title: Postcolonial literature

text: South Africa has 11 national languages: Afrikaans, English, Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho, Pedi, Tswana, Venda, SiSwati, Tsonga, and Ndebele. Any definitive literary history of South Africa should, it could be argued, discuss literature produced in all eleven languages. But the only literature ever to adopt characteristics that can be said to be "national" is Afrikaans. Olivier argues: "Of all the literatures in South Africa, Afrikaans literature has been the only one to have become a national literature in the sense that it developed a clear image of itself as a separate entity, and that by way of institutional entrenchment through teaching, distribution, a review culture, journals, etc. it could ensure the continuation of that concept." Part of the problem is that English literature has been seen within the greater context of English writing in the world, and has, because of English's global position as "lingua franca", not been seen as autonomous or indigenous to South Africa – in Olivier's words: "English literature in South Africa continues to be a sort of extension of British or international English literature." The African languages, on the other hand, are spoken across the borders of Southern Africa - for example, Tswana is spoken in Botswana, and Tsonga in Zimbabwe, and Sotho in Lesotho. South Africa's borders were established during the colonial era and, as with all other colonies, these borders were drawn without regard for the people living within them. Therefore: in a history of South African literature, do we include all Tswana writers, or only the ones with South African citizenship? Chapman bypasses this problem by including "Southern" African literatures. The second problem with the African languages is accessibility, because since the African languages are regional languages, none of them can claim the readership on a national scale comparable to Afrikaans and English. Sotho, for instance, while transgressing the national borders of the RSA, is on the other hand mainly spoken in the Free State, and bears a great amount of relation to the language of Natal for example, Zulu. So the language cannot claim a national readership, while on the other hand being "international" in the sense that it transgresses the national borders.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Olivier argues that "There is no obvious reason why it should be unhealthy or abnormal for different literatures to co-exist in one country, each possessing its own infrastructure and allowing theoreticians to develop impressive theories about polysystems". Yet political idealism proposing a unified "South Africa" (a remnant of the plans drawn up by Sir Henry Bartle Frere) has seeped into literary discourse and demands a unified national literature, which does not exist and has to be fabricated. It is unrealistic to ever think of South Africa and South African literature as homogenous, now or in the near or distant future, since the only reason it is a country at all is the interference of European colonial powers. This is not a racial issue, but rather has to do with culture, heritage and tradition (and indeed the constitution celebrates diversity). Rather, it seems more sensible to discuss South African literature as literature produced within the national borders by the different cultures and language groups inhabiting these borders. Otherwise the danger is emphasising one literary system at the expense of another, and more often than not, the beneficiary is English, with the African languages being ignored. The distinction "black" and "white" literature is further a remnant of colonialism that should be replaced by drawing distinctions between literary systems based on language affiliation rather than race.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The first texts produced by black authors were often inspired by missionaries and frequently deal with African history, in particular the history of kings such as Chaka. Modern South African writing in the African languages tends to play at writing realistically, at providing a mirror to society, and depicts the conflicts between rural and urban settings, between traditional and modern norms, racial conflicts and most recently, the problem of AIDS.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: In the first half of the 20th century, epics largely dominated black writing: historical novels, such as Sol T. Plaatje's "" (1930), Thomas Mofolo's "Chaka" (trans. 1925), and epic plays including those of H. I. E. Dhlomo, or heroic epic poetry such as the work of Mazizi Kunene. These texts "evince black African patriarchy in its traditional form, with men in authority, often as warriors or kings, and women as background figures of dependency, and/or mothers of the nation". Female literature in the African languages is severely limited because of the strong influence of patriarchy, but over the last decade or two society has changed much and it can be expected that more female voices will emerge.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The following are notable white South African writers in English: Athol Fugard, Nadine Gordimer, J. M. Coetzee, and Wilbur Smith. André Brink has written in both Afrikaans and English while Breyten Breytenbach writes primarily in Afrikaans, though many of their works have been translated into English. Dalene Matthee's (1938–2005) is another Afrikaner, best known for her four "Forest Novels", written in and around the Knysna Forest, including "Fiela se Kind" (1985) ("Fiela's Child"). Her books have been translated into fourteen languages, including English, French, and German. and over a million copies have been sold worldwide.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Maryse Condé (born 1937) is a French (Guadeloupean) author of historical fiction, best known for her novel "Segu" (1984–1985).


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The term "West Indies" first began to achieve wide currency in the 1950s, when writers such as Samuel Selvon, John Edgar Colwell Hearne, Edgar Mittelholzer, V.S. Naipaul, and George Lamming began to be published in the United Kingdom. A sense of a single literature developing across the islands was also encouraged in the 1940s by the BBC radio programme "Caribbean Voices", which featured stories and poems written by West Indian authors, recorded in London under the direction of producer Henry Swanzy, and broadcast back to the islands. Magazines such as "Kyk-Over-Al" in Guyana, "Bim" in Barbados, and "Focus" in Jamaica, which published work by writers from across the region, also encouraged links and helped build an audience.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Some West Indian writers have found it necessary to leave their home territories and base themselves in the United Kingdom, the United States, or Canada in order to make a living from their work—in some cases spending the greater parts of their careers away from the territories of their birth. Critics in their adopted territories might argue that, for instance, V. S. Naipaul ought to be considered a British writer instead of a Trinidadian writer, or Jamaica Kincaid and Paule Marshall American writers, but most West Indian readers and critics still consider these writers "West Indian".


title: Postcolonial literature

text: West Indian literature ranges over subjects and themes as wide as those of any other "national" literature, but in general many West Indian writers share a special concern with questions of identity, ethnicity, and language that rise out of the Caribbean historical experience.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: One unique and pervasive characteristic of Caribbean literature is the use of "dialect" forms of the national language, often termed creole. The various local variations in the European languages which became established in the West Indies during the period of European colonial rule. These languages have been modified over the years within each country and each has developed a blend that is unique to their country. Many Caribbean authors in their writing switch liberally between the local variation – now commonly termed nation language – and the standard form of the language. Two West Indian writers have won the Nobel Prize in Literature: Derek Walcott (1992), born in St. Lucia, resident mostly in Trinidad during the 1960s and '70s, and partly in the United States since then; and V. S. Naipaul, born in Trinidad and resident in the United Kingdom since the 1950. (Saint-John Perse, who won the Nobel Prize in 1960, was born in the French territory of Guadeloupe.)


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Other notable names in (anglophone) Caribbean literature have included Earl Lovelace, Austin Clarke, Claude McKay, Orlando Patterson, Andrew Salkey, Edward Kamau Brathwaite (who was born in Barbados and has lived in Ghana and Jamaica), Linton Kwesi Johnson, and Michelle Cliff. In more recent times, a number of literary voices have emerged from the Caribbean as well as the Caribbean diaspora, including Kittitian Caryl Phillips (who has lived in the UK since one month of age), Edwidge Danticat, a Haitian immigrant to the United States; Anthony Kellman from Barbados, who divides his time between Barbados and the United States; Andrea Levy of the United Kingdom, Jamaicans Colin Channer and Marlon James, the author of the Man Booker Prize-winning novel "A Brief History of Seven Killings" (2014) (as well as "John Crow's Devil", "The Book of Night Women", the unpublished screenplay "Dead Men", and the short story "Under Cover of Darkness"), Antiguan Marie-Elena John, and Lasana M. Sekou from St. Maarten/St. Martin.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The most famous writer from the island of Dominica is British-Dominican author Jean Rhys, best known for her 1966 novel "Wide Sargasso Sea", which was written as a prequel to Charlotte Brontë's "Jane Eyre". The novel deals with themes of women living in a patriarchal society, race, and assimilation. On 5 November 2019, "BBC News" listed "Wide Sargasso Sea" on its list of the 100 most influential novels. The novel has been adapted for stage, film and radio numerous times, most recently as a radio play by BBC Radio 4.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Earl Lovelace (born 1935) is a Trinidadian novelist, journalist, playwright, and short story writer. He is particularly recognized for his descriptive, dramatic fiction on Trinidadian culture: "Using Trinidadian dialect patterns and standard English, he probes the paradoxes often inherent in social change as well as the clash between rural and urban cultures." As Bernardine Evaristo notes, "Lovelace is unusual among celebrated Caribbean writers in that he has always lived in Trinidad. Most writers leave to find support for their literary endeavours elsewhere and this, arguably, shapes the literature, especially after long periods of exile. But Lovelace's fiction is deeply embedded in Trinidadian society and is written from the perspective of one whose ties to his homeland have never been broken."


title: Postcolonial literature

text: American David Henry Hwang's play "M. Butterfly" addresses the Western perspective on China and the French as well as the American perspectives on Vietnam during the Vietnam War. It was inspired by Giacomo Puccini's opera "Madama Butterfly".


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Maxine Hong Kingston (born 1940) is a Chinese American author who has written three novels and several works of non-fiction about the experiences of Chinese immigrants living in the United States.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Bharati Mukherjee although of East Indian ancestry has gone on record that she considers herself an American writer, and not an Indian expatriate writer. In a 1989 interview with Amanda Meer, Mukherjee said: "I totally consider myself an American writer, and that has been my big battle: to get to realize that my roots as a writer are no longer, if they ever were, among Indian writers, but that I am writing about the territory about the feelings, of a new kind of pioneer here in America. I'm the first among Asian immigrants to be making this distinction between immigrant writing and expatriate writing. Most Indian writers prior to this, have still thought of themselves as Indians, and their literary inspiration, has come from India. India has been the source, and home. Whereas I'm saying, those are wonderful roots, but now my roots are here and my emotions are here in North America."


