The Pearl River Delta Metropolitan Region is the low-lying area surrounding the Pearl River estuary, where the Pearl River flows into the South China Sea. It is one of the most densely urbanized regions in the world, is considered a megacity, it is now the wealthiest region in South China and one of the wealthiest in the whole of China along with the Yangtze River Delta in East China and Jingjinji in North China. The region's economy is referred to as Pearl River Delta Economic Zone, it is part of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area. The PRD is a megalopolis, with future development into a single mega metropolitan area, yet itself is at the southern end of a larger megalopolis running along the southern coast of China, which include metropolises such as Chaoshan, Zhangzhou-Xiamen, Quanzhou-Putian and Fuzhou; the nine largest cities of the PRD had a combined population of 57.15 million at the end of 2013, comprising 53.69% of the provincial population. According to the World Bank Group, the PRD has become the largest urban area in the world in both size and population.
The west side of this region, along with Chaoshan, was the source of much Chinese emigration from the 19th to the mid 20th centuries, including to the Western world, where they formed many Chinatowns. Today, much of the Chinese diaspora in the US, Australia, Latin America, much of Southeast Asia traces their ancestry to the west side of this region, its dominant language is Cantonese. The river delta known as the Golden Delta of Guangdong, is formed by three major rivers, the Xi Jiang, Bei Jiang, Dong Jiang; the flat lands of the delta are criss-crossed by a network of tributaries and distributaries of the Pearl River. The Pearl River Delta is two alluvial deltas, separated by the core branch of the Pearl River; the Bei Jiang and Xi Jiang converge to flow into the South China Sea and Pearl River in the west, while the Dong Jiang only flows into the Pearl River proper in the east. The Xi Jiang begins exhibiting delta-like characteristics as far west as Zhaoqing, although this city is not considered a part of the PRD region.
After passing through the Lingyang Gorge and converging with the Bei Jiang, the Xi Jiang opens up and flows as far east as Nansha Qu and as far west as Xinhui. Major distributaries of the Xi include Donghui Shuidao, Jiya Shuidao, Hutiaomen Shuidao, Yinzhou Hu, the main branch of the Xi Jiang. Jiangmen and Zhongshan are the major cities found in the western section of the delta; the Bei Jiang doesn't begin to split until near Sanshui. From here the two main distributaries are Tanzhou Shuidao and Shunde Shuidao which form multiple mouths along the west side of the Pearl River's estuary. Two other distributaries, Lubao Yong and Xinan Yong, split from the Bei further north and converge with the Liuxi He to form the main branch of the Pearl River just north of Guangzhou; the other major city in the north section of the delta is Foshan. The Dong Jiang flows through Huizhou into the delta, it begins diverging northeast of Dongguan into many distributaries, including the Dongguan Shuidao. Distributuares enter the Pearl River as far north as Luogang and as far south as Hu Men.
Saltwater crocodiles were present within the Pearl River estuary during antiquity. As well as the delta itself, the term Pearl River Delta refers to the dense network of cities that covers nine prefectures of the province of Guangdong, namely Dongguan, Guangzhou, Jiangmen, Zhaoqing and Zhuhai and the SARs of Hong Kong and Macau; the 2010/2011 State of the World Cities report, published by the United Nations Human Settlements Programme, estimates the population of the delta region at 120 million people. The eastern side of the PRD, dominated by foreign capital, is the most developed economically; the western areas, dominated by local private capital, are open for development. New transport links between Hong Kong and Zhuhai in the PRD are expected to open up new areas for development, further integrate the cities, facilitate trade within the region; the Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau Bridge, the proposed Shenzhen–Zhongshan Bridge in the planning phase, will be amongst the longest bridges in the world with a total length of 50 km each.
Until c. 1985, the PRD had been dominated by farms and small rural villages, but after the economy was reformed and opened, a flood of investment turned it into the land's economic powerhouse. The PRD's startling growth was fueled by foreign investment coming from Hong Kong manufacturers that moved their operations into the PRD. In 2003, Hong Kong companies employed 11 million workers in their PRD operations. There have been extreme labour shortages in the region due to runaway economic growth which caused wages to rise by about 20 to 30 percent in the past two years; the Pearl River Delta has been one of the most economically dynamic regions of the People's Republic of China since the launch of China’s reform programme in 1979. With annual gross domestic product growth of 13.45 percent over three decades since 1978, it is 3.5 percentage points higher than the national average. Since 1978 30% of all foreign investment in China was in the PRD. In 2007 its GDP rose to US$448 billion which makes its economy about the size of Taiwan's and by 2018 this figure has increased to US$2.0 trillion about the same size as Italy.
