text:
. . . Till one shall rise
Of proud ambitious heart, who not content
With fair equality, fraternal state,
Will arrogate dominion undeserved
Over his brethren, and quite dispossess
Concord and law of nature from the earth,
Hunting (and men not beasts shall be his game)
With war and hostile snare such as refuse
Subjection to his empire tyrannous:
A mighty hunter thence he shall be styled
Before the Lord, as in despite of heaven,
Or from heaven claiming second sovereignty;
And from rebellion shall derive his name,
Though of rebellion others he accuse.
Milton, Paradise Lost, Bk XII, ll. 24- 37
When Charles Muscatine argued that the heart of the Knight's Tale was an assertion of aesthetic, cosmic and metaphysical order, and that Theseus represents the underlying `principle of order' to which Chaucer was committed, he offered what has proved to be an extremely influential interpretation. Theseus has been represented time and again as the figure who understands `man's proper life in submission to the perfect harmony of the universe', the authoritative bearer of Chaucer's own `philosophical insight'.1 Against what has become an orthodox position some alternative readings have been developed, most outstandingly by Elizabeth Salter and R. Neuse, the scholars on whose very different work this chapter builds. I wish to argue that the Knight's Tale involves a most illuminating scrutiny of the versions of order, styles of und the word `pride'. Chaucer, as Jill Mann's study of the General Prologue demonstrated, was sharply aware of conflicting grounds of evaluation in his own culture, with their linguistic manifestations, and here he makes use of one such conflict over `pride' -- traditional moral and religious teaching attacked pride, recommending humility and abasement of self within a social structure where pride and self-display was an intrinsic part of aristocratic status, power and daily life.3 This ambivalence introduces us to the problems Chaucer will raise around Theseus as does the ruler's own response to the widowed ladies whose lamentations welcome him home (ll. 896 ff,). Henry Webb rightly noted the `hints of selfish motives' and thoughts of `his own honour and popularity' and Chaucer makes the duke's self- centredness rather pronounced (`myn', `my', `myn honour' (ll. 905-8)) , while his motives in attacking Creon are inextricably bound up with his public military fame (Il. 960- 6) - hardly unusual traits in rulers.4
But it is the next image associated with Theseus which will prove particularly important as the poem unfolds its full range of significance. As he rides off, he displays his banner:
The rede statue of Mars, with spere and targe,
So shyneth in his white baner large,
That alle the feeldes glyteren up and doun;
And by his baner born is his penoun
Of gold ful riche in which ther was ybete
The Mynotaur, which that he slough in Crete.
Thus rit this duc, thus rit this conquerour,
And in his hoost of chivalrie the flour. . . .
(Knight, ll. 975- 82)
Chaucer thus joins Theseus and Mars emblematically at the poem's opening. The language in which he does this represents heraldic and emblematic modes, so appropriate to unexamined assertions of power in the way they preclude attention to the real human motives
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and consequences of the activity celebrated, offering a glamour which, as Elizabeth Salter observed, is a comfort and a protection.5 Whereas some readers have succumbed to this form, Chaucer did not. He chose to de-sublimate this emblem by drawing out its human implications in very different literary modes. These disclose the meaning of commitment to Mars and encourage reflection on the kind of order which legitimates and glorifies such commitment. The process can be seen in Chaucer's description of the conqueror's actions after his victory over Thebes, and, most decisively, in `the temple of myghty Mars the rede', the figure whom Theseus elected to follow and celebrated on his banner.
The `order' Theseus imposes on Thebes has no constructive elements at all, for he `rente adoun bothe wall and sparre and rafter', and whereas in his source the duke has the plain searched so that the wounded could be given medical help and all the dead properly buried, Chaucer eliminated this action from Theseus' conduct. Instead, he introduced an entirely new passage:
And dide with al the contree as hym lest.
To ransake in the taas of bodyes dede,
Hem for to strepe of harneys and of wede,
The pilours diden bisynesse and cure
After the bataille and disconfiture
(Knight, ll. 1004- 8)
The reality of militarism and the attitudes it sponsors among human beings is concisely evoked. People are reduced to dead bodies, piled up and ransacked for profit, in a passage where Chaucer may well have been putting his own direct experience of war and its motives to use. The impression I get from this addition to Boccaccio is that Chaucer's imagination had great sympathy with the growing criticism of war (the lust for conquest and its economic foundations) among late medieval writers, an impression the poem's evolution confirms.6 In the present episode the `pilours' tear two royal Thebans from the heap of bodies and take them to Theseus (ll. 1009 ff.). The `worthy' duke's reaction to the gravely wounded men is revealing, for he `ful soone' sent them to prison in Athens, refusing to accept any ransom for these two prisoners (ll. 1022- 4). Webb's assertion that the conqueror was denying his prisoners a customary right is correct, and it was one Chaucer himself had cause to thank when he recalled his own capture and
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ransom in 1359-60). We have no reason to believe that the poet would have disagreed with Honoré Bonet when he stated that a victor who refused reasonable ransom is a `tyrant', as Palamon judges Theseus to be (l. 1111).7 Webb also noted that Chaucer altered Boccaccio's description of the imprisonment imposed on the young men. Whereas his source has the duke keep them at ease in his palace, Chaucer has them confined in a `grete tour, that was so thikke and stroong', in fact `the chief dongeoun' where they even have `fettres' placed on their legs (ll. 1030-2, 1056-8, 1279). If Theseus represents `the principle of order' in this culture, then Chaucer is leading us to see that we should never celebrate abstractions such as `order' but inquire about the kind of order and its specific human content.8
The poet's own inquiry into the order of those who celebrate Mars is perhaps most concentrated as he takes us into the temple of Mars.9 The imagery introducing the passage conveys the utter sterility of the way of life chosen by whose who admire the god (ll. 1975-94), and this moves into one of the poem's central disclosures about the commitments of those whose order is founded in the pursuit of Mars, a pursuit shared by Theseus, Arcite and many in Chaucer's own world:
The smylere with the knyf under the cloke
The shepne brennynge with the blake smoke;
The tresoun of the mordrynge in the bedde;
The open werre, with woundes al bibledde;
Contek, with blody knyf and sharp menace. . . .
The colde deeth, with mouth gapyng upright. . . .
The careyne in the busk, with throte ycorve;
A thousand slayn, and nat of qualm ystorve;
The tiraunt with the pray by force yraft;
The toun destroyed, ther was no thyng laft,
(ll. 1999- 2003, 2008, 2013-6)
In Theseus' war, his destruction of Thebes, his pillagers rummaging through heaps of dead and dying people, or in Arcite and Palamon trying to resolve their frustrations by violence, we have already encountered the effects of devotion to `force'. As Chaucer now evoked some details of human misery and loss produced by militarism and violence, so he negated the aestheticization of legalized and organized violence, whether in
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courtly literature, aristocratic banners, emblems, pageants, or the ceremonies where the glorified soldier displays himself `in his mooste pride'. While the passage points towards the ghastly physical consequences of `force', it yokes together sorts of violence habitually separated. This stresses the connections between those valued or glorified in aristocratic culture and those officially condemned. Even the most obviously purposeless and meaningless horror is connected with the followers of Mars:
The hunte strangled with the wilde beres;
The sowe freten the children right in the cradel;
(ll. 2018-19)
We are made aware of the links between the predatory `tiraunt' and the `pykepurs' or `smylere with the knyf under the cloke'; between the towns and livelihood destroyed with thousands killed on glorified battlefields and the secret murders, the sow eating the child in the cradle. Chaucer's `insistent probing of misery' is a probing of abstractions such as `law' and `order' to reveal the continuities between official, legal violence and illegal, between the celebration of Mars and the most grisly particulars of human destructiveness. 10 The poet's imagination suggests that certain traditional distinctions concerning modes of violence are the product of the highly partial official ideology sponsored by militaristic conquerors and their followers, and his own poetry undermines them. Our interest in Theseus, the great conqueror, makes us appreciate the relevance of another image in the temple:
Saugh I Conquest sittynge in greet honour,
With the sharpe swerd over his heed. . . .
(Knight, ll.2028-9)
We should remember this when later Theseus presents himself, `Arrayed right as he were a god in trone' (l.2529).
The final passage in the temple alludes to Theseus' banner. There the `rede statue of Mars' shone in glory, and here we see it in a fuller perspective which is undoubtedly disturbing:
A wolfe ther stood biforn hym at his feet
With eyen rede, and of a man he eet. . . .
(Knight, ll.2047-8)
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The dispassionate manner of the description is part of the meaning. It captures the contempt of humanity central to those committed to the values of Mars and `his glorie' (l. 2050). Chaucer makes it clear that in a culture where Mars is valued, as he is by Theseus, there will not be much encouragement of creative human love, let alone a `faire cheyne of love' binding all elements and events (cf. ll. 2987-93). We must emphasize that this is not to say such cultures lack `order' or that Theseus is not the 'principle' of that order: only, that what matters is the nature of the order in question. And Chaucer's poetry has become rather specific about the one realized in the Knight's Tale.
It is typical of this order that the deity who provides the solution to the celestial conflicts is Saturn, Chaucer expanding the slightest hint in Boccaccio who has no wish to dwell on discord among the gods and nothing to say about how it was solved.11 The new material Chaucer introduced is an essential component in our understanding of his own assessment of Theseus' final speech as well as of the values held by those at the commanding heights of this universe (ll.2438-78). We must note the absolute impotence of Jupiter in the dispute, his anxious ineffectuality lacking in vision, providential foreknowledge or power (l. 2442). The `principle of order', to use Muscatine's phrase again, is Saturn, quite unmentioned by Boccaccio. It is Saturn's intervention which brings `order' out of strife and is thus vital in illuminating the specific order created and scrutinized in the poem. Chaucer shows that Saturn's knowledge is based on `olde experience', the `wysdom and usage' of the old pragmatist quite uncritical of the Martian world, celebrating violence and human wretchedness which he has `power' to manipulate into one version of order:
Myn is the drenchyng in the see so wan;
Myn is the prison in the derke cote;
Myn is the stranglyng and hangyng by the throte,
The murmure and the cherles rebellyng,
The groynynge, and the pryvee empoysonyng;
I do vengeance and pleyn correccioun,
Whil I dwelle in the signe of the leoun.
Myn is the ruyne of the hye halles,
The fallynge of the toures and of the walles
Upon the mynour or the carpenter. . . .
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The derke tresons, and the castes olde;
My lookyng is the fader of pestilence.
Now weep namoore. . . .