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Jhumpa Lahiri (born 1967) is an Indian-American author. Lahiri's debut short story collection "Interpreter of Maladies" (1999) won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and her first novel, "The Namesake" (2003), was adapted into the popular film of the same name.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Throughout American history, African Americans have been discriminated against and subject to racist attitudes. This experience inspired some Black writers, at least during the early years of African-American literature, to prove they were the equals of European-American authors. As Henry Louis Gates, Jr, has said, "it is fair to describe the subtext of the history of black letters as this urge to refute the claim that because blacks had no written traditions they were bearers of an inferior culture."


title: Postcolonial literature

text: By refuting the claims of the dominant culture, African-American writers were also attempting to subvert the literary and power traditions of the United States. Some scholars assert that writing has traditionally been seen as "something defined by the dominant culture as a white male activity." This means that, in American society, literary acceptance has traditionally been intimately tied in with the very power dynamics which perpetrated such evils as racial discrimination. By borrowing from and incorporating the non-written oral traditions and folk life of the African diaspora, African-American literature broke "the mystique of connection between literary authority and patriarchal power." In producing their own literature, African Americans were able to establish their own literary traditions devoid of the white intellectual filter. In 1922, W. E. B. Du Bois wrote that "the great mission of the Negro to America and to the modern world" was to develop "Art and the appreciation of the Beautiful".


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Giannina Braschi (born 1953) is a Puerto Rican writer, who is credited with writing the first Spanglish novel "Yo-Yo Boing!" (1998), the post-modern poetry trilogy "Empire of Dreams" (1994), and the philosophical fiction "United States of Banana" (2011), which chronicles the Latin American immigrants' experiences in the United States and the Puerto Rican battle with Spanish and American colonialism.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The Canadian writer Margaret Atwood is a post-colonial writer who dealt with themes of identity-seeking through her Southern Ontario Gothic style of writing.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Canadian Michael Ondaatje, is an internationally acclaimed author with Sri Lankan roots, which he has explored in works like "Running in the Family" (1983) and "The Cat's Table" (2011).


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Cyril Dabydeen (born 1945) is a Guyana-born, Canadian writer of Indian descent. He grew up in a sugar plantation with the sense of Indian indenture rooted in his family background.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: African-Canadian George Elliott Clarke has promoted Black authors with "Directions Home: Approaches to African-Canadian Literature" (2012) as well as his own poetry, novels and plays.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: In the decade 2008-2018 Canadian Indigenous writers published so many works that some critics called it a renaissance. This phenomenon was studied in "Introduction to Indigenous Literary Criticism in Canada" (2015). Eds Heather MacFarlane & Armand Garnet Ruffo.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Canadian scholar, Joseph Pivato has promoted the study of ethnic minority authors with "Comparative Literature for the New Century" (2018). Eds. Giulia De Gasperi & Joseph Pivato.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Chunghee Sara Soh's book "The Comfort Women: Sexual Violence and Postcolonial Memory in Korea and Japan" has shed new light on the practice of having forced sexual slavery, called "comfort women" during the Imperial Japanese army before and during World War II.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Major figures in the postcolonial literature of the Middle East included Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz and Palestinian-American scholar Edward Said. Said published his most famous work, "Orientalism", discussing the depiction of Asia by the Western world. Mahfouz was inspired to write in a large part by his experiences during the Egyptian Revolution of 1919 (when he was seven years old), including witnessing British soldiers firing on crowds of demonstrators in an effort to disperse them; according to Mahfouz, "You could say ... that the one thing which most shook the security of my childhood was the 1919 revolution", as he recounted in an interview.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Philippine literature includes the legends of prehistory, and the colonial legacy of the Philippines. Pre-Hispanic Philippine literature were actually epics passed on from generation to generation originally through oral tradition. However, wealthy families, especially in Mindanao were able to keep transcribed copies of these epics as family heirloom. One such epic was the "Darangen", epic of the Maranaos of Lake Lanao. Most of the epics were known during the Spanish era.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Most of the notable literature of the Philippines was written during the Spanish period and the first half of the 20th century in the Spanish language. Philippine literature is written in Spanish, English, or any indigenous Philippine languages. Notable authors include F. Sionil José, Jose Dalisay, Jr., N. V. M. Gonzalez and Nick Joaquin.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Dutch Indies literature includes Dutch language postcolonial literature reflecting on the era of the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). Much of the postcolonial literature of this genre is written by Dutch Eurasians known as Indos. Important authors that have been translated to English include, Tjalie Robinson, Maria Dermout, and Marion Bloem.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Bonny Hicks (1968–1997) was a Singapore Eurasian model and writer. After garnering fame as a model, she gained recognition for her contributions to Singaporean post-colonial literature and for the anthropic philosophy conveyed in her works. Her first book, "Excuse Me, Are You A Model?", is recognised as a significant milestone in the literary and cultural history of Singapore.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: One of the key issues is the superiority/inferiority of Indian Writing in English (IWE) as opposed to the literary production in the various languages of India. Key polar concepts bandied in this context are superficial/authentic, imitative/creative, shallow/deep, critical/uncritical, elitist/parochial and so on.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The views of Salman Rushdie and Amit Chaudhuri expressed through their books "The Vintage Book of Indian Writing" and "The Picador Book of Modern Indian Literature" respectively essentialise this battle. Rushdie's statement in his book – "the ironic proposition that India's best writing since independence may have been done in the language of the departed imperialists is simply too much for some folks to bear" – created a lot of resentment among many writers, including writers in English. In his book, Amit Chaudhuri questions – "Can it be true that Indian writing, that endlessly rich, complex and problematic entity, is to be represented by a handful of writers who write in English, who live in England or America and whom one might have met at a party?"


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Chaudhuri feels that after Rushdie, Indian writing in English started employing magical realism, bagginess, non-linear narrative and hybrid language to sustain themes seen as microcosms of India and supposedly reflecting Indian conditions. He contrasts this with the works of earlier writers such as R. K. Narayan where the use of English is pure, but the deciphering of meaning needs cultural familiarity. He also feels that Indian is a theme constructed only in IWE and does not articulate itself in the vernacular literature. He further adds "the post-colonial novel, becomes a trope for an ideal hybrid by which the West celebrates not so much Indian, whatever that infinitely complex thing is, but its own historical quest, its reinterpretation of itself".


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Some of these arguments form an integral part of what is called postcolonial theory. The very categorisation of IWE – as IWE or under post-colonial literature – is seen by some as limiting. Amitav Ghosh made his views on this very clear by refusing to accept the Eurasian Commonwealth Writers Prize for his book "The Glass Palace" in 2001 and withdrawing it from the subsequent stage.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Indian authors like Amitav Ghosh, Anita Desai, Hanif Kureishi, Rohinton Mistry, Meena Alexander, Arundhati Roy and Kiran Desai have written about their postcolonial experiences.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The Hungry Generation was a literary movement in the Bengali language launched by what is known today as the "Hungryalist quartet", "i.e." Shakti Chattopadhyay, Malay Roy Choudhury, Samir Roychoudhury and Debi Roy (alias Haradhon Dhara), during the 1960s in Kolkata, India. Due to their involvement in this avant garde cultural movement, the leaders lost their jobs and were jailed by the incumbent government. They challenged contemporary ideas about literature and contributed significantly to the evolution of the language and idiom used by contemporaneous artists to express their feelings in literature and painting.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Khushwant Singh (1915-2014) has written numerous fiction and non-fiction novels about the India-Pakistan Partition.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Nissim Ezekiel (1924–2004) was a foundational figure in postcolonial India's literary history, specifically for Indian writing in English.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Urvashi Butalia's "The Other Side of Silence" is a collection of oral histories and testimonies about the India-Pakistan Partition.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Sri Lankan writers like Nihal De Silva and Carl Muller write about the post-colonial situation and the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. Notably authors such as the D.C.R.A Goonetilleke in Sri Lankan English Literature and the Sri Lankan People 1917-2003 targets the evolution of Sri Lankan English Literature specifically in regards to the acceptance of the English language and other major controversies of the time in Sri Lankan literature, after its Independence from the British Empire in 1948.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The novels of J. G. Farrell are important texts dealing with the decline of the British Empire. Farrell's novel "Troubles", set during the Irish War of Independence (1919–1921), is the first instalment in Farrell's "Empire Trilogy", preceding "The Siege of Krishnapur" and "The Singapore Grip", all written during the 1970s. Although there are similar themes within the three novels (most notably that of the British Empire), they do not form a sequence of storytelling. "The Siege of Krishnapur" was inspired by events such as the sieges of Cawnpore and Lucknow, and details the siege of a fictional Indian town, Krishnapur, during the Indian Rebellion of 1857 from the perspective of the city's British residents. "The Singapore Grip" is satirical book about events following Japan's entry into the Second World War and occupation of Singapore. The story centres on a British family who own one of the colony's leading trading companies.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Novelist E. M. Forster's "A Passage to India" (1924) takes as its subject the relationship between East and West, seen through the lens of India in the later days of the British Raj. Forster connects personal relationships with the politics of colonialism through the story of the Englishwoman Adela Quested, the Indian Dr. Aziz, and the question of what did or did not happen between them in the Marabar Caves.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: "The Raj Quartet" a four-volume novel sequence, written by Paul Scott, also deals with the subject of British colonial rule in India, in this case the concluding years of the British Raj. The series was written during the period 1965–1975. "The Times" called it "one of the most important landmarks of post-war fiction." The story of "The Raj Quartet" begins in 1942. World War II is at its zenith, and in South East Asia, the Allied forces have suffered great losses. Burma has been captured by Japan, and the Japanese invasion of the Indian subcontinent from the east appears imminent. The year 1942 is also marked by Indian nationalist leader Mahatma Gandhi's call for the Quit India movement to the British colonial government. "The Raj Quartet" is set in this tumultuous background for the British soldiers and civilians stationed in India who have a duty to manage this part of the British Empire. One recurrent theme is the moral certainty of the older generation as contrasted with the anomie of the younger. Another theme is the treatment of Indians by Britons living in India. As a reflection of these themes. the British characters let themselves be "trapped by codes and principles, which were in part to keep their own fears and doubts at bay."


title: Postcolonial literature

text: "An Outpost of Progress" and "Heart of Darkness" by Polish-British writer Joseph Conrad are based on his experiences in the Congo Free State. There is also "The Congo Diary and Other Uncollected Pieces".


