklehursts maltreatment of the students is discovered, several benefactors erect a new building, conditions at the school then improve dramatically
22.
Paris
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Paris is the capital and most populous city of France. It has an area of 105 square kilometres and a population of 2,229,621 in 2013 within its administrative limits, the agglomeration has grown well beyond the citys administrative limits. By the 17th century, Paris was one of Europes major centres of finance, commerce, fashion, science, and the arts, and it retains that position still today. The aire urbaine de Paris, a measure of area, spans most of the Île-de-France region and has a population of 12,405,426. It is therefore the second largest metropolitan area in the European Union after London, the Metropole of Grand Paris was created in 2016, combining the commune and its nearest suburbs into a single area for economic and environmental co-operation. Grand Paris covers 814 square kilometres and has a population of 7 million persons, the Paris Region had a GDP of €624 billion in 2012, accounting for 30.0 percent of the GDP of France and ranking it as one of the wealthiest regions in Europe. The city is also a rail, highway, and air-transport hub served by two international airports, Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly. Opened in 1900, the subway system, the Paris Métro. It is the second busiest metro system in Europe after Moscow Metro, notably, Paris Gare du Nord is the busiest railway station in the world outside of Japan, with 262 millions passengers in 2015. In 2015, Paris received 22.2 million visitors, making it one of the top tourist destinations. The association football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris, the 80, 000-seat Stade de France, built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup, is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis. Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on the red clay of Roland Garros, Paris hosted the 1900 and 1924 Summer Olympics and is bidding to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The name Paris is derived from its inhabitants, the Celtic Parisii tribe. Thus, though written the same, the name is not related to the Paris of Greek mythology. In the 1860s, the boulevards and streets of Paris were illuminated by 56,000 gas lamps, since the late 19th century, Paris has also been known as Panam in French slang. Inhabitants are known in English as Parisians and in French as Parisiens and they are also pejoratively called Parigots. The Parisii, a sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones, inhabited the Paris area from around the middle of the 3rd century BC. One of the areas major north-south trade routes crossed the Seine on the île de la Cité, this place of land and water trade routes gradually became a town
23.
Geneva
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Geneva is the second most populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situated where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the capital of the Republic, the municipality has a population of 198,072, and the canton has 484,736 residents. In 2014, the compact agglomération du Grand Genève had 946,000 inhabitants in 212 communities in both Switzerland and France, within Swiss territory, the commuter area named Métropole lémanique contains a population of 1.25 million. This area is essentially spread east from Geneva towards the Riviera area and north-east towards Yverdon-les-Bains, Geneva is the city that hosts the highest number of international organizations in the world. It is also the place where the Geneva Conventions were signed, Geneva was ranked as the worlds ninth most important financial centre for competitiveness by the Global Financial Centres Index, ahead of Frankfurt, and third in Europe behind London and Zürich. A2009 survey by Mercer found that Geneva has the third-highest quality of life of any city in the world, the city has been referred to as the worlds most compact metropolis and the Peace Capital. In 2009 and 2011, Geneva was ranked as, respectively, the city was mentioned in Latin texts, by Caesar, with the spelling Genava, probably from a Celtic toponym *genawa- from the stem *genu-, in the sense of a bending river or estuary. The medieval county of Geneva in Middle Latin was known as pagus major Genevensis or Comitatus Genevensis, the name takes various forms in modern languages, Geneva /dʒᵻˈniːvə/ in English, French, Genève, German, Genf, Italian, Ginevra, and Romansh, Genevra. The city in origin shares its name, *genawa estuary, with the Italian port city of Genoa, Geneva was an Allobrogian border town, fortified against the Helvetii tribe, when the Romans took it in 121 BC. It became Christian under the Late Roman Empire, and acquired its first bishop in the 5th century, having been connected to the bishopric of Vienne in the 4th. In the Middle Ages, Geneva was ruled by a count under the Holy Roman Empire until the late 14th century, around this time the House of Savoy came to dominate the city. In the 15th century, a republican government emerged with the creation of the Grand Council. In 1541, with Protestantism in the ascendancy, John Calvin, by the 18th century, however, Geneva had come under the influence of Catholic France, which cultivated the city as its own. France also tended to be at odds with the ordinary townsfolk, in 1798, revolutionary France under the Directory annexed Geneva. At the end of the Napoleonic Wars, on 1 June 1814, in 1907, the separation of Church and State was adopted. Geneva flourished in the 19th and 20th centuries, becoming the seat of international organizations. Geneva is located at 46°12 North, 6°09 East, at the end of Lake Geneva. It is surrounded by two chains, the Alps and the Jura
24.
