The viking image has changed dramatically over the centuries, romanticized in the 18th and 19 century, they are now alternatively portrayed as savage and violent heathens or adventurous explorers. Stereotypes and clichés are rampant in popular culture and vikings and their influence appear to various extents, from Wagner's Ring Cycle to the comic Hägar the Horrible, and J.R.R Tolkien's Lord of the Rings to Marvel's Thor. But what is actually true? Eleanor Barraclough lifts the lid on ten common viking myths.

The post 10 myths about the vikings appeared first on OUPblog.

Atheism is the absence of belief that God, and other deities, exist. How much do you know about this belief system? Julian Baggini, author of Atheism: A Very Short Introduction, tells us the ten things we never knew about atheism.

The post 10 surprising facts about atheism appeared first on OUPblog.

The French Revolution was one of the most momentous events in world history yet, over 220 years since it took place, many myths abound. Some of the most important and troubling of these myths relate to how a revolution that began with idealistic and humanitarian goals resorted to ‘the Terror’.

The post Ten myths about the French Revolution appeared first on OUPblog.

This is only my second Kazuo Ishiguro book following on from Never Let Me Go. For me, coming off a novel about cloning, I had no expectations about where he would go next. Much has been made about this novel being a “departure” for Ishiguro but I would argue that he has gone back to something […]

Today, 18 January 2015 marks World Religion Day across the globe. The day was created by the Baha’i faith in 1950 to foster dialogue and to and improve understanding of religions worldwide and it is now in its 64th year.

The aim of World Religion Day is to unite everyone, whatever their faith, by showing us all that there are common foundations to all religions and that together we can help humanity and live in harmony. The day often includes activities and events calling the attention of the followers of world faiths. In honour of this special day and to increase awareness of religions from around the world, we asked a few of our authors to dispel some of the popular myths from their chosen religions.

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Myth: Quakers are mostly silent worshippers

“If you are from Britain, or certain parts of the United States, you may think of Quakers as a quiet group that meets in silence on Sunday mornings, with only occasional, brief vocal messages to break the silence. Actually, between eighty and ninety per cent of Quakers are “pastoral” or “programmed” Friends, with the majority of these living in Africa (more in Kenya than any other country) and other parts of the global South. The services are conducted by pastors, and include prayers, sermons, much music, and even occasionally (in Burundi, for instance) dancing! Pastoral Quaker services sometimes include a brief period of “unprogrammed” worship, and sometimes not.  Quaker worship can be very lively!”

— Stephen W. Angell is Leatherock Professor of Quaker Studies, Earlham School of Religion and editor of The Oxford Handbook of Quaker Studies

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Myth: Zen as the Buddhist meditation school

“Zen is known as the Buddhist school emphasizing intensive practice of meditation, the name’s literal meaning that represents the Japanese pronunciation of an Indian term (dhyana). But hours of daily meditative practice are limited to a small group of monks, who participate in monastic austerities at a handful of training temples. The vast majority of members of Zen only rarely or perhaps never take part in this exercise. Instead, their religious affiliation with temple life primarily involves burials and memorials for deceased ancestors, or devotional rites to Buddhist icons and local spirits. Recent campaigns, however, have initiated weekly one-hour sessions introducing meditation for lay followers.”

— Steven Heine is Professor of Religion and History, Director of the Institute for Asian Studies, at Florida International University, and author of Zen Skin, Zen Marrow: Will the Real Zen Buddhism Please Stand Up?

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Myth: Atheists have no moral standards

“This was a common cry in the nineteenth century – the British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli made it – and it continues in the twenty-first century.  Atheists respond in two ways. First, if you need a god for morality, then what is to stop that god from being entirely arbitrary? It could make the highest moral demand to kill everyone not fluent in English – or Hebrew or whatever. But if this god does not do things in an arbitrary fashion, you have the atheist’s second response. There must be an independent set of values to which even the god is subject, and so why should the non-believer not be subject to and obey them, just like everyone else?”

— Michael Ruse is Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Program in the History and Philosophy of Science, at Florida State University and an editor of The Oxford Handbook of Atheism

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Myth: Islam is a coercive communitarian religion

“Claims of an Islamic state to enforce Sharia as the law of the state are alien to historical Islamic traditions and rejected by the actual current political choices of the vast majority of Muslims globally. Belief in Islam must always be a free choice and compliance with Sharia cannot have any religious value unless done voluntarily with the required personal intent of each individual Muslim to comply (nya). Theologically Islam is radically democratic because individual personal responsibility can never be abdicated or delegated to any other human being (see e.g. chapters and verses 6:164; 17:15; 35:18; 39:7; 52:21; 74:38 of the Quran).”

— Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na‘im is Charles Howard Candler Professor of Law at Emory University, and author of What Is an American Muslim? Embracing Faith and Citizenship

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Myth: Are Mormons Christians?

“Are Mormons Christian? Yes, but with greater similarity to the Church before the fourth century creeds gave it its modern shape. Mormons believe in and worship God the Father, but deny the formulas which claim he is without body, parts, or—most critically—passions. Latter-day Saints accept his Son Jesus Christ as Savior and Redeemer, but reject the Trinitarian statements making him of one substance with the Father. Mormons accept the Bible as the word of God, but reject the closed canon dating from the same era, just as they believe that God continues to reveal the truth to prophets and seeking individuals alike.”

— Terryl Givens is Professor of Literature and Religion at the University of Richmond, and author of Wrestling the Angel, The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity

*   *   *   *   *

Myth: Hinduism is tied to Southern Asia

“One myth about Hinduism is that it is an ethnic religion. The assumption is that Hinduism is tied to a particular South Asian ethnicity. This is misleading for at least three reasons. First, South Asia is ethnically diverse. Therefore, it is not logical to speak of a single, unified ethnicity. Second, Hinduism has long been established in Southeast Asia, where practitioners consider themselves Hindu but not South Asian. Third, although the appearance of ‘White Hindus’ is a phenomenon rather recent and somewhat controversial, the global outreach of Hindu missionary groups has prompted scores of modern converts to Hinduism throughout Europe and the Americas. In other words, not all Hindus are South Asian.”

— Kiyokazu Okita is Assistant Professor at The Hakubi Center for Advanced Research and Department of Indological Studies, Kyoto University, and author of Hindu Theology in Early Modern South Asia

*   *   *   *   *

Headline image credit: Candles, photo by Loren Kerns, CC-by-2.0 via Flickr

The post World Religion Day 2015 appeared first on OUPblog.

        

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By Sarah Dry

Nearly three hundred years since his death, Isaac Newton is as much a myth as a man. The mythical Newton abounds in contradictions; he is a semi-divine genius and a mad alchemist, a somber and solitary thinker and a passionate religious heretic. Myths usually have an element of truth to them but how many Newtonian varieties are true? Here are ten of the most common, debunked or confirmed by the evidence of his own private papers, kept hidden for centuries and now freely available online.

