text:
Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None (Also sprach Zarathustra: Ein Buch für Alle und Keinen), also translated as Thus Spake Zarathustra, is a work of philosophical fiction written by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche; it was published in four volumes between 1883 and 1885. The protagonist is nominally the historical Zoroaster.

Much of the book consists of discourses by Zarathustra on a wide variety of subjects, most of which end with the refrain, "Thus spoke Zarathustra". The character of Zarathustra first appeared in Nietzsche's earlier book The Gay Science (at §342, which closely resembles §1 of "Zarathustra's Prologue" in Thus Spoke Zarathustra).

The style of Nietzsche's Zarathustra has facilitated varied and often incompatible ideas about what Nietzsche's Zarathustra says. The "[e]xplanations and claims" given by the character of Zarathustra in this work "are almost always analogical and figurative". Though there is no consensus about what Zarathustra means when he speaks, there is some consensus about that which he speaks. Thus Spoke Zarathustra deals with ideas about the Übermensch, the death of God, the will to power, and eternal recurrence.

Origins
Nietzsche was born into, and largely remained within, the Bildungsbürgertum, a sort of highly cultivated middle class. By the time he was a teenager, he had been writing music and poetry. His aunt Rosalie gave him a biography of Alexander von Humboldt for his 15th birthday, and reading this inspired a love of learning "for its own sake". The schools he attended, the books he read, and his general milieu fostered and inculcated his interests in Bildung, or self-development, a concept at least tangential to many in Zarathustra, and he worked extremely hard. He became an outstanding philologist almost accidentally, and he renounced his ideas about being an artist. As a philologist he became particularly sensitive to the transmissions and modifications of ideas, which also bears relevance into Zarathustra. Nietzsche's growing distaste toward philology, however, was yoked with his growing taste toward philosophy. As a student, this yoke was his work with Diogenes Laertius. Even with that work he strongly opposed received opinion. With subsequent and properly philosophical work he continued to oppose received opinion. His books leading up to Zarathustra have been described as nihilistic destruction. Such nihilistic destruction combined with his increasing isolation and the rejection of his marriage proposals (to Lou Andreas-Salomé) devastated him. While he was working on Zarathustra he was walking very much. The imagery of his walks mingled with his physical and emotional and intellectual pains and his prior decades of hard work. What "erupted" was Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

Nietzsche has said that the central idea of Zarathustra is the eternal recurrence. He has also said that this central idea first occurred to him in August 1881: he was near a "pyramidal block of stone" while walking through the woods along the shores of Lake Silvaplana in the Upper Engadine, and he made a small note that read "6,000 feet beyond man and time".

A few weeks after meeting this idea, he paraphrased in a notebook something written by Friedrich von Hellwald about Zarathustra. This paraphrase was developed into the beginning of Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

A year and a half after making that paraphrase, Nietzsche was living in Rapallo. Nietzsche claimed that the entire first part was conceived, and that Zarathustra himself "came over him", while walking. He was regularly walking "the magnificent road to Zoagli" and "the whole Bay of Santa Margherita". He said in a letter that the entire first part "was conceived in the course of strenuous hiking: absolute certainty, as if every sentence were being called out to me".

Nietzsche returned to "the sacred place" in the summer of 1883 and he "found" the second part.

Nietzsche was in Nice the following winter and he "found" the third part.

According to Nietzsche in Ecce Homo it was "scarcely one year for the entire work", and ten days each part. More broadly, however, he said in a letter: "The whole of Zarathustra is an explosion of forces that have been accumulating for decades".

In January 1884 Nietzsche had finished the third part and thought the book finished. But by November he expected a fourth part to be finished by January. He also mentioned a fifth and sixth part leading to Zarathustra's death, "or else he will give me no peace". But after the fourth part was finished he called it "a fourth (and last) part of Zarathustra, a kind of sublime finale, which is not at all meant for the public".

The first three parts were initially published individually and were first published together in a single volume in 1887. The fourth part was written in 1885. While Nietzsche retained mental capacity and was involved in the publication of his works, forty copies of the fourth part were printed at his own expense and distributed to his closest friends, to whom he expressed "a vehement desire never to have the Fourth Part made public". In 1889, however, Nietzsche became significantly incapacitated. In March 1892 part four was published separately, and the following July the four parts were published in a single volume.

Character of Zarathustra
In the 1888 Ecce Homo, Nietzsche explained what he meant by making the Persian figure of Zoroaster the protagonist of his book: "People have never asked me as they should have done, what the name of Zarathustra precisely meant in my mouth, in the mouth of the first immoralist; for that which distinguishes this Persian from all others in the past is the very fact that he was the exact reverse of an immoralist. Zarathustra was the first to see in the struggle between good and evil the essential wheel in the working of things. The translation of morality into the realm of metaphysics, as force, cause, end-in-itself, is his work. But the very question suggests its own answer. Zarathustra created this most portentous of all errors,—morality; therefore he must be the first to expose it. Not only because he has had longer and greater experience of the subject than any other thinker,—all history is indeed the experimental refutation of the theory of the so-called moral order of things,—but because of the more important fact that Zarathustra was the most truthful of thinkers. In his teaching alone is truthfulness upheld as the highest virtue—that is to say, as the reverse of the cowardice of the "idealist" who takes to his heels at the sight of reality. Zarathustra has more pluck in his body than all other thinkers put together. To tell the truth and to aim straight: that is the first Persian virtue. Have I made myself clear? ... The overcoming of morality by itself, through truthfulness, the moralist's overcoming of himself in his opposite—in me—that is what the name Zarathustra means in my mouth." Thus, "[a]s Nietzsche admits himself, by choosing the name of Zarathustra as the prophet of his philosophy in a poetical idiom, he wanted to pay homage to the original Aryan prophet as a prominent founding figure of the spiritual-moral phase in human history, and reverse his teachings at the same time, according to his fundamental critical views on morality. The original Zoroastrian world-view interpreted being on the basis of the universality of the moral values and saw the whole world as an arena of the struggle between two fundamental moral elements, Good and Evil, depicted in two antagonistic divine figures [ Ahura Mazda and Ahriman]. Nietzsche’s Zarathustra, in contrast, puts forward his ontological immoralism and tries to prove and reestablish the primordial innocence of beings by destroying philosophically all moralistic interpretations and evaluations of being".

First part
The book begins with a prologue which sets up many of the themes that will be explored throughout the work. Zarathustra is introduced as a hermit who has lived ten years on a mountain with his two companions, an eagle and a serpent. One morning – inspired by the sun, which is happy only when it shines upon others – Zarathustra decides to return to the world and share his wisdom. Upon descending the mountain, he encounters a saint living in a forest, who spends his days praising God. Zarathustra marvels that the saint has not yet heard that "God is dead".

Arriving at the nearest town, Zarathustra addresses a crowd which has gathered to watch a tightrope walker. He tells them that mankind's goal must be to create something superior to itself – a new type of human, the Übermensch. All men, he says, must be prepared to will their own destruction in order to bring the Übermensch into being. The crowd greets this speech with scorn and mockery, and meanwhile the tightrope show begins. When the rope-dancer is halfway across, a clown comes up behind him, urging him to get out of the way. The clown then leaps over the rope-dancer, causing the latter to fall to his death. The crowd scatters; Zarathustra takes the corpse of the rope-dancer on his shoulders, carries it into the forest, and lays it in a hollow tree. He decides that from this point on, he will no longer attempt to speak to the masses, but only to a few chosen disciples.

There follows a series of discourses in which Zarathustra overturns many of the precepts of Christian morality. He gathers a group of disciples, but ultimately abandons them, saying that he will not return until they have disowned him.

Second part
Zarathustra retires to his mountain cave, and several years pass by. One night, he dreams that he looks into a mirror and sees the face of a devil instead of his own; he takes this as a sign that his doctrines are being distorted by his enemies, and joyfully descends the mountain to recover his lost disciples.

More discourses follow, which continue to develop the themes of the death of God and the rise of the Übermensch, and also introduce the concept of the will to power. There are hints, however, that Zarathustra is holding something back. A series of dreams and visions prompt him to reveal this secret teaching, but he cannot bring himself to do so. He withdraws from his disciples once more, in order to perfect himself.

Third part
While journeying home, Zarathustra is waylaid by the spirit of gravity, a dwarf-like creature which clings to his back and whispers taunts into his ear. Zarathustra at first becomes despondent, but then takes courage; he challenges the spirit to hear the "abysmal thought" which he has so far refrained from speaking. This is the doctrine of eternal recurrence. Time, says Zarathustra, is infinite, stretching both forward and backward into eternity. This means that everything that happens now must have happened before, and that every moment must continue to repeat itself eternally.

As he speaks, Zarathustra hears a dog howl in terror, and then he sees a new vision – a shepherd choking on a black serpent which has crept into his throat. At Zarathustra's urging, the shepherd bites the serpent's head off and spits it out. In that moment, the shepherd is transformed into a laughing, radiant being, something greater than human.

Zarathustra continues his journey, delivering more discourses inspired by his observations. Arriving at his mountain cave, he remains there for some time, reflecting on his mission. He is disgusted at humanity's pettiness, and despairs at the thought of the eternal recurrence of such an insignificant race. Eventually, however, he discovers his own longing for eternity, and sings a song in celebration of eternal return.

Fourth part
Zarathustra begins to grow old as he remains secluded in his cave. One day, he is visited by a soothsayer, who says that he has come to tempt Zarathustra to his final sin – compassion (mitleiden, which can also be translated as "pity"). A loud cry of distress is heard, and the soothsayer tells Zarathustra that "the higher man" is calling to him. Zarathustra is alarmed, and rushes to the aid of the higher man.

