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The Golden Turkey Awards

The Golden Turkey Awards is a 1980 book by film critic Michael Medved and his brother Harry.

About
The book awards "Golden Turkey Awards" to films judged by the authors as poor in quality, and to directors and actors judged to have created a chronically inept body of work. The book features many low-budget obscurities and exploitation films such as Rat Pfink a Boo Boo, Attack of the 50 Foot Woman, and the apparently lost Him. Other categories include expensive, big studio failures like The Swarm and popular films such as Jesus Christ Superstar.

In the introduction the authors admit that "we know our choices will not please everyone—least of all the actors, producers, writers and directors who are honored in the pages that follow. We further recognize that the number of bad films is so enormous and the competition for the very worst is so intense, that all decisions reached here are subject to considerable second-guessing. Nevertheless, we have researched the subject thoroughly—sitting through more than 2,000 wretched films in the last few years—and we believe that our nominees and award winners can stand the test of time."

The Medveds had previously celebrated bad cinema in the 1978 The Fifty Worst Films of All Time, many of which were also featured in the various Golden Turkey Awards categories. Subsequently, they turned their attention to box office bombs in The Hollywood Hall of Shame. They also published a sequel to The Golden Turkey Awards, Son of Golden Turkey Awards, in 1986. They declared that Son of Golden Turkey Awards "is our last word...we hereby solemnly pledge that the years ahead will produce no further Golden Turkey publications by the Medved Brothers...we now pass the torch to whichever brave souls feel ready to take up the challenge." Son of Golden Turkey Awards also listed a "Who's Who in the World of Bad Movies" at the end of its awards presentations.

The Golden Turkey Awards formed the basis of a 1983 television series The Worst of Hollywood hosted by Michael Medved.

Awards given
In the book The Fifty Worst Films of All Time the authors invited readers to write in nominating their favorite "worst films". More than 3,000 ballots were received. Based on these votes, the Worst Film of All Time award was given to Plan 9 from Outer Space by Ed Wood.

Wood is also awarded the title of Worst Director of All Time, judged by the authors. Raquel Welch is judged the Worst Actress of All Time over nominees including Candice Bergen and Mamie van Doren.

Richard Burton is judged as the Worst Actor of All Time over nominees John Agar, Tony Curtis and Victor Mature. While conceding he is sometimes brilliant, the authors claim Burton's "occasional triumphs only serve to highlight the pathetic waste in most of his films; for every Equus in which he appears there are at least a half-dozen Cleopatras or Boom!s. The authors state that "when he is bad ... well, he's just the pits" and list several "bad" films in which he has appeared: The Sandpiper, Hammersmith Is Out, The Voyage, The Medusa Touch and The Assassination of Trotsky. Another Burton film, Exorcist II: The Heretic, is the book's first runner up in the Worst Film of All Time award based on reader response.

List of Golden Turkey winners

 * Most Embarrassing Movie Debut: Paul Newman in The Silver Chalice
 * Most Ridiculous Movie Monster: Ro-Man from Robot Monster
 * Worst Performance by a Popular Singer: Tony Bennett in The Oscar
 * Worst Title: Rat Pfink a Boo Boo
 * Most Brainless Brain Movie: They Saved Hitler's Brain
 * Most 'Badly Bumbled Bee' Movie: The Swarm
 * Worst Casting: John Wayne as Genghis Khan in The Conqueror
 * Worst Performance by a Politician: United States Congressman and New York City Mayor John Lindsay in Rosebud
 * Worst Two-Headed Transplant Movie: The Thing with Two Heads
 * Worst Rodent Movie: The Food of the Gods
 * Worst Performance by a Novelist: Norman Mailer in Wild 90
 * P.T. Barnum Award for Worst Cinematic Exploitation of a Physical Deformity: The Terror of Tiny Town, a Western film with an all-dwarf cast.
 * Worst Musical Extravaganza: At Long Last Love
 * Worst Performance as a Clergyman or Nun: Mary Tyler Moore in Change of Habit
 * Worst Performance as Jesus Christ: Ted Neeley in Jesus Christ Superstar
 * Worst Blaxploitation Movie: Scream Blacula Scream
 * Biggest Rip-off in Hollywood History: The 1976 version of King Kong
 * Worst Credit Line: The 1929 version of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, "with additional dialogue by Sam Taylor" (this credit does not appear in the surviving prints of the film).
 * Most Unerotic Concept in Pornography: Him, a porn film about a priest with a sexual fixation on Jesus Christ
 * Worst Performance by an Animal: Dinky the Chimp in Tarzan and the Great River. (During filming, Dinky attacked and injured lead actor Mike Henry.)
 * Worst Vegetable Movie: Attack of the Mushroom People
 * Worst Performance by Sonny Tufts: Government Girl
 * Most Ludicrous Racial Impersonation: Marlon Brando as a native of Okinawa in The Teahouse of the August Moon
 * Most Obnoxious Child Performer: David Kory in Dondi
 * Worst Film You Never Saw (category for films never completed or only released in a limited fashion): Billy Jack Goes to Washington
 * Most Inane Technical Advance: Percepto, designed by William Castle for his 1959 film, The Tingler starring Vincent Price. At certain times in the film small vibrators attached to the underside of some seats within the auditorium were activated to give some audience members a tingle.
 * Worst Line of Romantic Dialogue: an exchange between Gary Cooper and Madeleine Carroll in Northwest Mounted Police
 * Worst Director: Ed Wood
 * Worst Actress: Raquel Welch
 * Worst Actor: Richard Burton (a highly controversial choice, considering that he was a seven-time Oscar nominee, noted Shakespearean performer and widely considered one of the world's greatest actors, but made because Burton starred in so many bad films)

In addition, the Golden Turkey Awards had a reader's choice category for Worst Film of All Time, voted upon by readers of The Fifty Worst Films of All Time.
 * First Runner-Up: Exorcist II: The Heretic
 * Worst Film: Plan 9 from Outer Space

Hoax film
One of the films nominated in the book was in fact an invention of the authors, and the book's readers were challenged by them to figure out which film was actually fake. The fake film was Dog of Norway featuring "Muki the Wonder Hound". This film was illustrated using a photo of a co-author's pet dog. The giveaway was that the same dog was in the photo of the authors in the back of the book. Another film in the book, the now-lost 1974 porn film Him, has also been cited as the hoax, though it is definitely known to have existed.