10. Newton was a heretic who had to keep his religious beliefs secret.

True. While Newton regularly attended chapel, he abstained from taking holy orders at Trinity College. No official excuse survives, but numerous theological treatises he left make perfectly clear why he refused to become an ordained clergyman, as College fellows were normally obliged to do. Newton believed that the doctrine of the Trinity, in which the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost were given equal status, was the result of centuries of corruption of the original Christian message and therefore false. Trinity College’s most famous fellow was, in fact, an anti-Trinitarian.

9. Newton never laughed.

False, but only just. There are only two specific instances that we know of when the great man laughed. One was when a friend to whom he had lent a volume of Euclid’s Elements asked what the point of it was, ‘upon which Sir Isaac was very merry.’ (The point being that if you have to ask what the point of Euclid is, you have already missed it.) So far, so moderately funny. The second time Newton laughed was during a conversation about his theory that comets inevitably crash into the stars around which they orbit. Newton noted that this applied not just to other stars but to the Sun as well and laughed while remarking to his interlocutor John Conduitt ‘that concerns us more.’

8. Newton was an alchemist.

True. Alchemical manuscripts make up roughly one tenth of the ten million words of private writing that Newton left on his death. This archive contains very few original treatises by Newton himself, but what does remain tells us in minute detail how he assessed the credibility of mysterious authors and their work. Most are copies of other people’s writings, along with recipes, a long alchemical index and laboratory notebooks. This material puzzled and disappointed many who encountered it, such as biographer David Brewster, who lamented ‘how a mind of such power, and so nobly occupied with the abstractions of geometry, and the study of the material world, could stoop to be even the copyist of the most contemptible alchemical work, the obvious production of a fool and a knave.’ While Brewster tried to sweep Newton’s alchemy under the rug, John Maynard Keynes made a splash when he wrote provocatively that Newton was the ‘last of the magicians’ rather than the ‘first king of reason.’

7. Newton believed that life on earth (and most likely on other planets in the universe) was sustained by dust and other vital particles from the tails of comets.

True. In Book 3 of the Principia, Newton wrote extensively how the rarefied vapour in comet’s tails was eventually drawn to earth by gravity, where it was required for the ‘conservation of the sea, and fluids of the planets’ and was most likely responsible for the ‘spirit’ which makes up the ‘most subtle and useful part of our air, and so much required to sustain the life of all things with us.’

6. Newton was a self-taught genius who made his pivotal discoveries in mathematics, physics and optics alone in his childhood home of Woolsthorpe while waiting out the plague years of 1665-7.

False, though this is a tricky one. One of the main treasures that scholars have sought in Newton’s papers is evidence for his scientific genius and for the method he used to make his discoveries. It is true that Newton’s intellectual achievement dwarfed that of his contemporaries. It is also true that as a 23 year-old, Newton made stunning progress on the calculus, and on his theories of gravity and light while on a plague-induced hiatus from his undergraduate studies at Trinity College. Evidence for these discoveries exists in notebooks which he saved for the rest of his life. However, notebooks kept at roughly the same time, both during his student days and his so called annus mirabilis, also demonstrate that Newton read and took careful notes on the work of leading mathematicians and natural philosophers, and that many of his signature discoveries owe much to them.

5. Newton found secret numerological codes in the Bible.

True. Like his fellow analysts of scripture, Newton believed there were important meanings attached to the numbers found there. In one theological treatise, Newton argues that the Pope is the anti-Christ based in part on the appearance in Scripture of the number of the name of the beast, 666. In another, he expounds on the meaning of the number 7, which figures prominently in the numbers of trumpets, vials and thunders found in Revelation.

4. Newton had terrible handwriting, like all geniuses.

False. Newton’s handwriting is usually clear and easy to read. It did change somewhat throughout his life. His youthful handwriting is slightly more angular, while in his old age, he wrote in a more open and rounded hand. More challenging than deciphering his handwriting is making sense of Newton’s heavily worked-over drafts, which are crowded with deletions and additions. He also left plenty of very neat drafts, especially of his work on church history and doctrine, which some considered to be suspiciously clean, evidence, said his 19^th century cataloguers, of Newton’s having fallen in love with his own hand-writing.

3. Newton believed the earth was created in seven days.

True. Newton believed that the Earth was created in seven days, but he assumed that the duration of one revolution of the planet at the beginning of time was much slower than it is today.

2. Newton discovered universal gravitation after seeing an apple fall from a tree.

False, though Newton himself was partly responsible for this myth. Seeking to shore up his legacy at the end of his life, Newton told several people, including Voltaire and his friend William Stukeley, the story of how he had observed an apple falling from a tree while waiting out the plague in Woolsthorpe between 1665-7. (He never said it hit him on the head.) At that time Newton was struck by two key ideas—that apples fall straight to the center of the earth with no deviation and that the attractive power of the earth extends beyond the upper atmosphere. As important as they are, these insights were not sufficient to get Newton to universal gravitation. That final, stunning leap came some twenty years later, in 1685, after Edmund Halley asked Newton if he could calculate the forces responsible for an elliptical planetary orbit.

1. Newton was a virgin.

Almost certainly true. One bit of evidence comes via Voltaire, who heard it from Newton’s physician Richard Mead and wrote it up in his Letters on England, noting that unlike Descartes, Newton was ‘never sensible to any passion, was not subject to the common frailties of mankind, nor ever had any commerce with women.’ More substantively, there is Newton’s lifelong status as a self-proclaimed godly bachelor who berated his friend Locke for trying to ‘embroil’ him with women and who wrote passionately about how other godly men struggled to tame their lust.

Sarah Dry is a writer, independent scholar, and a former post-doctoral fellow at the London School of Economics. She is the author of The Newton Papers: The Strange and True Odyssey of Isaac Newton’s Manuscripts. She blogs at sarahdry.wordpress.com and tweets at @SarahDry1.

The post True or false? Ten myths about Isaac Newton appeared first on OUPblog.

        

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Lost in the woods... 

We have all been lost in the woods at some time in our life either literally, metaphorically or both.

It is the same for children. 

Being lost in the dark forest is a recurrent theme in children's literature, fairy tales, folklore and mythology. 

Being lost in the woods, where there is no clear path to follow, and the light is fading, is a serious and frightening matter.

Wild beasts, dangerous people, and invading armies cannot be seen in the dark forests. But they are there, in the mind of the author, the teller of tales, the animator...and in the mind of the child, until the story or myth brings light, escape and salvation...

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Lost In the Woods with the Moomins

 The Moomin Forest Comes to the Museum...dangerous but safe. The Ateneum Art Museum, the national Finnish art museum in Helsinki, is celebrating the fantasy world of the Moomins as part of the100th year anniversary exhibit of artist Tove Jansson. Jansson wrote and drew the wonderful Moomins stories.

"The stories often contrast the warmth of home with the threats of nature, or familiar safety with the scary unknown. At the end of dangerous adventures the characters always find their way back home, and the stories always have a happy ending."  I found this description from the exhibit guide about Jansson's writing to be a most accurate description of the stories. However, I found nothing that fully described Jansson's extraordinary imagination and I was swept away by her delightful drawings, watercolors and gouache renderings of the fantasy world of the Moomins. 