Searching through his domain for the person who uttered the cry for help, Zarathustra encounters a series of characters representative of various aspects of humanity. He engages each of them in conversation, and ends by inviting each one to await his return in his cave. After a day's search, however, he is unable to find the higher man. Returning home, he hears the cry of distress once more, now coming from inside his own cave. He realises that all the people he has spoken to that day are collectively the higher man. Welcoming them to his home, he nevertheless tells them that they are not the men he has been waiting for; they are only the precursors of the Übermensch.

Zarathustra hosts a supper for his guests, which is enlivened by songs and arguments, and ends in the facetious worship of a donkey. The higher men thank Zarathustra for relieving them of their distress and teaching them to be content with life.

The following morning, outside his cave, Zarathustra encounters a lion and a flock of doves, which he interprets as a sign that those whom he calls his children are near. As the higher men emerge from the cave, the lion roars at them, causing them to cry out and flee. Their cry reminds Zarathustra of the soothsayer's prediction that he would be tempted into feeling compassion for the higher man. He declares that this is over, and that from this time forward he will think of nothing but his work.

Themes
Scholars have argued that "the worst possible way to understand Zarathustra is as a teacher of doctrines". Nonetheless Thus Spoke Zarathustra "has contributed most to the public perception of Nietzsche as philosopher – namely, as the teacher of the 'doctrines' of the will to power, the overman and the eternal return".

Will to power
Nietzsche's thinking was significantly influenced by the thinking of Arthur Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer emphasised will, and particularly will to live. Nietzsche emphasised Wille zur Macht, or will to power.

Nietzsche was not a systematic philosopher and left much of what he wrote open to interpretation. Receptive fascists are said to have misinterpreted the will to power, having overlooked Nietzsche's distinction between Kraft ("force" or "strength") and Macht ("power" or "might").

Scholars have often had recourse to Nietzsche's notebooks, where will to power is described in ways such as "willing-to-become-stronger [Stärker-werden-wollen], willing growth".

Übermensch
It is allegedly "well-known that as a term, Nietzsche’s Übermensch derives from Lucian of Samosata's hyperanthropos". This hyperanthropos, or "overman," appears in Lucian's Menippean satire Κατάπλους ἢ Τύραννος, usually translated Downward Journey or The Tyrant. This hyperanthropos is "imagined to be superior to others of 'lesser' station in this-worldly life and the same tyrant after his (comically unwilling) transport into the underworld". Nietzsche celebrated Goethe as an actualisation of the Übermensch.

Eternal recurrence

Nietzsche included some brief writings on eternal recurrence in his earlier book The Gay Science. Zarathustra also appeared in that book. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, the eternal recurrence is, according to Nietzsche, the "fundamental idea of the work".

Interpretations of the eternal recurrence have mostly revolved around cosmological and attitudinal and normative principles.

As a cosmological principle, it has been supposed to mean that time is circular, that all things recur eternally. A weak attempt at proof has been noted in Nietzsche's notebooks, and it is not clear to what extent, if at all, Nietzsche believed in the truth of it. Critics have mostly dealt with the cosmological principle as a puzzle of why Nietzsche might have touted the idea.

As an attitudinal principle it has often been dealt with as a thought experiment, to see how one would react, or as a sort of ultimate expression of life-affirmation, as if one should desire eternal recurrence.

As a normative principle, it has been thought of as a measure or standard, akin to a "moral rule".

Criticism of religion
Nietzsche studied extensively and was very familiar with Schopenhauer and Christianity and Buddhism, each of which he considered nihilistic and "enemies to a healthy culture". Thus Spoke Zarathustra can be understood as a "polemic" against these influences.

Though Nietzsche "probably learned Sanskrit while at Leipzig from 1865 to 1868", and "was probably one of the best read and most solidly grounded in Buddhism for his time among Europeans", Nietzsche was writing when Eastern thought was only beginning to be acknowledged in the West, and Eastern thought was easily misconstrued. Nietzsche's interpretations of Buddhism were coloured by his study of Schopenhauer, and it is "clear that Nietzsche, as well as Schopenhauer, entertained inaccurate views of Buddhism". An egregious example has been the idea of śūnyatā as "nothingness" rather than "emptiness". "Perhaps the most serious misreading we find in Nietzsche's account of Buddhism was his inability to recognize that the Buddhist doctrine of emptiness was an initiatory stage leading to a reawakening". Nietzsche dismissed Schopenhauer and Christianity and Buddhism as pessimistic and nihilistic, but, according to Benjamin A. Elman, "[w]hen understood on its own terms, Buddhism cannot be dismissed as pessimistic or nihilistic". Moreover, answers which Nietzsche assembled to the questions he was asking, not only generally but also in Zarathustra, put him "very close to some basic doctrines found in Buddhism". An example is when Zarathustra says that "the soul is only a word for something about the body".

Nihilism
It has been often repeated in some way that Nietzsche takes with one hand what he gives with the other. Accordingly, interpreting what he wrote has been notoriously slippery. One of the most vexed points in discussions of Nietzsche has been whether or not he was a nihilist. Though arguments have been made for either side, what is clear is that Nietzsche was at least interested in nihilism.

As far as nihilism touched other people, at least, metaphysical understandings of the world were progressively undermined until people could contend that "God is dead". Without God, humanity was greatly devalued. Without metaphysical or supernatural lenses, humans could be seen as animals with primitive drives which were or could be sublimated. According to Hollingdale, this led to Nietzsche's ideas about the will to power. Likewise, "Sublimated will to power was now the Ariadne's thread tracing the way out of the labyrinth of nihilism".

Style

The nature of the text is musical and operatic. While working on it Nietzsche wrote "of his aim 'to become Wagner's heir'". Nietzsche thought of it as akin to a symphony or opera. "No lesser a symphonist than Gustav Mahler corroborates: 'His Zarathustra was born completely from the spirit of music, and is even "symphonically constructed"'". Nietzsche"later draws special attention to "the tempo of Zarathustra's speeches" and their "delicate slowness" – "from an infinite fullness of light and depth of happiness drop falls after drop, word after word" –  as well as the necessity of "hearing properly the tone that issues from his mouth, this halcyon tone"." The length of paragraphs and the punctuation and the repetitions all enhance the musicality. The title is Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Much of the book is what Zarathustra said. What Zarathustra says "is throughout so highly parabolic, metaphorical, and aphoristic. Rather than state various claims about virtues and the present age and religion and aspirations, Zarathustra speaks about stars, animals, trees, tarantulas, dreams, and so forth. Explanations and claims are almost always analogical and figurative."

Nietzsche would often appropriate masks and models to develop himself and his thoughts and ideas, and to find voices and names through which to communicate. While writing Zarathustra, Nietzsche was particularly influenced by "the language of Luther and the poetic form of the Bible". But Zarathustra also frequently alludes to or appropriates from Hölderlin's Hyperion and Goethe's Faust and Emerson's Essays, among other things. It is generally agreed that the sorcerer is based on Wagner and the soothsayer is based on Schopenhauer.

The original text contains a great deal of word-play. For instance, words beginning with über ('over, above') and ('down, below') are often paired to emphasise the contrast, which is not always possible to bring out in translation, except by coinages. An example is untergang (lit. 'down-going'), which is used in German to mean 'setting' (as in, of the sun), but also 'sinking', 'demise', 'downfall', or 'doom'. Nietzsche pairs this word with its opposite übergang ('over-going'), used to mean 'transition'. Another example is übermensch ('overman' or 'superman').

Reception
Nietzsche considered Thus Spoke Zarathustra his magnum opus, writing:

In a letter of February 1884, he wrote:

"With Zarathustra I believe I have brought the German language to its culmination. After Luther and Goethe there was still a third step to be made."

To this, Parkes has said: "Many scholars believe that Nietzsche managed to make that step". But critical opinion varies extremely. The book is "a masterpiece of literature as well as philosophy" and "in large part a failure".

The style of the book, along with its ambiguity and paradoxical nature, has helped its eventual enthusiastic reception by the reading public, but has frustrated academic attempts at analysis (as Nietzsche may have intended). Thus Spoke Zarathustra remained unpopular as a topic for scholars (especially those in the Anglo-American analytic tradition) until the latter half of the 20th century brought widespread interest in Nietzsche and his unconventional style.

The critic Harold Bloom criticized Thus Spoke Zarathustra in The Western Canon (1994), calling the book "a gorgeous disaster" and "unreadable". Other commentators have suggested that Nietzsche's style is intentionally ironic for much of the book.

English translations
The first English translation of Zarathustra was published in 1896 by Alexander Tille.

Common (1909)
Thomas Common published a translation in 1909 which was based on Alexander Tille's earlier attempt.

Kaufmann's introduction to his own translation included a blistering critique of Common's version; he notes that in one instance, Common has taken the German "most evil" and rendered it "baddest", a particularly unfortunate error not merely for his having coined the term "baddest", but also because Nietzsche dedicated a third of The Genealogy of Morals to the difference between "bad" and "evil". This and other errors led Kaufmann to wonder whether Common "had little German and less English".

The German text available to Common was considerably flawed.

From Zarathustra's Prologue: "The Superman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say: The Superman shall be the meaning of the earth! I conjure you, my brethren, remain true to the earth, and believe not those who speak unto you of superearthly hopes! Poisoners are they, whether they know it or not."

Kaufmann (1954) and Hollingdale (1961)
The Common translation remained widely accepted until more critical translations, titled Thus Spoke Zarathustra, were published by Walter Kaufmann in 1954, and R.J. Hollingdale in 1961.

