title: Morning Has Broken

text: The hymn originally appeared in the second edition of "Songs of Praise" (published in 1931), to the tune "Bunessan", composed in the Scottish Islands. In "Songs of Praise Discussed", the editor, Percy Dearmer, explains that as there was need for a hymn to give thanks for each day, English poet and children's author Eleanor Farjeon had been "asked to make a poem to fit the lovely Scottish tune." A slight variation on the original hymn, also written by Eleanor Farjeon, can be found in the form of a poem contributed to the anthology "Children's Bells", under Farjeon's new title, "A Morning Song (For the First Day of Spring)", published by Oxford University Press in 1957. The song is noted in time but with a feel.


title: Morning Has Broken

text: After appearing in Lachlan MacBean's "Songs and Hymns of the Gael", "Bunessan" was used in the "Revised Church Hymnary" (1927) and the Appendix (1936) to the "Irish Church Hymnal" (1919) paired with the nativity text "Child in the Manger" by the Scottish poet Mary MacDonald (1789–1872), who lived on the Isle of Mull and was born there, near the village of Bunessan, for which the tune is named. The tune is also used for the James Quinn hymns "Christ Be Beside Me" and "This Day God Gives Me", both of which were adapted from the traditional Irish hymn "St. Patrick's Breastplate". Michael Saward's hymn "Baptized In Water" also uses the tune.


title: Morning Has Broken

text: Cat Stevens' recording, with piano arranged and performed by Rick Wakeman, led to international recognition of the song.


title: Morning Has Broken

text: When shaping "Morning Has Broken" for recording, Stevens started with the hymn, which took around 45 seconds to sing in its basic form. Producer Paul Samwell-Smith told him he could never put something like that on an album, and that it had to be at least three minutes, though an acoustic demo of an early Stevens version lasts almost three minutes. Prior to the actual recording Stevens heard Wakeman play something in the recording booth. It was a rough sketch of what would later become "Catherine Howard". Stevens told Wakeman that he liked it and wanted something similar as the opening section, the closing section and, if possible, a middle section as well. Wakeman told Stevens he could not as it was his piece destined for a solo album, but Stevens persuaded him to adapt his composition. The single reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart and number six on the US "Billboard" Hot 100, becoming Stevens's most successful single on the latter chart (later tied by his rendition of "Another Saturday Night").


title: Morning Has Broken

text: In 2000, Wakeman released an instrumental version of "Morning Has Broken" on an album of the same title. That same year he gave an interview on BBC Radio 5 Live in which he said he had agreed to perform on the Cat Stevens track for £10 and was "shattered" that he was omitted from the credits, adding that he never received the money either.


title: Morning Has Broken

text: On his return to performance as Yusuf Islam, Stevens paid Wakeman and apologized for the original non-payment, which he said arose from confusion and misunderstanding by the record label. On a documentary aired on British television, Wakeman stated that he felt Stevens's version of "Morning Has Broken" was a very beautiful piece of music that had brought people closer to religious truth, for which he expressed satisfaction in having contributed. Wakeman included a 3:42 version on his 2017 album of piano arrangements, "Piano Portraits".


title: Morning Has Broken

text: The Stevens arrangement changes key four times, with the first, second, and fourth verses of the song in C major, while the instrumental introduction, third verse, and the instrumental ending are in D major.


title: Morning Has Broken

text: The song has been recorded by many other artists, including The New Seekers, Steven Curtis Chapman, Judy Collins, Michael Card, Floyd Cramer, Dana, Neil Diamond, Órla Fallon, Art Garfunkel, Ellen Greene, Esther Ofarim, Daliah Lavi, Joe Longthorne, Jojje Wadenius and Anni-Frid Lyngstad (2010), the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Nana Mouskouri, Aaron Neville, Kenny Rogers and the First Edition, Joseph McManners, Sister Janet Mead, Mary O'Hara, Demis Roussos, Third Day, The Brilliance, Pam Tillis, Hayley Westenra, Roger Whittaker, 2nd Chapter of Acts, Libera (choir), Richard Souther and Dana Winner. A version by "Isleville Symphonette" reached No. 24 in the Canadian AC charts.


title: Morning Has Broken

text: The song has been translated into German ("Schön ist der Morgen", performed by Nana Mouskouri, and by Jürgen Henkys "Morgenlicht leuchtet" and included in the hymnal of the German Protestant Lutheran Church, Evangelisches Gesangbuch, under Nr. 455, and also in the hymnal of the Protestant (Reformed) Church of Switzerland, RG (reformiertes Gesangbuch), under Nr. 533. Also, the song has been translated into French ("Matin brisé", performed by Eva on her 1972 album "L'orage"), Dutch ("Licht Op De Lakes" performed by Rowwen Hèze) and other languages.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Aizen spent his life working at the Fifth Division, eventually becoming its lieutenant under the former captain, Shinji Hirako. Aizen gained followers, including Gin Ichimaru and Kaname Tōsen. A century before the series' setting, after Kisuke Urahara created the Hōgyoku, an item that he believed creates Soul Reaper/Hollow hybrids, Aizen began to experiment using the Soul Reapers that became the Vizards. Among his test subjects was Shinji, who knew about Aizen, but learned too late that Aizen used his mistrust against him. Having also framed Kisuke for the Vizards' creation and forced his exile, Aizen learned the Hōgyoku actually grants its user's desires if they have the will to carry it out. But as Kisuke took the Hōgyoku with him, Aizen bides his time to take the item when the time comes.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: At some point, Aizen saw the potential of Shuhei Hisagi, Momo Hinamori, Izuru Kira and Renji Abarai, and Aizen took the latter three into his division. Aizen continued experimenting on Soul Reaper/Hollow hybrids with his creations Metastacia and White, playing a respective role between Rukia Kuchiki and those of Isshin Shiba and Masaki Kurosaki. After leaving the Soul Society, Aizen, Ichimaru and Tosen travelled to Hueco Mundo and arranged an alliance with the self-proclaimed god king of Hueco Mundo, Barragan Luisenbarn. As Barragan refused, Aizen revealed all of the Hollow's minions were killed during the discussion and forces Barragan into servitude. From there, Aizen appropriates Barragan's palace Las Noches and reconstructs it in his own image, recruiting Tier Halibel and the other Arrancars that would become his Espadas.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Aizen is an extremely powerful combatant, well above many captain-level Soul Reapers. When preparing to activate the Hōgyoku, he states that despite its half-awakened state, it can be fully activated temporarily when fusing with someone with at least twice as much spirit pressure as an average captain-level Soul Reaper, referring to himself. After Aizen embedded the Hōgyoku into his body, he undergoes a series of transformations that give him extraordinary boosts in both speed and strength. There are very few who can go toe to toe with him and survive.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Originally, Aizen carried a "zanpakutō" called . Kyōka Suigetsu's Shikai ability , activated with the command , is effective if the target watches the Shikai sequence once and thus can fall under Aizen's deception any time he wishes. There are only a few means to escape the sword's influence such as touching the blade before it is activated as Gin overheard. Though unaware of that fact, in his gambit to take down Aizen, Yamamoto grabbed the blade when it pierced him and read the blade's force to distinguish Aizen. After his final evolution by the Hōgyoku, he was made immortal. It was only thanks to Ichigo's Mugetsu technique that Aizen was able to be sealed. Afterwards, Aizen finds that he no longer needs Kyōka Suigetsu itself as the weapon completely dissolves with its powers now a part of his being.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Setting up the events from the shadows, Aizen arranged for Rukia Kuchiki to meet with Ichigo Kurosaki so he can become a Soul Reaper. From there, by sending Hollows in Karakura Town to alert the Soul Society for the location to get the Hōgyoku that is concealed within her body, Aizen created an elaborate conspiracy among the Thirteen Court Squad captains by secretly killing the members of Central 46 Chambers and using his Zanpakutō to create an illusion of them and sentence Rukia to death. Gin fakes Aizen's death to have the captains and lieutenants fighting against themselves. However, Squad 4 Captain Retsu Unohana uncovered the truth, as Aizen removed the Hōgyoku from Rukia, before he, Gin and Tōsen escape into Hueco Mundo. There, Aizen prepares his goal: Using the Hōgyoku to sacrifice the souls of Karakura Town in order to create an and kill the Soul King.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: From there, Aizen begins to make several Arrancars in his service stronger using the Hōgyoku and sends some of his Espadas to the Land of the Living to gain information on Ichigo. Eventually, claiming to have an interest in her power, Aizen has Orihime Inoue brought to Las Noches on the notion that he needs her to save the powers of the deteriorating Hōgyoku. However, sacrificing the weakest members of the Espadas in the process, Aizen revealed the kidnapping as a distraction for Ichigo and as part of a scheme to cut the Soul Society's forces in half by the time he enacts his attack on Karakura Town. Though he came with three of his strongest Espadas, the defeat of Staark and Baraggan convinces Aizen that he has surpassed his own minions and strikes Halibel down to deal with the opposition personally. When confronted by Ichigo, who is the only person not affected by his Zanpakutō, Aizen reveals his role in the youth's life and struggles since meeting Rukia. Aizen then almost reveals Ichigo's lineage when Isshin intervened to take over the fight. Aizen reveals that he absorbed the Hōgyoku as it grants his desire for a Hollow-like form to easily defeat his enemies.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Aizen makes his way to the Soul Society so that he can create the Ōken, finding Ichigo's school friends and deciding to kill them first before enacting his goal. Aizen is wounded by Gin, who reveals he tricked Aizen by pretending to be his right-hand man until the time was ideal to betray him. However, his will to survive answered by the Hōgyoku, Aizen evolves into another form and mortally wounds Gin as Ichigo arrives. Though expecting him not to be a threat due to his sudden lack of spirit energy, Aizen finds himself overwhelmed by Ichigo's newly enhanced physical strength. Though his fear caused the Hōgyoku to turn him into a Hollow-like monster, Aizen barely survived Ichigo's final attack as he evolved once more to the point that he became immortal. However, Ichigo's attack weakened and defeated Aizen to the point that the Hōgyoku no longer acknowledges him as he is reverted to his human form while engulfed in a specially made "kidō" "Seal" that Urahara planted on him. Ten days later, numerous seals placed on his body to render him immobile and to keep his now vast reiatsu around his body, Aizen is sentenced by Central 46 to 18,800 years of imprisonment in the lowest underground prison, the 8th prison known as "Muken". Aizen's arrogance towards the matter results with him being gagged as the final seals are added and the sentence escalated to 20,000 years.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Later, when the Wandenreich invade the Soul Society, asks Aizen to join up with them, but he refuses and delays the time sufficiently in conversation and he is forced to retreat. During the second invasion by the Wandenreich, with the Soul King's Palace breached, Aizen is visited by the new Head-Captain Shunsui Kyōraku. Initially believing Aizen is being responsive, entrusted with the keys to unlock the seals, Shunsui claims to have three as he unseals the gag so Aizen can speak. However, this act of kindness allows Aizen to remove the other seals on his own with the exception of the last two. Once freed, Aizen accompanies Shunsui to the Seireitei where his power is needed as Yhwach reached the Soul King's chambers and killed the deity while taking his powers for his own. Despite the other Soul Reapers flustered by Shunsui freeing him after what he put them through, Aizen uses his powers to destroy the shadowy creatures that Yhwach produced from his body, before creating a path to the Soul King's Palace. Aizen confronts Yhwach, playing a role in the final battle when he nearly gets himself killed using his Kyoka Suigetsu illusion to give Ichigo an opening to fatally wound Yhwach. In the end, hearing Yhwach's dying words following his defeat at Ichigo's hands, Aizen willingly returns to his cell.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Ten years later, Aizen senses that the last remnants of Yhwach's Reiatsu have disappeared completely. He recalls Yhwach's final words about how his defeat meant the continuation of death and the fear accompanying it, remarking that the world Yhwach wanted would be a failed paradise. He states to create such a world would result in one which would be without hope. He remarks while people could go through life simply living, it does not compare to courageous individuals like Ichigo, who is willing to face death and cut through fate without fear.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Aizen appears in video games for the series, the most recent ones with him in his post-Soul Society outfit. He also has his own Bleach Beat Collection, a brief CD of character image songs. The tracks are Shinsen. In 2021, Kubo made an illustration of Aizen to promote the "Loki" television series, drawn in a similar pose to the ephonymous character in a show's poster to emphasize the similarities in their traitorous and conniving personalities.