Switzerland
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Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a federal republic in Europe. It consists of 26 cantons, and the city of Bern is the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in western-Central Europe, and is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland is a country geographically divided between the Alps, the Swiss Plateau and the Jura, spanning an area of 41,285 km2. The establishment of the Old Swiss Confederacy dates to the medieval period, resulting from a series of military successes against Austria. Swiss independence from the Holy Roman Empire was formally recognized in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. The country has a history of armed neutrality going back to the Reformation, it has not been in a state of war internationally since 1815, nevertheless, it pursues an active foreign policy and is frequently involved in peace-building processes around the world. In addition to being the birthplace of the Red Cross, Switzerland is home to international organisations. On the European level, it is a member of the European Free Trade Association. However, it participates in the Schengen Area and the European Single Market through bilateral treaties, spanning the intersection of Germanic and Romance Europe, Switzerland comprises four main linguistic and cultural regions, German, French, Italian and Romansh. Due to its diversity, Switzerland is known by a variety of native names, Schweiz, Suisse, Svizzera. On coins and stamps, Latin is used instead of the four living languages, Switzerland is one of the most developed countries in the world, with the highest nominal wealth per adult and the eighth-highest per capita gross domestic product according to the IMF. Zürich and Geneva have each been ranked among the top cities in the world in terms of quality of life, with the former ranked second globally, according to Mercer. The English name Switzerland is a compound containing Switzer, a term for the Swiss. The English adjective Swiss is a loan from French Suisse, also in use since the 16th century. The name Switzer is from the Alemannic Schwiizer, in origin an inhabitant of Schwyz and its associated territory, the Swiss began to adopt the name for themselves after the Swabian War of 1499, used alongside the term for Confederates, Eidgenossen, used since the 14th century. The data code for Switzerland, CH, is derived from Latin Confoederatio Helvetica. The toponym Schwyz itself was first attested in 972, as Old High German Suittes, ultimately related to swedan ‘to burn’
25.
Manorialism
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Manorialism was an essential element of feudal society. It was the principle of rural economy that originated in the Roman villa system of the Late Roman Empire. It was slowly replaced by the advent of a market economy. These obligations could be payable in several ways, in labor, in kind, or, on rare occasions, in examining the origins of the monastic cloister, Walter Horn found that as a manorial entity the Carolingian monastery. Manorialism died slowly and piecemeal, along with its most vivid feature in the landscape and it outlasted serfdom as it outlasted feudalism, primarily an economic organization, it could maintain a warrior, but it could equally well maintain a capitalist landlord. It could be self-sufficient, yield produce for the market, or it could yield a money rent, the last feudal dues in France were abolished at the French Revolution. In parts of eastern Germany, the Rittergut manors of Junkers remained until World War II, in Quebec, the last feudal rents were paid in 1970 under the modified provisions of the Seigniorial Dues Abolition Act of 1935. The term is most often used with reference to medieval Western Europe, antecedents of the system can be traced to the rural economy of the later Roman Empire. With a declining birthrate and population, labor was the key factor of production, the workers of the land were on their way to becoming serfs. The legal status of adscripti, bound to the soil, contrasted with barbarian foederati, the process of rural self-sufficiency was given an abrupt boost in the eighth century, when normal trade in the Mediterranean Sea was disrupted. The lord held a court, governed by public law. Not all territorial seigneurs were secular, bishops and abbots also held lands that entailed similar obligations, by extension, the word manor is sometimes used in England to mean any home area or territory in which authority is held, often in a police or criminal context. In the generic plan of a manor from Shepherds Historical Atlas. As concerns for privacy increased in the 18th century, manor houses were located a farther distance from the village. In an agrarian society, the conditions of land tenure underlie all social or economic factors, there were two legal systems of pre-manorial landholding. One, the most common, was the system of holding land allodially in full outright ownership, the other was a use of precaria or benefices, in which land was held conditionally. To these two systems, the Carolingian monarchs added a third, the aprisio, which linked manorialism with feudalism and he solved this problem by allotting desert tracts of uncultivated land belonging to the royal fisc under direct control of the emperor. These holdings aprisio entailed specific conditions, the earliest specific aprisio grant that has been identified was at Fontjoncouse, near Narbonne
26.
Heredity
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Heredity is the genetic information passing for traits from parents to their offspring, either through asexual reproduction or sexual reproduction. This is the process by which a cell or organism acquires or becomes predisposed to the characteristics of its parent cell or organism. Through heredity, variations exhibited by individuals can accumulate and cause some species to evolve through the selection of specific phenotype traits. The study of heredity in biology is called genetics, which includes the field of epigenetics, in humans, eye color is an example of an inherited characteristic, an individual might inherit the brown-eye trait from one of the parents. Inherited traits are controlled by genes and the set of genes within an organisms genome is called its genotype. The complete set of traits of the structure and behavior of an organism is called its phenotype. These traits arise from the interaction of its genotype with the environment, as a result, many aspects of an organisms phenotype are not inherited. For example, suntanned skin comes from the interaction between a persons phenotype and sunlight, thus, suntans are not passed on to peoples children, heritable traits are known to be passed from one generation to the next via DNA, a molecule that encodes genetic information. DNA is a polymer that incorporates four types of bases. The sequence of bases along a particular DNA molecule specifies the genetic information, before a cell divides through mitosis, the DNA is copied, so that each of the resulting two cells will inherit the DNA sequence. A portion of a DNA molecule that specifies a single unit is called a gene. Within cells, the strands of DNA form condensed structures called chromosomes. Organisms inherit genetic material from their parents in the form of homologous chromosomes, the specific location of a DNA sequence within a chromosome is known as a locus. If the DNA sequence at a locus varies between individuals, the different forms of this sequence are called alleles. DNA sequences can change through mutations, producing new alleles, if a mutation occurs within a gene, the new allele may affect the trait that the gene controls, altering the phenotype of the organism. However, while this simple correspondence between an allele and a works in some cases, most traits are more complex and are controlled by multiple interacting genes within. Recent findings have confirmed important examples of changes that cannot be explained by direct agency of the DNA molecule. These phenomena are classed as epigenetic inheritance systems that are causally or independently evolving over genes, Heritability may also occur at even larger scales
27.
