Anxious about the apostrophe? Confused by the comma? Stumped by the semicolon? Join Lynne Truss on a hilarious tour through the rules of punctuation that is sure to sort the dashes from the hyphens. We all had the basic rules of punctuation drilled into us at school, but punctuation pedants have good reason to suspect they never sank in. ‘Its Summer!’ screams a sign that sets our teeth on edge. ‘Pansy’s ready’, we learn to our considerable interest (‘Is she?’) as we browse among the bedding plants. It is not only the rules of punctuation that have come under attack but also a sense of why they matter. In this runaway bestseller, Lynne Truss takes the fight to emoticons and greengrocers’ apostrophes with a war cry of ‘Sticklers unite!’

The second of 6 eBook-only shorts from star of the Great British Sewing Bee and doyenne of the Women’s Institute, May Martin, including three gorgeous projects to try at home - Pencil Skirt, Bucket Bag and Shell Blouse - taken from May Martin’s Sewing Bible. May has been teaching sewing for over 40 years. Now she shares her tips and tricks for creating beautiful garments at home, perfect for beginner sewers. Beautifully styled and simple-to-follow, this authoritative sewing e-short, taken from May Martin’s Sewing Bible, offers three starter projects for those looking to create their own unique wardrobe.

An excellent, nostalgic gift from a bygone era when hard times were no excuse for shabby dressing. Contains practical tips to repair and improve clothes to save money. Travel back to the forties when a war-torn Europe was still no excuse to dress shabbily and the one thing you didn't ration was fashion. In this exclusive reproduction of a genuine archive copy, retro domestic goddess Joanna Chase prescribes ways to avoid fashion fauz pax in money-tight scenarios - whether the cause is a lack of coupons - or a credit crunch. In this book you will learn: o How to make the most out of every last inch of fabric o How to transform old skirts into brand spanking new outfits o How to make clothes out of old furnishings o How to turn your old dresses into ones that fit for your children o How to plan a whole families wardrobe in demand With this book, repackaged in a charming, nostalgic cover, as much a fashion accessory as a practical advice guide, you will learn all this and much much more. Uniform with this guide: Food Facts for the Kitchen Front o Make your Garden Feed You o The archive collection- because good advice never goes out of date.

A practical, affordable and accessible home photography tutor. This inspiring project-based course book covers everything from basic composition to the latest digital darkroom techniques. Learn at your own pace as this practical, comprehensive course helps you develop your key photographic techniques. Contents include: step-by-step projects on exposure, aperture, lenses, light, filters, colour, black and white and image enhancement; plus professional secrets and stunning shots from around the world. The fully interactive and project-based approach of Collins Complete Photography Course will help you to raise both your camera confidence and your level of photography.

The Organic Garden redefines what it means to be an organic gardener. This practical and thought-provoking handbook is both a manual of organic practice and a starting point for ethical living. The meaning of 'organic' is changing fast, becoming more and more an umbrella term for all things environmental: from ethical consumerism, waste recycling and self-sufficiency to new trends in wildlife-friendly, sustainable and forest gardening. The Organic Garden shows how these popular new areas of green living are relevant to the ordinary gardener and demonstrates simple, achievable ways in which you can use these ideas to transform your garden. Includes: ? Essentials of organic practice ? Gardening for wildlife and ornament ? Gardening for food ? Ethical choices at the garden centre ? Shed’s Dead – how to create an ecological shed and explore alternatives for outdoor living ? Gardening beyond the garden – allotments, conservation volunteering, community gardening ? Climate change and today’s gardener

This book is a combination of No Mistakes Grammar volumes I, II, and III. But it’s so much more. It has some new material, but it also has about 200 pictures. That’s right—pictures. This is one of the world’s first, if not the first, visual grammar book. Most people learn better with pictures. With Visual Grammar, you get images that show examples of the words you’re learning. Not every word has a picture but a lot of them do. This book includes misused words, redundancies, absolutes, flat adverbs, eponyms, idiomatic expressions, Latin phrases, and more. ?