Clancy Martin states the German text from which Hollingdale and Kaufmann worked was untrue to Nietzsche's own work in some ways. Martin criticizes Kaufmann for changing punctuation, altering literal and philosophical meanings, and dampening some of Nietzsche's more controversial metaphors. Kaufmann's version, which has become the most widely available, features a translator's note suggesting that Nietzsche's text would have benefited from an editor; Martin suggests that Kaufmann "took it upon himself to become [Nietzsche's] editor".

Kaufmann, from Zarathustra's Prologue: "The overman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say: the overman shall be the meaning of the earth! I beseech you, my brothers, remain faithful to the earth, and do not believe those who speak to you of otherworldly hopes! Poison-mixers are they, whether they know it or not."

Hollingdale, from Zarathustra's Prologue: "The Superman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say: the Superman shall be the meaning of the earth! I entreat you, my brothers, remain true to the earth, and do not believe those who speak to you of superterrestrial hopes! They are poisoners, whether they know it or not."

Parkes (2005)
Graham Parkes describes his own 2005 translation as trying to convey the musicality of the text.

Del Caro (2006)
In 2006, Cambridge University Press published a translation by Adrian Del Caro, edited by Robert Pippin.

English

 * Thus Spake Zarathustra, translated by Alexander Tille. New York: Macmillan. 1896.
 * Thus Spake Zarathustra, trans. Thomas Common. Edinburgh: T. N. Foulis. 1909.
 * Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Random House. 1954.
 * Reprints: In The Portable Nietzsche, New York: Viking Press. 1954; Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. 1976
 * Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. R. J. Hollingdale. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. 1961.
 * Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. Graham Parkes. Oxford: Oxford World's Classics. 2005.
 * Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. Clancy Martin. Barnes & Noble Books. 2005.
 * Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. Adrian del Caro and edited by Robert Pippin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2006.
 * Thus Spake Zarathustra, trans. Michael Hulse. New York Review Books. 2022.

German

 * Also sprach Zarathustra, edited by Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari. Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag (study edition of the standard German Nietzsche edition).
 * Also sprach Zarathustra (bilingual ed.) (in German and Russian), with 20 oil paintings by Lena Hades. Moscow: Institute of Philosophy, Russian Academy of Sciences. 2004. ISBN 5-9540-0019-0.

English

 * Nietzsche's 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra': Before Sunrise (essay collection), edited by James Luchte. London: Bloomsbury Publishing. 2008. ISBN 1-84706-221-0.
 * Higgins, Kathleen. [1987]. 2010. Nietzsche's Zarathustra (rev. ed.). Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
 * OSHO. 1987. "Zarathustra: A God That Can Dance". Pune, India: OSHO Commune International.
 * OSHO. 1987. "Zarathustra: The Laughing Prophet". Pune, India: OSHO Commune International.
 * Lampert, Laurence. 1989. Nietzsche's Teaching: An Interpretation of Thus Spoke Zarathustra. New Haven: Yale University Press.
 * Rosen, Stanley. 1995. The Mask of Enlightenment: Nietzsche's Zarathustra. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
 * 2nd ed. New Haven: Yale University Press. 2004.
 * Seung, T. K. 2005. Nietzsche's Epic of the Soul: Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books.

German

 * Naumann, Gustav. 1899–1901. Zarathustra-Commentar (in German), 4 vols. Leipzig: Haessel.
 * Zittel, Claus. 2011. Das ästhetische Kalkül von Friedrich Nietzsches 'Also sprach Zarathustra'. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann. ISBN 978-3-8260-4649-0.
 * Schmidt, Rüdiger. "Introduction" (in German). In Nietzsche für Anfänger: Also sprach Zarathustra – Eine Lese-Einführung.
 * Zittel, Claus: Wer also erzählt Nietzsches Zarathustra?, in: Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Geistesgeschichte 95, (2021), 327–351.

title: Thus Spoke Zarathustra


text:
Bach flower remedies

Bach flower remedies (BFRs) are solutions of brandy and water—the water containing extreme dilutions of flower material developed by Edward Bach, an English homeopath, in the 1930s. Bach claimed that the dew found on flower petals retains the supposed healing properties of that plant. Systematic reviews of clinical trials of Bach flower solutions have found no efficacy beyond that of a placebo.

Description
The Bach flower remedy solutions, which contain a 50:50 mix of water and brandy, are called mother tincture. Stock remedies—the solutions sold in shops—are dilutions of mother tincture into other liquid. Most often the liquid used is alcohol, so that the alcohol level by volume in most stock Bach remedies is between 25 and 40% (50 to 80 proof). The solutions do not have a characteristic scent or taste of the plant because of dilution. The dilution process results in the statistical likelihood that little more than a single molecule may remain; it is claimed that the remedies contain "energetic" or "vibrational" nature of the flower and that this can be transmitted to the user. The solutions are described by some as vibrational medicines, which implies they rely on the pseudoscientific concept of water memory. They are often labeled as homeopathic because they are extremely diluted in water, but are not homeopathy as they do not follow other homeopathic ideas such as the law of similars.

Effectiveness
In a 2002 database review of randomized trials Edzard Ernst concluded:

"The hypothesis that flower remedies are associated with effects beyond a placebo response is not supported by data from rigorous clinical trials."

All randomized double-blind studies, whether finding for or against the solutions, have suffered from small cohort sizes but the studies using the best methods found no effect over placebo. The most likely means of action for flower remedies is as placebos, enhanced by introspection on the patient's emotional state, or simply being listened to by the practitioner. The act of selecting and taking a remedy may act as a calming ritual.

A systematic review in 2009 concluded: "Most of the available evidence regarding the efficacy and safety of BFRs has a high risk of bias. We conclude that, based on the reported adverse events in these six trials, BFRs are probably safe. Few controlled prospective trials of BFRs for psychological problems and pain exist. Our analysis of the four controlled trials of BFRs for examination anxiety and ADHD indicates that there is no evidence of benefit compared with a placebo intervention."

A newer systematic review published in 2010 by Ernst concluded: "All placebo-controlled trials failed to demonstrate efficacy. It is concluded that the most reliable clinical trials do not show any differences between flower remedies and placebos."

Flower remedies are sometimes promoted as being capable of boosting the immune system, but "there is no scientific evidence to prove that flower remedies can control, cure or prevent any type of disease, including cancer".

Use
Each solution is used alone or in conjunction with other solutions, and each flower is said by advocates to impart specific qualities. Remedies are usually taken orally.

The solutions may be recommended by a naturopath or by a trained Bach flower practitioner after an interview.. Neither of these are licensed medical professionals.

The best known solution product is the Rescue Remedy combination, which contains an equal amount each of rock rose, impatiens, clematis, star of Bethlehem and cherry plum remedies. Rescue Remedy is a trademark and other companies produce the same formula under other names, such as Five Flower Remedy. Rescue Cream contains the same remedies in a cream form, with the addition of crab apple.

Philosophy
Bach believed that illness was the result of a conflict between the purposes of the soul and the personality's actions and outlook. This internal war, according to Bach, leads to negative moods and to "energy blocking", thought to cause a lack of "harmony", thus leading to physical diseases.

Bach derived his solutions intuitively and based on his perceived psychic connections to the plants, rather than using research based on scientific methods. If Bach felt a negative emotion, he would hold his hand over different plants, and if one alleviated the emotion, he would ascribe the power to heal that emotional problem to that plant. He imagined that early-morning sunlight passing through dew-drops on flower petals transferred the healing power of the flower onto the water, so he would collect the dew drops from the plants and preserve the dew with an equal amount of brandy to produce a mother tincture which would be further diluted before use. Later, he found that the amount of dew he could collect was not sufficient, so he would suspend flowers in spring water and allow the sun's rays to pass through them. If this was impractical because of lack of sunlight or other reasons, he wrote that the flowers may be boiled. The result of this process Bach termed the "mother tincture", which is then further diluted before sale or use.

Bach was satisfied with the method, because of its simplicity, and because it involved a process of combination of the four elements:

"The earth to nurture the plant, the air from which it feeds, the sun or fire to enable it to impart its power, and water to collect and be enriched with its beneficent magnetic healing."

By the time of his death in 1936 at 50 years of age, Bach had created a system of 38 different flower remedies along with their corresponding theories of ailments.

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

title: Bach flower remedies


text:
Talk:Inflation (cosmology)

= "three-dimensional sphere" ? == In the text "three-dimensional sphere" links to the article on "3-sphere" and I suggest to change "three-dimensional sphere" to "3-sphere" because the former suggests to actually be a 2-sphere, i.e. a 2-dimensional "equidistance-object" embedded in 3D. --46.91.59.169 (talk) 13:31, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

Hypothesis / Theory
The first introductory sentence of the article calls the Cosmic Inflation a "theory", making a false impression that it is an established scientific fact. There is still a debate about the validity of this hypothesis in the scientific community. Calling something a Scientific theory requires a much higher level of validation and experimental/observational testing. The phrasing is also in contrast with articles in other languages: German, French, Italian and Russian versions in different ways, but all mention the hypothetical nature of the subject at the outset.

I suggest changing the wording completely - by calling it a "hypothesis" or a "model". Or, at least, add a clarification that it "...is a theory that hypothesizes a period of exponential expansion of space...". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kanishev~enwiki (talk • contribs) 18:38, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

 * @Kanishev~enwiki
 * I agree. I think the most accurate description of the current situation is that it "is a collection of theoretical models that hypothesized a period of exponential expansion of space...". I hope someone would change the current language in the article.
 * CA2MI (talk) 17:16, 3 October 2022 (UTC)
 * All theories are provisional. While there is certainly research exploring alternative models, and some disturbing data from Webb, there is too much evidence supporting the old "Big Bang" and newer hyper-inflationary models to label them as mere hypotheses. --Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 11:41, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
 * All theories are provisional. While there is certainly research exploring alternative models, and some disturbing data from Webb, there is too much evidence supporting the old "Big Bang" and newer hyper-inflationary models to label them as mere hypotheses. --Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 11:41, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Singularity?
A recent edit removed a reference to the initial singularity with a comment mentioning Quantum Mechanics. I believe that the literature describe the big bang from a classical General Relativity perspective, especially in the early days, and that no definitive answer will be available until there is a viable Quantum Gravity theory. Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 12:45, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Inflation (cosmology)


text:
Chorditis

Chorditis is the inflammation of vocal cords (vocal folds) usually as a result of voice abuse but sometimes because of cancer.

