text:
User talk:Grutness/archive05

This file is an archive - please do not add new discussion here - add it to my Talk page

My RFA
Thank you for your comments on my RFA. Although the voting period just ended with a 14-8-2 vote, I will admit once and for all that I used it more as an evaluation of myself. Being promoted would have been a plus. I was more interested in who voted, when they voted, who would change their votes and when, and the comments I would receive. Hopefully I will correct the main weakness that was raised by those who voted oppose -- that I was too eager to put articles on VFD. Also, I will try to interact more with those Wikipedians who did not vote at all.

As for next month, I don't know if I will nominate myself again. I might not think about it until somebody else puts me up there on RFA at a later date. Eventually, I see myself as an admin, especially as the number of articles and users continues to grow. Thanks again and good luck at improving this vast archive of free knowledge. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 09:15, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

Thank You
What a year! My first year in Wiki, a featured article and now administrator. Thank you for your support. I feel honored to have befriended you. Tony the Marine (UTC)
 * replied 06:47, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Adminship
Thank you for asking, it certainly is something to think about. I do hope to be an admin eventually, but I don't think I'm ready for it yet. I have a major commitment looming at the end of July (the bar exam). If you're still inclined to nominate me after that time, I will gladly pursue the opportunity. -- BD2412 talk 02:57, 2005 May 20 (UTC)

Adminship
Thanks for supporting my vote, and for adding such a nice comment :).--Wiglaf 21:36, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Sig image
Use if images in signatures is discouraged for several reasons. See Sign_your_posts_on_talk_pages. -Casito⇝Talk 04:53, 4 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Yes, I know - I've actually done some editing work on that page. You might also note that it is not official policy, just a recommendation, as there is not a clear consensus supporting it. If there was any way that I could put my signature as a text item I would. Unfortunately, my signature is the picture - by which I mean that the Uffington White Horse is how I sign my name when writing or painting. To do otherwise here would feel as though it was not me doing the work. It's interesting, though, that after 25000 edits and a couple of months as an admin, I've had virtually no complaints (from memory, you are the second to mention it in the last six months). If there are many I'll definitely have to consider it, though. Grutness|hello? [[Image:Grutness.jpg|25px|]]

Hi, I was just about to mention it and I didn't wan't to start a new post. The server has been acting up lately (for me anyway) and putting images is just an extra strain. Howabout1 20:50, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Sigh... okay... it feels weirdly like it's someone else doing the writing now, though :( Grutness...  wha?  07:10, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry to see it go.-gadfium 08:26, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks - me too, but they're right, it does put a stress on the servers. Maybe someone will work out how to fix that sometime, but for now, I'll stick with this. Grutness...  wha?

Francis Petre
Its amazing isn't it how this page continues to grow, and hopefully after Friday, a lot more New Zealand edits and information will come along (we'll probably spend the weekend better incorporating them) This really is now one of the most informed studies on him on the internet. This has been so much more interesting and rewarding than the European subjects I've done, as this has been more discovery (for me anyway) I had never heard of him two months ago! Giano | talk 07:30, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Iwi & Hapu
Here is a really poetic description extracted from www.ngatiwhakaue.iwi.nz. It kind of puts it into perspective nicely...

The word whanau, family, means to give birth. "We are bound to our whanau, our family, by birth." The word hapu, extended family group, means to become pregnant. The hapu is made up of family groups bound together by marriage. The word for tribe, the word iwi, also means 'bones'.

MUCH more poetic and richer then either of us came up with.

 * Ngati Whakaue

Nevillednz 13:32, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Morocco geo stubs
Hi Grutness. Thanks for mentionning that to me. I'll deal with it today and re-fix that the way your explained. Cheers Svest 05:58, May 5, 2005 (UTC) Wiki me up

Euro-royal-stub
While I appreciate the effort to disambiguate stubs, I object to the conflation of "royal" and "noble". They aren't the same thing and shouldn't be referring to European nobility. If you have no serious objections, I'm going to move it to euro-noble-stub. Mackensen (talk) 23:12, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
 * There was a long debate at WikiProject Stub sorting/Criteria about the creation of this stub type, and it was decided that, since the two distinct types of article would be likely edited by the same group of editors, it makes sense to only have one stub. Stub templates, remember, are for the benefit of editors, not readers. Having two separate stubs will only mean that the same editors have to look in twice as many categories for articles to work on. Grutness...  wha?

My concern is that you don't seem to have asked any of us noble/royal/peerage people before going ahead with this scheme. I've also heard concerns about just what constitutes "Europe" (i.e. certain Kings of Jerusalem ought to qualify as European royalty). Also, the message at the bottom is simply incorrect (and grammatically vague). Monarchs aren't nobles, not always, and vice-versa. I really object to this conflation, and I don't think it's that great a hardship for editors to look through two categories instead of one. Mackensen (talk) 01:09, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

I've gone and commented at the stub-sorting page. I apologize for acting so hastily–I was so concerned about what looked like someone ignoring my groups policies it didn't occur to me that I was running afoul of someone else's. Ah well, so goes the balkanization of Wikipedia. Best, Mackensen (talk) 01:59, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

Religious Image
Heyas, read your reply at Template:Reli-stub and agree with the actions taken for your reasons. Apologies for stepping on any toes. I was being bold, but boldness without attention to the community is never quite good. Thanks for reviewing my edit. -SocratesJedi | Talk 03:06, 7 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Nah - that's fine. being bold is often the best thing. Hope I didn't tread on your toes too hard! :) Grutness|hello? [[Image:Grutness.jpg|25px|]] 03:08, 7 May 2005 (UTC)

multiple stub templates?
hi grutness, apologies if i could have easily found the answer to this somewhere else, but i haven't seen it- what is the policy on multiple stub templates? ie, is it ok for an article to be a stub in several different categories, or should it only be in one category? it doesn't seem that a stub should be three different kinds of stub, but i'm not sure what the other option would be if it fits into several categories/projects/etc. thanks alot. --Heah (talk) 05:18, 21 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Hi Heah - Stub policy is going through a major rewrite at the moment, but the current draft's wording says If an article overlaps two potential categories, two different stub templates may be used, but using more than two is strongly discouraged. (The full current policy draft is at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Stub_sorting, BTW) Grutness...  wha?

Hi, thanks for your comments and recommendations. I have updated the proposed template article I created. User:Who/ReqImage <> Who 02:22, 22 May 2005 (UTC)

stubs
Hi, again. I totally forgot about the Australia and Sweden stubs, or I would have posted them on the discussion page as well. Unfortunately I created the France actor stub before I knew about the discussion page. You can be assured that it wont happen again. Thanks for your understanding. <> Who 17:03, 22 May 2005 (UTC)
 * That's OK - just make sure it doesn't (sternly wags finger) :) Grutness...  wha?  01:44, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Australia stubs
Hi there, yeah I figured out the australia-geo-stub thing for a couple of them. Will do for all in future. Are you really familliar with stub templates? Whenever I try to load the template page it doesn't want to work. If I'm unsure about which stub to use, could I ask you? I'm already familliar with quite a few though. If it's a biography, should you put the country, or just bio-stub? Thanks, --Silversmith 11:22, 25 May 2005 (UTC)
 * replied.

Soviet Stub
I will place it at the Wikiportal sometime soon. But thanks for telling the Project people. I personally think the project is done, with everything shifting over to the Wikiportal. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 04:13, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Just thought it would be most useful there. Are there any other projects that might be able to use it (A Ukrainian one, or a Belarus one, perhaps? Or just a 20th century history one?) Grutness...  wha?

In answer to your question
yes :) Thryduulf 11:08, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much. Thryduulf 12:51, 26 May 2005 (UTC)

Stub matter
Hi there! I was asked to write an article for the Signpost on recent policy or guideline-related matters. Since there has been a lot of things to do with templates recently, I decided to take that as a sub-topic. One of the matters addressed is the recent deprecation of Template:Substub. So what I'd like to ask is, if you can spare the time, could you please look at my draft at User:Radiant!/WikiPrudence and see if there are any glaring errors or omissions? Thanks. Radiant_* 18:13, May 27, 2005 (UTC)
 * replied

 * Added your suggestion. It should be on WP:SIGN today. Radiant_* 11:54, May 30, 2005 (UTC)

Congratulations
With the help of your tireless work on the WP:WSS project, we have finally reached the elusive goal of getting rid of generic stubs. It has been a pleasure working with you for these past months.

I would also like to formally apologise for anything I said to you in the past. That lies, most certainly, in the past, but I would like that to make that completely clear. Cheers! --Sn0wflake 02:34, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

Substubs 1
I only tag things with a substub if they are nothing more than a line for a subject that pretty likely deserves an article, and I don't have the time to add enough to make them a stub. I have no particular attachment to the template, tho - I'm certainly not keen on folks starting articles this way. -- BD 24 12 thi m k 05:53, 2005 May 9 (UTC)
 * Fair enough - thanks for your comments. Grutness|hello? [[Image:Grutness.jpg|25px|]]

stubs vs. substubs
For the record, I was not using substubs for any particular reason; I just found out that they exist, and decided to start using them (you'll notice they only ever appear in my edits as of yesterday or so). After a short review of the arguments for and against, I think that they should just be thrown in with stubs, because I think that categorizing something as a, for instance, movie-stub, is more useful than categorizing it as a substub, so that people with the appropriate knowledge/interest base can find and enlarge it. So I'll stop using them as of now. And I suppose I should go through and change the ones I added to stubs. -- ericl234   talk  08:15, May 9, 2005 (UTC)

Re: Stubs and substubs
Hi Grutness! Yeah, I'm one of the few who actually use the substub tag... I think they serve a purpose, but at the same time those articles that deserve "substub" should generally be deleted. I'm open to any and all ideas. Linuxbeak 19:50, May 9, 2005 (UTC)

Re: substubs (again)
Thanks for saying that so politely. (I'm not being sarcastic.) You're perfectly entitled to your own opinion, and I have to say that on some level I agree with you. However, the issue is dead to me. I intend to ease back into Wikipedia and hope that people will eventually forget about the whole substubs thing, so that I can start over. I'm going to add my name to the list of participants in the stub sorting project, as it looks like a very good system to me. I look forward to working together on this. Mike ∞ Storm 01:07, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

substub votes for deletion
Though I voted keep, I am glad to see that the voting is going toward delete. My keep vote was more a call for a holding action, a "let's let the iron cool" than a "let's keep this forever, it's useful". Courtland 11:24, 2005 May 14 (UTC)

Substub template deletion discussion
I just noticed today that Template:Substub was gone, and went looking for why. The deletion log points to TfD, but there is nothing about it anywhere on the TfD archives. I managed to find the WSS discussion, which also mentioned a TfD discussion. Finally, I found on the TfD history that the discussion was in fact at Template talk:Substub.

While most of the argument was on the WSS talk page (and, after reading it, I agree is not needed anymore), I believe the TfD discussion should not be lost.

Could you please either undelete Template talk:Substub or copy the discussion to the TfD archives?

