#journal de stefan

[nesiacha]

Excerpts from Letters and Chapters of Historians on the Break Between Babeuf and Fouché

Yes, we all know the story of Babeuf, who was at one point manipulated by Fouché. But contrary to what Stefan Zweig describes, Babeuf is far from being a simpleton (by the way, Fouché manipulated many intelligent people, whether they were aware of it or not). He was an engaged revolutionary, far more humanitarian than others, while still having insightful reflections (I admit, it's my fan-girl side of Babeuf speaking, but the letters, especially those from the storming of the Bastille and the murder of Foulon, where he condemned this murder while offering very just opinions, can be found here: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/766775982269087744/gracchus-babeufs-opinion-on-the-storming-of-the?source=share). Yes, Fouché did manipulate him at one point because he knew Babeuf had humanitarian values, and here is an excerpt:

"Ordered by Fouché, who seeks to make common cause with the Thermidorians, in the context of the trial of Carrier, the man behind the Nantes drownings, it serves as an alibi for the former machine-gunner of Lyon. The method is classic. It consists of denouncing one's former political allies, exaggerating, in order to better save oneself." (Emmanuel de Waresquiel, Vendée and Chouannerie: Two Centuries of Memory, Revue des Deux Mondes, September 1993).

But Babeuf always denounced the double standard of morality (I am deliberately exaggerating here), and here is an excerpt from the historian Claude Mazauric:

"Babeuf is on the side of the Revolution and the Republic, not the opposite; it is precisely on the basis of republican and revolutionary values, which, according to him, are grounded in universal principles, that he protested against the 'decemviral tone,' the 'proconsular exactions,' the unnecessary and arbitrary violence, etc."

Moreover, Babeuf was a man who never abandoned his true friends, even in their time of need. He often wrote, for example, to the widow of Chaumette (even though she was considered the widow of a traitor). I really need to find these letters one day. In lieu of the letters to the widow of Chaumette, here is an excerpt from a letter Babeuf sent to Chaumette when he was still alive:

"Philanthropists! I announce to you my book on Equality, which I will present to the world. Sophists! With it, I will destroy all the false reasoning by which you have misled, chained, and made the Universe suffer; and despite you, men will know the full extent of their rights, nature's vow will no longer be violated, and they will all be happy."

Moreover, we see Babeuf gradually realizing Fouché's true nature. He distances himself from him until their eventual break.

Babeuf wrote on the 19th of Germinal Year III to Fouché after the popular insurrection of the Sans-Culottes due to famine and misery (Babeuf would lose his daughter Sophie because of this, a loss from which he never recovered):

"The catastrophe of the 12th of Germinal makes way for great changes. This does not mean that I renounce it and leave the party. The ideas that occupy me, together with the conclusion I wish to establish in this letter, will lead me, my friend, to speak to you about the great battle we just lost... but must we be crushed by it? No. It is in great dangers that genius and courage unfold."

But here is what he writes to Fouché in his journal The Tribune of the People:

"You have become very rich, Fouché. When I left to be relegated to the North, I believed I could place enough trust in you to recommend my children. They went to see you. You gave them ten francs one day. You took no more interest in the family of an honorable victim of the patriciate. Today, you would sacrifice four to five thousand francs to stifle a few truths. This last object deserves far more than the other to affect your heart. It is exactly a year ago, Fouché, that there was with the then government, another director or syndic of the library, than you: it was Lanthenas. He wrote to me. I still keep his letters, and I can still justify the similar propositions he suggested to me, though with a little more finesse. You don’t write to me; but you speak to me in front of Antonelle and company. I give you the same response I gave to Lanthenas. I don’t want a censor, a corrector, or a whisperer; I still opt for persecution, if necessary; I will not tune in with the Méhée, and I insist on maintaining, against you, that the time has come when every truth must be spoken. You may conspire with the current government: we know how every government conspires. I declare that I am also part of a conspiracy. It is not yours. Send your agents on the campaign as much as you want; you will not destroy it. If this letter were to be read by the patriots, I would tell them: remember that a year ago, I was more right on my own than all the Jacobins together. I loudly demanded the constitution of that time. If they had demanded it at the same time as me, they would have saved the people and themselves. On the contrary, they were long in opposition to me, constantly seeking to delay the implementation of that constitution. In the end, they recognized I saw better than them, and they came to echo me. They demanded, through Barrère and Audouin, the swift establishment of the constitutional regime; but it was too late. A few days later, their society died assassinated. Their demand, therefore, lost all force. The time for delays is over. We are no longer in times when one can wait. They say public opinion must be redone. It is too formed. The people feel too much the extent of their suffering; they can no longer bear it. To help them, there is no quicker remedy than to put them at odds with their enemies, with all those who are the cause of all they suffer. Wanting to make them wait is asking that each day add to the destructive force that is depopulating our country at terrifying speed, sending each of us, in turn, to death, in slow and horrible anguish."

And he adds to Fouché: "It has been said for some time that you were my Mentor [...] I don’t want a censor, a corrector, or a whisperer: I still opt for persecution, if necessary [...] And I insist on maintaining, against you, that the time has come when every truth must be spoken."

Babeuf understood Fouché’s ambitions and wanted nothing to do with him anymore. Personally, I’ve discussed with friends passionate about the French Revolution (some of whom have opinions different from mine, even very different, but that’s fine because otherwise, it would be boring, we wouldn’t learn as well, and everyone must benefit from free judgment) who hypothesized that if Babeuf had followed the tide, like Fouché, and had not denounced him, perhaps Fouché would have allowed him a pension. The same goes for Marie-Anne Babeuf, the wife of Gracchus Babeuf and his right-hand woman (she helped him print, managed subscriptions, was imprisoned under the Directory for her activism, tried to help him escape, walked many miles pregnant with 8-months-old to organize his defense, and kept her married name after her husband's execution), who continued her political activities after her husband's death (some sources describe her as a woman with a strong character who did not back down in the face of adversity and I believe it given the trials she has undergone and how she has reacted), to the point of being arrested twice by the Napoleonic police (more precisely, she was arrested by the police for the first time during the affair of the infernal machine in 1801, actually perpetrated by the royalists, and questioned a second time by the police who took all her papers and those of her son so her property in 1808) . We know that Félix Lepeletier was a close friend to her and her children and always helped them after her widowhood. Turreau adopted one of her sons, Camille (the only good deed I found from him), and maybe Réal. But nothing from Fouché (while one of the few good deeds he did in his life was granting a pension to the widow of Collot d'Herbois). Some of my friends have suggested that it was precisely because she was cut from the same cloth as Gracchus (or maybe she wanted nothing to do with Fouché, which makes sense) and given that she continued her political activism against those whom Fouché served, without abandoning her cause. This is a hypothesis I should look into one day.

P.S.: It is interesting to see the quote from Barère, as well as Xavier François Audouin, who played an important role in the period of the French Revolution, both in the 1792 years, and was a well-known neo-Jacobin opponent of the Directory, especially according to historian Bernard Gainot (he was a Hébertist who escaped deportation under Bonaparte, either through the intervention of Monge, or because Bonaparte hoped to win over his father-in-law Pache to his side, but this didn’t work out; indeed, Xavier Audouin had married Sylvie, who according to Mathilde Larrère, though young, was known for her Hébertist activism; in 1816, Xavier Audouin, under pressure from the Bourbon laws, became a royalist). As for Antonelle, I’ve already spoken about him here: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/761515728971202560/the-political-career-of-the-revolutionary?source=share

About Pache and the Audouin couple: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/767044131014033408/very-mediocre-and-horrible-quote-from-buzot?source=share https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/767308509546266624/this-is-the-principle-of-a-friendship-triangle?source=share

(I warn you, it’s not much, but I plan to do a post about Pache one day unless someone else does it for me).

And Barère, well… Let’s just say that many people better informed than I am have already said everything there is to say in my place. I couldn’t have said or done better.

