Category Archives: Ayn Rand

Who Was Ayn Rand?

Ayn Rand moved to the United States in 1926 and tried to establish herself in Hollywood. Her first novel, We the Living (1936), championed her rejection of collectivist values in favor of individual self interest, a belief that became more explicit with her subsequent novels The Fountainhead (1943) and Atlas Shrugged (1957). Following the immense success of the latter, Rand promoted her philosophy of Objectivism through courses, lectures and literature.

Ayn Rand was born Alissa Zinovievna Rosenbaum on February 2, 1905, in St. Petersburg, Russia. The oldest daughter of Jewish parents (and eventually an avowed atheist), she spent her early years in comfort thanks to her dad's success as a pharmacist, proving a brilliant student.

In 1917, her father's shop was suddenly seized by Bolshevik soldiers, forcing the family to resume life in poverty in the Crimea. The situation profoundly impacted young Alissa, who developed strong feelings toward government intrusion into individual livelihood. She returned to her city of birth to attend the University of Petrograd, graduating in 1924, and then enrolled at the State Institute for Cinema Arts to study screenwriting.

Granted a visa to visit relatives in Chicago, Alissa left for the United States in early 1926, never to look back. She took on her soon-to-be-famous pen name and, after a few months in Chicago, moved to Hollywood to become a screenwriter.

Following a chance encounter with Hollywood titan Cecil B. DeMille, Rand became an extra on the set of his 1927 film The King of Kings, where she met actor Frank O'Connor. They married in 1929, and she became an American citizen in 1931.

Rand landed a job as a clerk at RKO Pictures, eventually rising to head of the wardrobe department, and continued developing her craft as a writer. In 1932, she sold her screenplay Red Pawn, a Soviet romantic thriller, to Universal Studios. She soon completed a courtroom drama called Penthouse Legend, which featured the gimmick of audience members serving as the jury. In late 1934, Rand and her husband moved to New York City for its production, now renamed Night of January 16th.

Around this time, Rand also completed her first novel, We the Living. Published in 1936 after several rejections, We the Living championed the moral authority of the individual through its heroine's battles with a Soviet totalitarian state. Rand followed with the novella Anthem (1938), about a future collectivist dystopia in which "I" has been stamped out of the language.

In 1937, Rand began researching a new novel by working for New York architect Ely Jacques Kahn. The result, after years of writing and more rejections, was The Fountainhead. Underscoring Rands individualistic underpinnings, the books hero, architect Howard Roark, refuses to adhere to conventions, going so far as to blowing up one of his own creations. While not an immediate success, The Fountainhead eventually achieved strong sales, and at the end of the decade became a feature film, with Gary Cooper in the role of Roark.

Rand's ideas became even more explicit with the 1957 publication of Atlas Shrugged. A massive work of more than 1,000 pages, Atlas Shrugged portrays a future in which leading industrialists drop out of a collectivist society that exploits their talents, culminating with a notoriously lengthy speech by protagonist John Galt. The novel drew some harsh reviews, but became an immediate best seller.

Around 1950, Rand met with a college student named Nathan Blumenthal, who changed his name to Nathaniel Branden and became the author's designated heir. Along with his wife, Barbara, Braden formed a group that met at Rand's apartment to engage in intellectual discussions. The group, which included future Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, called itself the Collective, or the Class of '43 (the publication year of The Fountainhead).

Rand soon honed her philosophy of what she termed "Objectivism": a belief in a concrete reality, from which individuals can discern existing truths, and the ultimate moral value of the pursuit of self interest. The development of this system essentially ended her career as a novelist: In 1958, the Nathaniel Branden Institute formed to spread her message through lectures, courses and literature, and in 1962, the author and her top disciple launched The Objectivist Newsletter. Her books during this period, including For the New Intellectual (1961) and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal (1966), were primarily comprised of previously published essays and other works.

Following a public split with Braden, the author published The Romantic Manifesto (1969), a series of essays on the cultural importance of art, and repackaged her newsletter as The Ayn Rand Letter. She continued traveling to give lectures, though she was slowed by an operation for lung cancer. In 1979, she published a collection of articles in Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, which included an essay from protg Leonard Peikoff.

Rand was working on a television adaptation of Atlas Shrugged when she died of heart failure at her home in New York City on March 6, 1982.

Although she weathered criticism for her perceived literary shortcomings and philosophical arguments, Rand undeniably left her mark on the Western culture she embraced. In 1985, Peikoff founded the Ayn Rand Institute to continue her teachings. The following year, Braden's ex-wife, Barbara, published a tell-all memoir, The Passion of Ayn Rand, which later was made into a movie starring Helen Mirren.

Interest in Rand's works resurfaced alongside the rise of the Tea Party movement during President Barack Obama's administration, with leading political proponents like Rand Paul and Ted Cruz proclaiming their admiration for the author. In 2010, the Ayn Rand Institute announced that more than 500,000 copies of Atlas Shrugged had been sold the previous year.

In 2017, Tony-winning director Ivo van Hove reintroduced The Fountainhead to the American public with a production at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Having originated at Toneelgroep Amsterdam in the Netherlands, van Hove's version featured his performers speaking in Dutch, with their words projected onto a screen in English.

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Ayn Rand - Books, Quotes & Philosophy - Biography

Feb. 2Today marks the birthdate of Alisa Zinovyevna Rosenbaum, best known to the world as Ayn Rand.

A tenacious champion of capitalism and limited government, Rand provokes strong reactions from her supporters and detractors alike. Her legacy is polarizing to be sure, but there is no doubting her influence on the American right and the libertarian movement.

Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1905, witnessing the tremendous upheaval caused by war and communist revolution firsthand.

In 1926, she immigrated to the United States and pursued the classic American dream of becoming a screenwriter in Hollywood. Though she had limited success on the film and theatrical scene, she found her calling as a novelist.

In her early novels like "We The Living," "Anthem" and "The Fountainhead," she explored themes that would come to define her: the tyranny of the state against the individual, the menace of collectivistic philosophies and the will of individuals to triumph over oppression.

Her magnum opus "Atlas Shrugged" was published in 1957. The more than 1,000-page book tells the story of heroic, productive individuals and entrepreneurs suppressed by meddling bureaucrats.

It was through this novel that Rand extensively spelled out her core philosophy celebrating rational self-interest, reason and individualism.

It's an approach perhaps best summarized by a key line in the novel, "I swear by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."

"Atlas Shrugged" would go on to become an international success and a major influence on free market-minded conservatives and libertarians.

Until her death in 1982, Rand continued to write and appear on television programs valiantly defending individualism and capitalism, which she understood was essential to freeing individuals to put their creative energies to use.