n vara anului 1914, cea mai mare parte a Europei s-a prbuit ntr-un rzboi att de catastrofal nct a zdruncinat politica i nsui sistemul de credine al continentului ntr-un mod fundamental. Dezastrul i-a nspimntat pe supravieuitori i a ocat o civilizaie care i asumase total rolul de model pentru restul lumii. Totul s-a prbuit ntr-un haos de o slbticie aflat dincolo de orice termen de comparaie. n 1939, europenii aveau s nceap un al doilea conflict care a reuit s fie chiar i mai teribil – un rzboi n care uciderea civililor a ocupat scena central i care a culminat cu Holocaustul. Drumul spre iadne spune aceast poveste cu nelegere, fler i originalitate. Kershaw reia evenimentele ntr-o naraiune fascinant, dar abordeaz i problemele cele mai dificile pe care le ridic aceste ntmplri din trecut – ce au nsemnat ele pentru europenii care le-au declanat i care le-au trit i ce nseamn pentru noi. Istorie la dimensiuni epice... ar trebui s figureze n lista lecturilor obligatorii. –The New York Times Ne aflm n prezena unui istoric emerit.– Spectator Magistral.– The Economist

Cartea t?n?rului universitar Mihai-Bogdan Marian consacrat? analizei conflictelor interna?ionale este o invita?ie la luciditate, la reflec?ie autonom?, dezinhibat?, la cercetare aplicat?, f?r? prejudec??i ?i partizanate apriorice. Autorul este un analist pentru care exerci?iul ?n sine al disec?rii cauzelor ?i ?mprejur?rilor ce favorizeaz? apari?ia ?i acutizarea conflictelor interna?ionale nu este unul fortuit sau gratuit. Ideea sa tutelar? este c? orice astfel de conflict poate fi pre?nt?mpinat. Iar dac?, fatalmente, el s-a declan?at ?i s-a dezvoltat, sc?p?nd poate de sub control, poate fi dezamorsat, factorii angrena?i ?n acest proces av?nd la ?ndem?n? algoritmi ?i proceduri standard care nu trebuie s? fac? obiectul unei ac?iuni in extremis, care s? justifice de fapt prin e?ec escaladarea ?n continuare a conflictului ca atare. (Mihai Milca)

The period included in the reigns of Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian, was remarkable for two memorable events in the annals of ecclesiastical history; the first persecution of the Christian Church by the sixth Roman sovereign, and the dissolution of the Jewish polity by Titus. The destruction of Jerusalem was stupendous, not only as an act of divine wrath, but as being the proximate cause of the dispersion of a whole nation, upon which a long series of sorrow, spoliation, and oppression lighted, in consequence of the curse the Jews had invoked, when in reply to the remonstrances of Pilate they had cried out, “His blood be upon us and our children.” The church below, represented in Scripture as a type of the heavenly Jerusalem above, and having its seat then in the doomed city, was not to continue there, lest the native Jews composing it should gather round them a people of their own nation, in a place destined to remain desolate till the time when the dispersed of Israel should be converted, and rebuild their city and temple. The city bearing the ancient name of Jerusalem does not indeed occupy the same site, being built round the sacred spot where the garden once stood, in which a mortal sepulchre received the lifeless form of the Saviour of the world. But happier times seem dawning on the dispersed of Judea. Our own days have seen the foundations of a Jewish Christian church laid in Jerusalem; our Queen Victoria and the King of Prussia united to commence a work of love, thereby fulfilling in part the promise made to the Jews of old, “And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy nursing mothers.” To those readers who feel interested in the dispersed of Israel and Judea, these pages may afford, perhaps, information on an important subject as well as amusement.