Sources:

Eric Walter

Claude Mazauric

Mathilde Larrère

Bernard Gainot

[inthewitchesstew]

My book recs

☆Mostly classics but a few more modern ones in there too!! Make sure to check warnings for any books you read ☆

1. The Virgin Suicides - Jeffrey Eugenides

2. 1984 - George Orwell

3. If We Were Villains - M.L Rio

4. Animal farm - George Orwell

5. Dracula - Bram Stoker

6. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

7. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky

8. Notes From the Underground - Fyodor Dostoevsky

9. Dante's Divine Comedy - Dante Alighieri

10. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath

11. Ariel - Sylvia Plath

12. The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath - Sylvia Plath

13. The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath - Sylvia Plath

14. Moby Dick - Herman Melville

15. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper lee

16. Hamlet - William Shakespeare

17. Macbeth - William Shakespeare

18. The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodor Dostoevsky

19. The Devils - Fyodor Dostoevsky

20. The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoevsky

21. A Nervous Breakdown - Anton Chekhov

22. Nausea - Jean-Paul Sartre

23. The Wind in The Willows - Kenneth Grahame

24. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë

25. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy

26. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood

27. Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka

28. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austin

29. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

30. Emma - Jane Austen

31. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald

32. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

33. The Odyssey - Homer

34. To The Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf

35. The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas

36. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen

37. A Little Life - Hanya Yanagihara

38. The Trial - Franz kafka

39. My Year of Rest and Relaxation - Ottessa Moshfegh

40. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert

41. The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt

42. Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare

43. Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury

44. Selected Stories - Alice Munro

45. American Psycho - Bret Easton Ellis

46. Normal People - Sally Rooney

47. Existentialism is a Humanism - Jean-Paul Sartre

48. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley

49. Persuasion - Jane Austen

50. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

51. The Death of The Heart - Elizabeth Bowen

52. The Iliad - Homer

53. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest - Ken Kesey

54. The Catcher in the Rye - J.D Salinger

55. The Outsiders - S.E Hinton

56. The Chrysalids - John Wyndham

57. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller

58. Middlemarch - George Eliot

59. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy

60. Meditations - Marcus Aurelius

61. Beyond Good and Evil - Friedrich Nietzsche

62. The Stranger - Albert Camus

63. The Republic - Plato

64. Letters From a Stoic - Seneca

65. Man’s Search For Meaning - Viktor E. Frankl

66. The Myth of Sisyphus - Albert Camus

67. Bunny - Mona Awad

68. Belladonna - Anbara Salam

69. The Yellow Wallpaper - Charlotte Perkins Gilman

70. My Life Had Stood a Loaded Gun - Emily Dickinson

71. How We Weep and Laugh at the Same Thing - Michel de Montaigne

72. The Telltale Heart - Edgar Allen Poe

73. The Death of Ivan Ilych - Leo Tolstoy

74. Come Close - Sappho

75. The Fall of Icarus - Ovid

76. Tender Is the Flesh - Agustina Bazterrica

77. Cassandra - Christa Wolf

78. Forbidden Notebook - Alba de Céspedes

79. Girl, Interrupted - Susanna Kaysen

80. Carrie - Stephen King

81. Mrs. S - K Patrick

82. Sunburn - Chloe Michelle Howarth

83. Perfume - Patrick Suskind

84. After Dark - Haruki Murakami

85. Kafka on the Shore - Haruki Murakami

86. No Longer Human - Osamu Dazai

87. Wednesday's Child - Yiyun Li

88. My Husband - Maud Ventura

89. All Down Darkness Wide - Sean Hewitt

90. Norwegian Wood - Haruki Murakami

91. The Waves - Virginia Woolf

92. The Talented Mr Ripley - Patricia Highsmith

93. We Have Always Lived in the Castle - Shirley Jackson

94. For Whom the Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway

95. Journey Into the Past - Stefan Zweig

96. Outline - Rachel Cusk

97. Chess Story - Stephen Zweig

98. Diary of a Madman - Nikolai Gogol

99. A Very Easy Death - Simone De Beauvoir

100. A Writer's Diary - Virginia Woolf

Enjoy!!

[thefudge]

Drfudge, I remember you have some book recs posts but I can't find any, so I'd like to ask you what are your all time fave books, if it's okay. Thank you <3

you should check out my "books", and "book rec" tags on my blogs, but here is an updated list of some of my favorites (including essays and short stories):

what a carve up, by jonathan coe

excellent women, by barbara pym

restoration, by rose tremain

invitation to the waltz, by rosamond lehmann

journal d'hirondelle, by amelie nothomb

oblomov, by ivan goncharov

kiss me first, by lottie moggach

the idiot & demons, by dostoevsky

the idiot, by elif batuman

revolutionary road, by richard yates

the girl in the flammable skirt, by aimee bender

out of the woods, by chris offutt

hygiene de l'assassin, by amelie nothomb

memoirs of a dutiful daughter, by simone de beauvoir

chevengur, by andrei platonov

the master and margarita, by bulgakov

the corrections, by jonathan franzen

hamlet & king lear by shakespeare

richard iii & henry vi, part 1, by shakespeare

a midsummer night's dream, the taming of the shrew & as you like it by shakespeare

i capture the castle, by dodie smith

point counter point, by aldous huxley

arcadia, by tom stoppard

stoner, by john williams

eugene onegin, by pushkin

paradise lost & samson agonistes, by john milton

the age of innocence, by edith wharton

katherine mansfield's diaries & short stories

axel's castle, by edmund wilson

the dead, by james joyce

the heat of the day, by elizabeth bowen

pride and prejudice, by jane austen

franny and zooey, by salinger

the stranger, by albert camus

seduction and betrayal, by elizabeth hardwick

the beguiled, by cullinan thomas

girl with a pearl earring, by tracy chevalier

the wine of solitude, by irene nemirovsky

dark entries, by robert aickman

capitalist realism, by mark fisher

the blizzard, by vladimir sorokin

karate chop, dorothe nors

go, went, gone, by jenny erpenbeck

the blind firman, by ismail kadare

actress, by anne enright

genius and ink, by virginia woolf

real life, by brandon taylor

the world of yesterday, by stefan zweig

doce cuentos peregrinos, by gabriel garcia marquez

selected stories by anton chekhov

stories of your life, by ted chiang

ornament and silence, by kennedy fraser

the accompanist, by nina berberova

there are many others, including some romanian faves that i won't mention in this list, but this should give you a good overview!

[moralvictory]

            𝘁𝗵𝗲muses

each character should be viewed as an original character, most of whom are outright anti - canon after a certain point. removed from their traditional timeline and reimagined, they are now comprised of a mix of personal headcanons and outside influences — do not mistake them for their canon counterpart.

𝘁𝗵𝗲vampires …

༶ aurora de martel, [ rebecca breeds ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the fragility of sanity, eternal beauty vs. inner corruption, chess piece, fractured mirror, locks and keys, healing and self - acceptance, blood and wine ]

༶ caroline forbes, [ candice king ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ perfectionism vs. authenticity, the power of compassion, love as redemption, daisies, silver strings, balancing head and heart, diamonds born under pressure ]

༶ kaleb hawkins, [ chris lee ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ morality in the face of power, shadow and light, a shield, the power of vulnerability, embracing the monster, breaking chains ]

༶ rebekah mikaelson, [ claire holt ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ loyalty vs. independence, eternal roses, the quest for humanity, broken dolls, the feminine archetype of desire, the swan, golden light, chains and locks ]

༶ stefan salvatore, [ paul wesley ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the ripper's blood stain, duality of man, the stag, compasses and direction, love as salvation and damnation, the ouroboros, leather journal aged through time ]

𝘁𝗵𝗲werewolves …

༶ rafael waithe, [ peyton alex smith ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ control vs. instinct, loyalty and leadership, the wolf, open wilderness, reclaiming humanity, the reluctant leader, champion of underdogs, the moon ]

𝘁𝗵𝗲witches …

༶ bonnie bennett, [ kat graham ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ self - sacrifice vs. self - preservation, legacy and heritage, the cost of power, feathers, flickering candles, healing through love, grimoires, crescent moons ]

༶ davina claire, [ danielle campbell ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ a marionette on strings, the price of loyalty, the spiders web, a broken hourglass, healing through connection, mastering the unknown, power and responsibility ]

