Saturday, October 21, 2017

1937-9-21 Hobbit Published

1937-9-21 Tolkien’s fantasy novel The Hobbit 1st published in Britain > .

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien CBE FRSL (3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer, poet, philologist, and academic, best known as the author of the high fantasy works The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon and a Fellow of Pembroke College, both at the University of Oxford. He then moved within the same university to become the Merton Professor of English Language and Literature and Fellow of Merton College, positions he held from 1945 until his retirement in 1959. Tolkien was a close friend of C. S. Lewis, a co-member of the informal literary discussion group The Inklings. He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II on 28 March 1972.

On 21 September 1937 J. R. R. Tolkien’s fantasy novel The Hobbit was first published in the United Kingdom.

Tolkien was an academic linguist who held the position of Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford, where he was friends with fellow academic and novelist C. S. Lewis. Alongside his academic pursuits he had a creative mind that saw him produce a series playful poems and stories for his children. Tolkien combined both these areas in The Hobbit. While it is primarily a children’s book, part of its appeal is the rich fantasy world that Tolkien created by drawing upon his knowledge of Old English literature and early Germanic mythology.

Tolkien is said to have taken up to two years to write the original manuscript for the book, copies of which he lent to various friends. Through contact with one of his students at Oxford, the publisher George Allen & Unwin Ltd. obtained a copy, which was given a positive review by the 10-year old son of the owner and encouraged Unwin to publish it.

The initial run of 1,500 copies sold out within three months, and further runs proved similarly popular. Arguably The Hobbit’s greatest legacy is that it spawned the creation of The Lord of the Rings, the sequel that Tolkien was encouraged to write after the runaway success of The Hobbit.

The Hobbit has remained in print ever since it was first published, although Tolkien made a number of revisions to the text over the course of the next thirty years. This was done to bring plot elements into line with the storyline of the subsequent Lord of the Rings, and also to retain copyright in the United States.

Hollywood ↱ War

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How Hollywood Sells Us War - Second > .One Marvelous Scene - Military Ads in Marvel Movies - Just Write > .Reaching the Masses - Propaganda Film During WW1 - tgw > .


To influence public opinion in favor of WW1, the U.S produced films, commissioned colorful posters, published pamphlets and recruited everyday Americans to “sell the war.” These efforts helped create both modern American wartime propaganda and spurred the 20th century advertising industry.
Propaganda in the United States is spread by both government and media entities. Propaganda is carefully curated information, ideas, or rumors deliberately spread, usually to preserve the self-interest of a nation. It is used in advertising, radio, newspaper, posters, books, television and other media. Propagandists may provide either factual or non-factual information to their audiences, often emphasizing positive features and downplaying negative ones, or vice versa, in order to shape wide scale public opinion or influence behavioral changes.

The first large-scale use of propaganda by the U.S. government came during WW1. The government enlisted the help of citizens and children to help promote war bonds and stamps to help stimulate the economy. To keep the prices of war supplies down (guns, gunpowder, cannons, steel, etc.), the U.S. government produced posters that encouraged people to reduce waste and grow their own vegetables in "victory gardens". The public skepticism that was generated by the heavy-handed tactics of the Committee on Public Information would lead the postwar government to officially abandon the use of propaganda.

The 1915 film The German Side of the War was compiled from footage filmed by Chicago Tribune cameraman Edwin F. Weigle. It was one of the only American films to show the German perspective of the war. At the theater lines stretched around the block; the screenings were received with such enthusiasm that would-be moviegoers resorted to purchasing tickets from scalpers.

During WW2, the United States officially had no propaganda, but the Roosevelt government used means to circumvent this official line. One such propaganda tool was the publicly owned but government-funded Writers' War Board (WWB). The activities of the WWB were so extensive that it has been called the "greatest propaganda machine in history". Why We Fight is a famous series of US government propaganda films made to justify US involvement in World War II. Response to the use of propaganda in the United States was mixed, as attempts by the government to release propaganda during World War I was perceived negatively by the American public. The government did not initially use propaganda but was ultimately persuaded by businesses and media, which saw its use as informational. Cultural and racial stereotypes were used in World War II propaganda to encourage the perception of the Japanese people and government as a "ruthless and animalistic enemy that needed to be defeated", leading to many Americans seeing all Japanese people in a negative light. Many people of Japanese ancestry, most of whom were American citizens, were forcibly rounded up and placed in internment camps in the early 1940s.