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Wales was gradually annexed by the Kingdom of England during the Middle Ages, and was fully incorporated within the English legal system under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542. Distinctive Welsh politics developed in the 19th century, and Welsh nationalism grew during the 20th century. The Welsh nationalist party, Plaid Cymru, was formed in 1925 and the Welsh Language Society in 1962.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Welsh poet, novelist and dramatist Saunders Lewis, who was a prominent support of nationalism in Wales, rejected the possibility of Anglo-Welsh literature due to the language's status as the official tongue of the British state, affirming that "the literature which people called Anglo-Welsh was indistinguishable from English literature". Saunders Lewis was himself born in Wallasey in England to a Welsh-speaking family.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The attitude of the post-war generation of Welsh writers in English towards Wales differs from the previous generation, in that they were more sympathetic to Welsh nationalism and to the Welsh language. The change can be linked to the nationalist fervour generated by Saunders Lewis and the burning of the Bombing School on the Lleyn Peninsula in 1936, along with a sense of crisis generated by the Second World War. In poetry R. S. Thomas (1913–2000) was the most important figure throughout the second half of the 20th century, beginning with "The Stones of the Field" in 1946 and concluding with "No Truce with the Furies" (1995). While he "did not learn the Welsh language until he was 30 and wrote all his poems in English", he wanted the Welsh language to be made the official language of Wales, and the policy of Anglo-Welsh bilingualism abolished. He wrote his autobiography in Welsh, but said he lacked the necessary grasp of the language to employ it in his poems. Although an Anglican priest, he was a fervent nationalist and advocated boycotts against English owners of holiday homes in Wales. As an admirer of Saunders Lewis, Thomas defended his need to use English: "Since there is in Wales a mother tongue that continues to flourish, a proper Welshman can only look on English as a means of rekindling interest in the Welsh language, and of leading people back to the mother tongue."


title: Postcolonial literature

text: With the creation the National Assembly for Wales, under the Government of Wales Act 1998, Wales now has more local autonomy from the central government in London. The Welsh Language Act 1993 and the Government of Wales Act 1998 provide that the English and Welsh languages be treated on a basis of equality. English is spoken by almost all people in Wales and is the "de facto" main language. Northern and western Wales retain many areas where Welsh is spoken as a first language by the majority of the population, and English learnt as a second language. The 2011 Census showed 562,016 people, 19.0% of the Welsh population, were able to speak Welsh.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The English language was introduced to Ireland in the 13th century, following the Norman Conquest of Ireland. However, English rule did not extend over the whole island until the 16th–17th century Tudor conquest, which led to plantation of Ireland. In the 1690s, the Protestant Anglo-Irish started to become dominant over the Catholic majority, which was extended during the 18th century. The Irish language, however, remained the dominant language of Irish literature down to the 19th century, despite a slow decline which began in the 17th century with the expansion of English control in Ireland.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The 17th century saw the tightening of English control over Ireland and the suppression of the Irish aristocracy. This meant that the literary class lost its patrons, since the new nobility were English speakers with little interest for the older culture. The elaborate classical metres lost their dominance and were largely replaced by more popular forms. This was an age of social and political tension, as expressed by the poet Dáibhí Ó Bruadair and the anonymous authors of "Pairliment Chloinne Tomáis", a prose satire on the aspirations of the lower classes. Prose of another sort was represented by the historical works of Geoffrey Keating (Seathrún Céitinn) and the compilation known as the "Annals of the Four Masters".


title: Postcolonial literature

text: The consequences of these changes were seen in the 18th century. Poetry was still the dominant literary medium and its practitioners were poor scholars, often educated in the classics at local schools and schoolmasters by trade. Such writers produced polished work in popular metres for a local audience. This was particularly the case in Munster, in the south-west of Ireland, and notable names included Eoghan Rua Ó Súilleabháin and Aogán Ó Rathaille of Sliabh Luachra. A certain number of local patrons were still to be found, even in the early 19th century, and especially among the few surviving families of the Gaelic aristocracy. In the first half of the 18th century Dublin was the home of an Irish-language literary circle connected to the Ó Neachtain (Naughton) family, a group with wide-ranging Continental connections.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: With the Acts of Union in 1801, Ireland became a part of the United Kingdom. The latter part of the 19th century saw a rapid replacement of Irish by English in the greater part of the country, though Irish was still an urban language, and continued to be so well into the 19th century. At the end of the 19th century, however, cultural nationalism displayed a new energy, marked by the Gaelic Revival (which encouraged a modern literature in Irish) and more generally by the Irish Literary Revival.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: A war of independence in the early 20th century was followed by the partition of the island, creating the Irish Free State in 1922, which became increasingly sovereign over the following decades, and Northern Ireland, which remained a part of the United Kingdom.


title: Postcolonial literature

text: Clare Cavanagh believes that literature of Poland is postcolonial. Dariusz Skórczewski supports her and reveals how the experiences of foreign domination and the history of empire have shaped contemporary Polish culture and society. They both criticize Marxist basis of postcolonialism.


title: R. B. Choudary

text: Ratanlal Bhagatram Choudary is an Indian film producer who has worked in several film industries, predominantly in Tamil and Telugu along with a few films in Malayalam and Hindi. He is the founder of the production company Super Good Films.


title: R. B. Choudary

text: R. B. Choudary hails from a Rajasthani family. He was in to steel, exports and jewels business before entering film production. He started his career as a producer with Malayalam film industry first and produced a few films under "Super" banner. In 1989, he entered Tamil film industry and produced films on 'Super' banner in partnership with R. Mohan, who manufactured "Good Knight" mosquito mats. When they decided to part ways, Choudary borrowed good from 'Good Knight' and modified it as 'Super Good' films.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The Behistun Inscription (also Bisotun, Bisitun or Bisutun; , Old Persian: Bagastana, meaning "the place of god") is a multilingual inscription and large rock relief on a cliff at Mount Behistun in the Kermanshah Province of Iran, near the city of Kermanshah in western Iran, established by Darius the Great (). It was crucial to the decipherment of cuneiform script as the inscription includes three versions of the same text, written in three different cuneiform script languages: Old Persian, Elamite, and Babylonian (a variety of Akkadian). The inscription is to cuneiform script what the Rosetta Stone is to Egyptian hieroglyphs: the document most crucial in the deciphering of a previously lost writing system.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: Authored by Darius the Great sometime between his coronation as king of the Persian Empire in the summer of 522 BC and his death in autumn of 486 BC, the inscription begins with a brief autobiography of Darius, including his ancestry and lineage. Later in the inscription, Darius provides a lengthy sequence of events following the death of Cambyses II in which he fought nineteen battles in a period of one year (ending in December 521 BC) to put down multiple rebellions throughout the Persian Empire. The inscription states in detail that the rebellions, which had followed the death of Cambyses II, were orchestrated by several impostors and their co-conspirators in various cities throughout the empire, each of whom falsely proclaimed himself king during the upheaval following Cambyses II's death. Darius the Great proclaimed himself victorious in all battles during the period of upheaval, attributing his success to the "grace of Ahura Mazda".


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The inscription is approximately high by wide and up a limestone cliff from an ancient road connecting the capitals of Babylonia and Media (Babylon and Ecbatana, respectively). The Old Persian text contains 414 lines in five columns; the Elamite text includes 593 lines in eight columns, and the Babylonian text is in 112 lines. The inscription was illustrated by a life-sized bas-relief of Darius I, the Great, holding a bow as a sign of kingship, with his left foot on the chest of a figure lying on his back before him. The supine figure is reputed to be the pretender Gaumata. Darius is attended to the left by two servants, and nine one-meter figures stand to the right, with hands tied and rope around their necks, representing conquered peoples. A Faravahar floats above, giving its blessing to the king. One figure appears to have been added after the others were completed, as was Darius's beard, which is a separate block of stone attached with iron pins and lead.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: After the fall of the Persian Empire's Achaemenid Dynasty and its successors, and the lapse of Old Persian cuneiform writing into disuse, the nature of the inscription was forgotten, and fanciful explanations became the norm. For centuries, instead of being attributed to Darius the Great, it was believed to be from the reign of Khosrau II of Persia—one of the last Sassanid kings, who lived over 1000 years after the time of Darius the Great.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The inscription is mentioned by Ctesias of Cnidus, who noted its existence some time around 400 BC and mentioned a well and a garden beneath the inscription. He incorrectly concluded that the inscription had been dedicated "by Queen Semiramis of Babylon to Zeus". Tacitus also mentions it and includes a description of some of the long-lost ancillary monuments at the base of the cliff, including an altar to "Herakles". What has been recovered of them, including a statue dedicated in 148 BC, is consistent with Tacitus's description. Diodorus also writes of "Bagistanon" and claims it was inscribed by Semiramis.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: A legend began around Mount Behistun (Bisotun), as written about by the Persian poet and writer Ferdowsi in his "Shahnameh" ("Book of Kings") , about a man named Farhad, who was a lover of King Khosrow's wife, Shirin. The legend states that, exiled for his transgression, Farhad was given the task of cutting away the mountain to find water; if he succeeded, he would be given permission to marry Shirin. After many years and the removal of half the mountain, he did find water, but was informed by Khosrow that Shirin had died. He went mad, threw his axe down the hill, kissed the ground and died. It is told in the book of Khosrow and Shirin that his axe was made out of a pomegranate tree, and, where he threw the axe, a pomegranate tree grew with fruit that would cure the ill. Shirin was not dead, according to the story, and mourned upon hearing the news.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In 1598, Englishman Robert Sherley saw the inscription during a diplomatic mission to Safavid Persia on behalf of Austria, and brought it to the attention of Western European scholars. His party incorrectly came to the conclusion that it was Christian in origin. French General Gardanne thought it showed "Christ and his twelve apostles", and Sir Robert Ker Porter thought it represented the Lost Tribes of Israel and Shalmaneser of Assyria. In 1604, Italian explorer Pietro della Valle visited the inscription and made preliminary drawings of the monument.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: German surveyor Carsten Niebuhr visited in around 1764 for Frederick V of Denmark, publishing a copy of the inscription in the account of his journeys in 1778. Niebuhr's transcriptions were used by Georg Friedrich Grotefend and others in their efforts to decipher the Old Persian cuneiform script. Grotefend had deciphered ten of the 37 symbols of Old Persian by 1802, after realizing that unlike the Semitic cuneiform scripts, Old Persian text is alphabetic and each word is separated by a vertical slanted symbol.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The Old Persian text was copied and deciphered before recovery and copying of the Elamite and Babylonian inscriptions had even been attempted, which proved to be a good deciphering strategy, since Old Persian script was easier to study due to its alphabetic nature and because the language it represents had naturally evolved via Middle Persian to the living modern Persian language dialects, and was also related to the Avestan language, used in the Zoroastrian book the "Avesta".