Types

 * Chorditis fibrinosa
 * Chorditis nodosa
 * Chorditis tuberosa

title: Chorditis


text:
Heavenly Stems

The ten Heavenly Stems (or Celestial Stems ) are a system of ordinals indigenous to China and used throughout East Asia, first attested c. 1250 BCE during the Shang dynasty as the names of the ten days of the week. They were also used in Shang-era rituals in the names of dead family members, who were offered sacrifices on the corresponding day of the Shang week. Stems are no longer used as names for the days of the week, but have acquired many other uses. Most prominently, they have been used in conjunction with the associated set of twelve Earthly Branches in the compound sexagenary cycle, an important feature of historical Chinese calendars.

Origin
The Shang people believed that there were ten suns, each of which appeared in order in a ten-day cycle (旬; xún). The Heavenly Stems (tiāngān 天干) were the names of the ten suns, which may have designated world ages as did the Five Suns and the Six Ages of the World of Saint Augustine. They were found in the given names of the kings of the Shang in their Temple Names. These consisted of a relational term (Father, Mother, Grandfather, Grandmother) to which was added one of the ten gān names (e.g. Grandfather Jia). These names are often found on Shang bronzes designating whom the bronze was honoring (and on which day of the week their rites would have been performed, that day matching the day designated by their name). David Keightley, a leading scholar of ancient China and its bronzes, believes that the gān names were chosen posthumously through divination. Some historians think the ruling class of the Shang had ten clans, but it is not clear whether their society reflected the myth or vice versa. The associations with Yin-Yang and the Five Elements developed later, after the collapse of the Shang Dynasty.

Jonathan Smith has proposed that the heavenly stems predate the Shang and originally referred to ten asterisms along the ecliptic, of which their oracle bone script characters were drawings; he identifies similarities between these and asterisms in the later Four Images and Twenty-Eight Mansions systems. These would have been used to track the moon's progression along its monthly circuit, in conjunction with the earthly branches referring to its phase.

The literal meanings of the characters were, and are now, roughly as follows. Among the modern meanings, those deriving from the characters' position in the sequence of Heavenly Stems are in italics.

Current usage
The Stems are still commonly used nowadays in East Asian counting systems similar to the way the alphabet is used in English. For example:
 * Korea and Japan also use heavenly stems on legal documents in this way. In Korea, letters gap (甲) and eul (乙) are consistently used to denote the larger and the smaller contractor (respectively) in a legal contract, and are sometimes used as synonyms for such; this usage is also common in the Korean IT industry.
 * Chinese mathematician Li Shanlan developed a system using the heavenly stems and terrestrial branches to represent English letters in advanced mathematics. In Li's system, the first ten letters (a-j) are represented by the heavenly stems, the next twelve letters (k-v) are represented by the terrestrial branches, and the final four letters (w-z) are represented by ("matter"),  ("heaven"),  ("earth"), and  ("human"), respectively. The radical '口' (the 'mouth' radical) may be added to the corresponding heavenly stem, terrestrial branch, or any of '物', '天', '地', and '人' to denote an upper-case letter (e.g. a=甲, A=呷, d=丁, D=叮).
 * Choices on multiple choice exams, surveys, etc.
 * Organic chemicals (e.g. methanol: 甲醇 jiǎchún; ethanol: 乙醇 yǐchún). See Organic nomenclature in Chinese.
 * Diseases (Hepatitis A: 甲型肝炎 jiǎxíng gānyán; Hepatitis B: 乙型肝炎 yǐxíng gānyán)
 * Sports leagues (Serie A: 意甲 yìjiǎ)
 * Vitamins (although currently, in this case, the Latin letters are usually used)
 * Characters conversing in a short text (甲 speaks first, 乙 answers)
 * Students' grades in Taiwan: with an additional Yōu (優 "Excellence") before the first Heavenly Stem Jiǎ. Hence, American grades A, B, C, D and F correspond to 優, 甲, 乙, 丙 and 丁 (yōu, jiǎ, yǐ, bǐng, dīng).
 * In astrology and Feng Shui. The Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches form the four pillars of Chinese metaphysics in Qi Men Dun Jia and Da Liu Ren.

title: Heavenly Stems


text:
List of voice disorders

Voice disorders are medical conditions involving abnormal pitch, loudness or quality of the sound produced by the larynx and thereby affecting speech production. These include:

 * Vocal fold nodules
 * Vocal fold cysts
 * Vocal cord paresis
 * Reinke's edema
 * Spasmodic dysphonia
 * Foreign accent syndrome
 * Bogart–Bacall syndrome
 * Laryngeal papillomatosis
 * Laryngitis
 * Laryngeal papillomatosis
 * Laryngitis

title: List of voice disorders


text:
Nodule

Nodule may refer to:

 * Nodule (geology), a small rock or mineral cluster
 * Manganese nodule, a metallic concretion found on the seafloor
 * Nodule (medicine), a small aggregation of cells
 * Root nodule, a growth on the roots of legumes
 * A feature of mollusc sculpture
 * Nodule of vermis, an external feature of the cerebellum

title: Nodule


text:
Vocal cord nodule

Vocal cord nodules are bilaterally symmetrical benign white masses that form at the midpoint of the vocal folds. Although diagnosis involves a physical examination of the head and neck, as well as perceptual voice measures, visualization of the vocal nodules via laryngeal endoscopy remains the primary diagnostic method. Vocal fold nodules interfere with the vibratory characteristics of the vocal folds by increasing the mass of the vocal folds and changing the configuration of the vocal fold closure pattern. Due to these changes, the quality of the voice may be affected. As such, the major perceptual signs of vocal fold nodules include vocal hoarseness and breathiness. Other common symptoms include vocal fatigue, soreness or pain lateral to the larynx, and reduced frequency and intensity range. Airflow levels during speech may also be increased. Vocal fold nodules are thought to be the result of vocal fold tissue trauma caused by excessive mechanical stress, including repeated or chronic vocal overuse, abuse, or misuse. Predisposing factors include profession, gender, dehydration, respiratory infection, and other inflammatory factors.

For professional voice users as well as individuals who frequently experience hoarseness, vocal hygiene practices are recommended for the prevention of vocal fold nodules and other voice disorders. Vocal hygiene practices include three components: regulating the quantity and quality of voice use, improving vocal fold hydration, and reducing behaviours that jeopardize vocal health. About 10% of nodules resolve on their own, which is more likely if they are smaller and the onset more recent. Treatment of vocal fold nodules usually involves behavioural intervention therapy administered by a speech–language pathologist. In severe cases, surgery to remove the lesions is recommended for best prognosis. In children, vocal fold nodules are more common in males; in adults, they are more common in females.

Signs and symptoms
One of the major perceptual signs of vocal fold nodules is a change in the quality of the voice. The voice may be perceived as hoarse, due to aperiodic vibrations of the vocal folds, and may also be perceived as breathy,  due to an incomplete closure of the vocal folds upon phonation. The degree of hoarseness and breathiness perceived may vary in severity. This variability may be due to the size and firmness of the nodules. Other common symptoms include difficulty producing vocal pitches in the higher range,  increased phonatory effort, and vocal fatigue. There may be a sensation of soreness or pain in the neck, lateral to the larynx, which generally occurs because of the increased effort needed to produce the voice.

Acoustic signs
Major acoustic signs of vocal fold nodules involve changes in the frequency and the intensity of the voice. The fundamental frequency, an acoustic measure of voice pitch, may be normal. However, the range of pitches the individual is capable of producing may be reduced, and it may be especially difficult to produce pitches in the higher range. The intensity of the voice, an acoustic measure of amplitude or loudness, may also be normal. However, the individual's amplitude range may be reduced as well. Perturbations or variations in frequency, known as jitter, and in amplitude, known as shimmer, may be increased.

Aerodynamic signs
If the nodules affect the closure of the vocal folds, airflow levels during speech may be increased in comparison to the speaker's habitual levels. However, airflow levels may still fall within the upper limits of the normal range. The degree to which an individual's airflow levels increase seems to depend on the severity of the injury. Subglottal pressure, the air pressure that is available below the glottis and in the trachea to produce speech, may be increased as well.

Causes
Vocal fold nodules are thought to be the result of vocal fold tissue trauma caused by excessive mechanical stress. During phonation, the vocal folds undergo many forms of mechanical stress. One example of such stress is the impact stress caused by the collision between the left and right vocal fold surfaces during vibration. This stress is thought to reach its maximum in the mid-membranous region of the vocal folds, at the junction of the anterior 1/3rd and posterior 2/3rd, the most common site of nodule formation. Vocal overuse (speaking for long periods), abuse (yelling), or misuse (hyperfunction) may produce excessive amounts of mechanical stress by increasing the rate and/or force with which the vocal folds collide. This may lead to trauma that is focalized to the mid-membranous vocal fold and subsequent wound formation. Repeated or chronic mechanical stress is thought to lead to the remodeling of the superficial layer of the lamina propria. It is this process of tissue remodeling that results in the formation of benign lesions of the vocal folds such as nodules.