(Knight, ll.2456- 70)
This order is reflected in a poetic mode Chaucer used for the followers of Mars. The fragmentized details of violence are accumulated in a way which thoroughly undermines any claims about benign harmonies and unity favoured by all theodicies, whether traditional religious ones or their secularized development. The version of order is as alien to any creative love as to the higher forms of reason and reflexivity. Elizabeth Salter, commenting on the decisive positioning of this addition to Boccaccio, writes that it `sums up, in relentless detail, what we may have long suspected -- that the "remedie" for strife will not depend upon any weighing of just dispensation, but only upon the supreme craft and executive power of one god over another'.12 Saturn's repeated `weep namoore' after his recitation and the description of himself as `the fader of pestilence' drives home the absence of love and care towards humans in this world-order. Only participants with a comfortingly dishonest refusal to contemplate the revealed powers and practices, or those with ulterior and pragmatic motives, could talk about the fair chain of love shining through the mere appearances of disharmony, evil and suffering in this order. Chaucer follows Saturn's crucial intervention with Theseus arraying himself publicly `as he were a god in trone' (l. 2529), thus inviting us to acknowledge continuities between this earthly ruler and Saturn, between this godly conqueror and the temple of Mars with `Conquest sittynge in greet honour'.
Even an apparently un-Martian act of Theseus from his godly throne turns out to be thoroughly contradictory and finally ambivalent. He suddenly decides to modify `his firste purpos' and that the tournament should be limited to the lance, sword and mace (ll. 2537- 60). This modification cannot be taken as a rejection of his former life since he determines to continue with the tournament he has planned and the decision to settle the question of whom Emily should marry by sheer violence - rather than by consulting the oracles, drawing lots, detailed inquiry into the knights, or by letting Emily do what she wants and reject them both, preventing the violence altogether. Furthermore, he rules that each knight
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should ride a course `with a sharpe ygrounde spere', then fight on foot, exhorting them, `gooth forth, and ley on faste!/ With long swerd and with maces fightethe youre fille' (ll. 2549, 2558-9). This they do and Chaucer describes the fighting at length and in detail: the helmets are hacked to pieces, blood flows in red streams, bones are smashed by the maces Theseus allowed, men fight like `crueel' tigers, lions mad with hunger for blood (ll. 2601- 35). It would be quite implausible to claim that Chaucer's imagination and moral intelligence were unable to grasp the double-think involved in Theseus' organization of such violence (when originally the matter had been a conflict between two young knights for a woman who wanted neither of them), and his public protestation that he did not wish to shed upper-class blood (l. 2539). The fact that the moral status of tournaments was at least a controversial topic in the period offers further support for the conviction that Chaucer wished to exhibit the contradiction between gestures of compassion and militaristic commitments in knights and rulers like Theseus showing how these very gestures are embedded in a form of life which undermines and inverts them, a contradiction plainly visible in our world.13
Before going on to analyse the poem's conclusion we need to look briefly at the ruler's attitudes to love, for these could possibly reveal alternative orientations to those observed so far, more fitting prefaces to his final talk about `the faire chene of love'.14 It is not chance that, alongside his Martian banner, Chaucer gave the duke a pennon recalling his heroic adventure in Crete (ll. 978-80). From the poet's treatment of Theseus when he separates Palamon and Arcite it seems we should recall the past he himself alludes to. After stating that he need not torture the knights to extract information but can kill them directly, `by myghty Mars the rede' of course (ll. 1746- 7), he is placated by the weeping ladies trying to kiss his feet (an incident Chaucer invented for his own Theseus not one found in Boccaccio) and his gradual exercise of a `resoun' which has often been admired by modern scholars.15 Yet it is a version of reason and love that merits closer scrutiny than it usually receives. First of all it sanctions the kind of anarchic egotism in love which Arcite had expressed earlier in his argument with Palamon over who should have Emily: `in his resoun . . . he thoghte wel that every man/ Wol helpe hymself in love' (ll. 1766-8). Arcite had seen `love' as an irresistible and impersonal urge which took precedence over
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all, appealing to `olde clerkes' to support the proverb `who shal yeve a lovere any lawe? ` (ll. 1163-86). But he uses this old saying in exactly the way Pandarus does, not in the way the `olde clerkes' like Boethius had done. Whereas the latter had expounded the supersession of what is taken as lawless love in a neoplatonic framework exhorting the ascent of the soul to some heavenly fatherland, Arcite does nothing of the sort any more than does Palamon or their new lord Theseus.16 Far from encouraging the young knights to reflect on the different forms of love, and to imagine different forms of life to their present one, his mockery of their `hoote fare' never posits alternatives to their outlook and concludes with some impenitent reminiscing on his own past which he sees mirrored in the young knights (ll. 1785- 818). He recalls that he too was once `a servant' in love, like them, and `syn I knowe of loves peyne/ . . . As he that hath ben caught ofte in his laas', he will forgive them (ll. 1813-18). This allusion links with his pennon celebrating the adventure in Crete, and judging from Chaucer's own accounts of it he would have been most sharply aware of the self-indulgent and comically uncritical attitude of Theseus For in both theHouse of Fame and the Legend of Good Women (LGW) Chaucer presents Theseus as a man who exhibits `the grete untrouthe of love' (LGW, l. 1890), making the expedition to Crete a story of the duke's callous egotism, faithless manipulation and abandonment of a woman (his wife) on an island inhabited only by wild beasts.17 The sympathy Theseus displays to the young knights is thus understandable -- as Arcite said, `at the kynges court, my Brother,/ Ech man for hymself' (ll. 1181-2). Similarly he delights the young men by deciding to escalate the violence and treat Emily purely as an object deserved by the strongest in the sports of Mars.18 Here it is clear that his versions of `resoun' and 'love' lack any concern with moral or metaphysical issues. This lack is part of the order he represents and Chaucer's exposure of it is an important contribution in establishing the contexts in which we are to understand the final moments of the poem and the duke's closing speech.
The tournament ordained by Theseus culminates in the grisly `myracle' performed by the poem's gods, an eloquent image of the divine and earthly order informing this world. Saturn organizes `a furie infernal' to inflict a fatal injury on Arcite in an episode central to the total meaning of the poem (ll. 2684 ff.). Anyone who
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compares Chaucer's source will be struck by his introduction of `clinical detail' and a sharply particularized focus on the body, quite alien to the Italian text (ll. 2743- 56).19 As in the temple of Mars, or Saturn's self-revelation, Chaucer uses art against the traditional aestheticization of violence, challenging literary traditions which celebrate aggression and militarism (a task Milton still found relevant in the seventeenth century -- Paradise Lost, Bk IX, ll. 5- 47). The poet attends to Arcite's painfully swelling body, the clotted blood, the collapse of essential muscles, along with the medical attempts to counteract the `venym and corrupcioun' from blood-letting and vomiting to `downward laxatif'. In doing so, he makes us concentrate on experience readily dissolved into comforting generalities about the benevolent order of the whole; his text resists the absorption of individual identity and the particulars of misery into those grandly abstract patterns of consolation favoured by many Christian versions of theodicy as well as in certain of their secular successors.20 This resistance will be remembered when we find the tournament's organizer asserting his own brand of theodicy at the poem's close, for Chaucer has made the idea and function of theodicy a topic for reflection.21
Arcite's response is far less elaborate and ritualized than in Boccaccio's poem. He expresses his misery and the failure of his projects without any concern for his past military and knightly values, and without any comforting thoughts about an after life in Elysium:22
What is this world? what asketh men to have?
Now with his love, now in his colde grave
Allone, withouen any compaignye.
Fare wel, my sweete foo, myn Emelye!
And softe taak me in youre armes tweye
(Knight's Tale, ll. 2777-81)
This is a most admirably honest response to his discovery that the whole framework provided for his life by his aristocratic culture and its order, guided by Theseus is groundless. The dying knight acknowledges that the patterns of chivalry and the culture's deities have failed to offer any account of human existence and its possibilities which even begin to seem adequate. Worse still, we realize that the knight's pursuits, encouraged and later reaffirmed
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by Theseus have actually diverted him from grappling with the key questions he now asks.
It is worth remembering that earlier Chaucer had in fact shown both Arcite and Palamon attempting to reflect on their adverse experience and what it might convey about the grounds of their world. Arcite, for instance, had meditated on the `purveiaunce of God', the ignorance of the human will, including his own, and like many thinkers in Chaucer's own century (if not like Boethius and neoplatonic cum stoic metaphysicians) had stressed the contingency of the created world (ll. 1251-74).23 Similarly, despite his confusions and rage, Palamon had shown some desire for philosophical reflection which his culture and the plans of the duke had not nurtured. His earlier complaint in prison had made theodicy a topic for scrutiny;
O crueel goddes that governe
This world with byndyng of youre word eterne, . . .
What is mankynde moore unto you holde
Than is the sheep that rouketh in the folde?
For slayn is man right as another beest, . . .
What governance is in this prescience,
That gilteless tormenteth innocence?
(Knight's Tale, ll. 1303-4, 1307-9, 1313-14)
Chaucer does not give Palamon the responses to these probings which Boethius received from his philosophy, but this is certainly not to encourage readers' unexamined assumption that Boethius' philosophy gave satisfactory answers to all the controversial issues raised in the Consolation of Philosophy. As Elizabeth Salter showed, the narrative actually validates Palamon's ideas about the `crueel goddes' and their order. Nevertheless, he does modestly confess his perplexity with theological and metaphysical problems that troubled Langland, Chaucer and many others in the fourteenth century, and suspends judgment: `The answere of this lete I to dyvynys' (l. 1323). Metaphysicians, divines of any kind or creed, seem conspicuously absent in Theseus' culture and we hear no more of their existence.24
Instead, the young knights become re-integrated in the active aristocratic and courtly life guided by Theseus, that very earthly god (l. 2529). Not surprisingly they stop all philosophical reflection and settle for the unexamined worship of the culture's gods. It is
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only at his death that Arcite re-opens the major questions -- `What is this world? what asketh man to have?' As I pointed out, he then rejects the framework given him by his culture, but he goes further than this to ignore the problems about the gods and their order which had puzzled him and Palamon. Quite unlike Boccaccio's knight, Arcite now feels no need for metaphysical construction or the comforts of theodicy. His attention is on our world and human relationships. He affirms incarnate human love and friendship even as he fully experiences and acknowledges the miserable precariousness of individual life. Against the `colde grave' he sets 'love', a thoroughly embodied one, asking Emily, `softe taak me in youre armes tweye'.25 From this moving and self-consciously fragile affirmation, the dying man makes a request to Emily which is astonishingly magnanimous. Having confessed his `strif and rancour' with Palamon, he praises his kinsman and begs her, `if that evere ye shul ben a wyf,/ Forget nat Palamon, the gentil man' (ll. 2783-98). The selfless generosity transcends the values we have seen him and others pursuing. It is an impressive manifestation of human love, a glimmer of the human potential distorted and perverted by the culture over which Theseus presides, one where the appropriate metaphysical beings are the vicious deities ordered by Saturn. This glimmer is one of the lights Chaucer asks us to use in furthering our scrutiny of Theseus and his order.