"Capitalism was the only system in history where wealth was not acquired by looting, but by production, not by force, but by trade, the only system that stood for man's right to his own mind, to his work, to his life, to his happiness, to himself," she wrote in "Capitalism: The New Ideal."

In a time of big and growing government, we also remember Rand's warning that, "If a society is to be free, its government has to be controlled."

While Rand is certainly a polarizing figure, with collectivistic progressives who usually haven't read a single page of her work seemingly the most bothered by her, Rand's personal story and extensive intellectual contributions to the cause of liberty are worthy of respect and critical engagement.

A version of this editorial was published last year in these pages.

(c)2023 San Gabriel Valley Tribune, West Covina, Calif. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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EDITORIAL: Remembering the great Ayn Rand, a champion of capitalism and ...

This article is taken from the October 2022 issue of The Critic. To get the full magazine why not subscribe? Right now were offering five issues for just 10.

Cults have their comforts. Membership persuades their adherents that they are an elite, party to the secret workings of the world, unlike everyone else who exist in a benighted condition of original ignorance. Adherents are saved, non-adherents are damned.

One of the most curious of modern cults is surely that of Ayn Rand. Well before the advent of social media, cult members turned on heretics, renegades and unbelievers with the virulence of extremists, and one editor tells me that never in the 40-year history of his publication has anything aroused such fury as an article dispraising Rand. For members of her cult, she must be perfect, a kind of Mohammed or Lenin.

A cult needs its guru, and gurus comes in different shapes and sizes; but Ayn Rand is surely one of the least attractive of them. Intolerant, humourless, lacking in irony, incapable of self-doubt, arrogant, single-minded, hard and inflexible, it is difficult for those not under her spell to think of anything that accounts for the absolute loyalty that she inspired.

But just as some are inclined to believe that the lengths to which fanatics are prepared to go to further their cause reflects favourably upon the justice of that cause, so, perhaps, the very qualities of Rand that repel most people assure a tiny and at one time influential minority that she must be right. Why else would anyone have made herself so deeply unattractive?

She was highly intelligent, of course, but her intelligence was a narrow beam

She was highly intelligent, of course, but her intelligence was a narrow beam, a undirected laser sent into the void. She was a prime example of an ideologist, a person who looked at the world through the lens of a simple theory and makes evidence out of confirmation bias. Not for Rand is Matthew Arnolds world so various, so beautiful, so new, but a world already fully understood, needing only the application of her philosophical principle to be made perfect.

Alas, the ill-intentioned, the corrupt, the parasites, the inferiors of this world refused to immolate themselves on her altar, which explained its current gross imperfections. Remove the obstacles, by whatever force necessary, even violent revolution, and at last there would be progress to full humanity, even of the helots of existence.

Rands philosophy was one of the crudest ever to be enunciated seriously. She divided people under the present dispensation into the creative, productive and valuable on the one hand and the parasites, looters and worthless on the other, the latter of course being by far the more numerous. Full of resentment, they did everything to stymie the former, under the pretext or pretence of altruism. It was therefore necessary to destroy the illusion of altruism and replace it with the unadulterated and untrammelled egoism and pursuit of self-interest by the highly talented that would lead to progress for mankind.

Rand hated, feared or failed to notice the ambiguities of mans existence. She had no conception of the tragic dimension of life that imposes dilemmas without any perfect resolution. She had a Nietzschean worship of power and ruthlessness, turning what was an aperu into a whole world picture.

Sheer size and prepotency were to her virtues in themselves. Witness the supposed heroism of Roark, the architect in The Fountainhead whose only discernible quality of brilliance was that he outdid the Franco-Swiss fascist architect Le Corbusier in the matter of size, by many times. Alas for Palladio, alas for Christopher Wren, they were but primitives on the path to Roark, Lilliputians to Roarks Brobdingnagian. Bigger is better, biggest is best. It would be difficult to think of a viler aesthetic.

It is certainly true that apparent altruism can cover or even motivate a multitude of self-serving policies and brutalities: but that no more proves the impossibility of real altruism than does the existence of tinsel prove there is no such thing as silver.

It is instructive to compare Rands crudity with the subtlety of, say, Adam Smith. While he famously (and correctly) stated that we do not look to the benevolence of the butcher for our meat, this does not mean that the politeness, pleasantness or even kindness of the butcher is false. I well remember a scene in a fishmongers in which an old lady, wanting a piece of fish for her dinner, had not enough money in her purse to pay for it, but with an instinctive delicacy of feeling the fishmonger counted it out falsely and said that it was enough.

It is surely straining credulity to say that this was a manifestation of disguised self-interest, or anything but an act of genuine kindness and human solidarity, in accordance with what Smith says at the beginning of The Theory of Moral Sentiments:

How selfish soever man may be supposed, there areevidently some principles in his nature, which interest him inthe fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary tohim, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure ofseeing it.

Though I have spent a fair proportion of my life among worse-than-average people, what Adam Smith says here, his philosophical anthropology so to speak, accords with my experience far more than any denial of the possibility of widespread or genuine altruism, and this passage alone is both more realistic and worth more than all of Rand put together.

Of course, the articulation of this widespread (if not absolutely universal) sentiment with public policy is difficult and complex, precisely because desiderata are incommensurable and vary even within a single personage, let alone within a whole society. But to exclude considerations of benevolence altogether, to wish for a society directed by people completely devoid of feelings of altruism just because such feelings can be false or an instrument of abuse, is like refusing to prescribe a drug necessary to save life because it can have dangerous side-effects. Rands desire for consistency and rationality overwhelmed her common sense and rendered her both shallow and mad.

But how did this madness emerge and where did it come from?

No doubt a throw of the genetic dice had something to do with it. There is, after all, a quasi-neurological condition in which people fail to develop the capacity to connect socially with other people. As with most genetic conditions, the degree or severity of its expression probably varies according to environment. Where narcissism is more prevalent, for example, it is likely the expression of this condition will be both more frequent and more severe. But there is more to Rands militant and evangelical unfeelingness than this.

An explanation is offered in Professor Derek Offords short book, Ayn Rand and the Russian Intelligentsia. In intellectual style, she was always far more Russian than American. Rand was able to pass for someone very original in America only because of the unfamiliarity of Americans with nineteenth-century Russian thought, to which she was heir and continuator.

Offord, a distinguished historian of Russian intellectual life, makes a strong and to my mind unarguable case that Rand is comprehensible only by taking her Russian background strongly into account. This background went far deeper than mere horror of the Russian Revolution through which she lived in her formative years, and which deprived her of her relatively comfortable and privileged, though always somewhat precarious, situation as a prosperous, Russified Jew.