Provence
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The largest city of the region is Marseille. The Romans made the region into the first Roman province beyond the Alps and called it Provincia Romana and it was ruled by the Counts of Provence from their capital in Aix-en-Provence until 1481, when it became a province of the Kings of France. While it has been part of France for more than five hundred years, it retains a distinct cultural and linguistic identity. The coast of Provence has some of the earliest known sites of habitation in Europe. Primitive stone tools dated to 1 to 1.05 million years BC were found in the Grotte du Vallonnet near Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, tools dating to the Middle Paleolithic and Upper Paleolithic were discovered in the Observatory Cave, in the Jardin Exotique of Monaco. The Paleolithic period in Provence saw great changes in the climate, with the arrival, at the beginning of the Paleolithic period, the sea level in western Provence was 150 meters higher than it is today. By the end of the Paleolithic, it had dropped 100 to 150 metres lower than sea level. The cave dwellings of the inhabitants of Provence were regularly inundated by the rising sea or left far from the sea. The changes in the sea led to one of the most remarkable discoveries of signs of early man in Provence. In 1985, a diver named Henri Cosquer discovered the mouth of a submarine cave 37 metres below the surface of the Calanque de Morgiou near Marseille, the entrance led to a cave above sea level. Inside, the walls of the Cosquer Cave are decorated with drawings of bison, seals, auks, horses and outlines of human hands, dating to between 27,000 and 19,000 BC. The end of the Paleolithic and beginning of the Neolithic period saw the sea settle at its present level, a warming of the climate and the retreat of the forests. The disappearance of the forests and the deer and other easily hunted game meant that the inhabitants of Provence had to survive on rabbits, snails, since they were settled in one place they were able to develop new industries. Inspired by the pottery from the eastern Mediterranean, in about 6000 BC they created the first pottery to be made in France. Around 6000 BC, a wave of new settlers from the east and they were farmers and warriors, and gradually displaced the earlier pastoral people from their lands. They were followed in about 2500 BC by another wave of people, also farmers, known as the Courronniens, traces of these early civilisations can be found in many parts of Provence. A Neolithic site dating to about 6,000 BC was discovered in Marseille near the Saint-Charles railway station, and a dolmen from the Bronze Age can be found near Draguignan. Between the 10th and 4th century BC the Ligures were found in Provence from Massilia as far as modern day Liguria and they were of uncertain origin, they may have been the descendants of the indigenous neolithic peoples
28.
Deus ex machina
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Deus ex machina is a Latin calque from Greek ἀπὸ μηχανῆς θεός, meaning god from the machine. The term was coined from the conventions of Greek tragedy, where a machine is used to bring actors playing gods onto the stage, the machine could be either a crane used to lower actors from above or a riser that brought actors up through a trapdoor. Preparation to pick up the actors was done behind the skene, the idea was introduced by Aeschylus and was used often to resolve the conflict and conclude the drama. Although the device is associated mostly with Greek tragedy, it appeared in comedies. Aeschylus used the device in his Eumenides, but it was with Euripides that it became a stage machine. More than half of Euripides extant tragedies employ a deus ex machina in their resolution, in Alcestis, the eponymous heroine agrees to give up her own life in order to spare the life of her husband, Admetus. At the end, Heracles shows up and seizes Alcestis from Death, restoring her to life, aristophanes play Thesmophoriazusae parodies Euripides frequent use of the crane by making Euripides himself a character in the play and bringing him on stage by way of the mechane. The effect of the device on Greek audiences was a direct, audiences would have a feeling of wonder and astonishment at the appearance of the gods, which would often add to the moral effect of the drama. Shakespeare used the device in As You Like It, Pericles, Prince of Tyre, Cymbeline and it was also used in John Gays The Beggars Opera where the author uses a character to break the action and rewrite the ending as a reprieve of the hanging of MacHeath. Both in Shakespeares and Gays plays the deus ex machina happens with breaking the illusion often in the form of an episodic narrator exposing the play itself. This is different from the use of the deus ex machina in the ancient examples with the coming from a participant in the action in the form of a god. It is natural for the gods to be considered participants and not outside sources because of their privileged position and it is these attributes that allow the Greek gods to believably wrap up and solve the series of events. During the politically turbulent 17th and 18th centuries, the deus ex machina was sometimes used to make a controversial thesis more palatable to the powers of the day. Aristotle was the first to use deus ex machina as a term to describe the technique as a device to resolve the plot of tragedies and it is generally deemed undesirable in writing and often implies a lack of creativity on the part of the author. In H. G. Wellss The War of the Worlds, in the novel Lord of the Flies, the rescue of the savage children by a passing navy officer is viewed by some critics as a deus ex machina. The abrupt ending conveys the terrible fate that would have afflicted the children if the officer had not arrived at that moment. J. R. R. Tolkien coined the term eucatastrophe to refer to a turn of events that ensures the protagonist does not meet some impending fate. He also referred to the Great Eagles that appear in places in The Hobbit
29.