When Arcite dies, Chaucer makes one of his most famous changes to the Teseidu. The opening three stanzas of Boccaccio's eleventh book describe the ascent of Arcita's soul, his vision of cosmic order and the delightful music of the spheres, together with his new contempt for all human beings. The very idea of such a vision in the universe of Theseus and Saturn is bizarre, and Chaucer decided to delete it and substitute the following lines:
His spirit chaunged hous and wente ther,
As I cam nevere, I kan nat tellen wher.
Therfore I stynte, I nam no divinistre;
Of soules fynde I nat in this registre,
Ne me ne list thilke opinions to telle
Of hem, though that they writen wher they dwelle.
Arcite is coold, ther Mars his soule gye!
(Knight's Tale, ll. 2809-15)
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This constitutes a refusal to offer any consoling theodicy or comforting metaphysical sentiments which would have lacked foundation within the poem. Because of its integrity to the poem's movements we should respect this judgment and ensure we do not impose religious consolations which the text has pushed aside.26 Chaucer completes the passage by referring us back to the emphasis of his own work, commending the knight's soul to Mars, rather than the Mercury of theTeseida. He plainly has no wish for us to evade the centrality of Mars and his order in the Knight's Tale.
In this he is unlike Theseus and the retired ruler, Egeus. Whereas in death Arcite had uttered questions the poem takes seriously, and revealed human potentials all too rare in the universe he inhabited, the old man now indulges in a series of generalizations designed to remove any discomfort spectators may feel at what has happened (ll.2837-52). He observes that men are mortal:
`Right as ther dyed nevere man,' quod he,
`That he ne lyvede in erthe in some degree,
Right so there lyvede never man, `he seyde,
`In al this world, that some tyme he ne deyde.
(Knight's Tale, ll.2843-6)
To utter such platitudes so portentously, especially in the present context, exemplifies marked intellectual and emotional debility. Everything in the poem invites us to reflect critically on a wide range of substantial issues (including Theseus's version of order, and problems concerning theodicies) and to test out generalizations against particulars. The poet is the last person to have missed how Egeus evades the topics and the experiences realized for imaginative exploration in the tale. All distinctions about the different forms of life and death are dissolved into the old man's commonplace abstractions. Nor are the next lines more impressive, for all their plangent solemnity:
This world nys but a thurghfare ful of wo,
And we been pilgrymes, passynge to and fro
Deeth is an ende of every worldly soore.
(Knight's Tale, ll. 2847-9)
In the claim that our world is nothing but a thoroughfare full of woe for everyone passing through it, Chaucer nicely displays a
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conventional piece of pseudo-religious cant. For Egeus is a privileged, comfortably-placed old man, with a long life behind him as a ruler, and he inhabits a court in which we see the traditional courtly enjoyments of hunting, feasting, singing, lovetalk, jousting, dancing and `blisful', `rich' and `healthy' marriage, not to speak of the pursuit of fame and profits through war. The speaker evaporates the vital and massive differences between lives such as those led by Theseus and those subjected to the miseries the poem has also represented.27 His statement is also, ironically, thoroughly imprecise in the religious dimension at which it gestures: pilgrims passing `to and fro' actually conveys nothing about the kind of pilgrimage (something readers of the Canterbury Tales and Piers Plowman will be especially aware of), nor the crucial issue of its direction and final cause. Nothing in Chaucer's poem encourages us to settle for such language and the complacent superficiality it bears. Even the final line of the old man's oration is an unnecessarily inadequate response to the contexts, `Deeth is an ende of every worldly soore'. Showing us Arcite calling for Emily, generous towards Palamon, and thinking about the marriage of his kinsman, duly to take place in courtly festivities, the poet makes it obvious that Egeus conveniently forgets how death is as much the end of every worldly joy as of worldly `soore'. It is also clear that the line begs all the metaphysical problems raised by other figures, the poem's deities and the death of Arcite. Chaucer wryly observes that Egeus said, `muchel moore/ To this effect', and leaves us grateful that he chose not to report any more of this `wise' discourse (ll. 2850-2). In the face of the issues the poem has raised, the experiences it has mediated, only the least reflective of people would be consoled by such trite and imprecise comments. That Theseus is consoled by his father's words is significant, but can hardly be a surprise at this stage of the poem.
The final movement in the Knight's Tale includes the long speech Theseus makes in parliament concerning order, love, wisdom and the perfect joy he intends to create by marrying Emily to Palamon (ll. 2967-3093). This speech has been much admired as a piece of profound Boethian wisdom which Chaucer himself presented uncritically to clarify the `principle of order' informing poem, society and cosmos.28 It is not impossible that the Theseus we have followed could have undergone a philosophic and religious conversion at the conclusion of the narrative, but if we pay close
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attention to both the context and the particulars of his speech, I believe we will have to concede that no such event occurred. The first point to make about the speech is that it takes place in parliament as a move in a pragmatic political plan. R. Neuse depicted the situation well when he wrote of Theseus' organization that `his watchword is: politics as usual. Hence his philosophical reflections are enlisted rhetorically in the service of his marriage plans for Palamon and Emily.'29The cause of parliament is, `To have with certein countrees alliaunce,/ And have fully of Thebans obeisaunce' and it is explicitly in the service of this political, dominating and self-centred order that Theseus sent for Palamon and Emily (ll. 2970-80). This is Chaucer's special emphasis for it has no basis in his source and demanded preparatory changes earlier in the narrative -- in Boccaccio the duke promised the dying Arcita to let Palemone have Emilia, and there is no political or imperialistic motivation whatsoever (Teseida, X, ll. 16-35; XII, 3-19). Chaucer's Theseus, however, is now in one of those public situations he dominates with such conviction (ll. 298l-6; compare ll. 2528-32).
Like other rulers through the ages, Theseus sets about presenting his order in a solemn setting and with a language which exalts, sanctifies and seemingly depersonalizes his thoroughly material and partial ambitions. He now eschews those indulgent reminiscences about his service of what he called `love', and with a `sad visage' and a carefully weighted sigh he begins to deliver his `wille'. Chaucer selected the word 'wille' (l. 2986) carefully for, instead of suggesting that the ensuing utterance will be a philosophic meditation or dialogue, it carries the sense of a predetermined decision, the expression of a ruler's personal command. The setting is part of a brilliant dramatization of the possible connections between political rule and metaphysical ideas in orders such as that of Theseus.
The first half of the duke's address involves a patchwork of abstractions from different parts of the Consolation of Philosophy.30 He starts with the assertion that his world is bound together by `the faire cheyne of love' in an order which unambiguously and unproblematically demonstrates the existence of a stable and eternal `Firste Moevere' (ll. 2987 ff.). The 'experience' he asserts, is enough to prove such assertions:
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Thanne may men by this ordre wel discerne
That thilke Moevere stable is and eterne.
(Knight's Tale, ll. 3003-4)
Rather than trying to maintain the existence of a real but hidden structure to the phenomenal world, one which may be grasped by philosophic and religious reflection, he claims that the metaphysical order he gestures towards can be proved by immediate and unstructured experience (ll. 3000-4). There is certainly no reason to attribute such a naive view to Chaucer and, as Elizabeth Salter has noted, the poem itself has foregrounded the empirical difficulties that would have to be met in constructing any metaphysical claims about a benevolently ordered world:31
It gradually emerges that the speech will be in the nature of a substitution, a statement which will attempt to transcend the difficulties, rather than analyse and solve them. . . . Why speak of the exercise of divine love in the design of this drama, when the narrative has so openly exposed no more than the exercise of divine power and resourcefulness?
Before answering this question through analysis of the function such claims serve, we need to be clear that the `difficulties' Elizabeth Salter points out are by no means the only ones undermining the duke's new-found role as thinker.
When we look at the `experience' the duke now feels is proof of the presence of divine love and its benevolent ordering of our world, the result is to strengthen our sense that he is not given to examining such matters with any scrupulousness. Theseus offers the inevitable death of all generated things `in this wretched world' as the experiential proof of a stable and eternal first mover who binds all in a chain of love (ll. 2994-3004). He finds this argument so impressive that he later spends more lines stressing the same commonplaces, still assuming that this picture is unambiguous evidence of the first mover's `wise purveiaunce' (ll. 3011-40). One hardly needs to be familiar with fourteenth-century criticism of traditional metaphysical proofs of God's existence to notice the incoherence of this particular version of the argument from design, vulnerable enough in any form and place let alone in the contexts established by the Knight's Tale.32 From a `wretched world' in which all is subject to decay and death the last thing one can simply
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read off is the existence of a loving, omnipotent and eternal first mover. A more plausible speculation about the design and designing agency might go along lines such as the following: the order revealed by `experience' mediated through the text, suggests a world made by a crippled or apprentice deity whose work has always been the scorn of more competent ones; or, perhaps, it was made by conflicting and competing deities of limited but often malevolent powers, deities such as those in the heavenly dispute (ll. 2438- 78); or, joining some manichean and gnostic traditions, the world we experience was the product of a fallen and evil principle; or, if there was a superior deity, who was not malevolent, then he was quite unconcerned with this `wretched' order that had evolved among lesser gods and humans. Yet, although Theseus has no equivalent to the Christian doctrine of the Fall, to square the existence of an omnipotent and loving God with the evils of `this wretched world', he does not even consider such possible lines of speculation. Instead he asserts an argument from design which is not only inept in itself but made obviously so by the contexts in which Chaucer has placed it.
