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 writing in The Guardian, was one of the first to report that <mask> at this time ran a lucrative protection racket and was one of the most significant drug dealers in the Portadown area, primarily in ecstasy. King <mask>'s unit called themselves the "Brat pack". The nickname "King Rat" was first given to <mask> by the Mid-Ulster Ulster Defence Association (UDA) commander Robert John Kerr as a form of pub bantering. According to journalist and author Paul Larkin, Kerr sat inside a pub and jokingly bestowed a nickname on each patron as they entered. When <mask> walked through the door, Kerr gave him the sobriquet of "King Rat". Sunday World journalists Martin O'Hagan and Jim Campbell picked up on it and satirically named them the "rat pack"; they also used the name "King Rat" to identify <mask>.Much to <mask>'s annoyance, the name became popular with the media. In response, <mask> had the newspaper's offices bombed and issued a death threat to O'Hagan and anyone who worked for the paper. In an interview with Martin Dillon, he blamed the police raids, republican death threats and the "King Rat" nickname as factors which eventually caused the break-up of his marriage. He nevertheless maintained cordial relations with his ex-wife, Thelma, whom he described as a "good Christian". Drumcree standoff

The Drumcree conflict, stemming from an Orange Order protest at Drumcree Church after their parade had been banned from marching through the predominantly nationalist Catholic Garvaghy area of Portadown, returned to the headlines in 1995 with trouble expected in <mask>'s Portadown stronghold. Just before the July marching season Irish government representative Fergus Finlay held a meeting with <mask> in which the latter pledged his loyalty to the peace process and David Ervine in particular, although <mask> also warned Finlay that loyalist views had to be respected. Cracks began to show however as <mask> felt that the UVF response to the trouble had been inordinately low-key whilst his taste for the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) strategy also began to wane as the party moved increasingly towards a form of socialism, an ideology repugnant to <mask>.A further problem arose when <mask>, who by that time was a popular loyalist figure across Northern Ireland, travelled to the Shankill Road in Belfast in late 1995 to try to overturn a ban preventing an Orange Order parade entering a neighbouring Catholic area. <mask> had hoped to bring local UVF units onto the streets of the Shankill to force an overturning of the ban but the Shankill commanders refused to put their units at <mask>'s disposal, having assured the British authorities that they would not in a series of secret negotiations. <mask> returned to Portadown in disgust, accusing the Belfast UVF of having surrendered. Nonetheless, when <mask> was arrested in late 1995 for intimidation he was still on good terms with the UVF, whose magazine Combat called for his release. In January 1996, <mask> once again travelled to Belfast where he dropped a verbal bombshell by announcing that the Mid-Ulster Brigade would no longer operate under the authority of the Brigade Staff. That same year <mask> was ordered to attend a meeting called by the Brigade Staff at "the Eagle", their headquarters above a chip shop (bearing the same name) on the Shankill Road, to answer charges of alleged drug dealing and being a police informer. The latter accusation came about after the loss of a substantial amount of weapons from the Mid-Ulster Brigade and a large number of its members had been arrested.<mask> refused to attend and continued to flout Brigade Staff authority. Following the decision by RUC Chief Constable Hugh Annesley to ban the Orange parade through the Garvaghy Road area of Portadown in the summer of 1996, a protest campaign of road blockages and general disruption was organised across Northern Ireland by the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). The protests, which led to a reversal of the ban, saw no official UVF involvement although <mask>, despite not being a member of the Orange Order, was personally involved and led a sizeable force of his men to Drumcree. <mask> and the Mid-Ulster Brigade attracted considerable attention from the global media as they made a formidable show of strength and staunchly defended the Orangemen's right to march their traditional route. The brigade manned the barricades, and brought homemade weapons to the church; among these was a mechanical digger and a petrol tanker. There was intelligence that <mask> and his unit had planned to attack the British Army and police who were blocking the Orangemen's passage. Television cameras broadcast <mask> directing rioters on Drumcree hill against the security forces.<mask> even held a meeting with one of the central figures in the operation, UUP leader David Trimble, and he was often seen in the company of Harold Gracey, Grand Master of the Portadown District Orange Lodge. <mask> stood around six feet tall, had close-cropped blond hair and cold, pale blue eyes. Peter Taylor had been at Drumcree that July and got a close-up view of <mask>. Taylor described <mask> as a "charismatic leader". Clad in neat jeans, white T-shirt and wearing a single gold earring, he displayed a muscular build. Flanked by two bodyguards, <mask>'s sudden appearance at Drumcree had inspired much admiration from the young boys and girls who were present. Journalist David McKittrick in the Belfast Telegraph described <mask> as having been heavily tattooed, who walked with a "characteristic strut that radiated restrained menace"; and had a "bullet head, close-cropped with small ears and deep-set, piercing eyes".<ref name="mckittrick"><mask>: the loyalist assassin too violent for his comrades "<mask>: the loyalist assassin too violent for his comrades".Belfast Telegraph. David McKittrick. 15 September 2010]. Retrieved 10 September 2011</ref> Martin Dillon, who had interviewed him in his home in Portadown, admitted that he had been pleasant and charming throughout the interview, yet throughout the encounter Dillon had "sensed a dark side to his character". <mask> was also considered to have been a "political thinker and capable strategist". As a result of the Belfast leadership's inaction, <mask> ordered several killings on his own initiative. On 9 July 1996, at the height of the Drumcree standoff, the dead body of Catholic taxi driver, Michael McGoldrick, was found in his cab in a remote lane at Aghagallon, near Lurgan, a day after having picked up a fare in the town.He had been shot five times in the head. Both the UVF and the UDA released statements emphatically denying involvement in McGoldrick's killing. According to PUP leader David Ervine, <mask> had ordered the killing for the purpose of incriminating the UVF Brigade Staff by making it appear as if they had sanctioned it. To further <mask>'s ploy, a handgun had been sent down to the Mid-Ulster Brigade from the Shankill UVF arms dump, but as the weapon had no forensic history the plot backfired. Several years later, Clifford McKeown, the former supergrass, was convicted of the murder of McGoldrick. McKeown, who had claimed that the killing was a birthday present for <mask>, was sentenced to 24 years imprisonment for his involvement in the murder. Leader of the Loyalist Volunteer Force

<mask>, along with the Portadown unit of the Mid-Ulster Brigade, was stood down on 2 August 1996 by the UVF's Brigade Staff for the unauthorised attack on McGoldrick, insubordination, and undermining the peace process.<mask> was expelled from the UVF and also threatened with execution by the Combined Loyalist Military Command if he did not leave Northern Ireland. <mask> expressed the following sentiments regarding the CLMC death threat in an interview with journalist Emer Woodful in late August 1996:

My heart goes out to my family at a time like this. Well, if you think you're right, then you're right. Although I have done nothing wrong except express an opinion that's the prevalent opinion of the people of Northern Ireland and I will always do that, dear, no matter what the price. Well, I've been prepared to die for long many a year. I don't wish to die, but at the end of the day no one will force their opinions down my throat – no one. Other units of the Mid-Ulster Brigade soon affirmed their loyalty to the leadership.<mask> ignored an order to leave Northern Ireland by 1 September 1996, and hours before the deadline attended a Royal Black Preceptory march and a celebration at a club in Portadown's Corcrain estate, receiving a hero's welcome at both events. The security services reported that every lodge and band participating stopped near <mask> so that members could shake his hand. On 4 September, at least 5,000 loyalists attended a rally in Portadown in support of <mask>. The rally was addressed by Reverend William McCrea (a DUP Member of Parliament) and Harold Gracey (head of the Portadown Orange Lodge). McCrea made a speech critical of David Ervine and <mask> for what he felt was their involvement in the death threats. McCrea's sharing of the stage with a militant such as <mask> caused uproar, although he argued that he was merely supporting <mask>'s entitlement to freedom of speech. Ignoring the threat, <mask>, in a public show of defiance, formed the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF), taking members mainly from the officially-disbanded Portadown unit of the UVF Mid-Ulster Brigade.According to writers John Robert Gold and George Revill, <mask>'s "mythical stature" amongst loyalists "provided him with the status necessary to form the LVF" in the traditional UVF stronghold of Portadown. Appearing at a Drumcree protest rally, <mask> made the following statement: "I will not be leaving Ulster, I will not change my mind about what I believe is happening in Ulster. But all I would like to say is that it has broken my heart to think that fellow loyalists would turn their guns on me, and I have to ask them, 'For whom are you doing it?'". <mask>'s hardline stance won the support of a number of leading loyalists, including UVF colleague Jackie Mahood, Frankie Curry of the Red Hand Commandos and Alex Kerr of the Ulster Defence Association (UDA). Kerr, another key figure at the Drumcree standoff, had also been ordered by the Combined Loyalist Military Command to leave Northern Ireland on pain of execution. They were joined by other loyalists disaffected by the peace process, giving them a maximum strength estimated at around 250 activists. They operated outside the Combined Loyalist Military Command and ignored the ceasefire order of October 1994.<mask> denounced the UVF leadership as "communists", for the left wing inclinations of some of their public statements about reconciliation with nationalists. <mask> was strongly anti-communist and his belief in this was increased by a series of meetings he held with representatives of far right Christian groups from the southern states of the US. From these meetings, organised by Pastor Kenny McClinton, <mask> was introduced to conspiracy theories about the role of communists in bringing down Christian morality, ideas that appealed to him. In a somewhat similar vein, <mask> also enjoyed closed relations with a Bolton-based cell of activists belonging to the neo-Nazi organisation Combat 18 and had members of this group staying in Portadown during the build-up to the Drumcree stand-off in 1997. The UVF in its turn, regarded <mask> setting up a rival loyalist organisation in the Mid-Ulster area as "treason". Members of the Belfast UVF often contemptuously referred to <mask> as "<mask>", with one UVF leader suggesting that <mask> was motivated by "religious zealotry and blind bigotry". The LVF was proscribed by Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Mo Mowlam in June 1997.<mask> personally devised the LVF's codename of "Covenant" which was used to claim its attacks. The LVF published a document stating their aims and objectives