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Charles White of IGN commented that the plot twist in the story and the truth about Aizen was "fascinating and interesting", but also criticized it, saying his Zanpakuto's power was "far-fetched" and overpowered, and Aizen did not have any flaws and that his betrayal was "too planned out to [be] believ[able]". Despite this, the change in mood accompanying Aizen's revelation as a villain was also praised; White praised the animators' job at "giving his face this evil thing about it" without changing anything about the animation itself, citing that "the Aizen that we first knew was the nicest guy ever, he looked it, and now this Aizen actually looks like the most evil jerk we've ever seen". Carl Kimlinger from Anime News Network comments that Aizen's revelation as an antagonist is "brutally unpredictable". He notes the violence from that part to be frustrating but in the same time satisfying, praising the large number of revelations. Aizen was additionally noted to have a remarkable development in his introduction as a villain with Kimlinger wondering "If only all villain grandstandings were so thrilling". Theron Martin from the same site noted that this scene makes the anime deserve credits for "one of the biggest 'I am a total bastard' moments in anime history". Mania Entertainment's Bryce Coulter noted that such episode "makes you [viewers] want to hate Aizen" due to how he controlled the character's actions in previous episodes and how he now easily defeats most of them. Aizen's English voice actor, Kyle Hebert, describes Aizen as a "mysterious, calm, cool character"" and that gives an air of "where does this guy come from?".


title: Sōsuke Aizen

text: Nik Freeman of Anime News Network tried to summarize why "Bleach"s popularity declined between 2005 and 2015 from one of the most popular shonen series to "a shell of its former self that subsists on the memory of its glory days". Freeman's main thesis involving Aizen's declining popularity because of how Kubo changed his characterization within the series. The reviewer affirmed Aizen was the most important character on the series for most fans even surpassing Ichigo's influence. Initially a character that had "an excellent balance between being cool as hell and incredibly detestable", Aizen eventually "stopped bothering to devise clever schemes and instead relied purely on his own immense strength to get the job done. In other words, Aizen lost all the qualities that captivated fans when he first revealed himself as the villain." More positive was Carlo Santos from the same site who believed Aizen's character had grown "deliciously cruel" and that his ability to match the entirety of Soul Society via constantly-shifting technique made his battles "impossible to be bored with". Santos considered the battle between Aizen and Ichigo which ended Aizen's tenure as series villain a "predictable yet satisfying" scene which represented, for Tite Kubo, the culmination of many years of development as an artist. He felt, however, that after the years of buildup of Aizen as the villain, his defeat may have been too swift. Freeman was even more negative on the ending of Aizen's position as the series' main villain. He wrote that "when Aizen was defeated, the story felt finished" and that "a ton of people stopped reading at that point, even though it was widely known that the series would be continuing anyway". As part of 2018's April Fools, a joke was made by "Shonen Jump" stating Aizen took over the manga magazine.


title: Cupcake

text: A cupcake (also British English: fairy cake; Hiberno-English: bun) is a small cake designed to serve one person, which may be baked in a small thin paper or aluminum cup. As with larger cakes, frosting and other cake decorations such as fruit and candy may be applied.


title: Cupcake

text: The earliest extant description of what is now often called a cupcake was in 1796, when a recipe for "a light cake to bake in small cups" was written in "American Cookery" by Amelia Simmons. The earliest extant documentation of the term "cupcake" itself was in "Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats" in 1828 in Eliza Leslie's "Receipts" cookbook.


title: Cupcake

text: In the early 19th century, there were two different uses for the term "cup cake" or "cupcake". In previous centuries, before muffin tins were widely available, the cakes were often baked in individual pottery cups, ramekins, or molds and took their name from the cups they were baked in. This is the use of the name that has remained, and the name of "cupcake" is now given to any small, round cake that is about the size of a teacup. While English fairy cakes vary in size more than American cupcake, they are traditionally smaller and are rarely topped with elaborate frosting.


title: Cupcake

text: The other kind of "cup cake" referred to a cake whose ingredients were measured by volume, using a standard-sized cup, instead of being weighed. Recipes whose ingredients were measured using a standard-sized cup could also be baked in cups; however, they were more commonly baked in tins as layers or loaves. In later years, when the use of volume measurements was firmly established in home kitchens, these recipes became known as "1234 cakes" or "quarter cakes", so called because they are made up of four ingredients: one cup of butter, two cups of sugar, three cups of flour, and four eggs. They are plain yellow cakes, somewhat less rich and less expensive than pound cake, due to using about half as much butter and eggs compared to pound cake.


title: Cupcake

text: The names of these two major classes of cakes were intended to signal the method to the baker; "cup cake" uses a volume measurement, and "pound cake" uses a weight measurement.


title: Cupcake

text: A standard cupcake uses the same basic ingredients as standard-sized cakes: butter, sugar, eggs, and flour. Nearly any recipe that is suitable for a layer cake can be used to bake cupcakes. The cake batter used for cupcakes may be flavored or have other ingredients stirred in, such as raisins, berries, nuts, or chocolate chips.


title: Cupcake

text: Because their small size is more efficient for heat conduction, cupcakes bake much faster than a normal layered cake. During baking, the volume of the batter initially increases due to the production of carbon dioxide, then decreases upon cooling due to the release of leavening gases.


title: Cupcake

text: Cupcakes may be topped with frosting or other cake decorations. Elaborately decorated cupcakes may be made for special occasions.


title: Cupcake

text: They may be filled with frosting, fruit, or pastry cream. For bakers making a small number of filled cupcakes, this is usually accomplished by using a spoon or knife to scoop a small hole in the top of the cupcake. Another method is to just insert the pastry bag in the middle of the cupcake. In commercial bakeries, the filling may be injected using a syringe.


title: Cupcake

text: Originally, cupcakes were baked in heavy pottery cups. Some bakers still use individual ramekins, small coffee mugs, large tea cups, or other small ovenproof pottery-type dishes for baking cupcakes.


title: Cupcake

text: Cupcakes are usually baked in muffin tins. These pans are most often made from metal, with or without a non-stick surface, and generally have six or twelve depressions or "cups". They may also be made from stoneware, silicone rubber, or other materials. A standard size cup is in diameter and holds about , although pans for both miniature and jumbo size cupcakes exist. Specialty pans may offer many different sizes and shapes.


title: Cupcake

text: Individual patty cases, or cupcake liners, may be used in baking. These are typically round sheets of thin paper pressed into a round, fluted cup shape. Liners can facilitate the easy removal of the cupcake from the tin after baking, keep the cupcake more moist, and reduce the effort needed to clean the pan. The use of liners is also considered a more sanitary option when cupcakes are being passed from hand to hand. Like cupcake pans, several sizes of paper liners are available, from miniature to jumbo.


title: Cupcake

text: In addition to paper, cupcake liners may be made from very thin aluminum foil or, in a non-disposable version, silicone rubber. Because they can stand up on their own, foil and silicone liners can also be used on a flat baking sheet, which makes them popular among people who do not have a specialized muffin tin. Some of the largest paper liners are not fluted and are made out of thicker paper, often rolled at the top edge for additional strength, so that they can also stand independently for baking without a cupcake tin. Some bakers use two or three thin paper liners, nested together, to simulate the strength of a single foil cup.


title: Cupcake

text: Liners, which are also called "paper cases", come in a variety of sizes. Slightly different sizes are considered "standard" in different countries. Miniature cases are commonly in diameter at the base and tall. Standard-size cases range from in diameter at the base and are tall. Australian and Swedish bakers are accustomed to taller paper cases with a larger diameter at the top than American and British bakers.


title: Cupcake

text: In the early 21st century, a trend for cupcake shops, which are specialized bakeries that sell little or nothing except cupcakes, developed in the United States, playing off of the sense of nostalgia evoked by the cakes. In New York City, cupcake shops like Magnolia Bakery gained publicity in their appearances on popular television shows like HBO's "Sex and the City".