The speech reveals further inadequacies in areas important to the poem. The treatment of love is one of these. Theseus assumes that an act which consists solely of binding down natural elements in fixed places and establishing a maximum to the length of life, deserves to be called `love' (ll. 2987-93). This is a reductive and thoroughly negative handling of the notion which, in Neuse's words, `assumes the scientific neutrality of gravitational force'.33 This is not the product of chance, for in reducing `love' to an impersonal controlling force exercised over subordinate elements, Theseus displays a most appropriate image of the way he regards both love and order in all spheres of existence. Its reductive dehumanization is a travesty of the poem in the Consolation of Philosophy used in the passage, and Chaucer shows how the ruler's metaphysics illustrates far more about himself and his own version of order than about the hidden structures of the world metaphysics had traditionally sought to disclose.34 As a ruler who likes to pose as `a god in trone', Theseus doubtless has an especially high valuation of fiied and certain boundaries in the social world he rules (unless it is in his interest to change them), and he projects this valuation into his impoverished picture of love and order. Its negativity reflects the idealization of sheer power over others in
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some vaguely apprehended design where the act of control is spiritualized with the name `love'. It may also be relevant to wonder whether the perverse but revealing version of love encountered here may not also be partly due to Theseus' own thoroughly ungenerous experience of `love' in the past he alluded to earlier in the poem. This would be quite in keeping with Chaucer's sharp awareness of how personal prejudices and stances are often projected into a metaphysical plane and reified as objective and autonomous entities.
The grounds of his outlook emerge plainly as his parliamentary address moves to its practical end:
Thanne is it wysdom, as it thynketh me,
To maken vertu of necessitee,
And take it wee1 that we may nat eschue,
And namely that to us alle is due.
And whoso grucceth ought, he dooth folye,
And rebel is to hym that al may gye.
(Knight's Tale, ll. 3041-6)
Here R. Neuse commented that the speech has not led `to a spiritual vision, but merely to the tyrant's plea, "To maken vertu of necessitee" '.35 This is a sound observation, and I think we should also draw particular attention to the allusion Theseus makes to rebellion against the first mover. The duke simply assumes that the existing social order and its practices, under his governance, are fully sanctioned by a transcendent God who seems to be envisaged as other than the gods the poem has exhibited. Any protest about anything is branded as folly and any attempt to challenge this order presented as rebellion, not just against Theseus but against the supreme deity.36 Although much of the misery the poet has displayed is based in specific human practices and choices encouraged by the culture over which Theseus presides, the duke never thinks of differentiating between `that we may nat eschue' and what we could eschew with a change in outlook and practice. In his lack of reflexivity about his own discourse and order he never wonders whether a supreme deity might not share all his own values, and might not admire the forms of love and worship of Mars he and his followers relish. These are traits characteristic of rulers who wish to sacralize their own government, imagining themselves as gods on thrones (l. 2529) and their order as beyond
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discussion or criticism. The sacralization is unequivocally thisworldly and it is part of the ruler's contempt for genuine metaphysical inquiry and reflexivity. He will use any portion of any system of ideas which seem to bolster up his own exercise of power, an eclecticism hardly unknown in our own day.
This enables him to move easily to a set of values which have much to do with aristocratic culture but little to do with the Boethian language he has just been applying:
And certeinly a man hath moost honour
To dyen in his excellence and flour,
When he is siker of his goode name;
Thanne hath he doon his freend, ne hym no shame.
And gladder oghte his freend been of his deeth,
Whan with honour up yolden is his breeth, . . .
Thanne is it best, as for a worthy fame,
To dyen whan that he is best of name.
(Knight's Tale, ll. 3047-52; ll. 3055-6)
The criteria here are the antithesis of those cultivated by neoplatonizing metaphysicians such as the author of the Consolation of Philosophy,37 and although it may be unprincipled opportunism it does exhibit the real values he lives by and represents significant ideology in the culture of the court. The key terms are `worthy fame', `good name' and `honour' all taken in the senses determined by very earthly aristocratic groups. He applies them to Arcite and in their light unequivocally calls him good -- `good Arcite, of chivalric the flour' (l. 3059), recognizing him as a fellow-worshipper of Mars. Nothing could be further from the duke's imagination than that there may be other forms of worth, honour and human `excellence' than these. He has never begun to think seriously about the questions raised by Arcite, and he transforms the knight's miserable death into a glorious fulfilment of the best possibilities of human existence, even asserting that his friends should celebrate the `duetee and honour' of such an ending. Theseus' criteria of worth, with his total lack of reflexivity, were not Chaucer's although they do represent major tendencies in western civilization.
Theseus moves towards the festivities of the state-marriage he has planned and with a comically opportunistic eclecticism he brings together aristocratic `chivalric', a neoplatonic cliché about
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our life being nothing but a `foule prisoun', more emphasis on Arcite's welfare' in death, courtly merriment and talk about the `parfait joye lastynge evermo' which will now be produced by the marriage he has decreed (ll. 3057-72). Those who have followed the poet's depiction of Arcite's painful and questioning death without any other-worldly consolation, or even the sense of a meaningful pattern to his life and projects, will recognize the duke's talk about his `welfare' (and about Jupiter's benevolent `grace' in this case) as nonsense. But Chaucer shows just what kind of significant nonsense it is. He places Theseus' statement in contexts which bring out its dismissal of the particulars of suffering and perplexity, and in doing this he exemplifies the desensitizing of individual conscience and imaginative sympathy which can be so marked an aspect of theodicies in both their religious and secular forms. His own art encourages us to see just what is involved in Theseus' style of thought and arouses us to a critical response to his language, his ideas and the order he governs.
The final part of the ruler's speech is addressed to Emily:
`Suster,' quod he, `this is my fulle assent,
With al th'avys heere of my parlement,
That gentil Palamon, youre owene knyght,
That serveth yow with wille herte, and myght,
And ever hath doon syn ye first hym knewe,
That ye shul of youre grace upon hym rewe,
And taken hym for housbonde and for lord.
Lene me youre hond, for this is oure accord.
Lat se now of youre wommanly pitee.
He is a kynges brother sone, pardee;
(Knight's Tale, ll. 3075-84)
Part of the comedy here comes from issues Chaucer also raised in his treatment of love, sex and marriage in works discussed earlier (chapters 5 and 6) - the woman, honoured with male service, from her own knight, is commanded to give her grace (a free gift!) and womanly pity which will result in Palamon taking her, as her lord. Theseus utters these conventional phrases without allowing Emily to discuss the matter or even break into his monologue. His values, underpinning the courtly language of service and grace, come across clearly in the last line quoted, where the grounds of 'grace' in this culture seem to be social status. This recalls his initial
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assessment of `worth' in terms of 'roial lynage and richesse' (ll. 1829-32), and while this is a realistic enough example of aristocratic motives it again hardly has much to do with neoplatonic and Boethian ideas about love he had tried to exploit in his parliamentary address. His attitudes to `the bond/ That highte matrimoigne or mariage' are plainly part of the same culture as his discourse about the `cheyne of love' we have just examined, discourse grounded in the service of an order he himself, unlike his creator, would never bring into reflexive attention. Our response to the very brief statement that Palamon and Emily lived happily ever after (ll. 3097-107) is deeply affected by these considerations and the total context in which it occurs. Its cursoriness and conventionality point towards its evasion of the wide range of problems evoked by a poem which is anything but a romance centred on `Palamon and Emelye'. Quite as much as the Franklin's Tale (discussed in chapter 6) this text resists any conventional closure. True, the poet gives it one, and thus allows an audience steeped in romance to feel relieved and consoled, latching on to the few brief assertions about the future of Palamon and Emily, feeling reassured at the role of official secular authority in the marital union, and abandoning the disturbing meditations stimulated by the complete work. But there is no cause for readers more deeply concerned with the particulars of Chaucer's art and imagination to respond in this way. Quite the opposite in fact, for their attention to the poem will rather make them suspect that Chaucer was also thinking about the implications of traditionally consoling closures in romances, that while writing one down, to satisfy conventional expectations, he simultaneously invited the reader to grasp its distorting limitations and move beyond this particular form of closure. Having done soi he exposes the poem to the reactions of both `gentils' and class-conscious miller within his fiction, developing a literary form which will constantly resist attempts at closure of any kind.38
Far from being a text which exalts Theseus, his practices or his ideas, Chaucer's poem encourages our imagination and intellect to penetrate and supersede the forms of language and life represented by the duke and his order, one which has many continuities with major tendencies in the culture Chaucer inhabited and of which we are heirs. He inserted abstractions which had become reified (like `order', 'necessitee', 'love') in poetic processes which persuade us
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to explore their particular roles in actual human relations, desublimating them in ways which encourage critical discriminations unknown to Theseus. Chaucer's work is an outstanding poetic inquiry into problems of order in cultural and metaphysical dimensions, one which includes especial attention to the uses of metaphysical language by those in power, the transformations of metaphysics into an ideology of unreflexive secular domination.
1 See respectively Charles Muscatine, Chaucer and the French Tradition, University of California Press, 1964, chapter 6.2.1, especially pp. 181, 194; R. M. Jordan, Chaucer and the Shape of Creation, Harvard University Press, 1967, pp. 153, 157 (chapter 7); R. B. Burlin, Chaucerian Fiction, Princeton University Press, 1977, pp. 104-5 (chapter 5); similarly Howard, Idea, p. 245; P. M. Kean, Chaucer and the Making of English Poetry, Routledge & Kegan Paul. London, 1972, vol. 2, pp. 1-52; A. David, The Strumpet Muse, Art and Morals in Chaucers Poety, Indiana University Press, 1976, pp. 84-5.
2 Elizabeth Salter, Chaucer: The Knight's Tale and the Clerk's Tale, Arnold, London, 1%2, pp. 9-36; R. Neuse, `The Knight: the first mover in Chaucer's human comedy', UTQ, 31, 1962, reprinted from J. A. Burrow ed.,Chaucer, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1969, pp. 242-63; also involvmg relevant alternative readings to the prevalent orthodoxy are the following: H. J. Webb, `A reinterpretation of Chaucer's Theseus', RES, 23, 1947, pp. 289-96; D. Underwood, ELH, 29, 1959, pp. 455-69; C. Mitchell, MLQ, 25, 1964, pp. 66-75. P. T. Thurston,Artistic Ambivalence in Chaucer's Knight's Tale, University of Florida, 1968, should be pertinent, but unfortunately sees Chaucer's chief and continual target as the knight-narrator, Palamon, Arcite and the women, finding Arcite's pain and death `humorous' (l. 215) and revealing a `Christian significance' which he fails to explain (l. 226), while he has nothing to say about the vital final speech of Theseus, `so thoroughly explored by others' (l. 222). On the narrator see the sensible warnings in David, Strumpet Muse, pp. 76-8.
3 Henry of Lancaster offers a good example of conflict within an aristocrat contemporary with Chaucer, as J. Barnie has shown in War in the Medieval Society, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1974, pp. 62-5.