The use of the Ulster conflict as a crucible for far-reaching, fundamental and decisive change in the United Kingdom constitution. To restore Ulster's right to self-determination. To end Irish nationalist aggression against Ulster in whatever form. To end all forms of Irish interference in Ulster's internal affairs. To thwart the creation and/or implementation of any All-Ireland/All-Island political super-structure regardless of the powers vested in such institutions. To defeat the campaign of de-Britishisation and Gaelicisation of Ulster's daily life.Imprisonment

Despite a series of sectarian murders and attacks on Catholic property by the LVF from 1996 to early 1997 (although they were not claimed by the organisation), <mask> was not arrested until January 1997. He was charged with committing an act with intent to pervert the course of justice, and making death threats against a woman, Gwen Read. This threat followed an altercation with Read's family and LVF members. On 7 March he was sentenced to eight years imprisonment for both offences and initially imprisoned at HMP Maghaberry. On 18 March, he was visited by DUP politician Peter Robinson (who later became First Minister of Northern Ireland in 2008). During the meeting, <mask> told Robinson he believed an attempt on his life by republicans was imminent. He was sent to the Maze in April 1997.He demanded and was granted an LVF section in C and D wings of H-block 6 (H6) for himself and 26 fellow inmates. INLA prisoners were housed in the A and B wings, and the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP, the political wing of the INLA) warned there would be trouble if the prisoners were not kept segregated. In August 1997, LVF prisoners, led by <mask>, rioted over their visiting accommodation in the Maze. <mask> continued to direct LVF operations from the prison, although his deputy Mark "Swinger" Fulton served as its nominal leader. LVF membership increased during <mask>'s imprisonment; by October 1997, membership in the organisation was between 150 and 200, many of them former UVF members disillusioned with the ceasefire. It was afterwards discovered that he had kept an irregular diary whilst in prison. On some of the pages he had made subtle threats to Catholic human rights solicitor Rosemary Nelson (killed in 1999 by a Red Hand Defenders car bomb) and her client, IRA prisoner Colin Duffy, charged with killing two RUC constables (the charges against Duffy were later dropped).<mask>'s appeal was scheduled to be heard in February 1998. Assassination

A tense situation existed within the Maze Prison. INLA inmates had told staff "they intend, given a chance, to take out the LVF". The Prison Officers Association said precautions had been put in place to ensure inmates from the two groups did not come into contact with each other. Prison officers, however, had grave concerns over security measures in H Block 6, where <mask> and the LVF were housed. The situation was made more volatile because, unlike the IRA, the UVF, and the UDA, neither the LVF nor the INLA were on ceasefire. The decision to kill <mask> inside the Maze was made in mid-December 1997 at an INLA Ard Chomhairle which was attended by the INLA Chief of Staff.The assassination was to be carried out in retaliation for the LVF killing of Catholic civilian Gerry Devlin which had taken place shortly before. On 16 December a senior INLA member who had been at the Ard Chomhairle went to the Maze to pay a visit to the Officer Commanding of the INLA at H Block 6. On the morning of Saturday 27 December 1997, just before 10.00 a.m., <mask> was assassinated by INLA prisoners inside the Maze Prison. The operation was undertaken by three INLA volunteers – Christopher "Crip" McWilliams, John "Sonny" Glennon and John Kennaway – armed with two smuggled pistols, a PA63 semi-automatic and a .22 Derringer. He was shot in the forecourt outside H Block 6 as he sat in the back of a prison van (alongside another LVF prisoner, Norman Green and one prison officer acting as escort) on his way to the visitor's complex where he had an arranged visit with his girlfriend, Eleanor Reilly. John Glennon had been pretending to paint a mural in the sterile area between A and B wings which placed him in a position to see and hear what happened in the forecourt. Upon hearing the announcement over the

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 prison Tannoy system that <mask> and Green had been called for their respective visits, Glennon gave a pre-arranged signal to his two waiting accomplices.They moved into position at the A wing turnstile; Glennon ran into the canteen and he mounted a table situated beneath a window which gave him a clearer view of the block forecourt. When he saw <mask> entering the van at 9.59 a.m. he gave a second pre-arranged signal, which was: "Go, go, go". The three INLA men rushed through the turnstile leading to A wing's exercise yard. Peeling away a pre-cut section of wire fence, they climbed onto the roof of A wing and dropped into the forecourt where the Renault van containing <mask> had just started to move forward towards the exit gates. The van was ordered to stop by the armed INLA men, however, the driver, John Park, thinking that he and the other officer were about to be taken hostage, intended to accelerate through the partially opened gates in a bid to escape. He was prevented from doing so when the gates were automatically shut. The other prison officers stationed at the forecourt gates had spotted the men on the roof, and assuming there was a prison escape in progress, activated the alarm system.The van was ten feet away from the gates when it came to a halt. Neither of the two prison officers inside the van were armed. While an unarmed Kennaway physically restrained the driver, Glennon, armed with the Derringer, gave cover beside the van as  McWilliams opened the side door on the left at the rear, and shouted the words: "Armed INLA volunteers". With a smile on his face, he then took up a firing stance and aimed his PA63 pistol inside the van at <mask>, who was sitting sideways facing the side door beside Norman Green, with Prison Officer Stephen Sterritt seated behind the driver. <mask> had been in the middle of a conversation, discussing the "cost of Christmas", with both men. After McWilliams ordered Sterritt to "fuck up and sit in his seat" and Green to get out of the way, the two men instantly dropped to the floor to protect themselves; however, <mask> stood up and kicked out at his assailant who began firing at point blank range. Green pleaded with <mask> to "get down", but McWilliams climbed into the van and continued shooting at <mask>, hitting him a total of seven times.<mask>, despite being shot, continued to defend himself by moving forward, kicking and lashing out at McWilliams. <mask> was fatally wounded by the last shot, the bullet having lacerated his aorta. He slumped against the legs of Green. After screaming "they shot <mask>", Green made an attempt to resuscitate <mask>, but to no avail; he was taken to the prison hospital, where a doctor pronounced him dead at 10.53 a.m. None of the others inside the van were hurt. Immediately following the shooting attack, the three gunmen returned the way they had come and surrendered to prison guards. They handed over a statement

<mask> was executed for one reason and one reason only, and that was for directing and waging his campaign of terror against the nationalist people from his prison cell in Long Kesh [Maze]. Aftermath