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In 1835, Sir Henry Rawlinson, an officer of the British East India Company army assigned to the forces of the Shah of Iran, began studying the inscription in earnest. As the town of Bisotun's name was anglicized as "Behistun" at this time, the monument became known as the "Behistun Inscription". Despite its relative inaccessibility, Rawlinson was able to scale the cliff with the help of a local boy and copy the Old Persian inscription. The Elamite was across a chasm, and the Babylonian four meters above; both were beyond easy reach and were left for later.In 1847, he was able to send a full and accurate copy to Europe.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: With the Persian text, and with about a third of the syllabary made available to him by the work of Georg Friedrich Grotefend, Rawlinson set to work on deciphering the text. The first section of this text contained a list of the same Persian kings found in Herodotus but in their original Persian forms as opposed to Herodotus's Greek transliterations; for example Darius is given as the original "Dâryavuš" instead of the Hellenized "Δαρειος". By matching the names and the characters, Rawlinson deciphered the type of cuneiform used for Old Persian by 1838 and presented his results to the Royal Asiatic Society in London and the Société Asiatique in Paris.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In the interim, Rawlinson spent a brief tour of duty in Afghanistan, returning to the site in 1843. This time he crossed the chasm between the Persian and Elamite scripts by bridging the gap with planks, subsequently copying the Elamite inscription. He found an enterprising local boy to climb up a crack in the cliff and suspend ropes across the Babylonian writing, so that papier-mâché casts of the inscriptions could be taken. Rawlinson, along with several other scholars, most notably Edward Hincks, Julius Oppert, William Henry Fox Talbot, and Edwin Norris, either working separately or in collaboration, eventually deciphered these inscriptions, leading eventually to the ability to read them completely.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The translation of the Old Persian sections of the Behistun Inscription paved the way to the subsequent ability to decipher the Elamite and Babylonian parts of the text, which greatly promoted the development of modern Assyriology.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The site was visited by the American linguist A. V. Williams Jackson in 1903. Later expeditions, in 1904 sponsored by the British Museum and led by Leonard William King and Reginald Campbell Thompson and in 1948 by George G. Cameron of the University of Michigan, obtained photographs, casts and more accurate transcriptions of the texts, including passages that were not copied by Rawlinson.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: It also became apparent that rainwater had dissolved some areas of the limestone in which the text was inscribed, while leaving new deposits of limestone over other areas, covering the text.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In 1938, the inscription became of interest to the Nazi German think tank Ahnenerbe, although research plans were cancelled due to the onset of World War II.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The monument later suffered some damage from Allied soldiers using it for target practice in World War II, and during the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In 1999, Iranian archeologists began the documentation and assessment of damages to the site incurred during the 20th century. Malieh Mehdiabadi, who was project manager for the effort, described a photogrammetric process by which two-dimensional photos were taken of the inscriptions using two cameras and later transmuted into 3-D images.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In recent years, Iranian archaeologists have been undertaking conservation works. The site became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2006.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: In 2012, the Bisotun Cultural Heritage Center organized an international effort to re-examine the inscription.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: Later in the inscription, Darius provides an eye-witness account of battles he successfully fought over a one-year period to put down rebellions which had resulted from the deaths of Cyrus the Great, and his son Cambyses II:


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The site covers an area of 116 hectares. Archeological evidence indicates that this region became a human shelter 40,000 years ago. There are 18 historical monuments other than the inscription of Darius the Great in the Behistun complex that have been registered in the Iranian national list of historical sites. Some of them are:


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The Anubanini rock relief, also called Sarpol-i Zohab, of the Lullubi king Anubanini, dated to , and which is located not far from the Behistun reliefs at Sarpol-e Zahab, is very similar to the reliefs at Behistun. The attitude of the ruler, the trampling of an enemy, the lines of prisoners are all very similar, to such extent that it was said that the sculptors of the Behistun Inscription probably have seen the Anubanini relief beforehand and were inspired by it. The Lullubian reliefs were the model for the Behistun reliefs of Darius the Great.


