Embedded Files
Norse mythology considers Hope (Vön) to be the slobber dripping from the mouth of Fenrir Wolf: their concept of courage rated most highly a cheerful bravery in the absence of hope. The medievalist and fantasy author J. R. R. Tolkien derived the characters, stories, places, and languages of Middle-earth from many sources. Among these are Norse mythology, which depicts a reckless bravery that Tolkien named Northern courage. For Tolkien, this was exemplified by the way the gods of Norse mythology knew they would die in the last battle, Ragnarök, but they went to fight anyway.
Hope in an 1886 allegorical painting by George Frederic Watts, shows a lone blindfolded female figure sitting on a globe, playing a lyre that has only a single string remaining. The background is almost blank, its only visible feature a single star.
During Watts's lifetime, European culture had begun to question the concept of hope. Friedrich Nietzsche, saw hope as a negative attribute that encouraged humanity to expend their energies on futile efforts. Friedrich Nietzsche “In reality, hope is the worst of all evils, because it prolongs man's torments.”
And yet again, ‘Prison of Despair’, a 1887 painting by Mary Evelyn de Morgan, depicts Hope as a woman or very young man holding a lamp, representing the comfort brought by religious faith.
What to do with HOPE & DESPAIR?
Pope Francis in his autobiography, Hope, adapted Shakespeare's famous Hamlet "TO SEE OR NOT TO SEE, THAT IS THE QUESTION." In an appeal to people not to remain blind to the destruction of climate change and the mass migration it may cause. This Shakespearean dictum has a pervasive ramification to follow.
Hope Transcends all!
HOPE IS THE THING WITH FEATHERS THAT PERCHES IN THE SOUL AND SINGS THE TUNE WITHOUT THE WORDS AND NEVER STOPS AT ALL.
"TO SEE OR NOT TO SEE, THAT IS THE QUESTION."
This post is written with RISING HOPE!
WWW.ALLAUTHORS.INFO FEELS AMUSED AND BEMUSED:
Illustration of Frankenstein and his monster, taken from an abridged version of Mary Shelley's novel, appearing in The Birmingham Post-Herald, Januar 16, 1910
On January 1, 1818, Mary Shelley's gothic novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus was first published anonymously in London by a small London firm, in a small run of 500 copies, marking the creation of the science fiction genre. Mary Shelley was barely 20 years old then. Her name was not revealed until the 1821/1823 Paris edition. The original title for Frankenstein was The Modern Prometheus.
Shelley travelled through Europe in 1815, moving along the river Rhine in Germany, and stopping in Gernsheim near Frankenstein Castle, where, about a century earlier, Johann Konrad Dippel, an alchemist, had engaged in experiments. She then journeyed to the region of Geneva, Switzerland, where much of the story takes place. Galvanism and occult ideas were topics of conversation for her companions, particularly for her lover and future husband Percy Bysshe Shelley.
TRUE IDENTITY OF VICTOR FRANKESTEIN?
Although the Creature was described in later works as a composite of whole body parts grafted together from cadavers and reanimated by the use of electricity, this description is not consistent with Shelley's work; both the use of electricity and the cobbled-together image of Frankenstein's monster were more the result of James Whale's popular 1931 film adaptation of the story and other early motion-picture works based on the creature.
In Shelley's original work, Victor Frankenstein discovers a previously unknown but elemental principle of life, and that insight allows him to develop a method to imbue vitality into inanimate matter, though the exact nature of the process is left ambiguous.Or was it more allegorical, as some have posited the creature as a composite of Percy Shelley and Thomas Paine.
"Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould Me man? Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?"
WWW.ALLAUTHORS.INFO recalls the world premiere of R.U.R. on 2 Jan, 1921:
Cover of the first edition of R.U.R. designed by Josef Čapek, Aventinum, Prague, 1920
U.S. WPA Federal Theatre Project poster for the production by the Marionette Theatre, New York, 1939
In 1920, Czech writer Karel Čapek came up with the science fiction play, "R.U.R." or Rossum's Universal Robots. It had its world premiere on 2 January 1921. It introduced the word "robot" to the English language and to science fiction as a whole.
R.U.R. became so influential soon after its publication that by 1923, it got translated into thirty languages.
The robots described in Čapek's play are not robots in the popularly understood sense of an automaton. They are not mechanical devices, but rather artificial biological organisms that may be mistaken for humans. A comic scene at the beginning of the play shows Helena arguing with her future husband, Harry Domin, because she cannot believe his secretary is a robotess:
DOMIN: Sulla, let Miss Glory have a look at you.
HELENA: (stands and offers her hand) Pleased to meet you. It must be very hard for you out here, cut off from the rest of the world.
SULLA: I do not know the rest of the world Miss Glory. Please sit down.
HELENA: (sits) Where are you from?
SULLA: From here, the factory.
HELENA: Oh, you were born here.
SULLA: Yes I was made here.
HELENA: (startled) What?
DOMIN: (laughing) Sulla isn't a person, Miss Glory, she's a robot.
HELENA: Oh, please forgive me...
ČAPEK'S CONCEPTION OF ROBOTS
His robots resemble more modern conceptions of man-made life forms, such as the Replicants in Blade Runner, the "hosts" in the Westworld TV series and the humanoid Cylons in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, but in Čapek's time there was no conception of modern genetic engineering (DNA's role in heredity was not confirmed until 1952). There are descriptions of kneading-troughs for robot skin, great vats for liver and brains, and a factory for producing bones. Nerve fibers, arteries, and intestines are spun on factory bobbins, while the robots themselves are assembled like automobiles. Čapek's robots are living biological beings, but they are still assembled, as opposed to grown or born.
One critic has described Čapek's robots as epitomizing "the traumatic transformation of modern society by the First World War and the Fordist assembly line"
The play introduced the word robot, which displaced older words such as "automaton" or "android" in languages around the world. In an article in Lidové noviny, Karel Čapek named his brother Josef as the true inventor of the word. In Czech, robota means forced labour of the kind that serfs had to perform on their masters' lands and is derived from rab, meaning "slave".
The name Rossum is an allusion to the Czech word rozum, meaning "reason", "wisdom", "intellect" or "common sense". It has been suggested that the allusion might be preserved by translating "Rossum" as "Reason" but only the Majer/Porter version translates the word as "Reason".
MRS DALLOWAY SHOWS THE WAY to the gran turismo that accentuated literary perfection with her daunting London on that day in 1923. OR DID I SAVAGELY APE ULYSSES? AND THEN TO PLACATE ANY BACKFIRE I SHOT OFF VITRIOLIC GUN UPON JAMES JOYCE.
“What a lark! What a plunge!..There! Out it boomed. [The Big Ben] First a warning, musical; then the hour, irrevocable. The leaden circles dissolved in the air.”
And so, the working title of Mrs Dalloway was The Hours. The novel originated from two short stories, "Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street" and the unfinished "The Prime Minister". In autumn 1922, Woolf began to think of the "Mrs Dalloway" short story as the first chapter of her new novel, and she completed the manuscript in late autumn 1924 and published in May 1925.
Clarissa Dalloway goes around London in the morning, getting ready to host a party that evening. It was on the August 7, 2024 Mrs Dalloway made her London walk.
Mrs Dalloway is commonly thought to be a response to James Joyce's Ulysses. Both novels use the stream of consciousness technique to follow the thoughts of two characters, one older and one younger, during one day in a bustling city. Woolf herself, writing in 1928, denied any deliberate "method" to the book, saying instead that the structure came about "without any conscious direction".
Woolf unleashed her tirade against Ulysses saying:
"I finished Ulysses, & think it is a mis-fire. Genius it has I think; but of the inferior water. The book is diffuse. It is brackish. It is pretentious. It is underbred, not only in the obvious sense, but in the literary sense. ..I feel that myriads of tiny bullets pepper one & spatter one; but one does not get one deadly wound straight in the face—as from Tolstoy, for instance; but it is entirely absurd to compare him with Tolstoy."