--cesarb 16:25, 21 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Mmm. I'm not sure of the procedure for this, but I'll raise it at Wikipedia talk: Tfd - someone there will know what to do. Grutness...  wha?  01:50, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Chinatowns in Australasia and Oceania
My edit, unlike yours, was completely objective and my nationality bore no influence on it. The fact is Australasia is a term that encompasses New Zealand, and one that is used widely on either side of the Tasman. Anyways, there was duplication in terms, and given the scope, Oceania is preferred and the article was so moved. It can now be found at Chinatowns in Oceania.--Cyberjunkie 08:43, 5 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Apologies if you took my comments personally (perhaps I should have added one of those horrible smiley things) - I have no wish to upset you, as my feelings on your edits are equally positive. However, the term is widely used in some parts of New Zealand to refer to Australia and Papua New Guinea, but not New Zealand. Checking the article's edit history would have revealed that New Zealand had already been moved from the Australasia section to the Oceania section in the past. Reverting it without checking the reasons for the earlier edit was hardly objective. Grutness|hello? [[Image:Grutness.jpg|25px|]]
 * Dear James, I won't tell Cyberjunkie (though he or she may read it here), but I can assure you that this is the first time in my 64 years in New Zealand that I have come across the idea that the term "Australasia" is used in New Zealand to refer to Australia and Papua New Guinea, but not New Zealand. That sounds more like "Austronesia". - Robin Patterson 12:43, 6 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Just going by how I’ve heard it used, that’s all. Grutness...  wha?

Ahoy-hoy
Hello his Grutness! I am not sockpuppet of User:NoPuzzleStranger. NoPuzzleStranger is Wik. I am not Wik. Hope this clears things up so you can sleep better at night. Yours truly, Starky

Kiwidraw.jpg
Hey. To let you know, I am (painstakingly) trying to draw the Kiwidraw image into a png file. I want to let you know of this before I start to change templates and things like that. Zscout370 (talk) 03:35, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Painstaking? But it only takes a few key-clicks... have a look at [[Image:kiwidraw.png]] Grutness|hello? [[Image:Grutness.jpg|25px|]] 04:56, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Check Image:Kiwidraw.png now. That is what I wanted to do. Zscout370 (talk) 16:35, 9 May 2005 (UTC)

Re: 1968 in France
I agree with you now that the article is certainly fleshed-out enough to warrant its own page rather than just merging, and have noted that on the vfd entry. Might consider dates when appropriate. Thanks for bringing it back to my attention! ESkog 07:10, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I took another look at it, but I still hold that many of the events there (e.g. the olympic games) were of sufficiently global impact to get this merged with 1968 in general. Splitting the year categories by country is, I believe, overspecialized categorization. Yours, Radiant_* 11:42, May 17, 2005 (UTC)

Patrick Flynn VfD
Greetings! I'm wondering if you'd take a look at the detective work and the disambiguation that I did on the Patrick Flynn page, and perhaps reconsider your vote for deletion. Best wishes, Jacobw 12:46, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

Purple vs. violet
Thanks for fixing up the article. I've changed my vote and informed others of the change. Phil Welch already changed his vote too. Mgm|(talk) 10:17, May 30, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the reference. I think this page has improved due to the controversy on VFD. Ryan Prior 17:47, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)

Peer Review
Hey James, I was wondering if you wish to look at Peer review/Hero of Belarus/archive2. Also, your stuff is on the way. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 02:43, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Hi Zach - I really don't know enough about the subject to have any idea about whether it's good (although it does look good, and I will have a look from the point of view of editing, grammar and the like). But - I do know a Polish Wikipedian who deals with a lot of Belarus articles - and I see from his talk page that you know him too. Contact User:Halibutt and ask whether he can have a look at it - I'm sure he'd be keen to help! Grutness...  wha?
 * Its ok. I did run a spell-check on the article, so it is clean now, spelling wise. My main concern is the Babelfish translations, which I know they are off. So that is why I have the Russian names of the various companies. I will drop a note at Halibutt's page, and I am also trying to get User:Husnock to take a peek at it. I know he did major edits to Medal of Honor, a FA about a US medal. Thanks for the help. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 15:27, 16 May 2005 (UTC)

Hero of Belarus FAC
Hey James, you wrote "Support - with caveat. Looks good, and you've got my support so long as you manage to get better translations! The Babelfishiness of those translations is pretty obvious. Grutness...wha? 05:22, 19 May 2005 (UTC)." I just want to know what sections do you think sound Babelfishish. There are some sections that I wrote on my own that might now make grammar sense, but I know some of the translations are a bit off too. If you can show me where, it will be grateful of you. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 21:40, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
 * All fixed. Thanks a bunch. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 01:48, 20 May 2005 (UTC)

MSIE
I just read your comment about still using an old version of Micro$loth's Internet Exploder. Newer versions a slightly better and safer than old versions, but you really should be using anything but MSIE. See my main user page for my own brief comments on the main Windoze alternative browsers. Blank Verse  ∅  12:46, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

OU Psych
I'm not sure if you know who I am or not. You're someone that I know by sight, but I started in 1996, and finished in 2003, so I'm not sure if you know who I am or not. I worked with Tamar, we share the same first name, and you may be able to infer my surname from my username... --Limegreen 01:37, 18 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I used to have shoulder length brown hair back in the day, but look a little more conventional now...--Limegreen 02:56, 18 May 2005 (UTC)

Re: Hi
I'm not sure. I know i'm part of a large family which was mainly started around Sunderland, so it is possible. Hedley 16:03, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

Userpage babysitting request
Hey, I need a favor. I'm going to be camping in the woods for the next week (with no internet!!!) from the 23rd through the 27th. Could you watch my various user pages while I'm gone and revert any vandalism? Not that I'm expecting a deluge of vandals upon my departure, but I'd rather be cautious. These are the pages: Cheers. -- BD2412 talk 20:44, 2005 May 20 (UTC)
 * 1) User:BD2412
 * 2) User talk:BD2412
 * 3) User:BD2412/Archives
 * 4) User:BD2412/Archive - Pandeism discussion
 * 5) User:BD2412/Best_high_schools
 * 6) User:BD2412/signature
 * 7) Wiki-Hell
 * I've added them to my watchlist. Grutness...  wha?
 * Thanks - better a delayed fix than no fix at all! -- BD2412 talk 00:37, 2005 May 21 (UTC)
 * I also added those pages to my watch list, so your covered. Plus, to Grutness, does WikiPortals work better than WikiProjects? I created one for Russia, and I hope it works well. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:08, 21 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Hi, I'm back a day early - thanks! -- BD2412 talk 19:39, 2005 May 29 (UTC)

Glasgow-related edits
WP has a keen new contributor by the name of Babyoil, who probably means well, but, er, well, a look at some of the contributions may explain. I've reverted all those to Glasgow (of which 10% might have some merit, but I lacked the stamina to look); but those to Maryhill, etc., are quite beyond me. As you've done some work on these pages, you might like to keep an eye open for further contributions. -- Hoary 05:23, 2005 May 21 (UTC)
 * I doubt I know enough to help - my contribution to that page was minimal. Grutness...  wha?  05:35, 21 May 2005 (UTC)
 * B seems to be amiable enough: check his and my talk pages if interested. (I cleared mine out seconds earlier. In the circumstances, thank you for anonymizing your comments on my page.) -- Hoary 05:56, 2005 May 21 (UTC)
 * That was purely because I forgot to add the sig :) If you think it would be a good idea to remove it again, feel free to do so! Grutness...  wha?
 * No, it's fine. But damn, I always wish that welcome messages and the like didn't urge people to "be bold". I wasn't at all bold when I started, and my lack of boldness (plus my ability to spell, etc.) saved people a lot of trouble. Re-reversion of Glasgow coming soon -- if not by somebody else, then by me. -- Hoary 06:20, 2005 May 21 (UTC)

Speedy Deletion Request
Can you please delete these:

 * User:Apollomelos and User talk:Apollomelos, never been banned and never vandalized, I am leaving the project because I no longer have the time to spare contributing to often controversial topics in which I must spend 75% of my time explaining the information to users who did not even bother to read up on the topics and thus are often surprised

and i found the recent comments lodged when another user nominated me for adminship to be beyond offensive, borderline fanatic, attacking me for previous votes in which i supported artwork that contained nudity whilst the morality police tried to destroy them all, furthermore the usage of the word "agenda" when none of my articles have NPOV notices on them Apollomelos 20:03, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

"Where there is no significant abuse, and no administrative need to retain the personal information, you can request that your own user page or talk page be deleted. Most frequently, this occurs when a longterm contributor decides to leave."
 * :( Sorry to see you go. I hope that, if you get time to contribute again, you might reconsider your decision. Grutness...  wha?

Military history of Puerto Rico
It's been a long time! I wrote the article mentioned above and have self-nominated it for Featured article status. Please take a look onFeatured_article_candidates and I would be honored if you expressed your opinon. Thank you, Tony the Marine

Thank You For Your Support
I would like to thank all of the Wikipedians who supported and/or contributed to the article Military history of Puerto Rico. Because of Wikipedians like yourself, this article was able to make featured article status. It was my goal to celebrate my first year in Wikipedia with a featured article and you all made it possible. Thank you once again Tony the Marine

Page Protection
Is it legal for my user page to be protected during my moving process, which will take about a month or two to complete? Zscout370 (Sound Off) 21:54, 30 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Better yet, protected it now. It has been vandalized four times today, and also vandalized during my away time this past weekend. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 23:16, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

title: User talk:Grutness/archive05


text:
Vahl

Vahl is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:

 * Christian-Friedrich Vahl (born 1955), German cardiac surgeon
 * Emanuel Vahl (born 1938), Ukrainian-Israeli composer
 * Herbert-Ernst Vahl, German SS general
 * Jens Vahl (1796–1854), Danish botanist and pharmacist, botanical authority abbreviation J.Vahl
 * Martin Vahl (1749–1804), Danish-Norwegian botanist and zoologist, botanical authority abbreviation Vahl

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

title: Vahl


text:
Jóga

"Jóga" is a song recorded by Icelandic singer, songwriter and actress Björk for her third studio album, Homogenic (1997). An electronica song, "Jóga" fuses these elements with baroque and classical styles. The track's sound was partially inspired by Icelandic music, containing what have been described as "volcanic beats". Lyrically, the piece is an ode to Björk's native land and her best friend, while containing subtexts relating to the state of emergency.

"Jóga" was released as the lead single from Homogenic on 15 September 1997 to critical acclaim, with reviewers praising her powerful vocal performance, as well as the track's composition and overall production. Commercially, the song was a moderate success, but peaked at number one in Björk's native Iceland.

Recording and production
Like most of Homogenic, "Jóga" was recorded and produced at El Cortijo in Málaga, Spain. Björk wrote the song while walking and admiring the landscape, a common way for her to write songs since childhood.

She explained "an overall picture" of it to engineer Markus Dravs, who then came out with a rhythm that she felt was "too abstract". Mark Bell, the producer of the track, then came and "took 99 percent of what [he] did and came up with some noises", giving Dravs new ideas. Björk wrote the string arrangements, which were provided late in the production process by the Icelandic String Octet.