THE Mesopotamian civilization shares with the Egyptian civilization the honour of being one of the two earliest civilizations in the world, and although M. J. de Morgan’s excavations at Susa the ruined capital of ancient Elam, have brought to light the elements of an advanced civilization which perhaps even antedates that of Mesopotamia, it must be remembered that the Sumerians who, so far as our present knowledge goes, were the first to introduce the arts of life and all that they bring with them, into the low-lying valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, probably themselves emigrated from the Elamite plateau on the east of the Tigris; at all events the Sumerians expressed both “mountain” and “country” by the same writing-sign, the two apparently being synonymous from their point of view; in support of this theory of a mountain-home for the Sumerians, we may perhaps further explain the temple-towers, the characteristic feature of most of the religious edifices in Mesopotamia, as a conscious or unconscious imitation in bricks and mortar of the hills and ridges of their native-land, due to an innate aversion to the dead-level monotony of the Babylonian plain, while it is also a significant fact that in the earliest period Shamash the Sun-god is represented with one foot resting on a mountain, or else standing between two mountains. However this may be, the history of the Elamites was intimately wrapped up with that of the dwellers on the other side of the Tigris, from the earliest times down to the sack of Susa by Ashur-bani-pal, king of Assyria, in the seventh century. Both peoples adopted the cuneiform system of writing, so-called owing to the wedge-shaped formation of the characters, the wedges being due to the material used in later times for all writing purposes—the clay of their native soil—: both spoke an agglutinative, as opposed to an inflexional language like our own, and both inherited a similar culture. A further, and in its way a more convincing argument in support of the mountain-origin theory is afforded by the early art of the Sumerians. On the most primitive seal cylinders1 we find trees and animals whose home is in the mountains, and which certainly were not native to the low-lying plain of Babylonia. The cypress and the cedar-tree are only found in mountainous districts, but a tree which must be identified with one or the other of them is represented on the early seal cylinders; it is of course true that ancient Sumerian rulers fetched cedar wood from the mountains for their building operations, and therefore the presence of such a tree on cylinder seals merely argues a certain acquaintance with the tree, but Ceteris paribus it is more reasonable to suppose that the material earthly objects depicted, were those with which the people were entirely familiar and not those with which they were merely casually acquainted. Again, on the early cylinders the mountain bull, known as the Bison bonasus, assumes the r?le played in later times by the lowland water-buffalo. This occurs with such persistent regularity that the inference that the home of the Sumerians in those days was in the mountains is almost inevitable. Again, as Ward points out, the composite man-bull Ea-bani, the companion of Gilgamesh, has always the body of a bison, never that of a buffalo. So too the frequent occurrence of the ibex, the oryx, and the deer with branching horns, all argues in the same direction, for the natural home of all these animals lay in the mountains.

Volumul de fa?? reune?te portretele sclipitoare ale celor mai ilustre favorite. Apropiate puterii, exercit?ndu??i influen?a adesea ?ntr?o manier? clandestin?, ele alc?tuiesc un galant cortegiu de femei c?rora importan?i b?rba?i de stat le datoreaz? mult. Ce este o favorit?? Cuv?ntul, ne?ndoielnic originar din italian?, se refer? la o femeie care ?se bucur? de favorurile" unei persoane de rang foarte ?nalt. Spre deosebire de o amant?, favorita nu se mul?ume?te s? fie obiectul unei pasiuni amoroase, fie aceasta efemer? ori durabil?. Ea are putere, exercit? influen?? politic?, economic? sau artistic?; ob?ine rezultate, fericite sau dezastruoase. Fie c? e iubit? de popula?ie, tolerat? sau detestat?, nimic nu se face ?i nu se desface f?r? ea. Muzele prezentate de autor ?n acest periplu prin istoria Europei au jucat toate un rol propor?ional cu influen?a exercitat? asupra monarhului, prin?ului mo?tenitor, regelui sau ?mp?ratului l?ng? care s-au aflat, fie el c?s?torit, v?duv sau celibatar: Agnes Sorel, Diana de Poitiers, Gabrielle d’Estrées, Louise de La Valliere, marchiza de Montespan, doamna de Maintenon, surorile de Nesle, marchiza de Pompadour, doamna du Barry, Zoé du Cayla, Lol Montez, Miss Howard, Katia Dolgorukova, Blanche Delacroix, Magda Lupescu ?i Wallis Simpson. Optsprezece portrete de femei care au influen?at cursul istoriei. ?n bine ?i ?n r?u.?

The Frogs tells the story of the god Dionysus, who, despairing of the state of Athens' tragedians, travels to the underworld to bring the playwright Euripides back from the dead. He brings along his slave Xanthias, who is smarter and braver than Dionysus. As the play opens, Xanthias and Dionysus argue over what kind of jokes Xanthias can use to open the play.

