Search results for ""author iain"

What really counts in this life? For the writer, Alexander McCall Smith, it is friendship and love – themes that crop up time and again in his novels. And it is these themes that he explores in this collection of poems, with moments that swoop and soar, and descriptions that will make you laugh and realign your view. This collection reminds us to look at the world differently, to stop once in while and look up at the sky.

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Comprising contributions from a range of experts, this volume offers a critical commentary on the government's sustainable transport policy. A critical commentary on the Blair government's sustainable transport policy and its implementation. Firmly rooted in an appreciation of the politics of this controversial field. Experts contribute up-to-the-minute analyses of the key issues. Will inform debate over the future of transport policy. Includes a Foreword by David Begg, Chair of the Commission for Integrated Transport.

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What does it mean to be legally married today? From English teenagers eloping to Gretna Green to tie the knot without their parent's permission, to whether a wife can own property, it's clear that marriage law is different depending on where and when you're living. Now, the main debate centres on whether the law should be changed so that same-sex couples can marry. The Scottish and UK governments, plus a number of US states, are to legislate to allow same-sex marriage, prompting both celebration and outrage. Some argue against it on religious or cultural grounds; others support it on grounds of equality and human rights; still others disagree with the institute of marriage altogether. But amongst all the assumptions, there are few facts, and the debates about same-sex marriage in the UK and the US are taking place in an informational vacuum filled with emotion and rhetoric. Legally Married combines insights from history and law from the UK and Scotland with international examples of how marriage law has developed. Peterson and McLean show how many assumptions about marriage are contestable on a number of grounds, separate fact from fiction and explain the claims in terms of their historical context. It discusses the current debates about same-sex marriage in the UK Parliament and the US Supreme Court. It traces the development of marriage law in the UK, looking at the differences between Scotland and the rest of the UK. It compares UK marriage law to other countries, including the US, Ireland, South Africa and Canada. It explains the different theories of marriage that lead to conflicting views of what marriage law should be. It looks at the policy considerations critical to same-sex marriage, including religious freedom and travel between nations.

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Leading researchers in health care write about Archie Cochrane and his work, examining the legacy he left in research methods that have begun to revolutionise policy making and the delivery of health care today. Includes chapters on epidemiology, effectiveness, efficiency, equity, and evolution

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As Doctor Who approaches its fiftieth anniversary recent series have taken the show to new heights in terms of popular appeal and critical acclaim.The Doctor and his TARDIS-driven adventures, along with companions and iconic monsters, are now recognised and enjoyed globally. The time is ripe for a detailed analytic assessment of this cultural phenomenon. Focussing on the most recent television output The Inner World of Doctor Who examines why the show continues to fascinate contemporary audiences. Presenting closely-observed psychoanalytic readings of selected episodes, this book examines why these stories of time travel, monsters, and complex human relationships have been successful in providing such an emotionally rich dramatization of human experience. The Inner World of Doctor Who seeks to explore the multiple cultural and emotional dimensions of the series, moving back and forth from behind the famous sofa, where children remember hiding from scary monsters, and onto the proverbial psychoanalytic couch.

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Why do we plan? Who decides how and where we plan and what we should value? How do theories and ideologies filter down into real policies and plans which affect our lives?Written in a deliberately practitioner-friendly manner, this useful guide answers these questions and reveals planning theories to be simply new ideas that can help one see the world differently. Thinking about them enables us to take a step back to appreciate the wider context. The guide discusses the value of planning, how rationales for planning have changed, and whether we have too much, too little, or just the wrong kind of planning.It then sets out 25 key concepts central to professional practice, ranging from participation and complexity to post-politics and state theory, from risk and resilience to governmentality, from assemblage to ecosystems and sustainability.

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FOREWORD BY PRIME MINISTER THERESA MAY When Constance Markievicz stood for election as MP for Dublin St Patrick's in 1918, few people believed she could win the seat - yet she did. A breakthrough in the bitter struggle for female enfranchisement had come earlier that year, followed by a second landmark piece of legislation allowing women to be elected to Parliament - and Markievicz duly became the first female MP. A member of Sinn Fein, she refused to take her seat. She did, however, pave the way for future generations, and only eleven months later, Nancy Astor entered the Commons. A century on from that historic event, 491 women have now passed through the hallowed doors of Parliament. Each one of these pioneers has fought tenaciously to introduce enduring reform, and in doing so has helped revolutionise Britain's political landscape, ensuring that women's contributions are not consigned to the history books. Containing profiles of every woman MP from 1918 to 1996, and with female contributors from Mary Beard to Caroline Lucas, Ruth Davidson to Yvette Cooper and Margaret Beckett to Ann Widdecombe, The Honourable Ladies is an indispensable and illuminating testament to the stories and achievements of these remarkable women.

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In the years between about 1810 and 1840, Edinburgh—long and affectionately known as ‘Auld Reekie’—came to think of itself and be widely regarded as something else: the city became ‘Modern Athens’, an epithet later turned to ‘the Athens of the North’. The phrase is very well-known. It is also much used by those who have little understanding of the often confused and contradictory messages hidden within the apparent convenience of a trite or hackneyed term that conceals a myriad of nuanced meanings. This book examines the circumstances underlying a remarkable change in perception of a place and an age. It looks in detail at the ‘when’, the ‘by whom’, the ‘why’, the ‘how’, and the ‘with what consequences’ of this most interesting, if extremely complex, transformation of one city into an image—physical or spiritual, or both—of another. A very broad range of evidence is drawn upon, the story having not only topographical, artistic, and architectural dimensions but also social, cerebral, and philosophical ones. Edinburgh may well have been considered ‘Athenian’. But, in essence, it remained what it had always been. Maybe, however, for a brief period it was really a sort of hybrid: ‘Auld Greekie’.