As a bookish, socially-isolated adolescent, she was immersed both in the Russian novel of ideas (the principal way Russian thinkers could discuss such ideas), and in the long quasi-philosophical or critical essays that appeared in the so-called thick journals. Thus, for her there was little distinction between philosophy and literature, and her long, not to say interminable, novels were vehicles for conveying her ideas, much as milk floats convey bottles of milk.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with novels of ideas, but Rand had neither the literary talent nor the subtle understanding of a Turgenev, with the result that her novels are like long political pamphlets in stilted dialogue, dramatised versions of, say, Lenins Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, complete with odious and always ill-intentioned opponents.

Rands vituperative style is characteristic

Rands vituperative style is characteristic of the way in which the Russian intelligentsia discussed political questions. There is her simplistic division of good and bad, with a great void in between. There is the element of messianism, according to which there is a solution to all the problems of human existence. The very questions she was obsessed by were very Russian: for example, the proper place of self-sacrifice for the sake of others. The predominant answer was that it should be all; Rands answer was that it should be nothing. For most Russian thinkers, the happy medium was nothing more than a morally and intellectually dirty compromise.

Rand also belonged to a utilitarian school of literary aesthetics that was very Russian. The purpose of literature was to advance a cause, in the way a sermon is supposed to advance virtue. The hero, generally an arrogant creep of the first order, is intended as a template on which people should either model themselves or submit to in recognition of their own inferiority.

Rand argues that selflessness is the height of immorality. Sometimes her arguments, for a self-proclaimed rationalist, are of a crudity that almost defy belief. In a television interview in 1979, she said before an audience of millions that the Nazis demanded and received self-sacrifice, which just went to show how evil self-sacrifice was.

The question remains as to why her books have sold so well. Professor Offord rightly says, If we look for reasons why Rands fiction has had such appeal to readers beyond the literary critical literary world, then it is surely on its didactic, exhortatory and ideological content that we should focus. While this is undoubtedly true, it is also not very reassuring, given what Rand exhorts us to.

Rands heroic types are swashbuckling self-righteous megalomaniacs who have no scruple in riding roughshod over others in pursuit of their aims, the end supposedly justifying the means and benefitting the rest of ovine humanity. Of course, means sometimes are justified by their ends, but it needs a subtle understanding to know when this is.

Precisely how we are to identify Rands heroic types who are excluded by creativity from the constraints of normal social existence, she does not say. Presumably they identify themselves, which rather obviously opens the doors to abuse, given the number of ruthless psychopaths that there are. We may summarise Rands logic as follows:

Highly creative people are psychopathic

Therefore, psychopathic people are highly creative

This version of the positive hero accords with the romantic idea, not entirely false, of the frontiersman of the American West, who was not only brave and heroic but free from the petty trammels of an increasingly administered and fine-tuned life. The frontier may no longer exist, but there is Wall Street, ever- bigger skyscrapers to be built, ever-larger fortunes to be made, if the hundreds of millions of resentful lesser beings did not prevent it via their corrupt, scheming and envious tribunes!

There is an element of truth in this, of course. Envy and resentment are present in the human heart and can exert a baleful influence; but so are benevolence and generosity which exert a beneficial one. One can render benevolence into resentment manqu by intellectual legerdemain, in which case the part becomes the whole and what is asserted becomes true by definition, but this is an empty exercise. It is a refusal to recognise the complexity of the world and of the human heart.

As Offord shows, Rand was one of the many terrible simplifiers of many in the Russian intellectual tradition who exerted, and exert still, a disastrous influence in their homeland and elsewhere because simplifiers always attract acolytes. The freedom Rand extolled was that of a small race of supermen, deeply unattractive as human beings, at best idiots savants; the kind of people whom only those who would choose a pneumatic drill as a companion would find companionable.

Rands doctrines are, unwittingly, an illustration of Shigalovs dictum in The Possessed about the slide from perfect freedom into perfect enslavement. If one had to place Rand on a political spectrum, it would not be with the friends of freedom, but with the fascists.

Continued here:

The curious cult of the friend of fascism | Anthony Daniels - The Critic

Cris Pannullo, the "Jeopardy!" champion from Ocean City, delivered his most impressive performance yet on an episode that aired Monday, firing past the $200,000 total-prize mark and securing his seventh consecutive win.

The reigning champion faced Eugene Hahm, an attorney from Oaklyn, California; and Allie Nudelman, a health care policy professional from Brooklyn, New York. Building a strong lead early and adding to it with strong bets and a relentless run on high-value questions later in the game, Pannullo racked up $44,600 at the end of the Double Jeopardy round.

Wow thats a big number heading into Final Jeopardy, host Ken Jennings said.

The $44,600 score would have been the largest of the season by itself before Pannullo added another $15,221 on top of that in Final Jeopardy. (He correctly answered that Gerber was the company to use the likeness of baby Ann Turner Cook in its famous ad campaign.) His final score on the day was $59,821.

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While good for the strongest win of the season, Pannullos performance on Mondays episode was typical of the dominant play that audiences nationwide have watched now for a collective week. Of his seven victories, six Pannullo had clinched before the Final Jeopardy round began.

The two challengers had little opportunity to make their mark amidst Pannullos onslaught of right answers. Hahm and Nudelman had only $1,600 and $3,800 heading into the Final Jeopardy round, respectively. They ended the game with respective scores of $1,186 and $3,851.

Its always hard to go up (against) a player whos really locked in on the buzzer, but Eugene and Allie acquitted themselves about as well as you could, Jennings said towards the end of the game.

Pannullo, described on the show as a customer success operations manager, used to play poker professionally. He said on Mondays episode that he also used to work for a sports-data provider to help professional soccer teams in the U.S. with their use of analytics. In earlier games, Jennings had compared Pannullo to Jeopardy James Holzhauer a super champion who won 32 consecutive regular-season matches and over $2.4 million in 2019. Holzhauer used to work as a professional sports gambler.

The game was close early, with Pannullos $4,400 score giving him a mere $400 lead over Nudelman heading into the first commercial break. The champion then ran the board, shutting the challengers out until he found the first-round Daily Double. Going all-in, Pannullo doubled his score to $12,400, correctly identifying Betty Ford as a former wife of a politician who cofounded an addiction-treatment center which she chaired until 2005. He had $14,200 by the end of the first round, with his lead over Nudelman exploding to $8,000.

With a strong first-place position, Pannullo had the security to place larger bets than he typically does in the Double Jeopardy rounds. He bet $5,000 of his $16,200 score on a Daily Double question asking for the pen name that Alisa Rosenbaum adopted after immigrating to the U.S. from Russia in the 1920s. He then bet another $5,000 of his $26,000 on a Daily Double question requiring him to know whose 1791 death in Vienna prompted centuries of speculation and dramatic conspiracy theories. Pannullo got both questions correct, answering Ayn Rand and Mozart, respectively, boosting his score to $31,000.