Songs of Innocence and of Experience
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Songs of Innocence and of Experience is an illustrated collection of poems by William Blake. Innocence and Experience are definitions of consciousness that rethink Miltons existential-mythic states of Paradise, Songs of Innocence was originally a complete work first printed in 1789. It is a collection of 19 poems, engraved with artwork. The poems were published in 1794, some of the poems, such as The Little Girl Lost and The Little Girl Found, were moved by Blake to Songs of Innocence and were frequently moved between the two books. In The Chimney Sweeper and The Little Black Boy, Blake attacks the negative treatment of racial minorities, most interestingly, Blake uses much of Experience to highlight the negative influence of the Church, which he saw as corrupt and repressive. This can be seen especially in The Garden of Love and A Little Boy Lost, for Blake, we need to break the mind-forgd manacles caused by repressive religion, and embrace natural and physical pleasures as harmonious and essential for healthy development of content adulthood. Individual poems have also set by, among others, John Tavener, Victoria Poleva, Jah Wobble, Tangerine Dream, Jeff Johnson. A modified version of the poem The Little Black Boy was set to music in the song My Mother Bore Me from Maury Yestons musical Phantom. The folk musician Greg Brown recorded sixteen of the poems on his 1987 album Songs of Innocence and of Experience, in 2011 Victor Vertunni released a new music album on songs of Innocence and of Experience, another stepping stone in the long tradition. The poet Allen Ginsberg believed the poems were intended to be sung, and that through study of the rhyme and metre of the works. In 1969, he conceived, arranged, directed, sang on, the composer William Bolcom completed a setting of the entire collection of poems in 1984. The composer Victoria Poleva completed Songs of Innocence and of Experience in 2002 and it was first performed by the ensemble Accroche-Note of France. The Swedish composer David Unger completed Night songs op,24, a setting of five poems from Songs of Innocence for solo voice and piano in 2013. It was first performed by baritone Anthony Schneider and pianist Rosemary Barnes in Vienna, popular group Tangerine Dream, based their album Tyger on lyrics by William Blake. Popular rock group U2 released an album called Songs of Innocence in 2014 and they plan to follow up with a Songs of Experience album in the near future. Karl Jenkins Motets includes a setting of The Shepherd, tate Publishing, in collaboration with The William Blake Trust, produced a folio edition containing all of the songs of Innocence and Experience in 2006. A colour plate of each poem is accompanied by a literal transcription, and the volume is introduced by critic and historian Richard Holmes
30.
William Blake
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William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a figure in the history of the poetry. His so-called prophetic works were said by 20th century critic Northrop Frye to form what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language. His visual artistry led 21st-century critic Jonathan Jones to proclaim him far, in 2002, Blake was placed at number 38 in the BBCs poll of the 100 Greatest Britons. Although he lived in London his entire life, he produced a diverse and symbolically rich œuvre and his paintings and poetry have been characterised as part of the Romantic movement and as Pre-Romantic. Reverent of the Bible but hostile to the Church of England, Blake was influenced by the ideals and ambitions of the French, despite these known influences, the singularity of Blakes work makes him difficult to classify. William Blake was born on 28 November 1757 at 28 Broad Street in Soho and he was the third of seven children, two of whom died in infancy. Blakes father, James, was a hosier and he attended school only long enough to learn reading and writing, leaving at the age of ten, and was otherwise educated at home by his mother Catherine Blake. Even though the Blakes were English Dissenters, William was baptised on 11 December at St Jamess Church, Piccadilly, the Bible was an early and profound influence on Blake, and remained a source of inspiration throughout his life. Blake started engraving copies of drawings of Greek antiquities purchased for him by his father, within these drawings Blake found his first exposure to classical forms through the work of Raphael, Michelangelo, Maarten van Heemskerck and Albrecht Dürer. The number of prints and bound books that James and Catherine were able to purchase for young William suggests that the Blakes enjoyed, at least for a time, a comfortable wealth. When William was ten years old, his parents knew enough of his headstrong temperament that he was not sent to school and he read avidly on subjects of his own choosing. During this period, Blake made explorations into poetry, his work displays knowledge of Ben Jonson, Edmund Spenser. On 4 August 1772, Blake was apprenticed to engraver James Basire of Great Queen Street, at the sum of £52.10, at the end of the term, aged 21, he became a professional engraver. This aside, Basires style of line-engraving was of a kind held at the time to be old-fashioned compared to the flashier stipple or mezzotint styles. It has been speculated that Blakes instruction in this form may have been detrimental to his acquiring of work or recognition in later life. After two years, Basire sent his apprentice to copy images from the Gothic churches in London and his experiences in Westminster Abbey helped form his artistic style and ideas. The Abbey of his day was decorated with suits of armour, painted funeral effigies, ackroyd notes that. the most immediate would have been of faded brightness and colour
31.