title: Cupcake

text: Crumbs Bake Shop, a publicly traded business running the largest cupcake shop chain in the U.S., reached its peak stock price in 2011. Declining sales, due to competition from locally owned mom-and-pop specialty stores as well as increased competition from grocery stores, caused a sharp decline in the company's prospects and stock price in 2013.


title: Cupcake

text: Georgetown Cupcake was the first cupcakery to open in Washington, D.C. The cupcake shop gained widespread publicity after the 2010 premier of TLC's "DC Cupcakes", a six-part reality show about the shop and its owners, sisters Sophie LaMontagne and Katherine Kallinis.


title: Cupcake

text: Based in Beverly Hills, California, Sprinkles Cupcakes is owned by Candace Nelson, who is also a star judge on the Food Network's "Cupcake Wars", and her husband, Charles Nelson. Sprinkles is the first cupcake shop to debut a cupcake ATM, which could hold up to 350 cupcakes at one time.


title: Cupcake

text: Cupcake kits are kits which provide a set of parts needed to allow an amateur baker to produce a themed batch of cupcakes, often to tie in with themed parties. Examples of themes include princess, pirate, fairies and dinosaurs. Typically kits include appropriately decorated cupcake cases and cupcake toppers but some kits are available which also include the ingredients needed for baking. Cupcake kits were introduced in 2008 or 2009 and continue to be popular items in kitchenware stores.


title: The Vast of Night

text: The Vast of Night is a 2019 American science fiction mystery film directed by Andrew Patterson. It was co-produced and written by Patterson (under the pseudonym James Montague) and Craig W. Sanger. The story takes place in 1950s New Mexico and is loosely based on the Kecksburg UFO incident and Foss Lake disappearances. The film follows young switchboard operator Fay Crocker (Sierra McCormick) and radio disc jockey Everett Sloan (Jake Horowitz) as they discover a mysterious audio frequency that could be extraterrestrial in origin.


title: The Vast of Night

text: "The Vast of Night" premiered at the Slamdance Film Festival in January 2019. Amazon Studios acquired the distribution rights and released it on May 29, 2020 in drive-in theaters in the United States and via video-on-demand on Amazon Prime Video. The film received critical acclaim from critics, who particularly praised the direction, cinematography, and historical authenticity, as well as the performances of McCormick and Horowitz. At the 1st Critics' Choice Super Awards in 2021, the film received three nominations and several other accolades.


title: The Vast of Night

text: In 1950s Cayuga, New Mexico, teenage disc jockey Everett helps prepare for a high school basketball game. He and his friend Fay test out her new tape recorder, and Everett walks her to her job as a switchboard operator before starting his own night shift at the WOTW radio station. Fay listens to Everett's show, which is interrupted by a mysterious audio signal. Fielding calls about a strange wind-like phenomenon from the sky, she hears the same signal over the phone line; her connections drop when she calls friends about the signal. Fay calls Everett, who asks his listeners for information about the signal, which he broadcasts on the air.


title: The Vast of Night

text: A man named Billy calls, and Everett broadcasts him live. Billy explains that he served in the military and was flown to a highly secretive location in the desert. Warned that telling anyone about the classified project would "endanger America", he and the other personnel built a large underground bunker to house an enormous unknown object. Flying away from the facility, he heard the same unexplained signal on the plane's radio. Billy developed a lung condition that he believes was caused by his time in the desert and learned of other instances of the military burying similar cargo in secret locations, where the same signal was heard. He explains that the sound appears to be a communication signal, sometimes transmitted higher than any man-made object could fly.


title: The Vast of Night

text: The call is briefly disconnected, but Billy calls back and reveals that he and the other personnel chosen for these projects were all black or Mexican, to ensure they were less likely to be believed by the public. A friend of his managed to record the signal and sent copies to Billy and others who worked on the projects; one tape was given to a member of the Air Force in Cayuga, now deceased. Fay realizes that his tapes were given to the local library and steals them. Billy is disconnected, and Everett and Fay find the recording of the signal and broadcast it, but the radio station's power is knocked out. They race to the switchboard office, where Fay receives numerous reports of "something in the sky", and they meet Gerald and Bertsie, who have been driving in pursuit of the same unidentified flying object. An elderly woman named Mabel calls and offers to provide more information about the signal.


title: The Vast of Night

text: Everett and Fay go to Mabel's home, where they find her reciting a message in an unknown language. With Everett recording their conversation, Mabel claims that the phenomena seen across town are spaceships, piloted by aliens who use their message to hypnotize and abduct humans. She believes the aliens will target isolated people while most of the town is at the basketball game and suspects the aliens are responsible for sowing conflict in humanity, from alcoholism to war. Mabel asks to be taken to the alien ship to reunite with her son, who was abducted years ago. Unconvinced, Everett leaves with Fay, who collects her baby sister Maddie. They are soon picked up by Gerald and Bertsie. Everett plays the recording of Mabel reciting the alien message, sending Gerald and Bertsie into a trance and nearly causing them to crash. After the eerie incident, Everett and Fay panic and flee with Maddie into the woods.


title: The Vast of Night

text: Making their way through the woods, they find trees and branches that have been charred, and spot a large opening overhead as though an object has crashed through. Everett cautiously acknowledges the aliens are real and may be lurking nearby, which sends him and Fay running until they come to a clearing. The two take a moment to catch their breath, but they see the truth when they lay eyes on a flying saucer hovering nearby. They watch in awe as the spacecraft rejoins a massive mothership in the sky, and the wind begins swirling around them. Elsewhere the crowd leaves the basketball game, but Everett, Fay, and Maddie are gone. Only their footprints and tape recorder remain.


title: The Vast of Night

text: According to the director Andrew Patterson, the film came out of one of the ideas he had in the previous decade, which simply said: "1950s black and white. New Mexico, UFO landing." Patterson wrote the script with Craig W. Sanger, although he registered the script with the WGA under the pseudonym James Montague, who is also listed as the producer. Patterson also financed the film himself with earnings from his work producing commercials and shorts for the Oklahoma City Thunder and others. It was filmed in three to four weeks at a cost of $700,000.


title: The Vast of Night

text: The film was shot mostly in Whitney, Texas, during the fall of 2016, starting in September. The town was selected after looking through many towns to find one with the right gymnasium. In order to get the period details correct, the production team removed the three-point line of the basketball court in the gym at a cost of $20,000, and they found functional switchboards which were used at that time. The cinematographer for the film was M.I. Littin-Menz. Patterson spent a year editing the film.


title: The Vast of Night

text: The film premiered at the 2019 Slamdance Film Festival and went on to screen at several other film festivals. Amazon Studios acquired the movie in September 2019, and the trailer was released on February 6, 2020. The film was released in drive-in cinemas nationally on May 15, 2020, and on Amazon Prime on May 29.


title: The Vast of Night

text: On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The site's critics consensus reads: "An engrossing sci-fi thriller that transcends its period trappings, "The Vast of Night" suggests great things for debuting director Andrew Patterson." Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 84 out of 100, based on 35 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".


title: The Vast of Night

text: David Fear of "Rolling Stone" called the film an "ingenious debut from director Andrew Patterson." Katie Rife of "The A.V. Club" wrote that it "manages to be eerie and compelling" and "despite its intergalactic scope, this is an intimate, character-driven film." Amy Taubin of "Film Comment" called it "a display of visionary moviemaking intelligence," comparing it to first features by directors such as Richard Kelly and Christopher Nolan. Meg Shields of Film School Rejects commended the sound design as "inescapable and essential" and M.I. Littin-Menz's camerawork as "simply amazing." "Variety"s Amy Nicholson praised the film as charming and inventive, writing, "At the midpoint, Patterson wows with a tracking shot that seems to race a half-mile down a quiet street, take a left-hook through a parking lot, sprint through an ongoing basketball game, and zip up the crowded bleachers before plunging out of a window. It's effective razzle-dazzle that will probably get the young Oklahoman hired to make something 20 times "The Vast of Night"s budget. Yet, the ambition behind it is just as impressive — as is the crew’s creativity at spinning financial limitations into magic."


title: The Vast of Night

text: Writing for IndieWire, Ryan Lattanzio stated that "None of this would work without Horowitz and McCormick’s performances, which already feel iconic." In Forbes, Christopher Orr wrote, "Patterson’s young leads, McCormick and Horowitz, are both exceptional, the former offering an indelible portrait of the intrepid good-girl, and the latter recalling a young Christian Slater with his mesmerizing patter, half-cool, half-nerd." Josh Weiss, also writing in Forbes, said "The Vast of Night might have collapsed under the weight of its own ambitions, had it not been for its two electrifying leads. Horowitz is an absolute revelation, especially since this is his first time as a leading cast member. He brings Everett, who always seems to have a cigarette dangling from his lips, to vivid life with a boatload of charisma and an unparalleled sense of cool that channels American’ Graffiti’s John Milner or Dazed and Confused’s David Wooderson." Jacob Oller of "Paste" listed the performance of McCormick on "The 10 Breakout Film Performances of the Year", where they particularly praised her work in "the ten-minute scene, done in a single take, involving McCormick operating a switchboard trying to find out what has gone wrong in the sci-fi film’s desert town... It’s just McCormick out there, exposed, carrying the film for an unbroken ten minutes. It’s Olympic-level acting and she nails it, finding the exact tempo with which to pace her escalating concern."