Later in the round, Pannullo went on a run where he correctly answered four consecutive questions each worth $2,000. (They were about the assassination of Leon Trotsky, the movie Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Hawaiian geese and barnacles.)

Pannullos titanic win put his seven-day cash winnings at $221, 901. It is an appropriate total for the champion, as it was revealed last episode that the $221 figure he often works into his wagers signifies his girlfriends birthday.

He is set to compete again on an episode to air Tuesday night and has clinched a spot in the 2023 Jeopardy Tournament of Champions.

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Ocean City 'Jeopardy!' champion wins almost $60,000 in 7th consecutive win, over $220,000 total - Press of Atlantic City

Nearly a quarter century into her acting career, Amanda Seyfried has received just one SAG Award nomination, which she shared with her fellow Les Misrables ensemble members. After notably missing out on a solo bid for Mank in 2021, her first taste of individual attention from the acting guild appears imminent thanks to her powerhouse performance as Elizabeth Holmes on the Hulu limited series The Dropout. Having just earned a Best Movie/Limited Actress Emmy for the series, she could now become the 12th woman to leverage such a win into a SAG Award victory.

According to Gold Derbys SAG Awards predictions, Seyfried is in a secure first place position in this seasons Best TV Movie/Limited Actress race. Included among her likeliest challengers are Lily James (Pam and Tommy, second place), Julia Garner (Inventing Anna, fifth) and The White Lotus: Sicily duo Jennifer Coolidge (third) and Aubrey Plaza (fourth). Coolidge was just nominated here last year for the original White Lotus season but lost to Kate Winslet (Mare of Easttown). Just like at the 2022 Emmys, Garner could be a double individual nominee if she also picks up a Best Drama Actress bid for Ozark.

SEE5 best Emmy acceptance speeches: Sheryl Lee Ralph, Lizzo, Michael Keaton [POLL]

Among lead actresses, the precedent for winning an Emmy and then a SAG Award for a single limited series or TV movie role was set in 1998 by Alfre Woodard (Miss Evers Boys). She has since been followed by Judy Davis (Life with Judy Garland, 2002), S. Epatha Merkerson (Lackawanna Blues, 2006), Helen Mirren (Elizabeth I, 2007), Laura Linney (John Adams, 2009), Claire Danes (Temple Grandin, 2011), Winslet (Mildred Pierce, 2012 and Mare of Easttown), Julianne Moore (Game Change, 2013), Sarah Paulson (American Crime Story, 2017), Nicole Kidman (Big Little Lies, 2018) and Michelle Williams (Fosse/Verdon, 2020).

Since lead and supporting players are not separated at the SAG Awards, Vanessa Redgrave (If These Walls Could Talk 2, 2001) and Stockard Channing (The Matthew Shepard Story, 2003) can be counted as honorary members of this group, since their Best TV Movie/Mini Actress SAG Award wins were preceded by featured Emmy victories. Including SAG Award-then-Emmy champs Halle Berry (Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, 2000), Meryl Streep (Angels in America, 2004) and Frances McDormand (Olive Kitteridge, 2015), a total of 16 actresses have been lauded by both organizations for non-continuing series performances.

If she is at least nominated, Seyfried will have a 4-to-1 chance of winning a SAG Award for The Dropout, given that Best Movie/Limited Actress Emmy wins have led to only three unsuccessful SAG Award bids. The half-lucky ladies in these cases were Glenn Close (Serving in Silence), Mirren (The Passion of Ayn Rand) and Jessica Lange (Grey Gardens). With one major industry award under her belt and ample precedent on her side, Seyfried should have no trouble scoring both her first solo SAG Award nomination and win in the same season.

Nominations for the 29th SAG Awards will be announced on Wednesday, January 11 with the ceremony following on Sunday, February 26. The awards are expected to be televised, although the organization has yet to partner with a new network after reaching the end of their decades-long deal with TNT and TBS.

PREDICTthe 2023 SAG Awards nominees through January 10

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Will Amanda Seyfried (The Dropout) ride her Emmy high all the way to a SAG Award win? - Gold Derby

The Encyclopdia Britannica gets its own book-length entry while Nancy Mitford is given a modern rewrite in our recommended October reads

Credit: Unknown via Wikimedia Commons. Nancy Mitford's novels dramatised the same social conventions that defined her own family life

For sheer reading pleasure, Ive always found Nancy Mitfords 1945 novel The Pursuit of Love hard to beat. The book, dramatised last year on BBC1, famously draws on Mitfords own eccentric (or just plain mad) aristocratic upbringing to tell the story of the Radlett sisters as narrated by their cousin Fanny.

Like the Mitfords, the Radlett girls grow up with a ferocious father whose habits include denouncing foreigners and hunting his children with hounds.

In their world, the biggest sin is to be boringwhich is why the novel is packed with unforgettable characters and great jokes. And yet, try as everybody does to ignore it, theres an undertow of melancholy too, as real life fails to match up to romantic girlhood hopes, particularly for the main character Linda.

Given that The Pursuit of Love is pretty much perfect, it may seemat the very leasta little foolhardy of India Knight to attempt a 21st-century update that retains most of Mitfords original plot, characters and names (although the narrator understandably prefers to call herself Fran).

Fortunately, the answer to the question whats the point? soon proves a straightforward one: so that we can be lavishly entertained from first page to last.

"Knight applies the same bracing scepticism to the pomposities and social fads of our time as Mitford did to hers"

Granted, the shift to the 21st century isnt always seamless. Changing Lindas second husband Christian from a po-faced 1930s Communist to a po-faced modern leftie works beautifully, leading to some of the funniest sections in a very funny book.

Less successful is transforming the Radletts patriarch from landowner to former rock star. And quite often the sense is less of genuinely present-day people than of Mitfords characters having done a spot of time-travel (My cousins and I were ridiculously old-fashioned, acknowledges Fran at one point).

But in the end, none of this really matters. One thing Knight gets absolutely rightand that makes Darling so enjoyableis how hilariously she applies the same bracing scepticism to the pomposities and social fads of our time as Mitford did to hers.

She also manages the same neat trick of suggesting that while laughter might well be a defence mechanism against darker feelings, it is, as defence mechanisms go, one of the best.

Darling, (Fig Tree, available for14.99)

Simon Garfield touches on how the rise of Wikipedia made the print encyclopedia obsolete

In 1968, Encyclopdia Britannica hosted a banquet in Londons Guildhall tocelebrate its 200th birthday, with Prime Minister Harold Wilson among the 500 guests, and the Queen sending a telegram of congratulations.