There are several factors that may predispose an individual to vocal fold nodules. Activities or professions that may contribute to phonotraumatic behaviors include cheerleading, untrained singing, speaking above noise, and teaching without voice amplification, as these increase mechanical stress and subsequent vocal fold trauma. Gender may be another predisposing factor, as vocal fold nodules occur more frequently in females. The presence of dehydration, respiratory infection, and inflammatory factors may also act as predisposing or aggravating factors. Inflammatory factors may include allergies, tobacco and alcohol use, laryngopharyngeal reflux, and other environmental influences.

Pathophysiology
Vocal fold nodules often alter the mechanical properties of the vocal folds, which can interfere with their vibratory characteristics. Nodules may increase the mass of the vocal folds, especially along the medial edge where they are typically found. This increased mass may result in aperiodic or irregular vibration, the perception of greater pitch and loudness perturbations, and of increased hoarseness. Nodules may also affect the mucosal wave of the vocal folds by changing the configuration of the vocal fold closure pattern. They often cause incomplete closure of the vocal folds, resulting in an hourglass configuration. The incomplete closure allows more air to escape through the vocal folds, which often results in the perception of breathiness. The degree to which nodules will affect the mucosal wave and vibratory characteristics of the vocal folds depends highly on the size of the nodule. Smaller nodules may still allow the vocal folds to achieve complete closure.

Diagnosis
Diagnosing vocal fold nodules typically includes a comprehensive analysis of medical and voice history, a physical examination of the head and neck, perceptual evaluation of voice, and visualization of the vocal folds. Visualization is considered to be the main method of diagnosis as perceptual evaluation, which includes acoustic and aerodynamic measures, alone is insufficient. Laryngeal videostroboscopy, an imaging technique, is commonly used to view the vocal folds: this procedure can be performed nasally or orally. Vocal fold nodules are most often characterized as bilaterally symmetrical whitish masses, and tend to form at the midpoint of the vocal folds.

Nodules may prevent complete closure of the glottis, also known as glottal closure, and their presence may lead to an hourglass-shaped glottal closure. Voice problems may result from the presence of vocal fold nodules. They are diagnosed based on the presence of perceptual features not explicable by other causes. Such symptoms include: vocal fatigue, breathiness, loss of high pitch notes, lack of vocal control, or increased phonatory effort (i.e. increased effort to produce speech).

Regulating voice use
For individuals who work with their voice (e.g., singers, actors, teachers, stock brokers), voice training that includes vocal function exercises (VFEs) may help reduce undue vocal strain. Furthermore, recommendations for voice professionals include warm-up and cool-down exercises for the voice to reduce strain. Additionally, using amplification devices, such as speakers or microphones, is recommended for individuals who speak to large, and even small groups or in the presence of background noise.

Hydration
Staying hydrated decreases the pressure that the vocal folds exert on one another by ensuring sufficient lubrication by mucosa, increasing the efficiency of vocal fold oscillation during speech, and promoting a healthy voice quality. Consumption of caffeine in large quantities is dehydrating and is therefore implicated in an increased risk of vocal fold nodules.

Lifestyle changes
Behaviours such as frequent throat clearing, shouting, speaking over background noise, and hard crying are associated with an increased risk of developing nodules and other vocal pathologies. Furthermore, unconventional voice practices such as speaking in the falsetto register, cause excessive strain and may result in nodules. The avoidance of damaging vocal behaviours may prevent the formation of nodules. Tobacco, alcohol, certain medications, and recreational drugs have also been implicated in pathologies of the vocal folds. Reducing exposure to these substances has been shown to reduce one's risk of nodules. Other behaviours that are implicated in vocal fold nodules include poor sleeping habits and poor nutrition.

Treatment
The two main methods of treating vocal fold nodules are voice therapy (a behavioural treatment) and laryngeal microsurgery (a surgical treatment). Because of general risks of surgery (e.g. scar formation, or those posed by general anesthesia ), behavioural treatment is usually recommended first.

Behavioural treatment
Behavioural voice therapy is typically carried out by speech–language pathologists. While behavioural treatments methods vary greatly, they are generally effective at improving vocal quality and decreasing size of vocal fold nodules. Complete resolution of nodules through behavioural treatment is possible but unlikely.

Behavioural techniques can be indirect or direct. Indirect approaches focus on improving vocal hygiene, introducing and/or maintaining safe voice practices (thereby reducing opportunities for phonotrauma) and, occasionally, implementing vocal rest. Direct approaches involve reducing the physiological strain on the vocal system while the voice is being used (e.g. during speaking or singing), such as by reducing collision forces between the vocal folds, ensuring sufficient pulmonary support while speaking (e.g. by changing the individual's breathing pattern), and optimizing resonance of the larynx and other structures of the vocal apparatus.

Behavioural treatments also vary in delivery model. Traditional therapy distribution (e.g. eight sessions within eight weeks), more intensive approaches (e.g. eight session within three weeks) and remote therapy (i.e. telehealth) have all shown effectiveness in treating vocal fold nodules.

Assessment of outcomes of behavioural treatments also varies greatly. Effects can be measured visually (e.g. by the same methods typically used to confirm the presence of vocal fold nodules: video endoscopy and video stroboscopy ), aerodynamically (e.g. by measuring parameters such as transglottal pressure and the glottal airflow waveform ), perceptually (e.g. by rating the voice in terms of dimensions such as roughness, breathiness, asthenia and strain ), in terms of effect on quality of life measures, or using any combination of the above.

Finally, recurrence of vocal fold nodules after behavioural treatment is always a possibility, particularly if nodules were not completely resolved or if skills gained during treatment were not carried-over outside of therapy sessions or maintained after therapy blocks.

Surgery
When behavioural treatments have been deemed ineffective for a voice user, surgical intervention is often considered. Surgical treatments are considered in cases of unresolved dysphonia which negatively impacts the patient's quality of life. Removal of vocal fold nodules is a relatively safe and minor surgery. However, those who sing professionally or otherwise should take serious consideration before having surgery as it can affect the ability to sustain phonation, as well as alter the vocal range. While the patient is subdued under general anesthesia, long thin scissors and scalpels or CO2 surgical lasers might be used to remove the nodules. Microsutures are sometimes used to close the incision. Vocal rest for a period of 4 to 14 days is recommended post surgery to facilitate healing.

Prognosis
Vocal fold nodules typically respond well to non-surgical/behavioural treatment techniques such as those described in the "Treatment" section. Therefore, if the patient is able to engage in such behaviour modification techniques the prognosis is good (although exact data is not available). If lesions are still present after non-surgical treatment methods, it is likely they are another form of benign vocal fold lesion (polyp, fibrous mass, cyst, or pseudocyst). The prognosis of requiring surgery would only occur after an exhaustive attempt at non-surgical therapy techniques has been applied.

Epidemiology
Research on the epidemiology of vocal fold nodules in children has suggested that nodules are more common in boys (2:1), in particular boys who are active and scream more frequently. However, in adulthood, women are more likely to have nodules, and are especially likely if they have an outgoing personality or sing frequently. The exact prevalence of vocal fold nodules is not known, but it has been reported that 23.4% of children who attended an ENT clinic for voice hoarseness, 6% of phoniatric clinic attendees, and 43% of teachers with dysphonia had nodules.

title: Vocal cord nodule


text:
Clement Greenberg

Clement Greenberg (January 16, 1909 – May 7, 1994), occasionally writing under the pseudonym K. Hardesh, was an American essayist known mainly as an art critic closely associated with American modern art of the mid-20th century and a formalist aesthetician. He is best remembered for his association with the art movement abstract expressionism and the painter Jackson Pollock.

Early life
Clement Greenberg was born in the Bronx, New York City, in 1909. His parents were middle-class Jewish immigrants, and he was the eldest of their three sons. Since childhood, Greenberg sketched compulsively, until becoming a young adult, when he began to focus on literature. He attended Erasmus Hall High School, the Marquand School for Boys, and Syracuse University, graduating with an A.B. in 1930, cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa. After college, already fluent in Yiddish and English since childhood, Greenberg taught himself Italian and German in addition to French and Latin. Over the next few years, he traveled the U.S. working for his father's dry-goods business, but the work did not suit his inclinations, so he turned to working as a translator. Greenberg married in 1934, had a son the next year, and was divorced the year after that. In 1936, he took a series of jobs with the federal government, in the Civil Service Administration, the Veterans' Administration, and finally the Appraisers' Division of the Customs Service in 1937. It was then that Greenberg began to write seriously, and soon after began getting published in a handful of small magazines and literary journals.

"Avant-Garde and Kitsch"
Though his first published essays dealt mainly with literature and theatre, art still held a powerful attraction for Greenberg, so in 1939, he made a sudden name as a visual art writer with possibly his most well-known and oft-quoted essay, "Avant-Garde and Kitsch", first published in the journal Partisan Review. In this Marxist-influenced essay, Greenberg claimed that true avant-garde art is a product of the Enlightenment's revolution of critical thinking, and as such resists and recoils from the degradation of culture in both mainstream capitalist and communist society, while acknowledging the paradox that, at the same time, the artist, dependent on the market or the state, remains inexorably attached "by an umbilical cord of gold". Kitsch, on the other hand, is the product of industrialization and the urbanization of the working class, a filler made for consumption by the working class: a populace hungry for culture, but without the resources and education to enjoy avant-garde culture. Greenberg writes:

"Kitsch, using for raw material the debased and academicized simulacra of genuine culture, welcomes and cultivates this insensibility. It is the source of its profits. Kitsch is mechanical and operates by formulas. Kitsch is vicarious experience and faked sensations. Kitsch changes according to style, but remains always the same. Kitsch is the epitome of all that is spurious in the life of our times. Kitsch pretends to demand nothing of its customers except their money—not even their time."