༶ olivia "liv" parker, [ penelope mitchell ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ individuality vs. obligation, twin flames, the weight of legacy, the sacrifice of love, shattered glass, wilted flowers, the scales, breaking the chains of tradition ]

༶ vincent griffith, [ yusuf gatewood ] portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ redemption and atonement, vines and roots, faith vs. skepticism, community and healing, the tree of life, protector of innocence, sigils and runes ]

𝘁𝗵𝗲hybrids …

༶ elizabeth "lizzie" saltzman - forbes, [ jenny boyd ] ↳ siphoner witch & vampire — heretic — *sired to hope mikaelson portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the illusion of innocence, women who scream in the car, butterflies, insecurity will kill you, water, loneliness gross teeth, if you seek revenge dig two graves ]

༶ hayley marshall - kenner, [ phoebe tonkin ] ↳ werewolf & vampire — the unsired hybrid, original portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ motherhood and sacrifice, freedom vs. control, the crescent mark, unification starts within, the oak tree, identity and belonging, the setting sun ]

༶ niklaus mikaelson, [ joseph morgan ] ↳ werewolf & vampire — the original vampire / hybrid portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the burden of immortality, the crown of thorns, storms and tempests, the monster and the man, loyalty and betrayal, the dagger, the hollow oak ]

𝘁𝗵𝗲others …

༶ hope mikaelson, [ danielle rose russell ] ↳ witch, werewolf & vampire — tribrid — the first and only of her kind portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the sins of the father, isolation vs. belonging, the flame, too much hope turns violent, the red thread, chosen prophet destined for martyrdom, the key ]

༶ jenna sommers, [ sara canning ] ↳ human — featuring: vampire, verse specific portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the weight of responsibility, wine stains upon delicate lace, humanity in a supernatural world, the unlit candle, the unbroken chain, love vs. independence ]

༶ landon kirby, [ aria shahghasemi ] ↳ phoenix — "ferryman" / angel of death. portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ the struggle for belonging, love and sacrifice, the lost key, the fragility of mortality, fire and ash, courage in the face of the unknown, the compass ]

༶ vicki donovan, [ kayla ewell ] ↳ ghost — featuring: human + vampire, verse specific portrayal information — notes tag — more information tba [ mortality meets tragedy, the wildflower, exploring the darkness, the moth to a flame, finding stability, broken strings, the consequences of actions ]

[linguistlist-blog]

TOC: Journal of Historical Linguistics Vol. 14, No. 2 (2024)

2024. iii, 206 pp. Table of Contents ARTICLES The tonal morphology of the potential in Coatec Zapotec (Di′zhke′): Implications for early Zapotecan tone, *ʔ, and verb classes through internal and comparative reconstruction Rosemary G. Beam de Azcona pp. 179–241 Vowel shifts in Middle Wichi (Mataguayan family, South America) Verónica Nercesian & Nicolás Arellano pp. 242–303 Construct types in language change Stefan Schneider pp. 304–334 Polarity reversal constructions and counterfactuals in http://dlvr.it/T856cG

[qualityavenuejellyfish]

Stefan Anton George (German; July 12, 1868 – December 4, 1933) was a German symbolist poet and a translator of Dante Alighieri, William Shakespeare, Hesiod, and Charles Baudelaire. He is also known for his role as leader of the highly influential literary circle called the George-Kreis and for founding the literary magazine Blätter für die Kunst [de] ('Journal for the Arts').

Stefan George and his Heidelberg "novices", Pentecost 1919.

From left to right, standing: Ernst Morwitz, Erich Boehringer, Percy Gothein, and Woldemar von Uxkull.

[edisonblog]

Stefan Zweig was a prolific Austrian writer, born on 28 November 1881 in Vienna, who achieved international fame during the first decades of the 20th century. He wrote in a variety of genres, including fiction, poetry, biography, and journalism. Zweig was particularly known for his short stories and biographies.

He traveled throughout Europe during his lifetime and witnessed many political and social transformations. However, due to the rise of Nazism in Germany, Zweig, of Jewish origin, emigrated first to England and then to Brazil, where he settled in Petrópolis.

Zweig's work has been widely translated and continues to be read and studied today. Some of his most famous works include "Amok", "The Confusion of Feelings", "The Chess Player" and "The World of Yesterday", an autobiography in which he explores the major changes in the world during his lifetime.

by Viri Lordache #edisonmariotti

edison mariotti @edisonblog

.br

Stefan Zweig foi um prolífico escritor austríaco, nascido em 28 de novembro de 1881 em Viena, que alcançou fama internacional durante as primeiras décadas do século XX. Ele escreveu em vários gêneros, incluindo ficção, poesia, biografia e jornalismo. Zweig era particularmente conhecido por seus contos e biografias.

Viajou por toda a Europa durante a sua vida e testemunhou muitas transformações políticas e sociais. Porém, devido à ascensão do nazismo na Alemanha, Zweig, de origem judaica, emigrou primeiro para a Inglaterra e depois para o Brasil, onde se estabeleceu em Petrópolis.

A obra de Zweig foi amplamente traduzida e continua a ser lida e estudada até hoje. Algumas de suas obras mais famosas incluem "Amok", "A Confusão de Sentimentos", "O Jogador de Xadrez" e "O Mundo de Ontem", uma autobiografia na qual explora as principais mudanças no mundo durante sua vida.

[jcmicr]

Publications trends in major anesthesiology journals: A 20-year analysis of five top-ranked journals in the field by Stefan Koppert in Journal of Clinical and Medical Images, Case Reports  

Abstract

Background: With the intention to quantify the importance of a medical journal, the impact factor (IF) was introduced. It has become a de facto fictive rating instrument of the importance of medical journals. Also, it is often used to assess the value of the individual publications within the specific journal. The aim of the present study was to analyze publication trends over 20 years in five high-ranked anesthesiology journals.

Methods: The Medline (NCBI) database PubMed was used for analysis which was restricted to the following journals: 1. Anesthesiology; 2. British Journal of Anaesthesia; 3. Journal of Neurosurgical Anesthesiology; 4. Anesthesia & Analgesia; and 5. Anaesthesia. Specific publication parameters (IFs, number of pages and authors, etc.) were retrieved using the PubMed download function and imported into Microsoft Excel for further analysis.

Results: The mean IF of the five journals analyzed increased significantly within the study period (1991 vs. 2010; +61.81%). However, the absolute number of case reports decreased significantly by 54.7% since 1991. The journals Br J Anaesth (12.2%), J Neurosurg Anesthesiol (51.9%), and Anesth Analg (57.2%) showed significant increases in the number of publications per year. The mean number of authors increased significantly in all the journals from 1991 to 2010 (3.0 vs. 4.3; +43.3%).

 Conclusions: The IF, as well as the number of articles per year and the number of authors per article, increased significantly. In contrast, the number of pages per article remained comparable during the period analyzed.

Keywords: Impact factor; scientific publication; scientific journal; publication trend.

Introduction

The scientific productivity of a institution or person in medical research is reflected by the number of published articles [1]. However, both medical science and publication options have changed dramatically over the last several years. Publishing medical data in the new open access journals (OAJs) and via the World Wide Web (WWW) has gained significant importance recently. Although the classic printed journal was the standard for any years, it is now easily possible to publish peer-reviewed medical work without printing on paper. Publishing scientific medical papers remains the standard in medicine with regard to scientific reputation.

 To quantify the importance of a medical paper, the impact factor (IF) was introduced by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI, Thomson Scientific/Thomson Corporation, New York, NY, USA) in the 1960s [2]. The IF is a citation index calculated for a specific journal by dividing the number of citations within the last two years by the number of articles published [3, 4]. Therefore, it is a fictive instrument to rate the quality of a journal and the importance of an article because it is published within a specific journal [5]. The IF is relevant in medical research because it significantly impacts publication practice [6] and it has also gained enormous significance for research department funding [3]. The aim of the present study was to analyze the publication trends over 20 years in five high-ranked anesthesiology journals in Medline/PubMed [7]. We focused primarily on delineating trends in the IFs of each journal, as well as the numbers, types, and characteristics of each publication.