The nine books and comic strips have been translated into nearly 50 languages and reinvented for stage productions, theme parks, radio plays and TV films. Personally, I prefer the stories to the comic strips, as her writing is so imaginative.

 In Japan,  life -size Moomins in Tokyo's Moomin Cafe keep people company if they are eating alone.

Nature in the form of dark forests, mountains, water, and storms all play a major role in the Moomin adventures. Snow and cold weather take on a life of their own

Philip Pullman said: "Jansson is a genius of a very subtle kind. These simple stories resonate with profound and complex emotions that are like nothing else in literature for children or adults: intensely Nordic, and completely universal."

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                          Danger in the Woods...

The classic tale of Little Red Riding Hood's dangerous journey in the woods has been traced back at least 10 centuries. Here is an excerpt from an interview by Rachael Hartigan Shea in the National Geographic Daily News with Jamie Tehrani, an anthropologist at Durham University, UK, who has been studying the orgins and evolution of Red Riding Hood. Appropriately, the interview is entitled, What Wide Orgins You Have, Little Red Riding Hood.

What are some of the theories about the origins of "Little Red Riding Hood"?

"It's been suggested that the tale was an invention of Charles Perrault, who wrote it down in the 17th century. Other people have insisted that "Little Red Riding Hood" has ancient origins. There's an 11th-century poem from Belgium which was recorded by a priest, who says, oh, there's this tale told by the local peasants about a girl wearing a red baptism tunic who wanders off and encounters this wolf.

My results demonstrate that, although most versions that we're familiar with today descended from Perrault's tale, he didn't invent it. My analysis confirmed that the 11th-century poem is indeed an early ancestor of the modern fairy tale."

Here is an excerpt and link to the 17th century version of Little Red Riding Hood written by Charles Perrault

...Little Red Riding Hood set out immediately to go to her grandmother, who lived in another village.

As she was going through the wood, she met with a wolf, who had a very great mind to eat her up, but he dared not, because of some woodcutters working nearby in the forest. He asked her where she was going. The poor child, who did not know that it was dangerous to stay and talk to a wolf, said to him, "I am going to see my grandmother and carry her a cake and a little pot of butter from my mother."

"Does she live far off?" said the wolf

"Oh I say," answered Little Red Riding Hood; "it is beyond that mill you see there, at the first house in the village."

"Well," said the wolf, "and I'll go and see her too. I'll go this way and go you that, and we shall see who will be there first."

The wolf ran as fast as he could, taking the shortest path, and the little girl took a roundabout way, entertaining herself by gathering nuts, running after butterflies, and gathering bouquets of little flowers. It was not long before the wolf arrived at the old woman's house. He knocked at the door: tap, tap...

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"We don’t really know when fairy tales originated", said author and scholar

Jack Zipes in a Smithsonian interterview by K. Annabelle Smith..."I’ve tried to show in my most recent book, the Irresistible Fairytale, that in order to talk about any genre, particularly what we call simple genre—a myth, a legend, an anecdote, a tall tale, and so on—we really have to understand something about the origin of stories all together. What the Greeks and Romans considered myths, we consider fairy tales. We can see how very clearly the myths, which emanated from all cultures, had a huge influence on the development of the modern fairy tale."

Here's the link to read all the interview, including Zipes reaction to Snow White and the Huntsman:  Smithsonian

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If only Hansel and Gretel, Snow White and Red Riding Hood had a dog with them in the woods, their stories would have been totally different. Imagine having a fearless protector, who can "see" in the night, offers unconditional love, and if you ever get lost, knows the way home.

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China...The stories are the same , but the illustrations are new for the Planet OF The Dogs Series in China.

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This blog is dedicated to the power of story and the worlds of wonder and imagination that are the world of children's literature. And to therapy dogs, that help reluctant children banish fear of reading.

Therapy dogs help change children's lives and open the doors to possibilities through reading. In the Planet Of The Dogs books the dogs teach people about courage, loyalty and love.

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  LitWorld Takes Children Out Of The Forest of Illiteracy

LitWorld's Mission Statement: LitWorld empowers all children to author lives of independence, hope, and joy...LitWorld engages students and families around the globe by providing opportunities for them to explore and learn from their own narratives and voices, and builds sustainable communities for literacy where knowledge and empowerment break the cycle of illiteracy and give all people a chance to pursue every dream.

Here's a link to Pam Allyn,  the founder of LitWorld , being interviewed on AlJazeera, about reading problems and illiteracy in the USA and around the globe.

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If you have kids in the family, or have a soft spot for dogs, check out the lovely annimated song, On Dog, by Nat Johnson. Here is the link:
Educating Alice, the website of author, school teacher and book lover Monica Edinger.

Ms Edinger also posted a review of Rush Limbaugh's book for kids about the Pigrims:..."So I was curious when one of my students brought in Rush Limbaugh's Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims for me to see. After all, I had heard that the author was a finalist Children's Book Week Author of the Year Award due to its high status on the best seller list (and this week was dubbed the winner).  And so I was curious --- what was the book like? 

Sadly, I have to concur with both the Kirkus review and editor Vicky Smith's closer look at it (and its sequel);  the book is not good. The history offered in a fictional form is the standard take on the Pilgrims and so very familiar to me. The writing is incredibly poor, cringe-inducing in spots as are the digital illustrations. There are a few older looking images scattered throughout with citations at the end; unfortunately, these are muddled without proper identification. It would not be something I'd want to add to my curriculum, that is for sure..." Here's the link: Monica Edinger 

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Life With a Dog: You Meet People

Jane Brody, the highly respected health news writer for the New York Times, after four years as a widow, has "adopted a 5-month-old puppy, a hypoallergenic Havanese small enough for me to pick up and carry, even into my ninth decade, when I travel to visit family and friends." Here are excerpts from her informative and personal article on her new life with Max, as well as the health benefits of owning a dog...

"More American Households have dogs as pets than any other type of nonhuman companion. Studies of the health ramifications have strongly suggested that pets, particularly dogs, can foster cardiovascular health, resistance to stress, social connectivity and enhanced longevity...

Yes, he’s a lot of work, at least at this age. But like a small child, Max makes me laugh many times a day. That’s not unusual, apparently: In a study of 95 people who kept “laughter logs,” those who owned dogs laughed more often than cat owners and people who owned neither.

When I speak to Max, he looks at me lovingly and seems to understand what I’m saying. When I open his crate each morning, he greets me with unbounded enthusiasm.Likewise when I return from a walk or swim, a day at the office, or an evening at the theater.