For Greenberg, avant-garde art was too "innocent" to be effectively used as propaganda or bent to a cause, while kitsch was ideal for stirring up false sentiment.

Greenberg appropriated the German word "kitsch" to describe this low, concocted form of "culture", though its connotations have since been recast to a more affirmative acceptance of nostalgic materials of capitalist/communist culture.

Art history, Abstract Expressionism and after
Greenberg wrote several seminal essays that defined his views on art history in the 20th century.

In 1940, Greenberg joined Partisan Review as an editor. He became art critic for The Nation in 1942. He was associate editor of Commentary from 1945 until 1957.

In December 1950, Greenberg joined the government funded American Committee for Cultural Freedom. He believed modernism provided a critical commentary on experience. It was constantly changing to adapt to kitsch pseudo-culture, which was itself always developing. In the years after World War II, Greenberg pushed the position that the best avant-garde artists were emerging in America rather than Europe. Particularly, he championed Jackson Pollock as the greatest painter of his generation, commemorating the artist's "all-over" gestural canvases. In the 1955 essay "American-Type Painting", Greenberg promoted the work of Abstract Expressionists, among them Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Hans Hofmann, Barnett Newman, and Clyfford Still, as the next stage in Modernist art, arguing that these painters were moving toward greater emphasis on the "flatness" of the picture plane.

Greenberg helped to articulate a concept of medium specificity. It posited that there are inherent qualities specific to each artistic medium, and part of the modernist project involved creating artworks that are more and more committed to their particular medium. In the case of painting, the two-dimensional reality of the medium led to an increasing emphasis on flatness, in contrast with the illusion of depth commonly found in painting since the Renaissance and the invention of pictorial perspective.

In Greenberg's view, after World War II the United States had become the guardian of "advanced art". He praised similar movements abroad and, after the success of the Painters Eleven exhibition in 1956 with the American Abstract Artists at New York's Riverside Gallery, he traveled to Toronto in 1957 to see the group's work. He was particularly impressed by the potential of painters William Ronald and Jack Bush, and later developed a close friendship with Bush. Greenberg saw Bush's post-Painters Eleven work as a clear manifestation of the shift from abstract expressionism to color field painting and lyrical abstraction, a shift he had called for in most of his critical writings of the period.

Greenberg expressed mixed feelings about pop art. On the one hand he maintained that pop art partook of a trend toward "openness and clarity as against the turgidities of second generation Abstract Expressionism." But Greenberg claimed that pop art did not "really challenge taste on more than a superficial level".

During the 1960s, Greenberg remained an influential figure on a younger generation of critics, including Michael Fried and Rosalind E. Krauss. His antagonism to "postmodernist" theories and socially engaged movements in art caused him to become a target for critics who labeled him, and the art he admired, "old-fashioned".

In 1968, Greenberg delivered the inaugural John Power Memorial Lecture at the Power Institute of Fine Arts at the University of Sydney, Australia.

In his book The Painted Word, Tom Wolfe criticized Greenberg along with Harold Rosenberg and Leo Steinberg, whom he dubbed the kings of "Cultureburg". Wolfe argued that these three critics were dominating the world of art with their theories and that, unlike the world of literature in which anyone can buy a book, the art world was controlled by an insular circle of rich collectors, museums and critics with outsized influence.

Post-painterly abstraction
Eventually, Greenberg was concerned that some abstract expressionism had been "reduced to a set of mannerisms" and increasingly looked to a new set of artists who abandoned such elements as subject matter, connection with the artist, and definite brush strokes. He suggested this process attained a level of "purity" (a word he only used within scare quotes) that revealed the truthfulness of the canvas, and the two-dimensional aspects of the space (flatness). Greenberg coined the term post-painterly abstraction to distinguish it from abstract expressionism, or painterly abstraction, as he preferred to call it. Post-painterly abstraction was a term given to myriad abstract art that reacted against gestural abstraction of second-generation abstract expressionists. Among the dominant trends in post-painterly abstraction are hard-edged painters such as Ellsworth Kelly and Frank Stella, who explored relationships between tightly ruled shapes and edges—in Stella's case, between the shapes depicted on the surface and the literal shape of the support—and color-field painters such as Helen Frankenthaler and Morris Louis, who stained first Magna then water-based acrylic paints into unprimed canvas, exploring tactile and optical aspects of large, vivid fields of pure, open color. The line between these movements is tenuous, however, as artists such as Kenneth Noland used aspects of both movements in his art. Post-painterly abstraction is generally seen as continuing the modernist dialectic of self-criticism.

Clement Greenberg Collection
In 2000, the Portland Art Museum (PAM) acquired the Clement Greenberg Collection of 159 paintings, prints, drawings, and sculpture by 59 important artists of the late-20th century and early-21st century. PAM exhibits the works primarily in the Jubitz Center for Modern and Contemporary Art; some sculpture resides outdoors. Most of the artists represented are American, along with several Canadians and a handful of artists of other nationalities. Artists represented in the collection include Edward Avedisian, Walter Darby Bannard, Stanley Boxer, Jack Bush, Anthony Caro, Dan Christensen, Ronald Davis, Richard Diebenkorn, Enrico Donati, Friedel Dzubas, André Fauteux, Paul Feeley, Helen Frankenthaler, Robert Goodnough, Adolph Gottlieb, Hans Hofmann, Wolfgang Hollegha, Robert Jacobsen, Paul Jenkins, Seymour Lipton, Georges Mathieu, Kenneth Noland, Jules Olitski, William Perehudoff, Jackson Pollock, Larry Poons, William Ronald, Anne Ryan, David Smith, Theodoros Stamos, Anne Truitt, Alfred Wallis, and Larry Zox.

Greenberg's widow, Janice van Horne, donated his annotated library of exhibition catalogues and publications on artists in Greenberg's collection to the Portland Art Museum. Greenberg's annotated library is available at the Portland Art Museum's Crumpacker Family Library which is open to the public free of charge.

In popular culture
Greenberg was portrayed by actor Jeffrey Tambor in the 2000 film Pollock, about the life of Jackson Pollock.

title: Clement Greenberg


text:
Talk:Kelsey Grammer

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 15:54, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Drama League 2010 Grammer Neuwirth.jpg

The level is factually incorrect
If Grammar played Frasier Crane from 1984 to 2004, that's 20 years, not forty. Comes.amanuensis (talk) 23:12, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Kelsey Grammer


text:
The Gherkin

The Gherkin, formally 30 St Mary Axe and previously known as the Swiss Re Building, is a commercial skyscraper in London's primary financial district, the City of London. It was completed in December 2003 and opened in April 2004. With 41 floors, it is 180 m tall and stands on the sites of the former Baltic Exchange and Chamber of Shipping, which were extensively damaged in 1992 in the Baltic Exchange bombing by a device placed by the Provisional IRA in St Mary Axe, a narrow street leading north from Leadenhall Street.

After plans to build the 92-storey Millennium Tower were dropped, 30 St Mary Axe was designed by Foster + Partners and the Arup Group. It was built by Skanska; construction started in 2001.

The building has become a recognisable landmark of London, and it is one of the city's most widely recognised examples of contemporary architecture. It won the 2003 Emporis Skyscraper Award.

Site and early plans
The building stands on the site of the former Baltic Exchange (24–28 St Mary Axe), which was the headquarters of a global marketplace for shipping freight contracts and soft commodities, and the Chamber of Shipping (30–32 St Mary Axe). The tower's topmost panoramic dome, known as the "Lens", recalls the iconic glass dome that covered part of the ground floor of the Baltic Exchange and much of which is now displayed at the National Maritime Museum. The Gherkin nickname was applied to the current building at least as early as 1999, referring to the plan's highly unorthodox layout and appearance.

On 10 April 1992, the Provisional IRA detonated a bomb close to the Baltic Exchange, causing extensive damage to the historic building and neighbouring structures. The United Kingdom government's statutory adviser on the historic environment, English Heritage, and the City of London's governing body, the City of London Corporation, were keen that any redevelopment must restore the Baltic Exchange's old façade onto St Mary Axe. The Exchange Hall was a celebrated fixture of the shipping market.

English Heritage then discovered that the damage was far more severe than initially thought, and they stopped insisting on full restoration, albeit over the objections of architectural conservationists. The Baltic Exchange and the Chamber of Shipping sold the land to Trafalgar House in 1995. Most of the remaining structures on the Baltic Exchange site were then carefully dismantled, and the interior of Exchange Hall and the façade were preserved, hoping for a reconstruction of the building in the future. The salvaged material was sold for £800,000 and moved to Tallinn, Estonia, where it awaits reconstruction as the centrepiece of the city's commercial sector.

In 1996, Trafalgar House submitted plans for the London Millennium Tower, a 386 m building with more than 140000 sqm of office space, apartments, shops, restaurants and gardens. This plan was dropped after objections that it was totally out-of-scale in the City of London, and anticipated disruption to flight paths for both London City and London Heathrow airports; the revised plan for a lower tower was accepted.

Planning process
John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister, granted planning permission on 23 August 2000 to construct a building on the site, which would be much larger than the old Exchange. The site needed development, was not on any of the "sight lines" (planning guidance requires that new buildings do not obstruct or detract from the view of St Paul's Cathedral dome when viewed from a number of locations around London), and had housed the Baltic Exchange.

The plan for the site was to reconstruct the Baltic Exchange. GMW Architects proposed a new rectangular building surrounding a restored exchange: it would have the type of large floor plan that banks liked. Eventually, the planners realised that the exchange was not recoverable, forcing them to relax their building constraints; they hinted that an "architecturally significant" building might obtain a favourable reception from City authorities. This enabled alternative designs to be considered. The building was redesigned according to the client's needs, rather than for the needs of a large, capital-efficient, money-making building.