Not surprisingly, there was utter confidence that the 300th anniversary would be celebrated just as lavishly in 2068.

But that was only because, as Simon Garfield says in this suitably encyclopaedic bookwritten with all his usual wit and sharp eye for memorable factsthe meteorite in the sky was not yet visible.

In the event, within 45 years, the Britannica presses had rolled for the last time, as knowledge moved online. No longer would people want 30-volume books containing articles by the likes of Alfred Hitchcock (Motion Pictures), J B Priestley (English Literature) and J Edgar Hoover (FBI).

"The first Britannica entry for 'Woman' reads, in full, 'The female of man. See Homo'"

These days, in fact, you almost literally cant give them away, with full sets available for 1p, and many charity shops rejecting them as too bulky.

Garfield sorrowfully points out that not so long ago these abandoned encyclopaedias did more than any single thing to shape our understanding of the world.

Yet this is not a sentimental book. In tracing their history, he pays heartfelt tribute to the high-mindedness and commitment involved. But hes aware of their shortcomings toonot least that any mistakes couldnt be corrected for years, even decadesas well as having fun with their outdated attitudes (the first Britannica entry for Woman reads, in full, The female of man. See Homo).

To the possible dismay of encyclopaedia purists, hes also a big fan of Wikipediawhich is, after all, rather high-minded itself: resisting all pressure to accept advertising, sell on information or set up a paywall

"The very first home page, composed at 19.27 GMT on 15 January 2001, stated: This is the new WikiPedia! Its creator, Office.bomis.com, made the first edit 23 minutes later, adding a list of subjects WikiPedia should contain.

The following day at 19.00, Office.bomis.com created a mission statement: The idea here is to write a complete encyclopedia from scratch, without peer review process, etc. Some people think that this may be a hopeless endeavor, that the result will necessarily suck. We arent so sure. So, lets get to work!

By the end of its first year, Wikipedia had approximately 20,000 articles, including many that would not have been included in more traditional encyclopaedias.

Some of the earliest took for their subject matter the American philosopher William Alston, the singer Fiona Apple, the civil rights activist Rosa Parks, a list of the amendments in the US Constitution, a full list of the characters and locations in the novel Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, details about the number of people in the Algerian military, and a list of female tennis players.

There were also articles on the meaning of the word Machiavellian, the postage stamp, a track listing of the album Horsesby Patti Smith, a description of uric acid, and a brief biography of the Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin.

The randomness reflected the joy of the blank page: Were tiny and new, so Just Write anything! Twenty years later it has become very difficult to find anything that doesnt have an entry.

"The ninth edition advised its readers on how to become a vampire (get a cat to jump over your corpse)"

And then Wikipedia got bigger.

By the end of 2003, it had more than 100,000 articles in English, and in 2005 the figure exceeded 750,000. By October 2021 the figure was 6.39 million.

The total number of words has increased from 4.8 million at the beginning of 2002 to 3.98 billion by 20 October 2021. The number of people who had used Wikipedia up to that date came to 42,410,237.

Wikipedia has an obvious and magnificent advantage over the print stores it supplanted: incredible speed.

Britannica in particular had the habit of being published in the same month as calamitous events. (A new printing of the 14th edition arrived just three weeks before Germany invaded Poland; another in July 1945 narrowly managed to miss the dropping of the first atomic bomb.)

These days, when someone notable dies, the cause of death is on Wikipedia before the funeral.

Similarly, the prevalence of what may best be described as dubiousness in print might have a pernicious effect for decades, much to our amusement today.

How best to treat tuberculosis, for example? The most sovereign remedy, Britannicas first edition assured, is to get on horseback everyday. Childhood teething could be treated by the placing of leeches beneath the ears.

The ninth edition, published between 1875 and 1889, advised its readers on how to become a vampire (get a cat to jump over your corpse), while 30 years later the 11th found werewolves in leopard form among the people of Banana (Congo)."

All the Knowledge in the World: The Extraordinary History of the Encyclopaedia(Weidenfeld & Nicolson, available for18.99)

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OPINION:

Democrats are the party of death. Since Jan. 20, 2021, theyve been busy digging the graves of democracy, prosperity and freedom.

They are the party of abortion on demand, right up to the moment of birth. Theyve staked their prospects in the upcoming election on two issues an unlimited right to abortion and Republicans-are-fascists.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is putting up billboards touting California as the most abortion-friendly state in the nation. The governor is bursting with pride over the fact that what Nevada once was to quickie divorce, the Golden State is to quickie abortion.

California is also a mecca for the criminals and the deranged who live on the streets but no more so than Illinois or New York. The latest horrifying video from the Big Apple shows a woman being savagely beaten by a thug on parole, who has a history of attacking women going back to the murder of his grandmother when he was a teen. His latest victim may lose an eye, because of the blindness of the Democratic Party.

Democrats are now hiding from their pro-crime record, which includes cheering the 2020 race riots, calling for defunding the police and eliminating cash bail. This is how Democrats reimagined law enforcement. Criminals imagined easy prey and got it.

No party has done more to undermine the rule of law. Attorney General Merrick Garland thinks parents protesting at school board meetings should be investigated as domestic terrorists. A pro-life activist recently had his home raided by an FBI SWAT team, terrifying his wife and children. But when churches and pregnancy resource centers are vandalized and the homes of Supreme Court justices targeted, the AG yawns.

Open borders are an ongoing threat to public safety and national identity. On day one of his administration, President Biden stopped building the wall, ended the Remain in Mexico policy and turned the Border Patrol into the welcome wagon.

Criminals and drugs (including the fentanyl thats killing our children) flow in virtually unimpeded. By killing the border, the president has put us all at risk.

Also on day one, Democrats launched an offensive against domestic energy production. The Keystone pipeline was canceled, leases to drill were severely curtailed, and the strategic oil reserve was raided. California will ban the sale of gas-powered vehicles by 2035. It will ban reality by 2036.

The results are gas prices topping $5.00 a gallon and annual inflation over 8%. The rising cost of energy drives up the cost of everything. Collateral damage will include the most vulnerable among us. How many elderly will die this winter because theyre forced to choose between buying food or heating their homes?

But wait, thats not all, as the old Ronco commercials used to say.

Besides the impact of energy costs, Democrats are also killing the economy with inflationary spending, new taxes and the prospect of an additional 87,000 IRS agents.

Patriotism too is on the chopping block. Progressives who control the Democratic Party have made no secret of their loathing for this nation. Faith, family and freedom are the pillars of Americanism. Democrats seek to demolish all three.

Thanks to critical race theory and other woke instruction, white students are taught to hate themselves, and everyone learns to hate America because, supposedly, this country was founded on genocide, slavery and exploitation, and the Constitution is an anachronism written by white men in wigs and buckle shoes.