No formal clarification of the hoax film was provided by the subsequent release, The Hollywood Hall of Shame. That book again features the same dog pictured with the authors (as did the subsequent Son of Golden Turkey Awards). In The Hollywood Hall of Shame, in reference to the dish barbecued dog, the authors explain that it was "a snack which produced a mixed reaction among the representatives of an industry that had given the world Lassie, Rin Tin Tin, Benji, Phyllis Diller, and Muki the Wonder Hound."

The "Acknowledgements" page of The Fifty Worst Films of All Time ends with:
 * And love, most of all, to Muki, who was there to understand when the going got rough.

Reception
Betsa Marsh wrote for the Gannett News Service, "In their breezy, irreverent style, bristling with puns and sarcasm, the Medveds take us from one debacle to another... It's a great book to keep with your TV Guide, in your bathroom or even on your coffee table, to impress your friends with your impeccably bad taste."

Some critics took exception to the book's style; Kenneth Tucker wrote, "The line between the witty and the arrogant is indeed hard to draw. At times to me, however, the commentary degenerates into smugness or becomes unnecessarily waspish."

In Film Comment, J. Hoberman was quite hostile, describing The Fifty Worst Films of All Time and The Golden Turkey Awards as "a pair of humorous non-books researched by teenaged Harry Medved and written by his older brother Michael. The Medved position — if we discount its patina of Mad Magazine masochism and resolve to stomach their facetious tone — also suggests that the best bad movies are akin to masterpieces."

title: The Golden Turkey Awards


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George Fox

George Fox (July 1624 – 13 January 1691) was an English Dissenter, who was a founder of the Religious Society of Friends, commonly known as the Quakers or Friends. The son of a Leicestershire weaver, he lived in times of social upheaval and war. He rebelled against the religious and political authorities by proposing an unusual, uncompromising approach to the Christian faith. He travelled throughout Britain as a dissenting preacher, performed hundreds of healings, and was often persecuted by the disapproving authorities.

In 1669, he married Margaret Fell, widow of a wealthy supporter, Thomas Fell; she was a leading Friend. His ministry expanded and he made tours of North America and the Low Countries. He was arrested and jailed numerous times for his beliefs. He spent his final decade working in London to organise the expanding Quaker movement. Despite disdain from some Anglicans and Puritans, he was viewed with respect by the Quaker convert William Penn and the Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell.

Early life and education
Fox was born in the strongly Puritan village of Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire, England (now Fenny Drayton), 15 miles (24 km) west-south-west of Leicester, as the eldest of four children of Christopher Fox, a successful weaver, called "Righteous Christer" by his neighbours, and his wife, Mary née Lago. Christopher Fox was a churchwarden and relatively wealthy. He left his son a substantial legacy when he died in the late 1650s. Fox was of a serious, religious disposition from childhood. There is no record of any formal schooling but he learnt to read and write. "When I came to eleven years of age," he said, "I knew pureness and righteousness; for, while I was a child, I was taught how to walk to be kept pure. The Lord taught me to be faithful, in all things, and to act faithfully two ways; viz., inwardly to God, and outwardly to man." Known as an honest person, he also proclaimed, "The Lord taught me to be faithful in all things ... and to keep to Yea and Nay in all things."

As he grew up, Fox's relatives "thought to have made me a priest" but he was instead apprenticed to a local shoemaker and grazier, George Gee of Mancetter. This suited his contemplative temperament and he became well known for his diligence among the wool traders who had dealings with his master. A constant obsession for Fox was the pursuit of "simplicity" in life – humility and the abandonment of luxury. The short time he spent as a shepherd was important to the formation of this view. Toward the end of his life he wrote a letter for general circulation pointing out that Abel, Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses and David were all keepers of sheep or cattle and so a learned education should not be seen as a necessary qualification for ministry.

George Fox knew people who were "professors" (followers of the standard Church of England), but by the age of 19 he was looking down on their behaviour, in particular their consumption of alcohol. At prayer one night after leaving two acquaintances at a drinking session, Fox heard an inner voice saying, "Thou seest how young people go together into vanity, and old people into the earth; thou must forsake all, young and old, keep out of all, and be as a stranger unto all."

First travels
Driven by his "inner voice", Fox left Drayton-in-the-Clay in September 1643 and moved towards London in a state of mental torment and confusion. The English Civil War had begun and troops were stationed in many towns through which he passed. In Barnet, he was torn by depression (perhaps from the temptations of the resort town near London). He alternately shut himself in his room for days at a time or went out alone into the countryside. After almost a year he returned to Drayton, where he engaged Nathaniel Stephens, the clergyman of his home town, in long discussions on religious matters. Stephens considered Fox a gifted young man, but the two disagreed on so many issues that he later called Fox mad and spoke against him.

Over the next few years Fox continued to travel around the country, as his particular religious beliefs took shape. At times he actively sought the company of clergy, but found no comfort from them as they seemed unable to help with the matters troubling him. One, in Warwickshire, advised him to take tobacco (which Fox disliked) and sing psalms; another, in Coventry, lost his temper when Fox accidentally stood on a flower in his garden; a third suggested bloodletting. Fox became fascinated by the Bible, which he studied assiduously. He hoped to find among the "English Dissenters" a spiritual understanding absent from the established church, but he fell out with one group, for example, because he maintained that women had souls:

"as I had forsaken the priests, so I left the separate preachers also, and those esteemed the most experienced people; for I saw there was none among them all that could speak to my condition. And when all my hopes in them and in all men were gone, so that I had nothing outwardly to help me, nor could tell what to do, then, oh, then, I heard a voice which said, 'There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition'; and when I heard it my heart did leap for joy. Then the Lord let me see why there was none upon the earth that could speak to my condition, namely, that I might give Him all the glory; for all are concluded under sin, and shut up in unbelief as I had been, that Jesus Christ might have the pre-eminence who enlightens, and gives grace, and faith, and power. Thus when God doth work, who shall let (i. e. prevent) it? And this I knew experimentally." He thought intensely about the Temptation of Christ, which he compared to his own spiritual condition, but he drew strength from his conviction that God would support and preserve him. In prayer and meditation he came to a greater understanding of the nature of his faith and what it required from him; this process he called "opening". He also came to what he deemed a deep inner understanding of standard Christian beliefs. Among his ideas were:
 * Rituals can be safely ignored, as long as one experiences a true spiritual conversion.
 * The qualification for ministry is given by the Holy Spirit, not by ecclesiastical study. This implies that anyone has the right to minister, assuming the Spirit guides them, including women and children.
 * God "dwelleth in the hearts of his obedient people": religious experience is not confined to a church building. Indeed, Fox refused to apply the word "church" to a building, using instead the name "steeple-house", a usage maintained by many Quakers today. Fox would just as soon worship in fields and orchards, believing that God's presence could be felt anywhere.
 * Though Fox used the Bible to support his views, Fox reasoned that, because God was within the faithful, believers could follow their own inner guide rather than rely on a strict reading of Scripture or the word of clerics.
 * Fox also made no clear distinction between Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Religious Society of Friends
In 1647 Fox began to preach publicly: in market-places, fields, appointed meetings of various kinds or even sometimes in "steeple-houses" (churches) after the service. His powerful preaching began to attract a small following. It is not clear at what point the Society of Friends was formed, but there was certainly a group of people who often travelled together. At first, they called themselves "Children of the Light" or "Friends of the Truth", and later simply "Friends". Fox seems initially to have had no desire to found a sect, but only to proclaim what he saw as the pure and genuine principles of Christianity in their original simplicity, though he afterward showed great prowess as a religious organiser in the structure he gave to the new society.