The Tyger
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The Tyger is a poem by the English poet William Blake published in 1794 as part of the Songs of Experience collection. Literary critic Alfred Kazin calls it the most famous of his poems and it is one of Blakes most reinterpreted and arranged works. The Songs of Experience was published in 1794 as a follow up to Blakes 1789 Songs of Innocence. The two books were published together under the merged title Songs of Innocence and Experience, showing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul, the illustrations are arranged differently in some copies, while a number of poems were moved from Songs of Innocence to Songs of Experience. Blake continued to print the work throughout his life, of the copies of the original collection, only 28 published during his life are known to exist, with an additional 16 published posthumously. Only 5 of the poems from Songs of Experience appeared individually before 1839, the first and last stanzas are identical except the word could becomes dare in the second iteration. Kazin says to begin to wonder about the tiger, and its nature, Blake achieves great power through the use of alliteration combined with imagery, and he structures the poem to ring with incessant repetitive questioning, demanding of the creature, Who made thee. In the third stanza the focus moves from the tiger, the creation, the Tyger is six stanzas in length, each stanza four lines long. Much of the poem follows the pattern of its first line. A number of lines, however, such as four in the first stanza. The first stanza opens the question, What immortal hand or eye. Here the direct address to the creature becomes most obvious, but certainly, the second stanza questions the Tyger about where he was created, the third about how the creator formed him, the fourth about what tools were used. In the fifth stanza, Blake wonders how the creator reacted to the Tyger, finally, the sixth restates the central question while raising the stakes, rather than merely question what/who could create the Tyger, the speaker wonders, who dares. The Tyger is the poem to The Lamb, a reflection of similar ideas from a different perspective. The Songs of Experience were written as a contrary to the Songs of Innocence – a central tenet in Blakes philosophy, and central theme in his work. The struggle of humanity is based on the concept of the nature of things, Blake believed. Experience is not the face of evil but rather another facet of that created us. Kazin says of Blake, Never is he more heretical than, where he glories in the hammer and fire out of which are struck
32.
The Revenger's Tragedy
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The Revengers Tragedy is an English language, Jacobean revenge tragedy, formerly attributed to Cyril Tourneur but now generally recognized as the work of Thomas Middleton. It was performed in 1606, and published in 1607 by George Eld, a vivid and often violent portrayal of lust and ambition in an Italian court, the play typifies the satiric tone and cynicism of much Jacobean tragedy. Vindice, the revenger, frequently disguised as Piato, Hippolito, Vindices brother, sometimes called Carlo. Gratiana, a widow, mother of Vindice, Hippolito, the Duchess, the dukes second wife. Lussurioso, the son from an earlier marriage, and his heir. Spurio, the second son, a bastard. Junior Brother, the third son. Antonio, a lord at the Dukes court. Antonios wife, raped by Junior Brother Piero, a lord at the Dukes court. As mentioned above, Spurio is the son of the Duke. Nearly all action in the play involving Spurio consists of adultery, murder, as Thomas Laqueur puts it, while the legitimate child is from the froth of the father, the illegitimate child is from the seed of the mothers genitals, as if the father did not exist. The idea of Spurio and his character provides the function of bastardy in the misogynist gender politics of the play, the Duchess, Castiza, and Gratiana are the only three female characters found in the play. Gratiana, Vindices mother, exemplifies female frailty, the play is in accord with the medieval tradition of Christian Complaint, and Elizabethan satire in presenting sexuality mainly as symptomatic of general corruption. Even though Gratiana is the mother of a decent, strong-minded daughter and this personality-split is then repeated, in an episode exactly reversing the pattern, by her ironic, intelligent daughter. The play is set in an unnamed Italian court, Vindice broods over his fathers recent death and his desire for revenge on the lustful Duke for poisoning his beloved nine years before. Vindices brother Hippolito brings news, Lussurioso, the Dukes heir by his first marriage, has asked him if he can find a procurer to obtain a young virgin he lusts after. The brothers decide that Vindice will undertake this role in disguise, meanwhile, Lord Antonios wife has been raped by the new Duchesss youngest son Junior. He brazenly admits his guilt, even joking about it, but to widespread surprise the Duke suspends the proceedings, the Duchesss other sons, Ambitioso and Supervacuo, whisper a promise to have him freed, the Duchess vows to be unfaithful to the Duke
33.
Goodreads
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Goodreads is an Amazon company and social cataloging website founded in December 2006 and launched in January 2007 by Otis Chandler, II, a software engineer and entrepreneur, and Elizabeth Chandler. The website allows individuals to freely search Goodreads database of books, annotations, users can sign up and register books to generate library catalogs and reading lists. They can also create their own groups of book suggestions, surveys/polls, blogs, in December 2007, the site had over 650,000 members and over 10,000,000 books had been added. By July 2012, the site reported 10 million members,20 million monthly visits, on July 23,2013, it was announced on their website that the user base had grown to 20 million members, having doubled in close to 11 months. The websites offices are in San Francisco, on March 28,2013, Amazon announced its acquisition of Goodreads for an undisclosed amount. The Chandlers created Goodreads in 2006, Goodreads stated mission is to help people find and share books they love. To improve the process of reading and learning throughout the world, Goodreads also addressed what publishers call the discoverability problem by guiding consumers in the digital age to find books they might want to read. During its first year of business, the company was run without any formal funding, in December 2007, the site received funding estimated at $750,000 from angel investors. This funding lasted Goodreads until 2009, when Goodreads received two dollars from True Ventures. In October 2010 the company opened its application programming interface, which enabled developers to access its ratings, Goodreads also receives a small commission when a user clicks over from its site to an online bookseller and makes a purchase. After a user has rated 20 books on its five-star scale, Otis Chandler believed this rating system would be superior to Amazons, as Amazons includes books a user has browsed or purchased as gifts when determining its recommendations. Later that year, Goodreads introduced an algorithm to suggest books to registered users and had five million members. In October 2012, Goodreads announced it had grown to 11 million members with 395 million books catalogued, a month later, in November 2012, Goodreads had surpassed 12 million members, with the member base having doubled in one year. In March 2013, Amazon. com announced that it had reached an agreement to acquire Goodreads in the quarter of 2013 for an undisclosed sum. In September 2013, Goodreads announced it would delete, without warning, in January 2016, Amazon announced on Shelfari. com that it would be merging Shelfari with Goodreads and closing down Shelfari. To prepare Shelfari members for the move, Amazon posted on Shelfari. com a prominent announcement stating, IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT, although Shelfari discussion threads will not be migrated, users were advised, you may save your own data for your own records. In April 2016, Goodreads announced that over 50 million user reviews have been posted, once users have added friends to their profile, they will see their friends shelves and reviews and can comment on friends pages. Goodreads features a system of one to five stars, with the option of accompanying the rating with a written review
34.