title: The Vast of Night

text: At the 2019 Slamdance Film Festival, it won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature. At the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, it was named first runner-up for the in the Midnight Madness category. It won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2019 Overlook Film Festival and a Special Cinematography Award at the 2019 Hamptons International Film Festival, and was nominated for Best First Screenplay at the Independent Spirit Awards and Best International Feature film at the 2019 Edinburgh International Film Festival. At the 2021 Critics' Choice Super Awards, it received three nominations for Best Science Fiction/Fantasy Movie, and Best Actor and Actress in a Science Fiction/Fantasy Movie for Horowitz and McCormick, respectively.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Shane Wright (born January 5, 2004) is a Canadian professional ice hockey centre for the Seattle Kraken of the National Hockey League (NHL). Projected as a potential first overall pick throughout the 2021–22 NHL season, Wright was drafted fourth overall in the 2022 NHL Entry Draft by the Kraken.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Internationally, Wright won gold as a member of Team Canada at the 2021 IIHF World U18 Championships.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Wright was granted exceptional player status for the 2019–20 season, becoming the sixth player to be granted exceptional status. The preceding five players were John Tavares, Aaron Ekblad, Connor McDavid, Sean Day and Joe Veleno.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Wright was drafted by the Kingston Frontenacs with the first overall selection in the 2019 OHL Priority Selection. On September 20, 2019, Wright made his OHL debut at the age of 15, as he was held to no points in a 4–1 loss to the Oshawa Generals. One week later, on September 27, Wright scored the first OHL goal in his career against Andrew MacLean of the Oshawa Generals in a 4–1 loss. On October 4, Wright had his first career multi-point game in his OHL career, scoring a goal and adding an assist in an 8–4 loss to the Niagara IceDogs. Wright recorded his first multi-goal game on October 11, as he scored twice, including the overtime winning goal, in a 4–3 victory over the Niagara IceDogs. On December 30, the Frontenacs named Wright an alternate captain of the team, as he became the youngest team captain in CHL history. On February 29, Wright recorded his first career OHL hat trick, as he scored three goals and added an assist for a career-high four points in a game in a 6–1 win over the Flint Firebirds. Wright finished the 2019–20 season with 39 goals and 66 points in 58 games. Wright was named the winner of the Emms Family Award for OHL Rookie of the Year.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020–21 season was cancelled, leaving Wright without a league to play in. His only competitive hockey in that span was an appearance at the 2021 IIHF World U18 Championships.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Wright returned to the Frontenacs for the 2021–22 season. On October 8, 2021, he was named captain of the team, making him the youngest captain in OHL history. Expectations were high based on his rookie season, his performance internationally, and his presumptive status as the first overall pick in the NHL draft, but the season began with only 22 points in 19 games in his first two months. Many attributed this in part to the loss of the prior OHL season. However, he was widely credited with taking major strides in performance for the remainder. Wright finished the regular season with 32 goals and 62 assists, the former less than in his debut season, the latter a significant increase. The Frontenacs qualified for the OHL playoffs, and faced the Oshawa Generals in the first round. Wright scored the series-winning goal in overtime of Game 6 to eliminate the Generals and advance to the second round. The Frontenacs were eliminated by the North Bay Battalion in the second round, concluding his season.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Considered the presumptive first overall pick in the 2022 NHL Entry Draft at the start of the season, Wright's status began to be called into question by the midpoint of the 2021–22 season, with many scouts saying that he had "left the door open for someone to unseat him." As the draft approached, debate largely focused on the merits of Wright versus Slovak winger Juraj Slafkovský of Liiga's TPS. The first overall pick was won by the Montreal Canadiens, whose general manager, Kent Hughes, confirmed days before the draft that the choice was between Wright, Slafkovský, and Logan Cooley of the USNTDP. Ultimately the Canadiens used the first overall pick to select Slafkovský, the New Jersey Devils selected Šimon Nemec second and the Arizona Coyotes selected Cooley third, giving Seattle the opportunity to draft Wright with the fourth overall pick. He remarked afterward that he was "definitely gonna have a chip on my shoulder" as to being passed over by the first three teams.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: On July 13, 2022, Wright signed a three-year entry level contract with the Kraken worth $2.85 million over three years. Kraken general manager Ron Francis stated that he believed Wright would likely play the season with the Kraken. He played 6:14 in his NHL debut on October 12 in a 5–4 overtime loss to the Anaheim Ducks. Following his debut, Wright was a healthy scratch for the following two games before returning to the lineup on October 17. He recorded his first NHL point, an assist, in an October 19 overtime loss to the St. Louis Blues. As October concluded, coach Dave Hakstol's usage of Wright became a major source of debate in the media and among fans, as he was frequently scratched and being played for less than seven minutes per game on average when allowed into the lineup. Following five straight games as a healthy scratch, the Kraken exploited a loophole in league rules to send Wright to their American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, the Coachella Valley Firebirds, on a conditioning stint. This bypassed the requirement Wright be returned to major junior. After scoring four goals in five AHL games, he returned to the Kraken lineup on December 6, scoring his first career NHL goal in a 4–2 loss against the Canadiens, a result widely called "poetic."


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Wright made his international debut with Team Canada's U18 roster at the 2021 IIHF World U18 Championships, finishing second in the tournament scoring race and scoring two goals in the final against Team Russia to help win the gold medal. Later in the year he was selected for the national U20 team for the 2022 World Junior Championships, but was only able to play two games before the tournament was cancelled due to the Omicron variant. Wright expressed "shock and disappointment". Wright did not play in the rescheduled event, held in August 2022.


title: Shane Wright (ice hockey)

text: Wright was loaned by the Seattle Kraken to Team Canada in advance of the 2023 World Junior Championships in Moncton and Halifax. On December 18, he was named captain of the team for the tournament, which he called a "true honour."


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The Falmer Stadium, known for sponsorship purposes as the American Express Community Stadium and also referred to as the Amex, is a football stadium in the village of Falmer, in the City of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex. With a capacity of 31,800, it is the second largest stadium in all of South East England, and the 31st largest stadium in the United Kingdom.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: It serves as the home of Premier League club Brighton & Hove Albion, and was handed over from the developers to the club on 31 May 2011. The first competitive game played at the stadium was the 2010–11 season final of the Sussex Senior Cup between Brighton and Eastbourne Borough on 16 July 2011. The first league game was against Doncaster Rovers, who were also the opponents in the last game played at Brighton's former stadium, the Goldstone Ground, 14 years earlier.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: Falmer Stadium hosted Premier League football for the first time in August 2017, following Albion's promotion at the end of the 2016–17 season.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium was designed to allow hosting for other sports and events. It hosted some matches from the 2015 Rugby World Cup and the UEFA Women's Euro 2022.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The plans were initiated by Brighton & Hove Albion after the club's previous home, the Goldstone Ground, was sold by the club's former board (consisting of Greg Stanley, Bill Archer and David Bellotti) to developers in 1995 with no new home arranged.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: When the club was evicted at the end of the 1996–1997 season, it groundshared for two seasons at Gillingham's Priestfield Stadium, 50 miles away in Kent.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: Two years later, the club returned to Brighton as tenants of Withdean Stadium, which was upgraded to Football League capacity requirements and later expanded when Brighton reached Division One (now the EFL Championship) in 2002 following two successive promotions.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The site at Falmer was identified during the 1998–99 season and it was hoped that the stadium would be ready in the early to mid-2000s. However, subsequent delays in gaining planning permission meant that the club would have to wait until August 2011 before being able to play their home games there – more than a decade after the stadium was first proposed.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: Planning permission was given by the unitary authority of Brighton and Hove City Council in June 2002, with the intention of the stadium being ready for the 2005–06 season. The plans for the stadium were opposed by neighbouring Lewes District Council and local residents. While the stadium lies completely within Brighton and Hove, part of the north-east of the site is in Lewes. Bennet's Field, as it is known, is now used for parking.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: Further complications were due to both vacant fields, and the campus of the adjacent University of Sussex, being included in the South Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, although outside the National Park. This led to the designation of the stadium plans being the subject of a separate planning inquiry by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: John Prescott, then Deputy Prime Minister, approved the plans on 28 October 2005. However, Lewes District Council immediately mounted a new legal challenge to the stadium plan. In April 2006, Prescott admitted that he had given his approval based on the misconception that only a small part of the stadium site lay on the Lewes side, and withdrew it.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: Hazel Blears, the Secretary of State responsible for planning, re-affirmed the approval on 25 July 2007. Her decision went against the advice of planning inspectors. Lewes District Council, Falmer Parish Council and the South Downs Joint Committee (the three main opponents) announced shortly afterwards that they would not mount a High Court challenge. On 4 September 2007, the deadline for appealing the new grant of permission expired and the club received full permission to proceed.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: On 27 November 2008, the Buckingham Group signed the construction contract for the new stadium and began preparation work on the site on 17 December. The stadium is set three storeys down into the ground. 138,000 cubic metres of chalk was excavated during its construction, which was put on the field on the south side of Village Way. This has been estimated to prevent 22,000 lorry trips taking the chalk to off-site landfill.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: Construction at the site started on 17 December 2008 and finished in May 2011. The stadium was designed with scope for expansion, and plans were put in place to increase the capacity.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium was designed by London-based architects, KSS. The stadium capacity has been expanded, with an extra seating tier being installed above the East Stand (Family stand), which increases the capacity to about 30,000 seats. The deal with American Express Europe, Brighton and Hove's biggest private-sector employer, confirming the stadium's naming rights was announced on 22 June 2010.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium officially opened on 30 July 2011, hosting a friendly match against then-Brighton manager Gus Poyet's old club Tottenham Hotspur, the home-side narrowly losing 3–2. The first competitive match was held on 6 August 2011, when Brighton beat Doncaster Rovers 2–1, after being 1–0 down.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium set its first record attendance with 21,897 against Liverpool. They were also the first away team to win a competitive match at the stadium, beating Brighton 2–1 in a League Cup tie in September 2011. The stadium witnessed its first league defeat in its history when rival side Crystal Palace came from behind to win 3-1.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium uses hawks to scare away seagulls and pigeons. This stops pigeons nesting in the stadium.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: On 2 January 2012, Brighton & Hove Albion submitted an application to Brighton and Hove City council to increase the stadium capacity by a further 8,000 seats as well as to add additional corporate boxes, new television facilities and a luxury suite. This was granted unanimously by Brighton & Hove City Council's planning committee on 25 April 2012. The stadium was expanded to 27,250 by the start of the 2012–13 season, 27,750 by December 2012 and stood at 30,750 by the end of the 2012–13 season.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: A new record attendance was set on 15 December 2012 when 26,684 saw Brighton draw 0–0 with Nottingham Forest. This record attendance was broken on 26 January 2013, when 27,113 attended a 3-2 defeat against Arsenal in the fourth round of the FA Cup Less than two months later and the record was broken again; this time 28,499 people watched Brighton beat Crystal Palace 3–0 on 17 March 2013. This record was broken once again on 4 May 2013, on the last league game of the season against Wolverhampton Wanderers, 30,003 attended the game. This figure was beaten on 25 January 2015, when Arsenal visited in the FA Cup fourth round to once again win 3–2, in front of an attendance of 30,278. Another new attendance record of 30,292 came on 2 May 2016, when Derby County visited in the last home game of the 2015–16 season. A few weeks later this record was broken again when Brighton and Hove Albion played Sheffield Wednesday in the second leg of the play-offs. The record was broken once again on 24 September 2017 when 30,468 attended Brighton's 1–0 win over Newcastle United. The current record of 31,637 was set at a Premier League match against Manchester United on 7 May 2022.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: On 25 March 2013, the stadium hosted England's under-21s international friendly against Austria's under-21s.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: In December 2018, it was announced that the stadium would be one of the venues for the UEFA Women's Euro 2022 tournament. On 1 June 2019, the stadium hosted the England women's international friendly against New Zealand.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium was one of the ten venues used to host matches at the UEFA Women's Euro 2022. It was used to host Group A matches, which had the hosts England, and a quarter-final, which also involved England.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium hosted two Pool B matches in the 2015 Rugby World Cup, labelled as the Brighton Community Stadium. The first match was between South Africa and Japan on 19 September 2015 where with 29,290 in attendance, Japan caused one of the biggest upsets in Rugby World Cup history by beating twice winners South Africa 34–32. The other match was between Samoa and United States with Samoa winning 25–16 with 29,178 in attendance. Before them, as a trial run pre-World Cup, the stadium hosted the England U20s vs France U20s match in the final round of the 2015 Six Nations Under 20s Championship.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: In 2019, a film was produced telling the story of the match between Japan and South Africa, called "The Brighton Miracle",