Music and lyrics
"Jóga" is dedicated to—and named after—Björk's best friend, Jóga Gnarr Jóhannsdóttir (the wife of former Mayor of Reykjavík Jón Gnarr), whom Björk would usually thank in her album credits. The song is also a dedication to her native Iceland, an example of Björk's desire to have a conceptual focus on the country for Homogenic. Referring to this concept, she told OOR: "The electronic beats are the rhythm, the heartbeat. The violins create the old fashioned atmosphere, the colouring." "Jóga" has been described as "the real conceptual heart of the record" and "a sonic picture of the geographical beauty of her homeland". The track showcases these hybrid elements of strings and electronic backing beats through the album, thus being described as "baroque electronica" by Slant Magazine's Sal Cinquemani.

The strong beats—referred to as "volcanic"—reflect Iceland's primal and chaotic nature. Due to its harsh beats and halfway drop, some modern critics have described the track as "proto dubstep". "Jóga" is a love song; its lyrics were written by poet Sjón, Björk's friend and collaborator. Björk explained her inability to write the song's lyrics in an interview with MuchMusic: "I tried to write that tune but, I mean, I just wanted mainly to write lyrics. It was just pathetic. I was like 'her... her...' it was like 'love... love...' I couldn't even put it into words. So, you know, it's—yeah, it's probably the—I think it's the fiercest love song I have written, I think." She sings about the beauty of being in a "state of emergency", and thanks someone for pushing her into it.

Critical reception
"Jóga" has received acclaim from music critics ever since its release. Heather Phares of AllMusic wrote that "Björk lets a little light shine through "Jóga"" and described it as a "moving song", listing it as one of the album highlights. Furthermore, Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine labelled the track "adrenaline".

David Browne of Entertainment Weekly also commented on "Jóga", writing that it was more "somber" than another single from Homogenic, "Bachelorette", and Björk sings the lyrics with "the strings swelling luxuriantly". Robert Christgau, in his review for the album, placed it as one of the recommended tracks alongside "Bachelorette". British magazine Music Week rated it five out of five, picking it as Single of the Week. They described it as "a real beauty, with Björk's voice allowed to shine above spooky beats and lush strings."

In Slant Magazine's list "The 100 Best Singles of the 1990s", "Jóga" was placed at number 35; alongside the ranking, the track was praised, said to contain "one of the Icelandic singer-songwriter's fiercest vocal performances to date", as well as that the "sweeping string arrangement is its true star".

Commercial performance
"Jóga" was a commercial success in Björk's native Iceland, peaking atop the Íslenski Listinn Top 40 the week of 23–30 October 1997. Elsewhere, the song was moderately successful, peaking within the top 20 in Finland and the top 40 in Sweden.

While all of Björk's first 11 singles reached the top 40 of the UK Singles Chart, including three top-ten singles from Post (1995), "Jóga" was ruled ineligible to chart since it was released solely as a three-CD and VHS box set (as well as individual releases of the formats). Despite Björk's record label One Little Indian attempting to convince the Official Charts Company (OCC) that the VHS was bundled for free, "Jóga" remained barred from the chart as its release exceeded the chart's three-format limit. However, the song managed to enter the chart months after its release, peaking at number 191 on the chart dated 28 February 1998.

Music video
The music video was directed by Michel Gondry and filmed in Iceland.

The video for "Jóga" is a departure from her other videos as it features a simple concept of focusing primarily on different Icelandic terrains and landscapes with Björk's presence only in the beginning and towards the end. With the aid of computer animation, earthquakes begin to separate and shift the chunks of land along fault lines. The video ends with a computerised image of an island floating inside Björk's chest.

title: Jóga


text:
European Union Military Staff

The Military Staff of the European Union (EUMS) is the directorate-general of the European Union's (EU) External Action Service (EEAS) that contributes to the EU's Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) by providing strategic advice to the High Representative (HR/VP) and commanding operations through its Military Planning and Conduct Capability (MPCC) operational headquarters. From the end of 2020, the MPCC will be capable of running executive operations of up to 2,500 troops, i.e. the size of one EU battle group, as well as 3 non-executive missions.

The EUMS also reports to the European Union Military Committee (EUMC), representing member states' Chiefs of Defence, and performs "early warning", situation assessment and strategic planning.

The EUMS currently consists of 200+ military and civilian personnel, and is located in the Kortenberg building in Brussels.

1993–2000: Background
The Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) was introduced as a pillar of the EU by the Treaty of Maastricht in 1993, based on the earlier 1970 European Political Cooperation (EPC). The CFSP was to include ‘all questions related to the security of the Union, including the eventual framing of a common defence policy, which might in time lead to a common defence’.

In December 1998 the Franco-British Saint-Malo declaration stated that the EU ‘must have the capacity for autonomous action, backed up by credible military forces, the means to decide to use them, and a readiness to do so, in order to respond to international crises’. This marked a British change of course, as it previously had blocked any development of EU autonomous military capabilities.

At the European Council in Cologne in June 1999 the European Security and Defence Identity (ESDI) - formed in 1996 as a project between Western European Union's (WEU) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) - was transferred to the EU and renamed the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). The main goal of this newly established CSDP was to deal with crisis management outside EU territory.

2001: Creation as a Council body
In 2000 and 2001 a number of Council bodies were established as part of the ESDP:

 * Political and Security Committee (PSC), a preparatory body of ambassadorial level representatives thar observes the international situation, helps to define CFSP and ESDP policies and prepares a coherent EU response to a crisis
 * EU Military Committee (EUMC), the Council's highest military body, composed of member states' Chiefs of Defence, who are regularly represented by their permanent military representatives. The EUMC provides the PSC with advice and recommendations on all military matters within the EU.
 * European Union Military Staff (EUMS), a part of the General Secretariat whose primary task was to by EUMC's working and advisory body

In 2003 the Treaty of Nice provided the ESDP's legal foundation, in terms of competences, organisation, structures and assets.

2009: Transfer to the External Action Service
Upon the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon in 2009 the EUMS was transferred from the Council's General Secretariat to become a Directorate-General (DG) of the newly established European External Action Service (EEAS) - the EU's diplomatic service, a hybrid Council-Commission body resulting from a merger of the external relations departments of the Council and relevant international relations departments of the European Commission.

2016: Addition of the MPCC
In 2016 European Union Global Strategy was presented by HR Federica Mogherini and welcomed by the European Council. The implementation of this strategy in the field of CSDP has included the establishment of the Military Planning and Conduct Capability (MPCC), which gives the EUMS the role of commanding operations directly.

Task
The EUMS performs a supervisory function in relation to Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) operations:
 * providing strategic advice to the High Representative
 * reporting to the European Union Military Committee (EUMC)
 * performing "early warning, situation assessment and strategic planning for Petersberg tasks" and to implement CSDP missions (2001/80/CFSP, annex article 2) such as EUFOR Althea and the other European Union Force missions in Chad/CAR and the DR Congo.

The EUMS has supervised a number of deployments since its establishment.

Structure
The EUMS is a Directorate-General of the External Action Service (EADS) that is located in the Kortenberg building in Brussels and currently consists of 200+ military and civilian personnel.

Director General
The EUMS is led by the Director General (DGEUMS, a three-star general).

Since 2017 DGEUMS has also served as Director of the Military Planning and Conduct Capability, and as such assumes the function of the single commander for all non-executive military missions, exercising command and control over the current three training Missions and other possible future non-executive military Missions.

DGEUMS is assisted by the Deputy Director General and the Chef of Staff (DDG/COS, a two-star general).

Military Planning and Conduct Capability
The Military Planning and Conduct Capability (MPCC) is an EUMS facility that provides a permanent operational headquarters at the military strategic level for military operations. The MPCC reports to the Political and Security Committee (PSC) and informing the European Union Military Committee (EUMC).

Presently the MPCC may only run non-executive operations. By the end of 2020 the MPCC will also be capable of running executive operations of up to 2500 troops, i.e. the size of one battle group.

The MPCC cooperates with its existing civilian counterpart, the Civilian Planning and Conduct Capability (CPCC), through a Joint Support Coordination Cell (JSCC).

Directorates
The EUMS has five directorates, each led by a one-star commander.

Concepts and Capabilities
The Concepts and Capabilities Directorate (CON/CAP) is responsible for EUMS concepts, doctrine and the planning and development of capabilities including crisis management exercises, training, analysis and lessons learned, and for cooperation with the European Defence Agency (EDA), ensuring coherency between the EU military concepts and the crisis management procedures.

Intelligence
The Intelligence Directorate (INT) has the following tasks:
 * To provide intelligence input to early warning and situation assessment
 * To contribute to the EUMS planning through the provision of intelligence and intelligence planning expertise
 * To provide the intelligence input to crisis response planning and assessment for operations and exercises.

Operations
The Operations Directorate (OPS) has the following tasks:
 * To plan military crisis management operations, including post-launch strategic crisis response planning
 * To develop strategic advance and crisis response planning, including early military assessment and planning in support of informed decision making
 * To monitor all CSDP operations and to generate the capacity to plan and run an autonomous operation.

Logistics
The Logistics Directorate (LOG) provides administrative support, logistic planning expertise, logistic concepts, doctrine related to crisis response planning. LOG also assesses operations and exercises.

Communication and Information Systems
The Communication and Information Systems Directorate (CIS) has the following tasks:
 * To develop the EUMS' policies and guidance for implementation, operation and maintenance of communication and information systems, in support of CSDP activities.
 * To contribute to EUMS planning through the provision of CIS planning expertise at the strategic and operational level
 * To provide the CIS element of crisis response planning and assessment for operations and exercises.

Other units
Other units at the EUMS include:
 * ACOS Synchronisation unit, which assists the Chief of Staff in the coordination and synchronization of the EUMS internal processes and information flows, to facilitate and canalise the support the EUMS provides to the Chairman of the EUMC, and to support him in the preparation and management of meetings.
 * ACOS external relations unit, which develops policy for, and maintain the military dimension of, all EUMS' external relations in close cooperation with EEAS Management Directorates and the CMPD. This involves coordinating military-to-military cooperation with International Organisations, Strategic Partners; and Third States. The office is also responsible for all Public Information/Press Relations issues in close collaboration with the EEAS Strategic Communications Division.
 * EU cell at SHAPE (EUCS), a unit that prepares for EU operations having recourse to NATO common assets and capabilities under Berlin plus arrangements and to support DSACEUR in his role as a potential operational commander for an EU-led operation. It contributes to full transparency between NATO and the EU embodying their strategic partnership in crisis management.

title: European Union Military Staff


text:
Vavilov

Vavilov (Вави́лов, feminine: Vavilova) is a Russian surname. Notable people with the surname include:

 * Andrey Petrovich Vavilov (b. 1961), Russian politician and businessman
 * Elena Vavilova (born 1962), also known as Tracey Foley, Russian KGB sleeper agent
 * Natalya Vavilova (born 1959), Russian actress
 * Nikolai Vavilov (1887–1943), Russian geneticist
 * Sergey Ivanovich Vavilov (1891–1951), Russian physicist
 * Vladimir Sergeyevich Vavilov (born 1988), Russian footballer
 * Vladimir Fyodorovich Vavilov (1925–1973), Russian guitarist and composer

title: Vavilov


text:
Asterix and the Great Rescue

Asterix and the Great Rescue is a video game released by Sega for the Genesis/Mega Drive in 1993 and for the Game Gear and Master System in 1994.