That night, LVF gunmen opened fire on a disco frequented by Catholic teenagers in Dungannon.Four civilians were wounded and one, a former Provisional IRA member, was killed. Police believed that the disco itself was the intended target. Four masked and armed LVF men maintained a vigil beside <mask>'s body which was displayed in an open coffin prior to his paramilitary funeral which took place in Portadown on 30 December. The LVF ordered all shops in the town to shut as a mark of respect; bus and taxi services were also suspended, and the Union Jack flew at half-mast. The media was kept at a distance. After a private service inside <mask>'s Brownstown home, the funeral cortège, led by a lone bagpiper, proceeded to Seagoe Cemetery, two miles away. Thousands of mourners were in attendance as the hearse containing <mask>'s coffin moved through the crowded streets, flanked by a guard of honour and preceded by women bearing floral wreaths.The Reverend John Gray of the Free Presbyterian Church officiated at the graveside service. <mask>'s friend, the former UDA member Pastor Kenny McClinton, also delivered an oration in which he eulogised <mask> as having been "complicated, articulate, and sophisticated". LVF gunmen fired a volley of shots over his flag-draped coffin. <mask>'s close friend and deputy, Mark "Swinger" Fulton assumed control of the LVF leadership after <mask>'s death. The LVF became more closely tied to the Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF) organisation that was led by Johnny 'Mad Dog' Adair. The LVF committed a series of attacks on Catholic civilians, which it termed a "measured military response" in response to <mask>'s death. Other loyalist paramilitary groups also sought to avenge his killing.On 19 January 1998 the UDA's South Belfast Brigade shot dead Catholic taxi driver Larry Brennan outside his company offices in the Lower Ormeau Road. Martin O'Hagan, the Sunday World journalist whom <mask> especially disliked, was killed in September 2001 by the Red Hand Defenders, a cover-name used by the UDA and LVF. On 20 October 1998, Christopher McWilliams, John Glennon, and John Kennaway were convicted of murdering <mask>, possession of a firearm and ammunition with intent to endanger life. The three men had pleaded not guilty. Although they were sentenced to life imprisonment, they only served two years of their sentence due to the early release provisions of the Good Friday Agreement. Inquiry and allegations
The nature of <mask>'s killing, within a high security prison, has led to speculation that the authorities colluded with the INLA to have him killed as he was a danger to the emerging peace process. Four days before his death, <mask> himself believed that he would shortly be killed within the Maze Prison by agents of the British and Irish governments in collusion with loyalist informers and the INLA.The INLA strongly denied these rumours, and published a detailed account of the assassination in the March/April 1999 issue of The Starry Plough newspaper. <mask>'s father, David, had campaigned for a public inquiry into his son's murder and had appealed for help to the Northern Ireland, British and Irish authorities for help in the matter. The murder was investigated by the Cory Collusion Inquiry and it was recommended that the UK Government launch an inquiry into the circumstances of <mask>'s death. The Cory Inquiry concluded that "whatever criticism might properly be made regarding the reprehensible life and crimes of <mask>, it is apparent that he met his death bravely", and described his killing as "brutal and cowardly". June 2005 saw the <mask> inquiry open, chaired by Lord MacLean. Also sitting on the inquiry were academic professor Andrew Coyle from the University of London and the former Bishop of Hereford, the Reverend John Oliver. On 14 September 2010, the findings of the panel were released publicly at Stormont House in Belfast and found that there was no evidence of collusion between the authorities and the INLA.The inquiry, which had cost £30 million, did find a number of failings within the security of the prison. There was the main question of how the weapons were smuggled inside the prison to the killers. There was also the issue regarding the decision to house the INLA and LVF in H Block 6, when it was known that they were deadly rivals, neither of which was on ceasefire, and the INLA had vowed to kill <mask> given the opportunity. McWilliams and Kennaway had been transferred to the Maze from Maghaberry the previous May. One month before their transfer, when <mask> had still been at Maghaberry, they had organised an unsuccessful hostage-taking incident at the prison. This was meant to end in the assassination of <mask>; he was subsequently moved to the Maze. Other questions were raised after the discovery that on the morning of the killing, Prison Officer Raymond Hill was stood down from his post in the watchtower overlooking A and B wings of H-Block 6 where the INLA prisoners were housed.The CCTV camera placed in the area was also found to have been nonfunctioning for several days prior to the shooting. The visitors lists for 27 December 1997 had been circulated in both the LVF and INLA wings the day before thereby giving <mask>'s assassins time to prepare for the killing as the list clearly stated that <mask> was scheduled to receive a visit on 27 December. The LVF prison van had been parked outside the INLA wing that morning instead of following the normal procedure which was to park outside the LVF wing. And the gates leading from the forecourt were automatically locked as soon as the killers were spotted on the roof. This had prevented the van from driving off and thus effectively trapped <mask> in the rear. In an interview with The Guardian before his own death, one of the killers, John Kennaway said the security inside the Maze was "a joke". He claimed the weapons had been smuggled to McWilliams and Glennon inside nappies.He added that as soon as the "screws" [prison officers] had seen the INLA men on A wing's roof, they assumed the men were staging an escape and sounded the alarm system. The gates were automatically locked-down therefore preventing the van from leaving. Kennaway suggested that had the prison officers not seen them and quickly sounded the alarm, the van could have driven away in time and <mask> might have escaped with his life. Shortly before the findings of the inquiry into <mask>'s death were released in September 2010, Ulster Television News broadcast a report regarding the question of collusion. South Belfast UDA brigadier Jackie McDonald explained to Ulster Television's Live Tonight the UVF's mindset at the time <mask> was threatened with execution by the CLMC in 1996, "It was obvious he [<mask>] was doing his own thing and going his own way. I think he had become such an embarrassment to the UVF that they had to send word to him to get out of the country – that's when the LVF was formed, that's when the breakaway group appeared." When asked by the interviewer whether or not the CLMC had actually been prepared to carry out the death threat against <mask> replied, "You have to be prepared to kill people if you tell them to do something and they don't do it – something of that magnitude.If you say they had to go and they don't go – the defiance alone, it doesn't leave many alternatives". McDonald expressed his belief that there had probably been no state collusion in <mask>'s death. Equally dismissive of the allegations of collusion, Willie Gallagher of the Republican Socialist Movement offered the suggestion that had the INLA not killed <mask>, he would have been released from prison shortly afterwards. Once free, <mask> would have continued to conduct and orchestrate his murder campaign against nationalists. On 30 September 2011, <mask>'s father <mask> died in Portadown at the age of 78. After his funeral service at the Killicomain Baptist Church, he was buried, like <mask>, in Seagoe Cemetery. Up until his death, he had continued to profess his belief that there had been state collusion in his son's killing.He denounced the findings of the inquiry released in 2010 as a "total whitewash and a failure to get at the truth". Alleged links with RUC Special Branch
There are allegations that RUC Special Branch colluded with <mask>, providing him with information on suspected IRA members as well as alibis and protection. Before his assassination in 2001, journalist Martin O'Hagan revealed to fellow journalist Paul Larkin that a high-ranking RUC officer had told him <mask> received help from RUC Special Branch, and bore the code name "Bertie". Some in the UVF also suspected that <mask> was a police informer. An IRA Intelligence officer told Larkin that <mask> was selected and trained by Special Branch to take over from Robin Jackson, also an alleged Special Branch agent. A former member of the UVF Mid-Ulster Brigade, Laurence Maguire, claimed that police gave <mask> information on targets, and that he was nearby in a car when some meetings with police took place "up alleyways". Two senior security sources also told a BBC Spotlight team that <mask> was working for the police.Loyalist icon

Owing to his uncompromising stance as an upholder of Ulster loyalism and opposition to the peace process, <mask> has, since his death, become the most revered loyalist icon and cult figure in the history of the Troubles. For years after his death, his image adorned murals in housing estates in Portadown and elsewhere throughout Northern Ireland. However one of the most well-known of these, that on a wall near Portadown F.C. 's Shamrock Park home ground, was removed in 2006 with a mural of George Best painted in its stead. His picture appears on t-shirts, fridge magnets, key rings, and plates. He is regarded as a martyr and hero by hardline loyalists; many of whom have tattoos bearing his likeness. It was considered to be a status symbol in Portadown for loyalist men and women to display a <mask> tattoo on one's arm, leg, or back.Some of his more ardent devotees even have them on the private parts of their anatomy. His successor Mark "Swinger" Fulton had one tattooed over his heart. "Blood brothers' love consummated in death". Irish Tribune. Susan McKay. 16 June 2002. Retrieved 17 May 2011 Most of these tattoos were created by a Bolton-based member of Combat 18, who tattooed many LVF supporters with <mask>'s image at houses in Portadown's loyalist estates whilst visiting for the Twelfth.Immediately after his death, his grave became a shrine. One teenaged girl in North Belfast set up a shrine to <mask> in her bedroom complete with his photographs. She explained to a journalist, "I'm not interested in pop stars. <mask> was a real Loyalist hero and I like to go to sleep at night looking at him". Gunmen at a paramilitary display in Portadown in 2000 told journalists: "He [<mask>] did what he had to do to ensure that our faith and culture were kept intact." <mask> was also taken up as an inspiration by Johnny Adair and the UDA West Belfast Brigade. In the immediate aftermath of <mask>'s killing, Adair told his main gunmen Stephen McKeag and Gary Smyth that they had a free hand to "avenge" <mask>'s death, with McKeag almost immediately launching a machine gun attack on a bar in a mainly Catholic area despite the UDA being officially on ceasefire.The West Belfast Brigade would later reference <mask> as a true loyalist who had been a victim of the UVF in a leaflet circulated to foment a feud between the UDA and the UVF. Despite this, the two men had had a fractured relationship during <mask>'s life and according to Adair's sometime girlfriend Jackie "Legs" Robinson, Adair had told her that <mask> was a "bastard" when the UVF leader attended a party at Robinson's house. Robinson wrote the incident off as jealousy on Adair's part as <mask> was already well established as a leading figure in loyalism by that stage whilst Adair was still making his name. The Belfast Telegraph newspaper summed up <mask> as having been "one of the most fear-inspiring loyalist paramilitaries in Northern Ireland since the Shankill Butchers in the 1970s". Peter Taylor offered an alternative insight into the reputation of <mask> by suggesting that popular myth had laid many killings and atrocities at <mask>'s door when there was actually little evidence to back them up. References

Bibliography

Further reading
 Sean McPhilemy The Committee: Political Assassination in Northern Ireland'' (Hardcover), Roberts Rinehart, May 1998,

External links
 Cory Collusion Inquiry Report -<mask> HMSO. 2004

 Archived <mask> Inquiry Website

1960 births
1997 deaths
1997 murders in the United Kingdom
20th-century British criminals
British male criminals
British Presbyterians
Deaths by firearm in Northern Ireland
Loyalist Volunteer Force members
Murdered criminals
People from County Armagh
People from Northern Ireland who died in prison custody
People from Portadown
People from Wolverhampton
People killed by the Irish National Liberation Army
People murdered in Belfast
Prisoners murdered in custody
Prisoners who died in Northern Irish detention
Ulster loyalists imprisoned on charges of terrorism
Ulster Volunteer Force