The Hogarth Press, run by Virginia Woolf and her husband Leonard, had to turn down the chance to publish Ulysses in 1919 because of the obscenity law in England.
None the less Mrs Dalloway liver ever after. In a related 2002 film, The Hours depicts a single day in the lives of three women across generations affected by Mrs Dalloway: Woolf writing it in 1923, a Los Angeles housewife reading it in 1951, and a New York literary editor living it in 2001. Adapted from the 1998 novel by Michael Cunningham, the cast features Nicole Kidman as Woolf, Julianne Moore as housewife Laura, and Meryl Streep as editor Clarissa. Cunningham titled his novel The Hours after Woolf's working title for Mrs Dalloway. At the 75th Academy Awards, It received nine nominations, including Best Picture, with Kidman winning Best Actress. The film and novel, The Hours was adapted into an opera in 2022.
www.allauthors.info tracks down those purple patches in the making of literature.
In 1982, Peter Russell wrote his book called The Global Brain Awakens and set the ball rolling. However it was always presaged by medieval philosophers and sometimes feared too because global brain would reduce individual diversity and freedom, and lead to mass surveillance.
The global brain is neuroscience-inspired and futurological vision of the planetary information and communications technology network that interconnects all humans and their technological artifacts. As this network stores ever more information, takes over ever more functions of coordination and communication from traditional organizations, and becomes increasingly intelligent, it increasingly plays the role of a brain for the planet Earth.
In the 12th century, the medieval Andalusian philosopher Averroes , asserted that all humans share the same intellect and called it – ‘The unity of the intellect’ in situ with Aristotle's On the Soul to explain how universal knowledge is possible.
Some of the underlying ideas were already expressed by Nikola Tesla in the 19th century and were written about by many others before him. Even H.G. Wells wrote World Brain – a collection of essays in 1938. In 1982, Peter Russell wrote his book called The Global Brain Awakens and the name was coined. Towards becoming the Global Brain, the first algorithms that could turn the world-wide web into a collectively intelligent network were proposed by Francis Heylighen and Johan Bollen in 1996.
As the Internet increasingly ties its users together into a single information processing system that functions as part of the collective nervous system of the planet. The intelligence of this network is collective or distributed: it is not centralized or localized in any particular individual, organization or computer system. Therefore, no one can command or control it. Rather, it self-organizes or emerges from the dynamic networks of interactions between its components. This is a property typical of complex adaptive systems (CAS).
The World Wide Web in particular resembles the organization of a brain with its web pages (playing a role similar to neurons) connected by hyperlinks (playing a role similar to synapses), together forming an associative network along which information propagates. This analogy becomes stronger with the rise of social media, such as Facebook, where links between personal pages represent relationships in a social network along which information propagates from person to person.
Balking at the borders? Squabbling neighbors in colonies, countries fighting among themselves and it happens among galaxies too! GALAXY WALLS have scuttled our universe into smithereens, believe it. Then is the human race at a fault for settling territories yet and yet again?
In cosmology, galaxy filaments are the largest known structures in the universe, consisting of walls of galactic superclusters. These massive, thread-like formations can commonly reach 50 to 80 megaparsecs (160 to 260 megalight-years)—with the largest found to date being the Hercules-Corona Borealis Great Wall at around 3 gigaparsecs (9.8 Gly) in length—and form the boundaries between voids.
Recently, a team of international scientists led by Eshita Banerjee, a PhD scholar at the Inter University Centre for Astronomy & Astrophysics (IUCAA) discovered a giant cosmic web filament stretching nearly 850,000 light-years by analyzing light emitted 11.7 billion years ago. To put this in perspective, this length compares to roughly 10 times the size of the Milky Way’s stellar disk and one-third of the distance between the Milky Way and our nearest neighbor, Andromeda. The discovery was made possible using the Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile, operated by the European Southern Observatory (ESO).
Ishita Banerjee says, “The number of galaxies detected in such a small volume of the universe is ten times higher than what we typically observe in surveys at this epoch. Moreover, their spatial distribution across the sky revealed a rare alignment, which strongly suggests the presence of a larger, underlying filamentary structure.” Cosmic filaments are strands of dark matter and galaxies that rotate and as the filaments spin, they pull matter into their orbit and toward galaxy clusters at each end. These tendrils stretching hundreds of millions of light-years spin, twirling like giant corkscrews.
Galaxies are the fundamental building blocks of the universe. Modern galaxy evolution theories predict that galaxies are interconnected by vast, invisible streams of gas and dark matter, collectively referred to as the cosmic web. These cosmic web filaments serve as the nurseries where galaxies grow by accreting pristine gas that fuels their star formation. However, observing these filaments has been a daunting challenge because of their tenuous nature with densities 100 billion trillion times lower than our atmosphere.
Our universe is expanding faster than thought; as per recent findings in stellar physics & cosmology
I’m measuring the expansion of this universe. I was first discovered on 3rd August 1596. I was meant to be a reference star and remained so ever after. I’m the star Mira meaning astonishing or wonderful in Latin 600 billion years old and 300 light years from Earth. I was the first variable star to be recorded by the astronomer David Fabricius beginning on August 3, 1596. I’m a pulsating variable red giant star, the first non-supernova variable star discovered, with the possible exception of Algol.
Now I’ve become the prototype of the Mira variables. Mira variables are a type of giant star that go through regular cycles of expanding and contracting. These cycles cause their brightness to vary in a predictable way.
Mira variables are relatively cool and they are in the late stages of their life.
There is a strong relationship between how bright they are and how long their pulsation cycles last. This relationship allows astronomers to use them as "standard candles."
A standard candle is an object in space whose true brightness is known. By comparing how bright the object appears from Earth to how bright it actually is, scientists can calculate how far away it is. This is a key method used to measure distances in the universe, forming part of what astronomers call the "extragalactic distance ladder" to measure the expansion of the universe—known as the Hubble flow.
The rate at which the universe is expanding today is called the Hubble constant. In cosmology it helps us determine the size and age of the universe. However, there's currently a major puzzle in the scientific community known as the "Hubble tension." When astronomers measure the Hubble constant using other stars.
The Hubble constant has been a focal point of debate in recent years, with different measurement methods yielding discrepant values, leading to what is known as the “Hubble tension.” This discrepancy suggests that the universe may be expanding faster in the present day than we would expect based on our standard models of cosmology.
www.allauthors.info makes Bookhearts:
TO PERCEIVE BEYOND THE APPARENT
COGENT LITERATI keeps vigilant over ominous potboilers:
When you put foot in other’s mouth too, there’s double whammy. Memoirs that scintillate history in making, when revealed into a cooked recipe exposé, backfire and run into hall of infamy.
Winfrey called the story "the single greatest love story, in 22 years of doing this show, we've ever told on the air." Rosenblat appeared twice on The Oprah Winfrey Show before the book's announced publication. The book was scheduled for publication by Berkley Books, a division of Penguin Group USA, but got cancelled.
Angel at the Fence: The True Story of a Love That Survived is a Holocaust is a memoir by Herman Rosenblat in which the author invented the story that, while he was imprisoned in the Buchenwald concentration camp, a young girl from the outside would pass him food through the fence daily and years later they accidentally met and married. Although the author fabricated details about how he met his wife, he is an authentic Holocaust survivor.
A Million Little Pieces
It became an Oprah's Book Club selection. The author James Frey had it published it from Doubleday Books, a division of Random House that became a bestselling memoir in which the author created and exaggerated significant details of his drug addiction and recovery. However, when the book's authenticity was called into question, the author and publisher Nan Talese were invited back and publicly scolded by Winfrey in a live face-to-face confrontation. The televised showdown was highlighted all over by the press. The Washington Post's Richard Cohen went gaga over the confrontation that he crowned Winfrey "Mensch of the Year."
Forbidden Love
Norma Khouri wrote Forbidden Love that got published as Honor Lost in the United States and was published by Bantam Books in Australia and Doubleday in New York. It was purported to be the story of the author's best friend in Jordan, Dalia, who fell in love with a Christian soldier. Dalia's Muslim father was not told of the relationship, and when he eventually discovered it, he stabbed Dalia to death in a so-called honor killing.