Plot
This game is based on the long-running, French comic book series Asterix the Gaul. The characters Asterix and Obelix must rescue Getafix (Panoramix) and Dogmatix (Idéfix) from the Romans, who are in the process of taking over Gaul.

Gameplay
It is a side-scrolling platform game. The startup screen offers a choice of difficulty level, as well as the ability to turn off the music and/or sound effects. The Master System and Game Gear versions allows changing characters during a level, whereas the Mega Drive/Genesis version removes this feature in favor of allowing choosing characters at the start of a level.

Reception
Reviewing the Genesis version, GamePro criticized the steep difficulty slope and poor controls, elaborating that "it's annoyingly easy to mix up the button for swapping special weapons with the button for using the special weapons. Even worse, the hard-to-control jumps become ... a big frustration when you need to jump precisely, but can't."[emphases in original] They nonetheless recommended the game to players who like tough puzzles.

Mean Machines gave a positive review of the Master System version which was described as "particularly entertaining" and "compulsive". The graphics were praised including the characters' resemblance to the original comic versions. The game was found to be lacking originality as it was so similar to previous titles featuring Disney characters, and sometimes frustrating but was judged to be "a great game".

The four reviewers of Electronic Gaming Monthly gave the Game Gear version a 5 out of 10, remarking that the graphics are well done the sounds are "a nuisance", and that the controls make the game excessively frustrating. GamePro similarly wrote that the Game Gear version's graphics and animation are good but that controlling the character is extremely difficult.

title: Asterix and the Great Rescue


text:
René Leibowitz

René Leibowitz (17 February 1913 – 29 August 1972) was a Polish and French composer, conductor, music theorist and teacher. He was historically significant in promoting the music of the Second Viennese School in Paris after the Second World War, and teaching a new generation of serialist composers.

Leibowitz remained firmly committed to the musical aesthetic of Arnold Schoenberg, and was to some extent sidelined among the French avant-garde in the 1950s, when, under the influence of Leibowitz's former student, Pierre Boulez and others, the music of Schoenberg's pupil Anton Webern was adopted as the orthodox model by younger composers.

Although his compositional ideas remained strictly serialist, as a conductor Leibowitz had broad sympathies, performing works by composers as diverse as Gluck, Beethoven, Brahms, Offenbach and Ravel, and his repertory extended to include pieces by Gershwin, Puccini, Sullivan and Johann Strauss.

Early years
The facts about Leibowitz's early years are problematical, complicated by his practice of reinventing his history, but it is known that he was born in Warsaw. According to his pupil and translator, Jan Maguire, who wrote two studies of him for Tempo magazine in the late 1970s, Leibowitz was of Russian Jewish parentage; his father was an art historian. During the First World War the family was obliged to move from Warsaw to Berlin, where, Maguire writes, Leibowitz began a career as a concert violinist at the age of ten. That career was interrupted when the family moved to Paris three years later. By Maguire's account Leibowitz taught himself "the fundamentals of harmony, counterpoint and score-reading" while in high school, and took his Baccalauréat when he was seventeen. At this point, his history becomes unclear. By his own account, credited by Maguire and others, he then went to Vienna to study with Anton Webern. By other accounts he studied with Arnold Schoenberg. Neither is now believed to be correct: Sabine Meine wrote in the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians in 2001, "Leibowitz's claims of having met Schoenberg and studied with Webern in the early 1930s remain unsubstantiated", and in 2012 Nicole Gagné wrote in the Historical Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Classical Music, "despite his claims to the contrary, he never studied with Arnold Schoenberg or Anton Webern". Other claims about Leibowitz's teachers – that he studied composition with Maurice Ravel and conducting with Pierre Monteux – have been discounted by some writers in the present century, although as recently as 2010 in a study mainly focused on American composers Deborah Fillerup Weagel repeated the statement that Leibowitz was a pupil of Webern and Ravel. There is no mention of Leibowitz in the biographies of Ravel by Arbie Orenstein (1991) and Roger Nichols (2011) or of Monteux by John Canarina (2003).

Paris
In Paris, according to Maguire, Leibowitz earned his living as a jazz pianist and composed constantly. In his early twenties he married an artist from an illustrious French family and settled down in Paris, eventually taking French nationality. During the early 1930s he was introduced to Schoenberg's twelve-note technique by the German pianist and composer Erich Itor Kahn. Maguire writes that Leibowitz easily fitted into "the ebullient intellectual and artistic climate of Paris in the pre-war years". His aesthetic interests were not confined to music, and he became friendly with leading figures from the world of modern art, notably André Masson and Pablo Picasso, and with literary figures including Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and Albert Camus. For Leibowitz, according to Maguire, composing was his most regular activity, and the one he thought most important, although he was known more for his commentaries, his critical and analytical writings, his conducting, and his teaching, all of which he considered secondary.

When the Germans invaded France in the Second World War, Leibowitz was interned as an alien for a time. He did not succeed in emigrating, but, as the musicologist Reinhard Kapp puts it, "managed to survive somehow, partly hidden by [Georges] Bataille in Paris, at other times with his family in the Unoccupied Zone". While in wartime Paris he clandestinely taught students from the Paris Conservatoire. In 1944, just before the liberation of Paris, there was a party at the Left Bank apartment of the Swiss artist Balthus attended by artistic opponents of the Nazis, such as Picasso and others; Leibowitz provided the music.

Post-war
After the liberation Leibowitz resumed his interrupted career, teaching, conducting and writing, drawing on the extensive material he had produced during his enforced wartime seclusion. In 1947–48 and again in 1950 he visited Los Angeles to meet Schoenberg, whose cantata A Survivor from Warsaw he transcribed into full score. Many of the works of the Second Viennese School were first heard in France at the International Festival of Chamber Music established by Leibowitz in Paris in 1947. Leibowitz was highly influential in promoting the reputation of the School, both through teaching in Paris after the war and through his book Schoenberg et son école, published in 1947 and translated by Dika Newlin as Schoenberg and his School (US and UK editions 1949). The book was among the earliest theoretical treatises on Schoenberg's twelve-tone method of composition; Leibowitz (like Humphrey Searle) was among the first theorists to promulgate the term "serialism". The book attracted hostile criticism from composers on various points of the modernist continuum. Aaron Copland condemned its "dogmatic and fanatical" tone, and Milton Babbitt felt that its musical discussions were superficial, with misleading analogies between tonal and dodecaphonic music, but it was well received by the musical public.

Leibowitz's advocacy of the Schoenberg school was taken further by two of his pupils, Pierre Boulez and Jacques-Louis Monod, each taking different paths in promoting the music of Schoenberg, Webern and the development of serialism. Meine writes in Grove that during the 1950s Leibowitz's writings came under attack from some of the younger generation: Boulez and others accused him of "dogmatic orthodoxy and academicism". In the view of another pupil, Maguire, Boulez, having learned the twelve-tone technique from Leibowitz, "proceeded to apply it indiscriminately to every musical element, disregarding the most fundamental qualities, the essence of music". Leibowitz warned his former student, "But the public has not yet assimilated Schoenberg", and tried, unsuccessfully, to avoid a rancorous falling out.

Although Leibowitz composed continually, he seldom pressed to have his works performed. When he died, leaving an oeuvre of nearly a hundred pieces, the magazine Esprit commented, "Modest, perhaps too modest, he never spoke of his works, unless obliged to do so, doing nothing to get them played. It is certainly no exaggeration to say that at least three quarters of his scores have never been heard." Since his death a representative sample of his works have been recorded. A 2013 CD set from the Divox label contains recordings of 22 of Leibowitz's works: 6 Mélodies, Op. 6; Flute Sonata, Op. 12b; Explanation of Metaphors, Op. 15; Duo for Cello and Piano, Op. 23; 5 Pieces for clarinet and piano, Op. 29; Sérénade, Op. 38; 3 Poèmes, Op. 46; Violin Concerto, Op. 50; Marijuana variations non sérieuses, Op. 54; Toccata, Op. 62; 3 Caprices, Op. 70; 2 Settings, Op. 71; 3 Poèmes, Op. 73; Motifs, Op. 74; Petite suite, Op. 75; 2 poèmes, Op. 76a; Chanson dada, Op. 76b; Suite, Op. 81; 4 Lieder, Op. 86; 3 Intermezzi, Op. 87; Laboratoire central, Op. 88; and 3 Poèmes, Op. 92.

Although Leibowitz was receptive to a wide range of musical styles, he could not bear the music of Sibelius, and published a pamphlet about him under the title of Sibelius: the Worst Composer in the World; he also severely criticised Bartók for writing music that was too accessible: Leibowitz felt that by failing to adopt dodecaphony in his later works Bartók was pandering to popular taste rather than helping to move music away from tonality in accordance with Leibowitz's notions of historical inevitability and composers' duty. For Leibowitz, to write a popular work like Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra was a betrayal of modernism.

Grove has articles on thirty-two composers who studied with Leibowitz in Paris or attended his sessions at Darmstadt or elsewhere: as well as Boulez and Monod, they include Vinko Globokar; Hans Werner Henze; Diego Masson; Serge Nigg; and Bernd Alois Zimmermann. The writer Joan Peyser summed up Leibowitz's career: "one long splendid moment in his life, stretching from Paris in 1944 through Darmstadt in 1948, devoted to the promulgation of Schoenbergian ideas. When, in the late 40s and early 50s, Webern displaced Schoenberg as the venerated man and composers applied the serial idea beyond pitch, Leibowitz's time had passed. He refused to follow that path."

Leibowitz's obituarist in Esprit dismissed this as simplistic: "Let us rise above the very "Parisian" (but untrue) cliché of a René Leibowitz, abandoned by his brilliant pupils, and fallen into oblivion after the 1950s. There were breaks, especially with Boulez, but that did not prevent later generations from coming to lean on him: the generation of Puig, Globokar, etc. It is also true that many myths were circulated about him, both by the academicians who did not forgive him for having introduced the virus of the atonal and by the avant-gardists who found him too conformist."

Leibowitz died suddenly in Paris on 29 August 1972, at the age of 59.

Recordings
In the early LP era, in the 1950s, Leibowitz conducted complete recordings of seven operas, which were generally well received, and have mostly been reissued on CD. They were Bizet's Les Pêcheurs de perles; Gluck's Alceste and L'ivrogne corrigé; Mozart's Zaïde; Offenbach's La Belle Hélène and Orphée aux enfers; and Ravel's L'Heure espagnole. A set of Ravel's orchestral works was less well reviewed, but Leibowitz received qualified praise for his set of Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder ("Leibowitz makes a serious attempt to produce a convincing performance; his slow tempi find justification in Schoenberg's markings, but his artists cannot persuade us that Gurre-Lieder is other than an historical curiosity").

In 1961 Leibowitz conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in a set of Beethoven's symphonies made by Decca for Reader's Digest; it was among the first to attempt to follow Beethoven's metronome markings, following the pioneering set made in Vienna three years earlier, conducted by Hermann Scherchen. Reviewers observed that although Scherchen had achieved tempos more closely approaching the composer's markings, Leibowitz, at speeds not much slower, had secured better ensemble than the earlier set achieved. Initially the set was poorly received. The Stereo Record Guide called the performances "slack", "perfunctory" and "insensitive"; on its reissue in the 1980s a Gramphone reviewer thought much of the set "light-weight" and "lacking in gravitas", although he found the performance of the Seventh Symphony "magnificent". In 1995 Richard Taruskin, analysing a selection of Beethoven recordings, concluded that Leibowitz, like Scherchen, delivered performances that were musically and musicologically superior to more recent attempts by "authentic" conductors such as Christopher Hogwood. By the 21st century the performances had come to seem old-fashioned, in the view of a critic in Fanfare, who found them more akin to those by Herbert von Karajan than to those by specialist authenticists such as Roger Norrington and John Eliot Gardiner.