But perhaps the most interesting (and unpremeditated) benefit has been the scores of people I’ve met on the street, both with and without dogs, who stop to admire him and talk to me...Read it all by following this Link: JaneBrody  The photo of the Havanese is courtesy of Jenny Kutner at the Dodo.com 

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“The Barking Planet series of illustrated kids' books full of mythic fairy tale dog heroes is unabashedly humane, uplifting, and morally improving, which may not be everybody's cup of tea (or bowl of kibble), but it does make for interesting relief in a kid lit world increasingly obsessed with violence, family dysfunction and personal trauma.”-Barbara Julian, Animal Literature Blog

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The Power and Profit of a Retold Fairy Tale

Frozen has become a major financial triumph for Disney  reports Brooks Barnes in the New York Times (excerpted below). Perhaps stockholders, Disney executives and children who have seen the movie should all thank Hans Christian Anderson for creating the original Snow Queen fairy tale -- the inspiration for the film.

"According to Robert A. Iger, Disney's chief executive, 'No single business or entertainment offering was responsible for Disney’s overall spike in profit, although the runaway success of “Frozen' may have been the largest contributor. An animated princess musical, 'Frozen' has taken in $1.18 billion dollars worldwide since opening in November...

The Frozen soundtrack, released by Disney and distributed by Universal Music, has become the biggest hit of the season, selling nearly 2.5 million copies in the United States alone and ranking No. 1 on Billboard’s album chart 12 times.

Mr. Iger, speaking during a conference call with analysts, said “Frozen” now ranked as one of the top five franchises in terms of revenue, putting it up there with the likes of “Toy Story” and Winnie the Pooh in terms of importance.

“Passion for these characters and for the film is so extraordinary,” Mr. Iger said, noting that “Frozen” was coming to Broadway and that Disney was working to increase the presence of the film’s Nordic characters in its theme parks.

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Frozen was inspired by an 1845 Fairy Tale...

The Snow Queen...

Here is an excerpt from the 1872 English Translation by H.P. Pauli. The Snow Queen is one of 168 fairy tales by Hans Christian Anderson. The original tale is in seven parts and included a great deal of darkness, danger and evil characters. Nevertheless, it had a very happy ending as the pure heart of Gerda overcame the powers of the Snow Queen, the develish troll and the broken mirror. The original illustration of this edition are by Vilhelm Pedersen.

The original story concerns Gerda's quest to rescue Kay, a neighbor boy and dear friend, who has been lured to the Snow Queen's palace. Here is an excerpt... 

he walls of the palace were formed of drifted snow, and the windows and doors of the cutting winds. There were more than a hundred rooms in it, all as if they had been formed with snow blown together. The largest of them extended for several miles; they were all lighted up by the vivid light of the aurora, and they were so large and empty, so icy cold and glittering! There were no amusements here, not even a little bear’s ball, when the storm might have been the music, and the bears could have danced on their hind legs, and shown their good manners. There were no pleasant ...

...Just at this moment it happened that little Gerda came through the great door of the castle. Cutting winds were raging around her, but she offered up a prayer and the winds sank down as if they were going to sleep; and she went on till she came to the large empty hall, and caught sight of Kay; she knew him directly; she flew to him and threw her arms round his neck, and held him fast, while she exclaimed, “Kay, dear little Kay, I have found you at last.”

But he sat quite still, stiff and cold.

Then little Gerda wept hot tears, which fell on his breast, and penetrated into his heart, and thawed the lump of ice, and washed away the little piece of glass which had stuck there. Then he looked at her, and she sang..."

Gerda's good heart and courage ultimately prevail over turmoil, evil and danger,

and , once again, all is happy in the end.

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 The Early Days of Fairy Tales...

"The fairy tale grew, as a literary genre, out of out of the folk stories of the European past. We like to believe that they have no real authors, that they have been orally transmitted, and that they remain flexible in their details and their telling. Like Aesop's Fables, fairy tales come in famous groups with well-known characters: Beauty and the Beast, Hansel and Gretel, the Snow Queen, Rumplestiltskin, the Little Mermaid and the like. But fairy tales, as we know them now, are really the creation of literate collectors, editors, and authors working from the late seventeenth until the nineteenth century...Charles Perrault emerged in the last decades of the seventeenth century as the best and most widely read of these story tellers..." from the chapter, Straw Into Gold, in Seth Lerer's book, Children's Literature, A Reader's History from Aesop To Harry Potter.

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Maria Tatar has written several brief, pithy, descriptions of classic fairy tales. Here is one of them from her blog, Breezes from Wonderland.

Frog Prince: Sweet guy who is always ready to lend a helping hand. Tends to overshare and can become clingy at times. Willing to change for the right woman. Big supporter of sustainability movements and eco-friendly solutions.

Illustration by Warwick Goble

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 Dog Lovers...if you care about cruelty and animal abuse, but don't have time to spare, or you find the internet difficult to use...read this excerpt from John Woestendiak's  insightful review of CA Wulff's How to Change the World in Thirty Seconds as seen on
his outstanding website ohmidog!  

..."Just how much one person can do is laid out in Cayr Ariel Wulff’s new book, “How to Change the World in 30 Seconds: A Web Warriors Guide to Animal Advocacy Online.”

Wulff, who speaks from experience, shows how something as big and untenable as the Internet can, with relative ease, be used to make life better for individual dogs, and the species as a whole.
How to navigate the Internet, with an eye towards helping dogs, is clearly and concisely explained in Wulff’s handbook, which should be required reading for animal shelters, rescue organizations and anyone else interested in doing something more about the problems than complain."  Here is the link to read more of the review:  ChangeTheWorld

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Lost On The Yellow Brick Road -- When Reimagining a Classic Fairy Tale Fails...

Based on the reviews, The Legend Of Oz: Dorothy's Return which opened in many theaters on May 9th in North America, will soon be forgotten. Here is an excerpt from Peter Hurtlaub's review in the San Francisco Chronicle:

"Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return" returns the heroine who inspired a billion Halloween costumes back to the yellow brick road - this time in search of a plot.

The long journey is filled with action and familiar characters, but ultimately falls short of success. All the brains, heart and courage in the world can't save a movie that doesn't have a third act...Mostly, the film reaffirms how hard it is to make a movie as unforgettable and enduring as "The Wizard of Oz." Good chance you'll forget this one on the way home from the theater."

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A funny dog video from France... Dinner at the Country Club

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The Planet Of The Dogs series of books are available through your favorite independent bookstore or via Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Powell's... 

Librarians, teachers, bookstores...Order Planet Of The Dogs, Castle In The Mist, and Snow Valley Heroes, A Christmas Tale, through Ingram with a full professional discount. 

Therapy reading dog owners, librarians, teachers and organizations with therapy 
reading dog programs -- you can write us at [email protected] and we will send you free reader copies from the Planet of the Dogs Series...

 Dark woods and forests are not threatening in the Planet Of The Dogs book series because of the dogs...Read Sample chapteers here. 

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Author Claire Legrand sent us this information on the Kids Author's Carnival 

The goal of the KAC is to provide an opportunity for young readers to interact with authors up close and personal in a fun, party-like atmosphere...All ages are welcome and encouraged to attend. But please note that the kids will take center stage at this particular event! 