title: Behistun Inscription

text: The inscriptional tradition of the Achaemenids, starting especially with Darius I, is thought to have derived from the traditions of Elam, Lullubi, the Babylonians and the Assyrians.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: A native to the North Blue, Sanji grew up as part of the Vinsmoke family under his father Vinsmoke Judge, king of the Germa Kingdom, and mother Vinsmoke Sora. Living under a grueling father who only saw Sanji as a soldier, he escapes to Baratie where he learns to cook under “Red Leg” Zeff and learns his fighting style, which is characterized by the use of legs in combat. Sanji is the fifth member and the fourth to join Monkey D. Luffy’s pirate crew as cook after the battle against Don Krieg.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Oda was inspired by Mr. Pink, Steve Buscemi's character in "Reservoir Dogs" (1992), when creating Sanji.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji is a tall, slender man who commonly wears a black suit and smokes a cigarette. Before the timeskip, Sanji is seen with his blonde hair covering his right eye; however, after the timeskip, his hair covers his left eye. Before leaving his family, Sanji styled his hair in the opposite direction and wore a yellow shirt with a black number three on it. He also wore white pants, brown boots, and a yellow bandana. After leaving his family and still a child, he started wearing a white cook’s uniform. Sanji grows a goatee during the timeskip, and concept art shows this was his original design.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji's most distinctive feature is his eyebrows, which are characterized as swirls with the tail end pointing at his left side, opposite in direction in comparison to his siblings Ichiji, Niji, Yonji, and Reiju.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Oda revealed Sanji's real-world nationality would be a Frenchman, in contrast to the Nazi Germany themes of Germa 66.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji is mostly seen as a composed, nonchalant, and calm individual who always keeps his cool when in dire situations. However, this is contrasted by the many comedic gags he partakes in, such as when in the presence of a lady or when insulted by a crew member. Most notably, Sanji and Zoro have a great rivalry, often resorting to fighting (both verbally and physically). However, even when engaging in discourse, they still find ways to help their crew and those around them, such as when they inadvertently save Toko from death.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji is also known to have an enamored personality, constantly flirting with any attractive female he sees, earning him the nickname ""ero"-cook". Many fans want them to be with Nami. Even as a child, while working in Baratie, Sanji would become love-struck with attractive female customers and end up making mistakes in the process of cooking. He also shows jealousy towards those that he perceives to be luckier than him with women, such as when he sees Zoro with Hiyori. Despite this nature, Sanji exhibits some self-restraint due to his loyalty to his crew, as is shown by the fact that in spite of being attracted to Pudding, he sternly refused to marry her and decided to let her down gently. Moreover, due to this attitude and the multiple lectures from Zeff, Sanji follows his own strict set of personal morals in the form of chivalry. He has sworn to never attack women or let them be insulted, even at the cost of his own life and has gone so far as to only block against Kalifa, one of the main antagonists of the Water Seven arc, until Nami could help him. However Sanji did not ask for help — after growing up with an abusive biological father who never heeded his cries for help, Sanji never asks for help during the present-day series until the Wano Arc, where he asks Nico Robin to save him from a woman antagonist who he refuses to help. This is due to the greater vulnerability and acceptance of himself after Luffy saves him from an arranged marriage during the Whole Cake Island Arc.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji is kind and often saves others in danger, even at the cost of his own safety. Oftentimes he frames this kindhearted nature as mere chivalry towards women, but in his actions he consistently helps men as well. Having suffered from starvation among the litany of abuse put upon him by his father, he never denies a person a meal regardless of their intentions, as shown when Don Krieg attempted to take over the Baratie during his introductory arc. Frequently during the series he separates himself from everyone else to play a clandestine role which subsequently helps the crew and other allies survive. In Water 7, Sanji separates from the crew and finds Nico Robin boarding the Puffing Tom on its way to Enies Lobby for her execution. In Thriller Bark, he offers to give up his life in exchange for Luffy's. In Zou, Sanji decided to leave the crew in order to confront his family and protect the Straw Hats from the Fire Tank Pirates. In Wano, Sanji asks for help from another for the first time when asks Robin to save him.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: In the original Japanese version of the "One Piece" anime series, Sanji is voiced by Hiroaki Hirata as an adult and Ikue Ōtani as a child.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: In Odex's dubs of the first 104 episodes of One Piece in Singapore, Sanji was voiced by Joseph Murray and Paul Pistore. In the 4kids Entertainment's dub of the first 104 episodes of One Piece, Sanji was voiced by David Moo as an adult and by Veronica Taylor as a child. In Funimation Entertainment's dubs of the entire One Piece franchise, adult Sanji is voiced by Eric Vale with Christen Auten playing the role of child Sanji.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: When fighting, Sanji only ever relies on kicks, never punching opponents because of his belief that a cook's hands are important instruments for their craft, and thus must be protected from harm. Over the course of the series, Sanji utilizes attacks that are variations of kicks (deemed “Black Leg Style”), with the name of the attack usually having something to do with food, such as “Diable Jambe,” wherein he raises the temperatures of his legs so high that they glow bright red. During his time on Okama Island, Sanji learns a move named “Sky Walk,” which allows him to jump to great heights and to be able to float mid air by making sonic booms in the air behind him. Sanji is one of the few high-bounty individuals that has not consumed a Devil Fruit, fruits that give the consumer superhuman powers at the expense of becoming a dead weight in water. After Whole Cake Island, Sanji receives a Raid Suit gifted from Germa 66, the underground organization powering Germa Kingdom, which increases his physical capabilities and allows him to blend in with his environment.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Other than fighting skills, Sanji is also a well-renowned cook. He learned to cook under Zeff on the Baratie and has become quick and dexterous in his ability to use knives. He also has a strong sense of taste and smell, which is seen by being able to deduce the ingredients and being able to recreate the wedding cake on Whole Cake Island.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: During the timeskip, he develops Observation Haki, which allows him to sense the intent and presence of others, such as when he was able to dodge a jelly bean bullet from Katakuri. He is also able to utilize Armament Haki, which allows him to harden parts of his body and be able to attack Logia users.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Born as a prince of Germa Kingdom, a floating kingdom composed of several ships on the shells of large snails, is routinely ridiculed by his genetically enhanced sociopathic siblings and is locked away by his father Judge for being a disgrace. His appeals for help are met with disdain from Judge. With help from his sister Reiju, he escapes and flees Germa. On his way out, Sanji encounters his father, who tells him that if he is to run away, he must never tell anyone of his relation to the Germa, feeling shameful about their connection. Sanji eventually flees on a cruise ship known as the Orbit.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: While serving as an apprentice cook on a passenger ship, nine-year-old Sanji stands up to a boarding party of pirates led by the infamous "Red Foot" Zeff. During the encounter, Sanji is swept into the sea by a massive wave. Zeff jumps in after him because of their common dream of finding the , a legendary area where the East, West, North, and South Blue seas meet, containing every kind of fish in the world. While castaways together, the pirate saves Sanji's life yet again by giving him all of their food. After their eventual rescue, Sanji stays with Zeff for several years and helps him build a floating restaurant, the . Zeff in turn makes him a first-rate cook and teaches him his kick-based fighting style. Mirroring Zeff, Sanji will never refuse a starving person a meal, and he uses only his legs when fighting to protect the hands he needs for cooking. He has a weakness for women and makes it a principle never to harm one, even if it means his death.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Eventually Sanji becomes infamous as . In Thriller Bark, he offers to give up his life in exchange for Luffy's. While training for a period of two years in Emporio Ivankov's , he develops the , a variant of the technique , which allows him to essentially run through air. In Zou, Sanji is forced into an arranged marriage with the daughter of Big Mom, one of the Four Emperors. Sanji decides to leave the crew in order to confront his family and protect the Straw Hats from the Big Mom Pirates. However Luffy invades the Big Mom Pirates' Empire to save Sanji, but Sanji is unwilling to let his family, though he despises them, die in a trap laid out by Big Mom, who seeks their powerful technology. Luffy responds by acknowledging that such kindness is the heart of Sanji's character. Together they manage to save Sanji's family and escape Big Mom, earning bounty increases. Sanji is pleased that his bounty exceed's Zoro's, but angered at the inclusion of his surname in the poster. Sanji is also displeased to receive his own technologically-enhanced Raid Suit from his family which grants him the ability to turn invisible.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: In Wano, Sanji asks for help from another for the first time when asks Robin to save him from a woman enemy he is unwilling to fight. This is the first time Sanji asks for help in the present-day series from someone else. Later he realizes using the Raid Suit began to awaken dormant genetic enhancements that his mother suppressed years ago. He had gained an exoskeleton, a superhuman physical constitution, accelerated healing, increase in strength and speed which enhanced his fighting style immensely and his skin has become bulletproof. Sadly, this had dampened his emotions as well when he realized he had hurt a woman unknowingly who unintentionally got his way and became extremely afraid of him but that was not the case, as it is confirmed by Sanji, that Queen used his invisibility to make it look like he did the beating. Fearing he is losing his heart and humanity, he destroys the Raid Suit canister, freeing himself from Germa's influence for good and stopping him from losing more of himself.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: The creators of "", Yūto Tsukuda and Shun Saeki, created a set of spinoff one-shots titled "Shokugeki no Sanji", with the first installment being published in 2018 to celebrate One Piece’s 21st anniversary. There are currently four installments and the spinoffs are short stories detailing different cooking competitions that Sanji partakes in, as well as going into detail about his training in Okama Island.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: A cookbook titled "One Piece: Pirate Recipes" was published by Shueisha in November 2012. The book is attributed to Sanji himself and includes various "One Piece"-themed cooking recipes. A localization by Viz Media was announced in February 2021, and released on November 23, 2021.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji has also been featured in varying forms of merchandise. For instance, many figurines have been produced, with one example being the Sanji figure in the One Piece Locations Trading Figures series. In 2012, the French Luxury brand S.T Dupont collaborated on their 140th anniversary with Eiichiro Oda to recreate Sanji's iconic "Sleeping Mermaid" gold lighter.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Statues have also been erected in Sanji's honor. A bronze statue of Sanji was dedicated in Mashiki, Kumamoto as part of the Kumamoto Revival Project to help with healing after the 2016 earthquakes in the area. In the Nagoya location of the One Piece Mugiwara Store, a statue of Sanji stands next to artwork from the show. In "Sanji's Oresama Restaurant," one of the Tokyo One Piece Tower's restaurants, a statue of Sanji can be seen as part of a feast with the rest of the crew.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: In the Shōnen Jump One Piece popularity polls, Sanji was ranked fourth in the first poll (1999) and third for the three subsequent polls (2002, 2006, 2009). In the most recent poll (2021), which was the first polled held worldwide, Sanji was ranked the fourth most popular character with 970,286 votes.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Sanji is considered by many critics to be one of the deepest-written characters in "One Piece". Reviewer Merphy Napier noted he was “a character that you’ve been traveling with and knowing and really feeling you understand this chapter for a thousand chapters, or nine hundred chapters, and suddenly get a second backstory on them and all of a sudden everything you knew about them is still consistent but recontextualized and all of a sudden you know this character on a level you didn’t even know you were missing!“ Jason Klum wrote, "Sanji is the most complex character in One Piece. The countless nuances in his character, the back and forth mental struggles, his character development and how [Whole Cake Island] highlighted his humanity after giving him more characterization.”


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Another reviewer wrote that their "favourite character specific role is Sanji as the spy hero.” However, his attitude towards women is often criticized by fans and critics alike. Dyler Crews wrote how “Sanji has all of the tangibles to be one of the undisputed best characters in the entire series. His origin, powers, and style make him an easy favorite among One Piece fans. Still, his strange obsession with women pushes other fans away. The lecherous hero is as foundational to the shonen manga genre as gaudy transformations. Sanji is the most visible in a long line of problematic and confounding characters to express this annoyingly immature personality type.” When Sanji asked the woman Nico Robin to save him from danger in the Wano Arc, he was praised for this character development.


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: An analysis of Zoro and Sanji’s dichotomy noted Oda wrote them as “the Ying and Yang that complete Luffy. They are the representation, the embodiment of everything that Luffy stands for.” While Zoro represents Luffy as an ambitious combatant seeking kingly status, Sanji represent’s Luffy’s “more compassionate, kind side.” This allows them to recruit allies better than any other character in the show; Luffy and Sanji are shown to be the two most influential characters in the series in this regard. Both explicitly offered to sacrifice their lives in exchange for Luffy's. Nico Robin refers to Zoro and Sanji as the "wings of the Pirate King." This "suggests that they're the two most important people to Luffy becoming the Pirate King, for their ability to carry their responsibility effectively and fight at the highest level, if not more."


title: Sanji (One Piece)

