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"The Golden Kite, The Silver Wind" (1953) is a short story by Ray Bradbury, one of his collection The Golden Apples of the Sun .
The story was published during the Cold War, and serves as an allegory to the nuclear arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union. [1]
The story, set in China, begins in a small pastoral town or village, apparently in a time or place where trade and agriculture are still the norm. There is little in the way of modern technology; no electricity, automobile or advanced irrigation. Superstition is also rampant. The town is described as being in a desert area, and within the vicinity of another, called Kwan-Si. The inhabitants of the town the story is set in are prone to describe their town to be in the shape of an orange, defined by the city walls.
One day, a messenger comes to the Mandarin, or king, to inform him that the neighboring town has changed the shape of their walls to a pig – such that it would be interpreted by travelers as being about to eat the orange-shaped town. The messenger and the king discuss frantically how this will bring them ill luck – travelers would stay in and trade with the other town, and nature will favor the pig over the orange. Advised by his daughter, who stands behind a silken screen to hide herself, the king decides to have the town walls rebuilt to resemble a club, with which to beat the pig away. All is well in the town for a time, but soon the messenger brings news that Kwan-Si's walls have been reshaped as a bonfire to burn their club. The Mandarin of the first town has the walls changed to a shining lake; Kwan-Si's are changed to Mouth to drink the lake; the Mandarin's changed to a needle to sew the mouth; Kwan-Si's to a sword to break the needle. This goes on for quite some time, driving the cities' inhabitants away from their work at farms or in shops to fruitlessly rebuild the walls and wait for the other's response. Disease and famine are rampant. At last, the voice behind the silk screen, advising the Mandarin, says weakly "In the Name of the gods, send for Kwan-Si!"
The two Mandarins, both starved and ailing, agree to stop their feud of superstition. The first Mandarin's daughter shows the men several kites, lying abandoned on the ground. 'What are kites', she asks, 'without the wind to sustain them and make them beautiful?' Nothing, they agree. 'And what is the sky, without kites upon its face to make it beautiful?' Again, it is Nothing. Thus, she directs that Kwan-Si shall make itself to resemble the Silver Wind, and her town shall be made to resemble a Golden Kite, such that the two should sustain each other and they could live in peace.
Cycle of the Werewolf is a horror novella by American writer Stephen King, featuring illustrations by comic-book artist Bernie Wrightson. Each chapter is a short story unto itself. It tells the story of a werewolf haunting a small town as the moon turns full once every month. It was published as a limited-edition hardcover in 1983 by Land of Enchantment, and in 1985 as a mass-market trade paperback by Signet. King also wrote the screenplay for its film adaptation, Silver Bullet (1985). It is King's shortest novel to date at 127 pages, which makes it technically a novella.
Gan Ying was a Chinese diplomat, explorer, and military official who was sent on a mission to the Roman Empire to find out more about it in 97 CE by the Chinese military general Ban Chao.
In Irish mythology, Tír na nÓg or Tír na hÓige is one of the names for the Celtic Otherworld, or perhaps for a part of it. Tír na nÓg is best known from the tale of Oisín and Niamh.
Some numbers are believed by some to be auspicious or lucky or inauspicious or unlucky based on the Chinese word that the number sounds similar to. The numbers 6 and 8 are widely considered to be lucky, while 4 is considered unlucky. These traditions are not unique to Chinese culture, with other countries with a history of Han characters also having similar beliefs stemming from these concepts.
The Stories of Ray Bradbury is an anthology containing 100 short stories by American writer Ray Bradbury, first published by Knopf in 1980. The hundred stories, written from 1943 to 1980, were selected by the author himself. Bradbury's work had previously been collected in various compilations, such as The Martian Chronicles and The October Country, but never in such a large volume or spanning such a long period of time.
Vincy Chan is a Hong Kong-Singaporean Cantopop singer. She began her singing career after winning 1st runner up at the 2005 New Talent Singing Awards and has since been signed with Emperor Entertainment Group. Her best known songs include "Feeling" (感應) and "My Memories are Not My Own" (我的回憶不是我的).