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium was also nominated by Premiership Rugby as the potential home semi final location for Wasps in the 2014-15 European Champions Cup. Defeat in the quarter final vs Toulon however meant this did not happen.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The West Stand is a three-tiered stand, which holds 11,833 fans, including 14 luxury boxes. The East Stand (including the Family Stand and the premium fans' 1901 Club) holds 13,654 fans, with 10% reserved for away fans during cup games. The North Stand has 2,688 seats. The South Stand, is for visiting away supporters which contains 2,575 seats.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: As well as football matches, the stadium is also designed for other sports such as rugby and hockey, and music concerts, conferences and exhibitions. The stadium's drinking outlets offer real ales from two local breweries, Harvey's and Dark Star, both of which supported the club's appeal for a new stadium at Falmer, along with special guest beers from breweries local to the away teams.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium also incorporates a banqueting and conference facility, a nursery school/crèche, 720 square metres of teaching space for the University of Brighton, 1,200 square metres of office space for the University of Sussex, the club shop for tickets and merchandise and above it the 200 capacity bar/lounge named Dick's Bar after the club's life president, Dick Knight.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The stadium is close to the A27 Brighton by-pass, linking it northbound to the A23 and M23 motorway towards London and southbound to the A270 and the city centre. There is pre-paid parking available for 2000 cars on the University of Sussex and the Falmer Academy sites. The club runs several park and ride services to the stadium. One of these is at Mill Road situated at the A23/A27 intersection, which holds 500 cars. Another is at Brighton Racecourse, holding approximately 700 cars. The third site is at the University of Brighton's Mithras House on the Lewes Road, holding about 300 cars (this is currently closed). Match tickets include free travel to the stadium by train (from stations as far as Worthing, Haywards Heath, Seaford and Eastbourne), bus, and park and ride. Falmer railway station is next to the stadium; it is a nine-minute journey from Brighton railway station and seven minutes from Lewes railway station, both of which are served by trains from London.


title: Falmer Stadium

text: The site also includes: a new link road from the A270 skirting the southern edge of Stanmer Park to the Sussex campus; a new high capacity footbridge over the railway at Falmer station; a transport interchange/coach park to the south of the stadium across Village Way; a 1,000-space car park at Brighton Aldridge Community Academy; alterations to the A27/A270 road junction, including a new flyover; a combined footpath/cycleway; a 150-space car park for club officials, players and disabled drivers; 220 cycle spaces.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Tales from Topographic Oceans is the sixth studio album by English progressive rock band Yes, released on 7 December 1973 by Atlantic Records. It is their first studio album to feature drummer Alan White, who had replaced Bill Bruford in the previous year. Frontman Jon Anderson devised its concept during the Close to the Edge Tour, when he read a footnote in "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Paramahansa Yogananda that describes four bodies of Hindu texts about a specific field of knowledge, collectively named shastras–śruti, smriti, puranas, and tantras. After pitching the idea to guitarist Steve Howe, the pair spent the rest of the tour developing an outline of the album's musical themes and lyrics.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Rehearsals lasted for two months in London, during which the band decided to produce a double album containing four side-long tracks based on each text, ranging between 18 and 21 minutes. Keyboardist Rick Wakeman was critical of the concept and felt unable to contribute to the more experimental music that was being produced to fit a double album, and distanced himself from the group. Yes decided against recording in the countryside in order to use Britain's first 24-track machine at Morgan Studios, where they decorated the studio to resemble a farm. Roger Dean incorporated suggestions from the band into the album's cover art, which inspired his designs for the stage used on its tour.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: "Tales from Topographic Oceans" received mixed reviews upon release and became a symbol of the perceived excesses of the progressive rock, but earned a more positive reception in later years. It was a commercial success, becoming the first UK album to be certified Gold based solely on pre-orders, and spent two weeks at number one. In the US it peaked at number 6, where it was certified gold in 1974 for surpassing 500,000 copies. Yes toured the album for five months across Europe and North America, the first half of which featured the entire album performed live. Wakeman, who was against playing the whole album, quit the band at its conclusion to continue his solo career. In 2003, the album was remastered with previously unreleased tracks, and an edition with new stereo and 5.1 surround sound mixes by Steven Wilson, with additional bonus tracks, followed in 2016.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: By 1973, Yes had stabilised with a line-up of frontman and lead vocalist Jon Anderson, bassist Chris Squire, guitarist Steve Howe, keyboardist Rick Wakeman, and drummer Alan White, who had replaced original drummer Bill Bruford in the previous year. Their fifth album, "Close to the Edge" (1972), was released to commercial and critical acclaim, and the band toured worldwide to support the album between July 1972 and April 1973.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Anderson had begun searching for ideas for their next album during this time, one of which involved a "large-scale composition" as the group were writing successful longform pieces, including the 18-minute "Close to the Edge". While in his hotel room in Tokyo during the Japanese tour in March 1973, Anderson found himself "caught up in a lengthy footnote" in "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Paramahansa Yogananda which outlines four bodies of Hindu texts named shastras. Yogananda described them as "comprehensive treatises [that cover] every aspect of religious and social life, and the fields of law, medicine, architecture, art..." that "convey profound truths under a veil of detailed symbolism". Anderson "became engrossed" with the idea of a "four-part epic" concept album based on the four texts, though he later admitted that he only had a basic understanding of them. King Crimson drummer and percussionist Jamie Muir recommended Yogananda's book to Anderson at Bruford's wedding reception earlier in the month. Anderson said of Muir: "I felt I had to learn from him. We started talking about meditation in music—not the guru type but some really heavy stuff." Anderson gained further clarification of the texts from talking to Vera Stanley Alder, a mystic, painter, and author of spirituality books that had a profound influence on him. The 1973 BBC documentary series "The Ascent of Man" also gave Anderson "a lot to think about", and was influenced by host Jacob Bronowski's explanations of Earth, the solar system, and human "knowledge and truth".


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Yes moved on to Australia and the US in March and April 1973, during which Anderson pitched his idea to Howe, a prolific songwriter and arranger in the group, who took an interest in building on Anderson's concept. The pair held writing sessions in their hotel rooms lit by candlelight, exchanging musical and lyrical ideas. Howe recalled: "Jon would say to me, 'What have you got that's a bit like that...?' so I'd play him something and he'd go: 'that's great. Have you got anything else?' and I'd play him another tune". One riff that Howe played was initially discarded, but it was later incorporated into side three as by then, the two sought for a different theme that would suit the track. Howe looked back on this time as a "golden opportunity" for Anderson and himself to "explore the outer reaches of our possibilities", and avoided predictable choruses and song structures. A six-hour session in Savannah, Georgia, that ended at 7 a.m. saw Anderson and Howe complete the outline of the album's vocals, lyrics, and instrumentation, which took the form of one track based on each of the four texts. Anderson described the night as "magical [that] left both of us exhilarated for days". Anderson and Howe presented the album's concept to the rest of the band, which was met with some uncertainty; Howe recalled: "But Jon and I did manage to sell the idea ... sometimes [we] really had to spur the guys on".


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Phil Carson, then the London Senior Vice President of Atlantic Records, remembered that, during a dinner with Anderson and Nesuhi Ertegun, Anderson was originally going to name the album "Tales from Tobographic Oceans". He claimed he had invented the word "tobographic", which he used to depict one of astronomer Fred Hoyle's theories on space. Ertegun informed Anderson that "tobographic" was similar to the word "topographic" and described its meaning, and Anderson changed the title accordingly. Wakeman jokingly nicknamed the album "Tales from Toby's Graphic Go-Kart".