4 Webb, `Chaucer's Theseus', p. 295.
5 Salter, Chaucer, p. 19.
6 For Chaucer's changes compare Teseida, II. st. 72-91 (Opere Minori in Volgare, vol. 2, Rizzoli, Milan, 1970); see Webb, 'Chaucer's Theseus , pp. 290-1. On medieval war, besides Barnie's study (n. 3 above), H. J. Hewitt's book should be of considerable interest to students of medieval literature: The Organization of War under Edward III, Manchester University Press, 1966. For Chaucer's own critique of militarism and war, see Tale of Melibee, especially Robinson, pp. 169, 183-4.
7 See Webb, 'Chaucer's Theseus', pp. 293-4, 296; Honoré Bonet's statement is quoted by Barnie, Medieval War, p. 68.
8 On contemporary criticism of absolutism in relation to Chaucer, see discussion of Clerk's Tale at close of previous chapter and n. 48.
9 Lines 1967-2050: on the temples see Salter, Chaucer, pp. 17, 25-8. I have also read her as yet unpublished essay on `Chaucer and Boccaccio: The Knight's Tale': I am extremely grateful to her for this, her published work and her conversations with me on Chaucer.
10 The phrase in quotation marks is from Elizabeth Salter's `Chaucer and Boccaccio'; see too Salter, Chaucer, pp. 26-7. The continuities I describe would not surprise St Augustine as much as they would the modern admirers of Theseus: a famous passage in the City of God likens the order of kingdoms and of robber bands, asserting that the only difference is the impunity of legal rulers (IV. 4 and IV. 6: see the discussion by H. A. Deane, The Political and Social Ideas of Augustine, Columbia University Press, pp. 126-9).
11 Contrast Teseida, VII. st. 67 and IX. st. 2-4.
12 `Chaucer and Boccaccio', unpublished manuscript.
13 The class basis of Theseus' decision is made clear al. 2538-9). For contemporary criticism of tournaments Underwood, p. 462; to his examples it is worth adding Chaucer's admirer and friend, the Lollard knight Sir John Clanvowe, The Two Ways, ed. J. Scattergood, Brewer Press, 1976, pp. 69-70, condemning the glorification of militarism.
14 Webb, `Chaucer's Theseus', p. 289, notes the `tarnished' reputation of Theseus.
15 See ll. 1746-1869; for example of a recent admirer here, P. Elbow, Oppositions in Chaucer, Cambridge University Press, 1975, pp. 80-3, 90-3.
16 Consolation of Philosophy, III.m.12, Robinson, Chaucer, p. 358: see Troilus and Criseyde, IV, II. 589-90, 617-18. For the neoplatonic framework to the Consolation, see the masterly study by P. Courcelle, La consolation de philosophie dans la tradition littéraire, Paris, 1967.
17 LGW, 1886-2227 and HF, 405-26.
18 Lines 1829-75: Theseus sees women as objects to be disposed of in political alliances for his own benefit, (contrast Nature in PF, 407-10, 624-30, and the discussion of Chaucer's treatment of these issues in chapter 6).
19 The quoted phrase is Elizabeth Salter's unpublished manuscript, `Chaucer and Boccaccio'.
20 On secular theodicies, L. Kolakowski, Marxism and Beyond, Pall Mail Press, London, 1969, pp. 131-62.
21 For some interesting details of Chaucer's art here see W. C. Curry, Chaucer and the Medieval Sciences, New York, 1926, pp. 139 ff. Saturn controlled the 'retentive virtue' which prevents the 'vertu expulsif' ejecting the 'venym'. ensuring Arcite's slow death.
22 Teseida, X. St. 13-113.
23 Chaucer draws on the Consolation of Philosophy III. pr. 2 (and IV. pr. 6) for Arcite's meditation, but this is certainly no reason for scholars to assume that all Boethius' eclectic ideas were unquestioningly accepted as adequate solutions in the fourteenth century -- quite the contrary, as most cursory acquaintance with the period's philosophy and theology reveals. To confirm this one could focus on just one major topic, such as the problem of future contingents and see thinker after thinker struggling with it in terms which show how Boethius's solution was not found adequate: eg., Ockham, Predestination, God's Foreknowledge, and Future Contingents, tr. M. McCord Adams and N. Kretzmann, Appleton-Century-Crofts, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1969, pp. 48-50 (and the editors' note p. 50 n. 54). See G. Leff, Dissolution, for an introductory account of major developments in late medieval thought, together with his Medieval Thought, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1958,Bradwardine and the Pelagians, Cambridge University Press, 1957, William of Ockham, Manchester University Press, 1975.
24 For Chaucer's use of Boethius, Consolation, I.m5, and Salter, Chaucer, pp. 21-2; the comments in the previous note on attitudes to Bmthius's metaphysics in the fourteenth century are relevant here too.
25 Line 2781; line 2782 includes reference to God which is an oath with no theological focus; similarly the references to Jupiter, ll. 2786-7, 2792. On Arcite's honesty, Salter, Chaucer, p. 29.
26 On developing distinctions between theological and philosophical argument see Leff, Dissolution, chapters I and 2, and William of Ockham, Manchester University Press, 1975, parts I and 2. I take the narrative voice here as the poet's, the voice I hear in LGW, Prologue F, 1-9, for instance; see David, Strumpet Muse, pp. 77-8. The poem does not have just one narrative voice; for example of the range compare the following: ll. 1201 (write, not speak), 1340-52 (court-quiz), 1459-60, 1465-6, 1668-78 (metaphysics of extreme determinism), 1995-2088 (Boccaccio's prayers take over as narrative `I'), 2088, 2283-9 (prurience?), 2681-2 and 2807-26 (antifeminist cliché -- or is there a double-take, a parody of such cliché by Chaucer, shared with the audience?)
27 For the positives, lines 1673-95, 2190-2205, 2483-7; the militaristic pursuits have been discussed, and these merge with the designs on Thebes (ll. 2970-4). For the miseries, also discussed above, 1995-2050, 2453-69 and Arcite's death 2743-814.
28 See scholars cited in note 1; on the area of Boethius here the caveat in note 23 applies.
29 Neuse, `The Knight', p. 250: I do not, of course, agree with his view of the tale as one carefully given to the particular Knight of the General Prologue ironizing against chivalry -- see references to narrative voices (plural) in note 26, and on ambivalences in the General Prologue's knight, C. Mitchell, MLQ, 25, 1964, pp. 66-75.
30 II. m.8; III. pr 10; IV. pr. 6; IV. m. 6.
31 `Chaucer and Boccaccio', unpublished manuscript; also Salter, Chaucer, p. 35. Obviously I disagree with her treatment of Theseus's speech as Chaucer's attempt to impose a comforting Boethian resolution on intractable materials, seeing no more need to identify Theseus with Chaucer's views than those of Coriolanus with Shakespeare's.
32 For example of such criticism however, G. Leff, William of Ockham, Manchester University Press, 1975, chapters 5 and 6 (especially pp. 359-454); J. R. Weinberg, Nicolaus of Autrecourt (1948); Greenwood, 1969, chapters 2, 3, 5 (especially pp. 74-6, 95-113, 219); F. Coppleston, A History of philosophy, vol. 3, Burns & Oates, 1960, pp. 67-8, 81-8, 123-7, 131-2.
33 Neuse, `The Knight', p. 250.
34 II. m 8: see Troilus and Criseyde, III, ll. 1744-71, which re-creates the human dimension. <35> 35 Neuse, `The Knight', p. 250; Salter, p. 35. (Note the other contexts in which Chaucer uses this phrase, Squire's Tale, ll. 584-600 and T & C, IV, ll. 1275-589: in both cases the phrase advocates accommodation to wrong-doing, not metaphysical reflection.)
36 The duke calls the first mover 'Juppiter' (l. 3035) but this reference reminds us of lines 2438 ff., where Jupiter failed to create harmony and assented to Saturn's grisly exercise of power: Chaucer is hardly inviting us to dissolve his carefully constructed text and substitute a text such as the Consolation.
37 For the neoplatonism of the Consolation, see Courcelle, La consolation.
38 One could agree that this is one of the points where the narrative voice explicitly becomes that of the pilgrim-knight who will patch up an agreement relevant to the pilgrimage's bonhomie after the conflict between Host and Pardoner. On the plurality of narrative voices, note 26.


text:
How to Make It
Lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups, and level with a knife. Combine 1/2 cup flour, water, and vinegar, stirring with a whisk until well blended to form a slurry.
Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, sugar, and salt in a bowl, stirring with a whisk; cut in shortening with a pastry blender or 2 knives until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add slurry; toss with a fork until flour mixture is moist.
Gently press mixture into a 4-inch circle on heavy-duty plastic wrap, and cover with additional plastic wrap. Roll the dough, still covered, into an 18 x 12-inch rectangle; freeze 10 minutes or until plastic wrap can be easily removed. Remove 2 sheets plastic wrap, and place dough on a lightly floured surface; let stand 1 minute. Cut dough as directed according to the specific recipe. Chill dough until ready to use.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Countryside Corner
Neighborly Garden News
Issue 83
March 2019
All-America Selections (AAS) Winners for 2019!
All American Selections are flower and vegetable plants that have been trialed in gardens across North America to determine the best performing varieties. Plants that grow exceptionally well across North America become National winners; those that grow best in certain areas are deemed Regional winners. Independent judges look for such improvements as: disease and pest resistance, earlier and improved blooming, improved taste, novel colors and flower forms, to name but a few qualities considered. All AAS winners are bred and produced without using GMO's. Each entry must have shown at least two significantly improved qualities, over a ten year period, in order to be considered.
Zinnia Holi Scarlet
This stunning Winner is named after the famous Holi Festival of Colors because of its vibrant color! AAS Judges deemed this an "excellent flower" because of the bright solid color, size, and the number of blooms as well as the disease resistance, which was superior to the comparisons. Holi Scarlet will keep producing fresh; colorful blooms all season long, even through heat, humidity, and drought. Uniform and compact mounding plants will make a stunning mass planting of vibrantly colored deep red flowers drawing in both people and pollinators.
Zinnia Holi Scarlet
Tomato Fire Fly F1
This adorable tomato is not as small as a currant tomato and not as large as a cherry tomato, but is a "just right" in-between size. The fruits produced are super sweet pale white to pale yellow round fruits less than 1 inch in size and weigh about 1/2 oz. Delicate, translucent skins offer a mild acid flavor that enhances the sweet taste. They're small juicy fruits exploding with flavor, perfect for snacking and in salads. Indeterminate plants must be staked or caged as they grow upward to 5-6 feet and have good disease resistance.