The book was exposed as a hoax after the literary editor of the Sydney Morning Herald revealed that Khouri had not lived in Jordan during the book's timeframe, and apart from a three-week stay to research her book, had not lived there since her early childhood.
Odd Man Out
Matt McCarthy penned his memoir, Odd Man Out: A Year on the Mound with a Minor League Misfit and got published by Viking, a division of Penguin Group USA. It describes McCarthy's summer as a minor league pitcher. He writes about playing with racist teammates who take steroids: however, statistics from that season, combined with transaction listings and interviews with former teammates, suggest that much of the book is false.
The genre of literary hoax runs much longer adding grist to the publishing mill and heckling readers into a tizzy.
allauthors.info brings you the shuddering flashback of:
GLIB MOMENTS WITH BELLE GIBSON, the scammer author doyen!
GLIB MOMENTS WITH BELLE GIBSON, the scammer author doyen!
Can I gag Belle in the ball with a morsel of dry rice? Consider all this to get done with a naïve intention to make the story come out in the wash. She’s after all the proponent of The Whole Pantry and mouthful rice would be a wholesome affair invoking the ancient Chinese tradition.
In China circa 1000 BC, a person suspected of lying was required to fill one’s mouth with a handful of dry rice and after a while it was to be spat out. If the spat rice remained dry, the suspect was found guilty of fraud. They assumed that experiencing fear and anxiety out of lying is accompanied by decreased salivation and a dry mouth. In European courts too, priests administered consecrated meal at the end of worship. The accused would be stuffed with a piece of dry bread and a piece of hard sheep’s cheese. The accused was exonerated if he or she managed to swallow in one bite without difficulty. However, if the person choked or suffocated, the test brought a guilty verdict.
1991 born, Belle Gibson claimed that her mother changed her name five times. In 2010, she became a mother at age 18. Gibson launched The Whole Pantry mobile app in August 2013, at age 21. The Whole Pantry app was fabulously downloaded 200,000 times within its first month. It was voted Apple's Best Food and Drink App of 2013. Gibson soon after signed a book deal with Lantern Books, an imprint of Penguin Books, for an accompanying table-top cookbook, which was published in October 2014. She further worked with Apple Inc. in September 2014 to transition the app as a privileged pre-installed default third-party inclusion in the Apple Watch's April 2015 launch. By early 2015, it was estimated that in excess of A$1 million had been made in sales of The Whole Pantry app and the book. Gibson chronicled her battle with cancer on a blog of the same name, but "doubts about her claims surfaced after she failed to deliver a promised $300,000 donation to a charity".
In late April 2015, Gibson gave an interview to The Australian Women's Weekly, in which she admitted to having fabricated all her cancer claims. Gibson attributed her deceit to her upbringing, and specifically to neglect by her now-estranged mother, claiming to having been forced to take care of herself and her brother since the age of five.
Gibson fabricated claims of having had multiple cancers that were self-treated through diet and alternative medicine. Again she cooked up claims of undergoing multiple heart surgeries and having strokes. All this chicanery intended for making fraudulent claims of donating $300,000 of income to charities.
The facade of fame crumbled into a hall of infamy to make a historic reel in real life. Gibson is portrayed by Kaitlyn Dever in the 2025 Netflix drama limited series Apple Cider Vinegar. Belle picked the gauntlet to inveigle everyone to donate and ran the gauntlet aplomb unscathed into the tinsel town.
'COGENT LITERATI' TRAILS THE HIDDEN PAST:
CHRONICLES OF MY 92 LOST YEARS
CHRONICLES OF MY 92 LOST YEARS
Any authors around? I remained hidden in Portugal for 92 years. Even now the males are eluding you all. You’ve never seen our males doing tap dance for their ladies. I was found after a two-year long spider hunt while you ravaged those forest trenches. We’re Portuguese encore and remain in no other region. We live in burrows with webbed walls and a lid at the entrance, capturing all passing prey – devouring portal of force majeure infamy.
None of you writers have written about us. Some Gabriela Marquez may pen ’92-years of Solitude’, forced upon Fagilde’s trapdoor spider. The only specimens found in 1931 were gutted in the great Bocage Museum fire of 1978 and thereafter this species had not been scientifically recorded for nearly a century.
92 years later in 2023, arachnologists rediscovered our species in northern Portugal, noticing a female with ten offspring and recorded females to be dark brown that can grow up to 2.2 cm long. But what a parody you have made of your ultra tech scientific achievements that for now, you’ve no information about our males and their lifecycle.
Our DNA has now monikered us Nemesia berlandi. We are considered one of the rarest spiders on earth – whom you now call Fagilde's trapdoor spider or buraqueira-de-Fagilde in Portuguese of the family Nemesiidae, currently only known from Fagilde and the adjacent village of Vila Garcia, both in the Mangualde municipality of the Beira Alta region of Portugal, in the isolated slopes of the Dão River valley.
The bravado researchers are thumping their chests hoping this discovery will contribute to the preservation of our species, especially in light of the threat posed by agricultural development and frequent forest fires in their habitat due to climate change.
PHOTO: AndyScott - Own work
Book trailers & professional book reviews copiously roll out from www.allauthors.info We ideate and improvise your books.
'COGENT LITERATI' laments for Willemi Pine:
the imperilled sui generis doyens now gasping for solitude!
'COGENT LITERATI' laments for Willemi Pine:
the imperilled sui generis doyens now gasping for solitude!
PHOTO: By Sardaka
The humans are the devastating race ever! And I took refuge in the secluded pristine Blue Mountains of Sydney till I was hunted down three decades back. And what a war cry leapt out from hominids equating me with a savage plant dinosaur. I feel so belittled. And now I’m called out in various names like Willemi Pine and Wollemi nobilis and some passing me off as even a Christmas tree in a pot. And you humans call it resurgence? What an ordeal I’m suffering. My majestic canyon rife with humongous pines is now shackled with research hacks and I’m being grown at alien sites abhor some to me. We’re not even considered true pines. And choppers are chopping the wilderness shrieking with adventurous escapades and bushfires are on the rise, charring me to extinction. On one hand I’m called an Australian botanical icon and the next moment my sobriety is ruffed up in cloistered houses. However we bear the species of nobilis to oblige the humans with servility.
At BookReviews.Today, we improvise story-lines for fiction writers to stand apart from run of the mill drudgery.
YOU’RE 89 SECONDS TO DOOM!
YOU’RE 89 SECONDS TO DOOM!
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved their "Doomsday Clock" closer to midnight than ever before, citing Russian nuclear threats amid its invasion of Ukraine, tensions in other world hot spots, military applications of artificial intelligence and climate change as factors underlying the spectre of global catastrophe.
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has set the clock to 89 seconds before midnight - the theoretical point of annihilation. That is one second closer than it was set last year. The Doomsday Clock depicts how close humanity is to Armageddon. At the time of founding the clock in 1947, it read, “IT IS SEVEN MINUTES TO MIDNIGHT’.
IS THIS JUST A METAPHORICAL CLOCK WHIPPING UP FEAR PSYCHOSIS?
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded in 1945 by none other than Albert Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and University of Chicago scientists who helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project.
The Chicago-based nonprofit created the clock two years later in 1947 during the Cold War tensions that followed World War II to warn the public about how close humankind was to destroying the world. It was created using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the planet.
The Doomsday Clock is set every year by the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes nine Nobel laureates. The Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to global catastrophe caused by man-made technologies.
The organization says, it is the United States, China and Russia that have the prime responsibility to pull the world back from the brink, and urged good-faith international dialogue.
"The factors shaping this year's decision - nuclear risk, climate change, the potential misuse of advances in biological science and a variety of other emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence - were not new in 2024. But we have seen insufficient progress in addressing the key challenges, and in many cases this is leading to increasingly negative and worrisome effects," said Daniel Holz, chair of the Bulletin's Science and Security Board.