The Crystal Cave
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The Crystal Cave is a 1970 fantasy novel by Mary Stewart. The first in a quintet of novels covering the Arthurian legend, the protagonist of this story is a boy named Myrddin Emrys, also known as Merlin, which is the Welsh form of the word falcon. This story is told in narrative and includes his journey to find a home as he travels through Wales, Brittany. Emrys is also known as Ambrosius, or Prince of Light and this novel covers the time from Merlins sixth year until he becomes a young man. The Romans have recently left Britain, which is now divided into a number of kingdoms loosely united under a High King, Merlin is the illegitimate son of a Welsh princess, who refuses to name his father. Small for his age and often abused or neglected, Merlin occasionally has clairvoyant visions and these visions and his unknown parentage cause him to be referred to as the son of a devil and bastard child. Educated by a hermit, Galapas, who teaches him to use his powers as well as his earthly gifts. There, he assists in Ambrosiuss preparations to invade and unify Britain, defeat Vortigern, the Saxon usurper, also exiled in Brittany is Uther, Ambrosiuss brother, heir and supporter. It is revealed that Merlin is Ambrosiuss son, the result of a relationship between Ambrosius and Merlins mother. Merlin returns to Britain but finds Galapas killed and he is captured by Vortigern who is attempting to build a fortress at Dinas Emrys - but each night the newly built walls collapse. The kings mystics say the fort will only be built when a child with no father is sacrificed, Vortigern plans to use Merlin as the sacrifice. Merlin realises that the foundation is unstable due to the caves below ground. As a result of this, Merlin briefly becomes known as Vortigerns prophet, days later, Ambrosius invades and defeats Vortigern. Merlin uses his skills to rebuild Stonehenge, but has visions of Ambrosiuss death. Uther, Ambrosiuss younger brother, becomes King Uther Pendragon, however, Britain is thrown into chaos when Uther, besotted with Duchess Ygraine, goes to war with her husband, Gorlois, the Duke of Cornwall. Merlin helps Uther to enter Tintagel Castle by stealth, knowing the tryst will lead to the birth of King Arthur, Merlin, known also as Myrddin, with Emrys as a sort of patronym. The stories explore his learning to use magic and his centrality in the Matter of Britain, Niniane, his mother, a Christian who joins the local nunnery when he is 12. King of Maridunum, a king of South Wales, grandfather of Merlin, father of Camlach and Niniane
35.
The Hollow Hills
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The Hollow Hills is a novel by Mary Stewart. It is the second in a quintet of novels covering the Arthurian Legends and this book is preceded by The Crystal Cave and succeeded by The Last Enchantment. The Hollow Hills was written in 1970 and published in 1973, the protagonist and narrator is Merlin, who supervises the birth and raising of King Arthur. In later chapters, Merlin gives the child to his own nurse Moravik, inspired by a dream which he believes prophetic, Merlin finds the sword in a deserted temple of Mithras. There, Merlin becomes a hermit in a shrine, providing healing to the injured. Later, Merlin becomes Arthurs tutor and that of two boys, Arthurs foster-brother Cei and his friend Bedwyr. One day, Arthur discovers the sword of Maximus — his ancestor and Merlins — hidden in a cave on an island in the centre of a lake, and names it Caliburn. Later he wins his first battle in a victory against invading Saxons, whereupon his parentage is revealed. Shortly before he learns his identity, he mistakenly commits incest with his half-sister Morgause, when challenged to prove his birthright, he reveals Caliburn to the assembled kings
36.
The Last Enchantment
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The Last Enchantment is a 1979 fantasy novel by Mary Stewart. It is the third in a quintet of novels covering the Arthurian legend, preceded by The Hollow Hills, Arthur is now King and hard at work establishing Camelot as the center of government and authority. A few ambitious lords from other parts of Britain have designs on Arthurs throne, having unwisely taken Morgause to his bed as a very young man after his first battle and victory, Arthur is now the father of Mordred. Merlin foresees that Mordred will be the cause of Arthurs death and he spends a great deal of time traveling in disguise and observing Morgauses scheming and intrigue. Somewhere along the line, Merlin takes on a female apprentice, Niniane is not quite as gifted as Merlin himself, but he teaches her everything he knows, and they fall in love despite their age difference. As he gives her the secrets of his abilities and how to control them. In a depleted, weakened condition, he takes ill and falls into a coma, Niniane has him buried within the crystal cave, where he awakes some time later. He escapes after a few weeks, through a combination of luck and ingenious planning
37.