text: Eric Vale’s work with Sanji nominated him for the “Voice Actor of the Year” award in the Behind the Voice Actor Awards from 2015. Daniel Dockery, a senior staff writer for Crunchyroll, argued that Sanji has one of the best character introductions in anime. Ritwik Mitra of GameRant placed Sanji as the best comedy relief character in "shōnen" anime, citing his attempts at courting women and conflicts with his crew mate Roronoa Zoro as a source of humor. Mitra adds that Sanji is also a significant part in "some of the most iconic non-comedy moments", which he believes to be reason for his popularity.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger II (; 22 December 1095 – 26 February 1154) was King of Sicily and Africa, son of Roger I of Sicily and successor to his brother Simon. He began his rule as Count of Sicily in 1105, became Duke of Apulia and Calabria in 1127, then King of Sicily in 1130 and King of Africa in 1148. By the time of his death at the age of 58, Roger had succeeded in uniting all the Norman conquests in Italy into one kingdom with a strong centralized government.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: By 999, Norman adventurers had arrived in southern Italy. By 1016, they were involved in the complex local politics, where Lombards were fighting against the Byzantine Empire. As mercenaries they fought the enemies of the Italian city-states, sometimes fighting for the Byzantines and sometimes against them, but in the following century they gradually became the rulers of the major polities south of Rome.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger I ruled the County of Sicily at the time of the birth of his youngest son, Roger, at Mileto, Calabria, in 1095. Roger I's nephew, Roger Borsa, was the Duke of Apulia and Calabria, and his great nephew, Richard II of Capua, was the Prince of Capua. Alongside these three major rulers were a large number of minor counts, who effectively exercised sovereign power in their own localities. These counts at least nominally owed allegiance to one of these three Norman rulers, but such allegiance was usually weak and often ignored.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: When Roger I died in 1101, his young son Simon became count, with his mother Adelaide del Vasto as regent. Simon died four years later in 1105, at the age of 12. Adelaide continued as regent to her younger son Roger, who was nine.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Upon the death in 1105 of his elder brother, Simon of Hauteville, Roger inherited the County of Sicily under the regency of his mother, Adelaide del Vasto. His mother was assisted by such notables as Christodulus, the Greek emir of Palermo. In 1109, Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos bestowed upon him the title of "protonobilissimos", in recognition of his knowledge of the Byzantine court. In the summer of 1110, Roger was visited by the Norwegian king Sigurd the Crusader, who was on his way to Jerusalem. The story in Icelandic sources suggests that Sigurd called Roger the king of Sicily twenty years before the latter actually obtained this title.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1112, at the age of sixteen, Roger began his personal rule, being named "now knight, now count of Sicily and Calabria" in a charter document dated 12 June 1112. In 1117, his mother, who had married Baldwin I of Jerusalem, returned to Sicily, since the patriarch of Jerusalem had declared the marriage invalid. Roger seems to have felt the slight, and this might explain his later reluctance to go crusading. Roger married his first wife, Elvira, daughter of King Alfonso VI of Castile and his fourth wife, Isabella, who may be identical to his former concubine, the converted Moor, Zaida, baptised Isabella.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1122, Duke William II of Apulia, who was fighting with Count Jordan of Ariano, offered to renounce his remaining claims to Sicily as well as part of Calabria. Roger, in exchange, provided William with 600 knights and access to money for his campaign.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: When William II of Apulia died childless in July 1127, Roger claimed all Hauteville family possessions in the peninsula as well as the overlordship of the Principality of Capua, which had been nominally given to Apulia almost thirty years earlier. However, the union of Sicily and Apulia was resisted by Pope Honorius II and by the subjects of the duchy itself.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: The popes had long been suspicious of the growth of Norman power in southern Italy, and at Capua in December, the pope preached a crusade against Roger, setting Robert II of Capua and Ranulf II of Alife (his own brother-in-law) against him. After this coalition failed, in August 1128 Honorius invested Roger at Benevento as Duke of Apulia. The baronial resistance, backed by Naples, Bari, Salerno, and other cities whose aim was civic freedom, gave way. In September 1129 Roger was generally recognized as duke of Apulia by Sergius VII of Naples, Robert of Capua, and the rest. He began at once to enforce order in the duchy, where ducal power had long been fading.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: On the death of Pope Honorius in February 1130 there were two claimants to the papal throne. Roger supported Antipope Anacletus II against Innocent II. The reward was a crown, and, on 27 September 1130, Anacletus' papal bull made Roger king of Sicily. He was crowned in Palermo on Christmas Day 1130.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger II's elaborate royal mantle bears the year 528 of the Islamic calendar (1133–34); therefore it could not have been used for his coronation. This lavish item, made for special events to show power and regality, was most likely worn as a symbol of the Norman's victory and new dynasty in Sicily. It was later used as a coronation cloak by the Holy Roman Emperors and is now in the Imperial Treasury (Schatzkammer) in Vienna.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: The mantle is an example of the Normans' multicultural court and a mark of trade in Palermo. It is a luxury object made from red silk imported from the Byzantine Empire, its outer panels embellished with gold embroidery, pearls, enamel and jewels. The lining panels are separated into five sections made from three separate silks, each woven with gold. The pearls are from the Persian Gulf, with thousands outlining each section of the embroidery. Pearls were a common decoration on pan-Mediterranean textiles, but were also used and admired on clothing of the Byzantine Empire. The enameled surfaces are also attributed to the Byzantine Empire, as they had many craftsmen specializing in this type of work. The gold embroidery was most likely created by Muslim craftsmen, given the tiraz bands, the Arabic text in calligraphy, and Kufic script. The piece was made in a private royal workshop, dedicated to creating tiraz fabric and other royal garments. It is one of few surviving mementos of Fatimid-style royal garb preserved in its entirety.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: The inscription written in the tiraz band along the bottom of the piece states, "Here is what was created in the princely treasury, filled with luck, eminence, majesty, perfection, long-suffering, superiority, welcome, prosperity, liberality, brilliance, pride, beauty, the fulfillment of desires and hopes, the pleasure of days and nights, without cease or change, of glory, devotion, preservation of protection,luck, salvation, victory and capability, in the capital of Sicily, in the year 528 H. [1133–1134]" This mantle was made to promote status, bring the wearer good fortune, and to emphasize Roger II's regal power.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In addition to its lavish decoration and color, the mantle uses striking imagery to convey Roger II's power and victory over the previous dynasty. In a scene evoking domination through primal violence, two lions, a heraldic symbol of a powerful, male ruler, each attack a camel, addorsed on either side of a central palm tree. The lions are stylized rather than realistically portrayed. There are also evocations of the cosmos and constellations in the star shapes on the lions' heads. The mantle's pan-Mediterranean influence is brought out in the materials used to create it, the way it was made, and its design.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger's backing of Anacletus plunged him into a ten-year war. Bernard of Clairvaux, Innocent's champion, organized a coalition against Anacletus and his "half-heathen king". He was joined by Louis VI of France, Henry I of England, and Lothair III, Holy Roman Emperor. Meanwhile, southern Italy revolted.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1130, the Duchy of Amalfi revolted and in 1131, Roger sent John of Palermo across the Strait of Messina to join up with a royal troop from Apulia and Calabria and march on Amalfi by land while George of Antioch blockaded the town by sea and set up a base on Capri. Amalfi soon capitulated.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1132, Roger sent Robert II of Capua and Ranulf II of Alife to Rome in a show of force in support of Anacletus. While they were away, Roger's half-sister Matilda, Ranulf's wife, fled to Roger claiming abuse. Simultaneously, Roger annexed Ranulf's brother's County of Avellino. Ranulf demanded the restitution of both wife and countship. Both were denied, and Ranulf left Rome against orders, with Robert following.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: First Roger dealt with a rebellion in Apulia, where he defeated and deposed Grimoald, Prince of Bari, replacing him with his second son Tancred. Meanwhile, Robert and Ranulf took papal Benevento. Roger went to meet them but was defeated at the Battle of Nocera on 25 July 1132. He retreated to Salerno.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: The next year, Lothair III came down to Rome for his imperial coronation. The rebel leaders met him there, but they were refused help because Lothair's force was too small. With the emperor's departure, divisions in his opponents' ranks allowed Roger to reverse his fortunes. By July 1134, his troops had forced Ranulf, Sergius, and the other ringleaders to submit. Robert was expelled from Capua and Roger installed his third son, Alfonso of Hauteville, as Prince of Capua. Roger II's eldest son Roger was given the title of Duke of Apulia.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Meanwhile, Lothair's contemplated attack upon Roger had gained the backing of the Republic of Pisa, the Republic of Genoa, and the Byzantine emperor John II, each of whom feared the growth of a powerful Norman kingdom. A Pisan fleet led by the exiled prince of Capua dropped anchor off Naples in 1135. Ranulf joined Robert and Sergius there, encouraged by news coming from Sicily that Roger was fatally ill or even already dead. The important fortress of Aversa, among others, passed to the rebels and only Capua resisted, under the royal chancellor, Guarin. On June 5, however, Roger disembarked in Salerno, much to the surprise of all the mainland provinces. The royal army, split into several forces, easily conquered Aversa and even Alife, the base of the natural rebel leader, Ranulf. Most of the rebels took refuge in Naples, which was besieged in July, but despite poor health conditions within the city, Roger was unable to take it, and returned to Messina late in the year.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1136, the long-awaited imperial army, led by Lothair and the Duke of Bavaria, Henry the Proud, descended the peninsula to support the three rebels. Henry, Robert, and Ranulf took a large contingent of troops to besiege the peninsular capital of the kingdom, Salerno. Roger remained in Sicily, leaving its mainland garrisons helpless under the chancellor Robert of Selby, while even the Byzantine emperor John II Comnenus sent subsidies to Lothair. Salerno surrendered, and the large army of Germans and Normans marched to the very south of Apulia. There, in June 1137, Lothair besieged and took Bari. At San Severino, after the victorious campaign, he and the pope jointly invested Ranulf as Duke of Apulia in August 1137, and the emperor then retired to Germany. Roger, freed from the utmost danger, immediately disembarked in Calabria, at Tropea, with 400 knights and other troops, probably mostly Muslims. After having been welcomed by the Salernitans, he recovered ground in Campania, sacking Pozzuoli, Alife, Capua, and Avellino. Sergius was forced to acknowledge him as overlord of Naples and switch his allegiance to Anacletus. This moment marked the fall of an independent Neapolitan duchy, and thereafter the ancient city was fully integrated into the Norman realm.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: From there Roger moved to Benevento and northern Apulia, where Duke Ranulf, although steadily losing his bases of power, had some German troops plus some 1,500 knights from the cities of Melfi, Trani, Troia, and Bari, who were "ready to die rather than lead a miserable life". On 30 October 1137, at the Battle of Rignano (next to Monte Gargano), the younger Roger and his father, with Sergius of Naples, met the defensive army of Duke Ranulf. It was the greatest defeat of Roger II's career. Sergius died and Roger fled to Salerno. It capped Ranulf's meteoric career: twice victor over Roger. Anacletus II died in January 1138, but Innocent II refused to reconcile with the king.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In spring 1138, the royal army invaded the Principality of Capua, with the precise intent of avoiding a pitched battle and of dispersing Ranulf's army with a series of marches through difficult terrain. While the Count of Alife hesitated, Roger, now supported by Benevento, destroyed all the rebels' castles in the region, capturing an immense booty. In April 1139, at the Second Council of the Lateran, Innocent II declared Roger excommunicated. Ranulf himself, who had taken refuge in his capital Troia, died of malarial fever on 30 April 1139. Roger exhumed his body from his grave in Troia cathedral and threw it in a ditch, only to repent subsequently and rebury him decently.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: At this time, with Sergius dead, Alfonso was elected to replace him and together with his brother Roger went off to conquer the Abruzzi.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: After the death of Anacletus in January 1138, Roger had sought the confirmation of his title from Innocent. However, the pope wanted an independent Principality of Capua as a buffer state between the Kingdom of Sicily and the Papal States, something Roger would not accept. In the summer of 1139, Innocent II invaded the kingdom with a large army, but was ambushed on 22 July 1139 at Galluccio, southeast of present-day Cassino, by Roger's son and was captured. Three days later, by the Treaty of Mignano, the pope proclaimed Roger II "rex Siciliae ducatus Apuliae et principatus Capuae" (King of Sicily, Duke of Apulia and commander of Capua). The boundaries of his "regno" were only later fixed by a truce with the pope in October 1144. These lands were for the next seven centuries to constitute the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1139, Bari, the 50,000 inhabitants of which had remained unscathed behind its massive walls during the wars of the past year, decided to surrender. The "excellentissimus princeps" Jaquintus, who had led the rebellion of the city, was hanged, along with many of his followers, but the city avoided being sacked. Roger's execution of the prince and his counsellors was perhaps the most violent act of his life.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: While his sons overcame pockets of resistance on the mainland, on 5 November 1139 Roger returned to Palermo to plan a great act of legislation: the Assizes of Ariano, an attempt to establish his dominions in southern Italy as a coherent state. He returned to check on his sons' progress in 1140 and then went to Ariano, a town central to the peninsular possessions (and a center of rebellion under his predecessors). There he promulgated the great law regulating all Sicilian affairs. It invested the king and his bureaucracy with absolute powers and reduced the authority of the often rebellious vassals. While there, centralising his kingdom, Roger declared a new standard coinage, named after the duchy of Apulia: the "ducat."