"SETTING THE DOOMSDAY CLOCK AT 89 SECONDS TO MIDNIGHT IS A WARNING TO ALL WORLD LEADERS,"
- Daniel Holz, chair of the Bulletin's Science and Security Board.
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"This is a bleak picture but it is not yet irreversible." -Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Juan Manuel Santos, Colombia's former president,
ARE WE TILTING AT WINDMILLS WITH MORBID IDEAS OR ARE WE INDEED SAILING CLOSE TO THE WIND?
At BookReviews.Today , we add polymathic grist to the milling storylines for authors to improvise their fiction.
WARPED MEMOIRS OF MARIO LLOSA
WARPED MEMOIRS OF MARIO LLOSA
COGENT LITERATI finds memoirs are often creaking when later another memoir is penned by its other character countering it and at times the memoir gets heaving too when candid narration altogether is at stake! Memoirs very often suffer the brunt of vilification drive and yet it pops up in cinematic rendition bearing the testimony of a corroborated episode. And in this case the first wife also the sister of his own aunt either assisted or desisted in winning him a Nobel Prize. Set in Peru during the 1950s, it is the torrid love story of an 18-year-old student who falls for a 32-year-old divorcee. The novel is based on the author's real life experience.
In 1977, Vargas Llosa was elected as a member of the Peruvian Academy of Language. The same year, he brought out Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (La tía Julia y el escribidor), based in part on his marriage to his first wife, Julia Urquidi, to whom he dedicated the novel. Things turned awry when later Julia Urquidi wrote a memoir, Lo que Varguitas no dijo (What Little Vargas Didn't Say). Julia gives her personal account of their relationship accusing Vargas Llosa's account of exaggeration with many negative points in their courtship and marriage while downplaying her role of assisting his literary career.
Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter chronicles the scriptwriter's rise in popularity, and subsequent descent into madness, in tandem with the protagonist's affair. It alternates between Mario's account of his life and episodes of Camacho's serials, which become increasingly unhinged as the novel progresses.
Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter stands out as one of the most striking cases of how the language and imagery of popular culture can be pitted in literature. The novel was adapted in 1990 into a Hollywood feature film, Tune in Tomorrow.
Tune in Tomorrow is a 1990 American comedy film directed by Jon Amiel that is based on the 1977 Mario Vargas Llosa novel Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, and was released under that same title in many countries. Relocated from the novel's setting in 1950s-era Lima, Peru to New Orleans, Louisiana that same decade, it stars Peter Falk, Keanu Reeves and Barbara Hershey in a story surrounding a radio drama.
Roger Ebert gave the movie 2 and a half stars out of 4, noting that "sometimes we laugh easily, sometimes uncertainly, and sometimes we just look at the screen and wonder why anyone thought that was funny." The Washington Post, was more positive about the film: "A tri-layered tale of love, creative impulses and dial-spinning, it comes and it goes, evocative and a little bit magical, flawed but forgivably so."
BookReviews.Today sends this obituary of the patriarch of Latin American Boom, Mario Vargas Llosa.
PATSY CLINE: I'LL SAIL MY SHIP ALONE
PATSY CLINE: I'LL SAIL MY SHIP ALONE
BookReviews.Today bemoans this day of 5th March. It was 1963:
I FELL TO PIECES after my swansong, I'LL SAIL MY SHIP ALONE.
I was the first country music artist to cross over into pop music notching two number-one hits on the Billboard Hot Country and Western Sides chart. I “Fall to Pieces” remained a popular seller for 39 consecutive weeks.
Camden PA-24 crash took its toll over me! Piper Comanche, the airplane was destroyed on impact and all four occupants were killed. On March 3, 1963, Patsy Cline performed her final song that she had recorded the previous month, "I'll Sail My Ship Alone".
American country and western singer Patsy Cline with her original name Virginia Patterson Hensley was one of the classic performers of the genre, known for raging ballads that bridged the gap between country music and more mainstream audiences.
Ginni had a shortlived life of 30 years with several major hits during her phenomenal eight-year recording career. However, a slew of posthumous productions surged unabated. The ballads of Patsy Cline, ‘I Fall to Pieces’ and ‘Crazy’ swirled all over and in 1985 Patsy Cline biopic, Sweet Dreams came up. A 1991 box set of her recordings received critical acclaim. Her greatest hits album sold over 10 million copies in 2005.
In 1957 Cline made her first national television appearance on Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts. After performing "Walkin' After Midnight", the single became her first major hit on both the country and pop charts.
The 1961 single "I Fall to Pieces" became her first to top the Billboard country chart. Cline was severely injured in an automobile accident, which caused her to spend a month in the hospital. After she recovered, her next single "Crazy" also became a major hit.
In 1973, she became the first female performer to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
In the 1980s, Cline's posthumous successes continued in the mass media. She was portrayed twice in major motion pictures, including the 1985 biopic Sweet Dreams starring Jessica Lange. Several documentaries and stage shows about her have been made, including the 1988 musical Always...Patsy Cline. A 1991 box set of her recordings received critical acclaim. Her greatest hits album sold over 10 million copies in 2005. In 2011, Cline's childhood home in Winchester was restored as a museum for visitors and fans to tour.
Patsy performed at the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall, Kansas City, Kansas, for the family of disc jockey "Cactus" Jack Call who he had died in an automobile crash a little over a month earlier. Despite having a cold, Cline performed at 2:00, 5:15, and 8:15 pm. All the shows were standing-room only. For the 2 p.m. show, she wore a sky-blue tulle-laden dress; for the 5:15 show, a red dress; and for the closing show at 8 p.m., Cline wore white chiffon.
Known in her youth as “Ginny,” she began to sing with local country bands while a teenager, sometimes accompanying herself on guitar. By the time she had reached her early 20s, Cline was promoting herself as “Patsy” and was on her way toward country music stardom. She first recorded on the Four Star label in 1955, but it was with the advent of television culture in the late 1950s that she gained a wider audience. Cline began appearing on the radio and on Town and Country Jamboree, a local television variety show that was broadcast every Saturday night from Capitol Arena in Washington, D.C.
Singing “Walkin’ After Midnight” as a contestant on the CBS television show Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts, Cline took first prize—the opportunity to appear on Godfrey’s morning show for two weeks. She thereby gained national exposure both for herself and for her song.
Three years later she became a regular performer on the Grand Ole Opry radio broadcasts from Nashville, Tennessee, which largely defined the country music genre. Although Cline preferred traditional country music, which typically included vocalizations such as yodeling, the country music industry—coming into increasing competition with rock and roll—was trying to increase its appeal to a more mainstream audience. After her recording of “I Fall to Pieces” remained a popular seller for 39 consecutive weeks, she was marketed as a pop singer and was backed by strings and vocals. Cline never fully donned the pop music mantle, however: she did not eliminate yodeling from her repertoire; she dressed in distinctly western-style clothing; and she favoured country songs—especially heart-wrenching ballads of lost or waning love—over her three popular songs “Walkin’ After Midnight,” “I Fall to Pieces,” and “Crazy”
Sweet Dreams is a 1985 American biographical drama film which tells the story of country music singer Patsy Cline. Many actresses wanted the role of Patsy Cline, including Meryl Streep, but she was turned down, one of three times the actress was denied a role.
The film was originally to be titled I Fall to Pieces, after Cline's signature song, before the producers eventually changed it to Sweet Dreams. Patsy's mother Hilda Hensley was not a fan of the film, speaking publicly against it in several interviews.
BookReviews.Today takes peek at the bygone epochs
The Christmas Truce - 'live and let live’
The Christmas Truce - 'live and let live’
British and German troops meeting in no man's land during the unofficial truce (British troops from the Northumberland Hussars, 7th Division, Bridoux–Rouge Banc Sector)
Soldiers from both sides (the British and the German) exchange cheerful conversation (an artist's impression from The Illustrated London News of 9 January 1915: "British and German Soldiers Arm-in-Arm Exchanging Headgear: A Christmas Truce between Opposing Trenches").