With the Decca team, Leibowitz recorded eleven more albums between 1959 and 1962. They included large-scale works such as The Rite of Spring, symphonies by Mozart, Schubert, Schumann, and concertos by Grieg, Liszt, Mendelssohn, Prokofiev, as well as short pieces by more than thirty composers ranging from Bach to Gershwin, from Wagner to Sullivan, Puccini and Johann Strauss.

Works

 * Piano Sonata op.1 (1939)
 * 10 Canons for wind trio op.2 (1939)
 * String Quartet no.1 op.3 (1940)
 * Symphony op.4 (1941)
 * Double concerto for violin, piano and 17 instruments op.5 (1942)
 * 6 Songs for bass and piano op.6 (1942)
 * Tourist Death, concert aria for soprano and chamber orchestra (T: Archibald MacLeish) op.7 (1943)
 * 4 Piano Pieces op.8 (1943)
 * 3 Songs for soprano and piano (T: Pablo Picasso) op.9 (1943)
 * Chamber Concerto for nine instruments op.10 (1944)
 * Wind Quintet op.11 (1944)
 * Sonata for violin and piano op.12a (1944)
 * Sonata for flute and piano op.12b (1944)
 * Empedokles for mixed a cappella chorus (T: Friedrich Hölderlin) op.13 (1944/45)
 * Variations for orchestra op.14 (1945)
 * L'explication des métaphores/Explanation of Metaphors (T: Raymond Queneau) op.15 (1947)
 * Chamber Symphony ("Kammersymphonie") for 12 instruments op.16 (1948)
 * La Nuit close, music drama in three acts (T: Georges Limbour) op.17 (1947–50)
 * 4 Songs for soprano and piano (T: Michel Leiris) op.18 (1949)
 * 3 Piano Pieces op.19 (1949)
 * Piano Trio op.20 (1950)
 * L'Emprise du Donné op.21 (1950)
 * String Quartet no.2 op.22 (1950)
 * Duo for cello and piano op.23 (1951)
 * Perpetuum Mobile: The City – A Dramatic Symphony for Narrator and Orchestra (T: William Carlos Williams) op.24 (1951)
 * 5 Songs for soprano and piano op.25 (1951)
 * String Quartet no.3 op.26 (1951)
 * Fantasy for piano op.27 (1952)
 * 6 Short Piano Pieces op.28 (1952)
 * 5 Pieces for clarinet and piano op.29 (1952)
 * La Circulaire de minuit, opera in three acts (T: Georges Limbour) op.30 (1953)
 * 6 Orchestral Pieces op.31 (1954)
 * Concerto for piano and orchestra op.32 (1954)
 * Träume vom Tod und vom Leben – Eine Symphonie für Soli, Sprecher, gemischten Chor und Orchester (T: Hans Arp) op.33 (1954–55)
 * 4 Songs for soprano and piano (T: James Joyce) op.34 (1954)
 * Concertino for viola and chamber orchestra op.35 (1954)
 * Rhapsodie Concertante for violin and piano op.36 (1955)
 * La notte (T: Angelo Poliziano), Epigramma (T: Torquato Tasso) and A se stesso (T: Giacomo Leopardi) for mixed chorus op.37 (1955)
 * Serenade for baritone and eight instruments (T: Friedrich Hölderlin, Clemens Brentano) op.38 (1955)
 * Symphonic Fantasy for orchestra op.39 (1956)
 * The Renegade for mixed chorus and instruments (T: Lionel Abel) op.40 (1956)
 * Capriccio for high soprano and nine instruments (T: Friedrich Hölderlin) op.41 (1956)
 * String Trio op.42 (1956)
 * Sonata quasi una fantasia for piano op.43 (1957)
 * Humoresque for six percussionists op.44 (1957)
 * String Quartet no.4 op.45 (1958)
 * Trois Poèmes de Georges Limbour for soprano and six instruments (T: Georges Limbour) op.46 (1958)

 * Concertino for piano duet op.47 (1958)
 * Overture for orchestra op.48 (1958)
 * Damocles, song cycle for soprano and piano (T: Michel Leiris) op.49 (1958)
 * Concerto for violin and orchestra op.50 'dedicated to Ivry Gitlis' (1958)
 * 3 Bagatelles for string orchestra op.51 (1958)
 * Art for Art's Sake – A Fantasia for Jazz Orchestra op.52 (1959)
 * Concertino for trombone and orchestra op.53 (1960)
 * ''Marijuana – Variations non sérieuses op.54 (1960)
 * Sinfonietta da Camera op.55 (1961)
 * Fantasy for violin solo op.56 (1961)
 * Introduction, Funeral March and Fanfare op.57 (1961)
 * Concerto for cello and orchestra op.58 (1962)
 * String Quartet no.5 op.59 (1963)
 * Les Espagnols à Venise – Opera buffa in one act (T: Georges Limbour) op.60 (1964)
 * Quatre bagatelles for trombone and piano op.61 (1963)
 * Toccata pour piano op.62 (1964)
 * Symphonic Rhapsody for orchestra op.63 (1965)
 * Trois Études miniatures for piano op.64 (1965)
 * String Quartet no.6 op.65 (1965)
 * Suite for violin and piano op.66 (1965)
 * 2 Songs for soprano and piano (T: Aimé Cesaire) op.67 (1965)
 * A Prayer – A Symphonic Cantata for mezzo-soprano, male chorus and orchestra (T: James Joyce) op.68 (1965)
 * Sonatina for flute, viola and harp op.69 (1966)
 * Trois Caprices for vibraphone op.70 (1966)
 * Two Settings after William Blake for mixed chorus (T: William Blake) op.71 (1966)
 * String Quartet no.7 op.72 (1966)
 * Trois Poèmes de Georges Bataille for bass and piano (T: Georges Bataille) op.73 (1966)
 * Motifs for speaker and instruments (T: Georges Limbour) op.74 (1967)
 * Petite Suite for piano op.75 (1966)
 * Deux Poèmes for soprano and piano (T: Michel Leiris) op.76a (1966)
 * Chanson Dada, three melodramas for treble and instruments (T: Tristan Tzara) op.76b (1966)
 * Sonnet for soprano and five instruments (T: E. E. Cummings) op.77 (1967)
 * Rondo capriccioso for piano op.78 (1967)
 * Capriccio for flute and strings op.79 (1967)
 * 4 Songs for bass and piano (T: Carl Einstein) op.80 (1967)
 * Suite for nine instruments op.81 (1967)
 * Legend for soprano, piano and orchestra (T: Hart Crane) op.82 (1968)
 * String Quartet no.8 op.83 (1968)
 * Saxophone Quartet op.84 (1969)
 * Labyrinthe, music drama in one act (T: René Leibowitz after Charles Baudelaire) op.85 (1969)
 * 4 Songs for bass and piano (T: Paul Celan) op.86 (1969)
 * Tre Intermezzi per pianoforte op.87 (1970)
 * Laboratoire Central – Short Cantata for speaker, female chorus and instruments (T: Max Jacob) op.88 (1970)
 * Scene and Aria for soprano and orchestra (T: Georg Heym) op.89 (1970)
 * Clarinet Sextet op.90 (1970)
 * Todos Caeràn, opera in 2 acts and 5 tableaux (T: René Leibowitz) op.91 (1971)
 * Trois Poèmes de Pierre Reverdy for vocal quartet and piano (T: Pierre Reverdy) op.92 (1971)
 * String Quartet no.9 op.93 (1972)

Mono recordings

 * Bizet: Les Pêcheurs de perles. Mattiwilda Dobbs, Enzo Seri, Jean Borthayre; Paris Philharmonic Chorus and Orchestra. Preiser (CD)
 * Gluck: Alceste – Semser, Seri, Demigny, Mollien, Hoffmann, Lindenfelder, Chœur et Orch Phil de Paris, Jean-Pierre Rampal, Orchestre Philharmonique de Paris (1950)
 * Gluck: L'ivrogne corrigé: Jean-Christophe Benoît, Bernard Demigny, Claudine Collart, Freda Betti and Jean Hoffmann. (Nixa, 1951)
 * Massenet & Puccini: A Portrait of Manon – Anna Moffo, Giuseppe di Stefano, Flaviano Labo, Robert Kerns – RCA Italiana Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Testament (CD)
 * Offenbach: La Belle Hélène. Paris Philharmonic Chorus and Orchestra. Regis (CD)
 * Offenbach: Orphée aux enfers – Paris Opera Chorus and Orchestra. Regis (CD), also Preiser (CD)
 * Ravel: L'Heure espagnole – Janine Linda, André Dran, Jean Mollien, Jean Hoffmann, Lucien Mans, Orch Radio-Symph de Paris (Vox PL7880)
 * Rossini: overtures to L'Italiana in Algeri, La gazza ladra, Guillaume Tell, Semiramide – Pasdeloup Orchestra (Urania-USD-1014)
 * Roussel: Le Festin de l'Araignée suite (1912) & Le Marchand de sable qui passe – Paris Philharmonic Orch (Counterpoint-Esoteric LP 5511)
 * Schoenberg: Gurre-Lieder. Ethel Semser, Nell Tangeman, John Riley, Richard Lewis, Ferry Gruber, Morris Gesell, Chœurs et Orchestre de la Nouvelle Association Symphonique de Paris.
 * Schoenberg: Piano Concerto Op. 42. Claude Helffer (piano), Orchestre Radio-Symphonique de Paris. Counterpoint (LP)
 * Schoenberg: Pierrot lunaire. Ethel Semser, The Virtuoso Chamber Ensemble. Argo/Westminster (LP)