Material and Methods

Journals

The Medline (National Center for Biotechnology Information, NCBI, Rockville Pike, MD, USA) database PubMed (http://www.pubmed.com) was used for analysis [7]. Five high-ranked anesthesiology journals (excluding pain medicine), according to the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI, Thomson Scientific, Rockville Pike, MD, USA), were identified using InCites™ [2]. These top-ranked journals were selected by the highest IF in 2010. The IFs of these journals were gathered to analyze the trend in IF for each journal during the period from 1991 to 2010 [2]. Further analysis was restricted to the following journals: 1. Anesthesiology; 2. British Journal of Anaesthesia (Br J Anaesth); 3. Journal of Neurosurgical Anesthesiology (J Neurosurg Anesthesiol); 4. Anesthesia & Analgesia (Anesth Analg); and 5. Anaesthesia.

Data acquisition

For specific data analysis, the following publication information was recorded in the following data sets:

country of origin;

article type (i.e., randomized, controlled trial [RCT], clinical trial, comparative study, or case report);

number of articles per year and journal [n];

number of pages per article [n]; and

number of authors per article [n].

Letters to the editor, editorials, and comments were excluded from the analysis because they are not necessarily based on scientific, peer-reviewed data. All published articles from these journals were gathered by direct data import from PubMed via Microsoft Excel® 2003 (Microsoft, Redmond, WA, USA) for each year (1991-2010) and for each of the five journals (search string; e.g., "Anesthesiology"[Journal] AND ("2006/01/01"[PDAT]: "2006/12/31"[PDAT]). Data were retrieved using the PubMed download function (XML data format; “Extensible Markup Language“) and were imported into Microsoft Excel for further analysis.

Statistical analysis

Descriptive statistics were performed by using Microsoft Excel® 2003. The t-test and the Chi²-test were used for the statistical analysis. A value of p<0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results

Impact factor analysis

Trends in the IF for each journal and year over the 20-year time frame (1991-2010) were gathered (Figure 1). During this period, the IFs of all journals increased (2.249 in 1991 vs. 3.639 in 2010; i.e., +61.81%). The IF of J Neurosurg Anesthesiol increased from 0.638 in 1992 to 2.205 in 2010, i.e., +245%. The smallest increase was +46.03% for Anesth Analg (from 1991 to 2010)

Figure 1: The trend in impact factors (IF) among the top five anesthesiology journals [2]. x-axis shows the years analyzed and the y-axis shows the impact factor (IF) during that time.

Country of origin

A total of 42,549 articles, containing 183,763 pages written by 154,437 authors, were found between January 1, 1991, and December 31, 2010, in the five journals. Among these articles, the greatest numbers of publications were submitted from the US (31.05%; Table 1), followed by the UK (13.64%), Japan (9.24%), Germany (7.68%), and France (6.22%).

Table 1: Country of origin, number of publications, and resulting rank (1991 to 2010).

Article type

The absolute number of comparative studies and randomized, controlled trials (RCT) was comparable between 1991 and 2010 (Figure 2) with minor changes during that time-frame. The number of case reports also varied from year to year; however, the absolute number of case reports decreased significantly by 45.8% between 2003 and 2010 and by 54.7% between 1991 and 2010 (p<0.0001; Figure 2).

Figure 2: Publication types (case reports, comparative studies, and randomized controlled trials [RCTs]).

Articles per year

During the time frame analyzed, the mean number of articles per year in each journal [n] was 425±226. Altogether, 42,549 articles were published in the five journals. Anesth Analg (n=14,085 of 42,549; 33.1%) published the most articles, followed by Anesthesiology (23.4%), Anaesthesia (22.5%), Br J Anaesth (18.6%), and J Neurosurg Anesthesiol (2.4%). In Anesthesiology, the mean number of articles published per year was 498.8±67.6 (maximum n=628 in 1999; Figure 3). Compared to 1991, the number of articles per year decreased by 5.0% in this journal until 2010 (p=0.009). In Anaesthesia, a decrease of 45.1% (p<0.0001) in the mean number of articles published was also observed between 1991 and 2010. In contrast, the journals Br J Anaesth (+12.2%; p=0.816), J Neurosurg Anesthesiol (+51.9%; p<0.0001), and Anesth Analg (+57.2%; p<0.0001) all showed increases in the numbers of publications per year.

Figure 3: Number of articles per year [n] in the top five anesthesia journals.

Pages per article

Although the mean number of pages per article (4.3±1.4) did not change between 1991 and 2010 (Figure 4; p>0.05), there were variations among the years. In the Br J Anaesth only, the pages per article remained stable during the time frame analyzed (p>0.05). In the other journals, the pages per article increased (Anesthesiology, Anesth Analg, Anaesthesia) or decreased (J Neurosurg Anesthesiol).

Figure 4: Pages per article [n] in the top five anesthesia journals.

Number of authors per article

The mean number of authors per article [n] was 3.6±0.7, which increased significantly in all journals from 1991 to 2010 (3.0 vs. 4.3, a relative increase of 43.3%; p<0.0001; Figure 5). Anesthesiology showed the smallest increase (1991 vs. 2010, 3.43 vs. 4.28 authors; relative increase of 24.8%), followed by Anaesthesia (2.3 vs. 3.2; +39.1%), Anesth Analg (3.35 vs. 4.67; +39.4%), and Br J Anaesth (3.08 vs. 4.62; +50%); the greatest increase was observed in the J Neurosurg Anesthesiol (3.0 vs. 4.8; +62.5%).

Discussion

The aim of the present study was to analyze publication parameters in five top-ranked anesthesia journals over a 20-year time frame. The following journals were analyzed: 1. Anesthesiology; 2. Br J Anaesth; 3. J Neurosurg Anesthesiol; 4. Anesth Analg; and 5. Anaesthesia. The absolute number of scientific publications has been rising since the 18th century [8]. Since then, the number of publications has doubled every 10 to 15 years [8]. This trend has been especially true in Anesthesiology, which has gained relevance recently, thereby resulting in a concomitant increase in scientific publications [9-11]

Figure 5: Number of authors per article [n] in the top five anesthesia journals (1991 to 2010).

Country of origin

In the present study, the vast majority of publications were submitted from the US, followed by Western Europe and Japan (Table 1). These data are in concordance with Li et al.’s study, analyzing journals between 2000 and 2009 [12]. The top five countries in the present investigation were among the top seven countries in the study by Li et al. [12]. Figueredo and colleagues also found that the USA, the UK, Japan, Germany, Canada, and France published the most articles in anesthesia journals between 1997 and 2001 [13]. In their study, the largest increase in scientific production in anesthesiology was observed in Germany [13]. However, they concluded that the geographical distribution of scientific production must not only be analyzed in absolute terms but should also be evaluated relative to other variables, such as financial spending on research and development, as well as population growth [13].

Articles per year

Altogether, 42,549 articles were published in the five journals within the time frame analyzed. In Anesthesiology, the mean number of articles published per year was 498.8±67.6. Compared to 1991, the number of articles per year decreased by 5.0% until 2010. In Anaesthesia, a decrease of 45.1% in the mean number of articles published was observed in the same period. In order to attain higher quality in journal articles and consequently a higher IF, several prerequisites for article acceptance have been developed in recent years. Currently, clinical trial registration, as well as plagiarism checks and ethical committee approvals, is a standard practice. Although this practice ensures higher-quality articles, it also could result in a decrease in the number of accepted publications.

Li et al. [14] confirmed these results in 18 different anesthesiology journals. The authors postulated that this decrease might be associated with an increasing IF. Feneck and colleagues also found a decrease in research publications from the UK in anesthesia journals from 1997 to 2006 [15]. In our study, the journals Br J Anaesth, J Neurosurg Anesthesiol, and Anesth Analg showed significant increases in the numbers of publications per year (1991 to 2010). Another study published by Li et al. [14] showed that these journals have decreasing numbers of articles while analyzing the period of 2000-2009 only. However, it is accepted that the absolute number of scientific publications is less important due to the difficulties that can occur in quality assessments of studies [16].