A cross, left in Saint-Yves (Saint-Yvon – Ploegsteert; Comines-Warneton in Belgium) in 1999, to commemorate the site of the Christmas Truce. The text reads: "1914 – The Khaki Chums Christmas Truce – 1999 – 85 Years – Lest We Forget"
The Christmas truce was a series of widespread unofficial ceasefires along the Western Front of the First World War around Christmas 1914.
Before Christmas 1914, there were several peace initiatives. The Open Christmas Letter was a public message for peace addressed "To the Women of Germany and Austria", signed by a group of 101 British women's suffragettes at the end of 1914. Pope Benedict XV, on 7 December 1914, had begged for an official truce between the warring governments. He asked "that the guns may fall silent at least upon the night the angels sang", which was refused by both sides.
24–26 December 1914: Soldiers from United Kingdom, France, Austria-Hungary, German Empire, Russian Empire maintained temporary informal ceasefires in Europe.
Roughly 100,000 British and German troops were involved in the informal cessations of hostility along the Western Front. The Germans placed candles on their trenches and on Christmas trees, and then continued the celebration by singing Christmas carols. The British responded by singing carols of their own. The truce occurred five months after hostilities had begun.
This testimonial comes from a French soldier about fraternisation in sectors where German and French companies opposed each other. Gustave Berthier mentions "On Christmas Day the Boches made a sign showing they wished to speak to us. They said they didn't want to shoot. ... They were tired of making war, they were married like me, they didn't have any differences with the French but with the English".
ON 25th DECEMBER Captain Robert Miles, King's Shropshire Light Infantry, who was attached to the Royal Irish Rifles, recalled in an edited letter about Christmas Day. “We are having the most extraordinary Christmas Day imaginable. A sort of unarranged and quite unauthorized but perfectly understood and scrupulously observed truce exists between us and our friends in front. The funny thing is it only seems to exist in this part of the battle line – on our right and left we can all hear them firing away as cheerfully as ever. The thing started last night – a bitter cold night, with white frost – soon after dusk when the Germans started shouting 'Merry Christmas, Englishmen' to us. Of course our fellows shouted back and presently large numbers of both sides had left their trenches, unarmed, and met in the debatable, shot-riddled, no man's land between the lines. Here the agreement – all on their own – came to be made that we should not fire at each other until after midnight tonight. The men were all fraternizing in the middle (we naturally did not allow them too close to our line) and swapped cigarettes and lies in the utmost good fellowship. Not a shot was fired all night.
Of the Germans he wrote: "They are distinctly bored with the war.... In fact, one of them wanted to know what on earth we were doing here fighting them." The truce in that sector continued into Boxing Day.
AND SOON ON 30TH DECEMBER 1914, HE WAS KILLED IN ACTION.
A German Lieutenant, Johannes Niemann, wrote "grabbed my binoculars and looking cautiously over the parapet saw the incredible sight of our soldiers exchanging cigarettes, schnapps and chocolate with the enemy".
THE WORST MARITIME TRAGEDY STRUCK THIS DAY, 30 JANUARY 1945; 9,400 PEOPLE DIED, MAKING IT THE LARGEST LOSS OF LIFE IN A SINGLE SHIP SINKING IN HISTORY
Adolf Hitler passes Wilhelm Gustloff crew lined up on the lower promenade deck while touring the ship on March 29, 1938.
Courtesy of the Wilhelm Gustloff Museum
LITERATURE THAT SPAWNED UPON THE SINKING OF MV WILHEM GUSTLOFF
LITERATURE THAT SPAWNED UPON THE SINKING OF MV WILHEM GUSTLOFF
MV Wilhelm Gustloff was a German military transport ship which was sunk on 30 January 1945 by Soviet submarine S-13 in the Baltic Sea. It was the first purpose-built cruise ship for the purpose were to provide recreational and cultural activities for German functionaries and workers, including concerts, cruises, and other holiday trips, and to serve as a public relations tool that would present "a more acceptable image of the Third Reich".
Wilhelm Gustloff was soon sighted by the Soviet submarine S-13. The submarine sensor on board the escorting torpedo boat had frozen, rendering it inoperable, as had her anti-aircraft guns, leaving the vessels defenseless. The three torpedoes that were fired successfully all struck Wilhelm Gustloff on her port side. The first struck the ship's bow, causing watertight doors to seal off the area where off-duty crew members were sleeping. The second hit the accommodations for the women's naval auxiliary, located in the ship's drained swimming pool. It dislodged the pool tiles at high velocity, which caused high casualties; only three of the 373 women quartered there survived. The third torpedo scored a direct hit on the engine room located amidships, disabling all power and communications.
Reportedly, only nine lifeboats could be lowered; the rest had frozen in their davits and had to be broken free. About twenty minutes after the torpedoes' impact, Wilhelm Gustloff suddenly listed so dramatically to port that the lifeboats lowered on the high starboard side crashed into the ship's tilting side, destroying many lifeboats and spilling their occupants.
Less than 40 minutes after being struck, Wilhelm Gustloff was lying on her side. She sank bow-first ten minutes later, in 44 m (144 ft) of water.German forces were able to rescue 1,252 people while all the four captains on Wilhelm Gustloff survived her sinking.
The ship was originally intended to be named Adolf Hitler but instead was named after Wilhelm Gustloff, leader of the Nazi Party's Swiss branch, who had been assassinated by a Jewish medical studeNT. Adolf Hitler decided on the name change after sitting next to Gustloff's widow during his memorial service.
Günter Grass wrote Im Krebsgang, translated into English as Crabwalk. It combines historical elements, such as the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff, with fictional elements, such as the book's major characters and events. Günter Grass said in an interview with The New York Times in April 2003: "One of the many reasons I wrote Crabwalk was to take the subject away from the extreme Right... They said the tragedy of Wilhelm Gustloff was a war crime. It wasn't. It was terrible, but it was a result of war, a terrible result of war."
A ticket for the Gustloff from someone who didn't board the ship at the last minute. Courtesy of the Wilhelm Gustloff Museum
DÍA DAS LETRAS GALEGAS
DÍA DAS LETRAS GALEGAS
GALICIAN LITERATURE DAY - MAY 17
GALICIAN LITERATURE DAY - MAY 17
María Rosalía Rita de Castro (23 February 1837 – 15 July 1885), was a Galician poet and novelist, considered one of the most important figures of the 19th-century Spanish literature and modern lyricism. As the greatest Galician cultural icon, she led the emergence of the literary Galician language. Through her work, she projected multiple emotions, including the yearning for the celebration of Galician identity and culture, and female empowerment.
Rosalía published her first collection of poetry in Galician, Cantares gallegos ("Galician Songs"), on 17 May 1863. This date, 17 May, is now known as the Día das Letras Galegas ("Galician Literature Day"). It all started a century later on 17 May1963 to commemorate Rosalía's achievement every year.
In 2019 the International Astronomical Union named the star HD 149143 as Rosalíadecastro in honour of Rosalía de Castro whose work often referenced the night and celestial objects. The exoplanet companion was named Riosar in honour of the Sar River in Spain that was present in much of the literary work of the Spanish author Rosalía de Castro.
FOUR OUT OF FIVE JAPANESE NOBEL PRIZE WINNERS FOR MEDICINE \ PHYSIOLOGY ARE IMMUNOLOGISTS
FOUR OUT OF FIVE JAPANESE NOBEL PRIZE WINNERS FOR MEDICINE \ PHYSIOLOGY ARE IMMUNOLOGISTS
Except for Ōmura Satoshi, all Japanese Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine have been immunologists.
Japan strolled in the immunology arena for Nobel Prize way back in 1987 when Susumu Tonegawa was the sole recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in for his discovery of V(D)J recombination, the genetic mechanism which produces antibody diversity. Tonegawa's Nobel Prize work elucidated the genetic mechanism of the adaptive immune system, which had been the central question of immunology for over 100 years.