There were a great many rival Christian denominations holding very diverse opinions in that period; the atmosphere of dispute and confusion gave Fox an opportunity to put forward his own beliefs through his personal sermons. Fox's preaching was grounded in scripture but was mainly effective because of the intense personal experience he was able to project. He was scathing about immorality, deceit and the exacting of tithes and urged his listeners to lead lives without sin, avoiding the Ranter's antinomian view that a believer becomes automatically sinless. By 1651 he had gathered other talented preachers around him and continued to roam the country despite a harsh reception from some listeners, who would whip and beat them to drive them away. As his reputation spread, his words were not welcomed by all. As an uncompromising preacher, he hurled disputation and contradiction to the faces of his opponents. The worship of Friends in the form of silent waiting punctuated by individuals speaking as the Spirit moved them seems to have been well-established by this time, though it is not recorded how this came to be; Richard Bauman asserts that "speaking was an important feature of the meeting for worship from the earliest days of Quakerism."

Imprisonment
Fox complained to judges about decisions he considered morally wrong, as he did in a letter on the case of a woman due to be executed for theft. He campaigned against paying the tithes intended to fund the established church, which often went into the pockets of absentee landlords or religious colleges distant from the paying parishioners. In his view, as God was everywhere and anyone could preach, the established church was unnecessary and a university qualification irrelevant for a preacher. Conflict with civil authority was inevitable. Fox was imprisoned several times, the first at Nottingham in 1649. At Derby in 1650 he was imprisoned for blasphemy; a judge mocked Fox's exhortation to "tremble at the word of the Lord", calling him and his followers "Quakers". After he refused to fight against the return of the monarchy (or to take up arms for any reason), his sentence was doubled. The refusal to swear oaths or take up arms came to be much more important in his public statements. Refusal to take oaths meant that Quakers could be prosecuted under laws compelling subjects to pledge allegiance and made testifying in court problematic. In a letter of 1652 (That which is set up by the sword), he urged Friends not to use "carnal weapons" but "spiritual weapons", saying, "let the waves [the power of nations] break over your heads".

In 1652, Fox preached for several hours under a walnut tree at Balby, where his disciple Thomas Aldham was instrumental in setting up the first meeting in the Doncaster area. In the same year Fox felt that God led him to ascend Pendle Hill, where he had a vision of many souls coming to Christ. From there he travelled to Sedbergh, where he had heard a group of Seekers was meeting, and preached to over a thousand people on Firbank Fell, convincing many, including Francis Howgill, to accept that Christ might speak to people directly. At the end of the month he stayed at Swarthmoor Hall, near Ulverston, the home of Thomas Fell, vice-chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and his wife, Margaret. Around that time, the ad hoc meetings of Friends began to be formalised and a monthly meeting was set up in County Durham. Margaret became a Quaker, and although Thomas did not convert, his familiarity with the Friends proved influential when Fox was arrested for blasphemy in October. Fell was one of three presiding judges, and the charges were dismissed on a technicality.

Fox remained at Swarthmoor until the summer of 1653, then left for Carlisle, where he was arrested again for blasphemy. It was even proposed to put him to death, but Parliament requested his release rather than have "a young man ... die for religion". Further imprisonments came in London in 1654, Launceston in 1656, Lancaster in 1660, Leicester in 1662, Lancaster again and Scarborough in 1664–1666 and Worcester in 1673–1675. Charges usually included causing a disturbance and travelling without a pass. Quakers fell foul of irregularly enforced laws forbidding unauthorised worship, while actions motivated by belief in social equality – refusing to use or acknowledge titles, take hats off in court or bow to those who considered themselves socially superior – were seen as disrespectful. While imprisoned at Launceston, Fox wrote, "Christ our Lord and master saith 'Swear not at all, but let your communications be yea, yea, and nay, nay, for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.' ... the Apostle James saith, 'My brethren, above all things swear not, neither by heaven, nor by earth, nor by any other oath. Lest ye fall into condemnation.'"

In prison George Fox continued writing and preaching, feeling that imprisonment brought him into contact with people who needed his help—the jailers as well as his fellow prisoners. In his journal, he told his magistrate, "God dwells not in temples made with hands." He also sought to set an example by his actions there, turning the other cheek when being beaten and refusing to show his captors any dejected feelings.

Encounters with Cromwell

Parliamentarians grew suspicious of monarchist plots and fearful that the group travelling with Fox aimed to overthrow the government: by this time his meetings were regularly attracting crowds of over a thousand. In early 1655 he was arrested at Whetstone, Leicestershire and taken to London under armed guard. In March he was brought before the Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell. After affirming that he had no intention of taking up arms, Fox was able to speak to Cromwell for most of the morning about the Friends. He advised him to listen to God's voice and obey it, so that as Fox left, Cromwell "with tears in his eyes said, 'Come again to my house; for if thou and I were but an hour of a day together, we should be nearer one to the other'; adding that he wished [Fox] no more ill than he did to his own soul."

This episode was later recalled as an example of "speaking truth to power", a preaching technique by which subsequent Quakers hoped to influence the powerful. Although not used until the 20th century, the phrase is related to the ideas of plain speech and simplicity which Fox practised, but motivated by the more worldly goal of eradicating war, injustice and oppression.

Fox petitioned Cromwell over the course of 1656 to alleviate the persecution of Quakers. Later that year, they met for a second time at Whitehall. On a personal level, the meeting went well; despite disagreements between the two men, they had a certain rapport. Fox invited Cromwell to "lay down his crown at the feet of Jesus" – which Cromwell declined to do. Fox met Cromwell again twice in March 1657. Their last meeting was in 1658 at Hampton Court, though they could not speak for long or meet again because of the Protector's worsening illness – Fox even wrote that "he looked like a dead man". Cromwell died in September of that year.