The new building's low-level plan satisfied the planning authority's desire to maintain London's traditional streetscape, with its narrow streets. The massing of the tower was not too imposing. Like Barclays' former city headquarters in Lombard Street, the idea was that the passer-by in neighbouring streets would be nearly oblivious to the tower's existence until directly underneath it.

Foster + Partners was awarded the tender for its design for the building in 1999. The project was managed by RWG Associates, structural engineering was provided by Arup, and Skanska served as the main contractor.

Design and construction
The design by Foster + Assocs has been described as incorporating various architectural styles: high-tech architecture (also known as structural expressionism), neo-futurism, and post-modernism.

The building was constructed by Skanska, completed in December 2003 and opened on 28 April 2004. The main tenant of the building is Swiss Re, who had the building commissioned as the head office for its UK operation. The tower is thus sometimes known as the Swiss Re Building, although this name has never been official and was never in popular usage anyway, unlike the Gherkin moniker.

The building uses energy-saving methods which allow it to use only half the power that a similar tower would typically consume. Gaps in each floor create six shafts that serve as a natural ventilation system for the entire building, even though required firebreaks on every sixth floor interrupt the "chimney". The shafts create a giant double glazing effect; air is sandwiched between two layers of glazing and insulates the office space inside.

Architects promote double glazing in residential houses, which avoids the inefficient convection of heat across the relatively narrow gap between the panes, but the tower exploits this effect. The shafts pull warm air out of the building during the summer and warm the building in the winter using passive solar heating. The shafts also allow sunlight to pass through the building, making the work environment more pleasing, and keeping the lighting costs down.

The primary methods for controlling wind-excited sways are to increase the stiffness, or increase damping with tuned/active mass dampers. To a design by Arup, its fully triangulated perimeter structure makes the building rigid enough without any extra reinforcements. Despite its overall curved glass shape, there is only one piece of curved glass on the building, the lens-shaped cap at the apex.

On the building's top level (the 40th floor), there is a bar for tenants and their guests, with a panoramic view of London. A restaurant operates on the 39th floor, and private dining rooms on the 38th. Most buildings have extensive lift equipment on the roof of the building, but this was not possible for the Gherkin, since a bar had been planned for the 40th floor. The architects dealt with this by having the main lift only reach the 34th floor, with a separate push-from-below lift to the 39th floor. There is a marble stairwell and a disabled persons' lift, which leads the visitor up to the bar in the dome.

The building is visible over long distances: From the north, for instance, it can be seen from the M11 motorway, some 32 km away, while to the west it can be seen from the statue of George III in Windsor Great Park.

After completion
In April 2005, a glass panel two thirds up the tower fell to the plaza beneath. The plaza was sealed off, but the building remained open. A temporary covered walkway, extending across the plaza to the building's reception, was erected to protect visitors. Engineers examined the other 744 glass panels on the building. The cost of repair was covered by main contractor Skanska and curtain-wall supplier Schmidlin (now called Schmidlin-TSK AG). The open-floor ventilation system did not operate as designed due to tenants adding glass partitions to increase security.

Since its completion, the building has won a number of awards for architecture. In October 2004, the architect was awarded the 2004 Stirling Prize. For the first time in the prize's history, the judges were unanimous. In December 2005, a survey of the world's largest firms of architects published in 2006 BD World Architecture 200 voted the tower as the most admired new building in the world. However, Ken Shuttleworth, who worked for Foster + Partners on the design of the building, said in 2011 that he believed the style was now out-moded: "I was looking at the glass all around and [thought], 'Why on earth did we do that?' Now we would do things differently". The building appeared in recent films such as Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, A Good Year, Basic Instinct 2, and Match Point and, rechristened the Spirit of London, became the spaceship centrepiece of Keith Mansfield's 2008 novel Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London.

In September 2006, the building was put up for sale with a price tag of £600 million. Potential buyers included British Land, Land Securities, Prudential, ING, and the Abu Dhabi royal family. On 21 February 2007, IVG Immobilien AG and UK investment firm Evans Randall completed their joint purchase of the building for £630 million, making it Britain's most expensive office building. Swiss Re made a gain of more than £300 million from the sale. The new owners are seeking compensation from four of their former managers on the deal, in which about £620 million was paid for a building with a build cost of about £200 million, giving the previous owners a clear £300 million profit.

Since February 2010, Sky News has broadcast its flagship business programme, Jeff Randall Live, from a studio in the building. The top two floors of the tower have been available since at least 2015 for private hire for events.

Deloitte announced in April 2014 that the building was again being put up for sale, with an expected price of £550 million. The current owners could not afford to make loan repayments, citing differences in the value of the multi-currency loan and the British pound, high interest rates and general financing structure. In November 2014, the Gherkin was purchased for £700 million by the Safra Group, controlled by the Brazilian billionaire Joseph Safra.

Roman tomb
In the construction process of 30 St Mary Axe, a skeleton of a teenage girl was unearthed and dated as roughly 1600 years old. To prevent damaging it throughout the construction process, it was stored in the Museum of London. In 2006, 3 years after the completion of the building, she was returned to and reburied on the site. Her tomb is visible and marked with an inscription in both Latin and English:

title: The Gherkin


text:
MPEG-21

The MPEG-21 standard, from the Moving Picture Experts Group, aims at defining an open framework for multimedia applications. MPEG-21 is ratified in the standards ISO/IEC 21000 - Multimedia framework (MPEG-21).

MPEG-21 is based on two essential concepts:
 * definition of a Digital Item (a fundamental unit of distribution and transaction)
 * users interacting with Digital Items

Digital Items can be considered the kernel of the Multimedia Framework and the users can be considered as who interacts with them inside the Multimedia Framework. At its most basic level, MPEG-21 provides a framework in which one user interacts with another one, and the object of that interaction is a Digital Item. Due to that, we could say that the main objective of the MPEG-21 is to define the technology needed to support users to exchange, access, consume, trade or manipulate Digital Items in an efficient and transparent way.

MPEG-21 Part 9: File Format defined the storage of an MPEG-21 Digital Item in a file format based on the ISO base media file format, with some or all of Digital Item's ancillary data (such as movies, images or other non-XML data) within the same file. It uses filename extensions .m21 or .mp21 and MIME type application/mp21.

Digital Rights Management
MPEG-21 defines also a "Rights Expression Language" standard as means of managing restrictions for digital content usage. As an XML-based standard, MPEG-21 is designed to communicate machine-readable license information and do so in a "ubiquitous, unambiguous and secure" manner.

Among the aspirations for this standard, that the industry hope will put an end to file sharing, is that it will constitute: "A normative open framework for multimedia delivery and consumption for use by all the players in the delivery and consumption chain. This open framework will provide content creators, producers, distributors and service providers with equal opportunities in the MPEG-21 enabled open market."

title: MPEG-21


text:
Esslingen am Neckar

Esslingen am Neckar (Swabian: Esslenga am Neckor; until 16 October 1964 officially  Eßlingen am Neckar) is a town in the Stuttgart Region of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany, seat of the District of Esslingen as well as the largest town in the district. Within Baden-Württemberg it is the 11th largest city.

It is located on the river Neckar, about 14 km southeast of Stuttgart city center. The regions surrounding the city of Esslingen are also mostly developed.

Esslingen was a free imperial city for several centuries until it was annexed by Württemberg in 1802.

The German Timber-Frame Road passes through the city.

Prehistoric times
There is archaeological evidence that what is now the city of Esslingen was settled since the Neolithic period. Traces of human settlement found at the site of the city church date back to around 1000 B.C.

Roman times
In the 1st century AD the Esslingen region became part of the Roman Empire. During this period a Roman warehouse was located in the area of Oberesslingen. The nearest major Roman settlements and garrisons were at Cannstatt and Köngen.

Migration and Merovingian period
There are so far no findings from the early Alemanni period, which do exist on the Filder (uplands) nearby. There are findings in Rüdern which suggest a rich grave with eastern influence, including, for example, a set of three-winged spear heads. The ending "-ingen" indicates a group of people wherein a man named Azzilo, Hezzilo or Hetsilo was landlord and family patriarch played an influential role. This means the city's name originally meant: "the peoples of Azzilo". This name, for the first time documented in 856 as Ezlinga and 866 as Hetsilinga ended up becoming today's Esslingen.

In the 6th century, the Alemanni were subjugated by the Merovingians under king Clovis I. But they still took over administrative tasks and formed a Duchy in Francia. In the 8th century they tried to become sovereign again. But the attempt failed near Cannstatt. The end of the Alemannian duchy was marked with the Council of Cannstatt.

In an excavation by Günter Fehring, the remains of the Vitalis-Cella under the church St. Dionysius were uncovered. Proof of settlement dates back to the late Merovingian period. Even older are the single row graves in Oberesslingen and Sirnau.

Middle Ages
Esslingen was first mentioned in 777 in the last will of Abbot Fulrad from Saint-Denis (near Paris), the chaplain of Pippin and Charlemagne. He bequeathed the sixth cell upon the river Neckar that he had received from an Alemannic nobleman by the name of "Hafti" to his monastery, Saint-Denis. He also brought the bones of Saint Vitalis to Esslingen, which made it a destination for pilgrims and led to its growth. Around 800 Esslingen became a market town, its market rights being certified in 866. In 949–953 it was a possession of Liudolf, Duke of Swabia. Esslingen received city rights in 1229 under Emperor Frederick II. During the same period the still-extant Neckar bridge was built, making Esslingen a major center for trade on the route between Italy, Switzerland, and northern Germany. Taxes provided by the bridge and market led to further growth of the town, as did the export of the highly regarded wines from the region.