If the brainwashed of today are asked to defend their country tomorrow, it will be the end of America.

Children are also taught that they can change their gender at will. But dont tell the folks, because, as former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe said in a debate last year, parents shouldnt interfere in their childrens education. Youll never guess his party affiliation.

The president is trying to facilitate Irans acquisition of nuclear weapons, on the theory that a regime thats currently killing protesters in the streets will use nukes responsibly, just like Russia. By curbing domestic energy production, the Democrats make us more vulnerable to blackmail by rogue regimes.

In so many ways, Democrats are the party of death. As their symbol, they should trade the donkey for the Grim Reaper.

Nothing in their agenda is about building. Its all destruction with a green energy/racial equity veneer. Perhaps they want humanity to disappear to reduce carbon footprints.

But their success depends on our compliance. We have to voluntarily step into the graves theyve dug. Novelist Ayn Rand called this the sanction of the victim.

Don Feder is a columnist with The Washington Times.

Read the original here:

Democrats dig the graves of freedom and prosperity - Washington Times

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Fall has arrived. The leaves have begun to turn and pumpkin spice has seeped into our coffee, our challah and everything around us. The calendar has turned to October, which means that Major League Baseballs postseason is kicking into high gear just as were getting ready for Yom Kippur, which starts at sundown tonight.

Growing up Jewish in America, weve been mainlined the mythos of Sandy Koufax and his historic decision to skip the first game of the 1965 World Series because it coincided with this holiest day on the Jewish calendar. (Lesser known is that he came back the next night and lost.) But there is so much more to explore in the confluence of fastballs and, well, fasting.

There was another ace pitcher who skipped more Yom Kippur games: Mostly forgotten to history is the story of Ken Holtzman, who had more Yom Kippurs off the mound than Koufax. The two pitched against each other in the weeks leading up to the High Holidays in 1966; Holtzman won. Many years later, the now 76-year-old Holtzman told us in an interview, the two bumped into each other. He does not recall discussing their showdown, but said they did discuss our favorite kosher delis around the country. Read the story

When Hank Greenberg attended Rosh Hashanah services, his shul gave him a standing ovation. (Getty)

The surprising trajectory of Richard McKinney is the focus of Joshua Seftels documentary. (Kurt Schroder)

A U.S. Army vet planned on bombing a mosque in his hometown in Indiana. Instead, he converted to Islam: Joshua Seftel, a Jewish filmmaker, tells the story of that remarkable turnabout in his new documentary, Stranger at the Gate, already being talked about for an Oscar. This film is not about a religious conversion, Seftel said. Its about humanity and about whats possible when we come together. Read the story

First-person | My boyfriend died this year. It showed me how meaningful Jewish mourning rituals can be and how flawed: Rina Shamilov, one of our interns, got the call nobody expects. She wept, she journaled, she sat shiva with her boyfriends family. With every new batch of visitors came the same set of questions, she writes. I was already so exhausted, and I didnt know how much longer I could go on retelling a story that was so meaningful, but now brought me tremendous pain to recount. Read her essay

And one more: A popular Long Island Jewish day camp has been forced to close because of zoning violations. It had requested a religious exemption, but was denied because it was deemed, in essence, not Jewish enough.

Forwarding the News is now also available on our website. Click on the blue button below to share it on social media or send to friends.

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Some Instagram influencers have endorsed the use of IV drips to prep for the Yom Kippur fast. (Jackie Hajdenberg/JTA)

People who are looking for a trick to an easier Yom Kippur fast are turning to concierge IV therapy as a hydration hack. Totally NOT cheating, one company boasted on Instagram. (JTA)

Former President Donald Trump is suing CNN for $475 million for, among other things, comparing him to Hitler. According to the lawsuit, its historically defamation and the comparison has had an adverse impact on the plaintiffs reputation and political career. (PBS, Law & Crime)

A recent headline claiming that several student groups at U.C. Berkeleys law school are developing Jewish-free zones by banning speakers who support Israel sparked debate and confusion. Some are now saying that accusations of campus hostility to Israeli and Jewish speakers have been misleading. (Jewish Insider, J. The Jewish News of Northern California)

Student clubs at Yeshiva University will resume later this month after a judge approved an agreement between the university and an LGBTQ club pausing their dispute until all appeals are decided. (Commentator)

From 1997 to 2020, the U.S. banned companies from posting high-resolution satellite images of Israel. Since former President Donald Trump overturned the ban, Google has been updated with much better imagery. But recently, for reasons unknown, Google is once again blurring satellite images of Israel on its Maps and Earth services. (Haaretz)

Apps like Duolingo sparked a surge in young people learning to speak Yiddish during the pandemic. The YIVO Institute reported a 500% increase in enrollment during that time period and now offers 10 times as many courses as it did before March 2020. (Washington Post)

Quotable The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes everyday. A quote attributed to Donald Trump during his time as a real estate developer, complaining about a Black accountant, in the new book, The Divider by Peter Baker and Susan Glasser.

What else were reading On Yom Kippur, Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg explains why repentance is so important A Chicago bakery combines Mexican and Jewish cuisines Israeli gives birth after menopause with transplant of 20-year frozen ovary.

Was this newsletter forwarded to you or are you reading it on our website? Receive it in your inbox each morning by clicking the blue button below.

Alvin Toffler walks down a Manhattan street in 1974. (Getty)

On this day in history (1928): Alvin Toffler, a writer and futurist who coined the term information overload, was born to Polish Jewish immigrants. Toffler was a White House correspondent for a Pennsylvania newspaper and, later, a writer for Playboy, where he interviewed Vladimir Nabokov and Ayn Rand. His seminal 1970 book, Future Shock, sold millions of copies and was translated into dozens of languages. World leaders and corporate CEOs consulted with Toffler, known for his sage advice about the future and the effect of new technologies on society, until his death, at 87, in 2016.

In honor of the birthday of Buster Keaton, read his secret Jewish history.

In honor of National Taco Day, how about saying kaddish for the Choco Taco.

Haredi men and children perform tashlich at sunset Monday in the coastal Israeli city of Netanya. Tashlich is the ritual casting of sins into the water, generally performed between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. While some people use bread scraps to represent their sins, environmentalists have decried that practice.

Thanks to Rina Shamilov and Talya Zax for contributing to todays newsletter. You can reach the Forwarding team at [emailprotected].

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Baseball and Yom Kippur: Is there a Koufax curse? - Forward

Last Friday, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson participated in a quietly joyous investiture ceremony, the final formal hurdle before her first term on the Supreme Court begins this week. President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris attended, as did members of Jacksons family. (Her husband, Dr. Patrick Jackson, raised his sock game significantly for the occasion.)