James Nayler
One early Quaker convert, the Yorkshireman James Nayler, arose as a prominent preacher in London around 1655. A breach began to form between Fox's and Nayler's followers. As Fox was held prisoner at Launceston, Nayler moved south-westwards towards Launceston intending to meet Fox and heal any rift. On the way he was arrested himself and held at Exeter. After Fox was released from Launceston gaol in 1656, he preached throughout the West Country. Arriving at Exeter late in September, Fox was reunited with Nayler. Nayler and his followers refused to remove their hats while Fox prayed, which Fox took as both a personal slight and a bad example. When Nayler refused to kiss Fox's hand, Fox told Nayler to kiss his foot instead. Nayler was offended and the two parted acrimoniously. Fox wrote that "there was now a wicked spirit risen amongst Friends".

After Nayler's own release later the same year he rode into Bristol triumphantly playing the part of Jesus Christ in a re-enactment of Palm Sunday. He was arrested and taken to London, where Parliament defeated a motion to execute him by 96–82. Instead, they ordered that he be pilloried and whipped through both London and Bristol, branded on his forehead with the letter B (for blasphemer), bored through the tongue with a red-hot iron and imprisoned in solitary confinement with hard labour. Nayler was released in 1659, but he was a broken man. On meeting Fox in London, he fell to his knees and begged Fox's forgiveness. Shortly afterward, Nayler was attacked by thieves while travelling home to his family, and died.

Suffering and growth
The persecutions of these years – with about a thousand Friends in prison by 1657 – hardened Fox's opinions of traditional religious and social practices. In his preaching, he often emphasised the Quaker rejection of baptism by water; this was a useful way of highlighting how the focus of Friends on inward transformation differed from what he saw as the superstition of outward ritual. It was also a deliberate provocation of adherents of those practices, so providing opportunities for Fox to argue with them on matters of scripture. The same pattern appeared in his court appearances: when a judge challenged him to remove his hat, Fox replied by asking where in the Bible such an injunction could be found.

The Society of Friends became increasingly organised towards the end of the decade. Large meetings were held, including a three-day event in Bedfordshire, the precursor of the present Britain Yearly Meeting system. Fox commissioned two Friends to travel around the country collecting the testimonies of imprisoned Quakers, as evidence of their persecution; this led to the establishment in 1675 of Meeting for Sufferings, which has continued to the present day.

The 1650s, when the Friends were at their most confrontational, was one of the most creative periods of their history. Under the Commonwealth, Fox had hoped that the movement would become the major church in England. Disagreements, persecution and increasing social turmoil, however, led Fox to suffer from severe depression, which left him deeply troubled at Reading, Berkshire, for ten weeks in 1658 or 1659. In 1659, he sent parliament his most politically radical pamphlet, Fifty nine Particulars laid down for the Regulating things, but the year was so chaotic that it never considered these; the document was not reprinted until the 21st century.

The Restoration
With the restoration of the monarchy, Fox's dreams of establishing the Friends as the dominant religion seemed at an end. He was again accused of conspiracy, this time against Charles II, and fanaticism – a charge he resented. He was imprisoned in Lancaster for five months, during which he wrote to the king offering advice on governance: Charles should refrain from war and domestic religious persecution, and discourage oath-taking, plays, and maypole games. These last suggestions reveal Fox's Puritan leanings, which continued to influence Quakers for centuries after his death. Once again, Fox was released after demonstrating that he had no military ambitions.

At least on one point, Charles listened to Fox. The 700 Quakers who had been imprisoned under Richard Cromwell were released, though the government remained uncertain about the group's links with other, more violent, movements. A revolt by the Fifth Monarchists in January 1661 led to the suppression of that sect and the repression of other Nonconformists, including Quakers. In the aftermath of this attempted coup, Fox and eleven other Quakers issued a broadside proclaiming what became known among Friends in the 20th century as the "peace testimony", committing themselves to oppose all outward wars and strife as contrary to the will of God. Not all his followers accepted this commitment; Isaac Penington, for example, dissented for a time, arguing that the state had a duty to protect the innocent from evil, if necessary by using military force. Despite the testimony, persecution against Quakers and other dissenters continued.

Penington and others such as John Perrot and John Pennyman were uneasy at Fox's increasing power within the movement. Like Nayler before them, they saw no reason why men should remove their hats for prayer, arguing that men and women should be treated as equals, and if, as according to the apostle Paul, women should cover their heads, then so could men. Perrot and Penington lost the argument. Perrot emigrated to the New World, and Fox retained leadership of the movement.

Parliament enacted laws which forbade non-Anglican religious meetings of more than five people, essentially making Quaker meetings illegal. Fox counselled his followers to violate openly laws that attempted to suppress the movement, and many Friends, including women and children, were jailed over the next quarter-century. Meanwhile, Quakers in New England had been banished (and some executed), and Charles was advised by his councillors to issue a mandamus condemning this practice and allowing them to return. Fox was able to meet some of the New England Friends when they came to London, stimulating his interest in the colonies. Fox was unable to travel there immediately: he was imprisoned again in 1664 for his refusal to swear the oath of allegiance, and on his release in 1666 was preoccupied with organizational matters — he normalised the system of monthly and quarterly meetings throughout the country, and extended it to Ireland.

Visiting Ireland also gave him a chance to preach against what he saw as the excesses of the Roman Catholic Church, in particular the use of ritual. More recent Quaker commentators have noted points of contact between the denominations: both claim the actual presence of God in their meetings, and both allow the collective opinion of the church to augment Biblical teaching. Fox, however, did not perceive this, brought up as he had been in a wholly Protestant environment hostile to "Popery".

Fox married Margaret Fell of Swarthmoor Hall, a lady of high social position and one of his early converts, on 27 October 1669 at a meeting in Bristol. She was ten years his senior and had eight children (all but one of them Quakers) by her first husband, Thomas Fell, who had died in 1658. She was herself very active in the movement, and had campaigned for equality and the acceptance of women as preachers. As there were no priests at Quaker weddings to perform the ceremony, the union took the form of a civil marriage approved by the principals and the witnesses at a meeting. Ten days after the marriage, Margaret returned to Swarthmoor to continue her work there, while George went back to London. Their shared religious work was at the heart of their life together, and they later collaborated on much of the administration the Society required. Shortly after the marriage, Margaret was imprisoned in Lancaster; George remained in the south-east of England, becoming so ill and depressed that for a time he lost his sight.