The Death of Koschei the Deathless or Marya Morevna is a Russian fairy tale collected by Alexander Afanasyev in Narodnye russkie skazki and included by Andrew Lang in The Red Fairy Book. The character Koschei is an evil immortal man who menaces young women with his magic.
The Enchanted Pig is a Romanian fairy tale, collected in Rumanische Märchen and also by Petre Ispirescu in Legende sau basmele românilor. Andrew Lang included it in The Red Fairy Book.
The Feather of Finist the Falcon or Finist the Falcon is a Russian fairy tale collected by Alexander Afanasyev in Narodnye russkie skazki. It is Aarne–Thompson type 432, the prince as bird. Other tales of this type include The Green Knight, The Blue Bird, and The Greenish Bird. Variants of the tale are primarily known in Russia.
Symphony in Slang is a 1951 cartoon short directed by Tex Avery, written by Rich Hogan and released with the feature film No Questions Asked by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Minimalist and abstract in style, it tells the story of a man, who finds himself at the Pearly Gates explaining the story of his life to a bewildered Saint Peter and Noah Webster using slang of that era. The majority of the short is made up of sight gags based on Peter and Webster's imagined, literal understandings of such phrases as "I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth" and "Outside it was raining cats and dogs."
Abimilki around 1347 BC held the rank of Prince of Tyre, during the period of the Amarna letters correspondence. He is the author of ten letters to the Egyptian pharaoh, EA 146–155. In letter EA 147, Pharaoh Akhenaten confirmed him as ruler of Tyre upon the death of his father, and in EA 149, referred to him with the rank of rabisu (general).
Alexander Balus is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel, named after its title character, the Seleucid king Alexander Balas. The work has three acts and was written in English. The period of the story is from 150 B.C to 145 B.C. The libretto is by Thomas Morell after the biblical book of 1 Maccabees.
Dr. Wai in "The Scripture with No Words" is a 1996 Hong Kong action film directed by Ching Siu-tung and starring Jet Li.
Cuquío is a town and municipality, in Jalisco in central-western Mexico. The municipality covers an area of 248 square miles (643 km2). It limits to the North with the municipality of Yahualica and the State of Zacatecas; to the South, Zapotlanejo and Acatic; to the East, Yahualica and Tepatitlán; and to the West, Ixtlahuacán del Río. Its name derives from the word Cuixui, which in the Aztec language Náhuatl means kite, and is interpreted as "place of kites", or in Tarascan language, "place of frogs or toads". The foundation of the town is awarded to the Purépechas (Tarascans) who repeatedly ventured through these valleys after the Saltpeter War (1480-1510). As a third version about the origins of the municipality name, it is well known that the tribe of coquias settled in La Cofradía, two kilometers from the current town, whose name is conjectured the denomination comes from. Cuquío also depended on the Tonalteca kingdom.
Legends featuring pig-faced women originated roughly simultaneously in The Netherlands, England and France in the late 1630s. The stories tell of a wealthy woman whose body is of normal human appearance, but whose face is that of a pig.
The Adventures of Jinbao is a 2012 Chinese-Hong Kong-American anime-influenced computer-animated action comedy martial arts film directed by Kwok-Shing Lo and written by Andy Ng Yiu-Kuen and Lam Fung from an original story by Peter Cheung Wing-Yiu. The film's English cast features Rob Schneider, Haylie Duff, Norm Macdonald, Lauren Elizabeth, and Tom Kenny. Many of the film's fight scenes were animated using motion capture. It is loosely based on the Kung Fu Panda franchise.
The Horse Lurja is a Georgian folktale published by Georgian folklorist Mikhail Chikovani. It tells the story about the friendship between a princess and a magic horse, which sacrifices itself for her after it rescues her from great peril. Although the tale appears in Georgia, some scholars recognize similar narratives in Central Asia and across Europe.
Dog, and His Human Speech is a Central African folktale collected by missionary Robert Hamill Nassau, from the Tanga people. According to scholars, the tale is related to the folkloric theme of the Calumniated Wife, and finds parallels with European variants of tale type ATU 707, "The Three Golden Children", of the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index.
Trandafiru is a Romanian fairy tale collected by Arthur Carl Victor Schott and Albert Schott in the mid-19th century and sourced from Banat.