Tomato Fire Fly F1
Petunia Wave Carmine Velour F1
This newest color of the popular Wave petunias had the AAS judges coming up with an array of ways to describe the unique carmine rose color: "Fabulous," "Stunning," "Intense," "Vibrant," "Lively," "Great color," "Bright," "Non-fading," "Outstanding," "My favorite!". Large 2-2.5 inch flowers literally cover the easy-care spreading plants that rarely need deadheading because new blooms continuously pop-up and cover the spent blooms. Wave petunias are an excellent landscape performer, and do equally well in containers or hanging baskets as it does in flower beds.
Petunia Wave Carmine Velour F1
Nasturtium Baby Rose
The last nasturtium AAS Winner was back in the early days, in the 1930's. Baby Rose is a petite-flowered, mounding variety with healthy, dark foliage ideal for containers and small space gardens. AAS' expert judges praised the uniformly compact plants that sported flowers with consistent coloration. Their compact habit means less "flower flopping" with their blooms remaining upright throughout the season. The rose color is uncommon in nasturtiums and contrasts beautifully with the dark-green foliage. Bonus: both the leaves and flowers are edible!
Nasturtium Baby Rose
Pepper Just Sweet F1
A unique snacking pepper with four lobes like a larger bell pepper, only smaller. Not only are the 3 inch fruits deliciously sweet with nice thick walls but the plants are vigorous growers (up to 36 inches tall and 15 inches wide) that don't need to be staked because they've been bred to have a strong bushy habit. Many judges conduct consumer taste tests and reported back that this pepper won those tests, hands down. The Just Sweet peppers are exceptionally bright, shiny and a vivid yellow color with a flavor described as sweet with aromatic accents.
Pepper Just Sweet F1
Tomato Chef's Choice Black F1
Chef's Choice Black is a beefsteak type tomato with a dark green/brown/black hue. AAS Judges reported vigorous, healthy plants with clean and uniform fruits that were early to set and had a meaty interior with great flavor. This hybrid boasts a prolific yield of 8-ounce fruits grown on strong, 5-foot indeterminate vines. You'll harvest 30 or more blemish-free fruits throughout the season from this disease-resistant plant with dark green leaves and well-behaved form.
Tomato Chef's Choice Black F1
Begonia Viking XL Red on Chocolate F1
A brand new begonia with large, uniquely colored dark leaves. Judges were impressed with how the deep bronze/brown color remained sharp and intense throughout the season, no matter where they were located; north, south, east or west. The color tones shine through to give a stunning garden appearance. Covered with vibrant red flowers, the compact plant retains its shape well and does not become rangy. "This year's weather seemed unusually conducive to disease on large-leaf begonias but none of these plants were affected" stated one judge. These extra-large (XL) mounded plants are perfect in both landscapes and containers.
Begonia Viking XL Red on Chocolate F1
After being trialed in over 35 locations throughout North America, AAS winners become available as seeds and plants at garden centers, mail order, and internet sources. This link will bring you to some of the retailers that offer AAS winners for sale: https://all-americaselections.org/buy-winners/
March's 'to-do' list:
The vernal or spring equinox arrives on March 20th. On this day the sun will rise exactly in the east and set exactly in the west; the length of night and day are approximately equal. Let's hope for a mild and sunny spring!
Prepare for the start of another tick season. Ticks that cause Lyme disease will become active when temperatures are above freezing, and the ground has thawed. Unfortunately, ticks don't die with the onset of cold weather, they just go into dormancy. I've heard of numerous reports of ticks on hikers, and their dogs, just recently. Our tick specialist, Herb Severs, can advise you on the various methods we have at our disposal for managing this dangerous pest.
If your garden beds are dried out enough to walk on them, you may begin spring clean-up. Wet soil is very susceptible to compaction, so be prepared to wait until the soils have drained sufficiently to walk on.
Begin cutting down spent ornamental grasses now, before they begin sprouting.
As spring bulbs begin to emerge scratch in some organic bulb fertilizer around them, to give them a nutritional boost. 'Bulb Booster' fertilizer typically has a 9-9-6 ratio of elements. Using bone meal is discouraged, because it can attract wildlife. Spring bulbs are usually very cold hardy; an occasional spring snow won't negatively affect their growth.
If you have stored any bulbs from last summer, such as: Dahlias, tuberous Begonias, Cannas, or Calla lilies, pot them up now, and set in the light.
Early March is the time to start seeds of long season vegetables, like peppers, tomatoes & eggplants. Tomatoes germinate quickly, followed by peppers. Eggplants can take up to 14 days or more to germinate. These vegetables are in the Solanaceae family, which thrive with warmth. Growing them with supplemental bottom heat can help promote germination.
Spraying ornamental and fruiting plants with horticultural oil while they are dormant, is an ecological and effective way to control insect pests. Horticultural oil is ultra-fine grade, so it is considered non-toxic to humans and pets. Horticultural oil kills overwintering pests and their eggs by smothering them.
Prune out and remove any Raspberry canes that bore fruit last year. Remove any canes that are thinner than a pencil in diameter. Cut the remaining canes back by at least 12" and make repairs to their trellis or fence as needed. Wait to apply fertilizer, until you see some new green shoots, and the ground has warmed up.
If you keep bird nesting boxes, now is a good time to clean and disinfect them, before a new tenant starts making a nest. Wear gloves and a dust mask to protect you from any pests that may be living in the old nesting material.
Have you heard about Medlars?
Mespilus germanica, common name Medlar, produces very distinctive, unusually shaped fruit. Their flavor when fully ripe is said to taste just like cinnamon applesauce. The Medlar has been written about and included in great works of literature by Shakespeare, Chaucer, and Cervantes. The most famous reference to Medlars appears in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, when Mercutio laughs at Romeo's unrequited love for his mistress Rosaline (II, 1, 34–38):
Now will he sit under a Medlar tree,
And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit
As maids call Medlars, when they laugh alone.
O Romeo, that she were, O that she were
An open-arse and thou a pop'rin pear!
Old English refers to Medlars as Open-Arse fruit, because of their unique shape when ripe. A little crude, but what a conversation starter!
Ripening Medlar fruit
'Royal' Medlar
The Medlar's fruit must undergo a ripening process called bletting; after being exposed to frost, the fruit becomes very soft and brown in color, looking almost rotten. Looks are deceiving, and they may look strange, but taste very sweet. Bletted Medlars may be eaten raw, in desserts, or made into jelly. Historically the advantage of the Medlar was that they provided fruit during the winter, when little fresh fruit was available. Bletting can also be done indoors in a cool, light, room.
Ripe and unripe Medlar fruit
Ripe Medlar
The Medlar is a 'pome-type' fruit. It is related to the Quince, and is often grafted onto Pear, or Quince rootstock. Medlars grow into a shrubby small tree, 15-25 feet tall. It doesn't require much pruning to shape the tree, other than removing any dead branches that may occur. The attractive grey bark forms deep vertical lines that develop into rectangular plates. The 3-5" long, elliptical shaped leaves develop good red fall color. The fragrant 2.5" wide white flowers resemble large apple-blossom flowers. Medlars are considered self-fertile, and don't require a pollinator.
Medlar flowers
The cultivar 'Royal' hails from England, by way of Russia, and is considered cold hardy to zones 5-9. Medlar trees can begin to bear fruit in 2-4 years time. Surprisingly, a new species of Mespilus was discovered in North America (Arkansas). It was named Mespilus canescens, Stern's Medlar, in 1990, and is thought to be a hybrid between M. germanica, and one of our native Hawthorn (Crataegus) species. With only 25 individual trees identified, Stern's Medlar is a critically endangered, endemic species.
Thinking ahead…
Raspberries are one of those fruit that just begs to be eaten fresh. Grocery store raspberries can't compare to ones you've just picked! Raspberries are very easy to grow; they are divided roughly into two categories: Summer Bearing and Everbearing (Fall Bearing). Summer Bearing: one crop of berries is produced on the overwintering canes during the summer months. Everbearing (Fall Bearing): plants produce two crops; a first harvest in the early summer, the second crop is borne in the late summer/early fall on the tips of canes that grew throughout the summer.
All Raspberries prefer a 'sweet soil' with Ph in the 6.5-6.8 range. They prefer full sun, and good air circulation, but will tolerate light shade. Raspberries are not just red; but also black, purple and yellow. Absolutely nothing beats homemade raspberry jam on hot scones. Some of the best tasting berries are:
Prelude red Raspberry is a prolific early Summer Bearing variety. This raspberry plant produces great flavored berries and has vigorous growth. It is rated 'excellent' for both flavor and winter hardiness.
Prelude Raspberry
Bristol black Raspberry is a Summer Bearing variety that produces berries mid-season. The intense black raspberry flavor is rated 'excellent', and is a good cold hardy variety.
Bristol Raspberry
Royalty purple Raspberry is a Summer Bearing type that produces juicy purple berries late season. The firm fruit is rated good for freezing, taste and hardiness.
Royalty Raspberry
Anne golden raspberry is an Everbearing variety, producing large, very sweet, pale yellow fruit. It is rated 'excellent' for flavor and cold hardiness.
Anne Raspberry
Caroline red Raspberry is an Everbearing variety that produces a large berry, with a 'very full, intense flavor' rated excellent for both taste and cold hardiness.
Caroline Raspberry


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Women On Target® is an instructional shooting clinic. This course is an introduction to firearms safety, gun handling, and the fundamentals of shooting skills. It creates more opportunities for women to learn all about firearms, and to gain confidence in newly-acquired shooting skills
For more details, please visit HERE
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27 Apr Weekly Roundup 4/20-4/26
Project SAM's Kevin Sabet released a statement on CNN's "Weed 3" Special.
The Huffington Post publicized an American Journal of Medicine article calling for medically appropriate language when referring to persons with substance abuse disorders.
New York Governor Mario Cuomo issued a health alert after a spike in emergency room visits due to synthetic marijuana.
The Mississippi State Department of Health reports an increase in emergency room visits due to synthetic marijuana.
The Alabama Department of Public Health reports an increase in the use of synthetic cannabinoids.
Synthetic marijuana hospitalized more than twenty people in one weekend in Austin, Texas.
The Public Policy Institute of California released a fact sheet on Californians' attitudes toward marijuana legalization.
The Florida Senate voted to ban powdered alcohol (Palcohol) for two years.
The International Business Times reported on a new study showing that regular users of marijuana show increased susceptibility to false or distorted memories.
Students at the University of California Santa Barbara have teamed up to provide safe disposal boxes on campus for prescription medications.
The San Francisco Giants may become the first major league baseball team to ban smokeless chewing tobacco.