The Wicked Day
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The Wicked Day is a 1983 fantasy novel by Mary Stewart. The fourth in a quintet of novels covering the Arthurian legend, it is preceded by The Last Enchantment and succeeded by The Prince, the protagonists of this story are, Mordred and his father the king, Arthur. Lost as a youth, Mordred is raised by fisherfolk until he is returned to his birth mother Morgause, the novel portrays Mordred as a pawn of fate unlike many tales which paint him as the villain of the Arthurian saga. The novel covers the time after Merlins self-imposed exile and stretches to the deaths of Mordred and Arthur
38.
The Prince and the Pilgrim
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The Prince and the Pilgrim is a 1995 fantasy novel by Mary Stewart. It is a novel, has an oblique reference to King Arthur. The Prince, the protagonist, is named Alexander and his father, Prince Baudouin, is murdered by the King of Cornwall, King March. When Alexander comes of age, he out to Camelot to seek justice from King Arthur. She rescues a young French nobleman who has in his possession an enchanted silver cup, the chalice may be the mysterious and much-sought-after Holy Grail. Prince Alexander is diverted in his quest by the enchantments of Morgan Le Fay and she persuades him to attempt a theft of the cup so that she can gain power over King Arthur and his court. Alexanders search for the mysterious cup leads him to Alice, together the prince and the pilgrim find what theyve really been seeking, love. The tale is a novel taking place during Arthurs reign
39.
Madam, Will You Talk?
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Madam, Will You Talk. is a novel by Mary Stewart, first published in 1954. It is Stewarts first published novel, the title is a quotation from a folk song, Madam, Will You Walk. The line Madam, will you walk and talk with me. is quoted at the start of Chapter 17, charity Selborne is on holiday in Provence with her friend and former colleague Louise. Before her marriage to Johnny Selborne they both taught at the school in the West Midlands. Charity is now a widow, her husbands plane was shot down in France during the war and she is staying at the same hotel as David Shelley and his stepmother, Loraine Bristol. Mrs. Bristol has taken David to France from England, davids father, Richard Byron, an antique dealer, who has been accused of murder, is pursuing his son across France. Also staying at the hotel are John Marsden, who is English and reads T. S. Eliot at breakfast, and Paul Véry, both have parts to play in subsequent events
40.
My Brother Michael
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My Brother Michael is a novel by Mary Stewart, first published in 1959. Camilla Haven has recently broken her engagement to Philip and is holidaying on her own in Greece. She is sitting in a cafe in Athens writing to Elizabeth, who would have been with Camilla but for a broken leg, Camilla hasnt requested it, but no one else claims the car. She wants to visit Delphi, but was doubtful about being able to afford it, shes told that it is a matter of life and death and that the deposit has been paid. So, after leaving her hotel address with the cafés proprietor, on the way she meets Simon Lester. Simon is in Greece to learn more about the death of his brother Michael during the Second World War
41.
The Ivy Tree
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The Ivy Tree is a novel of romantic suspense by English author Mary Stewart. Her sixth novel, it was published in 1961 in Britain by Hodder & Stoughton, as usual with the author, the novel is narrated in first person by a bold and intelligent young woman, and the setting is picturesque - in this case, Northumberland. Mary Grey, protagonist, a new arrival in England from Canada, working in the Kasbah cafe in Newcastle and her alternate identity is Annabel Winslow, the well-liked but wayward favorite of her grandfather, Matthew. Connor Winslow, the handsome but hot-tempered and ruthless manager of Whitescar Farm, Lisa Dermott, Connors half-sister, loyal only to her brother and anxious that he become the Farms heir. Matthew Winslow, the patriarch of Whitescar, the grandfather of Annabel and Julie. Although a stroke has weakened him and death is imminent, Matthew continues to control his household, Julie Winslow is the pretty, vivacious young cousin of Annabel. Julie adores Annabel and freely confides about her feelings concerning Whitescar, her boyfriend Donald, when Connor threatens Julie, Annabel and Adam rescue her. When he almost dies in a cave-in on Forrest Hall property, Adam Forrest, owner of Forrest Hall, is a neighbor of the Winslow family, and sometime the paramour of Annabel, even during his wifes lifetime. At the end of the story, he is identified with the Biblical Adam, narrator/protagonist Mary Grey is off work on Sunday afternoon and enjoying the beauty of the northern English countryside. As she leans against Hadrians Wall near a cliff overlooking the waters of Crag Lough, a local youth called Connor Winslow mistakes her for his long-lost cousin Annabel. For reasons only partially explained she agrees, and succeeds in convincing the household - Grandfather Matthew, Connors sister Lisa, cousin Julie, and Mr. and Mrs. Bates - that she is indeed Annabel. When Adam discovers the long-lost Annabel after her visit to the ivy tree, he discovers the imposture. In a later plot twist, a story is introduced wherein Mary Grey was herself a double-identity assumed by the original Annabel Winslow. At the climax, Annabel tries to save Adam from a cave-in of an old cellar, and is confronted by Connor. In conclusion, Annabel and Julie are confirmed friends, Julie will marry her boyfriend, and Annabel and Adam are presumed to marry, Mary Stewart was already a popular author of romantic suspense and most reviewers felt that this novel was up to her standards. The Atlantic Monthly said, The author has a touch with red herrings. The eminent mystery-novel critic Anthony Boucher said, No one writes the damsel in distress tale with greater charm or urgency. Jo Walton, in a conflicted but mostly negative critique, compares and contrasts the novel with Josephine Teys Brat Farrar, the Christian Science Monitor, January 11,1962
42.