Impact factor analysis

Among the many surrogate parameters, the IF from the Institute for Scientific Information [2] has achieved the greatest popularity, especially in government research and medical schools [3, 4]. It is a common, but fictive, instrument for quantifying the importance of a medical paper based on citations [17] and it is used to rate the quality of a (medical) journal [4, 5]. Today, the IF also has enormous significance for research department funding [3, 18]. The IF was originally designed and sold as a product for advertisers, i.e., it was sold to advertisers, at very high costs for the purpose of helping them target their advertisements to the most widely read journals within the set of journals that were read by potential buyers of their products [19]. Although the IF is not an absolute measurement of the quality of a journal [3], it can quantify the influence of a journal in the medical field [4]. Because the IF influences medical research and funding [18], changes in the IF can significantly affect publication practice [6]. During the time frame analyzed, the IF of all journals in the present study increased (2.249 in 1991 vs. 3.639 in 2010; i.e., +61.81%). This phenomenon is not new and has been observed for several years also by other authors [20]. The median and highest IF in the present study have increased since 2005 [3]. This increase in IF has been observed for years [3, 20]. One main reason for the IF boom is the growth of research production [4, 20, 21]. More researchers are writing more contributions in more journals [22, 23] with more references [3]. In contrast, several journals have decreasing IFs, especially those in non-English languages and those that are difficult to access.

However, IFs can be manipulated by many strategies: self-citation; increasing editorials and reviews (more likely to be cited); and a reduction of the number of case reports (less likely to be cited) [4, 16, 18]. Therefore, the importance of the IF remains controversial [24] and there is no established current alternative available to rate the quality of scientific publications [4].

As the main factor that could lead to overestimate the IF is the amount of self-citations within a journal, in 2010 Landoni et al. [25] have suggested to apply a new metric called “new IF 20%”. This instrument, accounting the weight of self-citation with the aim of limiting their influence on the final result, is employed when the self-citation percentage is more than 20% of the total. Other authors present innovative journal metrics as IF substitute, e.g. the CAPCI factor (Citation Average per Citable Item) by E.P. Diamandis [26]. In addition, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) has outlined guidelines for the authorship of scientific papers [27], but it remains unclear whether authors comply with these prerequisites when submitting manuscripts. Therefore, the contributions of each author should not only be judged by the authors themselves but also by the editors to prevent misconduct by researchers and inadequate authorship.

Article type

Although the absolute numbers of comparative studies and RCTs were comparable between 1991 and 2010, there were significant variations per year. In contrast, the absolute number of case reports decreased significantly by 45.8% between 2003 and 2010 and by 54.7% between 1991 and 2010. Li et al. [14] also found a decreasing number of articles per year (both clinical studies and RCTs) when analyzing several different journals. Because case reports are cited less frequently in the years after their publication, publishing them can be counterproductive for a journal striving to obtain a higher IF. Therefore, publishing fewer case reports to enhance the IF might have motivated the major anesthesiology journals that were analyzed in the present study.

Pages per article

The mean number of pages per article was 4.3±1.4 and did not change between 1991 and 2010 (Figure 4; p>0.05). However, only in the Br J Anaesth the pages per article remained stable during the time frame analyzed (p>0.05). For Anesthesiology, Anesth Analg, and Anaesthesia the pages per article increased but decreased significantly for J Neurosurg Anesthesiol. However, due to lower publications costs and the availability of electronic publication [28], restrictions on the length of articles might not have been as relevant as such restrictions previously were.

Number of authors per article

The mean number of authors per article was 3.6±0.7 in the present study, and it increased significantly in all journals analyzed between 1991 and 2010 (3.0 vs. 4.3; relative increase of 43.3%). This increase was the lowest in Anesthesiology (+24.8%) and was significantly higher in the other journals (+62.5%). The increase in the number of authors per articles has also been a commonly observed phenomenon in other medical journals and in different countries [29, 30]. This phenomenon has been observed even in the most highly ranked journals (N Engl J Med, J Am Med Assoc, and The Lancet) [29, 30]. Kumar et al. [30] reported a gradual increase in the average number of authors over the past three decades [30]. Drenth et al. also found an increasing number of authors in the Br Med J [31]. These findings are congruent with the results of the present study, although different medical fields were analyzed. A number of reasons could be responsible for this phenomenon [30]. There has been an increasing trend toward cooperation among researchers in multiple disciplines and an increase in multi-center studies, as well as an increase in the complexity of research projects, which could facilitate collaboration and result in an increase in the number of authors per article [30, 32]. Additionally, it has been shown that studies with many authors are cited more often than studies with fewer authors, thereby contributing to the IF of the journal [23].

Limitations

The analysis in the present study was restricted to only five high-ranked anesthesiology journals listed in the Medline and PubMed database. All these journals are published in English. Due to the descriptive character of this study, it was possible to delineate variations in the specific publications measured, but it was not possible to provide definitive answers why these changes occurred. However, we used a 20-year time frame to compensate for variations in specific years. Although the journals were selected from the anesthesiology category of JCR, a few of the selected journals cover disciplines beyond anesthesia research.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Not Applicable.

Consent for publication

Granted by all authors.

Availability of data and material

On request.

Funding

None of the authors received financial or other support for the data analysis or for the writing of this manuscript. This study was not funded and did not require outside writing assistance.

Authors' information (optional)

All authors contributed significantly to the data analysis and to the writing of the manuscript.

Acknowledgements

None

Conclusions

The present study could provide some interesting insight into the trends in several specific publication measurements. When interpreted in the global context of biomedical publishing, the present study identified the potential publication strategies used to enhance the prominence of anesthesia journals. The IF (mean: +61.81%), as well the number of articles per year (+57.2%) and the numbers of authors per article (+43.3%) increased significantly between 1991 and 2010. In contrast, only the number of pages per article remained comparable during the period analyzed. It is impossible to offer definitive answers explaining why these measures changed, but these changes could partially be due to the authors (e.g., number of authors per article). In our opinion, the publication process would have greater transparency if journals would provide such data at the end of each year.

For more details : https://jcmimagescasereports.org/author-guidelines/ 

[difunttichronicles]

Le Retour

Journal d’un Vampire, tome 3, L. J. Smith PrésentationLE MAL RÔDE.LA PASSION S’EMBRASE.Elena est revenue d’entre les morts. Mais ce n’est plus une simple humaine. Esprit pur doté de pouvoirs, elle attire inexorablement toutes les créatures démoniaques qui gravitent autour de la ville. Alors que Stefan ne pense qu’à la protéger, Damon désire plus que jamais en faire sa princesse des ténèbres.…

[none-ofthisnonsense]

Hi! I hope you don't mind me adding on - I have my bac this year, so I can definitely tell you what I studied!

These are only the books my school studied, curricula vary between schools!

6ème:

Madame Leprince de Beaumont, La Belle et la Bête

Charles Perrault, Contes

Hans Christian Andersen, La Petite Sirène (The Little Mermaid)

Ovide, Les Métamorphoses (only a few. I have never seen anyone read the entire thing, and we studied.... 5? I think?)

Homère, l'Odyssée (don't read the full version. Seriously. Everyone reads a very shortened version. I remember my teacher saying "buy another one" when someone showed up with the whole thing.)

Jean de la Fontaine, Fables (again, only a few. Most people have learnt some of these in primary school: mandatory ones (= that everyone knows) are Le Corbeau et le Renard, la Cigale et la Fourmi, and le Lion et le Rat.)

1 piece by Molière: I happened to read Le Médecin Malgré Lui

Basically 6ème is very Antiquity-focussed because French is supposedly learnt chronologically. (They basically just shove as many things from one era at you one year and the next era the following one.)

5ème:

Chrétien de Troyes : one of his things. My school chose Yvain ou le Chevalier au Lion

Le Roman de Renart (unknown author).

Michel Tournier, Vendredi ou la Vie Sauvage (sometimes teachers will also have you read Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe)

Jules Verne, Un Hivernage Dans Les Glaces (or Le Tour du Monde en 80 Jours, or Voyage au Centre de la Terre. Maybe even Vingt Mille Lieues Sous les Mers)

Poems: I remember studying some by Louise Labé but I have no idea which one, sorry.