The German Cancer Research Center released a study on reduced cardiovascular disease among people who quit smoking.
Three teens protested marijuana legalization at Vancouver's 4/20 rally.
Health Day reports that watching actors drink in movies may influence children to drink.
The Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders Center for Excellence published a summary of a recent Pediatrics article on misdiagnosis of FASD.
SAMHSA reports that 1 in 10 full-time workers have had a substance use disorder in the past year.
SAMHSA's National Survey on Drug Use and Health released Trends in Heroin Use in the United States: 2002-2013.
SAMHSA is accepting applications for up to $800,000 for Statewide Peer Networks for Recovery and Resiliency.


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Vanuatu Completes First Rainforest Carbon Credit Scheme In Pacific Region
220 hectares of Espiritu Santo lowland rainforest to be protected
PORT VILA, Vanuatu (Vanuatu Daily Post, Nov. 29, 2016) – Live & Learn International's Executive Director, Mr Christian Nielsen has congratulated Director General for the Vanuatu Ministry of Climate Change, Mr Jessie Benjamin, on a partnership with the Nakau Programme that has led to the Pacific's first sale of high-quality, certified rainforest carbon credits.
Since 2011 the Loru landowners of Espiritu Santo have committed to manage 220 Ha of remnant lowland rainforest for conservation and regeneration. The area protects habitat for critically endangered species, including the Vanuatu Megapode bird and the Coconut Crab. The project has sold 3,711 credits (3,711 tonnes CO2e) to buyers overseas and within Vanuatu during 2016.
The income received from the sale of carbon credits is used for managing the Loru Community Conservation Area, monitoring the project and to provide payments to the landowners that compensates them for foregoing opportunities to clear the land for gardening or copra.
"The Loru Forest Project leads the way in demonstrating the opportunities for Pacific islanders to benefit in a green economy; said Mr Benjamin DG. The project owners not only benefit from income generated through the project but also from protecting the forest resource which provides them with food, water, medicine and cultural heritage."
"This project will monitor over time how the project impacts the community to measure effects on community resilience" said Mr Nielsen.
The majority of credits have been sold to a company in Sweden, Opus, that has elected to become carbon neutral. The company has reduced its carbon footprint and then offsets its remaining emissions by purchasing carbon credits from Loru.
Zero Mission, a European broker selling Nakau credits in Europe, responds to consumers who are placing increasing pressure on companies to demonstrate that they are good global citizens.
The Nakau Programme projects not only deliver third-party validated carbon credits but they provide multiple co-benefits to the forest dependent project owners. Many companies are keen to align their business to work that is quality assured to provide environmental and social benefits.
Nakau is also working with buyers present in Vanuatu such as German development agency, GIZ, and regional body, SPC, who are offsetting project-based emissions. Private buyers are also offsetting their flights or travel purchasing Nakau credits via online retail presence, Ekos (www.ekos.org.nz).
The project is formally recognised as a national REDD+ pilot project by the Vanuatu Government. Live & Learn is a member of the National Technical Committee for REDD+ which ensures lessons learned from this project can assist the Government to develop a national REDD+ program. The project is a partnership between the Nakau Programme, Live & Learn Vanuatu and the Serakar Clan (land owners of the Loru Community Conservation Area).
"While Vanuatu is the first country to successfully process sales for rainforest carbon protection, our projects in Fiji and the Solomon Islands are also close to generating their first sales." stated Mr Nielsen, "the Nakau Programme is growing and our project methodology is being replicated across the Pacific. It is accessible to other NGOs, project developers and forest owning communities however a source of start-up finance such as a grant is required to develop a new project in the program."
Vanuatu Daily Post
Copyright © 2016 Trading Post Limited. All Rights Reserved


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Touchpaper is a not-for-profit, on a mission to make it much easier for startups and corporates to work together. To foster an environment where collaboration, innovation and value creation are enabled and where business processes are fit for purpose, delivering relationships, revenue, and results.


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Dec 25, New Delhi: While welcoming the public release of the report of Sri Lanka's Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission, India on Sunday expressed hope that Sri Lanka would act decisively on the devolution of powers and national reconciliation issues with a vision.
Issuing a statement in response to a question the official Spokesperson of India's External Affairs Ministry said the Indian government will remain engaged with the Sri Lankan government through the process of reconciliation and offers their support "in the spirit of partnership".
Noting the Sri Lankan government's initiative to set up a mechanism to carry out further investigations relating to instances of alleged human rights violations and civilian deaths, the Spokesperson underscored the need to put in place an independent and credible mechanism to investigate allegations of human rights violations in a time-bound manner.
The Sri Lankan government tabled the 400-page report of the LLRC in the parliament on December 16.
The Spokesperson said India is still studying the report but can share some initial comments on the report.
Indian government has taken note of the assurance given by the Sri Lankan government in parliament about implementation of many of LLRC's recommendations.
The Spokesperson detailing various constructive measures proposed by the LLRC to foster a process of lasting peace and reconciliation in the island nation said they have noted the assurance given by the Sri Lankan government in Parliament that it will ensure the withdrawal of security forces from all aspects of community life and confine their role exclusively to security matters.
Among the measures proposed by the LLRC are the investigation of cases of disappearances and abductions, promotion of a trilingual policy, deployment of Tamil-speaking officers in all offices, curbing activities of illegal armed groups, reduction of high security zones, return of private lands by the military and demilitarization, including phasing out of the involvement of the security forces in civilian activities and restoration of civilian administration in the Northern Province.
Further, the implementation of assurances to ensure speedy resettlement and genuine reconciliation, including early completion of the process of the return of Internally Displaced Persons and refugees to their respective homes, restoration of normal civilian life in affected areas would mark a major step forward in the process of reconciliation, the Spokesperson emphasized.
The LLRC report has underlined that the present situation provides a great window of opportunity to forge a consensual way forward towards reconciliation through a political settlement based on devolution of power, he pointed out.
The report recognized that a political solution is imperative to addressing the root cause of the conflict and noted that the Government should provide leadership to a political process to establish a framework for ensuring sustainable peace and security in the post-conflict environment.
"In this context, we have been assured by the Government of Sri Lanka on several occasions in the past, of its commitment towards pursuit of a political process, through a broader dialogue with all parties, including the Tamil National Alliance, leading to the full implementation of the 13th Amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution, and to go beyond, so as to achieve meaningful devolution of powers and genuine national reconciliation," the Spokesperson recalled.


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LG Electronics' ultra-slim laptop computer "Gram 14" is gaining high popularity, selling one unit per every three minutes. According to industry sources on March 30, the Gram 14, which was released on January 14, 2015, has been sold more than 500 units a day.The weekly sales of the Gram 14, in particular, during this period, reached more than 2,000 units, the fastest sales pace among the laptop
SEOUL, Mar. 30, 2015 ― LG Electronics (LG) kicks off the global rollout of its new mid-range smartphone lineup starting in South America to be followed closely by Europe, Asia, Middle East Africa and North America. This premium but affordable series comprised of Magna, Spirit, Leon and Joy was first unveiled at Mobile World Congress (MWC) in early March where it was noted for bringing sophisticate
Cisco estimates that 50 billion devices will be connected to the Internet by 2020 and wearable technology is expected to play a large part in this growth of the "Internet of Things", or IoT. As consumers, we expect wearables to improve our daily experiences and generally make our lives easier and better by unobtrusively and conveniently sensing, analysing, monitoring and tracking. These tiny conne
LONDON, March 3, 2015 - The wearable devices space is viewed as the next goldmine of opportunity for sensor manufacturers as profits shrink in the smartphone and tablet segments. Further, the sensor landscape for wearable devices will gain a new dimension through the entry of software and hardware giants such as Google (www.google.com), Apple (www.apple.com), Samsung (www.samsung.com) and Intel (w
WELLINGTON, New Zealand - RS Components (RS), the trading brand of Electrocomponents plc (LSE:ECM), the global distributor for engineers, today announced that the next-generation Raspberry Pi 2 credit-card-sized single-board computer from the Raspberry Pi Foundation is now available to order at http://nz.rs-online.com/web/Building upon the massive success of the first generation Raspberry Pi, an
SEOUL, KOREA - LG Electronics is going to introduce the 'WCP-300', the world's smallest wireless charger with only 6.98㎝ in diameter. The slim and sleek wireless charger is designed to maximize portability. Despite its compact size, the charging area is 1.7 times wider than that of the company's existing charger, providing the utmost charging efficiency.The new charger uses magnetic induction te
SEOUL, KOREA - GA, an LED light manufacturer, announced 12th that it had developed 'light-pollution-preventing LED light based on Power Line Communication (PLC)' through an academic-industrial cooperation with Prof. Yoon Dal-hwan from Semyung university.The newly-developed light can be used for streetlight, security light, tunnel light and others. And its steering mechanism can adjust the angle
SEOUL, KOREA - LG Electronics is going to make public its new three types of 'L Series 2' smartphones at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2013 to be held in Barcelona, Spain on 25th (local time).The new products to be released are 'Optimus L3 2', 'Optimus L5 2' and 'Optimus L7 2' These new 'L Series 2' smartphones are followed by 'L series' that was first revealed at MWC2012 last year. Compared with th
LAS VEGAS, USA - At the 2013 Consumer Electronics Show 2013 in Las Vegas, LG will showcase its smart appliance lineup, offering enhanced connectivity and greater user convenience. By simply touching their smartphone to the NFC Tag-on symbol on one of LG's smart appliances, customers can easily register and control their refrigerator, washing machine, robotic vacuum cleaner or range oven. Smart Con
LAS VEGAS, USA - LG will showcase its newest square robotic vacuum cleaner in a most creative fashion at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) from January 8-11 in Las Vegas. A highly trained troupe of HOM-BOT SQUARE units will demonstrate their incredible maneuverability with a well-choreographed dance routine at select times over the period of the show. Aside from possessing superb dance skill
LAS VEGAS, USA - Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. announced today its Evolution Kit at the 2013 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) from January 8-11, 2013. The Evolution Kit, which has been introduced for the first time at CES 2012, is an innovative concept that enables Samsung 2012 Smart TV to evolve into Samsung's new 2013 Smart TVs. By simply attaching the Evolution Kit device into
LAS VEGAS, USA - LG announced today that it will begin accepting pre-orders for its eagerly-awaited 55-inch class (54.6-inch diagonal) WRGB OLED TV (Model 55EM9700) in South Korea this month with deliveries scheduled to begin next month. Other markets where the revolutionary LG OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) TV will be available will be announced over the next several weeks along with the
SEOUL, KOREA - LG will unveil its new CINEMA 3D Smart TV lineup at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. The 2013 lineup offers easier content access and sharing along with an updated Magic Remote for a simplified, intuitive user experience (UX). A variety of models and sizes will be on display at CES, including LG's awe-inspiring 84-inch Ultra HD and 55-inch OLED TVs.