Immunology made advent in Japan quite early with Hideyo Noguchi who emerged as a prominent Japanese bacteriologist and immunologist and was nominated multiple times for the Nobel Prize between 1913 and 1927 but never won. Noguchi was one of the first Japanese scientists to gain international acclaim outside of Japan for his scientific contributions. He stood out as a highly respected scientist in his lifetime, particularly for his work at the Rockefeller Institute. Following his death in 1928, some of his findings were disproven with the development of new technology like the electron microscope. For example, he mistakenly identified a bacterium as the cause of yellow fever, which was later determined to be a virus.
Despite the inaccuracies in some of his later research, Noguchi was a highly influential figure who brought international attention to neglected tropical diseases. He remains a celebrated figure in Japan, and his face appeared on the 1000 yen note.
Yoshinori Ohsumi is a Japanese cell biologist who received the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries of mechanisms for autophagy, the process that cells use to destroy and recycle cellular components.
Tasuku Honjo, a Japanese physician-scientist and immunologist won the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his identification of programmed cell death protein. He was awarded in 2018 along with James P. Allison for their discovery of cancer therapy by inhibiting negative immune regulation. Honjo's work centered on the identification of PD-1, a protein that functions as a "brake" on the immune system, paving the way for immunotherapy treatments.
Now the 2025 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine is again clinched by a Japanese immunologist Shimon Sakaguchi (Pic: Right), making him the fourth Japanese immunologist winner out of five Japanese receiving the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine. His work includes the discovery of regulatory T cells and describing their role in the immune system.
2025 NOBEL PHYSICS TO LEVERAGE QUANTUM BIOLOGY
2025 NOBEL PHYSICS TO LEVERAGE QUANTUM BIOLOGY
The Nobel Prize for Physics in 2025 has been awarded for the discovery of macroscopic quantum tunneling and energy quantization in electric circuit.
Quantum tunneling is barrier penetration wherein an object such as an electron or atom passes through a potential energy barrier that, according to classical mechanics, should not be passable due to the object not having sufficient energy to pass or surmount the barrier. Tunneling is a consequence of the wave nature of matter, where the quantum wave function describes the state of a particle or other physical system, and wave equations such as the Schrödinger equation describe their behavior.
Quantum tunnelling is among the central non-trivial quantum effects in quantum biology. Here it is important both as electron tunnelling and proton tunnelling. Electron tunnelling is a key factor in many biochemical redox reactions (photosynthesis, cellular respiration) as well as enzymatic catalysis. Proton tunnelling is a key factor in spontaneous DNA mutation.
Spontaneous mutation occurs when normal DNA replication takes place after a particularly significant proton has tunnelled. A hydrogen bond joins DNA base pairs. A double well potential along a hydrogen bond separates a potential energy barrier. It is believed that the double well potential is asymmetric, with one well deeper than the other such that the proton normally rests in the deeper well. For a mutation to occur, the proton must have tunnelled into the shallower well. The proton's movement from its regular position is called a tautomeric transition. If DNA replication takes place in this state, the base pairing rule for DNA may be jeopardised, causing a mutation. Per-Olov Lowdin was the first to develop this theory of spontaneous mutation within the double helix. Other instances of quantum tunnelling-induced mutations in biology are believed to be a cause of ageing and cancer.
Early pioneers of quantum physics saw applications of quantum mechanics in biological problems. Erwin Schrödinger's 1944 book What Is Life? discussed applications of quantum mechanics in biology. Schrödinger introduced the idea of an "aperiodic crystal" that contained genetic information in its configuration of covalent chemical bonds. He further suggested that mutations are introduced by "quantum leaps". Other pioneers Niels Bohr, Pascual Jordan, and Max Delbrück argued that the quantum idea of complementarity was fundamental to the life sciences. In 1963, Per-Olov Löwdin published proton tunneling as another mechanism for DNA mutation. In his paper, he stated that there is a new field of study called "quantum biology". In 1979, the Soviet and Ukrainian physicist Alexander Davydov published the first textbook on quantum biology entitled Biology and Quantum Mechanics.
This year’s Nobel Physics Prize instills furtherance of quantum tunneling in biological sciences.
FIRST PHOTOGRAPH OF EARTH FROM SPACE
FIRST PHOTOGRAPH OF EARTH FROM SPACE
OCTOBER 24,1946
OCTOBER 24,1946
The first photos of Earth from space were taken on October 24, 1946 on the sub-orbital U.S.-launched V-2 rocket (flight #13) at White Sands Missile Range. Photos were captured every second and a half. The highest altitude (65 miles, 105 km) was 5 times higher than any picture taken before. This photo of the Earth was taken above the Kármán line, taken with a motion picture camera aboard the V-2 No. 13.
The flight was an addition to the Hermes program which had been ongoing since 1944. Rocket V-2 No.13 was assembled and launched by General Electric company with both captured German components and re-manufactured ones.The US Army conducted dozens of V-2 test flights from White Sands following World War II, using missiles and scientists captured from Nazi Germany.
" Here is the Stillness, which is not still even on a good day.
Now it ripples, reverberates, in cataclysm. Now there is a line, roughly east-west and too straight, almost neat in its manifest unnaturalness, spanning the girth of the land’s equator.
..The truth is benath the surface, a leviathan waiting to uncurl, but the waters of his thoughts are placid for now. Denial is powerful.
In those memories I was someone else, just as the Stillness was someworld else. Then, and now. You, and you.
Then. This land, then, was three lands – though these are in virtually the same position as what will someday be called the Stillness. "
THE STILLNESS IS OVERWHELMING with the belligerence of volcanic plume to a height of 45,000 ft after 12,000 years of innocuous existence and pristine appearance throughout the Holocene period.
WATCHOUT EARTHRISE ON X-MAS EVE with www.allauthors.info
Anders: Oh my God! Look at that picture over there! There's the Earth coming up. Wow, that's pretty.
Borman: Hey, don't take that, it's not scheduled. (joking)
Anders: (laughs) You got a color film, Jim?
Hand me that roll of color quick, would you...
Lovell: Oh man, that's great!
Apollo 8 was the first manned mission to the moon, which entered the Moon’s orbit on Christmas Eve 1968. William Anders first spotted it, the Earth, peeking over the horizon. That evening, the astronauts onboard held a live broadcast, in which they showed pictures of the Earth and moon as seen from their spacecraft. Command Module Pilot Jim Lovell said, "The vast loneliness is awe-inspiring and it makes you realize just what you have back there on Earth." The astronauts ended the broadcast with the crew taking turns reading from the book of Genesis.
This iconic image speaks volumes. To many it underscores the vastness of space, the loneliness of the cosmos and how fragile our home planet really is entitled “Earthrise,”
“Earthrise” is a photograph of Earth that was taken from lunar orbit by astronaut William Anders on December 24, 1968, during the Apollo 8 mission, the first crewed voyage to orbit the Moon.
On the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 8 mission in 2018, Anders stated: "It really undercut my religious beliefs. The idea that things rotate around the pope and up there is a big supercomputer wondering whether Billy was a good boy yesterday? It doesn't make any sense. I became a big buddy of [atheist scientist] Richard Dawkins."
In Life's 2003 book 100 Photographs that Changed the World, wilderness photographer Galen Rowell described it as "the most influential environmental photograph ever taken".
The Earth "rose" because the spacecraft was traveling over the Moon's surface. An earthrise that might be witnessed from the surface of the Moon would be quite unlike moonrises on Earth. Because the Moon is tidally locked with the Earth, one side of the Moon always faces toward Earth. Interpretation of this fact would lead one to believe that the Earth's position is fixed on the lunar sky and no earthrises can occur; however, the Moon librates slightly, which causes the Earth to draw a Lissajous figure on the sky. This figure fits inside a rectangle 15°48' wide and 13°20' high (in angular dimensions), while the angular diameter of the Earth as seen from the Moon is only about 2°. This means that earthrises are visible near the edge of the Earth-observable surface of the Moon (about 20% of the surface). Since a full libration cycle takes about 27 days, earthrises are very slow, and it takes about 48 hours for Earth to clear its diameter. During the course of the month-long lunar orbit, an observer would additionally witness a succession of "Earth phases", much like the lunar phases seen from Earth. That is what accounts for the half-illuminated globe's earthlight, and the ashen light seen in the photograph.