Poems: Pierre de Ronsard - various choices. I personally learnt Quand vous serez bien vieille...

Molière, a comedy. I studied Les Fourberies de Scapin

5ème is very focussed on the Moyen Âge (Middle Ages) as a continuity of the Antiquity studied in 6ème.

4ème:

Georges Simenon, Le Chien Jaune

Bernard Solet, Il était un capitaine

Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac (may have been done in 5ème idk)

Pierre Corneille, Le Cid

Guy de Maupassant, La Parure & autres nouvelles (we studied Apparition)

Théophile Gautier, La Morte Amoureuse

Honestly you can miss out on most of these ones, I know I hated half of them. Le Cid and Cyrano de Bergerac are important though. 4ème is a lot of XIXth century

3ème:

Anne Frank, Journal

Jean Anouilh, Antigone

Stefan Zweig, Le Joueur d'échecs

Philip K. Dick, Ubik (or Ray Bradbury stories or other stuff by Philip K. Dick)

George Orwell, La Ferme des Animaux (= Animal Farm)

That's all I can remember for 3ème - I'm fairly sure there was some other stuff. It's pretty modern or contemporary works.

2de:

Jean Racine, Phèdre

Émile Zola, La Fortune des Rougon/Au Bonheur des Dames

I'm sure there's other stuff but I don't remember it.

1ère:

Honoré de Balzac, La Peau de Chagrin

Molière, Le malade imaginaire

Abbé Prévost, Manon Lescaut

François Rabelais, Gargantua

La Bruyère, Caractères

You have the French Bac at the end of year, so it's the last year where you study French in class!

(Found this in my drafts so I'm posting it now.)

Can you please when you have time ofc, write a list of the books any French high-school graduate should have read? Like the baccalaureate curriculum for example. I'm seeking to catch up my general knowledge of universal literature + attempt to read directly in French

Sure!

Now curriculum may vary and there was a reform of education since I left high school so it might have changed but what any french graduate should have read: (authors in bold, titles in italics)

Poetry (middle ages and early Renaissance):

Any three poems from Joachim du Bellay or other poets from the Pleiade. Most important is Heureux qui comme Ulysse.

Also look up who the Pleiade were.

16th and 17th centuries novels:

La Princesse de Montpensier, by Madame de Lafayette. 90 pages but very, very antiquated language.

Gargantua, by Rabelais. It's NOT cheating to take the modern-french translation. Native speakers do it. It's not cheating either to just dump it half-way through because you don't understand half of it. Native speakers do it too.

La Belle et la Bête, by Madame Leprince de Beaumont.

Any fairy tale by Perrault.

Les Liaisons Dangereuses, by Choderlos de Laclos. Please. Do. Not. Read. It. It's awful, the protagonist rapes a 15yo girl but it's ok because him loving her is making him into a better person (Yikes), the whole thing is about the protagonist and his long-time on-and-off girlfriend (who's married to someone else) teaming up to dirty/perverse two (maybe three?) innocent young ladies. It's studied because it's a classics, not because it's good. Please. Don't subject yourself to it.

Les Lettres Persannes, by Montesquieu. letters from a bunch of fictional characters to the others, two iranians (but at the time Iran was called Perse) visit France and criticize everything (way for Montesquieu to criticize but be able to say "nah it's my characters saying that not me"). TW of suicide and incest iirc. Not something too graphic either, since it's always second-hand testimonies or third-hand.

Theatre of the 17th and 18th centuries:

Le Cid, by Pierre Corneille.

At least one play by Molière. Can't recommand because I don't remember much of it. Do read summaries for a few of his plays though because some characters names have passed into common language to mean the type of characters they were (a Harpagon is going to be a greedy man, a Tartuffe a guy pretending to be devoted but being a hypocrite...)

Le Mariage de Figaro, by Beaumarchais. It's a political satire but also people are jumping from the window so that the husband doesn't find them in the lady's room. Basically.

If you fell in love with theatre at that point, you can look up Racine but fair warning, all of those have old language but Racine (along with Corneille) have very old language.

19th century novel:

Short version of Les Misérables, by Victor Hugo. I'd recommand the long one but only the short one is required and also the long one has 40 pages of description of the parisian sewers system with no relevance at all to the story and that's not the only long digression so... Do what you want.

A book by Honoré de Balzac, whichever you'd want. If you want to read the whole series, it might be best to look up the order on wikipedia, they'll know better than me. Basically him and the next author on the list had a bibliographic universe before Marvel made it cool. 60-or-so books with common characters but not the same protagonists. I'd recommand you simply go with Le Lys de la Vallée, slightly royalist and apparently the easiest to read? (so i've been told but i didn't read it myself so...)

Any book by Emile Zola. I'd recommand Au bonheur des dames because it has to be the only one with a happy ending and a cute romance out of the 40-and-more books by Zola.

Bel-Ami, by Guy de Maupassant. The protagonist has no morals but it's funny. Kinda.

Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert. A tad bit depressing. Not the most interesting either. But it's one of the few that have been studied more than once in my schooling so I know it's an important one.

19th century theatre:

Hernani, a play by Victor Hugo. Tragedy, so a bit sad. But do look up the Battle of Hernani (sorry there's not a big choice of languages for this one on wikipedia). Basically founded the french romantic genre. Quite a scandal.

If per chance Hernani was love at first reading for you, you might also like Ruy Blas, still Hugo, although i found it a bit less good. If you want a ridiculously overdramatic, over-the-top movie freely inspired by Ruy Blas but in which no one dies, you've got La Folie des Grandeurs, a comedy with Louis de Funès.

Cyrano de Bergerac, by Edmond Rostand, and if the style of the author makes you want to read more, go for l'Aiglon, which is about Napoleon's son but is a bit sadder.

19th century poetry:

Les fleurs du mal by Baudelaire. Awful. Simply awful. I mean you can try a few. I hated them all. Not necessary to have read all of them by any mean.

20th century:

A Ionesco play, either La Cantatrice Chauve or Rhinoceros, for the Theatre de l'Absurde. La Cantatrice Chauve is funnier I think.

Actually I won't give you any novels from that century because most of the ones studied suck and also it's for post-bac (after graduation) studies so it doesn't fall under the ask.

Now if I had to give you a few classics to read, what I'd recommand:

Les Trois Mousquetaires, by Alexandre Dumas.

Le Comte de Monte-Cristo, (ibidem). Luckily this one is on substack format at the cristo account.

Notre-Dame de Paris, by Victor Hugo.

I think that's all. If you've got any more questions, about books or about whether or not it's worth reading That Book instead of watching an adaptation or reading a summary, or which adaptation of, for example, Les Miserables, is the best, I'm here to answer them.

[heroslitteraires]

Une histoire aidée par les auteurs de la série télévisée.

D’après les romans de L.J. Smith développée par Kevin Williamson et Julie Plec.

Le journal de Stefan, tome 4, 259 pages. Tome 5, 255 pages. Tome 6, 259 pages.

Éditions de Noyelles.

Angleterre, 1888. Cherchant à échapper à son passé sanglant, Stefan s’installe dans la paisible campagne anglaise. Il commence peu à peu une nouvelle vie, mais reste hanté par le souvenir de Katherine, qu’il continue de haïr autant qu’il l’a aimée. Bientôt, à Londres, une rumeur court sur un certain Jack l’Éventreur. Stefan, lui, est convaincu qu’un vampire se cache derrière ce mystérieux meurtrier. Un vampire cruel et sournois : son frère Damon. Stefan se met en devoir de l’arrêter. Quand il découvre le message « Salvatore : je me vengerai » laissé à son attention, Stefan perd pied. Et si Damon était en fait en danger?

Traqués par Samuel, un monstre sanguinaire et enragé, Stefan et Damon sont obligés de se terrer dans les tunnels de Londres pour survivre. La haine de Samuel est insatiable. Rien ne l’arrêtera tant qu’il n’aura pas vengé la mort de Katherine… Vampire impitoyable, Katherine n’hésitait jamais à boire le sang de ses propres amants. Ni à les trahir. Pourquoi donc Damon et Stephen sont-ils obsédés par l’idée qu’elle ait pu aimer Samuel? Pourquoi continuent-ils de sentir la caresse de ses lèvres sur les leurs? Et surtout, lequel des deux frères devra mourir pour que la malédiction se dissipe enfin?