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger’s reforms in laws and administration aimed not only to strengthen his rule but also to improve the economic standing of Sicily and southern Italy. He was "very concerned to gain money, but hardly very prodigal in expending it".


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: In 1140 at his assembly at Ariano he introduced new coinage including smaller denominations, to facilitate trade with the rest of the Mediterranean. However, although this new coinage made long-distance trade easier, it was detrimental to local trade, which spread "hatred throughout Italy". By the 1150s most of this coinage was no longer in use and soon after, it disappeared altogether.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Nevertheless, the controversy over the coinage did not hinder the Kingdom's prosperity. Roger II had acquired large wealth not only through his royal patrimony but also through his military campaigns and their financial rewards. For example, gold and silver were gained through the campaigns in Apulia in 1133 and Greece in 1147.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Sicily's geographic situation at the centre of the Mediterranean favored trade with Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Its primary export was durum wheat; others included foods like cheese and vine fruits. Unlike other states, Sicily also had a strong political and military standing, so its merchants were supported and to some extent protected. This standing allowed for an increase in internal trade and a stronger market, which led to noticeable developments in agriculture.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger had now become one of the greatest kings in Europe. At Palermo, he gathered round him distinguished men of various races, such as the famous Arab geographer Muhammad al-Idrisi and the Byzantine Greek historian Nilus Doxopatrius or Neilos Doxapatres. Sicily, in the center of the Mediterranean and a natural stopping point for people traveling across it, had been run by several different groups in its history, and Roger welcomed the learned and practiced tolerance toward the several creeds, races and languages of his realm. To administer his domain he hired many Greeks and Arabs, who were trained in long-established traditions of centralized government. He was served by men of several nationalities, such as the Englishman Thomas Brun, a "kaid" of the "Curia", and in the fleet by two Greeks, first Christodulus and then George of Antioch, whom he made in 1132 "ammiratus ammiratorum" or "Emir of Emirs", in effect prime vizier. (This title later became the English word admiral). Roger made Sicily the leading maritime power in the Mediterranean.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: A powerful fleet was built up under several admirals, or "emirs", of whom the greatest was George, formerly in the service of the Muslim prince of Mahdia. Mainly thanks to him, a series of conquests were made on the African coast (1146–1153). From 1135 Roger II started to conquer the coast of Tunisia and enlarge his dominions: Tripoli was captured in 1146 and Cape Bona in 1148. These conquests were lost in the reign of Roger's successor William, however, and never formed an integral part of the kingdom in southern Italy.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: The Second Crusade (1147–1148) offered Roger an opportunity to revive attacks on the Byzantine Empire, the traditional Norman enemy to the East. It also afforded him an opportunity, through the agency of Theodwin, a cardinal ever-vigilant for Crusade supporters, to strike up a correspondence with Conrad III of Germany in an effort to break his alliance with Manuel I Comnenus. Roger himself never went on an expedition against Byzantium, instead handing command to the skillful George. In 1147, George set sail from Otranto with seventy galleys to attack Corfu. According to Nicetas Choniates, the island capitulated thanks to George's bribes (and the tax burden of the imperial government), welcoming the Normans as their liberators. Leaving a garrison of 1,000 men, George sailed on to the Peloponnesus. He sacked Athens and quickly moved on to the Aegean Islands. He ravaged the coast all along Euboea and the Gulf of Corinth and penetrated as far as Thebes, where he pillaged the silk factories and carried off the Jewish damask, brocade, and silk weavers, taking them back to Palermo where they formed the basis for the Sicilian silk industry. George capped the expedition with a sack of Corinth, in which the relics of Saint Theodore were stolen, and then returned to Sicily. In 1149, however, Corfu was retaken. George went on a punitive expedition against Constantinople, but could not land and instead defied the Byzantine emperor by firing arrows against the palace windows. Despite this act, his expedition left no enduring effects.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger died at Palermo on 26 February 1154 and was buried in the Cathedral of Palermo. He was succeeded by his fourth son, William.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger is the subject of "King Roger", a 1926 opera by Polish composer Karol Szymanowski. The last months of his life are also featured in Tariq Ali's book "A Sultan in Palermo". Studiorum Universitas Ruggero II, a private non-traditional university connected to Accademia Normanna was incorporated in the U.S. on April 30, 2001 in his honor.


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger's first marriage was in 1117 to Elvira, a daughter of King Alfonso VI of Castile. When she died, rumors flew that Roger had died as well, as his grief had made him a recluse. They had six children:


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger's second marriage was in 1149 to Sibylla, daughter of Hugh II, Duke of Burgundy. They had two children:


title: Roger II of Sicily

text: Roger's third marriage was in 1151 to Beatrice of Rethel, a grandniece of King Baldwin II of Jerusalem. They had one daughter:


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Sacubitril/valsartan, sold under the brand name Entresto, is a fixed-dose combination medication for use in heart failure. It consists of the neprilysin inhibitor sacubitril and the angiotensin receptor blocker valsartan. The combination is sometimes described as an "angiotensin receptor-neprilysin inhibitor" (ARNi). It is recommended for use as a replacement for an ACE inhibitor or an angiotensin receptor blocker in people with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: It was approved for medical use in the United States and in the European Union in 2015, and in Australia in 2016. In 2020, it was the 219th most commonly prescribed medication in the United States, with more than 2million prescriptions.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Sacubitril is the molecule that is metabolically activated by de-ethylation by esterases. The active form of the molecule, Sacubitrilat, is responsible for the molecule's drug lowering effects.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Sacubitril/valsartan can be used instead of an ACE inhibitor or an angiotensin receptor blocker in people with heart failure and a reduced left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), alongside other standard therapies (e.g. beta-blockers) for heart failure. To investigate its use for heart failure in those with a preserved LVEF (HFpEF), Novartis funded the PARAGON-HF trial which was designed to investigate the use of sacubitril/valsartan in the treatment of HFpEF patients with a LVEF of 45% or more. Concluding in 2019, it failed to show significance for reducing hospitalisation related to heart failure or reducing death from cardiovascular causes, and therefore appearing to show limited benefit to those with HFpEF. A Cochrane systematic review of data from 37 trials investigating treatments for HFpEF suggested that evidence is also lacking to support the use of ACE Inhibitors, ARBs or ARNIs in patients with HFpEF at this time, and that the mainstay pharmacological therapy for HFpEF still remains the treatment of co-morbidities such as hypertension or other triggers for decompensation. Patients who exhibit symptoms of NYHA Class II or III heart failure and are still symptomatic despite maximally tolerated dose of an ACE inhibitor or ARB alone, may be considered for sacubitril/valsartan dual therapy to decrease the risk of cardiovascular-related and all-cause mortality. Mortality benefits have only been observed to date in those with LVEF less than 35%.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Changing 100 people from an ACE inhibitor or angiotensin II receptor antagonist to sacubitril/valsartan for 2.3 years would prevent three deaths, five hospitalizations for heart failure, and eleven hospitalizations overall.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Common adverse effects [>1%] include hyperkalaemia [high potassium levels in the blood, a known side effect of Valsartan], hypotension [low blood pressure, common in vasodilators and extracellular fluid volume reducers], a persistent dry cough and renal impairment [reduced kidney function].