From 1944 to 1948, prominent US policy makers promoted a domestic propaganda campaign aimed at convincing the U.S. public to agree to a harsh peace for the German people, for example by removing the common view of the German people and the Nazi Party as separate entities. The core of this campaign was the Writers' War Board, which was closely associated with the Roosevelt administration.

Another means was the United States Office of War Information that Roosevelt established in June 1942, whose mandate was to promote understanding of the war policies under the director Elmer Davis. It dealt with posters, press, movies, exhibitions, and produced often slanted material conforming to US wartime purposes.

United States home front during WW2 .Cold War .
War on Drugs .
Gulf War .
Iraq War .
Ad Council .
COVID-19 pandemic .

How Civil Wars Start

22-11-1 How Civil Wars Start: Pelosi Attack, Rise of Extremism in US - A&Co > .

Friday, October 20, 2017

Influencers & Advertising

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23-9-16 Don't trust me, I'm an influencer - Sabine Hossenfelder > .
Ruscist Indoctrination 
24-8-9 [Popadantsi - Ruscian Imperialist Domestic Pulp Fiction] - Adam S > .
Societal Manipulation 

Around the world, there are regulations for "influencers". Those regulations make sure that if someone is paid to endorse a product, they have to declare that payment to the people watching. But why does no-one on TV, or film, or anywhere else have to do that?

Infantry Attacks - Infanterie greift an (1937)

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Infantry Attacks - Infanterie greift an (1937) is a classic book on military tactics written by Erwin Rommel about his experiences in WW1. At the time of the book's writing in the mid-1930s, Rommel's rank was lieutenant colonel. Rommel had planned to write a successor called Panzer greift an (Tank Attacks) about tank warfare, and gathered much material during the North Africa Campaign. However, he was forced to commit suicide before completing this work.

Rommel describes his Stoßtruppen (shock troops) tactics, which used speed, deception, and deep penetration into enemy territory to surprise and overwhelm. Throughout the book, Rommel reports assigning small numbers of men to approach enemy lines from the direction in which attack was expected. The men would yell, throw hand grenades and otherwise simulate the anticipated attack from concealment, while attack squads and larger bodies of men sneaked to the flanks and rears of the defenders to take them by surprise. These tactics often intimidated enemies into surrendering, thus avoiding unnecessary exertion, expenditure of ammunition, and risk of injury.

Infanterie greift an was first published in 1937 and helped to persuade Adolf Hitler to give Rommel high command in WW2, although he was not from an old military family or the Prussian aristocracy, which had traditionally dominated the German officer corps. It was printed in Germany until 1945. By then, about 500,000 copies had been published. 

In 1943, an abridged version titled, more simply, Attacks! was released by the US military for officers' tactical study. The first full English translation was published in 1944 by The Infantry Journal in the United States. The translator was Lieutenant Colonel Gustave E. Kidde without permission from Rommel, according to the foreword to the 1995 edition published by Stackpole Books.

The book was also used throughout the West as a resource for infantry tactical movements. General George S. Patton was among the many influential military leaders reported to have read Infantry Attacks.


The text is divided into six chapters:
I. Movement War 1914 in Belgium and Northern France
II. Fights in the Argonne 1915
III. Position war in the High Vosges 1916, movement war in Romania 1916/1917
IV. Fights in the Southeastern Carpathians, August 1917
V. Attacking battle at Tolmein 1917
VI. Pursuit of Tagliamento and Piave

The book is still in print, and was most recently published in German in 2015.

sī vīs pācem, parā bellum

igitur quī dēsīderat pācem praeparet bellum    therefore, he who desires peace, let him prepare for war sī vīs pācem, parā bellum if you wan...