Travels in North America and Europe

By 1671 Fox had recovered and Margaret had been released by order of the King. Fox resolved to visit the English settlements in North America and the West Indies, remaining there for two years, possibly to counter any remnants of Perrot's teaching there. After a voyage of seven weeks, during which dolphins were caught and eaten, the party arrived in Barbados on 3 October 1671. From there, Fox sent an epistle to Friends spelling out the role of women's meetings in the Quaker marriage ceremony, a point of controversy when he returned home. One of his proposals suggested that the prospective couple should be interviewed by an all-female meeting prior to the marriage to determine whether there were any financial or other impediments. Though women's meetings had been held in London for the last ten years, this was an innovation in Bristol and the north-west of England, which many there felt went too far.

Fox wrote a letter to the governor and assembly of the island in which he refuted charges that Quakers were stirring up the slaves to revolt and tried to affirm the orthodoxy of Quaker beliefs. After a stay in Jamaica, Fox's first landfall on the North American continent was at Maryland, where he participated in a four-day meeting of local Quakers. He remained there while various of his English companions travelled to the other colonies, because he wished to meet some Native Americans who were interested in Quaker ways—though he relates that they had "a great dispute" among themselves about whether to participate in the meeting. Fox was impressed by their general demeanour, which he saw as "courteous and loving". He resented the suggestion (from a man in North Carolina) that "the Light and Spirit of God ... was not in the Indians", a proposition which Fox rejected. Fox left no record of encountering slaves on the mainland.

Elsewhere in the colonies, Fox helped to establish organizational systems for the Friends, along the same lines as he had done in Britain. He also preached to many non-Quakers, some but not all of whom were converted.

After extensive travels round the various American colonies, George Fox returned to England in June 1673 confident that his movement was firmly established there. Back in England, however, he found his movement sharply divided among provincial Friends (such as William Rogers, John Wilkinson and John Story) who resisted establishment of women's meetings and the power of those who resided in or near London. With William Penn and Robert Barclay as allies of Fox, the challenge to Fox's leadership was eventually put down. But in the midst of the dispute, Fox was imprisoned again for refusing to swear oaths after being captured at Armscote, Worcestershire. His mother died shortly after hearing of his arrest and Fox's health began to suffer. Margaret Fell petitioned the king for his release, which was granted, but Fox felt too weak to take up his travels immediately. Recuperating at Swarthmoor, he began dictating what would be published after his death as his journal and devoted his time to his written output: letters, both public and private, as well as books and essays. Much of his energy was devoted to the topic of oaths, having become convinced of its importance to Quaker ideas. By refusing to swear, he felt that he could bear witness to the value of truth in everyday life, as well as to God, whom he associated with truth and the inner light.

For three months in 1677 and a month in 1684, Fox visited the Friends in the Netherlands, and organised their meetings for discipline. The first trip was the more extensive, taking him into what is now Germany, proceeding along the coast to Friedrichstadt and back again over several days. Meanwhile, Fox was participating in a dispute among Friends in Britain over the role of women in meetings, a struggle which took much of his energy and left him exhausted. Returning to England, he stayed in the south to try to end the dispute. He followed with interest the foundation of the colony of Pennsylvania, where Penn had given him over 1000 acre of land. Persecution continued, with Fox arrested briefly in October 1683. Fox's health was worsening, but he continued his activities – writing to leaders in Poland, Denmark, Germany and elsewhere about his beliefs and their treatment of Quakers.

Last years
In the last years of his life, Fox continued to participate in the London Meetings, and still made representations to Parliament about the sufferings of Friends. The new King, James II, pardoned religious dissenters jailed for failure to attend the established church, leading to the release of about 1,500 Friends. Though the Quakers lost influence after the Glorious Revolution, which deposed James II, the Act of Toleration 1689 put an end to the uniformity laws under which Quakers had been persecuted, permitting them to assemble freely.

Two days after preaching as usual at the Gracechurch Street Meeting House in London, George Fox died between 9 and 10 p.m. on 13 January 1690 O.S. (23 January 1691 N.S.). He was interred three days later in the Quaker Burying Ground, in the presence of thousands of mourners.

Book of Miracles
George Fox performed hundreds of healings throughout his preaching ministry, the records of which were collected in a notable but now lost book titled Book of Miracles. This book was listed in the catalogue of George Fox's work maintained by the Library of the Society of Friends at Friends House, London. In 1932, Henry Cadbury found a reference to Book of Miracles in the catalogue, which included the beginning and ending of each account of a miraculous cure. The book was then reconstructed based on this resource and journal accounts. According to Rufus M. Jones, the Book of Miracles "makes it possible for us to follow George Fox as he went about his seventeenth-century world, not only preaching his fresh messages of life and power, but as a remarkable healer of disease with the undoubted reputation of miracle-worker." The Book of Miracles was deliberately suppressed in favour of printing Fox's Journal and other writings.

A sample from Book of Miracles: "And a young woman her mother ... had made her well. And another young woman was ... small pox ... of God was made well."

Journal and letters
Fox's journal was first published in 1694, after editing by Thomas Ellwood – a friend and associate of John Milton – with a preface by William Penn. Like most similar works of its time the journal was not written contemporaneously to the events it describes, but rather compiled many years later, much of it dictated. Parts of the journal were not in fact by Fox at all, but constructed by its editors from diverse sources and written as if by him. The dissent within the movement and the contributions of others to the development of Quakerism are largely excluded from the narrative. Fox portrays himself as always in the right and always vindicated by God's interventions on his behalf. As a religious autobiography, Rufus Jones compared it to such works as Augustine's Confessions and John Bunyan's Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. It is, though, an intensely personal work with little dramatic power that only succeeds in appealing to readers after substantial editing. Historians have used it as a primary source because of its wealth of detail on ordinary life in the 17th century, and the many towns and villages which Fox visited. A notable edition was published in 1852 by Quaker abolitionist Wilson Armistead annotated with historical and biographical footnotes which, according to Armistead, "must materially increase its interest".

Hundreds of Fox's letters – mostly intended for wide circulation, along with a few private communications – were also published. Written from the 1650s onwards, with such titles as Friends, seek the peace of all men or To Friends, to know one another in the light, they give enormous insight into the detail of Fox's beliefs and show his determination to spread them. These writings, in the words of Henry Cadbury, Professor of Divinity at Harvard University and a prominent Quaker, "contain a few fresh phrases of his own, [but] are generally characterized by an excess of scriptural language and today they seem dull and repetitious". Others point out that "Fox's sermons, rich in biblical metaphor and common speech, brought hope in a dark time." Fox's aphorisms found an audience beyond the Quakers, with many other church groups using them to illustrate principles of Christianity.