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Angioedema, a rare but more serious reaction, can occur in some patients [<1%] and involves swelling of the face and lips. Angioedema is more common in black patients. Sacubitril/Valsartan should not be taken within 36 hours of an Angiotensin Converting Enzyme Inhibitor to reduce the risk of developing Angioedema.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: The side effect profile in trials of sacubitril/valsartan compared to valsartan alone or enalapril [an angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor] is very similar, with the incidence of hypotension slightly higher in sacubitril/valsartan, the risk comparable for angioedema, and the chance of hyperkalaemia, renal impairment and cough slightly lower.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Sacubitril/valsartan is contraindicated in pregnancy because it contains valsartan, a known risk for birth defects.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Valsartan blocks the angiotensin II receptor type 1 (AT). This receptor is found on both vascular smooth muscle cells, and on the zona glomerulosa cells of the adrenal gland which are responsible for aldosterone secretion. In the absence of AT blockade, angiotensin causes both direct vasoconstriction and adrenal aldosterone secretion, the aldosterone then acting on the distal tubular cells of the kidney to promote sodium reabsorption which expands extracellular fluid (ECF) volume. Blockade of (AT) thus causes blood vessel dilation and reduction of ECF volume.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Sacubitril is a prodrug that is activated to sacubitrilat (LBQ657) by de-ethylation via esterases. Sacubitrilat inhibits the enzyme neprilysin, a neutral endopeptidase that degrades vasoactive peptides, including natriuretic peptides, bradykinin, and adrenomedullin. Thus, sacubitril increases the levels of these peptides, causing blood vessel dilation and reduction of ECF volume via sodium excretion.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Despite these actions, neprilysin inhibitors have been found to have limited efficacy in the treatment of hypertension and heart failure when taken on their own. This is attributed to a reduction in enzymatic breakdown of angiotensin II by the reduction of neprilysin activity, which results in an increase in systemic angiotensin II levels and the negation of the positive effects of this drug family in cardiovascular disease treatment. Combined treatment with a neprilysin inhibitor and an angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor has been shown to be effective in reducing angiotensin II levels, and demonstrated superiority in lowering blood pressure compared to ACE inhibition alone. However, due to an increase in bradykinins from the inhibition of both ACE and neprilysin, there was a threefold increase in relative risk of angioedema compared with ACE inhibition alone following this combination treatment. The combination of a neprilysin inhibitor with an angiotensin receptor blocker instead of the ACE inhibitor has been shown to have a comparable risk of angioedema, whilst also demonstrating superiority in treating moderate-severe heart failure to ACE inhibitor treatment.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Neprilysin also has a role in clearing the protein amyloid beta from the cerebrospinal fluid, and its inhibition by sacubitril has shown increased levels of AB in healthy subjects (Entresto 194/206 for two weeks). Amyloid beta is considered to contribute to the development of Alzheimer's disease, and there exist concerns that sacubitril may promote the development of Alzheimer's disease.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Sacubitril/valsartan is co-crystallized sacubitril and valsartan, in a one-to-one molar ratio. One sacubitril/valsartan complex consists of six sacubitril anions, six valsartan dianions, 18 sodium cations, and 15 molecules of water, resulting in the molecular formula CHNNaO·15HO and a molecular mass of 5748.03 g/mol.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: The substance is a white powder consisting of thin hexagonal plates. It is stable in solid form as well as in aqueous (water) solution with a pH of 5 to 7, and has a melting point of about .


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: During its development by Novartis, Entresto was known as LCZ696. It was approved under the FDA's priority review process on 7 July 2015. It was also approved in Europe in 2015. In 2022, Novartis sold its India marketing rights of Sacubitril Valsartan to JB Pharma, under the brand name Azmarda.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: There was controversy over the PARADIGM-HF trial—the Phase III trial on the basis of which the drug was approved by the FDA. For example, both Richard Lehman, a physician who writes a weekly review of key medical articles for the BMJ Blog and a December 2015, report from the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER) found that the risk–benefit ratio was not adequately determined because the design of the clinical trial was too artificial and did not reflect people with heart failure that doctors usually encounter. In 2019, the PIONEER-HF and PARAGON-HF trials studied the effect of sacubitril/valsartan in 800 patients recently hospitalised with severe heart failure and 4800 patients with less severe symptoms of heart failure respectively. The medication consistently demonstrated similar levels of safety, with higher rates of very low blood pressure, compared to current treatments across all three trials in a variety of patients, however it has only shown effectiveness in those with more advanced heart failure. In December 2015, Steven Nissen and other thought leaders in cardiology said that the approval of sacubitril/valsartan had the greatest impact on clinical practice in cardiology in 2015, and Nissen called the drug "truly a breakthrough approach."


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: One 2015 review stated that sacubitril/valsartan represents "an advancement in the chronic treatment of heart failure with reduced ejection fraction" but that widespread clinical success with the drug will require taking care to use it in appropriate patients, specifically those with characteristics similar to those in the clinical trial population. Another 2015 review called the reductions in mortality and hospitalization conferred by sacubitril/valsartan "striking", but noted that its effects in heart failure people with hypertension, diabetes, chronic kidney disease, and the elderly needed to be evaluated further.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: The wholesale cost to the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK is approximately per person per year as of 2017. The wholesale cost in the United States is per year . Similar class generic drugs without sacubitril, such as valsartan alone, cost approximately a year. One industry-funded analysis found a cost of per quality-adjusted life year (QALY).


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: The PARADIGM-HF trial (in which Milton Packer was one of the principal investigators) compared treatment with sacubitril/valsartan to treatment with enalapril. People with heart failure and reduced LVEF (10,513) were sequentially treated on a short-term basis with enalapril and then with sacubitril/valsartan. Those that were able to tolerate both regimens (8442, 80%) were randomly assigned to long-term treatment with either enalapril or sacubitril/valsartan. Participants were mainly white (66%), male (78%), middle aged (median 63.8 +/- 11 years) with NYHA stage II (71.6%) or stage III (23.1%) heart failure.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: The trial was stopped early after a prespecified interim analysis revealed a reduction in the primary endpoint of cardiovascular death or heart failure in the sacubitril/valsartan group relative to those treated with enalapril. Taken individually, the reductions in cardiovascular death and heart failure hospitalizations retained statistical significance. Relative to enalapril, sacubitril/valsartan provided reductions in:


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Limitations of the trial include scarce experience with initiation of therapy in hospitalized patients and in those with NYHA heart failure class IV symptoms. Additionally the trial compared a maximal dose of valsartan (plus sacubitril) with a sub-maximal dose of enalapril, and was thus not directly comparable with current gold-standard use of ACE inhibitors in heart failure, diminishing the validity of the trial results.


title: Sacubitril/valsartan

text: Treatment of 57-year-old human cadaver skin cells with valsartan and sacubitril led to a four-fold increase in collagen type-1 production, which opens up the potential for a new use of this combination of drugs, already as a local remedy for rejuvenating aged skin.


title: Aviva

text: Aviva plc is a British multinational insurance company headquartered in London, England. It has about 18 million customers across its core markets of the United Kingdom, Ireland and Canada. In the United Kingdom, Aviva is the largest general insurer and a leading life and pensions provider. Aviva is also the second largest general insurer in Canada.


title: Aviva

text: Aviva also has a focus on the growth markets of China and South East Asia through investments and joint ventures with other firms. Aviva has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange, and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.


title: Aviva

text: The name of the company upon its formation in May 2000 was CGNU plc and was created when Norwich Union merged with insurer CGU. In April 2002, the company's shareholders voted to change the company name to Aviva plc, an invented palindrome word derived from "viva", the Latin for 'alive' and designed to be short, memorable and work worldwide. The Norwich Union brand, however, was retained for the UK long-term savings and general insurance business.


title: Aviva

text: In April 2008, Aviva announced that it would adopt the Aviva name as its worldwide consumer facing brand, and that the Norwich Union brand would be phased out in the United Kingdom.


title: Aviva

text: Aviva can trace its history back to the establishment of the Hand in Hand Fire & Life Insurance Society in London in 1696.


title: Aviva

text: It was created by a merger of two British insurance firms, Norwich Union and CGU plc (itself created by the merger of 1998 of Commercial Union and General Accident) as CGNU in February 2000. The Aviva name was adopted in July 2002. Thereafter, most of the group operations, except for some strong local brands, were carried out under the uniform brand "Aviva".


title: Aviva

text: In July 2006, Aviva greatly increased its presence in the United States by acquiring AmerUs Group, a Des Moines based financial services company founded in 1896 in a $2.9 billion (£1.6 billion) deal.


title: Aviva

text: The launch was supported by a £9 million advertising campaign to promote the rebranding (one of the most expensive ever in the insurance field), with the participation of celebrities including Bruce Willis and Alice Cooper. In June 2009, the company decided to dispose of "Navigator", its Australian wealth management business, to National Australia Bank for A$825 million (£401 million).


title: Aviva

text: In October 2009, the company decided to focus on its commercial insurance sector and demonstrate its commitment to brokers by launching their 'find a broker' facility, using the British Insurance Brokers Association search engine. To help them with this endeavour, Paul Whitehouse was recruited to play the part of a successful hairdresser running three salons. The message of the campaign focused on business insurance through insurance brokers.


title: Aviva

text: In September 2011, Aviva completed the sale of RAC plc breakdown recovery operation for £1.0 billion to The Carlyle Group. In February 2012, Aviva sold its occupational health business to the British support services company Capita.


title: Aviva

text: In July 2012, Aviva announced plans to sell or close 16 non core businesses in order to simplify its activities and boost shareholder returns. As part of the plans Aviva announced the sale of its operations in South Korea and the closure to new business of its bulk buying annuity unit in the United Kingdom. In August 2012, Aviva announced that up to 800 jobs would be lost, following a reorganization caused by further turmoil in the Eurozone.


title: Aviva

text: In December 2012, Aviva agreed to sell Aviva USA Corporation to Athene Holding for US$1.8 billion (£1.1 billion) as part of a plan to improve shareholder returns and reduce the group's capital requirements, having paid $2.9 billion in 2006 and incurring a large loss on sale. Athene subsequently sold the life insurance business of Aviva to Global Atlantic.