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<mask> (born 14 December 1976) is an English professional snooker player from London. Career
Burden originally had his eyes set on making a career as a professional footballer, but a badly broken leg curtailed this ambition. He spent a couple of seasons at Arsenal F.C. as a schoolboy apprentice, but was with Swindon Town F.C. at the time of the injury. Burden soon showed he was well above average at snooker and qualified for the World Championship in 1998. He gave Tony Drago a run for his money before losing 8–10.In the 2006–07 season, Burden qualified for the China Open. He defeated Shokat Ali, Rod Lawler and former top-16 player David Gray to qualify for the tournament but lost in the Wild Card round to Chinese player Mei Xiwen, 2–5. He dropped off the main tour after the 2007/08 season. On 25 November 2009 he won the IBSF World Snooker Championship in Hyderabad, India, beating Brazilian Igor Figueiredo 10–8 in the final. With this he earned a place on the 2010/2011 professional main tour and did well enough over that and the following season to end 2011/12 ranked world number 60, inside the top 64 who retained their places for the 2012–13 season. Burden had an exceptional 2012/2013 season in the minor-ranking Players Tour Championship events. In the Second Event he beat Andrew Higginson, James Wattana, Barry Hawkins, Robert Milkins and Ryan Day to reach the semi-finals.There, he was defeated 1–4 by Martin Gould. In the European Tour Event 3 played in Antwerp, Belgium, Burden beat Gareth Allen, Joe Swail and Mark King, before losing 3–4 to Neil Robertson in the last 16. These results, together with three other last 32 defeats, helped Burden to 23rd place on the PTC Order of Merit, just inside the top 26 who qualified for the Finals. In the Finals, Burden beat world number one Judd Trump 4–3, clinching the match with a 116 break to reach the last 16, the joint furthest he has ever been in a ranking event and the first since 2000. Burden subsequently lost 2–4 to Xiao Guodong in the last 16. He then reached the final round of World Championship Qualifying with wins over Paul Davison and Dave Harold, but lost 5–10 to Dominic Dale to end the season ranked world number 53. Burden qualified for the first round of the 2013 Wuxi Classic to begin the 2013–14 season, but lost 5–2 to Ali Carter in the opening round.He saw off three players to reach the first round of the Australian Goldfields Open and then beat Michael Holt 5–2 to match his best ever performance in a ranking event. In the last 16 he lost 5–3 against Mark Davis. At the European Tour event, the Gdynia Open, Burden won four matches but was then defeated 4–3 by Sam Baird in the quarter-finals. He finished 34th on the Order of Merit, nine places outside of qualifying for the Finals. Burden got through to the second round of the China Open courtesy of Tony Drago's withdrawal and then lost 5–3 to Jimmy White. Burden won just two matches in his first eight events of the 2014–15 season but then won four matches to advance to the quarter-finals of the Xuzhou Open, where he lost 4–2 to Tom Ford. He beat David Grace 5–3 and Sam Baird 5–4 in qualifying for the German Masters.Burden defeated Michael Georgiou 5–3 in the first round, closing the match with a 112 break, but fell short of reaching the first ranking event quarter-final of his career as Ryan Day knocked him out 5–2. He ended the season 67th in the world rankings which would have relegated him from the tour, but his Asian Tour performances earned him a new two-year card. Burden reached the first ranking event quarter-final of his career in the 2016 China Open courtesy of victories over Robbie Williams, Joe Perry, Rhys Clark and Rory McLeod, where he lost 5–1 to Stephen Maguire. He held a 9–5 advantage over Ryan Day in the second round of World Championship qualifying, before being defeated 10–9. Burden edged out Ryan Day 4–3 to qualify for the 2016 European Masters and then beat Yu Delu 4–1 and Ricky Walden 4–3 to play in his second career ranking event quarter-final, where he was thrashed 4–0 by Mark Selby. Four successive wins saw Burden reach the quarter-finals of the minor ranking 2017 Gibraltar Open, where he lost 4–2 to Michael White. In December 2016 Burden scored his first 147 Maximum Break in competition, coming against Daniel Wells in the English Open.<mask> went on to lose the match 4-3 but came away with £12,000 prize money on account of his high break. In January 2017, <mask> was found guilty of placing bets totalling £25,000 on snooker matches including those he had played in. He had bet on himself to win and over the 86 bets in 10 years he had lost £2,995. Burden was fined £5,000 and given a six-month ban, which will only come into force if he bets on snooker again before January 2018. His second quarter-final of the season came at the Gibraltar Open and he made breaks of 131 and 109 to force a deciding frame with Nigel Bond, but lost it. Burden went into Qualifying for the 2018 World Championships in danger of losing his place on the Tour and in need of a good showing to retain his place. He achieved this, clinching the deciding frame in the second round of qualifying to beat higher-ranked player David Gilbert 10-9 and secure his place on the Tour for two more years, despite having finished the season outside the top 64, on account of his performances in the 2017/18 season.Burden lost out to Thepchaiya Un-Nooh 10–8 in the final round of qualifying and thus failed to emulate his achievement of 1998 in reaching the last 32 and a place at snooker's biggest stage, the Crucible Theatre. In December 2018 Burden defeated former world champions Peter Ebdon and John Higgins on his way to reaching the quarter-finals of the Scottish Open. Remarkably, in rounds 2 and 3 he came back from 3-0 down to win 4–3 against Marco Fu and Zhang Yong, respectively. A lacklustre performance in the quarter-final resulted in a 5–0 loss to the eventual tournament winner Mark Allen. He has the highest number of centuries for any player never to have been ranked in the top 32. Burden announced his retirement from snooker on 2 September 2020. However, he returned to Q School in May 2021 and was successful in Event Two, winning a two-year Tour Card.Performance and rankings timeline

Career finals

Non-ranking finals: 2 (1 title)

Amateur finals: 2 (1 title)

References

External links

<mask> <mask> at worldsnooker.com

Profile on Global Snooker

1976 births
Living people
Snooker players from London
People from Paddington

masks:
Alfred Burden
Burden
Burden
Alfie
Burden


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<mask><mask> is a former Republican member of the Wisconsin Senate, representing the 32nd District from 2005 until losing his seat to Jennifer Shilling in the 2011 Wisconsin Senate recall elections. Early life, education and career
<mask> was born in La Crosse, Wisconsin on August 21, 1947. He graduated from Luther High School in Onalaska in 1965. He later graduated from the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse, where he earned a B.S. in 1975 and a M.E.P.D. in Education in 1987. He served in the United States Marine Corps Reserve and in the Wisconsin National Guard.He also served on the Town of Campbell Board. He is the founding owner of the La Crosse Loggers Northwoods League Baseball Team and was a district sales manager at Kaltenberg Seed Farms for 30 years. Wisconsin Senate
<mask> won election to the Wisconsin State Senate twice, first in 2004 against LaCrosse County Board Supervisor Brad Pfaff, and again in 2008 against La Crosse County Supervisor Tara Johnson. Kapanke served as chair of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Forestry, and Higher Education, and was also a member of the committees on Energy, Biotechnology, and Consumer Protection, on Financial Institutions and Rural Issues, and on Workforce Development, Small Business, and Tourism. He was also co-chair of the Joint Survey Committee on Retirement Systems. Kapanke has been criticized for ethics violations, including using $32,000 from a lobbyist-funded charity to pay off personal debt, and violating the state's open records law, causing taxpayers to pay $38,000 in legal bills. According to Kapanke, the violations were unintentional.During the 2011 Wisconsin protests, <mask> reported that he had received death threats from his vote, and claimed that the windshield of his car had been vandalized, causing him to cancel public appearances. However, a police report had previously concluded that the damage was instead caused by a stray rock. Nevertheless, Kapanke persisted in publicly blaming it on protesters; according to PolitiFact, "Kapanke allowed the myth of the smashed windshield to run wild and uncorrected for almost three weeks after he knew it was not true." 2011 recall

Kapanke was subject to an active recall effort to remove him from his seat in the Wisconsin Senate, as part of the 2011 Wisconsin protests. On March 2, 2011, the "Committee to Recall Kapanke" officially registered with the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board. 15,588 valid signatures of electors residing within the 32nd District must be collected by May 2, 2011 to generate a recall election. A March 9, 2011 poll by Survey USA indicated that 57% voters in <mask>'s district would vote for recall.<mask> indicated his strong support for Governor Scott Walker, explaining it by asking, "How can you go wrong following a leader that obviously gets his mission on this earth? ", referring to their strong religious beliefs. At a separate occasion, he indicated that he did not believe that Walker's plans went far enough, and stated that public safety unions (police, firemen, and state patrol unions) should be included in the collective bargaining ban (under Walker's plan, they are exempt.) On April 1, 2011, Wisconsin Democrats announced that they had enough signatures to recall Kapanke and filed petitions that day, with 22,561 signatures, 45% more than the 15,588 verifiable signatures required by the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board (GAB). On April 9, 2011, State Rep. Jennifer Shilling (D - La Crosse) announced her candidacy against Kapanke in a possible recall election. At a LaCrosse County Republican Party meeting held in late May 2011, party officials discussed the possibility of running an additional Democratic Party candidate against Rep. Shilling, with the intent being to force a primary election against a token opponent, delaying the date of the recall election. According to election clerks, this would cost the state $101,000.At the same meeting, <mask> expressed concern over his re-election bid due to the large number of public workers in his district, saying that he hoped they would sleep through the election. <mask> challenges the petition
On April 15, 2011, <mask> filed a challenge with the Government Accountability Board stating that the recall petitions should be thrown out as organizers neglected to file a required registration statement. According to <mask>'s challenge, a specific organizer, Patrick Scheller, is the Recall Petitioner, as he was the one delivering the 22,561 petitions, and thus should have filed the registration himself (which was instead filed by the Recall Committee.) <mask> also challenged approximately 900 of the 22,561 signatures (15,588 valid signatures are required to force a recall election.) Pro-recall organizers filed a rebuttal in response, arguing that <mask>'s argument "proceeds from a false factual premise", noting that Scheller was simply a representative of the recall committee, as "a committee can neither be an elector or hold a pen." GAB rules against <mask>
In late May, the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board (GAB) approved the recall petition against Senator <mask>, rejecting his challenge. The date for the recall election was set for August 9, 2011, following a Democratic primary on July 12, 2011.Recall results
<mask> lost the recall effort to Shilling on August 9, 2011, earning 45% of the vote (26,724) to Shilling's 55% (33,192). Political campaigns

2010 U.S. Congressional campaign
In the summer 2009, <mask> announced his intention to run for the United States House of Representatives in Wisconsin's 3rd congressional district. His state senate district was largely coextensive with the central portion of the congressional district, including its second-largest city, La Crosse. In October 2009, <mask> was added to the National Republican Congressional Committee's Young Guns Program as an "On the Radar" candidate. This designation was only given to ten Republican Congressional candidates in the Midwest. During the same month, Congressional Quarterly readjusted the 3rd Congressional District political status from a "Safe Democratic" to a "Likely Democratic" district. In September 2010, <mask> defeated Bruce Evers in the 3rd congressional district Republican Primary election.<mask> won with approximately 78% of the vote. <mask> then lost the general election to incumbent Congressman Ron Kind, taking 46 percent of the vote to Kind's 50 percent. It was easily the closest race in Kind's career. Electoral history

References

External links

32nd Senate District, Senator <mask> in the Wisconsin Blue Book (2005–2006)

1947 births
Living people
Politicians from La Crosse, Wisconsin
Wisconsin National Guard personnel
University of Wisconsin–La Crosse alumni
Wisconsin city council members
Wisconsin state senators
Wisconsin Republicans
Recalled state legislators of the United States
21st-century American politicians

masks:
Daniel E
. Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke
Kapanke


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<mask> (), is a German political scientist and Professor of International Relations. He was born in 1944 in Damascus, Syria to an aristocratic family, and moved to Germany in 1962 where he later became a citizen in 1976. He is known for his analysis of international relations and the introduction of Islam to the study of international conflict and of civilization. <mask> is known for introducing the controversial concept of European Leitkultur as well as the concept of Euroislam to discussions about integration of Muslim immigrants to countries in Europe. He is also the founder of Islamology as a social-scientific study of Islam and conflict in post-bipolar politics. <mask> has done research in Asian and African countries. He publishes in English, German and Arabic.Academic career
He studied in Frankfurt am Main under Max Horkheimer, obtaining his Ph.D. there in 1971, and later habilitated in Hamburg, Germany. From 1973 until his retirement in 2009, he was Professor for International Relations at Göttingen University. Parallel to this appointment he was, from 1982 to 2000, at Harvard University in a variety of affiliations, the latest being a 1998 to 2000 stint as The Bosch Fellow. Currently, he is an A.D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University. Tibi had eighteen visiting professorships in all continents including fellowships in Princeton University, UC Berkeley, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, and most recently (2010) at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Washington D.C. <mask> was also a visiting senior fellow at Yale University. After his retirement in 2009, he published "Islam's Predicament with Cultural Modernity", a book embodying his life's work..