The Moon-Spinners
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The Moon-Spinners is a 1964 American Walt Disney Productions feature film starring Hayley Mills, Eli Wallach and Peter McEnery in a story about a jewel thief hiding on the island of Crete. The film was based upon a 1962 suspense novel by Mary Stewart and was directed by James Neilson, the Moon-Spinners was Mills fifth of six films for Disney, and featured the legendary silent film actress Pola Negri in her final screen performance. A young English woman named Nicky Ferris takes a trip with her folk musicologist aunt, Frances, owner Sophia refuses to allow them to stay at her inn, The Moon-Spinners, but Aunt Frances and Sophias teenage son Alexis persuade her into changing her mind. Whilst Nicky and Aunt Frances are in their room, Sophias brother Stratos demands to know why they chose to stay at his sisters inn and says they should leave, Stratos reluctantly agrees to allow them to stay for one night. During a wedding party at the inn later that evening, Nicky meets a stranger named Mark and their dinner meeting attracts Stratoss suspicious stare, which Nicky notices and points out to Mark. Mark hints theres more to Stratos than appears, at end of the evening, Mark suggests that he and Nicky could meet in the morning to go for a swim in the Bay of Dolphins. She comes downstairs the next morning, and quickly learns that Mark has checked out of the inn, during a walk on the island, she stumbles across Mark whos been shot. And so her adventure begins, which lead her to a mysterious wealthy woman. Traveling alone in the book, she is accompanied by her aunt in the film, the film is somewhat dark, similar to other Disney live-action features made in the 1950s and 1960s for more mainstream audiences such as 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Treasure Island. It was Walt Disneys penultimate live-action film in which he was credited as producer while alive, Disney persuaded silent film actress Pola Negri, who had been retired for two decades, to return to the screen for this, her final film. Both Mills and Wallach were interviewed extensively about their work with Negri in The Moon-Spinners for the 2006 biographical documentary film Pola Negri, Life Is a Dream in Cinema. Official website The Moon-Spinners at the TCM Movie Database The Moon-Spinners at the Internet Movie Database List of American films of 1964 Hayley Mills Eli Wallach Pola Negri
43.
This Rough Magic
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This Rough Magic is a romantic suspense novel by Mary Stewart, first published in 1964. The title is a quote from William Shakespeares The Tempest, lucy Waring, a young actress, is holidaying in Corfu with her sister, who is married to a rich Italian. She meets photographer Godfrey Manning, the famous actor Sir Julian Gale, his aloof son Max, the idyllic scene is shattered when Marias teenage son is reported drowned after falling overboard while out at night sailing in Godfreys boat. One theme running through the book is the idea that Corfu is the setting for The Tempest, another theme is that of a dolphin which will approach humans. Julian Gale and the play Tiger, Tiger are also mentioned in The Wind Off the Small Isles by the same author, the book was serialised in the British magazine Womans Journal
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Airs Above the Ground (novel)
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Airs Above the Ground is a novel by Mary Stewart, first published in 1965. These trained moves were used by the horse to aid mounted soldiers in battle. Mary Stewart is known for raising the genre of suspense novels to a higher. Airs Above the Ground is a murder mystery which takes place in Austria. The story evokes the vivid and accurate sense of location, for which the author is well-known and this haunting story was the seed around which this novel was built. Vanessa March is married to Lewis, who works for the Sales Department of Pan-European Chemicals. Having tea with her mothers schoolfriend Carmel Lacy at Harrods, she learns that Lewis, Carmel, assuming Vanessa will be joining Lewis in Austria, asks her to accompany her seventeen-year-old son Timothy, who wants to visit his divorced father in Vienna. Seeing the newsreel for herself, Vanessa sees Lewis in Austria — with his arm around a blonde girl, when she receives a message from Lewis postmarked Stockholm, Vanessa immediately agrees to travel to Austria, unaware that by doing so she is endangering her husband and herself. The story is set against a backdrop of circus life, stolen goods, international smuggling, and an old mystery involving the disappearance of a famed Lipizzaner stallion and his groom
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The Wind Off the Small Isles
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The Wind Off the Small Isles is a novella by Mary Stewart, first published in 1968. Unlike her other works, it is brief, at only 96 pages in hardcover and it was never published in the United States and is hard to find today. Perdita works for childrens writer Cora Gresham as secretary and personal assistant, Cora is writing about pirates on the Barbary Coast and wants to visit the Canary Islands. After hearing Perditas description of the islands, Cora decides on Lanzarote. Only two days after arriving there, Cora decides she wants to buy a house, while driving around the island they reach Playa Blanca and Cora sees just the house she is looking for. She sends Perdita to ask who owns it, Perdita, after getting no answer at the front door, meets Michael in the grounds who is supervising building work. There is a mention of Julian Gale from Stewarts earlier novel, This Rough Magic