Fox is described by Ellwood as "graceful in countenance, manly in personage, grave in gesture, courteous in conversation". Penn says he was "civil beyond all forms of breeding". We are told that he was "plain and powerful in preaching, fervent in prayer", "a discerner of other men's spirits, and very much master of his own", skilful to "speak a word in due season to the conditions and capacities of most, especially to them that were weary, and wanted soul's rest"; "valiant in asserting the truth, bold in defending it, patient in suffering for it, immovable as a rock".

Legacy
Fox had a tremendous influence on the Society of Friends and his beliefs have largely been carried forward. Perhaps his most significant achievement, other than his predominant influence in the early movement, was his leadership in overcoming the twin challenges of government prosecution after the Restoration and internal disputes that threatened its stability during the same period. Not all of his beliefs were welcome to all Quakers: his Puritan-like opposition to the arts and rejection of theological study, forestalled development of these practices among Quakers for some time. The George Fox room at Friends House, London, UK is named after him.

Walt Whitman, who was raised by parents inspired by Quaker principles, later wrote: "George Fox stands for something too - a thought - the thought that wakes in silent hours - perhaps the deepest, most eternal thought latent in the human soul. This is the thought of God, merged in the thoughts of moral right and the immortality of identity. Great, great is this thought - aye, greater than all else."

George is remembered in the Church of England with a commemoration on 13 January.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: George Fox


text:
Talk:Giordano Bruno

Bruno Was Burned-At-The Stake Because Of Teaching Reincarnation
The Vatican was very guarded in c. 1600 about controlling the "Gates of Heaven" - the afterlife. They still are. Bruno taught reincarnation and this is probably the #1 reason why the Inquisition burned him at the stake. 2601:589:4800:9090:4043:CCE9:64FF:C66F (talk) 16:58, 28 April 2021 (UTC)

"Some historians contend that the main reason for Bruno's death was indeed his cosmological views"
This is total nonsense. Bruno was not a "scientist" (or what they'd call a "natural philosopher" in those days) -he was a mystic, somewhat analogous to modern-day New Agers like Deepak Chapra. He was not considered a scientist by his contemporaries and did not use the scientific method or even respect this process; he rejected scientific reasoning in favor of his mystical insights. As mentioned elsewhere, Nicholas of Cusa, a high-ranking cardinal, proposed the same many worlds view (this is where Bruno got this idea from) and somehow was never executed for his "cosmological views".

The argument quoted is total pseudo-historical nonsense and should be removed to improve the article's quality. "Some historians" don't think this at all -this line was sourced to one guy. Jonathan f1 (talk) 04:32, 7 July 2023 (UTC)

 * I added an additional source, though you may think that Alexandre Koyré is another "pseudo-historian" who writes "total nonsense". Other historians, like Miguel Ángel Granada (main translator of Giordano Bruno's works in Spanish and one of the most prestigious experts in Bruno's philosophy worldwide), are of the same opinion, among many others. By the way, which sources do yo provide to support your opinions? For instance, any reliable source that suggests that Bruno is "somewhat analogous to modern-day New Agers like Deepak Chapra"? Thank you in advance! PedroAcero76 (talk) 17:42, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