LAS VEGAS, USA - Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today debuted two new additions to its lineup of premium monitors, putting professional-grade picture quality within reach for professional and consumer audiences alike. The innovative Series 7 SC770 Touch Monitor comes optimized for Windows 8, while the Series 7 SC750 features a s
SEOUL, KOREA - Samsung Electronics announced on December 26 that it would upgrade its smart TV content platform "Smart Hub" and show off at the CES that is slated to be held on January 8, 2013 in Las Vegas. The upgraded Smart Hub will make it easier for consumers to find the contents that they want to enjoy. Unlike existing Smart Hub that features a simple configuration of contents on an app m
SEOUL, KOREA - LG Electronics (LG) will introduce an extended Google TV lineup at the 2013 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. LG's new models GA7900 and GA6400 deliver an outstandingly intuitive user experience at various sizes and new design to meet more consumers' expectations.Google's latest platform and LG's redesigned Magic Remote Qwerty work together to enhance the
USA - International Trade Administration, an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce, announced on December 20 that it would impose anti-dumping duties of 9.29, 13.02, and 82.41 percent to Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, and Daewoo Electronics, respectively, for their washing machines. In addition, the agency assessed countervailing duties on subsidies paid for by the government at 1.85, 0.
SEOUL, KOREA - LG Electronics (LG) today announced an all-new Magic Re-mote for its CINEMA 3D Smart TV lineup prior to the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. The redesigned device adopts enhanced language recognition ca-pabilities that make executing commands simple, natural, interactive and conversational. The new design will continue to employ four control options – voice, gesture, po
PLYMOUTH, ENGLAND - Plessey today announced that its new innovative MAGIC™ (MAnufactured on GaN ICs) High Brightness LED (HBLED) products have won the Solid-State Lighting Application Category of the Elektra Awards 2012. The winners were revealed last week at the European Electronics Industry Awards ceremony in London. Barry Dennington, Plessey's COO, said, "LEDs are the next key phase of the
SEOUL, KOREA – LG Electronics announced on December 3 that it has released an 84-type Ultra HD TV in Nigeria, targeting affluent consumers in Africa.Given that there are many high-income families in oil-rich countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, LG Electronics selected Nigeria as its base to gain a larger share in the African premium TV market. According to a consulting firm Bain & Company, the num


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I love Shamils project 'Encore' of artists that have just come off stage. They all look so worn out but at the same time quite wired. Great idea for a series, you can see them all here
Excuse the poor quality of picture, I took a shot of this on my camera phone, I liked these graphic illustrations which were carefully put together shapes of paper, difficult to appreciate on this image though, sorry!
This photographer caught my eye at the photography show today
Also liked these paintings by Jacob Eaton
I went to the Camberwell degree shows today and thought they were really very good, here are some of my favourites from the illustration show.
I came across this artist while trying to decipher what a rather large triffid looking plant in my garden was! Anyway it turned out to be a teasel as featured in one of these really beautiful prints.
Photographs from a shoot for wired magazine using a large format camera, amazing group shot.
These paintings by artist David Lyle are a wonderful play on past and present, bringing the both together with clever wit. A really wonderful series. see the rest on his website.
I'm loving these new shots by Joe, a bit of sun, colour and glamour, could do with a bit of that at the moment!
Lovely series by Franck Allais


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I created my new Microsoft accounts using temporary email addresses because of OneDrive. I didn't do anything on my accounts and they were blocked. I unblocked them using my phone number. I can use Outlook and other Microsoft websites registering with temporary email addresses.
I never use OneDrive and have never been blocked by them for anything.
I've never been blocked by Microsoft.
No.....I'm sorry. I relegate my blocking to lesser minions such as Amirite, where the brown shirt Nazi "Anthony" continues his cleansing purge of we older members from SH.
Nope, but sorry that happened to you.
Not to my knowledge. As far as I know, I don't use OneDrive.


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How to Size Up a Reverse Mortgage
Do the math to figure your total cost or the equity remaining when your loan ends.
When you shop for a reverse mortgage, lenders must give you the total annual loan cost (TALC), the equivalent of an annual percentage rate. But this doesn't reflect how your pattern of withdrawals will affect your total cost or the equity when the loan ends.
AARP has developed a model that lets counselors and lenders give you a customized analysis. Golden Gateway Financial, a reverse-mortgage broker, has an online calculator that uses AARP's model to let you compare loans.
At GoldenGateway.com, click on "Do the math." Input your age, estimated home value and zip code (to determine whether your home's value exceeds the Federal Housing Administration limit for your area). The program generates your loan options, which you can sort by loan limit or by interest rate.
The table below summarizes the results in March for a homeowner in northern Virginia whose home is worth $350,000 and who has a $50,000 mortgage balance. It assumes an upfront withdrawal of $50,000 to pay off the mortgage. We ran the numbers two ways: with a loan term of 20 years for a 62-year-old and ten years for a 72-year-old.
Different ages, different payouts
|Loan term (yrs.)
|Initial loan limit
|Max. monthly payment
|Total cost
|Cash received
|Equity remaining
Interest. Most lenders charge a variable rate based on the one-year Constant Maturity Treasury or LIBOR index plus a margin of one to one and a half percentage points. In March, lenders at Golden Gateway offered rates ranging from 4.86% to 5.55%. The loan used in the example had an initial rate of 5.28%.
Initial loan limit. This is based on your age (or that of the youngest co-borrower), the value of your home and its location (see the accompanying article). The older the borrower, the higher the limit.
Maximum monthly payment. This amount depends on how much you initially withdraw as a lump sum or reserve for a line of credit. In our example, the younger buyer qualifies for a much lower monthly payout.
Total cost. In addition to interest, the lender can currently charge up to 2% of the home's value (or the FHA limit, whichever is less) for the origination fee. Lenders can also charge for such things as an appraisal and title search. Plus, you'll pay a monthly servicing fee of $30 to $35.
For the federally insured home equity conversion mortgage, you'll pay mortgage insurance of 2% of your home's value upfront, plus 0.5% added to the interest rate on your loan.
Equity remaining. This is the amount of equity you're projected to have left at the loan's end. In the table, the younger borrower's remaining equity is only slightly lower because we assumed 4% per year annual appreciation -- the historical average.


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Mozillian Profile
Muhammed Shibin
Vouched By
Akhil James
Shibin is a self motivated person and an active contributor. He is an open source enthusiast and also a great developer. He is an active member at Mozilla CUSAT Club and also a good event organizer. He has contributed to Webmaker, FirefoxOS and now L10n. Happy to vouch for him. :)
Shibin is one of active contributor and an awesome developer.Much happy to vouch him.He is a passionate contributer.Has been contributing to FirefoxOS, SuMo and Webmaker :) A much active local community member and Co-Organizer of certain mozilla events too.. Feel free to contact me for any inputs required :-)


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It will come as a relief to many in the world of journalism that the party has promised to scrap the Section 40 powers that would create a tougher press regulator.
The party pledged: "We will repeal Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2014, which, if enacted, would force media organisations to become members of a flawed regulatory system or risk having to pay the legal costs of both sides in libel and privacy cases, even if they win."
Read next: No lobbying measures in Tory manifesto, but APPC and PRCA (again) call for reform
A new Conservative Government would also not embark on Part Two of the Leveson inquiry, the manifesto says.
"Given the comprehensive nature of the first stage of the Leveson Inquiry and given the lengthy investigations by the police and Crown Prosecution Service into alleged wrongdoing, we will not proceed with the second stage of the Leveson Inquiry into the culture, practices and ethics of the press," it reads.
The Conservative manifesto makes pledges of support for comms campaigns, including:
- "A national campaign to increase the number of black, Asian and ethnic minority organ donors"
- "We will encourage the world to visit, study and do business in the UK through the GREAT Britain campaign and Visit Britain"
- "We will also create a power in law for government to introduce an industry-wide levy from social media companies and communication service providers to support awareness and preventative activity to counter internet harms, just as is already the case with the gambling industry"
Labour's manifesto accused the Conservatives of failing to support the BBC and its independence.
The Conservative manifesto makes just one mention of the BBC - saying it will place it (and charity the British Council) "on a secure footing so they are able to promote the best of British values around the globe". However, it also commits "to promote democracy, the rule of law, property entitlements, a free and open media".
This chimes with comments from BBC's comms chief at a PRWeek event last year, that the World Service was "hugely treasured", and "very important in projecting soft power and British values".
The Conservative manifesto also says it will "continue to push the internet companies to deliver on their commitments to develop technical tools to identify and remove terrorist propaganda".
Another media pledge from the Tories is to "ensure there is a sustainable business model for high-quality media online, to create a level playing field for our media and creative industries".


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I always believe that when kids can get craft materials in their hands, their creativity and imagination have a million times better chance of igniting then simply "putting on their thinking caps". I shared over on the Sculpey blog these super simple and fun aliens using my Cosmic Cafe collection as inspiration. Encouraging kids with imaginative writing is FUN with clay.
The printable I created to go with this educational fun is another way to support creative thinking and you can get it on the Sculpey blog for free.
You can also download this story planning chart and use it with these aliens or for other story telling starters. It would be useful for students and kids to do it about themselves to support the writing of an autobiography.
There are other great Cosmic Cafe printable in my ShopLauraKelly store. Check them out HERE!
Happy creating and teaching and learning,


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A tribute from beathearts for the second fallen soldier of Slum Village. Titus "Baatin" Glover (March 8, 1974–July 31, 2009).
T3 is the last living member of the original Slum Village, a group that's been very important in my life, and especially J Dilla. But that's for later on, this one's for Baatin.
Baatin - Girl
Noel Zancanella - The Embryo feat. Baatin
Noel Zancanella - Could It Be feat. Baatin
Slum Village - Actin' Normal (prod. Karriem Riggins)
Beautiful video in remembrance. Directed by Dwele.


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Course Descriptions
Listing of all academic courses offered at California Institute of Integral Studies.
School of Professional Psychology and Health CMH 7701 3.00
This culminating course provides an opportunity for students to reflect on their processes of personal and academic integration in the CMH program. Students will demonstrate the following: key learning from theoretical and conceptual standpoints, and knowledge of community and public mental health systems and clinical experiences. CMH student