Stereo recordings

 * May 1959
 * International Symphony Orchestra
 * Schumann Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Op. 97 "Rhenish"
 * Liszt Mephisto Waltz No. 1 S110/2
 * June 1959
 * "London Festival Orchestra" (New Symphony Orchestra of London)
 * Stravinsky The Rite of Spring
 * Debussy Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune
 * June 1960
 * Malcolm Frager (piano)
 * Paris Conservatoire Orchestra
 * Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor Op. 16
 * June 1960
 * Paris Conservatoire Orchestra
 * Offenbach Orphée aux enfers: Overture
 * Debussy Petite Suite: En bateau
 * Ravel Bolero
 * Ravel La valse
 * Gounod Faust: Ballet Music
 * Gounod Funeral March of a Marionette
 * Saint-Saëns Danse Macabre Op. 40
 * Pierné Marche des petits soldats de plomb
 * Borodin Prince Igor: Overture & Polovtsian Dances
 * Dukas L'apprenti sorcier
 * Bizet Carmen: Suite
 * Auber Les diamants de la couronne: Overture
 * Offenbach Les contes d'Hoffmann: Barcarolle
 * Puccini Manon Lescaut: Intermezzo
 * Mozart Le nozze di Figaro K492: Overture
 * February 1961
 * "London Festival Orchestra"
 * Chopin Polonaise in A-flat Op. 53
 * Gade Jealousy
 * Delibes La Source: Intermezzo
 * Waldteufel Les Patineurs – Waltz Op. 183
 * Dinicu Hora Staccato
 * Dvořák Humoresque Op. 101/7 B187/7
 * Ippolitov-Ivanov Procession of the Sadar Op. 10
 * Bizet Carmen: Habañera
 * Bach-Gounod Ave Maria
 * Franck Panis Angelicus
 * Trad. Londonderry Air & Greensleeves
 * J. Strauss II Die Fledermaus: Overture
 * Falla El Amor Brujo: Ritual Fire Dance
 * Gershwin Porgy and Bess: Excerpts
 * Boccherini String Quintet in E G275: Minuet
 * Sullivan HMS Pinafore: Overture
 * Rimsky-Korsakov Tsar Saltan: Flight of the Bumble Bee
 * Beethoven Die Ruinen von Athen, Op. 113: Turkish March

 * April, May and June 1961
 * Inge Borkh (soprano), Ruth Siewert (contralto), Richard Lewis (tenor), Ludwig Weber (bass), Royal Philharmonic Chorus; Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
 * Beethoven: Symphonies 1–9
 * January and February 1962
 * Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
 * Mozart Symphony No. 41 in C, K551 "Jupiter"
 * Wagner Tannhäuser: Overture
 * Bach-Leibowitz Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor BWV 582
 * Schubert Symphony No. 9 in C, D944 "Great"
 * Offenbach-Leibowitz La vie parisienne
 * February 1962
 * Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
 * Musorgsky-Ravel Pictures at an Exhibition
 * Mendelssohn A Midsummer Night's Dream Overture Op. 21
 * Mendelssohn Octet in E-flat Op. 20: Scherzo
 * Mussorgsky-Leibowitz Night on the Bare Mountain
 * Beethoven Leonore Overture No. 3, Op. 72a
 * Wagner Die Meistersinger: Prelude to act 1
 * October 1962
 * Hyman Bress (violin)
 * Earl Wild (piano)
 * Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
 * Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor Op. 64
 * Grieg Piano Concerto in A minor Op. 16
 * Beethoven Egmont Op. 84: Overture
 * December 1962
 * Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
 * Weber Der Freischütz J277: Overture
 * Schumann Manfred Op. 115: Overture
 * March 1963
 * Leonard Pennario (piano)
 * London Symphony Orchestra
 * Liszt Piano Concerto No. 1 in E-flat S124
 * Liszt Piano Concerto No. 2 in A S125

Publications by Leibowitz

 * 1947 Schoenberg et son école: l'étape contemporaine du langage musical. [Paris]: J.B. Janin. (English edition, as Schoenberg and His School: The Contemporary Stage in the Language of Music. Translated by Dika Newlin. New York: Philosophical Library, 1949).
 * 1948. Qu'est-ce que la musique de douze sons? Le Concerto pour neuf instruments, op. 24, d'Anton Webern. Liège: Éditions Dynamo.
 * 1949. Introduction à la musique de douze sons. Les variations pour orchestre op. 31, d'Arnold Schoenberg. Paris: L'Arche.
 * 1950. L'artiste et sa conscience: esquisse d'une dialectique de la conscience artistique. Préf. de Jean-Paul Sartre. Paris: L'Arche.
 * 1950. Scènes de la vie musicale américaine. Liège: Éditions Dynamo.
 * 1950. Arnold Schoenberg ou Sisyphe dans la musique contemporaine. Liège: Éditions Dynamo.
 * 1951. L'évolution de la musique, de Bach à Schoenberg. Paris: Éditions Corrêa.
 * 1957. Histoire de l'opéra. Paris: Buchet Chastel.
 * 1969. Schoenberg. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.
 * 1971. Le compositeur et son double: essais sur l'interprétation musicale. Paris: Gallimard. (Ed. augm., version définitive. Paris: Gallimard, 1986.)
 * 1972. Les fantômes de l'opéra: essais sur le théâtre lyrique. Paris: Gallimard.

title: René Leibowitz


text:
Silvije Degen

Silvije Degen (born 15 June 1942 in Bjelovar) is a Croatian lawyer and politician from Zagreb.

Silvije Degen, a native of Zagreb, in 1980s became one of the best known lawyers in Yugoslavia. This was due to his impeccable fashion sense and tendency to take high-profile criminal cases, best known being the trial of Andrija Artuković, whom he defended unsuccessfully.

In the early 1990s Degen entered politics, becoming a leader of the Socialist Party of Croatia. As such, he made a minor upset in the 1992 Croatian presidential election, by finishing fifth with 108,979 or 4.07% of the vote.

title: Silvije Degen


text:
Rudra (band)

Rudra is a Singaporean band which was formed in 1992. Rudra play a uniquely composed avant garde blend of styles, including, among others, black metal-influenced death metal with interpolations and extended passages of traditional Carnatic music. The lyrical content is derived from Sanskrit Vedic literature and philosophy with, ancient mantras (shlokas) incorporated into the song structures. The band describes the style as Vedic metal.

History
Rudra was formed in mid-1992 as a trio, then made up of Kathir (bass and vocals), Shiva (drums) and Bala (guitar). It was then known as Rudhra. A fourth member, Selvam, was recruited to supplement Bala on guitar. With this line-up they released a 4-track demo, The Past, in 1994. Prior to this release, Rudhra had been featured in a few underground death metal compilation albums with Singaporean underground metal bands.

In early 1996, the band had a hiatus and the members were involved in separate bands. Towards the end of 1996, Kathir decided to resurrect Rudhra with a slight alteration to its name; thus Rudra (the most common English transliteration for the Sanskrit word) was born. Kathir teamed up with Shiva and started work in the studio, soon to be joined by Bala and Alvin Chua to complete the line up before recording the self-titled debut album in late 1997, which was released in June 1998. The band played a couple of gigs and also starting work on new material. The band replaced its two guitarists with Selvam (ex-member) and Kannan in January 2000.

With that line-up Rudra released its second album, The Aryan Crusade, in September 2001. In January 2002, Big O magazine named this album as one of the top 40 albums of the year. In July 2003, Rudra released a third album Kurukshetra, named after the battlefield featured in the Indian epic the Mahabharata, Kurukshetra.

After touring in Singapore, India, Indonesia and Thailand, Rudra released Brahmavidya: Primordial I, in April 2005. Brahmavidya: Primordial I represented a slight shift in the band's sound as it exhibits more black metal influences than their previous albums and presents a denser recording that showcases the band's progressive move into more dynamic leads, complex bass-lines, and tighter, faster drumming with a bigger emphasis on blast beats. With this release, Rudra toured the United States in January 2007.

In 2008, Kannan was replaced by Devan. In 2009, Rudra released Brahmavidya: Transcendental I as the second chapter in the Brahmavidya trilogy. They have collaborated with Singapore director Jacen Tan on the music video for Hymns from the Blazing Chariot. In 2009, the band went through another line up change with Vinod replacing longtime member Selvam.

In August 2010, Rudra headlined the first day of Baybeats, an annual 3-day alternative music festival, held in Singapore. This was a rare occurrence: an extreme metal band headlining a non-metal music festival. The band has also invited the interest of musicologists and research papers have been published about both Vedic metal and the band.

In November 2011, Rudra announced that they will be closing the 2011 Brahmavidya Tour by headlining the Strawberry Fields Rock Fest in Bangalore, India. It had been more than 7 years since the band last played Bangalore.

In July 2011, Devan left the band to focus on his personal life. Subash joined the band officially in January 2012 to replace Devan. In 2013, Simon joined the band to replace Subash. In August 2021, Simon had to leave the band due to work commitments. Devan rejoined the band subsequently. Their 10th album (and 9th of all original material) Eight Mahavidyas was released on December 22, 2022.

Discography

 * The Past (Demo, 1995)
 * Rudra (1998)
 * The Aryan Crusade (2001)
 * Kurukshetra (2003)
 * Brahmavidya: Primordial I (2005)
 * Brahmavidya: Transcendental I (2009) (Trinity Recs - Asia, Vic Records - Europe)
 * Brahmavidya: Immortal I (2011)
 * RTA (2013)
 * Kurukshetra (Remastered) (2015)
 * Enemy of Duality (2016)
 * The Blackisle Sessions (2018)
 * Past Life Regression (2018)
 * Invoking the Gods (2019)
 * Eight Mahavidyas (2022)

title: Rudra (band)


text:
Zorba the Greek

Zorba the Greek (Βίος και Πολιτεία του Αλέξη Ζορμπά, Víos kai Politeía tou Aléxē Zorbá, Life and Times of Alexis Zorbas) is a novel written by Nikos Kazantzakis, first published in 1946. It is the tale of a young Greek intellectual who ventures to escape his bookish life with the aid of the boisterous and mysterious Alexis Zorba. The novel was adapted into the successful 1964 film of the same name directed by Michael Cacoyannis, as well as a stage musical and a BBC radio play.

Plot
The book opens in a café in Piraeus, just before dawn on a gusty autumn morning sometime after the end of World War I. The narrator, a young Greek intellectual, resolves to set aside his books for a few months after being stung by the parting words of a friend, Stavridakis, who has left for the Russian Caucasus and Ukraine to help the Caucasus Greeks and Ukrainian Greeks who were facing persecution from the Bolsheviks. He sets off for Crete to re-open a disused lignite mine, and immerse himself in the world of peasants and the proletariat.

He is about to begin reading his copy of Dante's Divine Comedy when he feels he is being watched; he turns around and sees a man of around sixty peering at him through the glass door of the café. The man enters and immediately approaches him to ask for work. He claims expertise as a chef, a miner, and player of the santouri, and introduces himself as Alexis Zorba, a Greek born in Macedonia. The narrator is fascinated by Zorba's lascivious opinions and expressive manner and decides to employ him as a foreman. On their way to Crete, they talk on a great number of subjects, and Zorba's soliloquies set the tone for a large part of the book.

On arrival, they reject the hospitality of Anagnostis and Kondomanolious the café-owner, and on Zorba's suggestion make their way to Madame Hortense's hotel, which is nothing more than a row of old bathing-huts. They are forced by circumstances to share a bathing-hut. The narrator spends Sunday roaming the island, the landscape of which reminds him of "good prose, carefully ordered, sober… powerful and restrained" and reads Dante. On returning to the hotel for dinner, the pair invite Madame Hortense to their table and get her to talk about her past as a courtesan. Zorba gives her the pet-name "Bouboulina" (likely inspired by the Greek heroine) while he takes the pet-name "Canavaro" (after real-life Admiral Canevaro, a past lover claimed by Hortense).

The next day, the mine opens and work begins. The narrator, who has socialist ideals, attempts to get to know the workers, but Zorba warns him to keep his distance: "Man is a brute.... If you're cruel to him, he respects and fears you. If you're kind to him, he plucks your eyes out." Zorba himself plunges into the work, which is characteristic of his overall attitude, which is one of being absorbed in whatever he is doing or whomever he is with at any particular moment. Quite frequently Zorba works long hours, and requests not to be interrupted while working. The narrator and Zorba have a great many lengthy conversations, about a variety of things, from life to religion, each other's past and how they came to be where they are now, and the narrator learns a great deal about the human condition from Zorba that he otherwise had not gleaned from his life of books and paper.