The abundance of employment opportunities created a pool of wealthy, middle-income, professional consumers with an annual per capita income that puts them among China's weal
Hellmut Diwald was a German historian and Professor of Medieval and Modern History at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg from 1965 to 1985. He was from southern Moravia, the son of an Austrian engineer and a Czech mother, went to school in Prague before the family relocated to Nuremberg in Bavaria in 1938. During World War II, he served in the German Army. After the war, he went on to study mechanical engineering in Nuremberg before he studied philosophy and history at the universities of Hamburg and Erlangen, he earned a doctorate in history in 1952 and completed his Habilitation in 1958. In 1965, he was appointed as Professor of Medieval and Modern History at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, where he taught until his retirement in 1985, he was editor of Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte, a scientific journal, from 1948 to 1966. Diwald earned much recognition for his books on the philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey and his publication of the works of Ernst Ludwig von Gerlach, as well as for his biography of Albrecht von Wallenstein and his book on European history from 1400 to 1555.
He regularly appeared on the ZDF TV show Fragen zur Zeit and was a regular contributor of articles to the newspaper Die Welt. He is known for a discussed book on German history from 1978, he published his opus magnum. Fünf Jahrtausende Weltgeschichte in Darstellungen und Dokumenten, a history of humankind during the last 5000 years in six volumes, in 1990. In 1981, he co-founded the Zeitgeschichtliche Forschungsstelle Ingolstadt, he was married to Susanne Diwald, a scholar of Islamic studies who taught at the University of Erlangen. Untersuchungen zum Geschichtsrealismus im 19. Jahrhundert. Dissertation. Erlangen 1952 Der Hegelianismus in Preussen von Heinrich Leo. Hrsg. Leiden-Köln, 1958 Lebendiger Geist. Hrsg. Leiden-Köln, 1959 Leopold von Ranke, Geschichte Wallensteins. Hrsg. Düsseldorf, 1967 Wilhelm Dilthey, Erkenntnistheorie und Philosophie der Geschichte. Goettingen, 1963 Wallenstein. Eine Biographie. Muenchen-Esslingen, 1969, ISBN 3-7628-0432-X Die Freiheit des Glaubens, Freiheit und Toleranz in der abendländischen Geschichte.
Hannover, 1967 Ernst Moritz Arndt. Das Entstehen des deutschen Nationalbewußtseins. München, 1970 Ernst Ludwig von Gerlach, Von der Revolution zum Norddeutschen Bund. Hrsg. Goettingen, 1970 Die Anerkennung. Bericht zur Klage der Nation. München-Esslingen, 1970 Friedrich Schiller, Wallenstein. Frankfurt/M – Berlin – Wien, 1970 Menschen und Mächte – Geschichte im Blickpunkt. Buchreihe mit 8 Bänden, Hrsg. München, 1973 Anspruch auf Mündigkeit, Propyläen Geschichte Europas Band 1, 1400–1555. Frankfurt/M – Berlin – Wien, 1975, ISBN 3-549-05481-5 Geschichte der Deutschen. Propyläen. Frankfurt/M – Berlin – Wien, 1978, ISBN 3-549-05801-2 Der Kampf um die Weltmeere. München/Zürich, 1980 Im Zeichen des Adlers, Porträts berühmter Preußen. Hrsg. Bergisch Gladbach, 1981 Luther. Eine Biographie. Bergisch Gladbach, 1982, ISBN 3-404-61096-2 Lebensbilder Martin Luthers. Bergisch Gladbach, 1982 Dokumente Deutschen Daseins. Hrsg. Krefeld, 1983 Mut zur Geschichte. 1983, ISBN 3-8334-4593-9 Die Erben Poseidons. Seemachtpolitik im 20.