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: After touring finished, Yes regrouped at Manticore Studios in Fulham, London, a former cinema bought by fellow progressive rock band Emerson, Lake & Palmer, in May 1973. They spent eight weeks rehearsing and developing Anderson and Howe's initial ideas. This resulted in four tracks, as Wakeman described: "One was about eight minutes. One was 15. One was 19 and one was 12", but the band had to decide whether to refine them to fit a single album or extend them to make a double. Howe recalled a mutual agreement to make a double, which Wakeman supported provided that the group could come up with strong enough material. Anderson had gained confidence towards a double from the success of "Yessongs", their first live album, released as a triple in May 1973 that contained almost 130 minutes of music. Wakeman described an early musical concept for "Tales from Topographic Oceans" around the time of its release, whereby its parts could be interchangeable at any time depending on the audience's reaction, thus allowing the band to perform upbeat portions back to back and skip the slower sections until a later time in the piece. The problem, however, was putting such a concept on a record.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The group agreed to make a double album but had no ideas at hand to develop, so the four tracks were fleshed out through improvisations. Wakeman disagreed with the "almost busking, free-form thinking" approach and the musical "padding" that resulted, which he thought needed further rehearsal. He felt sections resembled "avant-garde jazz rock, and I had nothing to offer". Squire recognised "a lot of substance" to the four tracks but at times they lacked strength, which resulted in an album that was varied and scattered. Despite the uncertainty, Anderson stated in the liner notes that Squire, Wakeman, and White made important contributions to the music. Anderson looked back at this time and thought the band were on the same page, but disagreements from Wakeman and producer Eddy Offord marked the end of the period of "illusive harmony" that had been in the group since "Fragile". Yes took a break roughly one month into rehearsals, during which Anderson vacated to Marrakesh with his family and wrote lyrics.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The group were split in deciding where to record; Anderson and Wakeman wanted to retreat in the countryside while Squire and Howe preferred to stay in London, leaving White, who was indifferent, as the tie-breaking vote. Anderson wanted to record at night under a tent in a forest with electrical generators buried into the ground so they would be inaudible, but "when I suggested that, they all said, 'Jon, get a life!'" Yes were joined by Offord, their engineer and producer who had worked with the band since 1970 and mixed their sound on tour. He pushed their manager, Brian Lane, to record in the country, thinking "some flowers and trees" would lessen the tension that the album was creating within the group. Yes were swayed to remain in London, but wanted to avoid the familiar surroundings of Advision Studios in Fitzrovia, so they chose to record at Morgan Studios in Willesden as it housed a 3M M79, Britain's first 24-track tape machine, which presented greater possibilities in the studio. Despite the advantage, the machine malfunctioned often and required periods of down time for repairs. Squire worked in the studio for as long as sixteen-hour days, seven days a week.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: In July 1973, Yes settled into studio 3 at Morgan for a period of ten weeks. Lane and Anderson proceeded to decorate the studio to resemble a farm; Squire believed Lane did so as a joke on Anderson as his tent idea was shut down. Anderson brought in flowers, pots of greenery, and cutout cows and sheep; white picket fences were placed around Wakeman's keyboards with amplifiers placed on stacks of hay. When Black Sabbath moved into studio 4 to record "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath", singer Ozzy Osbourne visited and recalled a model cow with electronic udders and a small barn in the corner, "like a kid's plaything." Offord remembered the cows being covered in graffiti and the plants dying halfway through recording, "that just kind of sums up that whole album". One time during recording, Anderson wanted to replicate the sound he heard while singing in the bathroom and asked lighting engineer Michael Tait to build him a three-sided tiled booth for him to sing in. Despite Tait explaining how the idea would not work, he built one using plywood and glued tiles on the inside. Sound engineer Nigel Luby recalled tiles falling off the box during takes. Wakeman distanced himself from the band as recording went on and spent most of his time drinking and playing darts in the studio bar. Osborne befriended him and remembered Wakeman was "bored out of his mind", and invited him to play the synthesizer on "Sabbra Cadabra". Wakeman would not accept money for his contribution, so the band paid him in beer. While talking to reporter Chris Welch in August 1973, Anderson dispelled rumours that no one was quitting the band, and that a difference of opinion from an unnamed member had been resolved.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Yes spent one week putting down the backing tracks for each of the four songs, after which they worked on the overdubs. Howe said a considerable amount of time was spent on both tasks, and took turns with Anderson to lead and convince the other members when they questioned if the arrangements were going to work. Anderson recalled a near-disaster situation with the finished tapes. After working through the night with Offord to complete the last mix, the pair left Morgan at dawn and Offord placed the tapes on the roof his car to find the keys. He proceeded to drive off, forgetting about the tapes. They stopped the car to find the tapes had fallen onto the road, and Anderson rushed back to save them from an oncoming bus. The tapes were unharmed from the incident. Yes had spent five months arranging, rehearsing, and recording "Tales from Topographic Oceans", and their time spent in Morgan amounted to £90,000 in studio costs.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The album contains four tracks, or "movements", as described by Anderson, that range between 18 and 21 minutes. All band members are credited for composing the music. Anderson provided a short description of how the album came together, and how its concept is expressed in a musical sense in each track, in the album's liner notes. The original LP lists Anderson and Howe as co-writers of the lyrics, but the 2003 reissue lists Squire as an additional co-author for "The Ancient" and Squire, Wakeman, and White as additional co-authors for "The Remembering".


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: "The Revealing Science of God (Dance of the Dawn)" is based on the shruti, which Yogananda described as scriptures that are "directly heard" or "revealed", in particular the Vedas. Regarding its title, Anderson said: "It's always delicate to start talking about religious things ... [it] should have just been 'The Revealing'. But I got sort of hip." The track was originally 28 minutes long, but six minutes were cut due to the time constraints of a vinyl. Anderson was inspired to open the track with voices that gradually build from listening to Gregorian chants, and used the Vietnam War as a source for its lyrics. Howe plays a Gibson ES-345, and his solos were influenced by his belief that Frank Zappa performed lengthy solos "because the audience wanted it. I was thinking at one stage, 'I'll do that. They'll love it'. The "Young Christians see it" section originated from an unused take from the "Fragile" sessions, a take from which was released as a bonus track in 2015 as "All Fighters Past". White recalled the group spent around six days mixing the track. The 2003 CD reissue of the album includes a previously unreleased two minute introduction.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: "The Remembering (High the Memory)" relates to the smriti, texts literally meaning "that which is remembered". Yogananda wrote the smritis were "written down in a remote past as the world's longest epic poems", specifically the "Mahabharata" and "Ramayana". Anderson described it as "a calm sea of music" and wanted the band to play like the sea with "rhythms, eddies, swells, and undercurrents" of sound. The track includes a keyboard solo that Anderson wrote "bring[s] alive the ebb and flow and depth of our mind's eye", and rated it as one of Wakeman's best. Squire played a fretless Guild bass, and described his performance as "one of the nicest things" he has done, and ranked it higher than his playing on more popular songs. He considered the track was particularly successful in its arrangement. White came up with the chord basis of a section on a guitar, which he does not play confidently, but Anderson recognised his tune and told him to repeat it until he could grasp his idea. Howe plays a Danelectro electric sitar, lute, and acoustic guitar.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: "The Ancient (Giants Under the Sun)" is attributed to the puranas, meaning "of ancient times", which contain eighteen "ancient" allegories. "Steve's guitar", wrote Anderson, "is pivotal in sharpening reflection on the beauties and treasures of lost civilisations." The lyrics contain several translations of the word "Sun" or an explanation of the Sun from various languages. Howe felt the opening section amazes him to this day, thinking how the band could "go so far out". He plays a steel guitar and a Spanish Ramirez acoustic guitar, and described it as "quite Stravinsky, quite folky". To help achieve the right sound he wanted out of his guitars, Howe played several recordings by classical guitarist Julian Bream to Offord as a guide. The track ends with an acoustic-based song which later became known as "Leaves of Green". White used a hollowed out log and brushes on an aluminium sheet as percussion.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: "Ritual (Nous sommes du soleil)" relates to the tantras, literally meaning rites or rituals. Anderson described its bass and drum solos as a presentation of the fight and struggle that life presents between "sources of evil and pure love". Howe is particularly fond of his guitar solo at the beginning, which to him was "spine-chilling" and "heavenly to play", and uses a Gibson Les Paul Junior. He wrote the chords and some lyrics to the "Life is like a fight" section. His outro guitar solo was more improvised and jazz-oriented at first, but the rest of the group felt dissatisfied with the arrangement. Anderson suggested that Howe pick several themes from the album and combine them, which Howe did with "a more concise, more thematic approach". During one of Wakeman's absences from the studio, White came up with the piano sequence for the closing "Nous sommes du soleil" section. The second half contains a percussion jam that features the main melody played on the drums. White, who played a standard kit, taught the sequence to the other members, with Anderson on a cocktail kit and Squire on timpani. Howe, despite participating on the drum solo on stage early on, opted out as it affected his guitar playing afterward.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The album was packaged as a gatefold sleeve designed and illustrated by Roger Dean, who had also designed the artwork for "Fragile", "Close to the Edge", and "Yessongs". Each of them carried a loose narrative thread that Dean did not continue for "Tales from Topographic Oceans". Dean and Anderson discussed ideas for the cover during a flight from London to Tokyo via Anchorage, Alaska, for the Japanese leg of the Close to the Edge Tour. Prior to the flight, Dean had completed the artwork to John Michell's book "The View over Atlantis". He recalled: "The wives and girlfriends made a cake ... and we all had some. I have no idea what was in it but from London to Anchorage, I was stoned ... But from Anchorage to Tokyo, I couldn't stop talking. And I was telling Jon all about this book, about patterns in the landscape and dragon lines, and we were flying hour after hour after hour over the most amazing landscapes ... So the idea of ... a sort of magical landscape and an alternative landscape ... that informed everything: the album cover, the merchandising, the stage."


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Dean, who primarily describes himself as a landscape painter, wished to convey his enthusiasm for landscapes on the cover, and everything depicted in the design is of something that exists. Painted using watercolour and ink, the front depicts fish circling a waterfall under several constellations of stars. In his book "Views", Dean explained that the final collection of landmarks on the front was more complex than intended "because it seemed appropriate to the nature of the project that everyone who wanted to contribute should do so." Anderson wanted a Mayan temple at Chichen Itza with the sun behind it, and White suggested using markings from the plains of Nazca. The landscape comprised, amongst other things, famous English rocks taken from Dominy Hamilton's postcard collection, including Brimham Rocks, the last rocks at Land's End, Logan Rock at Treen, and single stones from Avebury and Stonehenge. Dean thought "the result is a somewhat incongruous mixture, but effective nonetheless."