Views

On Islam
Tibi is a Muslim, but criticizes Islamism and advocates "reforming" Islam. Tibi also suggests that Muslim immigrants should refrain from engaging in religious missionary activities, Dawa.On Europe
When it comes to Europe, <mask> distinguishes positive and negative elements of European culture. The positive ones are, according to <mask>, enlightenment, pluralism, civil rights and secularization. <mask> argues that there is a need for Europe to defend these values, especially in times of globalization and migration from Muslim countries. On the other hand, <mask> argues that racism is a European invention, and that Europeans must overcome what he calls "Euro-arrogance" and xenophobia to integrate immigrants. He criticizes European imperialism, arguing that it disrupted and deformed other cultures. Acknowledging that Muslim conquerors also did wrongs, <mask> argues that, unlike the European conquests, Muslim conquests were not driven by any kind of racism. On Germany
He has criticised the left-green dominated German media for stifling debate about Islam in Germany, leading to ordinary people being afraid to state their opinions.As an example he gives Uwe Tellkamp, who expressed criticism against the German policy of migration and was attacked in mainstream media and painted as a right-extremist. He has also criticised authorities in Germany for not standing up to the large organised Islamic community organisations like the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs and for not supporting liberal Muslims like Seyran Ateş and Necla Kelek. On Israel
<mask> <mask> has criticized the Likud party of Israel as blocking the peace process. He states that in the 1990s, the Likud adopted the "Three Nos" policy:
"No to the Palestinian State, no to dividing Jerusalem, no to returning Golan Heights to Syria. According to <mask>, the Likud government of 1996 engaged in provoking Arabs by constructing Har Homa in Arab Jerusalem, and digging a tunnel under the Temple Mount, and thereby exposing Israel to terrorism. Awards

In 1995 he was decorated by the President of Germany, Roman Herzog, with the Bundesverdienstkreuz, cross of merits first class. In 2003, the Swiss Foundation for European Awareness granted him in Zurich with the annual prize.Published works

Books in English
The Crisis of Modern Islam: A Preindustrial Culture in the Scientific-Technological Age. Translated by Judith von Sivers. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1988. Islam and the Cultural Accommodation of Social Change. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1990. Conflict and War in the Middle East: From Interstate War to New Security, new expanded ed. 1998, published in association with WCFIA/Harvard University.Arab Nationalism. Between Islam and the Nation-State, first ed. 1980, second ed. 1990, third expanded and revised ed. 1997, Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. The Challenge of Fundamentalism: Political Islam and the New World Disorder. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998; updated edition 2002.Islam between Culture and Politics. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire; New York Cambridge, Mass: Palgrave, in association with the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, 2001. 2nd edition, 2005. Crusade and Jihad: Islam and the Christian World. Wilhelm Goldmann Verlag, München, Random House GmbH, 2001
Political Islam, World Politics and Europe. Routledge, New York, 2008. Islam’s Predicament with Modernity: Religious Reform and Cultural Change Routledge, NY and London, 2009,
Islamism and Islam.Yale University Press (May 22, 2012)

Articles and book chapters (selection)
"Islam and Modern European Ideologies." International Journal of Middle East Studies 18, no. 1 (1986): 15-29. "The European Tradition of Human Rights and Culture of Islam." In Human Rights in Africa Cross Cultural Perspectives, ed. Abdullahi Ahmed An Na`im and Francis M. Deng, 104. Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 1990."The Simultaneity of the Unsimultaneous - Old Tribes and Imposed Nation-States in the Modern Middle East." In Tribes and State Formation in the Middle East, ed. Philip S. Khoury and Joseph Kostiner, 127-152. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990. "Islamic Law/Shari'a, Human Rights, Universal Morality and International Relations." Human Rights Quarterly 16, no. 2 (1994): 277."The Worldview of Sunni Arab Fundamentalists: Attitudes toward Modern Science and Technology." In Fundamentalisms and Society, ed. Martin E. Marty and R. Scott Appelby, 73-102. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. "War and Peace in Islam." In Ethics of War and Peace, ed. Terry Nardin, 128-145.Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996. "The Fundamentalist Challenge to the Secular Order in the Middle East." The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 23 (1999): 191-210. "Post-Bipolar Order in Crisis: The Challenge of Politicised Islam." Millennium 29, no. 3 (2000): 843-860. "Europeanizing Islam or the Islamization of Europe," in: Peter Katzenstein, ed., Religion in an Expanding Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006)
"The Totalitarianism of Jihadist Islamism and its Challenge to Europe and to Islam."in: Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, Vol. 8, No. 1, March 2007, 35–54. "A Migration Story: From Muslim Immigrants to European “Citizens of the Heart?“" in: The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs Vol.31 (Winter 2007) 1: 191-210. "Euro-Islamic Religious Pluralism for Europe. An Alternative to Ethnicity and to "Multiculturalism of Fear"," in: The Current, Vol. 11 (Fall 2007) 1: 89-103."Islamism and Democracy: The Case of the Arab World," in: Leonard Weinberg, ed., Democratic Responses to Terrorism (New York: Routledge, 2008), 41-61. "Religious Extremism or Religionization of Politics? The Ideological Foundations of Political Islam", in: Hillel Frisch and Efraim Inbar, eds, Radical Islam and International Security (New York: Routledge, 2008), Chapter One, pp. 11–37, . "The Return of the Sacred to Politics as a Constitutional Law. The Case of the Shari’atization of Politics in Islamic Civilization", in: Theoria. A Journal of Social and Political Theory, vol.55 (April 2008), issue 115, pp. 91–119, . "Turkey’s Islamist Danger. Islamists Approach Europe", in: Middle East Quarterly, vol. 16,1 (Winter 2009), pp. 47–54. "Euro-Islam: An Alternative to Islamization and Ethnicity of Fear", in: Zeyno Baran (Ed.), The Other Muslims: Moderate and Secular, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010

References

External links
 Homepage of <mask> Tibi
 Europeanisation, not Islamisation <mask> <mask> argues for Euro-Islam as a bridge between civilisations
 Voices on Antisemitism Interview with <mask> <mask> from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum
  From Sayyid Qutb to Hamas, The Middle-East Conflict and the Islamization of Antisemitism, in Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism, online working paper, 2010

German political scientists
Syrian political scientists
Cornell University faculty
Middle Eastern studies in the United States
20th-century Muslim scholars of Islam
Muslim reformers
Harvard Fellows
Officers Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
German Muslims
Syrian emigrants to Germany
People from Damascus
1944 births
Living people
Members of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts
German scholars of Islam

masks:
Bassam Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Tibi
Bassam
Tibi
Tibi
Bassam
Bassam
Tibi
Bassam
Tibi


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<mask> (; born August 1, 1946) is an American politician who was the U.S. representative for  from 1983 to 2011. He is a member of the Democratic Party. He was defeated in his bid for a 15th term by Republican Morgan Griffith in the 2010 elections. Early life, education and career
<mask> is a native of Abingdon, Virginia, where he currently lives. He earned his BA from Roanoke College where he was a member of Kappa Alpha Order fraternity. He received his law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law. He has practiced law on Wall Street initially as an associate at Milbank Tweed in the firm's New York City office, and later in Virginia.Prior to his election to Congress, he served for seven years as a member of the Senate of Virginia. His a former member of the Law and Justice Committee of the National Conference of State Legislatures, the Board of Directors of the First Virginia Bank of Damascus, Virginia, and the Board of Directors of Client Centered Legal Services of Southwest Virginia. He formerly served on the Advisory Board of Virginia Cares Inc. In May 2011, Boucher joined prominent Washington law firm Sidley Austin and was charged with leading their government strategies practice. The Internet Innovation Alliance (IIA), an industry advocacy group, also announced that Boucher has joined as the honorary chair. The IIA includes among its members AT&T and Americans for Tax Reform and has focused on expanding broadband access and adoption with particular emphasis on increased mobile connectivity for underserved and rural communities. U.S. House of Representatives

Political campaigns
Boucher was first elected to Congress in 1982, defeating 16-year Republican incumbent Bill Wampler by 1,100 votes.He was narrowly reelected in 1984, defeating Delegate Jefferson Stafford by four points, even as Ronald Reagan carried the 9th in a landslide. However, he was completely unopposed for a third term in 1986, and was reelected 11 more times without serious difficulty. Boucher remained very popular in his district even as its socially conservative tint made it friendlier to Republicans. The GOP won most of the area's seats in the Virginia General Assembly in 2001, and has held them ever since. From 2002 to 2006, he fended off three reasonably well-funded Republican challengers with relative ease. In 2002, he defeated state delegate Jay Katzen with 66 percent of the vote. In 2004, he defeated NASCAR official Kevin Triplett with 59 percent of the vote even as George W. Bush easily carried the district.In 2006, he defeated state delegate Bill Carrico with 68 percent of the vote. He was reelected unopposed in 2008 even as John McCain carried the district with his largest margin in the state. It was generally thought that Boucher would be succeeded by a Republican once he retired. 2010