The narrator absorbs a new zest for life from his experiences with Zorba and the other people around him, but reversal and tragedy mark his stay on Crete. His one-night stand with a beautiful passionate widow is followed by her public decapitation. Alienated by the villagers' harshness and amorality, and having spent all of his remaining funds on a mining-related construction project that ends in a spectacular collapse, the narrator finds himself beset by doubts and uncertainty. Having overcome one of his own demons (such as his internal "no," which the narrator equates with the Buddha, whose teachings he has been studying and about whom he has been writing for much of the narrative, and who he also equates with "the void") and feeling he is needed elsewhere (near the end of the novel, the narrator has a premonition of the death of his old friend Stavridakis), the narrator takes his leave of Zorba for the mainland, which, despite the lack of any major outward burst of emotionality, is significantly wrenching for both Zorba and the narrator. It almost goes without saying that the two friends will remember each other for the duration of their natural lives.

The narrator and Zorba never see each other again, although Zorba sends the narrator letters over the years, informing him of his travels and work, and his marriage to a 25-year-old woman. Despite Zorba's many invitations to visit, the narrator does not accept. Eventually the narrator receives a letter from Zorba's wife, informing him of Zorba's death (which the narrator had a premonition of). Zorba's widow tells the narrator that Zorba's last words were of him, and in accordance with her dead husband's wishes, she wants the narrator to visit her home and take Zorba's santouri.

Historical basis
Alexis Zorba (Αλέξης Ζορμπάς) is a fictionalized version of the mine worker George Zorbas (Γιώργης Ζορμπάς, 1867–1941).

Adaptations
The novel was adapted into the Academy Award–winning 1964 film Zorba the Greek directed by Michael Cacoyannis starring Anthony Quinn as Zorba and Alan Bates: the film won three Academy Awards. It was also adapted into a musical in 1968, Zorba as well as a 1993 two-part radio play, Zorba the Greek, part of the BBC's Classic Serial radio series, starring Robert Stephens as Zorba and Michael Maloney. In addition to the film winning the three Academy Awards, as mentioned, "Zorba" also became a household name.

The book has been adapted many more times in languages other than English, including a 1972 German-language telemovie, and a 1987–88 ballet, Zorba il Greco, by Mikis Theodorakis produced at the Verona Arena.

title: Zorba the Greek


text:
Wytham

Wytham is a village and civil parish on the Seacourt Stream, a branch of the River Thames, about 3 mi northwest of the centre of Oxford. It is just west of the Western By-Pass Road, part of the Oxford Ring Road (A34). The nearest village is Godstow. Wytham was the northernmost part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred it to Oxfordshire.

Etymology
Wytham derives its name from the Anglo Saxon Witta's Home around 500 BCE. The toponym is first recorded as Wihtham around 957, and comes from the Old English for a homestead or village in a river-bend.

History of the manor
The manor of Wytham, along with Wytham Abbey (not a religious foundation but the manor house) and much of the village, was formerly owned by the Earls of Abingdon. The Church of England parish church of All Saints was originally a medieval building but it was extensively rebuilt between 1811 and 1812 by Montagu Bertie, 5th Earl of Abingdon. The ruins of the former Godstow Nunnery lie just east of the village

The 20th century
In the 1920s, The 9th Earl of Abingdon sold the Wytham Estate – comprising not just the Abbey but most of the houses in the village and approximately 2,500 acres of park, farm and woodland, including Wytham Great Wood – to Colonel Raymond ffennell, who had made a fortune in South Africa and changed his name from Schumacher on arrival in England, and his wife Hope (nee Weigall). During World War II they agreed to take in six East End children as part of the evacuee programme. After the war, they gifted the entire Wytham Estate to the University of Oxford – the largest bequest to the University since the Middle Ages. The Abbey was subsequently sold by the University of Oxford in 1991 and is now in private hands.

Wytham Great Wood
Wytham Woods is an area of long-established mixed woodland noted for its high population of badgers and long-term monitoring of great tits. It is on rising ground to the west of the village and covers 1000 acres. The woods are a Site of Special Scientific Interest. The University of Oxford has owned the woods since 1942 and uses them for research in zoology and climate change. The University has a field station north of the village. It is claimed to be one of the most researched pieces of woodland in the world. The woods are open to the public by permit which are available on application, for walking but are closed to dogs, horses and bicycles.

A named path within the wood is called the Singing Way. It is aligned with Oxford and got its name because monks on pilgrimage from Cirencester to Canterbury would break into song here as they sighted the town and the end of their day's journey. On 7 October 2017 an Oxfordshire Blue Plaque was unveiled at the Keeper's Hill car park in Wytham Woods, commemorating the bequest of the woods to the University of Oxford in 1942 by Raymond and Hope Ffennell.

Inspector Morse
Wytham village and Wytham Woods have frequently featured in the "Inspector Morse" detective novels by Colin Dexter, most notably in The Way Through the Woods.

title: Wytham


text:
Wytham Woods

Wytham Woods is a 423.8 ha biological Site of Special Scientific Interest north-west of Oxford in Oxfordshire. It is a Nature Conservation Review site.

Habitats in this site, which formerly belonged to Abingdon Abbey, include ancient woodland and limestone grassland. Over 500 species of vascular plant have been recorded, and probably more data about the bird, mammal, and invertebrate fauna have been recorded about this site than any other in the country as a result of studies by the University of Oxford. More than 900 species of beetles, 580 flies, 200 spiders, 700 bees, wasps and ants, 250 true bugs, and 27 earthworms have been recorded. An important aspect of these data is that they are long-term, with bird data dating back for over 60 years, badger data for over 30 years and climate change data for the last 18 years. Although the majority of the research activity is Oxford-based, any organisation can use the site, with permission.

Current projects include the continuation of long-term study of blue and great tits, bats and climate change, but also newly created projects such as the Darwin Tree of Life project, in conjunction with the Wellcome Sanger Institute.

Access is only allowed with a permit from the owner, the University of Oxford.

title: Wytham Woods


text:
Emballonuridae

Emballonuridae is a family of microbats, many of which are referred to as sac-winged or sheath-tailed bats. They are widely distributed in tropical and subtropical regions around the world. The earliest fossil records are from the Eocene.

Description
The emballonurids include some of the smallest of all bats, and range from 3.5 to 10 cm in body length. They are generally brown or grey, although the species of genus Diclidurus are white. The faces are said to be handsome, the heads being comparable to those of domestic dogs, and their wings are long and narrow. As with other microchiropteran families, they use ultrasonic echolocation to sense the surrounding environment and their prey; the signals of some species are unusual in being audible to humans.

Possession of the postorbital processes, the reduced, noncontacting premaxillaries, and rather simple shoulder and elbow joints, which is similar to pteropodids, makes them rather a primitive group. However, they are more advanced in the reduction of the second digit phalanges and the flexion of the third digit proximal phalanges over the metacarpal dorsal side.

The wing surface extends between the legs, a membrane known as a uropatagium, and the structure of these is a characteristic in many of the genera. They have tails which are partially enclosed, a short part of which projects through the uropatagium to form a sheath. The usual arrangement of the uropatagium is as to be fixed to the tail, but the sheathtail feature is joined by an elastic component which allows greater flexibility; they are able to use the hind legs for locomotion and to adjust the membrane's surface while in flight. As a common name indicates, many species also possess sac-shaped glands in their wings (propatagium), which are open to the air and may release pheromones to attract mates. Other species have throat glands which produce strong-smelling secretions. They have the dental formula

These bats generally prefer to roost in better-illuminated areas than other species of bats. Their dwellings can often be found in hollow trees and entryways to caves or other structures. Some species, such as the genus Taphozous, live in large colonies, but others are solitary. Species living away from the tropics may enter periods of torpor or extended hibernation during colder months.

Emballonurids feed mainly on insects and occasionally on fruit. Most of these bats catch their meals while flying.

The common name for some groups, 'sheath-tailed bats', is sometimes noted as sheathtails.

Distribution
Found in the Neotropics, Afrotropics, southern Asia, Australia and South Pacific islands.

Classification
Family Emballonuridae
 * Genus Balantiopteryx
 * Ecuadorian sac-winged bat, Balantiopteryx infusca
 * Thomas's sac-winged bat, Balantiopteryx io
 * Gray sac-winged bat, Balantiopteryx plicata
 * Genus Centronycteris
 * Thomas's shaggy bat, Centronycteris centralis
 * Shaggy bat, Centronycteris maximiliani
 * Genus Coleura
 * African sheath-tailed bat, Coleura afra
 * Madagascar sheath-tailed bat, Coleura kibomalandy
 * Seychelles sheath-tailed bat, Coleura seychellensis
 * Genus Cormura
 * Chestnut sac-winged bat, Cormura brevirostris
 * Genus Cyttarops
 * Short-eared bat, Cyttarops alecto
 * Genus Diclidurus - ghost bats''
 * Northern ghost bat, Diclidurus albus
 * Greater ghost bat, Diclidurus ingens
 * Isabelle's ghost bat, Diclidurus isabella
 * Lesser ghost bat, Diclidurus scutatus
 * Genus Emballonura
 * Small Asian sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura alecto
 * Beccari's sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura beccarii
 * Large-eared sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura dianae
 * Greater sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura furax
 * Lesser sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura monticola
 * Raffray's sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura raffrayana
 * Pacific sheath-tailed bat, Emballonura semicaudata
 * Seri's Sheathtail-bat, Emballonura serii
 * Genus Mosia
 * Dark sheath-tailed bat, Mosia nigrescens
 * Genus Paremballonura
 * Western sheath-tailed bat, Paremballonura tiavato
 * Peters's sheath-tailed bat, Paremballonura atrata
 * Genus Peropteryx
 * Greater dog-like bat, Peropteryx kappleri
 * White-winged dog-like bat, Peropteryx leucoptera
 * Lesser dog-like bat, Peropteryx macrotis
 * Pale-winged dog-like bat, Peropteryx pallidoptera
 * Trinidad dog-like bat, Peropteryx trinitatis
 * Genus Rhynchonycteris
 * Proboscis bat, Rhynchonycteris naso
 * Genus Saccolaimus
 * Yellow-bellied pouched bat, Saccolaimus flaviventris
 * Troughton's pouched bat, Saccolaimus mixtus
 * Pel's pouched bat, Saccolaimus peli
 * Naked-rumped pouched bat, Saccolaimus saccolaimus
 * Genus Saccopteryx
 * Antioquian sac-winged bat, Saccopteryx antioquensis
 * Greater sac-winged bat, Saccopteryx bilineata
 * Frosted sac-winged bat, Saccopteryx canescens
 * Amazonian sac-winged bat, Saccopteryx gymnura
 * Lesser sac-winged bat, Saccopteryx leptura
 * Genus Taphozous
 * Indonesian tomb bat (Taphozous achates)
 * Coastal sheath-tailed bat (Taphozous australis)
 * Common sheath-tailed bat (Taphozous georgianus)
 * Hamilton's tomb bat (Taphozous hamiltoni)
 * Hildegarde's tomb bat (Taphozous hildegardeae)
 * Hill's sheath-tailed bat (Taphozous hilli)
 * Arnhem sheath-tailed bat (Taphozous kapalgensis)
 * Long-winged tomb bat (Taphozous longimanus)
 * Mauritian tomb bat (Taphozous mauritianus)
 * Black-bearded tomb bat (Taphozous melanopogon)
 * Naked-rumped tomb bat (Taphozous nudiventris)
 * Egyptian tomb bat (Taphozous perforatus)
 * Theobald's tomb bat (Taphozous theobaldi)
 * Troughton's sheath-tailed bat (Taphozous troughtoni)

title: Emballonuridae


text:
Jo Durie

Joanna Mary Durie (born 27 July 1960) is a former world No. 5 tennis player from the United Kingdom. During her career, she also reached No. 9 in doubles, and won two Grand Slam titles, both in the mixed doubles with Jeremy Bates.