Reckon those redeeming moments with www.allauthors.info & www.booklore.fun
Apollo 8 crew. From left: Commander Frank Borman, Lunar Module Pilot William Anders, and Command Module Pilot James Lovell.
A copy of the modified Hasselblad 500 EL camera
U.S. postage stamp
Lunario Novo, one of the first printed editions of the new calendar, printed in Rome by Vincenzo Accolti in 1582
Clock dial displaying both decimal (inside the circle) and duodecimal time (on the outer rim)
Several countries and regions changed their calendars on December 31, typically as part of the transition to the Gregorian calendar from the Julian calendar or other traditional systems. On these dates, December 31 was immediately followed by January 1, effectively removing the date from the calendar for that specific year in that location.
Countries and areas that had December 31 as the last day before adopting a new calendar system include:
Belgium/Southern Netherlands In areas under Spanish rule, the last day of the Julian calendar was December 20, 1582, which was followed by December 31, 1582 (or one day later).
Germany (Aachen) The city of Aachen's last day before the change was December 31, 1582, which was followed by January 11, 1583.
Netherlands (Friesland and Groningen) Friesland's last day was December 31, 1700, followed by January 12, 1701. Groningen made a similar change.
France (Mulhouse) The city of Mulhouse's last day before the change was December 31, 1700, followed by January 12, 1701.
Great Britain and its Dominions While the specific date of dropping days was in September 1752, the British Empire and colonies (except Scotland) changed the start of the legal new year from March 25 to January 1, with the day after December 31, 1751 being January 1, 1752.
Philippines In 1844, the Philippines removed December 31 from the calendar to align with its Asian trading partners' time zones. Monday, December 30, 1844, was immediately followed by Wednesday, January 1, 1845.
Kiribati In 1994, Kiribati introduced a date change for its eastern islands to no longer straddle the International Date Line. Friday, December 30, 1994, was followed by Sunday, January 1, 1995, effectively skipping December 31 for those islands.
Other countries adopted the Gregorian calendar on January 1, but often this was a simple start to a new year under a new system, without explicitly "changing" the calendar on December 31 in the sense of jumping days: Japan (1873), Korea (1896) and China (1912).
The Gregorian calendar was decreed in 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII, to correct an error in the Julian calendar that was causing an erroneous calculation of the date of Easter. The Julian calendar had been based upon a year lasting 365.25 days, but this was slightly too long; in reality, it is about 365.2422 days,and so over the centuries, the calendar had drifted increasingly out of alignment with the Earth's orbit.
'You can spend way too much of your life staring into that black hole. '
Demon is still ruling the roost! Ron Charles of The Washington Post upheld Demon Copperhead as his "favorite novel of 2022" for being "equal parts hilarious and heartbreaking, this is the story of an irrepressible boy nobody wants, but readers will love."
Again in 2025 parting shot, Amitav Ghosh flutters Demon Copperhead. ‘December is always the month when writers are asked about their most memorable books of the year, so it’s as good a time as any to name a few. The first on my list is Barbara Kingsolver’s novel Demon Copperhead’ says Amitav Ghosh.
HEADSTARTER
Unforgettable Protagonist: Demon's voice—witty, resilient, and authentic—draws you into his struggles from birth, making his story incredibly compelling.
Masterful Storytelling: Barbara Kingsolver expertly blends tragedy with beauty, delivering an epic narrative that's both emotionally devastating and ultimately inspiring.
Social Relevance: It offers a deeply personal, humane look at the opioid epidemic, child abuse, and poverty in rural America, giving a voice to the forgotten.
Dickensian Resonance: It cleverly reimagines David Copperfield for the modern era, highlighting how societal problems persists.
Rich Characters & Themes: Beyond Demon, the book features a dynamic cast, exploring themes of love, loss, identity, and the fight for survival.
WHAT TO EXPECT
· Heart-wrenching but Hopeful: Expect a story filled with immense hardship but also moments of tender connection and Demon's enduring spirit.
· Beautiful Prose: The writing is exquisite, even when describing difficult realities, creating a truly immersive experience.
· Inciting: It's a book that makes you angry about injustice but also deeply empathetic to the people living through it.
However, Lorraine Berry of The Boston Globe criticized the novel as poverty porn, arguing that,
‘In seeking to raise awareness of child hunger and poverty in the United States, Kingsolver turns her characters’ lives into tales of misery and the inevitability of failure. Her characters wallow in dark hollows with little light, condemned to forever repeat the horrific mistakes of previous generations. She makes the people of Appalachia into objects of pity, but in doing so, also intimates that falling into drug abuse, rejecting education, and 'clinging' to their ways are moral choices.’
Pro captu lectoris habent sua fata libelli.
"Books receive their dooms according to the reader's capacity" or more commonly, "Books have their own destinies according to the reader's capacity)".
"How does it feel to want?"
WATCH OUT OLIVE KITTERIDGE: the formidable, complex, and often difficult retired math teacher in the fictional Maine town of Crosby, exploring life's joys, sorrows, and human connections through her changing perspective as she ages, marries kind pharmacist Henry, raises her son Christopher, and grapples with loneliness and loss after Henry's death, revealing deep humanity beneath her abrasive exterior.
Olive wields happiness, cruelty, resilience, and the nuances of the human soul.
One sees -
Olive Kitteridge: A large, blunt, stern, yet sometimes deeply compassionate retired math teacher; a force in her small town.
Henry Kitteridge: Olive's kind, gentle, and steady husband, who runs the local pharmacy and grounds her.
Christopher Kitteridge: Olive and Henry's son, who grows up to be a podiatrist, often feeling tyrannized by his mother's intense personality.
Structure & Themes:
Short Story Cycle: A series of 13 distinct, interconnected stories, not a traditional linear novel, though they form a cohesive whole.
Shifting Perspectives: Olive is central in some stories, a supporting character in others, allowing readers to see her from different angles and understand her impact on others.
Human Condition: Explores themes of depression, loss, jealousy, family friction, aging, loneliness, resilience, and the contradictions within people.
Crosby, Maine: The setting of the fictional coastal town is crucial, reflecting the small-town dynamics and shared lives.
Narrative Arc (Broad Strokes)
Early Years: Introduction to Olive, Henry, and teenage Christopher; Olive's difficult nature and impact on her family.
Mid-Life: Stories cover Olive's retirement, Henry's declining health (stroke), and Christopher's difficult marriages.
Later Life: Explores Olive's profound loneliness and grappling with life after Henry's death, finding unexpected moments of connection and self-discovery.
Key Insight
The book reveals that beneath Olive's abrasive exterior lies a complex, deeply feeling woman, prompting readers to look beyond surface judgments and recognize the shared, messy humanity in everyone, including themselves.
“You couldn't make yourself stop feeling a certain way, no matter what the other person did. You had to just wait. Eventually the feeling went away because others came along. Or sometimes it didn't go away but got squeezed into something tiny, and hung like a piece of tinsel in the back of your mind.”
“She didn't like to be alone. Even more, she didn't like being with people.”
“Traits don't change, states of mind do.”
― Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge
COGENT LITERATI RECKONS 31 DECEMBER WITH THE THEATRE OF MOOD
COGENT LITERATI RECKONS 31 DECEMBER WITH THE THEATRE OF MOOD
THREE SISTERS SET RUMBLING ADAPTATIONS
THREE SISTERS SET RUMBLING ADAPTATIONS
The play Three Sisters on the shortlist of Anton Chekhov's outstanding plays, along with The Cherry Orchard. Three Sisters runs on the shortlist of Anton Chekhov's outstanding plays, along with The Cherry Orchard. The play was written for the Moscow Art Theatre and it opened on 31 January 1901, under the direction of Konstantin Stanislavsk. The play has several important characters who are talked about frequently, but never seen onstage.