The folks at Brigadoon Service Dogs care about helping and healing people who have
serious life problems. The dog lovers at Brigadoon know through experience that these difficult and often painful problems respond to the canine connection. In their own words...

Elizabeth Burns is a librarian, author and blogger, who is passionate about reading and the world of books. I rarely post about teen readers, but was very taken by her article which analyzed the flaws in recent writings on NPR, Time, and, especially, Common Sense Media's research on Children, Teens and Reading.

 If you need help to choose a guard dog

Way Cool Dogs, always filled with good articles and insights for dog lovers, posted this helpful information regarding Guard Dogs. Here is an excerpt... 

"The guard dog is a security or protection dog. His or her job saves thousands of dollars
of property damage and saves many lives every day. In a way, they are considered a hero dog.

If you need help to choose a guard dog, here are a few top-notch breeds to choose from. Each has its own behavior and personality. Remember. A dog whose purpose is guarding helps protect your property and your family from danger. A bad one will not.

Choosing the perfect security dog for you, your business, and your family requires two things...Here's the link to read more: Guard Dogs   The illustration by Stella McCarty is from Castle In The Mist

...................................

By Sherry Hamby

The common stereotypes about battered women are wrong and not based on up-to-date science. Here are five common myths about battered women and the real truths about the realities and complexities of domestic violence.

Myth #1

Battered women keep domestic violence a secret.

Reality: Countless research studies show that most battered women disclose their partner’s violence to at least one person—about 80% to 90% of victims in many studies. Victims not only tell, they often tell multiple people and agencies. The problem is not that women don’t tell, it is that they do not receive useful help when they do disclose.

Myth #2

Victims just need to call the police.

Reality: Police officers cannot offer a cure-all for domestic violence. Police arrest perpetrators less than half the time when they are called to the scene of domestic violence incidents, according to the most recently available national data. Worse, arrested perpetrators seldom go to jail—approximately five out of six perpetrators arrested for domestic violence never serve any jail time.

Myth #3

Battered women don’t seek professional help.

Reality: Despite the limitations of police and victim services in many communities, battered women seek help at rates that are similar to people facing other problems. Battered women report to the police at rates that are similar to many other crime victims, and also similar to the helpseeking of people with psychological problems such as depression and anxiety.

Myth #4

Battered women just need to leave.

Reality: All sorts of dangers can increase when women try to leave, including separation violence, stalking, and increased homicide risk. Further, custody battles and other risks can, in some ways, pose even greater threats to women’s well-being and that of their children. We all wish that there was a simple solution like walking out, but the reality is far more complex.

Myth #5

Most women need professional help to cope with domestic violence.

Reality: Most women cope with the problem of domestic violence with informal helpseeking. In nationally representative data, it was ten times more common for women to go to a friend or family’s house than to a domestic violence shelter.

If you want to help women who have been victims of domestic violence, listen to their assessments of what is important, respect their values, and help them come up with a plan or seek resources that address all of the complexities and realities of domestic violence.

Sherry Hamby, Ph.D., is Research Professor of Psychology and Director of the Life Paths Research Program at the University of the South. She is author of Battered Women’s Protective Strategies: Stronger Than You Know.

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Image Credit: Violencia de género. Photo by Concha García Hernández. CC-BY-3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

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Jackie at a recent book signing.

If you’ve already got a copy of the book you might want to have it to hand whilst you read what she reveals, so you can go back and look at the images with fresh eyes. And if you haven’t already found a place in your home for this piece of art between two covers, … well perhaps this post ought to come with a warning notice. There’s magic in and on the pages of The Ice Bear. Prepare to be charmed and enchanted.

“The Ice Bear began with an image in my mind’s eye. It was an image of a child, kneeling. Around the child there were bears, so that the child looked like the centre of a daisy and the bears were the petals. My job was to work out how to get the child there, and probably more important, how to get him out again. This is what books are about for me, asking and answering questions, and in the process discovering more questions.

The Ice Bear began with a friend, pregnant with her first child. Something went wrong. The baby stopped moving, at full term. He died. She had to deliver a stillborn child. A tragedy for her and the child and her husband. The way people reacted to this was a shock to me. Quick, rush over it, brush over it, hide it under business, do anything but face the pain. (Not Sophie and Jon. They couldn’t rush over it, hide it, they had to face it.) I wanted to do a book about a lost child, about loosing a child. This was a thread that wove into the book. Though few would know if I didn’t say and the book is dedicated to Rhoderic, and Sophie and Jon and also to Katie and Thomas who were born by the time the book came out.

Some of Jackie’s first sketches for The Ice Bear

The Ice Bear began with a wish to do a book about polar bears, and to weave into it transformation and a legend, of the trickster and the shaman.

The Ice Bear began when the flight of a raven began to stitch together ideas with its patterned flight in the Pembrokeshire sky, because all books are like rivers, fed by streams of ideas, coming together.

The book is part of a series of books I have written about animals, each with a cover that is a portrait of the animal, staring out from the book. The covers are strong, almost iconic, and the books are often given shelf space so that the whole cover is seen, rather than being placed spine out on a shelf. I am told by bookshops who put the in the window that they work like a charm to bring people in to the shop, and one shop in Edinburgh said that people often missed their bus as they crossed the road to get a better look at the Snow Leopard when that was in the window. There’s something about eyes looking straight at you that still holds a primitive magic over the wild parts of the human consciousness. When I paint an animal in this way I am not searching for the humanity in the animal. I am searching for the soul, the spirit of the creature.

Some of Jackie’s covers, including her forthcoming ‘Something About a Bear’

Having ‘begun’ with an image the story then builds into a balance of words and images. Picture books are meant to be read aloud. The language needs to taste good in the ear, to look right where it sits on the page. A picture book is like a theatre, each page a stage set for that part of the story and in designing each page I often include parts of the stories that are only in the pictures. Once open I try to keep the words inside the pictures. I want the book to become a world where the pictures and the words tell the story. The composition is thought out right to the corners and often the corners and edges are where the main focus of the story is. (You can see this best in the picture where the child finds his mother bear. The image dominated the page but in the top right hand corner there is the figure of the father, charging in).

I paint on smooth paper, arches hot pressed, beginning with pale washes and then building and building with layers and then smaller details. The paints that I use are Winsor and Newton Artist Quality watercolours, usually tubes, and I use ceramic palettes. I know these colours quite well now after 25 years of working with them. I know when to run wet into wet and how much water to use. Now I use sable brushes. They carry the paint so well and a brush like a series 7, no. 4 will allow a wide wash but also can pull the finest line when handled right. And in the same way that writing is like finding the answers to a series of questions, so too is painting. I am constantly asking myself questions, about composition and colour and line and finding the answers is what makes the book.

In The Ice Bear the mother and the father each have a totem animal. The mother’s is the Arctic fox, and often when it seems that the child is alone on the ice you can see the fox is there somewhere, watching. The father’s is the owl, a fierce sky hunter. The boy’s is the bear and always will be. And raven, the trickster, a character who is perhaps a force for good, perhaps bad. He steals the bear child, but takes him to the hunter and his wife who have longed for a child. And when it is time he leads him back across the ice and joins the bear people with the human people forever. So is she good, or bad?