Born in Bristol, England, Jo Durie was the last British woman to reach the semifinal of a Grand Slam tournament until Johanna Konta reached the semifinal of the 2016 Australian Open, and the last British woman to win a major title in any discipline, until Heather Watson won the 2016 Wimbledon mixed doubles title with Henri Kontinen.

Singles career
After a successful junior career which included winning junior British titles on all three surfaces (grass, hard court and indoor) in 1976; Jo Durie turned professional in 1977, and played her first match at Wimbledon that year against the eventual champion Virginia Wade. In 1980 Durie suffered a major back injury which kept her out of the game for eight months. However, she made a successful return to the woman's tennis circuit in 1981, reaching the fourth round of the singles at Wimbledon and the US Open and climbing to her highest singles ranking so far of 31.

Her most successful year as a singles player was 1983, ending the season at No. 6 in the world rankings and on the prize money leader board. As an unseeded player Durie reached the semifinals of the French Open, beating both Pam Shriver and Tracy Austin along the way. Later that year she made another Grand Slam singles semifinal appearance at the US Open, where she eventually lost to Chris Evert in straight sets. Her dramatic rise up the singles rankings that year ended with a quarterfinal at the Australian Open in December. Durie's success as a singles player during 1983 gained her a coveted place at the 1984 WTA Tour Championship as the fifth seed.

Her most successful year at Wimbledon as a singles player came in 1984 when she reached the quarterfinals, beating a 15-year-old Steffi Graf in a memorable fourth-round match. It was just after Wimbledon that she reached a career-high singles ranking of world No. 5.

She won two top-level WTA singles titles (both in 1983) at Mahwah, New Jersey and Sydney, and had career wins over Steffi Graf, Zina Garrison, Pam Shriver, Hana Mandlíková, and Tracy Austin. Further back injuries in 1989 led to a remodeling of her service action. Durie made her last appearance in a WTA tour singles final at the Virginia Slims of Newport tournament in 1990. In 1991 at the age of 30, and one of the oldest singles competitors that year, she had another successful run to the fourth round of the US Open.

She was ranked the No. 1 British player for most of her career. She won the British National Singles title a record seven times. She was the second British woman player after Virginia Wade to win $1 million in prize money.

Doubles career
Partnering her fellow British player Jeremy Bates, Durie won the mixed doubles title at Wimbledon in 1987, the first British doubles team to win the title for fifty-one years. In 1991 they became the first British doubles team ever to win the Australian Open mixed doubles title. As of 2013 both of these records still stand. As a team Bates and Durie reached an additional three mixed doubles quarterfinals at Wimbledon in 1986, 1990 and 1993. They also reached the quarter-finals of the Australian Open in 1992 as defending champions.

Durie would go on to win five woman's doubles titles from eighteen finals during her career. Her most successful year as a doubles player, aside from the Grand Slams in 1987 and 1991 was in 1983, when she reached six finals, winning three titles. Durie also reached the semifinals of the women's doubles at the French Open and Wimbledon. By virtue of this success she gained a place at the 1984 WTA Tour Championship in doubles, and reached the final partnering Ann Kiyomura.

Durie won the British National Doubles title a record nine times.

Team tennis
Durie was a stalwart member of the British Wightman Cup (1979, 1981–89), British Federation Cup (1981–95) and British European Cup teams (1989–92). Durie was the youngest member of the British Federation Cup team, alongside Virginia Wade and Sue Barker, which reached the team final in 1981. Durie led the British team to victory in the European Championship in Prague in 1992.

Retirement
Durie retired from competitive tennis at the Wimbledon Championships in 1995, (her 18th appearance at the Championships), and marked it with a memorable performance. After three successive operations on her left knee, Durie went into the Championships ranked No. 326 in the world, yet reached the second round of the ladies' singles. She beat France's Alexia Dechaume-Balleret, ranked No. 85 in the world, in straight sets in the first round. Her second round, and last singles match at Wimbledon, was against Jana Novotná. Her last match at Wimbledon was a mixed doubles match on Centre Court, where she played alongside her long-standing partner Jeremy Bates.

She is one of the very few players to have a winning record against Steffi Graf and leads 4–3 in head-to-heads. Note, however, that all of her wins against Graf were before or during 1985, when Graf was typically a much lower-ranked player during the initial stages of her career.

After retiring from the professional tour, Durie had heart surgery to rectify a problem for which she had originally been prescribed Beta blockers early in her career. She did not take the prescribed medication, as she didn't feel well after taking them. She revealed this fact in March 2016 in an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live, after the revelation that Maria Sharapova had been found taking a similar heart-issue drug, which later had been banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Since retirement, Durie has worked as a TV tennis commentator for both the BBC and British Eurosport. She used to coach British number one Elena Baltacha alongside her own former coach Alan Jones. She won back-to-back Wimbledon Ladies' Senior Invitation doubles titles in 1996 and 1997.

Durie currently works as an academy coach at the FC** Academy in Middlesex.

Mixed doubles

 * Note: The Australian Open was held twice in 1977, in January and December.

Federation Cup

 * 1 – In 1992 the 16 teams which lost in the first round of the main draw were re-drawn to face each other to maintain their positions in the World Group in 1993. The four teams which won their two knock-out play-off ties successfully defended their places in the World Group whilst the 12 teams which did not were relegated.
 * 2 – In 1993 the 16 teams which lost in the first round of the main draw were re-drawn to face each other to maintain their positions in the World Group in 1994. The eight teams which won their knock-out play-off ties successfully defended their places in the World Group whilst the eight losing teams were relegated.

title: Jo Durie


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Domaine musical

The Domaine musical was a concert society established by Pierre Boulez in Paris, which was active from 1954 to 1973. Composers represented at its concerts included Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Olivier Messiaen, Luciano Berio, John Cage, Sylvano Bussotti, Mauricio Kagel, Hans Werner Henze, Henri Pousseur, Ernst Krenek, Gilbert Amy, Peter Schat and Gilles Tremblay, Betsy Jolas as well as earlier composers considered part of the Modernist movement in music. Its regular performers included the pianists Claude Helffer, Paul Jacobs, Yvonne Loriod and Marcelle Mercenier.

title: Domaine musical


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Millie Peacock

Millie Gertrude Peacock, Lady Peacock (née Holden; 3 August 1870 – 7 February 1948), was the first woman elected to the Parliament of Victoria. She was the wife of Sir Alexander Peacock, a three-time Premier of Victoria. Upon his death in 1933, Lady Peacock won the by-election to replace him in parliament. She served only a single term, retiring at the 1935 state election.

Early life
Millie Gertrude Holden was the second of two daughters born in East Framlingham, Victoria, to Marianne (née Arnold) and John Bryson Holden.

Her parents were born in Ireland. Her father, originally from County Antrim, had arrived in Victoria in 1855, and became a successful land agent and auctioneer in Port Fairy. Her mother died when she was a few months old, and her father remarried Millie's maternal aunt Jane Ellen Arnold. Millie was given eight half-brothers and half-sisters from this union, and Jane was referred to as her mother throughout her life.

Holden attended Methodist Ladies' College, Melbourne. She was first introduced to politician Alexander Peacock in 1899, when her family hosted members of the Australian Natives' Association during a conference. They married on 1 January 1901, when she was 30 and he was 38. After her husband's knighthood the following year she was known as "Lady Peacock".

Lady Peacock was the President of the Creswick Red Cross from 1914–1918, and a member of the Ladies Benevolent Society, Children's Welfare Association, and Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind Auxiliary.

The Peacocks did not have any children. They appear to have stayed close to Millie's family, especially Millie's only full sibling Agnes (Nellie) and her husband, solicitor Charles Jonas Horsfall. When Sir Alexander Peacock died on 7 October 1933, Charles was named an executor of his will.

Parliament
Following Sir Alexander Peacock's death in 1933, Robert Menzies encouraged Lady Peacock to stand in the by-election for her husband's seat of Allandale. She did so reluctantly and, because she was mourning her husband's death, made no speeches. She was elected and sworn in as the first woman member of the Victorian Legislative Assembly on 21 November 1933.

Lady Peacock only gave one speech in parliament, on the third reading of the Factories Act Bill. She spoke on her husband's role in forming the bill.

She retired from politics at the end of her term in 1935, saying that representing a country electorate in parliament was no place for a woman. She stated that her constituents were unwilling to discuss their concerns with a woman. Nonetheless she felt that she had "broken the ice" for women to enter the Victorian parliament.

Death
Lady Peacock continued her community work at Creswick. She died in 1948, and is buried next to her husband.

title: Millie Peacock


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User talk:NRaja

I am a software programmer from Hyderabad. I am most interested in learning and the brain.

I am biased in my own particular culture. I don't like Bush much at all, but I would most grudgingly offer him tea if he came to visit, and a jolly hot vindaloo. Blair would get French Fancies and scones with cream.

With great respect NRaja

title: User talk:NRaja


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Super Columns

Super Columns (スーパーコラムス) is a tile-matching puzzle video game released by Sega for the Game Gear in 1995. It was later included on the Coleco Sonic, along with the original Columns, to which it is a sequel.

Gameplay
Super Columns enhanced the classic Columns gameplay by adding new types of blocks and the ability to turn the lines of blocks. New blocks include glitter columns (which remove gems of a certain type from the grid), reversal columns (which flip the grid upside-down), magic columns (which clears all gems above a section), and lanterns (which can clear a whole row, column, or grid).

The main gameplay mode is "Story," wherein the player is pitted against an evil merchant, Surhand, who wants to harness the power of a mystical amulet in order to conquer all of Phoenicia. The player must defeat five opponents thrice each in order to advance in the game. During story matches, both the player and the player's opponents can unleash various spells, indicated by a numbered display that ascends as gems are matched. Each spell has a different effect, such as increasing the speed at which opponent columns fall, or restricting the opponent's ability to rotate their columns. Like in previous Columns games, there are also "Endless" and "Flash" modes available. In an "Endless" game, the player matches gems until inevitably reaching a game-over. "Flash" mode presents the player with 10 puzzle stages where all flashing gems must be matched in order to progress to the next stage.

Reception
GamePro gave Super Columns a positive review. They praised the variety of addictive game modes, simple controls, and clean graphics.

title: Super Columns