Reception of Three Sisters was mixed. Chekhov felt that Stanislavski's "exuberant" direction had masked the subtleties of the work and that only Knipper had shown her character developing in the manner the playwright had intended. In the directors' view, the point was to show the hopes, aspirations and dreams of the characters, but audiences were affected by the pathos of the sisters' loneliness and desperation and by their eventual, uncomplaining acceptance of their situation. Nonetheless the piece proved popular and soon it became established in the company's repertoire.
Three Sisters is considered a cornerstone of modern drama because it revolutionized theater by shifting focus away from dramatic, plot-driven action to the subtle exploration of "submerged" human psychology, mood, and the quiet tragedy of unfulfilled lives. It is unique for its blending of profound melancholy with irony and comedy, often described as a "theatre of mood" rather than a conventional play. Unlike typical dramas of its time, Three Sisters features little external action. Instead, the drama is found in the everyday lives, conversations, and emotional undercurrents of the Prozorov siblings (Olga, Masha, Irina, and Andrei). Three Sisters follows a non-linear, almost musical structure. The play famously starts with a celebration (the anniversary of their father's death) and ends with a heartbreaking farewell as the military brigade departs, leaving the sisters alone with their diminished,, uncomplaining acceptance of their situation.
Chekhov’s genius lies in what is not said. The true drama exists in the "submerged life" between the lines.
1. The "Submerged" Plot and Realism
Unlike typical dramas of its time, Three Sisters features little external action. Instead, the drama is found in the everyday lives, conversations, and emotional undercurrents of the Prozorov siblings (Olga, Masha, Irina, and Andrei).
"Nothing Happens" Effect: The play is famous for having characters who talk about doing things—specifically moving to Moscow—but rarely act.
Focus on Subtext: Chekhov’s genius lies in what is not said. The true drama exists in the "submerged life" between the lines.
2. Moscow as a Symbol of Disillusionment
The yearning for Moscow is not just a plot point; it is a powerful symbol of lost potential, nostalgia, and the human tendency to believe happiness is always elsewhere. As the play progresses, Moscow transforms from a tangible goal into a mirage, representing the unattainable dreams of the characters.
3. Tragicomic Characters and Ennui
The characters are masterpieces of "Chekhovian" longing and listlessness, struggling with ennui (a deep, restless weariness).
Complex Humanity: They are not simple villains or heroes, but ordinary people with flaws who evoke both sympathy and irony.
Group Protagonist: The focus is not on one hero, but on the ensemble, creating a feeling of "chamber music" rather than a solo performance.
4. The Tension Between Past, Present, and Future
The play captures the transition of time. The sisters live in a provincial town, haunted by the memory of a sophisticated life in Moscow, yet paralyzed by the dull reality of their present. They constantly look toward a better future that never arrives.
5. Revolutionary Structure (Arrivals and Departures)
Three Sisters follows a non-linear, almost musical structure. The play famously starts with a celebration (the anniversary of their father's death) and ends with a heartbreaking farewell as the military brigade departs, leaving the sisters alone with their diminished,, uncomplaining acceptance of their situation.
6. The "Three Sisters" Metaphor (Thematic Symbiosis)
The title refers to the Prozorov sisters, but it also reflects a wider, almost universal, human condition of sustaining one another through misery. Similar to the agricultural practice of the "Three Sisters" (corn, beans, and squash), which thrive best when planted together, the sisters in the play provide support, yet their lives are also "poisoned" by the very act of hoping for a better life.
Ultimately, Three Sisters is special because it finds the universal in the particular, making the quiet desperation of a 19th-century Russian household resonate with modern audiences, focusing on the pain of "what we do and what we don't do".
Tapping Subconscious Mind
Tapping Subconscious Mind
Paranormal activities can be seen as possible phenomenon. RatnadeepBanerji interacts with some women practitioners
The women of today are increasingly concerned over body-mind-soul axis. What was mumbo-jumbo to science is gaining credibility. The paranormal phenomenon is achievable through graded and guided practice; its rationale is surfacing up. Subconscious mind is not just in brain but resides in every part of physical body as well. At the Women Economic Forum of 2016 with women from over 100 countries, over a dozen sessions were devoted to holistic wellness, despite being an economic forum. Economic progress needs to be coupled with the solace within.
Spontaneous art session
Holotropic breathing session
Woman facing miscarriage moulds fetus from miscarriage
Hypnotic therapy and hypnodrama
ManjuAgrawal was a top notch fashion designer. When hardly 23 and she got diagnosed with a cyst in her throat and had developed thyroid problem. She was put under throat rest.Manju was dogged in not going under the doctor’s knife. She came across an Indian faith healer who was otherwise a physicist in Germany. And she was healed. All tests confirmed it. That was 2007. Manju largely gave upfashion designing andavowedly took up hypnotic therapy and pursues in the National Capital Region of Delhi. I even have patients with physical problems like diabetes arthritis and even psoriasis. ‘Our subconscious is in every part of the body. We talk to those parts’, says Manju.
In hypnotherapy, a therapist leads the sufferer to positive change while he or she is in a trance state. The result is cleansing, catharsis, healing and purification of mind.
Grandpa is gone. But where did he stash away the jewelry casket or leave the bank papers? Need to speak to him! Or say, why did my son commit suicide?A very senior businesswoman from Taj Group of Hotels lost her mother in accident. The entire time mother’s image comes up before her eyes, she is not able to work properly. ‘Can hypnodrama let me know how my mother is?’ she asks. Surekha Kothari based in Chennai practices hypnodrama to make people communicate with the deceased. People often want to communicate with their deceased kith and kin to know some information or to know their well-being. She says, ‘People are increasingly becoming inquisitive over their past lives to get rid of persistent problems in their present life. You’ve to bare your soul to yourself and this is a very painful process.’Surekha Kothari is also into spirit releases and insists that there is no other way. The Women Economic Forum 2016 awarded her.
ManjuAgrawal also conducts holotropic breath-work sessions. It is a shamanistic way of healing. A special music with specific rhythm and beats helps the participants to move deeper into their inner selves and tap those parts that need to be transformed. A powerful release of emotional trauma and negative energy takes place. ‘It helps to bury the past of shame, guilt or trauma and come out of it completely’, says ManjuAgrawal.
Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP)
We humans do not experience the world as it is but we experience a model of the world. We receive ongoing impressions or information but only a tiny fraction of that information reaches the conscious mind. We cannot accommodate millions of information, so they are filtered by our minds, which delete, distort, and generalize what we hear, feel, taste and smell. Kusum Gandhi Vig is a NLP mind trainer, proficient in psychology. Kusum clarifies, ‘Between reality and the mind is a filter that determines what information gets to the conscious mind. This filter is a model of the world, that is formed by our personality patterns. NLP perceives the thoughts as key to both improving our daily lives and achieving our goals.’NLP therapy involves several techniques like hypnosis and holotropic breathing.
NLP is highly contested. Wikipedia mentions it a discredited theory. But yet it has practitioners and believers round the globe. NLP claims far-reaching benefits wherein you may get to explicate a miraculous thing in a seeming phenomenon.Kusum’s clientele includes Symbiosis Centre for Management Studies, Pune, Defense Institute of Psychological Research under Defense Research &Development Organization and army welfare centres.
Art Therapy
Cyntha Gonzalez is an American living in Dubai. Her art therapy follows spontaneous art to build trust and intuition and to make fragmented parts into wholeness. There is no prior planning nor any instructions. She asks participants in blindfolded state to make clay moulds of objects they cherish or detest. ‘A woman with miscarriage sculpted a fetus’, says Cyntha. I ask them to make clay masks or self-portraits. Deeper self-confidence ebbs over. Cyntha quotes Carl Jung, ‘Symbol is the tool for transformation.’Cyntha also asks people to paint with fingers and not use a brush that gives voice in the first person. Though right handed, I painted a wilted wedding bouquet with my left-hand fingers when my marriage ended’, says Cyntha.
At the age of 24, Cynthahad been working in San Francisco with 6-10 year children charged with felony.In 2004, Cyntha worked with street children of the age group 8-16 years in Bangalore.
The haze of paranormal waxes and wanes as per the ambit of existing science.
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