In 1969 the small Asian nation of Cambodia was under attack: first by US bombers as the Vietnam war spilled over the border, and then by the Khmer Rouge as they began their brutal reign of terror. Under the rule of Pol Pot, ordinary city folk were driven from their homes and banished to labour camps that eventually saw two million people die. Darkness descended and "Year Zero" had begun. Mother and the Tiger is the story of one small girl, who struggled to survive one of the most ruthless regimes in human history. Six-year-old Hui Lim was trapped by the madness around her and cast into a seemingly endless nightmare. Her family was cursed as a member of a hated ethnic minority and targeted by the murderous Khmer Rouge. To survive where so many others died, Hui had to tap an inner strength that she never knew she possessed. Despite her youth she was determined to find her scattered family, no matter the odds. Her memoir of that brutal regime proves that even amidst the blackest depths of human depravity, hope can endure.

Cei ce sus?in c? tr?im ?ntr-o er? a comunic?rii par s? confunde dezvoltarea telecomunica?iilor cu progresul comunic?rii interumane. Nu este c?tu?i de pu?in sigur c? suntem ast?zi mai capabili dec?t ?n trecut de solidaritate afectiv? cu semenii, de ?mp?rt??ire de tr?iri intime, de prietenie ?i dragoste. Poate chiar dimpotriv?. Ceea ce ?inea ?n trecut de normalitatea vie?ii de fiecare zi ?i, ca atare, nu mobiliza ?n mod special aten?ia celor implica?i, a devenit ast?zi obiect de analiz? tocmai pentru c? nu se mai produce spontan, ci necesit? un efort con?tient, inclusiv de natura teoretic-investigativ?.Cunoa?terea principiilor ?i a mecanismelor comunic?rii interpersonale a devenit indispensabil? pentru ameliorarea raporturilor dintre oameni ?i a ?ncetat s? mai fie numai o problem? a speciali?tilor. Dac? ?n trecut oamenii comunicau spontan, ?n felul ?n care f?cea proza ?burghezul gentilom“, ast?zi suntem tot mai mult ?n situa?ia unui domn Jourdain care, pentru a se apropia de semenii s?i, are nevoie de un ghid. Acestui imperativ ?ncearc? s?-i r?spund?, ?n felul s?u, ?i lucrarea de fa??.

Prometheus, a Titan who defies the gods and gives fire to mankind, acts for which he is subjected to perpetual punishment. The Oceanids appear and attempt to comfort Prometheus by conversing with him. Prometheus cryptically tells them that he knows of a potential marriage that would lead to Zeus's downfall. A Titan named Oceanus commiserates with Prometheus and urges him to make peace with Zeus.

A group of women, led by the wise and redoubtable Praxagora, has decided that the women of Athens must convince the men to give them control of the city, as they are convinced they can do a better job. Disguised as men, the women sneak into the assembly and command the majority of votes needed to carry their series of revolutionary proposals, even convincing some of the men to vote for it on the grounds that it is the only thing they have not tried.

Un volum cuprinzand studii si documente descoperite in arhivele romane si straine (aproximativ 900 pagini) privind istoria conflictului mondial din 1939-1945 si a razboiului rece. Lucrarea reflecta, in esenta, batalia pentru informatii angajata intre serviciile de spionaj dupa 1939, pregatirea si infaptuirea loviturii de stat de la 23 August 1944, lupta pentru putere la nivelul conducerii P.C.R. (1944-1989), premisele loviturii de stat din 22 decembrie 1989, prabusirea statului comunist in Europa Est-Centrala e.t.c.

Insumeaza o serie de cursuri universitare (de docenta si nu numai) tinute de unul dintre cei mai ilustrii elevi ai lui Vasile Parvan, prof. dr. docent Vladimir Dumitrescu, la Universitatea din Bucuresti in anii 30 ai secolului trecut, in vederea obtinerii titlului de docent si pe cel de conferentiar al respectivei Universitati. Volumul incepe cu o cuprinzatoare prelegere din care aflam cere au fost formele de civilizatie preistorica in Dacia rasariteana pana in mileniul I, i. C., precum si rolul marilor fluvii in dezvoltarea civilizatiilor omenesti.