During the telling of a tale things can change. When I originally wrote The Ice Bear the raven lured the child out over the ice with small shards of sea glass. But I had wanted the book to be set long before glass was invented. The child becomes the first shaman, a bridge between humanity and the bear people. It was a time when there were no borders and people wondered the land without any border controls. There was no concept of ownership of land. The very idea would have seemed ridiculous. And so I looked for something else, something more timeless and lit upon the idea of amber. Amber is natural, not a manufactured thing. And I have a necklace of amber beads that if taken apart by a mischievous raven would look just like the broken amber heart in the snow.

Jackie’s amber necklace

The Ice Bear has been published now in many languages, French, Spanish, Catalan, Danish, Swedish, Korean, Chinese, Japanese. This is one of the things I love about working with books. Words found on a hill top in Wales can travel the world. I also love the democracy of books. Paintings in a gallery are expensive and usually bought to be hung in one home. Books can be bought, translated, and borrowed from libraries. They can be shared.”

My thanks go to Jackie for so generously sharing some of the stories behind The Ice Bear.

The House of the Golden Dreams (an art gallery featuring Jackie’s work): https://www.facebook.com/TheHouseofGoldenDreams
Jackie on Twitter: @JackieMorrisArt
Jackie’s blog: http://www.jackiemorris.co.uk/blog/

Writers, the real ones I mean, are magnets for neuroses, paranoia, depression, fits of rage, and yes, occasional bouts of constipation and anal seepage. (I tried, but there was no way to pretty that up.) It’s a wonder we have enough strength to smother our sorrows in Haagan Dazs.

And as if this crazy cocktail wasn’t enough, many of us succumb to Seasonal Myth Disorder. Not familiar with SMD? Perhaps you are. You just didn’t know it has a name. Let me explain. Assuming we agree life comes in seasons (and not just the April showers variety), it’s important to recognize that with these life seasons come some myth-perceptions, otherwise known as Seasonal Myth Disorder. (Don’t bother looking for it in the DSM V classifications. If you must know, I made it up.)

In any given season of life, especially the ones that ram us down a rabbit hole, it is easy to mistake these three myths for fact:

1. I am alone in this season.
2. No one understands what it’s like to be in this season.
3. This season will last forever.

Let’s myth bust these one at a time, ever so gently, shall we?

1. I am alone in this season. Are you struggling to find time to write, much less produce anything worth reading? Trolling around Facebook will lead you to believe you are the only one who isn’t there yet. Everyone is landing agents, agents are landing contracts, books are launching, movies based on the books are debuting, writers are churning out novellas before tea time . . . and then there’s you. Everyone is wildly successful and you’re nothing but a schlep with digestive issues. NO YOU’RE NOT! (And lay off the Facebook for a while.)

2. No one understands what it’s like to be in this season. HIGH SODIUM LUNCHEON MEAT! (aka BOLOGNA!)

3. This season will last forever. IMPOSSIBLE!

Okay, okay, so maybe that wasn’t so gentle. The point is, these are all myths. You’re a smart, literary person. You know what a myth is. It ain’t true.

You are not alone. In fact, you’re in good company.

Every single writer you can name or will ever know struggles with seasons of despair from time to time (even the super cute ones). Lots of people understand what you’re going through. If you don’t know any, join SCBWI, start a critique group or do something to connect with at least one other writer. You’re sure to find some sympathetic souls.

And no, this season–even though it feels like a six-month-Michigan-winter–will not last forever. You’ll get your groove back. You’ll have some small successes. Heck, maybe even big ones. So, please stop mything all over yourself. You’re too fine a person for that. And you know what that does to your gut. Let this be the start of Be Kind to Me season, okay?

Now, put down the spoon and go write something.

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. ~ Anne Bradstreet

By Kandice Rawlings

Leonardo da Vinci was born 562 years ago today, and we’re still fascinated with his life and work. It’s no real mystery why – he was an extraordinary person, a genius and a celebrity in his own lifetime. He left behind some remarkable artifacts in the form of paintings and writings and drawings on all manner of subjects. But there’s much about Leonardo we don’t know, making him susceptible to a number myths, theories, and entertaining but inaccurate representations in popular culture. The following are some of my favorites.

Leonardo da Vinci, Presumed Self Portrait, circa 1512. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

Myth #1 – Leonardo was gay.

Leonardo’s possible homosexuality is one of the more prevalent – and more plausible – myths circulating about the artist, and has the backing of none other than Sigmund Freud. There’s no way of knowing Leonardo’s sexual orientation for sure, but he isn’t known to have had romantic relationships with any women, never married, and in 1476 was accused (but later cleared) of charges of sodomy – then a capital crime in Florence. Scholars’ opinions on the issue fall along a spectrum between “maybe” and “very probably”.

Conclusion: Maybe true.

Myth #2 – Leonardo wrote backward to keep his ideas secret, and his notebooks weren’t “decoded” until long after his death.

For all his skill, Leonardo was not a prolific painter – the major part of his surviving output is in the form of his notebooks filled with theoretical and scientific writings, notes, and drawings. His strange habit of writing backward in these notebooks has been used to perpetuate the image of the artist as a mysterious, secretive person. But in fact it’s much more likely that Leonardo wrote this way simply because he was left-handed, and found it easier to write across the page from right to left and in reverse. No decoding is necessary – just a mirror. Leonardo’s theoretical writings and other notes were preserved by his follower and heir Francesco Melzi, and were widely known, at least in artistic circles, during the 16th and 17th centuries. Published extracts began appearing in 1651.

Conclusion: False.

Myth #3 – Leonardo put “secret” codes and symbols in his works.

I’d rather not get into all the problems with The Da Vinci Code too much, but I have to credit this 2003 book, by renowned author Dan Brown, for a lot of these theories. Aside from the fact that the book is full of factual errors (example: Leonardo’s “hundreds of Vatican commissions,” which actually number in the vicinity of zero) and twists the historical record, its readings of Leonardo’s artworks are based on some fundamentally flawed conceptions about the making, meaning, and purpose of art in the Italian Renaissance. In Leonardo’s world, paintings like the Last Supper in Milan were made according to patrons’ requirements, with very specific Christian meanings to be conveyed. Despite Leonardo’s artistic innovations, the content of his religious paintings and portrayal of religious figures (with the exception of some details in an altarpiece from the 1480s) were not untraditional.

Conclusion: False.

Leonardo da Vinci, The Mona Lisa, between 1503-1505. Louvre. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

Myth #4 – The Mona Lisa is a self-portrait/male lover in disguise/woman with high cholesterol.