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Initial pressings included a slipstream in the background behind the fish that was removed from later copies. Although it was not a part of the original design, Anderson persuaded Dean to add it after it had been painted, so Dean drew it on a clear cel and photographed the cover with and without the slipstream. Dean thought the idea still did not work, and used the original design for the advertisements and posters. In 2002, readers of "Rolling Stone" magazine voted the album's cover as the best cover art of all time.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The album was finished in the first week of November 1973, and aired on British radio several times before its release in stores. It was set for broadcast on David Jensen's show on Radio Luxembourg on 8 November, but according to Anderson, the radio station somehow received blank tapes, resulting in dead air after the album was introduced. Two more radio broadcasts followed, one on "Your Mother Wouldn't Like It" hosted by Nicky Horne on Capital Radio on 9 November, and on "Rock on Radio One" with Pete Drummond on BBC Radio 1 the following day. A listening session was held at Morgan, which studio engineer and manager Roger Quested attended and remembered rows of seats laid out by a set of speakers before the whole album was played. "All but the diehard had drifted away before it had finished." Radio consultant Lee Abrams recalled the risk and difficulty in getting the album played on American radio, with many stations mainly playing "The Revealing Science of God" and primarily at night hours.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The album was released in the UK on 7 December 1973, followed by its North American release on 9 January 1974. It was a commercial success for the group; following a change in industry regulations by the British Phonographic Industry for albums to qualify for a Gold disc in April 1973, the album became the first UK record to reach Gold certification based on pre-orders alone after 75,000 orders were made. It was number 1 on the UK Album Chart for two consecutive weeks and peaked at number 6 on the US "Billboard" Top LPs chart. The album was certified Gold in the UK on 1 March 1974 and in the US on 8 February 1974, the latter for surpassing 500,000 copies.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The album received an initial divided reception from British critics. Robert Sheldon for "The Times" termed the music as "rockophonic", and selected "The Ancient" as a piece of music that "will be studied twenty-five years hence as a turning point in modern music". "The Guardian" newspaper thought Anderson's "high-pitched and carefully modulated voice ... seemed at ease and control". Steve Peacock reviewed the album and a live performance of it for "Sounds" magazine using the headlines "Wishy washy tales from the deep" and "Close to boredom". Critic and Yes biographer Chris Welch reviewed the album for "Melody Maker" and wrote: "It is a fragmented masterpiece, assembled with loving care and long hours in the studio. Brilliant in patches, but often taking far too long to make its various points, and curiously lacking in warmth or personal expression". He thought "Ritual" brought the "first enjoyable moments" of the entire album, "where Alan's driving drums have something to grip on to and the lyrics of la la la speak volumes. But even this cannot last long and cohesion is lost once more to the gods of drab self-indulgence." For "New Musical Express", Steve Clarke, who had listened to the album for two months and saw the band perform the album live once, declared the album "a great disappointment", coming from the strength of "Close to the Edge" and notes the "colour and excitement" that the group usually puts on their albums was missing. He thought Wakeman's abilities were restricted, and a lack of "positive construction" in the music which too often loses itself to "a wash of synthetic sounds". Howe's guitar adopts the same tone as Wakeman's keyboards, which bored Clarke, but Anderson was praised in helping carry the music through with his "frail, pure and at times very beautiful" voice. Clarke concluded with a hope of Yes making a return to "real songs" which demonstrate their musicianship better.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The album also received mixed reviews in America. Abrams thought it could have received better marketing, and suggested "an experiment in recording" as a tag line. "Record World" magazine considered it "by far the most progressive album to date" and displays the talents of each band member well, particularly Wakeman's. A review in "Billboard" said the four sides produce mixed results, with Anderson's "weighty spiritual concept" having "indigestible lyrics that are fortunately outplayed by the band's rich, sweeping playing" and praised Wakeman's keyboards in particular. It concluded with "Ritual (Nous sommes du soleil)" as the most "complete" track. In his negative review for "Rolling Stone", Gordon Fletcher described the record as "psychedelic doodles" and thought it suffers from "over-elaboration" compared to more successful songs on "Fragile" and "Close to the Edge". He complained about the album's length, Howe's guitar solos on "The Ancient", and the percussion section on "Ritual", but praised Wakeman for his "stellar performance" throughout and believed the keyboardist was the "most human of the group". Fletcher singled out the acoustic guitar section from "The Ancient" as the album's high point. "Cash Box" magazine praised the album with its "spectacular cuts" making a "phenomenal" record, and noted the band "are as much in touch with the bright future of their art form as they are with its rich, traditional past". Wakeman's "inspirational" playing was also pointed out which "sparkles" throughout the album. It concluded with "one of this year's best without doubt." In September 1974, "Time" magazine called it "by far the most provocative album of the past year."


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Retrospectively, Bruce Eder of AllMusic thought the album contains "some of the most sublimely beautiful musical passages ever to come from the group, and develops a major chunk of that music in depth and degrees in ways that one can only marvel at, though there's a big leap from marvel to enjoy. If one can grab onto it, "Tales" is a long, sometimes glorious musical ride across landscapes strange and wonderful, thick with enticing musical textures". In its fortieth anniversary issue from 1992, "NME" selected "Tales from Topographic Oceans" as their "40 Records That Captured The Moment". In 1996, "Progression" magazine writer John Covach wrote that it is "Tales from Topographic Oceans", not "Close to the Edge", that represents the band's true hallmark of the first half of their 1970s output and their "real point of arrival". He pointed out "the playing is virtuosic throughout, the singing innovative and often complex, and the lyrics mystical and poetic. All this having been asserted ... even the most devoted listener to "Tales" is also forced to admit that the album is in many ways flawed. Tracks tend to wander a bit ... and the music therefore is perhaps not as focussed as it might be." He notes that while Howe "set a new standard for rock guitar", he thought Wakeman's parts were not used properly and that the keyboardist was instead "relegated to the role of sideman". Author and critic Martin Popoff called the album the "black hole of Yes experiences, the band dissipating, expanding, exploding and imploding all at once", though he thought it contained "some fairly accessible music".


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: In January 1974, Squire picked "The Yes Album" and "Tales from Topographic Oceans" as the two most personally satisfying Yes albums "in terms of being captivated". In 1984, after Yes had released "90125" (1983), Anderson looked back on "Tales from Topographic Oceans" as "difficult in some respects", but felt it was "stupid to even think about defending it." In 1990, he said that he was pleased with three quarters of the album, with the remaining quarter "not quite jelling", but the tight deadline to finish it meant there was little time to make the necessary changes. Squire recalled the album as an unhappy period in the band's history, and commented on Anderson's attitude then: "Jon had this visionary idea that you could just walk into a studio, and if the vibes were right ... the music would be great at the end of the day ... It isn't reality". Wakeman continues to hold a mostly critical view. In 2006, he clarified that there are some "very nice musical moments in "Topographic Oceans", but because of the format of how records used to be we had too much for a single album but not enough for a double, so we padded it out and the padding is awful ... but there are some beautiful solos like "Nous sommes du soleil" ... one of the most beautiful melodies ... and deserved to be developed even more perhaps."


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Anderson spoke about his wish to edit the album and reissue it as a condensed 60-minute version with remixes and overdubs, but the plan was affected by "personality problems". The album was digitally remastered for CD by Joe Gastwirt using the original master tapes, in 1994. It was remastered again by Bill Inglot in 2003 as an "expanded" version on Elektra/Rhino Records, which features a restored two-minute introduction to "The Revealing Science of God" not included on the original LP, but previously released on the 2002 box set "". The set includes studio run-throughs of the same track and "The Ancient". The 2003 edition was included in the band's 2013 studio album box set, "The Studio Albums 1969–1987".


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: "Tales from Topographic Oceans" was reissued with new stereo and 5.1 surround sound mixes by Steven Wilson in October 2016 on the Panegyric label. The four-disc set was available on CD and Blu-ray or DVD-Audio and includes the new mixes, bonus and previously unreleased mixes and tracks, and expanded and restored cover art.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Yes had planned to start touring the album with an American leg from October 1973, but it was cancelled in order to have more time to complete it in the studio. Shortly after its release, Anderson wished the album and tour was pushed back until January 1974 to allocate more time for rehearsals, but half of the available tickets for the opening British tour had quickly sold and the band were unable to cancel. Yes sold out five consecutive nights at the Rainbow Theatre in London, which marked the first time a rock band achieved the feat. They tried to secure two extra shows, but the dates were unavailable; promoter Harvey Goldsmith said the huge demand for tickets for the UK dates was comparable to a Rolling Stones tour. The first Rainbow show was to be filmed by the BBC for broadcast on "The Old Grey Whistle Test" and to air on radio, but recording did not go ahead. Initial tour rehearsals took place at Manticore.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: The 77-date tour visited Europe and North America between November 1973 and April 1974, with a two-hour set of "Close to the Edge" and "Tales from Topographic Oceans" performed in their entirety, plus encores. The band toured with no support act. The set was altered as the tour progressed; within a month Lane, Tait, and the road crew had advised Yes to drop "The Ancient" as they thought it was dragging the set, but the group had started to perform it better and kept it in. "The Remembering" was removed completely from March. The North American leg included two sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden in New York City that grossed over $200,000. The band spent £5,000 on a hot air balloon which was decorated with the album's artwork and tethered in each city they performed in the US.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Yes brought four times as much equipment than their previous tours, which included an elaborate set designed by Dean and his brother Martyn. Two versions of the stage were built; the second, used from the American leg onward, consisted of fibreglass structures, dry ice effects, a drum platform surrounding White, and a tunnel that the band emerged from. During one show, the structure around White that opened and closed failed to operate, leaving him trapped. White claimed the incident was the inspiration behind a scene depicted in the rock mockumentary "This Is Spinal Tap". Tait spent £10,000 on lighting equipment for the tour, and Offord mixed the band's live sound using a 24-track mixing desk.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: No full recording from the tour has been officially released, apart from a performance of "Ritual" from Zurich in April 1974 on the album's 2016 reissue. Yes continued to perform "Ritual" until the end of their 1976 North American tour, after which material from "Tales from Topographic Oceans" would not be performed for 20 years, when the album's line-up reunited for the "Keys to Ascension" albums and performed "The Revealing Science of God". From 1997 to 2004 either "The Revealing Science of God" or "Ritual" was performed live, which included the latter performed with an orchestra on stage in 2001. From 2016 to 2018, Yes performed sides one and four as part of their Album Series Tour.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: Following the Rainbow gigs Wakeman called for a band meeting and announced his decision to quit, but the band, Lane, and Carson convinced him to stay for the rest of the tour. His frustration from playing the entire album, and the lack of rehearsal time for the British tour, culminated at a subsequent show in Manchester where his technician brought him a curry which he ate on stage. Roadie Bill Turner recalled Wakeman waving to the audience with a hand puppet and running a wind-up toy dinosaur across the stage when he got bored. Anderson felt he had pushed Wakeman too far, as he was unsatisfied with one of his keyboard solos in the set and had constantly asked him to get it right. Despite the problems, Wakeman said the situation improved as the American leg progressed. When the tour finished, Wakeman declined to attend rehearsals for their next album and confirmed his exit on 18 May 1974, his twenty-fifth birthday; later that day, he found out his solo album, "Journey to the Centre of the Earth", had entered the UK chart at number one. Wakeman was replaced by Swiss keyboardist Patrick Moraz.