 * I've also added one more source. The statement says nothing about Bruno being a scientist or not, but that the main reason of his condemnation derived from his cosmology, simple as that. Cosmologies may be more or less scientific or not at all. Also, the new source shows that there is a recent trend among the scholars to consider his cosmology as indeed one of the main reasons. Quoting Hilary Gatti : "One of the first and most notable developments consisted in a growing awareness that earlier commentators had indeed been right to consider Bruno's trial as being closely linked to that of Galileo (...) Jean Seidengart underlined the particular emphasis to be found throughout the trial on Bruno's doctrine of a plurality of worlds." and "Bruno, however, by admitting so candidly his distance from the Catholic theology, was indirectly questioning such a system of law, which imposed on his conscience views different from his own. (...) he was doing it in the name of a principle of religious pluralism which derived directly from his cosmology." Best regards! Bafuncius (talk) 19:37, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
 * I did not say that Martinez is a "pseudo-historian" -he's a good historian who makes a convincing case that Bruno's "many worlds" mysticism was part of the reason for his execution. But it was not the only reason, or the central reason, which is the claim I'm objecting to. Bruno's multiplicity of worlds was part of a goody bag of mystical nonsense: he thought these worlds were all divine; he thought the planets and stars were inhabited by souls and governed by spirits; he believed in reincarnation and was a pantheist; and, perhaps more importantly, he rejected transubstantiation. All of these elements combined, not merely his "cosmological views" (which were not separate from this other stuff).
 * And there's an issue where you have "cosmological views" linked to a Wiki page on the science of cosmology. Again, Bruno was not a scientist, did not arrive at these views via scientific reasoning and was not executed for anything to do with science. This is not a small point to make either: Bruno lived in an age when modern science was emerging. Galileo, Kepler, Harriot, Scheiner, Gilbert, Clavius, Vieta, Beeckman etc all did empirical science but Bruno did not and was actively opposed to scientific reasoning and methodology. All of his theories were based on non-empirical mystical speculation.
 * Maybe you could say that Bruno was some sort of "martyr for free speech" (if by "free speech" we mean the freedom to express crackpot ideas that have no basis in evidence, are not reasonable and may contradict religious dogma), but even here it's historically problematic to project a post-Enlightenment idea of "free speech" onto the 16th Century when people had no concept of this. Jonathan f1 (talk) 00:42, 9 July 2023 (UTC)
 * Bafuncius -true, Galileo was not on trial for science either; he was tried for contradicting Church dogma based on a theory that had no scientific backing at the time. Heliocentrism was not consensus science in Galileo's day, so the Church actually had "science" on its side. And Galileo was well aware that most of his contemporaries (actual scientists) disputed the Copernican model.
 * With Bruno it is even worse. Unlike Galileo, Bruno was not a scientist. He was a mystic who did not do empirical science or even believe in the process.
 * "Bruno has the Copernican model of the solar system wrong. He demonstrates total ignorance of the most elementary ideas of geometry, let alone geometric optics. He throws in scraps of pseudoscientific argument, mostly garbled, and proceeds to high-flying speculations that seem disconnected from the preceding or subsequent arguments."
 * Frances Yates described Bruno as a Hermetical magician and wrote that, ''“the legend that Bruno was prosecuted as a philosophical thinker, was burned for his daring views on innumerable worlds or on the movement of the Earth, can no longer stand.”(p. 355)
 * In Plurality of Worlds: The Extraterrestrial Life Debate from Democritus to Kant, Stephen Dick wrote “It is true that he [Bruno] was burned at the stake in Rome in 1600, but the church authorities were almost certainly more distressed at his denial of Christ’s divinity and alleged diabolism than his cosmological doctrines.”(p.10)
 * (Note that Dick has since adjusted his views, but only because Bruno's pantheistic cosmology cannot be coherently separated from his other mysticism -they were all part of the same grab bag of nonsense.)
 * Michael J. Crowe also reached the same conclusion that it is a myth “that Giordano Bruno was martyred for his pluralistic convictions’ about many worlds."(p. 8).
 * If the Bruno affair was "closely linked to Galileo's trial", then why wasn't the ruling on Bruno cited during Galileo's later trial? The Roman Inquisition worked not just by precedent but also case law (see Thomas Mayer's The Roman Inquisition: A Papal Bureaucracy and Its Laws in the Age of Galileo, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013, p.152, 169) - meaning that, if it were true what you say, Bruno's trial would've resulted in a ruling that the Copernican model was at least formally heretical in 1599 and so could've been cited in a 1616 trial. But not only was it not cited during Galileo's trial, but Cardinal Bellarmine put the question to assessment -which means there was no precedent ruling at the time.
 * But you know nothing about any of this and are just randomly quoting scholars without any context. There's also a high likelihood you are totally misinterpreting what Hilary Gatti has written about Bruno, assuming you have even read all her work. In Giordano Bruno and Renaissance Science (Cornell, 2002, p. 3), she wrote that Bruno had “a well-known and clearly expressed distaste for the new mathematics, which he saw as a schematic abstraction attempting to imprison the vital vicissitudes of matter into static formulae of universal validity.” So Hilary Gatti does not dispute the unremarkable fact that Bruno did not join the Scientific Revolution of his period and even rejected its methods.
 * You need to adjust the lead where it describes Bruno as a "cosmological theorist" and links to a page on cosmological science -he was a cosmological mysticist, a totally different thing. There were people doing empirical science in his day - Galileo, Kepler, Harriot, Cardano, Scheiner, Gilbert, Clavius, Vieta, Beeckman etc -but Bruno wasn't one of them. And all that sciency talk about "Copernican model" and "cosmic pluralism" is also irrelevant -he didn't even understand these models and merely borrowed bits and pieces from them in the same way he borrowed from astrology and pantheistic mysticism. And to describe his case as a "landmark in the history of free thought and the emerging sciences" is total nonsense -he was not an "emerging scientist" number one, and secondly "free thought/free speech" is a post-Enlightenment concept and didn't apply to the 16th Century. Jonathan f1 (talk) 20:36, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
 * , you're narrowing the sense of cosmology down to the current scientific one, but look at its Wikipedia page for other meanings: "(it) is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe. The term cosmology was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's Glossographia,[2] and in 1731 taken up in Latin by German philosopher Christian Wolff, in Cosmologia Generalis.[3] Religious or mythological cosmology is a body of beliefs based on mythological, religious, and esoteric literature and traditions of creation myths and eschatology.". Also, there are the sections "Philosophy" and "Religious or mythological cosmology" for it. It is just a matter of that interpretation, there is no issue in saying that ancient and medieval philosophers and theologians had cosmologies, or even that each lay person can have one's own personal cosmology. Bafuncius (talk) 21:44, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
 * Okay, you raise a fair point -that page does indeed include the metaphysical stuff and not just physical science. But why write this:
 * " He is known for his cosmological theories, which conceptually extended to include the then novel Copernican model."
 * Bruno did not even understand the Copernican model; he merely borrowed some bits and pieces of it (see above sources). He had no interest in the scientific debates of his age.
 * And then also:
 * "He proposed that the stars were distant suns surrounded by their own planets (exoplanets), and he raised the possibility that these planets might foster life of their own, a cosmological position known as cosmic pluralism. He also insisted that the universe is infinite and could have no center."
 * All of this language makes it sound like he was doing empirical science, which he was not. His multiple worlds theory also included souls and spirits in these planets and a pantheistic universe. And all of these ideas were obtained via mystical speculation and not by any mathematics or empirical methods. Jonathan f1 (talk) 23:21, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
 * , those affirmations may sound scientific, but they are correct. First, Bruno was a reader of Copernicus, and even a good one at that according to Hilary Gatti ("he shows an overall understanding of Copernicus's text which is much more sophisticated than usually supposed and includes some of the most technically difficult aspects of the new astronomy such as the precession of the equinoxes and even anomalies such as axial precession" ), but yes, more as a philosopher, not a scientist doing experiments. Nevertheless, that first statement has no problems, "he is known for his cosmological theories, which conceptually extended to include the then novel Copernican model". As Gatti says, in the same page of the book link above, "he opened up the universe to a multiplicity of solar systems (...) Above all, his daring and uncompromosing development of universal infinity launched into the post-Copernican cosmological debate a discussion which, although in rather different terms, is still ongoing". In that book, it is evident that his "intuition" were discussed by future astronomers such as Kepler and Brahe, and even them were skeptic of infinite suns, worlds and universe due to their own personal beliefs. Nonetheless, Bruno was cited due to being one of the first who expounded thus in a more philosophically advanced manner during that century. As Gatti concludes here :
 * , those affirmations may sound scientific, but they are correct. First, Bruno was a reader of Copernicus, and even a good one at that according to Hilary Gatti ("he shows an overall understanding of Copernicus's text which is much more sophisticated than usually supposed and includes some of the most technically difficult aspects of the new astronomy such as the precession of the equinoxes and even anomalies such as axial precession" ), but yes, more as a philosopher, not a scientist doing experiments. Nevertheless, that first statement has no problems, "he is known for his cosmological theories, which conceptually extended to include the then novel Copernican model". As Gatti says, in the same page of the book link above, "he opened up the universe to a multiplicity of solar systems (...) Above all, his daring and uncompromosing development of universal infinity launched into the post-Copernican cosmological debate a discussion which, although in rather different terms, is still ongoing". In that book, it is evident that his "intuition" were discussed by future astronomers such as Kepler and Brahe, and even them were skeptic of infinite suns, worlds and universe due to their own personal beliefs. Nonetheless, Bruno was cited due to being one of the first who expounded thus in a more philosophically advanced manner during that century. As Gatti concludes here :