In 2010 Boucher faced his strongest opponent to date in House of Delegates Majority Leader Morgan Griffith. Although Boucher charged that Griffith lived outside of the 9th (Griffith's home in Salem was indeed just outside the 9th's borders), it was not enough to overcome Griffith's attacks that Boucher was an ally of Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi. Ultimately, Griffith unseated Boucher with 51 percent of the vote to Boucher's 46 percent. No Democrat has crossed the 40 percent mark in the district since Boucher left office.Committee assignments
Committee on Energy and Commerce
Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet (Chairman)
Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality (Chairman)
Committee on the Judiciary
Subcommittee on Courts and Competition Policy

Boucher served in the House Democratic leadership as an assistant whip from 1985 to 2010. Political positions
Boucher has been active on Internet-related legislation, including cosponsoring the High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991. He chaired the Science Subcommittee of the House Committee on Science and Technology and through hearings oversaw the transition of the Internet from a National Science Foundation managed government research project (known as NSFnet) to the private sector. In that role, he authored the legislation which permitted the first commercial use of the Internet. His proposals to promote competition in the cable and local telephone industries contributed to the enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Boucher originated the House Internet Caucus and served as its co-chairman (1996-2011). He also authored the Digital Media Consumers' Rights Act (DMCRA) legislation and introduced the FAIR USE Act.He was named Politician of the Year for 2006 by the Association of American Libraries' Library Journal, largely due to his efforts to protect the fair use doctrine and expand Internet technologies to rural areas. Boucher voted in favor of the Auto Industry Financing and Restructuring Act, as well as the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Boucher has received a rating of "A+" from the National Rifle Association and is one of the 81 House Democrats who voted in favor of authorizing the invasion of Iraq. Boucher is a strong opponent of tax patents and has introduced bills to either have them banned or to exempt tax attorneys and tax payers from liability in infringing them. In June 2009, Boucher voted in favor of the American Clean Energy and Security Act which, if enacted, would establish a cap-and-trade system. Boucher was chairman of the energy sub-committee of the previous Congress which first drafted the legislation, and was deemed to be instrumental in the bills development. Boucher opened his pre-vote remarks on the bill by saying that he was in "strong support of the bill."In November 2009, Boucher, along with 39 other Democratic members of the House, voted against the Affordable Health Care for America Act. Also, on March 21, 2010, Boucher voted against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. <mask>r endorsed Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination for president, while his district went solidly for Hillary Clinton. In 2007, Congress.org ranked <mask> as the 10th most powerful member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Electoral history

Personal life
Boucher announced his engagement at age 59 to Amy Hauslohner, an editor of the Galax Gazette in Galax, Virginia. Said Boucher of the engagement "We have decided since I will be 60 in August and she just turned 50 last week, we probably are mature enough to handle marriage." Boucher and Houslohner were married on June 3, 2006.References

External links
<mask> for Congress official campaign site

<mask> speaks of Hulu, Boxee, gains major tech cred at Comcast-NBC hearing, Top of the Ticket, Los Angeles Times, February 5, 2010

1946 births
Living people
Members of the United States House of Representatives from Virginia
New York (state) lawyers
Virginia lawyers
Virginia state senators
University of Virginia School of Law alumni
Roanoke College alumni
Politicians from Abingdon, Virginia
Virginia Democrats
Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Virginia
Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives
21st-century American politicians
American United Methodists

masks:
Frederick Carlyle Boucher
Boucher
Rick Bouche
Rick Boucher
Rick Boucher
Rick Boucher


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<mask> (; 12 July 18684 December 1933) was a German symbolist poet and a translator of Dante Alighieri, William Shakespeare, Hesiod, and Charles Baudelaire. He is also known for his role as leader of the highly influential literary group called the George-Kreis and for founding the literary magazine  ("Journal for the Arts"). Biography

Early life
<mask> was born in 1868 in Büdesheim (now part of Bitburg-Prüm) in the Grand Duchy of Hesse (now part of Rhineland-Palatinate). His father, also named <mask>, was an inn keeper and wine merchant and his mother Eva (née Schmitt) was a homemaker. When <mask> was five years old, the family moved to Bingen am Rhein. According to Michael and Erika Metzger, both sides of the <mask> family had lived in the area for generations and had risen from peasants, to millers, and finally to small town merchants. At the time, the Roman Catholic Church was very important to the daily life of Bingen am Rhein and to the <mask> family.Life revolved around the feast days of the Liturgical Calendar. Furthermore, when <mask>'s mother died, the oleander trees she had planted when she had married her husband were donated to the nuns of the nearby Rochusberg, which symbolized a returning of God's gifts back to Him. After attending primary school in Bingen, <mask> was sent, at the age of thirteen, to one of the best secondary schools in the Grand Duchy of Hesse, the Ludwig-Georgs-Gymnasium in the Grand-Duke Louis IV's capitol city of Darmstadt. There, from 1882 to 1888, <mask>, "received a vigorous humanistic education in which Greek, Latin, and French were stressed." <mask> "excelled in French" and gained "a thorough knowledge of modern European literature, as well as of the Greek and Roman authors." Although later described as a loner, <mask> assembled his first circle of friends in Darmstadt, where he had access to libraries and to the theater, which fascinated him. He also taught himself to read Norwegian in order to read the works of Henrik Ibsen in the original language.The making of a poet
At the age of nineteen, <mask> and a few other students of the Gymnasium started a literary journal called Rosen und Disteln ("Roses and Thistles"). Here <mask> published his first poems under the pseudonym Edmund Delorme. Even though the Gymnasium emphasized the poetry of the German Romantics, <mask> taught himself Italian, in order to both read and translate the Renaissance poets whom he most revered. His first poems consisted of literary translations and imitations of the Italian poetry of Petrarch and Torquato Tasso. When his schooling was concluded in 1888, it was clear to <mask> and to his family that it would not work for him to follow the usual course into university, business, or the German civil service. Instead he began to travel. He later told a friend, "Germany was intolerable then; just think of Nietzsche!I would have thrown a bomb if they had kept me here; or I would have perished like Nietzsche. My father was glad to get rid of me, for he sensed the danger." Hoping to improve his grasp of English, <mask> lived in London between May and October 1888. Queen Victoria was on the throne and London was still the capital of the global British Empire. <mask> later recalled that in England he saw, "an expansive sense of life, borne by great political tasks and goals, an ancient cultural unity which carefully preserved traditions, a firmly moded way of life for all classes of the populace, a decorous politeness among all the people, phenomena which were no longer found in the Germany of those years, or which were just beginning to emerge." It is also believed to have been during his time in London that <mask> first encountered the English poetry of the, "honored masters", Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and Ernest Dowson, whose works <mask> would later translate into German and publish in his homeland. While briefly returning to Germany and his parental home in Bingen, <mask> expressed a desire to convene a "Congress" of like-minded poets and to publish a collection of their works.This was an idea deeply rooted in both the Western Canon and in German literature, as Goethe, Schiller, and the other German Romantic poets had circles of adherents who gathered around them. Even before that, Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock had referred to his closest friends as, die wenigen Edlen ("The Noble Few") and had made detailed plans for, Die Gelehrtenrepublik ("The Republic of Scholars"). During his subsequent tours of Switzerland and northern Italy, <mask> played the title role in a production of Moliere's Le Misanthrope performed at Montreux. <mask> later recalled, "Can you imagine anything more contradictory than that I, the socialist, communard, atheist, should play in a comedy with a German baron in the house of a professor of theology surrounded by a whole bevy of society ladies?" Suffering from severe loneliness, <mask> arrived in Paris in May 1889. On his first day there, he met the French poet Albert Saint-Paul, through whom <mask> was introduced into the city's literary bohemia. Despite the