The period between the 13th century and 16th century saw many conflicts between the Free Imperial City and the Counts of Württemberg (later Duchy of Württemberg). About half the population died in the Thirty Years War between 1618 and 1648 through famine or epidemics. Esslingen lost its independence as an Imperial city during the Napoleonic era in 1802–1803, becoming part of the Duchy of Württemberg.

19th century to Present
The beginning of the 19th century was characterized by industrialization. Glove manufacturing, food processing, textiles, and metal working were early industries in Esslingen. On 20 November 1845 the first train ran from Cannstatt to Esslingen station.

Esslingen was occupied by U.S. troops starting in April 1945, at the very end of World War II. During the war the city suffered very little damage, and it was peaceably surrendered to the approaching allied forces, thus the medieval character of its city center has been mostly preserved.

After the Second World War about 47,000 people moved to Esslingen, mostly refugees and displaced persons from East Germany. Housing developments in Oberesslingen and Zollberg were created to overcome the shortage of housing.

In 1973 Nürtingen district was merged with Esslingen am Neckar, making Esslingen the seat of a much enlarged district.

Largest groups of immigrants by 31.12.2020 :

Air transport
Stuttgart Airport, the largest airport in Baden-Württemberg, is located in the Esslingen District, roughly ten kilometers south of the town, on the border with the town of Leinfelden-Echterdingen. A plane owned by Lufthansa has been named after the town. The junction on the Bundesautobahn 8 Karlsruhe-Munich which serves Esslingen is just after the airport when traveling towards Munich.

Road Transport
Esslingen is directly on the B10 State Highway which runs as a dual carriageway from Stuttgart to Süßen, and continues onward to Ulm. The exit for Esslingen, just after the B10 passes under the ancient Pliensau Bridge, is particularly unusual, because in the direction of Ulm there are two entry and exit points to the dual carriageway. This makes it is possible to reach the center of Esslingen directly from Stuttgart, and to drive from central Esslingen directly onto the Dual Carriageway in the direction of Ulm without having to pass traffic lights. Despite the six to eight lanes on the new Pliensau Bridge and the surrounding roads, the infrastructure around Pliensauvorstadt and the route to Zollberg still suffers from frequent congestion.

Esslingen is also on the German Timber-Frame Road.

Long Distance Rail Transport
Esslingen (Neckar) station is on the Fils Valley Railway and is served by line S 1 of the Stuttgart S-Bahn and regional services. The town is on the main rail line between Stuttgart and Ulm, operated by Deutsche Bahn, the main German rail operator. In 2009, the company named a high speed 'Intercity-Express' train "Esslingen-am-Neckar".

S-Bahn
The Stuttgart S-Bahn line S1 which operates between Kirchheim-unter-Teck and Herrenberg via Stuttgart centre, serves the stations of Mettingen, Esslingen (Neckar), Oberesslingen and Esslingen (Zell). Under the planned rebuilding of the railways in central Stuttgart under the Stuttgart 21 scheme, the S1 will be shortened to operate from Kirchheim unter Teck as far as Stuttgart Schwabstraße station.

Direct bus connection to Stuttgart Airport
To avoid the long S-Bahn route to the airport via Stuttgart, the Bus 122, operated by the END Company, now runs directly from the central bus and rail interchange to the airport via Ostfildern Scharnhausen.

Urban Tramway
The Esslingen Urban Tram system was opened in May 1912 and closed on 7 July 1944 after 32 years of operation. It was replaced by trolley buses. The operating company, the Esslinger Städtische Straßenbahn (ESS, translated Esslingen Town Tramway) changed its name in 1944 to the Städtischer Verkehrsbetrieb Esslingen (SVE, or "Esslingen Transport Company").

Former Interurban Tram
On 18 December 1926 the Esslingen-Nellingen-Denkendorf (END) interurban tram began operating. This was the last tram system to be built in Germany before the wave of closures later in the century: after this date permission from the authorities was only given for extensions to existing systems. The tram had to negotiate a five kilometer gradient out of the Neckar Valley to reach the towns and villages of the Eastern Filder region. In total, the system transported 153 million passengers from Denkendorf and later from Neuhausen to Esslingen, and took delivery of two new open trams in 1958. The line was discontinued in February 1978.

Trolley bus and diesel bus
Esslingen, along with Solingen and Eberswalde, is one of the last three German towns which still use trolleybuses. The SVE currently operates two lines using electric power: 101: Oberesslingen Lerchenacker Endstation – Esslingen railway station – Stuttgart-Obertürkheim station. 118: Esslingen Railway Station – Zollberg. Apart from this around 50 taxis operate in the town.

Car-Sharing
In 1994 A car-sharing company opened a station in Esslingen.

Rebuilding of bus/rail interchange
An ambitious redevelopment project has been in progress since 2004 in the area near the railway station. The current phase of this project is a large redevelopment of the station forecourt costing about 7.4 million euros. The Baden-Württemberg State Environment and Transport ministry helped fund this with a grant of 4.9 million euros. During 2009 the Neckarstraße was diverted along unused land on the railway station and lengthened to the west of the site. The next phase, completed in November 2014, was a large-scale redevelopment of the station forecourt to create a bus and rail interchange.

Hochschule Esslingen
The city is home to the Esslingen University of Applied Sciences (Hochschule Esslingen). It is known for its mechanical engineering and automotive engineering courses, and also for its three international master's programs (MBA in International Industrial Management, MEng in Automotive Systems, MEng in Design and Development in Automotive and Mechanical Engineering), which are organised by the Esslingen Graduate School and taught completely in English.

Twin towns – sister cities
Esslingen am Neckar is twinned with:

 * 🇮🇳 Coimbatore, India
 * 🇭🇺 Eger, Hungary
 * 🇧🇾 Maladzyechna, Belarus
 * 🏴 Neath Port Talbot, Wales, United Kingdom
 * 🇸🇪 Norrköping, Sweden
 * 🇵🇱 Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland
 * Schiedam, Netherlands
 * 🇺🇸 Sheboygan, Wisconsin, United States
 * 🇮🇹 Udine, Italy
 * 🇸🇮 Velenje, Slovenia
 * 🇫🇷 Vienne, France

Notable people

 * Richard Baum (1902–2000), musicologist and music historian
 * Thommie Bayer (born 1953), writer, musician and painter
 * Otto Borst (1924–2001), German historian
 * Karl Deffner (1817–1877), manufacturer, member of parliament
 * Cristian Fiél (born 1980), Spanish-German football player
 * Isabelle Faust (born 1972), Violinist
 * Albert Günther (1830–1914), British zoologist, born in Esslingen
 * Volker Hauff (born 1940), German politician, former Member of Bundestag, former Lord Mayor of Frankfurt am Main (SPD)
 * Wolfgang Fritz Haug (born 1936), philosopher
 * Otto Hauser (born 1952), German politician (CDU), former Member of Bundestag and retired parliamentarian secretary of state
 * Walter Hirrlinger (born 1926), German politician (SPD), Member of Landtag, minister of economy, 1990–2008 president of Sozialverband VdK Deutschland, 1953 to 1968 member of local council in Esslingen
 * Wilhelm Christian Hochstetter (1825–1881), botanist, university gardener and inspector of the botanical garden in Tübingen
 * Ferdinand von Hochstetter (1829–1884), geographer, geologist and natural scientist
 * Johann Eberhard Ihle (1727–1814), painter
 * Emil von Kessler (1813–1867), founder of the Maschinenfabrik Esslingen (locomotive factory)
 * Emil von Keßler jun. (1841–1895), German entrepreneur and politician, director of Maschinenfabrik Esslingen, son of Emil von Keßler
 * Georg Christian von Kessler (1787–1842), founder of the still existing sparkling wine cellar Kessler Sekt
 * Hermann Kurz (1813–1873), poet, author and translator, father of Isolde Kurz
 * Alfred Leikam (1915–1992), notary, politician and mayor, Righteous among the Nations
 * Karl Mayer (1819–1889), politician, member of parliament and parliamentary deputy
 * Otto Merz (1889–1933), race car driver
 * Julius Motteler (1838–1907), leading member of the early German workers' movement, Reichstag deputy
 * Wilhelm Murr (1888–1945), German politician (NSDAP), Gauleiter
 * Georg Restle (born 1965), journalist
 * Paula Rueß (1902–1980), German resistance fighter (French Resistance) and feminist
 * Thomas Ruf (1911–1996), German politician (CDU), Member of Bundestag district Esslingen
 * Max Sailer (1882–1964), car racing driver and engineer
 * Heinrich Schickhardt (1558–1635), builder
 * Louis Schlegel (1858–1929), German politician (SPD), Member of Reichstag and Landtag
 * Ronja Schmitt (born 1989), German politician (CDU), Member of Bundestag
 * Jakob Ferdinand Schreiber (1809–1868), founder of J.F.Schreiber, a publisher known for its children books

title: Esslingen am Neckar


text:
Talk:Murasaki Shikibu

Revert
I keep creating a infobox for this page, but it keeps getting deleted. May somebody stop deleting it, please? Jtconline08 (talk) 16:34, 21 November 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes, I deleted it. When that happens on Wikipedia the process is to post to the talk page and initate discussion, per what we call BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. After the first revert it would have been best to start a discussion here instead of re-adding. That can be considered edit warring.As for your edit, this is what we call a featured article. Generally it's best to discuss edits and changes to featured articles, because there are main editors here as well as people who were involved in reviewing and have been stewarding the article.In my view, an infobox has limited utility for a person whose name is unknown, whose birth dates and death dates are unknown, etc. Victoria (tk) 23:47, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Murasaki Shikibu