Jahrh.. München, 1984 Inferiorität als Staatsräson. Hrsg. Krefeld, 1985 Heinrich der Erste. Die Gründung des Deutschen Reichs. Bergisch Gladbach, 1987 Der Fall Rose. Ein Nürnberger Urteil wird widerlegt. Einleitung. Mut-Verlag, Asendorf 1988, ISBN 3-89182-033-X Geschichte macht Mut. Erlangen, 1989 Deutschland Einig Vaterland. Geschichte unserer Gegenwart. Ullstein. Frankfurt/M – Berlin, 1990, ISBN 3-8334-5463-6 Die Großen Ereignisse. Fünf Jahrtausende Weltgeschichte. 6 Bände, Lachen am Zürichsee, 1990 Ein Querkopf braucht kein Alibi: Szenen der Geschichte. Frankfurt/M – Berlin, 1991, ISBN 3-8334-5464-4 Warum so bedrückt? Deutschland hat Zukunft. Hrsg. Hohenrain-Verlag, Tübingen 1992, ISBN 3-89180-034-7. Unsere gestohlene Geschichte. Deutsche Akademie für Bildung und Kultur, München 1992 Handbuch zur Deutschen Nation, Band 4, Deutschlands Einigung und Europas Zukunft. Hrsg. Tübingen, 1992 1979 Kulturpreis für Wissenschaft der Sudetendeutschen Landsmannschaft 1980 Südmährischer Kulturpreis 1980 Johannes Mathesius – Medaille 1983 Kant-Plakette der Deutschen Akademie für Bildung und Kultur 1988 Goldener Ehrenring „Der deutschen Literatur“ des Deutschen Kulturwerkes Europäischen Geistes 1990 Bismarck-Medaille in Gold 1992 Schiller-Preis des Deutschen Kulturwerks Europäischen Geistes Hellmut Diwald Obituary by Alfred Schickel
Laura is a detective novel by Vera Caspary. It is her best known work, was adapted into a popular film in 1944, with Gene Tierney in the title role. Laura ran in Colliers from October to November 1942 as a seven-part serial titled Ring Twice for Laura. Houghton Mifflin republished Laura in book form the next year. In 1946, Caspary sold the story for a fourth time, this time co-writing a theatrical version with George Sklar. Laura achieved an international readership and has been translated into German, Italian and Dutch, it was released as an Armed Services Edition for the American military during World War II. Since its original publication, the novel has been reissued many times. I Books released an edition in 2000. An edition from Feminist Press became available in 2006. In 2015, it was included as part of the Library of America's Women Crime Writers omnibus collection. Like Wilkie Collins' detective novel The Moonstone, Laura is narrated in the first person by several alternating characters.
These individual stories all revolve around the apparent murder of the title character, a successful New York advertiser killed in the doorway of her apartment with a shotgun blast that obliterated her face. Detective Mark McPherson, assigned to the case, begins investigating the two men who were closest to Laura: her former lover, a narcissistic middle-aged writer named Waldo Lydecker, her fiance, the philandering Shelby Carpenter; as he learns more about Laura, Mark – not the most sentimental of men – begins to fall in love with her memory. When Laura turns out to be much alive, she becomes the prime suspect; the novel has some autobiographical elements. Laura Hunt, a smart and beautiful New York advertiser whose career is thriving Mark McPherson, the young homicide detective assigned to the Laura Hunt murder case Waldo Lydecker, an obese middle-aged writer with expensive tastes and Laura's former lover Shelby Carpenter, Laura's fiance, an undistinguished philanderer Diane Redfern, a struggling young model and the actual murder victim Laura is identified, erroneously, as a noir novel, the lead character as a femme fatale.
Laura Hunt, true, is smart, independent and desirable. All these things throw suspicion on her. Morally, Laura's only equal is Mark McPherson, the hardboiled detective who begins by investigating Laura's murder; the falsely impugned heroine, her rescue by her lover, the happy ending put Laura solidly in the romantic suspense genre. What sets it apart is that Laura is no helpless virgin: She has a successful career and a considerable sexual history, but still emerges as sincere and lovable, with domestic urges so strong that she is prepared to marry an unworthy man to fulfill them. McNamara, Eugene. "Laura" as novel and myth. New York: Edwin Mellen Press, 1992. Women Crime Writers: Four Suspense Novels of the 1940s at Library of America.. A Napa Valley Register review of Dreamweaver Theatre's March 2007 performance of Laura, with background information