"In this poem Bruno retraces the difficult elaboration of his thought, renewing polemic against the Aristotelian physics and reaffirming his cosmological conception which implies the intuitive surpassing of the closed heliocentric system as expounded by Copernicus. Thus he confers on the universe an infinite dimension. We may indeed consider Bruno to be a 'Philosopher of the Renaissance' in that he occupies the middle position in a line which, if towards the past it reaches back to classical and pre-classical positions concerning natural philosophy and cosmological intuitions, as to the future it would be impossible to deny that he anticipates positions which are scientifically supported in our own days" Bafuncius (talk) 00:15, 11 July 2023 (UTC)

 * A tad late in replying -I apologize, for completely forgetting about this discussion.
 * Bruno "anticipated" modern-day science theories? Wow, I sincerely doubt the legitimacy of the sources you guys are using, or at least your interpretation of these sources. I know we're not allowed to conduct original research (at this point what difference does it make -you guys don't care about any secondary RS I cite), but have a look at a contemporary account of his condemnation by Gaspar Schoppe (and I'm sure you can find this cited in some scholarly sources):
 * ''That Bruno’s homeland was Nola, in the Kingdom of Naples, where he was professed as a Dominican. He already started doubting the Transubstantiation eighteen years ago (what goes beyond the Reason is, as your Chrysostom affirms, repugnant), and had even denied it. Then he began casting doubts on the virginity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (whom Chrysostom himself calls purer than all the Cherubim and Seraphim) and moved to Geneva, where he stayed for two years. But he didn’t completely approve of Calvinism and was therefore forced to leave and go to Lyon and then to Toulouse, before finally settling in Paris. There he performed as a supplementary professor, for he saw that regular professors were compelled to attend Holy Mass. After that, he went to London and published a small book about “the Triumphant Beast”4, that is to say the Pope, for your people accustom to call him “beast” on account of his honour. Then he repaired to Wittenberg and lectured publicly for two years there, if I’m not mistaken.
 * Once again forced to leave Wittenberg, he published a small book entitled De inmenso et infinito itemque de innumerabilibus (if I correctly remember the titles, because I had those books with me in Prague), and then another one entitled De umbris et Idaeis5, and in both of them he teaches the most horrible and absurd things; for example: that there’s a countless amount of Worlds; that a soul can indeed migrate from a body to another body and also to another World; that a single soul can form two bodies, that magic is a good thing and it is allowed to practice it; that the Holy Ghost is none other than the soul of the World and this is what Moses meant when he wrote that it hovered over the waters; that the World exists from everlasting; that Moses performed the miracles through magic, in which he had greater skill than the rest of the Egyptians; that Moses fabricated the Laws himself; that the Holy Scriptures are a fable; that the Devil will be saved; that only the Hebrew descend from Adam and Eve and that the rest of the Nations descend from two people that God made the day before; that Christ was not God, but a distinguished magician that mocked people and because of that he wasn’t crucified but rightly hanged; that the Prophets and Apostles were vile magicians and most of them were hanged. Lastly, it would be an endless task to enumerate the entirety of his absurdities, the ones he asserted in his books but also by word of mouth. In summary, he defended everything that has been said by the pagan philosophers or by any ancient or recent heretic.''
 * Note that not once does Schoppe describe Bruno as a "natural philosopher" (ie scientist) who was condemned for anything to do with "natural philosophy" (ie science): his crimes were all religious heresies and his theories were mystical. You guys are seriously misleading readers with some of the language in this article. Jonathan f1 (talk) 19:27, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

"embraced Calvinism"
Looks like an editor may have engaged in deceptive editing to shoehorn this into the article (although the situation may have come about from other editors changing the sourcing). It was supported solely by a supposed quotation from Singer, paired with a footnote explaining that even she found the evidence unconvincing. However, the book it was cited to is searchable on IA, and the quotation itself was not in the book at all! A search of Google books finds only one 1800s source which suggests this and at least one that suggests that it was untrue. Additional web sources making this claim did not really appear to be reliable. While it is also in Encyclopedia Brittanica, that's a tertiary source and since it does appear to be either an outdated or minority view, this will need better sourcing and the inclusion of opposing views to get a better idea of what current scholarship really thinks about this. Meanwhile I've removed the strong unqualified claim from the lead and the unverifiable quotation from the body, which was the only support for this position in the article. Skyerise (talk) 11:35, 4 June 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Giordano Bruno


text:
Gilles Apap

Gilles Apap (born 21 May 1963) is a French classical violinist. Born in Béjaïa, Algeria, he was raised in Nice, France. In 1985 he won first prize in the contemporary music category at the Yehudi Menuhin Competition. He served as concertmaster with the Santa Barbara Symphony Orchestra for 10 years, but has since focused on his career as a soloist with orchestras around the world.

A virtuosic violinist, Gilles is also known for his interpretations of traditional music from Eastern Europe to America, such as gypsy, Irish, swing or bluegrass.

He recorded three CDs in the 1990s with Sony Classical Records, then formed his own company, Apapaziz Productions. Since 1999, Apapaziz has recorded eight Gilles Apap CDs.

Discography

 * 1994 Gilles Apap and the Transylvanian Mountain Boys: Who? (Sony)
 * 1996 Gilles Apap and the Transylvanian Mountain Boys: Gilles Apap & the Transylvanian Mountain Boys (Sony)
 * 1997 Gilles Apap and the Transylvanian Mountain Boys: d'Ici & d'Ailleurs (Sony)
 * 1999 Enescu, Debussy and Ravel – Sonatas for violin and piano (Apapaziz)
 * 2001 No Piano on That One (Apapaziz)
 * 2002 Vivaldi's Four Seasons (Apapaziz)
 * 2003 Gilles Apap and The Sinfonia Varsovia (Apapaziz)
 * 2006 Gilles Apap: Music for Solo Violin (Apapaziz)
 * 2007 Friends (Apapaziz)
 * 2008 Sans Orchestre (Apapaziz)
 * 2012 Gypsy Tunes… California Style That Is (Apapaziz)

Films

 * 1993 The unknown fiddler of Santa Barbara (Bruno Monsaingeon, Ideale Audience)
 * 1993 Gilles Apap and Friends (Bruno Monsaingeon, Ideale Audience)
 * 1993 Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould
 * 1999 Gilles Apap plays Mozart's Third Concerto (Ideale Audience)
 * 2004 Apap Masala, Gilles Apap in India (Max Jourdan, Ideale Audience)

title: Gilles Apap