Martin Kemp has observed, “The silly season for the Mona Lisa never closes.” The ridiculous theories about this painting abound. Here’s what we can say with reasonable certainty: Leonardo started the painting, probably a portrait of Lisa Gherardini, a merchant’s wife, while in Florence around 1503. For unknown reasons, he didn’t deliver it to the patron, however, and it ended up in the possession of his workshop assistant Salai (who some think was Leonardo’s lover – again, without evidence). There’s no reason to think that Leonardo recorded in this painting his own features or those of Salai, even if, as many art historians believe, he continued to work on the painting after he left Florence for Milan and then France. In a theory that deviates from the usual speculation about the identity of the sitter, an Italian scientist thinks that the way Leonardo portrayed the sitter shows she had high cholesterol. Right, because Renaissance paintings are straightforward, scientific images, pretty much just like MRIs and X-rays.

Conclusion: False.

Myth #5 – Leonardo made the image of Christ on the Shroud of Turin.

The Shroud of Turin is a relic purported to be the shroud that Christ’s body was buried in after the Crucifixion. According to its legend, the image of his body was miraculously transferred to the cloth when he was resurrected. The idea that Leonardo forged it depends on claims that the proportions of Christ’s face as depicted on the shroud match those in a drawing that is thought to be a self-portrait by the artist, and that Leonardo devised a photographic process that transferred the image of his face to the shroud. The fact that the shroud dates to at least the mid-14th century, a hundred years before Leonardo’s birth, just makes this already kooky theory even harder to buy. I’ll admit, though, that I haven’t read the whole book explaining it … and I’m not going to.

Conclusion: False.

Myth #6 – Leonardo was a vegetarian.

Vegetarianism would have been pretty unthinkable in Renaissance Italy (and veganism just plain absurd); people probably ate about as much meat as they could afford. The most commonly cited quote used to back up this claim is taken from a novel (see p. 227) and often misattributed to Leonardo himself. None of Leonardo’s own writings or early biographies mentions any unconventional eating habits. There’s really only one documentary source that might be relevant, a letter written by a possible acquaintance of the artist, who compares Leonardo to people in India who don’t eat meat or allow others to harm living things. Pretty tenuous, but vegetarians love to claim him.

Conclusion: Probably false.

Myth #7 – Leonardo invented bicycles, helicopters, submarines, and parachutes.

It’s true that Leonardo was fascinated with mechanics, aerodynamics, hydrodynamics, flight, and military engineering, which he touted in his famous letter to Ludovico Sforza seeking a position at the court of Milan. Leonardo’s notebooks contain many designs for machines and devices related to these explorations. But these were, for the most part, probably not ideas that Leonardo considered thoroughly enough to actually build and demonstrate. In the case of the bicycle, the drawing was likely made by someone else, and might even be a modern forgery.

Conclusion: Not so much.

Leonardo da Vinci, Design for a Flying Machine, 1488. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

Myth #8 – Leonardo built robots.

While it sounds nutty, this one’s not so far off the mark, if you consider automatons – mechanical devices that seem to move on their own – to be robots. In a plot line of the cable fantasy drama Da Vinci’s Demons, Leonardo constructs a flying mechanical bird to dazzle the crowds gathered in the Cathedral piazza for Easter. A reliable historical record instead points to a lion that Leonardo made for the King of France’s triumphal entry into Milan in 1509. One observer’s description reads:

When the King entered Milan, besides the other entertainments, Lionardo da Vinci, the famous painter and our Florentine, devised the following intervention: he represented a lion above the gate, which, lying down, got onto its feet when the King came in, and with its paw opened up its chest and pulled out blue balls full of gold lilies, which he threw and strewed about on the ground. Afterwards he pulled out his heart and, pressing it, more gold lilies came out … Stopping beside this spectacle, [the King] liked it and took much pleasure in it.

Wow.

Conclusion: True.

If you’re interested in learning more about Leonardo, including the current locations of his works, read his biography from the Benezit Dictionary of Artists, or, for a longer treatment, pick up the accessible but smart book by leading expert Martin Kemp.

Kandice Rawlings is Associate Editor of Oxford Art Online and the Benezit Dictionary of Artists. She holds a PhD in art history from Rutgers University.

Oxford Art Online offers access to the most authoritative, inclusive, and easily searchable online art resources available today. Through a single, elegant gateway users can access — and simultaneously cross-search — an expanding range of Oxford’s acclaimed art reference works: Grove Art Online, the Benezit Dictionary of Artists, the Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, The Oxford Companion to Western Art, and The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms, as well as many specially commissioned articles and bibliographies available exclusively online.

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By Rachel Holt and Jo Wojtkowski

Oxford University Press is excited to be attending the twenty-second International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA) conference, to be held at the InterContinental Miami, Florida, on 6-9 April 2014. This year’s theme, “Legitimacy: Myths, Realities, Challenges” gives opportunity for practitioners, scholars and judges to explore the issues surrounding, what has been dubbed by some, the legitimacy crisis. To find out more take a look at this year’s exciting program devised by Lucy Reed and her team.

The four-day conference is packed with informative panel discussions, interactive breakout sessions, ICCA Interest Groups lunch meetings and networking events. With over 1,000 participants from around the world, highlights include “Legitimacy: Examined against Empirical Data” chaired by Jan Paulson, Holder of Michael Klein Distinguished Scholar Chair, University of Miami, and the opening session “Setting the Scene: What Are the Myths? What Are the Realities? What Are the Challenges?”, where Oxford author Eric Bergsten is to receive the ICCA Award for Lifelong Contribution to the Field of International Arbitration. Here are some of the conference events we’re excited about:

• Monday 7 April, 12:15 -13:30p.m.: Latin America: The Hottest Issues, Country-by-Country
  Lunch seminar chaired by Doak Bishop.
• Monday 7 April, 13:45-15:00p.m.: Proof: A Plea for Precision
  Proof is fundamental and can be maddeningly elusive. But must proof of fact and law so often be so imprecise? This session will explore the often fudged and occasionally ignored elements of burden of proof, the standard of proof, methods of proof to establish applicable law, and the importance of addressing these topics in a procedural order.
• Monday 7 April, 15:30 – 16:45p.m.: Premise: Arbitral Institutions Can Do More To Further Legitimacy. True or False?
  Have arbitral institutions been steady stewards of legitimacy in arbitration? Or, as more say, are they stagnant and protective of the status quo? In particular, can arbitration be legitimate if the arbitrator selection process is opaque, the quality of awards is variable, and the arbitral process lacks foreseeability? Particularly as the growth in regional institutions continues, are there consistent practices to be encouraged, and others to be eschewed, to promote and preserve legitimacy? This session will challenge whether institutions are doing enough to ensure the availability of diverse, well-trained arbitrators and to ensure first-rate, timely performance of their duties.
• Tuesday, 8 April, 8:45 – 10:00p.m.: Matters of Evidence: Witness and Experts
  Witness statements and expert reports tell the story, but whose story is it to be told? How rigorous are tribunals in “gating” witnesses? This session will explore the “do’s and don’ts” of drafting witness statements; whether the weight given to statements should vary and, if so, precisely why; and the impact of witness nonappearance on the admissibility and weight of testimony. It will also examine parallel questions for experts and expert reports.
• Tuesday, 8 April, 13:45 – 15:00p.m.: ‘Treaty Arbitration: Pleading and Proof of Fraud and Comparable Forms of Abuse’
  This session will explore and catalogue standards that govern the presentation and resolution of issues of fraud, abuse of rights, and similarly serious allegations that may impugn either a claim or the investment in treaty arbitrations. How do these issues arise? And how do tribunals address them? Is there a common understanding of pleading and proof standards for fraud, abuse of rights, or the bona fides of an investment? These are easy questions to ask, but precise answers are vexing.
• Tuesday, 8 April, 12:15 -13:30p.m.: Spotlight on International Arbitration in Miami and the United States
  A mock argument of BG Group PLC v. Argentina—the first investment treaty arbitration case to be heard by the US Supreme Court—will be one of the stops on a tour of international arbitration in Miami and the United States. Other stops will include Miami’s favorable arbitration climate, enforcement of arbitral awards in the United States generally and Florida specifically, arbitration class actions in the US, and an update on the Restatement (Third), The US Law of International Commercial Arbitration.

