A dictator is a political leader who possesses absolute power. A dictatorship is a state ruled by one dictator or by a small clique. The word originated as the title of a Roman dictator elected by the Roman Senate to rule the republic in times of emergency.
The Battle of Narva on 30 November [O.S. 19 November] 1700 was an early battle in the Great Northern War. A Swedish relief army under Charles XII of Sweden defeated a Russian siege force three to four times its size. Previously, Charles XII had forced Denmark–Norway to sign the Treaty of Travendal. Narva was not followed by further advances of the Swedish army into Russia; instead, Charles XII turned southward to expel August the Strong from Livonia and Poland-Lithuania. Tsar Peter the Great of Russia took Narva in a second battle in 1704.
Robert Merle was a French novelist.
Jacques Heath Futrelle was an American journalist and mystery writer. He is best known for writing short detective stories featuring Professor Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen, also known as "The Thinking Machine" for his use of logic. He died in the sinking of the RMS Titanic.
"The Cask of Amontillado" is a short story by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in the November 1846 issue of Godey's Lady's Book. The story, set in an unnamed Italian city at carnival time, is about a man taking fatal revenge on a friend who, he believes, has insulted him. Like several of Poe's stories, and in keeping with the 19th-century fascination with the subject, the narrative follows a person being buried alive – in this case, by immurement. As in "The Black Cat" and "The Tell-Tale Heart", Poe conveys the story from the murderer's perspective.
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, written in 1838, is the only complete novel by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The work relates the tale of the young Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaler called the Grampus. Various adventures and misadventures befall Pym, including shipwreck, mutiny, and cannibalism, before he is saved by the crew of the Jane Guy. Aboard this vessel, Pym and a sailor named Dirk Peters continue their adventures farther south. Docking on land, they encounter hostile, black-skinned natives before escaping back to the ocean. The novel ends abruptly as Pym and Peters continue toward the South Pole.
Pankaj Mishra is an Indian essayist, novelist, and socialist. His non-fiction works include Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet, and Beyond, along with From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia, and A Great Clamour: Encounters with China and Its Neighbours, and he has published two novels. He is a Bloomberg opinion columnist, and prolific contributor to other periodicals such as The Guardian, The New York Times, The New Yorker and the New York Review of Books. His writings have led to a number of controversies, including disputes with Salil Tripathi, Niall Ferguson and Jordan Peterson. He was awarded the Windham–Campbell Prize for non-fiction in 2014.
The Massie Trial, for what was known as the Massie Affair, was a 1932 criminal trial that took place in Honolulu, Hawaii Territory. Socialite Grace Fortescue, along with several accomplices, was charged with the murder of the well-known local prizefighter Joseph Kahahawai. Fortescue was the mother of Thalia Massie, who had brought charges that Kahahawai was one of a group of men who had raped her.
Julia the Elder, known to her contemporaries as Julia Caesaris filia or Julia Augusti filia, was the daughter and only biological child of Augustus, the first Roman emperor, and his second wife, Scribonia. Julia was also stepsister and second wife of the Emperor Tiberius; maternal grandmother of the Emperor Caligula and the Empress Agrippina the Younger; grandmother-in-law of the Emperor Claudius; and maternal great-grandmother of the Emperor Nero. Her epithet "the Elder" distinguishes her from her daughter, Julia the Younger.
Augustus was the first emperor of ancient Rome.
Mahaut of Artois also known as Mathilda, ruled as Countess of Artois from 1302 to 1329. She was furthermore regent of the County of Burgundy from 1303 to 1315 during the minority and the absence of her daughter, Joan II, Countess of Burgundy.
Allan Johnstone Massie is a Scottish journalist, columnist, sports writer and novelist. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He has lived in the Scottish Borders for the last 25 years, and now lives in Selkirk.
Robert Kinloch "Bob" Massie IV is an American activist, author, clergyman and early pioneer in the fields of corporate accountability, finance, sustainability, and climate change. He has created or led several organizations, including Ceres, the Global Reporting Initiative, the Investor Network on Climate Risk, the New Economy Coalition and the Sustainable Solutions Lab. His early activism centered on opposition to South Africa's apartheid regime, writing about the relationship between the U.S. and South Africa in the apartheid era.
Alex Massie is a British journalist based in Edinburgh. He is served as the Scotland editor for The Spectator, and writes political columns for The Times and The Sunday Times. Massie is also a regular contributor to ITV Border, BBC Television and BBC Radio.
Hugh Ferns McLeod OBE was a Scottish rugby union player, who played forty times for Scotland between 1954 and 1962. He played 14 times for the Barbarians between 1954 and 1959, scoring only once, a try in their 1958 match against East Africa in Nairobi on 28 May 1958. His home team was Hawick RFC. giving rise to his nickname, the Hawick Hardman. Allan Massie describes him as "Hawick through and through, and is indeed now President of the Club".
Thomas Harold Massie is an American businessman, engineer, and politician. A member of the Republican Party, Massie has been the United States representative for Kentucky's 4th congressional district since 2012, when he defeated Bill Adkins in the special and general elections. The district covers much of northeastern Kentucky, but is dominated by the Kentucky side of the Cincinnati area and Louisville's eastern suburbs.
The Fault in Our Stars is a novel by John Green. It is his fourth solo novel, and sixth novel overall. It was published on January 10, 2012. The title is inspired by Act 1, Scene 2 of Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, in which the nobleman Cassius says to Brutus: "Men at some time were masters of their fates, / The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, / But in ourselves, that we are underlings." The story is narrated by Hazel Grace Lancaster, a 16-year-old girl with thyroid cancer that has affected her lungs. Hazel is forced by her parents to attend a support group where she subsequently meets and falls in love with 17-year-old Augustus Waters, an ex-basketball player, amputee, and survivor of osteosarcoma.
Fortune de France is a sequence of 13 historical novels by French author Robert Merle, published between 1977 and 2003. The series is about 16th and 17th century France through the eyes of a fictitious Huguenot doctor-turned-spy Pierre de Siorac. It made Merle a household name in France, with the author repeatedly called the Alexandre Dumas of the 20th century. As of 2014, Fortune de France had sold over five million copies in France.
Tiberius is a 1991 historical novel by Scottish writer Allan Massie, about the Roman Emperor Tiberius. It is the second in the series of novels Massie wrote about the early Roman Emperors.
Allan Douglas Kirk, FACS, is chairman of the department of surgery in the Duke University School of Medicine and surgeon-in-chief for Duke University Health System. He is the David C. Sabiston Jr. Professor of Surgery and a professor of immunology and pediatrics. He served as editor-in-chief for the American Journal of Transplantation from 2010 through 2020, and is now Editor Emeritus.