title: Tales from Topographic Oceans

text: All music by Jon Anderson, Steve Howe, Chris Squire, Rick Wakeman, and Alan White; lyrics are taken from the 2003 reissue. The track durations are taken from the original UK pressing.


title: Monocle

text: A monocle is a type of corrective lens used to correct or enhance the visual perception in only one eye. It consists of a circular lens, generally with a wire ring around the circumference that can be attached to a string or wire. The other end of the string is then connected to the wearer's clothing to avoid losing the monocle. The antiquarian Philipp von Stosch wore a monocle in Rome in the 1720s, in order to closely examine engravings and antique engraved gems, but the monocle did not become an article of gentlemen's apparel until the 19th century. It was introduced by the dandy's quizzing glass of the 1790s, as an article of high fashion.


title: Monocle

text: There are three additional styles of the monocle. The first style consists of a simple loop of metal with a lens that was slotted into the eye orbit. These were the first monocles worn in England and could be found from the 1830s onwards. The second style, which was developed in the 1890s, was the most elaborate, consisting of a frame with a raised edge-like extension known as the "gallery". The gallery was designed to help secure the monocle in place by raising it out of the eye's orbit slightly so that the eyelashes would not jar it. Monocles with galleries were often the most expensive. The wealthy would have the frames custom-made to fit their eye sockets. A sub-category of the galleried monocle was the "sprung gallery", where the gallery was replaced by an incomplete circle of flattened, ridged wire supported by three posts. The ends were pulled together, the monocle was placed in the eye orbit, and the ends were released, causing the gallery to spring out and keep the monocle in place.


title: Monocle

text: The third style of monocle was frameless. This consisted of a cut piece of glass, with a serrated edge to provide a grip and sometimes a hole drilled into one side for a cord. Often the frameless monocle had no cord and would be worn freely. This style was popular at the beginning of the 20th century as the lens could be cut to fit any shape eye orbit inexpensively, without the cost of a customized frame.


title: Monocle

text: Wearing a monocle is generally not uncomfortable. If customized, monocles could be worn securely with little effort. However, periodic adjustment is common for monocle wearers to keep the monocle from popping, as can be seen in films featuring Erich von Stroheim. Often only the rich could afford to have a monocle custom-fabricated, while the poor had to settle for ill-fitting monocles that were less comfortable and less secure. The popular perception was (and still is) that a monocle could easily fall off with the wrong facial expression. This is true to an extent, for example raising the eyebrow too far will allow the monocle to fall.


title: Monocle

text: A once-standard comedic device exploits this: an upper-class gentleman affects a shocked expression in response to some event, and his monocle falls into his drink or smashes to pieces on the floor, etc.


title: Monocle

text: Abraham Lincoln was not known to wear a monocle, although it has also been said that he created his own style of monocle and wore it when he was away from the public.


title: Monocle

text: The quizzing glass should not be confused with a monocle, since it is held to one's eye with a handle in a fashion similar to a lorgnette. A quizzing glass is not held by the eye socket itself.


title: Monocle

text: During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the monocle was generally associated with wealthy upper-class men. Combined with a morning coat and a top hat, the monocle completed the costume of the stereotypical 1890s capitalist. Monocles were also accessories of German military officers from this period; especially from World War I and World War II. German military officers known to have worn a monocle include Hans Krebs, Werner von Fritsch, Erich Ludendorff, Walter Model, Walter von Reichenau, Dietrich von Saucken, Wilhelm Keitel, Hans von Seeckt, and Hugo Sperrle.


title: Monocle

text: Monocles were most prevalent in the late 19th century, but are rarely worn today. This is due in large part to advances in optometry which allow for better measurement of refractive error, so that glasses and contact lenses can be prescribed with different strengths in each eye.


title: Monocle

text: The monocle did, however, gain a following in the stylish lesbian circles of the early 20th century, when lesbians would wear a monocle for effect. Such women included Una Lady Troubridge, Radclyffe Hall, and Weimar German reporter Sylvia von Harden; The painting "Portrait of the Journalist Sylvia Von Harden" by German expressionist painter Otto Dix depicts its subject wearing a monocle.


title: Monocle

text: Famous figures who wore a monocle include British politicians Joseph Chamberlain, his son Austen, Henry Chaplin, and Angus Maude. Percy Toplis (The Monocled Mutineer), founder of Pakistan Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Portuguese President António de Spínola, filmmakers Fritz Lang and Erich von Stroheim, prominent 19th-century Portuguese writer Eça de Queiroz, Soviet writer Mikhail Bulgakov, actor Conrad Veidt, Dadaists Tristan Tzara and Raoul Hausmann, esoteric-fascist Julius Evola, French collaborationist politician Louis Darquier de Pellepoix, Poet laureate Alfred Lord Tennyson, singer Richard Tauber, diplomat Christopher Ewart-Biggs (a smoked-glass monocle, to disguise his glass eye), Major Johnnie Cradock, actors Ralph Lynn, George Arliss and Martyn Green, and Karl Marx. In another vein, G. E. M. Anscombe was one of only a few noted women who occasionally wore a monocle. Famous wearers of the 21st century so far include astronomer Sir Patrick Moore, and former boxer Chris Eubank. Abstract expressionist painter Barnett Newman wore a monocle mainly for getting a closer look at artworks. Richard Tauber wore a monocle to mask a squint in one eye. The Irish poet William Butler Yeats wore them at times too.


title: Mortal Engines

text: Mortal Engines is a young-adult science fantasy novel by Philip Reeve, published by Scholastic UK in 2001. The book focuses on a futuristic, steampunk version of London, now a giant machine striving to survive on a world that is running out of resources.


title: Mortal Engines

text: "Mortal Engines" is the first book of a series, the "Mortal Engines Quartet", published from 2001 to 2006. It has been adapted as a 2018 feature film by Peter Jackson and Hollywood, though its movie universe is different from that of the book.


title: Mortal Engines

text: The book won a Nestlé Smarties Book Prize and the 2003 Blue Peter Book Award. It was shortlisted for the 2002 Whitbread Award, the 2004 ALA's Notable Books for Children award and the 2020 Blue Peter Awards 20th anniversary prize.


title: Mortal Engines

text: The book is set in a post-apocalyptic world, ravaged by the "Sixty Minute War", a global conflict so violent it caused massive geological upheaval. To escape earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and other natural threats, a Nomad leader called Nikola Quercus (known throughout the Quartet as Nicholas Quirke, and revered as a deity) installed massive engines and wheels on London, enabling it to dismantle (or eat) other cities for resources. The technology rapidly spread and evolved into what is known as "Municipal Darwinism". Although the planet has since become stable, Municipal Darwinism has spread worldwide. Because scientific progress has almost completely halted and much technological and scientific knowledge was lost during the war, "Old Tech" is highly prized and recovered by scavengers and archaeologists. Europe, some of Asia, North Africa, Antarctica, and the Arctic are dominated by Traction Cities. In contrast, North America - often identified as "the dead continent" due to the extensive destruction it suffered during the war - and the rest of the world is the stronghold of the Anti-Traction League, which seeks to keep cities from moving and thus stop the intense consumption of the planet's remaining resources.


title: Mortal Engines

text: London is the principal Traction City in the novel, which has returned to a Victorian-era society. London's society is divided into four major and several minor Guilds. The Engineers are responsible for maintaining the machines necessary for the survival of London, many of which are found by the Guild of Historians. The Historians are in charge of collecting and preserving highly prized, often dangerous artifacts. The Navigators are responsible for steering and plotting the course of London. The Merchants are in charge of running London's economy. London is officially ruled by an elected Mayor. The Lord Mayor is Magnus Crome, who is also the head of the Guild of Engineers. Like most Traction Cities, London is built on a series of tiers. This encourages the system of social classes, with the wealthier nobles at the top of the city and the lower classes further down, closer to the noise and pollution of the city's massive engines. Atop the whole of London sits St Paul's Cathedral: the only building known to have survived the Sixty Minute War.


title: Mortal Engines

text: The book starts with the traction city of London chasing and catching a small mining town called Salthook. Tom Natsworthy, a teenage Apprentice Historian, is sent, as punishment for skipping a chore, to the "Gut" of London, where captured Traction cities or towns are stripped of resources. Tom incidentally meets the Head of the Guild of Historians, Thaddeus Valentine, along with his daughter, Katherine. One of Salthook's residents, teenager Hester Shaw, attempts to assassinate Valentine, but Tom interferes and chases her. She reveals a disfiguring scar on her face and claims Valentine caused it, before escaping the London police through a chute. When Tom informs Valentine of her name, Valentine pushes him down into the chute. Tom and Hester recover outside of London within the Hunting Ground and, after an argument, they start following the city's tracks to reboard it.