intensely anti-German revanchism reigning over French culture during the Belle Époque, <mask> found himself, "spontaneously accepted by his peers."Through Albert Saint-Paul, <mask> was introduced to Paul Verlaine, Francis Vielé-Griffin, Albert Mockel, and Waclaw Rolicz-Lieder. Saint-Paul also persuaded the poet Stéphane Mallarmé to invite <mask> to attend the Tuesday Symbolist soirées held in, "that little room in the Rue de Rome". <mask> had been described to Mallarmé as resembling, "the young Goethe before Werther". When they met, Mallarmé received <mask> warmly, particularly when the latter revealed that he had recently begun translating Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal into German. Many years later, the members of Mallarmé's circle were to recall that they immediately identified <mask> as, "a poet of unusual promise." Despite his confidence, <mask> seemed extremely shy and rarely participated in the circle's discussions, preferring instead to listen and learn. Meanwhile, <mask> also filled 365 pages with poems by French and other European authors, many of which he was later to translate into German.According to the Metzgers, "For the Symbolists, the pursuit of 'art for art's sake', was a highly serious - nearly a sacred - function, since beauty, in and of itself, stood for a higher meaning beyond itself. In their ultimate higher striving, the French Symbolists are not far from the Platonic ideals of the Good, the True, and the Beautiful, and this idealistic aspect was undoubtedly what appealed to <mask> far more than the Estheticism, the Bohemianism, and the apparent Nihilism so often superficially associated with this group." Paul Verlaine and Stéphane Mallarmé were the only living poets whom <mask> considered his superiors and whose apprentice he ever wished to be. Particularly Mallarmé, whose circle of disciples called him Le Maître ("The Master"), was to be a lifelong model for <mask>'s art, philosophy, and way of life. The French Symbolists were every bit as enthusiastic for <mask>, as is revealed by the evidence of their surviving letters and subsequent memoirs of his visit to Paris, which were published in a 1928 theme issue of the Revue d'Allemagne. <mask> wrote in 1896, "Paris, the only place where I found and possess true friends." At this time, <mask> felt a very intense hostility to what he saw as the banality and philistinism of German culture during the German Empire.In his subsequent poem Franken ("Frankish Lands"), which celebrates his visit to Paris and, "whose title recalls the original unity of Germany and France under Charlemagne", <mask> denounced the militarism and expansionism of the Imperial Government, "the complacent materialism of the German middle class", and the hostility to German artists, poets, and intellectuals. <mask> asked the German people, "Where is your bard, you proud and boastful race?" He then answered that there was no one, as the German people had driven Friedrich Nietzsche insane and forced Arnold Böcklin into exile. Even so, "<mask>'s experience in Paris during the early 1890's ... impelled him to return to Germany to give a new voice and form to German poetry." Blätter für die Kunst
After returning to Germany, <mask> first began to study Romance languages and their literature at Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin, where he remained for three semesters. At the time, <mask> had serious doubts about the ability of the German language to say what he wished to say in his poems. For this reason, he preferred instead to write French and Spanish poetry and even invented a language which he dubbed Lingua Romana, which combined words from Spanish and Latin with German syntax.<mask> also seriously considered emigrating to Mexico at the urging of a wealthy Mexican family he had met and befriended in Paris. When <mask> saw the family off on a ship back to Mexico, he gifted them with a copy of the first collection of his poems in German; Hymnen ("Odes"), which had just been privately printed in a limited edition of 100 copies. Also while living in Berlin, <mask> joined forces with fellow student Carl August Klein to found the annual literary magazine entitled . At the time, <mask> felt that German poets had been reduced to two main literary movements, both of which he opposed. The first was for a poet to be, "a provider of a pleasant diversion", or as Arno Holz called such poetry, "a lilac-sweet spring rhapsode". The other role was for a poet to become a Naturalistic social critic, or what <mask> sarcastically termed, "an apostle of reality". <mask> and Carl Klein therefore intended for Blätter für die Kunst to be a vehicle for what they termed, "the new art", which was intended to both build upon and supersede both literary movements within German poetry, while also drawing upon the ideas of the French Symbolists.While <mask> was not the first German poet to draw inspiration from the French Symbolists, he has been termed, "the most gifted, eloquent, and productive exponent of the poetic aspects of the movement in his homeland". <mask> also, "did not slavishly follow any masters", but set his own stamp upon those aspects of Symbolism that he found appropriate for his purpose of revitalizing German culture and German literature. <mask> was the main person of the literary and academic group known as the George-Kreis ("George-Circle"), which included some of the major, young writers of the time such as Friedrich Gundolf and Ludwig Klages. In addition to sharing cultural interests, the group promoted mystical and political themes. <mask> knew and befriended the "Bohemian Countess" of Schwabing, Fanny zu Reventlow, who sometimes satirised the group for its melodramatic actions and opinions. <mask> and his writings were identified with the Conservative Revolutionary philosophy. He was homosexual, yet exhorted his young friends to have a celibate life like his own.During 1914, at the start of the World War, <mask> foretold a sad end for Germany. In 1916, in a deliberate revolt against the jingoistic literary movement known as Hurrah-Patriotismus, which was overwhelmingly popular on the German home-front during the First World War, <mask> wrote and published the pessimistic poem " Der Krieg" ("The War"). The outcome of the war was the realization of his worst fears. In the 1920s, <mask> despised the culture of Germany, particularly its bourgeois mentality and archaic church rites. He wished to create a new, noble German culture, and offered "form", regarded as a mental discipline and a guide to relationships with others, as an ideal while Germany was in a period of social, political, spiritual and artistic decadence. National Revolution
<mask>'s poetry was discovered by the small but ascendant Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP), a precursor to Nazism, which had its roots in Bavaria. <mask>'s concepts of "the thousand year Reich" and "fire of the blood" were adopted by the NSDAP and incorporated into the party's propaganda.<mask> would come to detest their racial theories, especially the notion of the “Nordic superman”. According to Peter Hoffmann, however,  <mask>, "had a low opinion of Hitler, in whom he saw none of the greatness of a Caesar or a Napoleon". Shortly before Hitler became Chancellor on January 30, 1933, "the poet said that if the National Socialists came to power, everyone in Germany would have to wear a noose around his neck, and those who refused would be hanged immediately." In February 1933, the Nazis began dismissing all of their political opponents as well as Jews from the Prussian Academy of the Arts; including Thomas Mann, René Schickele, Georg Kaiser, and Franz Werfel. They were replaced with politically reliable, "national writers", such as Hans Grimm and Hans Carossa. By April 1933, <mask> was referring to the National Socialists as, "hangmen." He also assigned the youngest of his followers, Karl Josef Partsch to talk Frank Mehnert out of joining any Nazi-affiliated organizations.On May 5, 1933, the Prussian Minister for Sciences, Arts, and Public Education, Bernhard Rust, informed <mask> that the new government wished to appoint him to an honorary position within the Academy. Rust further explained that he intended to publicly describe <mask> as the forefather of the Nazi Party's "national revolution", and also offered him a large sum of money to do with as he wished. If <mask> was agreeable to the proposal, President Paul von Hindenburg or Chancellor Adolf Hitler would personally write the official letter. On May 10, 1933, <mask> replied by letter. He declined both the money and the honorary position, "in the so-called academy", but said that he approved of its "national" orientation. <mask> explained, however, that he had administered German literature for five decades without any need for an academy. On the other hand, <mask> did not deny his, "ancestorship of the new national movement and did not preclude his intellectual cooperation".There were those within the Nazi Party, however, who were enraged by <mask>'s negative response to the offer, who suspected the sincerity of his claims of sympathy for the national revolution, and who even denounced <mask> by calling him a Jew. In order to renew his passport, <mask> returned to his native Bingen am Rhein at the beginning of July, but left for Berlin-Dahlem just four days before his 65th birthday. Some historians believe that this was a deliberate effort to evade official honors from the new government. But the new Government made no further efforts beyond a personal telegram of congratulations from Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. Personal life