There is even a “Spotlight on International Arbitration in Miami and the United States” session which is not to be missed, but there is more to this amazing city than just arbitration. Located on the Atlantic coast in south-eastern Florida, Miami is a major centre and a leader in finance, commerce, culture, and international trade. In 2012, Miami was classified as an Alpha-World City in the World Cities Study Group’s inventory. In her upcoming title, Ethics in International Arbitration (publishing summer 2014), author Catherine Rogers argues:

“Ultimately, the challenge of ethical self-regulation is a challenge for the international arbitration community to think beyond its present situation, to future generations and future developments in an ever-more globalized legal world. It is a challenge for international arbitration to bring to bear all the pragmatism, creativity, and sense of the noble duty to transnational justice that it has demonstrated in the very best moments of its history.”

This comment highlights just one of the challenges facing arbitral legitimacy in the ever-growing world of international arbitration, which further highlights the importance of the ICCA’s chosen theme for the 2014 conference. If you are joining us in Miami, don’t forget to visit the Oxford University Press booth #16 where you can browse our award-winning books, and take advantage of the 20% conference discount. Plus, enter our prize draw to for a chance to win an iPad Mini, and pick up a free access password to our collection of online law resources including Investment Claims. See you in Miami!

Jo Wojtkowski is the Assistant Marketing Manager for Law at Oxford University Press. Rachel Holt is Assistant Commissioning Editor for Arbitration products at Oxford University Press.

Oxford University Press is a leading publisher in arbitration including the Journal of International Dispute Settlement, edited by Dr Thomas Schultz, and the ICSID Review edited by Meg Kinnear and Professor Campbell McLachlan, as well as the latest titles from experts in the field, and a wide range of law journals and online products. We publish original works across key areas of study, from trademarks to patents, designs and copyrights, developing outstanding resources to support students, scholars, and practitioners worldwide.

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Lightning Cake is a tiny zine of illustrated speculative flash fiction. New electrifying bites posted weekly—cut yourself a slice and chomp in. Lightning Cake wants speculative stories—stories that are fantastic, strange, idiosyncratic. Science fiction, fantasy, magical realism, slipstream, weird, new weird, futuristic, surreal, mythic, fairy tales—Lightning Cake likes them all. Lightning Cake will fall for the stories that scared you to write, and will love the stories that you loved writing.

Submit previously unpublished speculative flash fiction up to 500 words.

Lightning Cake pays $5 ($0.01-$0.04/word) for accepted stories.

Upcoming reading period: April 1 - July 31, 2014.

Follow @LightningCake on Twitter for updates.

Read our guidelines here.  Our website.

Call for submissions for re-launch of Dead, Mad, or a Poet. Fiction, poetry and articles for a Pagan literary magazine. Submit by January 15. Guidelines here.

Our focus is on fiction, poetry and art by a certain subset of modern Pagans, but we will happily accept work from other folks, Pagan or no, if it suits our sensibilities and aesthetic. We do not publish oathbound material, nor do we support the proliferation of fake “traditional” material which actually has a known or knowable source. We may publish liturgical poetry presented to us by the original author, but we do not publish spells or rituals unless they have independent literary merit.

We print previously unpublished work, except by arrangement. Previous publication includes the Internet, so if you have posted your work in your personal blog or other fora, please remove it before you submit it to us.

Poetry: Image-rich, sensuous, and strange. It should sound like the fairies would like it. Send 3-5 poems per submission.

Fiction: Fiction by or about Pagans, re-tellings of myth or fairy tales, original work in a mythic or fairy tale style, or anything that wouldn’t look out of place with them at a party.

Art: Digital formats, please. More specific information forthcoming.

Non-fiction: Craft (as in writing) essays, Craft (as in witch) essays, folklore, mythology, history relevant to our other interests, or any combination of the above. We welcome solid scholarly work with cries of glee, but personal musings are also perfectly acceptable.

Poetry may be any length; fiction should be less than 10,000 words. Microfictions are delightful. Send as an attachment (.doc, .rtf, or .odt file) to an e-mail with the genre, your name, and the title(s) of your work in the subject heading to:

submissionsATdeadmadorpoetDOTcom (Change AT to @ and DOT to .)

You may submit as many times or in as many genres as you like, but please wait until you receive a response before sending your next submission. We do not accept simultaneous submissions.

Hi folks, I'm continuing my series on writer myths and that is coming up, but first, I've got to mention some egg action. You may remember that once upon a time I chatted about eggs.  It's been a while since I've had an opportunity to mention this fun part of my blog. This week we are near the hatching phase of "egg-dom." So, news is to come!

Now, back to myths. Last week, I chatted about the myth of bad reviews. This week I'm moving on to the myth of "kill your darlings." Okay, it is true that you must often kill your darlings. I mean, most of us remember some relationship that just wasn't moving us forward, and it had to go. Sometimes, we write bland, flat drivel that needs to find the nearest circular file, and that's fine.

But there are times when you need to put down the murder weapon. I mean, killing some of those darlings is a crime or  at least a crying shame.

Here is my story. Once upon a time I was collaborating with another author on a project. I would write an awesome line, and the other author would love it too. Then a few days later, I'd get into slasher mode and ditch my awesome line. Delete.

My collaborator was unhappy with the slashing of "awesome" lines.

I answered, "I can always do better." But certain things slowly became clear. I can't aways do better.

My collaborator was like, "I think you are killing our story, and please stop it."

I learned something I love about writing in that moment. Every story is about a kind of collaboration. You and the reader are sitting by a fire. You are the spell maker; they are the mesmerized.  If you have created magic the first time, just let it be.

Sometimes you will get it right without trying. Don't second guess yourself. Never leave genius on the cutting room floor.

See you next week with more about writer myths, and perhaps a reason to throw a party!

And now for a mythical doodle. This one is called "Pixie."

Fickle Muses, an online journal of mythic poetry and fiction, wants your work! We are particularly interested in poetry at this time.