Samuel a enlevé Damon. Craignant le pire, Stefan se lance à la recherche de son frère. Et si Katherine n’était pas le seul motif qui pousse Samuel à la haine? S’il poursuivait un but plus funeste encore? Stefan acquiert bientôt la certitude que la puissance de Samuel a une origine magique. Qu’il dispose d’alliés dotés de pouvoirs et dévoués à sa cause. Stefan choisit de leur opposer des moyens identiques et de s’unir avec un autre groupe de sorciers. C’est sa seule chance de stopper Samuel dans ses desseins redoutables : car c’est une armée de vampires que ce dernier s’apprête à lever…

Mon avis :

Je me suis replongée dans cet univers, car ils étaient dans ma PAL depuis un bon moment. Et quoi de mieux qu’octobre pour se replonger dans une série qui se rapproche de la peur! J’avais fait l’acquisition de ces romans durant la période où la série était populaire à la télévision. C’est un complément à la série, des histoires différentes des émissions. On suit la jeunesse de Stefan en tant que vampire durant ses vingt premières années. La lecture se fait rapidement, car les tomes sont petits. Le style est plutôt young adult, c’est parfait pour les débutants qui veulent se lancer dans la lecture. C’est trois livres se suivent, on doit absolument les lire à la suite, car il y a souvent des références dans les livres précédents. J’ai bien aimé les aimés les lires comme cela et ne pas avoir attendu trop longtemps entre chacun, j’aurais probablement oublié des bouts des romans précédents. Stefan devra se lier d’amitié avec des sorcières et son frère pour pouvoir battre un vampire plus fort que lui avec un siècle d’expérience. L’action et le romantisme est présent.

Avez-vous déjà suivi la série télévisé ou lu les livres?

[worldchampionpeccobagnaia]

this story is a circle

1. mabel (episode eighteen: unusual hungers) - becca de la rosa & mabel martin // remy gardner to crash.net // (1) // 2. kenan sofuoğlu to motorsport.tr // excerpt - clarice lispector // climbing - lucille clifton // ktm ceo stefan pierer to speedweek.com // oresteia - robert icke // the unabridged journals of sylvia plath - sylvia plath // (2) // a slip of the keyboard - terry pratchett // working for the knife - mitski //

[thatsadorbsyo]

Alexander - 3

FROM THE JOURNAL OF ALEXANDER CORDULA.

24 Thunsheer

Simon--

It has been a day of black tidings. This time, I write to you from the safety of a tavern in a smiling town, but I fought an endless road for the privilege of slumbering in a real bed. The people in Vallaki are livelier than those in Barovia, but this is not a difficult measure to exceed, and the town does have certain charms. There is a wall around it to keep out the wolves, and a bard with tolerable songs to play and stories to tell downstairs in the tavern -- which, by the way, gives all of its wine away for free. For free, Simon. There’s something of a surplus wine economy here. Not even the nicest pillowhouses back home offer gratis champagne! The strangeness of this land expands ever on, finding no boundary to shape it.

Before sleep, I can only think of the last time I slept. Theodore has found me, I’m happy to report. Even here, he came to me after I laid down to rest, leading me to a grove with a great tree full of ravens, and a winged statue buried deep in the sucking mud. It was as inscrutable as all of Theodore’s little field trips, but something he said to me was more curious than usual. When I asked how he found me, he turned the question back on me and asked if I believed I could hide from him by coming to Barovia. This releases no small tide of riddles. Why would a raven who only visits me in my dreams need to travel, perhaps physically, to this place beyond the mist, lest I be unable to hear his call? Is there more to Theodore’s nature that I have not considered? I have long thought him to be a figment of my imagination, a vestigial piece of my childhood that only finds continued life in the quagmire of dreams, but what of it?

Theodore also gave me a missive to look for “the sign of the raven”, which could have so many interpretations that I don’t know where to start. For example, the tavern in which I sleep tonight has a raven wing on the sign hanging over the door. Could it be so literal? Would Theodore give me such an easy pitch, just the once? Perhaps it has something to do with the absentee Nightmother, which is what the people of Barovia call the Raven Queen. Most likely, the answer is something I cannot yet see. There is a piece to this that I am missing, and all I can do is keep my eyes and my mind open until something catches and sticks. My mother called this ‘filter-feeding on reality’, which reminds me that she was often about as inscrutable as Theodore in her turns of phrase.

The middle of the day is difficult to think about. The grave dangers on the road feel distant from the comforts of this room, though I still feel the energy that it sapped from me, both through the mundane vampirism inherent to highway travel and through conflict with Strahd’s patrolling riders. These are men in dark cloaks on ominous black destriers, brandishing cruel weapons and harrying innocent travelers the moment they come into view of the castle’s great red eye.

But they are far from a homogenous lot. One such rider, a man named Lars Stefan de Barovia, saved us from an ambush of wolves, and apparently he frequents this very tavern, getting day drunk on free wine while the locals call him cruel epithets (notable: bootlicker) for his compulsory servitude to the Count. Yet another rider was not so polite as to give us his name but did demand the blood that drips in our veins as the Count’s rightful tithe, before running us off the road and chasing us through the woods. Such a variable bouquet of fucking individuals did Strahd’s dark riders turn out to be. If only they were better at telegraphing whether they’re sad drunkards or vicious tax-collectors, the roads might be safer for it.

There is more I could say, but my legs are weary and my mind is racing. I intend to lie down and spiral into a single-minded, free-floating obsession for a little while, with my hands calmly folded over my chest on the bed while my heart believes it’s taking a sprint from the ground floor to the top of the Zauberspire. This is the exact sort of tantrum that you used to disrupt by tossing a cupful of water onto my upturned face. And gods, don’t I need it. I miss you. I do. Whatever else may be true, so too is this. (How many simultaneous truths can a man hold in his heart, even if all of them seemingly contradict?)

Sincerely yours,

Alexander Cordula

[ghost-bison]

Here Goes Nothing

After two people ( @bonniebutwithoutclyde & @starved-kitten <3) seemed to show interest in seeing the letter, I have decided that I would translate it and share it with you guys. So here goes, the OG French version, and the one I have just spent 10 minutes translating (so, yes, there will be mistakes). I hope you enjoy it, because I don't, I'll probably post a little update on how it went wednesday *crying noises*

French version

"Je n’aurais jamais cru en être réduit à coucher ces mots sur le papier un jour ; ou quelque mot que ce soit, d’ailleurs. C’est plus le truc de Stefan, mon frère. Il commence toujours comme ça : « Cher journal, », et puis ça s’étend, sur un minimum de cinq pages larmoyantes par jour, sur ses pertes de contrôle et l’amour vertueux et dégoulinant qu’il porte à Elena ; ou Valérie, ou Katherine, ou Rebekah, selon la décennie. Il écrit, et il se souvient, et il se lamente. C’est un cercle vicieux. Moi, je préfère oublier. Alors jusqu’ici, je n’avais rien écrit.

Ce soir, j’ai tout essayé de ce qui, d’habitude, fonctionne : le bourbon, les femmes, les hommes, le meurtre ; rien n’a fonctionné. J’ai, encore une fois, fait soupirer tout le monde. Mon prénom n’est désormais plus que l’allégorie de la déception des gens qui m’entourent.

J’imagine que ça ne me dérangerait pas, si je n’essayais pas constamment de m’améliorer. Et ça fonctionne… temporairement. Je prends sur moi, je bois une poche de sang réfrigérée en substitut d’un couple de campeurs, j’essaie tant bien que mal d’éviter les blagues douteuses qui collent des rides entre les sourcils broussailleux de Stefan, mais quoi qu’il arrive, je finis toujours par faire une erreur.