Ida Coblenz
Many years later, <mask> told his friends that there had been a woman who was "my world". <mask> met Ida Coblenz, a wealthy and cultured German Jewish heiress who both admired his poems and showed very deep insights into them, at Bingen am Rhein in 1892. Many of <mask>'s poems in Preisgedichte, Das Jahr der Seele (1897), and even in Der Siebente Ring (1907), were inspired by her.<mask> saw Ida often, particularly in the fall of 1894 and the

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 summer of 1896. Ida's brief and unhappy arranged marriage to Leopold Auerbach, a Jewish businessman from Berlin, did nothing to interrupt her relationship with <mask>. When Ida, however, began a relationship with the married poet Richard Dehmel, whom she later married in 1901, <mask> viewed Ida's decision as a betrayal of the worst order. Dehmel, due to his Marxism, Bohemianism, and, "sensual glorification of life as it is", stood for everything that <mask> detested in German poetry in Imperial Germany. After meeting Dehmel before Coblenz's house in Bingen, <mask> wrote to her, "Our [friendship] arises from the fact that each of us is able to communicate what he thinks great and noble to the other - it rises and falls with this ability - and disappears entirely when something appears great and noble to one which is brutal and debased to the other." <mask> had been planning to dedicate his 1897 poetry collection Das Jahr der Seele to Ida Coblenz. Instead, the name of <mask>'s sister was printed where that of Ida Coblenz was intended to have stood.Death in exile
On July 25, 1933, <mask> travelled to Wasserburg on Lake Constance, where he remained for four weeks. He was joined there at various times by Frank Mehnert, Berthold von Stauffenberg, Claus von Stauffenberg, and other younger members of the George-Kreis. On August 24, 1933, <mask> took a ferry across the Lake to Heiden, Switzerland. Although the Master had chosen to make the journey to escape the humid lakeside air and had spent the previous two winters at Minusio, <mask> later said, in an example of the Master's, "mild political humor", that in the middle of the Lake he began to breathe far more easily. Shortly after the attending the Roman Catholic wedding at Bamberg of his brother Claus to Baroness Nina von Lerchenfeld, Berthold von Stauffenberg arrived at Minusio on September 27, 1933 and found the Master feeling very weak and devoid of appetite. That same month, however, <mask> declared that both his way of life and his friendships were sufficient proof of his tolerance and indifference to all religions. In November 1933, Frank Mehnert spread the news that the Master's medical condition was very grave.Robert Boehringer, Frank Mehnert, Walter Kempner, and Clotilde Schlayer took turns keeping vigil at his hospital bedside. When Partsch, Albrecht von Blumenthal, Walter Anton, Ludwig Thormaehlen, and the three Stauffenberg brothers also arrived, they were allowed a brief glimpse of the Master in his darkened room; but the poet was not aware of their presence. <mask> died at Minusio on December 4, 1933. Although Berthold von Stauffenberg, Thormaehlen, Anton, Blumenthal, and others wished to return the Master's body to Germany for burial, Boehringer, as the poet's heir, overruled them by quoting the Master's own words, "A man should be buried where he dies." In response, the <mask>-Kreis decided to inter the Master locally. Claus von Stauffenberg organized the wake in accordance with the customs of the Italian-speaking Canton of Ticino and the George-Kreis kept constant vigil at the Minusio cemetery chapel until the morning of December 6, 1933. On December 5, the German Consulate at Lugano contacted the city officials of Minusio and asked for the date and time of the funeral.The <mask>-Kreis replied that the funeral would be at 3pm on December 6, but added that mourners from outside the Circle were not wanted. Just in case, the funeral was then secretly rescheduled for 8:15 on the morning of December 6. Boehringer, however, disapproved of the deception and quietly informed Baron Ernst von Weizsäcker, the German Minister at Bern, that he could deliver a wreath to the grave on the day after the funeral. Twenty-five members of the George-Kreis, including Jewish members Ernst Morwitz and Karl Wolfskehl, attended the funeral. The laurel wreath later delivered by the German Foreign Office bore a swastika printed on a white ribbon. This subsequently caused a running battle within the Circle between those, like Clotilde Schlayer, who repeatedly chose to remove it and other members who kept replacing it with new swastika ribbons. As the mourners left the railroad station at Locarno following the ceremony, some of the younger members of the George-Kreis were seen to give the Nazi salute.Legacy
According to the Metzgers, "When <mask> died in 1933, there was a grim dissonance between the eulogies from inside and outside Germany, the former claiming <mask> as the prophet of the Third Reich, which had taken power that year, the latter often interpreting his silence as expressing his utter contempt for the new regime." Literary achievements
From the inception of the Circle, <mask> and his followers represented a literary and cultural revolt against the Far-Left literary realism trend in German literature during the last decades of the German Empire. <mask> was also a highly important intermediary between German Romanticism and literary realism of the 19th century and the 20th-century Expressionist and Modernist poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke, August Stramm, Reinhard Sorge, and Berthold Brecht. Even though the Master was, like his fellow war poets Siegfried Sassoon, Hedd Wyn, and Wilfred Owen, a very harsh critic of his own era, <mask> was also very much a man of his own time. <mask>'s poetry is characterized by an aristocratic ethos; his verse is formal in style, lyrical in tone, and often arcane in language, being influenced by Greek classical forms. By both emulating and building upon the literary language of the German Romantics and Biedermeier poets, "<mask>'s poetry", according to Peter Hoffmann, "helped to form modern literary German." He also experimented with various poetic metres, punctuation, obscure allusions and typography.Believing that the purpose of poetry was to create an alternative to reality  he was a strong advocate of art for art's sake  <mask>'s beliefs about poetry were drawn from the French Symbolist poets and he considered himself to be both the student and the successor of Stéphane Mallarmé and Paul Verlaine. <mask>'s "evident homosexuality" is represented by works such as Algabal and the love poetry he devoted to a gifted adolescent of his acquaintance named Maximilian Kronberger, whom he called "Maximin", and whom he believed to be a manifestation of the divine. The relevance of <mask>'s sexuality to his poetic work has been discussed by contemporary critics, such as Thomas Karlauf and Marita Keilson-Lauritz. Algabal is one of <mask>'s best remembered collections of poetry, if also one of his strangest; the title is a reference to the effete Roman emperor Elagabalus. <mask> was also an important translator; he translated Dante, Shakespeare and Baudelaire into German. <mask> was awarded the Goethe Prize during 1927. Das neue Reich
George's last complete book of poems, Das neue Reich ("The New Realm"), was published in 1928.It was banned in Occupied Germany after World War II, as the title sounded tainted by Nazism. But <mask> had dedicated the work, which includes the lyric Geheimes Deutschland ("Secret Germany") written in 1922, to Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, who, with his brother Claus, took a leading role in the 20 July plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler and overthrow the Nazi Party. Both brothers, who were executed after the plot failed, had considered themselves to be acting on the teachings of the Master by trying to kill Hitler and put an end to Nazism. The book describes a new form of society ruled by a hierarchical spiritual aristocracy. <mask> rejected all attempts to use it for mundane political purposes, including those of Nazism. Influence
In a view inspired by the German Romantic poets and the French Symbolist, <mask> and his followers saw him as the monarch of a separate government of Germany, composed of his intellectual and artistic disciples, bonded by their faithfulness to "The Master" and to a common vision. In his memoirs, Albert Speer claims to have met <mask> during the early 1920s and that his elder brother, Hermann, was an acquaintance of his: <mask> "radiated dignity and pride and a kind of priestliness... there was something magnetic about him."<mask>'s poetry emphasized self-sacrifice, heroism, and power, which won him the approval of the National Socialists. Though many Nazis claimed <mask> as an influence, <mask> remained aloof from such associations. Soon after the Nazi seizure of power, <mask> left Germany for Switzerland where he died the same year. Some of the members of the 20 July plot against Hitler were drawn from among his devotees, notably the Stauffenberg brothers who were introduced to <mask> by the poet and classical scholar Albrecht von Blumenthal. Although some members of the <mask> circle were avowedly anti-semitic (for example, Klages), the Circle also included Jewish authors such as Gundolf, the historian Ernst Kantorowicz, the Zionist Karl Wolfskehl, and Erich Berger. <mask> was fond of his Jewish disciples, but he expressed reservations about their ever becoming a majority in the group. <mask>'s influence on Ernst Kantorowicz was decisive in the latter's controversial biography of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, which was published in 1927.The book's account of Frederick II and his "dynamic personality and ability to shape the Empire according to a higher vision seemed to sum up the aspirations of the George Circle." <mask> is even reported to have "carefully corrected" the manuscript and saw that it was published. One of <mask>'s most well known collaborators was Hugo von Hofmannsthal, a leading literary modernist in the Austria-Hungarian Empire. Hofmannsthal, however, refused membership in the group. Later in life, Hofmannsthal wrote that no one had influenced him more than <mask>. Those closest to the "Master," as <mask> had his disciples call him, included several members of the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler, among them Claus von Stauffenberg himself. Stauffenberg frequently quoted <mask>'s poem Der Widerchrist (The Anti-Christ) to his fellow members of the 20 July plot.In popular culture

In Classical music
<mask>'s poetry was a major influence upon the 20th-century classical music composed by the Second Viennese School, particularly during their Expressionist period. Radically innovative Austrian Jewish composer Arnold Schönberg set <mask>'s poetry to music in the "Ich darf nicht dankend", Op. 14/1 (1907), String Quartet No. 2, Op. 10 (1908), and in The Book of the Hanging Gardens, Op. 15 (1909). Arnold Schoenberg's student Anton Webern also set <mask>'s poetry to music in his early choral work Entflieht auf leichten Kähnen, Op.2. Webern did the same in two other sets of songs, Op. 3 and 4 of 1909, and in several posthumously published vocal compositions from the same period. Film
Rainer Werner Fassbinder's 1976 comedy film Satan's Brew pokes fun at both <mask> and the George-Kreis. In West Germany during the 1970s, a once famous Far-Left poet named Walter Kranz (Kurt Raab) is suffering from both excessive narcissism and a severe case of writer's block. In response, Kranz buys a tailored Wilhelmian-era suit, dons a white powdered wig, and attempts to become <mask> by plagiarizing his philosophy and poetry and lecturing to a group of disciples, who only attend and listen because Kranz is bribing them to be there. Eventually, Kranz's wife reminds him that <mask> was a homosexual, so Kranz picks up a male prostitute in a men's bathroom, but finds himself unable to go through with having gay sex with the gigolo.Kranz accordingly declares <mask> dead, but remains attached to the latter's philosophy of the Nieschtzean superman. Bibliography
 1890: Hymnen ("Hymns"), 18 poems written reflecting Symbolism; dedicated to Carl August Klein; limited, private edition
 1891: Pilgerfahrten ("Pilgrimages") limited, private edition. 1892: Algabal (1892); illustrated by Melchior Lechter; limited, private edition. 1897: Das Jahr der Seele ("The Year of the Soul"). 1899: Teppich des Lebens ("The Tapestry of Life"). 1900: Hymnen, Pilgerfahrten, and Algabal, a one-volume edition published in Berlin by Georg Bondi which first made <mask>'s work available to the public at large. 1901: Die Fibel ("Primer"), poems written from 1886–1889.1903: Tage und Taten ("Days and Works"; cf. Hesiod's Works and Days). 1907: Der siebente Ring ("The Seventh Ring"). 1913: Der Stern des Bundes ("The Star of the Covenant")
 1917: Der Krieg ("The War"). 1928: Das neue Reich ("The Kingdom Come"). References

Further reading
 Breuer, <mask> (1996). Ästhetischer Fundamentalismus: <mask> und der deutsche Antimodernismus.Darmstadt: Primus. Capetanakis, D., '<mask>', in Demetrios Capetanakis  A Greek Poet In England (1947), p. 72–89
 Frank, Lore & Sabine Ribbeck (2000). Stefan-George-Bibliographie 1976–1997. Mit Nachträgen bis 1976. Auf der Grundlage der Bestände des <mask>-Archivs in der Württembergischen Landesbibliothek. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Goldsmith, Ulrich (1951).<mask> and the theatre. New York: The Modern Language Association (PLMA Publications LXVI:2). Goldsmith, Ulrich (1959). <mask>: A study of his early work. Boulder: University of Colorado Press (University of Colorado Studies Series in Language and Literature 7). Goldsmith, Ulrich (1970). <mask>.New York: Columbia University Press (Essays on Modern Writers). Goldsmith, Ulrich (1974). Shakespeare and <mask>: The sonnets. Berne: Franke. Kluncker, Karlhans (1985). "Das geheime Deutschland": Über <mask> und seinen Kreis. Bonn: Bouvier (Abhandlungen zur Kunst-, Musik- und Literaturwissenschaft 355).Norton, Robert E. (2002). Secret Germany: <mask> and his Circle. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Norton, Robert E. (2010). "Wozu <mask> George?" WestEnd. Neue Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung, 7.Jg., Heft 2, : 133–141. Schmitz, Victor (1978). <mask> und Rainer Maria Rilke: Gestaltung und Verinnerlichung. Berne: Wild. Rieckmann, Jens (ed.) (2005). A Companion to the Works of <mask>.Camden House. Lacchin, Giancarlo (2006). <mask> e l'antichità. Lineamenti di una filosofia dell'arte. Lugano: University Words. Schefold, Bertram. (2011).Politische Ökonomie als Geisteswissenschaft. Edgar Salin und andere Ökonomen um <mask>, in Studien zur Entwicklung der ökonomischen Theorie, XXVI. Edited by Harald Hagemann, Duncker & Humblot
 Lerner, Robert E. (2017). Ernst Kantorowicz: A Life, for <mask>'s relationship with his pupil Kantorowicz. External links

Concise overview
The Writings of <mask> Online (In German)
<mask> letters to Ernst Morwitz, 1905–1956. Manuscripts and Archives, New York Public Library. Some poems in both German and English

1868 births
1933 deaths
People from Bingen am Rhein
People from Rhenish Hesse
Conservative Revolutionary movement
German expatriates in Switzerland
German-language poets
German poets
German translators
German World War I poets
Writers from Rhineland-Palatinate
English–German translators
French–German translators
Italian–German translators
Translators of William Shakespeare
Translators of Dante Alighieri
German male poets
German male dramatists and playwrights
20th-century German dramatists and playwrights
German nationalists
Symbolist poets
LGBT poets from Germany
German gay

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