But now, the work begins.

Jackson joins the court at a time when trust and public confidence in the institution are at all-time lows. A new Gallup poll shows a record-high of 58% of U.S. adults saying they disapprove of the job the Supreme Court is doing, with only 25% of Americans expressing confidence in the court, down from 36% in 2021. These are the worst numbers in 50 years of polling, driven largely by last terms decisions on guns, environmental policy, the separation of church and state, and the dismantling of abortion rights.

Looking ahead, gird whats girdable, say experts.

Its hard to imagine a Supreme Court term worse than last years when the Courts conservative wing overturnedRoe v. Wadeand a number of other settled precedentsjust because they could, writes Jessica Mason Pielko, a former litigator and co-host, along with Imani Gandi, of the excellent Boom! Lawyered podcast. Im here to tell you this term will be worse.

This week, the court began a nine-month term. On the docket are cases involving re-districting, college admissions, and adoptionspecifically, striking down part of a law that favors Native American parents in adoption cases involving Native American children.

At the heart of deliberations will be the concept ofrace-neutral interpretations of the law and a return to influence of Chief Justice John Roberts, who has long supported the idea of a colorblind Constitution.

Alabama will be the first to test the race-neutral waters of the new court.

In Merrill v. Milligan, the justices will consider whether the state has violated key elements of the Voting Rights Act by reconfiguring its Congressional districts to purposefully dilute Black representation. Alabamas Black population hovers at about 27% but comprises the majority in only one of seven congressional districts. NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund civil rights attorney Deuel Ross, who has been part of the case since its earliest days, is making his Supreme Court debut. Alabama is the birthplace of the Voting Rights Act and in some ways the birthplace of the civil rights movement, Ross told Bloomberg Law. And yet, in a lot of ways, it has been left behind because of lack of representation.

While it does not seem hard to predict how this majority-conservative bench will lean on these issues, there is hope that Jacksons presence, even in the minority, will fuel legal counterpunching efforts.

We have Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a brilliant jurist, powerful communicator, and the first Black woman to sit on the Supreme Court. Her addition to the bench, and the dissents she will author, will help shape a new progressive legal movement that will rebuild from this backlash, says Pielko.

Thats a lot of pressure on one Black woman, a position familiar to many in corporate life. And while social scientists have argued persuasively that colorblind approaches to leadership and policy-making do not workat least not for underrepresented populations seeking redress, equity, or just trying to get through their workdays unscathedignoring this evidence is also business as usual.

And thats a deadly problem.

The real-world consequences of retrograde thinking on race have left innovation, profits, and justice on the table in corporate life for decades. With this much at stake in the lives of ordinary people, its a precedent the Supreme Court should consider.

Ellen McGirt@ellmcgirtEllen.McGirt@fortune.com

This edition of raceAhead was edited by Ashley Sylla.

The Onion has filed an amicus brief to the Supreme Court and its the best thing youll read this year. A bold statement, I know. The brief is in support of a man named Anthony Novak, who was arrested in 2016 after he launched a Facebook page that parodied the Parma Ohio Police Departments official Facebook page, which included absurd details like racist job postings and offering amnesty to sex offenders after they completed a series of quizzes and puzzles. The 17-page brief asks SCOTUS to take up Novaks case and defends the right to parody. Every word is a gift. Rising from its humble beginnings as a print newspaper in 1756, The Onion now enjoys a daily readership of 4.3 trillion and has grown into the single most powerful and influential organization in human history, it begins. Americans can be put in jail for poking fun at the government? This was a surprise to Americas Finest News Source and an uncomfortable learning experience for its editorial team. It just gets better and better.SupremeCourt.gov

California governor signs a bill limiting the use of rap lyrics in criminal cases. The Decriminalizing Artistic Expression Act easily passed the state legislature in August and was signed into law on Friday. The signing of AB 2799 into California law is a huge victory for the artistic and creative community, and a big step in the right direction towards our federal legislation preventing the use of lyrics as the sole basis to prosecute cases, said Willie Prophet Stiggers, co-founder of Black Music Action Coalition, in a statement. There is a long and ugly history of criminalizing rap artists, in many cases deeming provocative lyrics as true threats, and not worthy of protection as political, creative, or social commentary. You can find coverage of noteworthy past cases here; the New York State Senate passed SB S7527, a similar measure, this spring. A truly eye-opening 2019 research report found 500 cases in which rap lyrics were used as evidence in state or federal trials.San Francisco Chronicle

Puerto Rico needs to be understood through a racial frame Frances Negrn-Muntaner, a Columbia University professor, scholar, and filmmaker, has written an essential piece that digs into the mainlands complicated relationship with its island colonycommonwealth oh what should we call Puerto Rico? Its complicated. The original impulse to acquire colonies in the region was predicated on ideas of white racial superiority. While the island was pillaged over time, Puerto Ricans living on the mainland experienced the same race-based issuessubstandard schools, lack of access to credit markets, etc.as other non-white citizens. Written in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, Negrn-Muntaner says that then President Trump was on message.[T]he presidents response to the hurricane is consistent with American colonial history, she writes.The Root

A Nobel Prize-winning racist wrote the conservative playbook? I havent read Democracy in Chains, a finalist for the National Book Award in Nonfiction by Duke University historian Nancy MacLean. But if this review is any indication, it would go a long way to explain the lingering grip of economic pseudo-science that informs the divisive political discussions were having today. It is the story of James McGill Buchanan, who co-authored a piece on public choice theory in 1962 that went on to win a Nobel Prize in 1986. His research and theorizingdescribed as a darker version of Ayn Rand, yikeswas largely abandoned and uncategorized after his death in 2013. While doing research, MacLean gained access to his papers and found among his work a trove of correspondence between Buchanan and conservative industrialist Charles Koch. Buchanan devoted his life to undoing the socialist impulses in society and created an institute to train operatives to dismantle Brown v. Board of Education and resegregate society. His aim was to provide intellectual cover for the rich and eliminate "the parasites" endeavoring to take what they had not earned. Suppressing voting, changing legislative processes so that a normal majority could no longer prevail, sowing public distrust of government institutions all these were tactics toward the goal. Institute for New Economic Thinking

The high cost of bullying bosses Heres a fun idea! If you havent met the CEO of your company but would like to, consider forwarding this insightful piece by Stanford professor Robert Sutton, prolific researcher of abuse and bullying in the workplace and author of The Asshole Survival Guide: How to Deal with People Who Treat You Like Dirt. The pressure of an always-on, global business means that empathy goes out the window in email, text, and the like. Meantime, some rising executives believe that treating people badly is a path to personal successa conclusion bolstered by journalists and a few academics, who celebrate demeaning and disrespectful leaders. Jerk behavior, along with change, starts at the top.McKinsey

McKinley Mac Phipps Jr, convicted of murder and sentenced to 30 years in prison based on no other evidence than his rap lyrics.