Alors, voici ma demande : j’ai conscience de l’excitation que le mauvais garçon que je n’interprète que trop bien suscite au sein des groupies, mais la seule attention dont j’aurais réellement besoin, si vous cessiez de me faire disjoncter dès que vous en trouvez l’occasion, c’est celle d’Elena. Je veux être digne de son amour ; je veux mériter le pardon et la loyauté de Bonnie et Enzo, mes meilleurs amis ; je veux pouvoir m’asseoir à un café sans me demander quelle serveuse sera mon prochain déjeuner.

Avec tout le respect que je vous dois, c’est-à-dire aucun, vous me le devez. Et vous me l’accorderez, car dans le cas contraire, je vous traquerai, et lorsque je vous aurai retrouvés, je vous ferai déguster vos globes oculaires à la petite cuillère."

Amicalement,

Damon Salvatore

English Version

"I never would have thought I’d one day be reduced to writing those words on paper; or any words, really. That’s more Stefan’s thing. My brother. It always starts like this “Dear diary,”, and he just goes on and on, on a minimum of five weepy pages a day, complaining about how he keeps losing control, or professing his undying, dripping love for Elena; or Valerie, or Katherine, or Rebekah, depending on the decade. He writes it all down, and he remembers, and laments. It’s a downward spiral. Me? I’d rather forget. So until then, I hadn’t written a thing.

Tonight, though, I tried everything: bourbon, women, men, murder; nothing works. Once again, I made everyone sigh. My name is now just an allegory for the disappointment I bring to the people around me.

I guess I wouldn’t mind, if I wasn’t constantly trying to change. And it works… for a while. I try, I drink out of a blood bag instead of a couple of campers, I refrain from making those dubious jokes which always stick Stefan’s bushy eyebrows with nasty little wrinkles, but whatever I do I always end up making a mistake.

So, here is my request: I am aware of all the excitement the bad boy within me provides the fangirls with, but the only attention I am trying to get is that of Elena. I want to be worthy of her love; I want to deserve the forgiveness of Bonnie and Enzo, my two best friends. And I want to be able to sit at the local bar without wondering which waitress will be my next meal.

With all due respect, which is none, you owe me. And I will get what I want, because if I don’t, then I will track you down, and when I find you, I will take out your eyeballs, with a spoon, and make you eat them."

All the best,

Damon Salvatore

Ok so in my French class we had to write a letter from a character's pov adressed go its author and I might have chosen Damon Salvatore and I might have actually done it and I might just have to read it in front of my entire class of fellow 20 y/o students idk

[xjoyce66]

Un texte plus que jamais d'actualité, alors qu'on assiste au plus grand mouvement de réfugiés depuis la deuxième guerre mondiale...

« Regarde-les donc bien ces apatrides, toi qui as la chance de savoir où sont ta maison et ton pays, toi qui à ton retour de voyage trouves ta chambre et ton lit prêts, qui as autour de toi les livres que tu aimes et les ustensiles auxquels tu es habitué. Regarde-les bien, ces déracinés, toi qui as la chance de savoir de quoi tu vis et pour qui, afin de comprendre avec humilité à quel point le hasard t'a favorisé par rapport aux autres. Regarde-les bien, ces hommes entassés à l'arrière du bateau et va vers eux, parle-leur, car cette simple démarche, aller vers eux, est déjà une consolation ; et tandis que tu leur adresses la parole dans leur langue, ils aspirent inconsciemment une bouffée de l'air de leur pays natal et leurs yeux s'éclairent et deviennent éloquents.

Telle est bien en effet notre nature : tout le mal qui a lieu ici-bas, nous en sommes informés. Chaque matin, le journal nous lance en pleine figure son lot de guerres, de meurtres et de crimes, la folie de la politique encombre nos pensées, mais le bien qui se fait sans bruit, la plupart du temps nous n'en savons rien. Or cela serait particulièrement nécessaire dans une époque comme la nôtre, car toute œuvre morale éveille en nous par son exemple les énergies véritablement précieuses, et chaque homme devient meilleur quand il est capable d'admirer avec sincérité ce qui est bien.»

Stefan Zweig -Voyages.

[lairreparablefugadeltiempo]

Los mejores libros que he leído en 2021

1.       Ungeduld des Herzens [La impaciencia del corazón] (Stefan Zweig, 1939)

2.       Brennendes Geheimnis [Ardiente secreto] (Stefan Zweig, 1911)

3.       Vierundzwanzig Stunden aus dem Leben einer Frau [Veinticuatro horas en la vida de una mujer] (Stefan Zweig, 1925)

4.       Hiob. Roman eines einfachen Mannes [Job] (Joseph Roth, 1930)

5.       Thérèse Raquin [Thérèse Raquin] (Émile Zola, 1867)

6.       Detstvo [Infancia] (Maksim Gorki, 1914)

7.       Le petit saint [La mirada inocente] (Georges Simenon, 1964)

8.       Lessico famigliare [Léxico familiar] (Natalia Ginzburg, 1963)

9.       Les Trois Mousquetaires [Los tres mosqueteros] (Alexandre Dumas, 1844)

10.   Notre-Dame de Paris [Nuestra Señora de París] (Victor Hugo, 1831)

11.   El 19 de marzo y el 2 de mayo (Benito Pérez Galdós, 1873)

12.   The Black Arrow [La flecha negra] (Robert Louis Stevenson, 1883)

13.   Fräulein Else [La señorita Else] (Arthur Schnitlzer, 1924)

14.   Widerstand der Wirklichkeit | Reise in die Vergangenheit [Viaje al pasado] (Stefan Zweig, 1929)

15.   Waiting for the Barbarians [Esperando a los bárbaros] (J. M. Coetzee, 1980)

16.   È stato così [Y eso fue lo que pasó] (Natalia Ginzburg, 1947)

17.   L'homme qui regardait passer les trains [El hombre que miraba pasar los trenes] (Georges Simenon, 1938)

18.   Oliver Twist (Charles Dickens, 1838)

19.   The Searchers [Centauros del desierto] (Alan Le May, 1954)

20.   Les Fiançailles de M. Hire [La prometida del señor Hire] (Georges Simenon, 1933)

21.   Yama no oto [El rumor de la montaña] (Kawabata Yasunari, 1953)

22.   Le chat [El gato] (Georges Simenon, 1966)

23.   Cécile est morte [Cécile ha muerto] (Georges Simenon, 1940)

24.   Cuentos del Lejano Oeste (Bret Harte, 1860-1900)

25.   Carmilla (Sheridan Le Fanu, 1872)

26.   The Blank Wall [La pared vacía] (Elizabeth Sanxay Holding, 1947)

27.   Gan [El ganso salvaje] (Mori Ōgai, 1911)

28.   The Chrysalids [Las crisálidas] (John Wyndham, 1955)

29.   Trafalgar (Benito Pérez Galdós, 1873)

30.   Bailén (Benito Pérez Galdós, 1873)

31.   Zama (Antonio Di Benedetto, 1956)

32.   Le Fantôme de l'Opéra [El fantasma de la ópera] (Gaston Leroux, 1910)

33.   The Great God Pan [El gran dios Pan] (Arthur Machen, 1891)

34.   La barraca (Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, 1898)

35.   Marianna Sirca [Mariana Sirca] (Grazia Deledda, 1915)

36.   Le voci della será [Las palabras de la noche] (Natalia Ginzburg, 1961)

37.   Los jardines de Beatriz (José María Latorre, 1993)

38.   El hombre de las leyendas (José María Latorre, 1996)

39.   El sombrero de tres picos (Pedro Antonio de Alarcón, 1874)

40.   El amigo de la muerte (Pedro Antonio de Alarcón, 1852)

41.   La sonrisa y la hormiga (María Jesús Echevarría, 1962)

42.   Destino negro (Manuel Mur Oti, 1948)

43.   Vampiros en España (Ed. Alberto López Aroca, 2021)

44.   Jumping Jenny [Baile de máscaras] (Anthony Berkeley, 1933)

45.   Pietr-le-Letton [Pietr el Letón] (Georges Simenon, 1930)

46.   Journal of the Gun Years [Diario de los años del plomo] (Richard Matheson, 1991)

47.   War er es? [¿Fue él?] (Stefan Zweig, c.1940)

48.   El caso del doctor Iturbe (Rafael López de Haro, 1912)