Dictionarul de sociologie rurala este primul volum din cele sase care alcatuiesc Enciclopedia Rurala. Lucrarea se inscrie in traditia deschisa de Scoala Sociologica de la Bucuresti si pentru realizarea sa a colaborat un colectiv de autori din toate centrele universitare ale tarii: Bucuresti, Cluj, Oradea, Iasi, Brasov, Craiova. Dictionarul este structurat pe patru sectiuni (termeni, personalitati, curente, reviste) si cumuleaza, pe o intindere de aproximativ 650 de pagini, un numar de peste 300 de termeni. Lucrarea valorifica terminologia sociologiei rurale romanesti si europene precum si cea din practica unor institutii internationale si regionale care prin natura preocuparilor lor afecteaza mediul rural. De asemenea dictionarul ofera o sistematizare schematica a teoriilor si curentelor de referinta pentru domeniu si constituie un ghid util pentru toti cei interesati de practica si metodologia de cercetare rurala din sociologie, antropologie si politici de dezvoltare.

TRAVELERS who go into Scotland take a great interest in visiting, among other places, a certain room in the ruins of an old palace, where Queen Mary was born. Queen Mary was very beautiful, but she was very unfortunate and unhappy. Every body takes a strong interest in her story, and this interest attaches, in some degree, to the room where her sad and sorrowful life was begun.??The palace is near a little village called Linlithgow. The village has but one long street, which consists of ancient stone houses. North of it is a little lake, or rather pond: they call it, in Scotland, a loch. The palace is between the village and the loch; it is upon a beautiful swell of land which projects out into the water. There is a very small island in the middle of the loch and the shores are bordered with fertile fields. The palace, when entire, was square, with an open space or court in the center. There was a beautiful stone fountain in the center of this court, and an arched gateway through which horsemen and carriages could ride in. The doors of entrance into the palace were on the inside of the court.??The palace is now in ruins. A troop of soldiers came to it one day in time of war, after Mary and her mother had left it, and spent the night there: they spread straw over the floors to sleep upon. In the morning, when they went away, they wantonly set the straw on fire, and left it burning, and thus the palace was destroyed. Some of the lower floors were of stone; but all the upper floors and the roof were burned, and all the wood-work of the rooms, and the doors and window-frames. Since then the palace has never been repaired, but remains a melancholy pile of ruins.??The room where Mary was born had a stone floor. The rubbish which has fallen from above has covered it with a sort of soil, and grass and weeds grow up all over it. It is a very melancholy sight to see.

SOME men are renowned in history on account of the extraordinary powers and capacities which they exhibited in the course of their career, or the intrinsic greatness of the deeds which they performed. Others, without having really achieved any thing in itself very great or wonderful, have become widely known to mankind by reason of the vast consequences which, in the subsequent course of events, resulted from their doings. Men of this latter class are conspicuous rather than great. From among thousands of other men equally exalted in character with themselves, they are brought out prominently to the notice of mankind only in consequence of the strong light reflected, by great events subsequently occurring, back upon the position where they happened to stand.??The celebrity of Romulus seems to be of this latter kind. He founded a city. A thousand other men have founded cities; and in doing their work have evinced perhaps as much courage, sagacity, and mental power as Romulus displayed. ?The city of Romulus, however, became in the end the queen and mistress of the world. It rose to so exalted a position of influence and power, and retained its ascendency so long, that now for twenty centuries every civilized nation in the western world have felt a strong interest in every thing pertaining to its history, and have been accustomed to look back with special curiosity to the circumstances of its origin. ??In consequence of this it has happened that though Romulus, in his actual day, performed no very great exploits, and enjoyed no pre-eminence above the thousand other half-savage chieftains of his class, whose names have been long forgotten, and very probably while he lived never dreamed of any extended fame, yet so brilliant is the illumination which the subsequent events of history have shed upon his position and his doings, that his name and the incidents of his life have been brought out very conspicuously to view, and attract very strongly the attention of mankind.??The history of Rome is usually made to begin with the story of ?neas. In order that the reader may understand in what light that romantic tale is to be re-garded, it is necessary to premise some statements in respect to the general condition of society in ancient days, and to the nature of the strange narrations, circulated in those early periods among mankind, out of which in later ages, when the art of writing came to be introduced, learned men compiled and recorded what they termed history.