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The limits of Justice Ketanji Brown Jacksons power - Fortune

When showcasing the new series at a special event, Kate Phillips, BBC Director, Unscripted, said: From stand-out documentaries like the Real Mo Farah and Freddies Field Of Dreams, to the BBC Proms and the launch of Frozen Planet II, the team here are at the very top of their game, bringing audiences high impact, uniquely public service content at its very best.

"Weve got plenty more to look forward to in the months ahead and Im excited to unveil such an impressive array of diverse new content featuring big and upcoming talent, and bringing us new perspectives, incredible access and big moments for everyone.

The third edition of the Race Across The World will be the most extreme to date, as the five pairs of travellers will have to race across an entire continent.

Starting from the very edge of the Pacific in Vancouver, they will have to travel 16,000km through six time zones at ground level to the Atlantic coast in St John's Newfoundland.

Using just the cash equivalent of the airfare (no air travel or any modern conveniences, including phones, internet or credit cards, are allowed), the pairs must race through the very edges of civilisation to reach the finish line quickest and win the 20,000 cash prize.

Louis Theroux goes behind the scenes and in conversation with stars of British entertainment.

Each of the six episodes will see Theroux visit one of: Stormzy, Dame Judi Dench, Rita Ora, Bear Grylls, Yungblud and Katherine Ryan.

He'll explore their lives and careers in settings both personal and intimate, often in the company of their families.

First up is Stormzy, who Theroux joins on his biggest tour to date.

Forensics is back for a third series, once again following West Midlands Police as they use cutting edge science to bring criminals to justice.

As well as the homicide and CID teams featured previously, this series will explore new territories: from gun crime and ballistic testing to major fire investigations.

In a one-off special, Stacey Solomon and her family and friends will show us how to have a magical Christmas on a micro budget.

Said Solomon: Christmas is one of the most magical times of the year! There's no better feeling than giving someone the perfect gift, especially when it's one I've made at home with my little helpers. DIY gifts mean so much more and save a bit of money too, as do hand-crafted decorations which we love making for our tree."

As well as hand-making gifts and decorations, Solomon will transform the barn next to her Pickle Cottage home into a Christmas grotto, where she will throw a festive party for heroes in the local community.

The story of the hugely influential designer and entrepreneur, Virgil Abloh, whose aesthetic transformed the fashion industry.

Black and white, men and women, anti-fashion and high fashion: Abloh knew that nothing was binary and everything was open for exploration.

His first fashion label, Off-White, turned streetwear into high fashion by tearing down the walls of the white haute couture world. He later became Artistic Director of Louis Vuitton menswear, one of the first Black men to head up a couture house, while designing shoes for Nike, furniture for IKEA and cars for Mercedes-Benz.

But the documentary will start from the beginning, when he worked as Kanye West's Creative Director and witnessed his struggle to break into high fashion due to racism and snobbery. Abloh made it his mission to change all this - to show what difference Black people could make when listened to.

DJ Benji B, model and DJ Honey Dijon, rapper Headie One, singer songwriter Louis III, model and poet Kai-Isaiah Jamal and menswear designer Katie Eary are among the contributors who will pay homage to the designer, who died in November 2021 at the age of 41 following a private battle with cancer.

Historian Simon Schama looks back at the dramatic history that has played out in the decades of his lifetime.

Born in 1945 on the night of the bombing of Dresden, he was part of the generation determined to rebuild the world from the ashes of war. Across three films, he will reveal the vital role of artists, writers and musicians in fighting for the values they hoped would define the post-war world: democracy, equality and the dream of plenty.

Among others, George Orwell and Vaclav Havel to Nina Simone and David Hockney, Charlie Chaplin, Ayn Rand and Rachel Carson all issued warnings about assaults on democracy and the trade-off between capitalism and the fate of the planet.

The series will also hear from contemporary artists boldly engaging with current affairs, including Margaret Atwood, Ai Weiwei, Nadya Tolonnikova, Armando Iannucci and Edward Burtynsky.

In a three-part series, Lucy Worsley investigates the most successful novelist of all time, Agatha Christie, whose novels, plays and short stories defined the detective genre for over a century.

The real woman behind the literary persona was one of the most famous and most complex of the 20th century. And as she lived through two World Wars and several scientific and social revolutions, Worsley will look at Christie's life and life's work with her expert historian eyes to also tell a dynamic history of the 20th century.

A drama-documentary starring Seroca Davies as trailblazing poet, playwright and campaigner Una Marson.

Marson joined the BBC's Empire Service during World War II where she became the first broadcaster to give voice to Caribbean writers and intellectuals, thus broadening the cultural horizons of a global audience accustomed to hearing only English accents.

She also became the first Black writer to script a play for London's West End while championing women's and civil rights as an activist.

The one-off documentary will use her writing, correspondence and her BBC personnel file to give proper insight into her life and work.

A new modern adaptation of the much-loved ballet combining animation and live action dance.

Vito Mazzeo stars as cosmetic surgeon Dr. Coppelius, whose promise of superficial beauty poisons the town. Swan (Michaela DePrince) sets out to reveal the truth about the popular newcomer who puts her community and the life of her beloved Franz (Daniel Camargo) in danger.

Ted Brandsen has choreographed the piece, set to an original score composed by Maurizio Malagnini and performed by the BBC Concert Orchestra.

Biologist Liz Bonnin visits the mass dinosaur graveyard in the Badlands of Wyoming, USA, to see what new insights into the Jurassic age it can offer.

Across two parts, she joins the international team of leading palaeontologists for a crucial fortnight of digging. Storms are threatening to destroy the fragile bones, and it's not long before the site closes for winter.

Together they must race to unearth as many of the fossils as possible, from those of the giant herbivores like Diplodocus to the ferocious Allosaurus.

The site also holds a wealth of other evidence, including footprints, plants they ate, and signs of more carnivorous behaviour, allowing them to piece together the life stories of each dinosaur.

Professor Hannah Fry will explore the wonders of modern technology and tell some of the mind-boggling stories behind it for a new six part series.

From contactless payments to smart devices with the power of supercomputers: the future has arrived. But we've become so used to these gadgets and inventions that we've forgotten to notice just how genius they are.

For each episode of The Secret Genius Of Everything, Fry will take one modern wonder apart to find out how it works and its often unbelievable origin story, be it the food delivery apps built on technology developed for nuclear missiles or online payments revolutionised by the rise of X-rated websites.

See more here:

Race Across The World and Louis Theroux Interviews among new BBC Factual and Arts slate - Royal Television Society |