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With case studies from the film industries of Turkey, India and the Philippines, 'The Hollywood Meme' is the first comprehensive study of the transnational adaptations of Hollywood movies that have appeared throughout world cinema.

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This book covers foreign exchange options from the point of view of the finance practitioner. It contains everything a quant or trader working in a bank or hedge fund would need to know about the mathematics of foreign exchange—not just the theoretical mathematics covered in other books but also comprehensive coverage of implementation, pricing and calibration. With content developed with input from traders and with examples using real-world data, this book introduces many of the more commonly requested products from FX options trading desks, together with the models that capture the risk characteristics necessary to price these products accurately. Crucially, this book describes the numerical methods required for calibration of these models – an area often neglected in the literature, which is nevertheless of paramount importance in practice. Thorough treatment is given in one unified text to the following features: Correct market conventions for FX volatility surface construction Adjustment for settlement and delayed delivery of options Pricing of vanillas and barrier options under the volatility smile Barrier bending for limiting barrier discontinuity risk near expiry Industry strength partial differential equations in one and several spatial variables using finite differences on nonuniform grids Fourier transform methods for pricing European options using characteristic functions Stochastic and local volatility models, and a mixed stochastic/local volatility model Three-factor long-dated FX model Numerical calibration techniques for all the models in this work The augmented state variable approach for pricing strongly path-dependent options using either partial differential equations or Monte Carlo simulation Connecting mathematically rigorous theory with practice, this is the essential guide to foreign exchange options in the context of the real financial marketplace.

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A fictive traveler's guide to the East, both Near and Far, The Book of John Mandeville was a late--medieval best seller, more popular in its day than Marco Polo's Travels. In addition to a fresh, vibrant translation--the first from the Middle French original since the fifteenth century—this edition of The Book of John Mandeville offers a succinct, broad-ranging Introduction to the work that touches on the question of authorship, the sources on which the text drew, and the transformation and reception of the work down to the present day.

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"I need you to understand something. I wrote this for you. I wrote this for you and only you. Everyone else who reads it, doesn't get it." Started 2007, I Wrote This For You is an acclaimed exploration of hauntingly beautiful words, photography and emotion that's unique to each person who reads it. This book gathers together nearly 200 of the most beautiful entries into four distinct chapters; Sun, Moon, Stars, Rain. Together with several new and exclusive poems that don't appear anywhere else, each chapter of I Wrote This For You focuses on a different facet of life, love, loss, beginnings and endings.

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Whether in poetry, fiction, radio drama or sound installations, Esther Dischereit's work represents a unique departure in recent European writing: a distinctive, off-beat syntax of German-Jewish intimacy with the fractured consciousness and deeply rutted cultural landscape of today's Germany. Sometimes a Single Leaf, mirroring the development of Esther Dischereit's poetry across three decades, includes selections from three of her books as well as a sampling of more recent, uncollected poems. It is her first book of poetry in English translation. In the words of her translator: “Esther Dischereit’s poetry offers a visceral pathography of post-war continuities, spectres, amnesia and trauma. Her work builds on the poet’s vulnerability and witness to a previous and ultimately un-sealable dimension – a dimension inhabited in a different way by the poetry of Paul Celan – in which the violations and degradation of the Shoah resonate with harrowing persistence in the detail of contemporary everyday life. At the same time, however, her poems test moments of personal and poetic redress, espousing forms developed in an incessant exploration of speech rhythms and images, celebrating the erotic and quotidian, experimenting with hope, seeking community."

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Over 1,400 pages of economic and demographic statistics, wide-ranging directory material and authoritative articles Contributions from over 50 leading experts on African affairs Incisive analysis of the latest available information. General Survey Thoroughly revised and updated analytical articles written by acknowledged experts covering the issues affecting the area as a whole: Reforming Africa: Continuities and Changes; Economic Trends in Africa South of the Sahara 2006; Health and Medical Issues in Sub-Saharan Africa; The Privatization of Security in Sub-Saharan Africa and European Colonial Rule in Africa A political map of contemporary Africa and a chronological list of the dates of independence of African countries. Country SurveysIndividual chapters on every country incorporating: an introductory survey, containing essays on the physical and social geography, recent history and economy of each country an extensive statistical survey of economic indicators, which include area and population, health and welfare, agriculture, forestry, fishing, mining, industry, finance, trade, transport, tourism, media and education a full directory containing names, addresses and contact numbers for key areas such as the government, political organizations, diplomatic representation, the judiciary, religion, the media, finance, trade and industry, tourism, defence and education a useful bibliography, providing sources for further research. Regional InformationDetailed information on the following: regional organizations; major commodities; calendars, time reckoning, weights and measures; research institutes concerned with Africa and a select periodicals bibliography.

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Written by practitioners for practitioners, this definitive handbook covers all of the main aspects of costs and funding issues encountered in the Scottish Civil Courts. It covers the routes to funding, when expenses may be sought, the court's powers in awarding expenses and provides detail on issues including Success Fee Agreements, Qualified One Way Cost Shifting, Pre-Action Protocols, Pursuers' Offers and Tenders, party Litigants, Amendment, Abandonment, Caution and Simple Procedure. It brings together all of the key legislation, court rules and judgments to provide a user-friendly and quick-reference guide to expenses law and practice.

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Ideal for the nature-loving traveler, Wildlife of Australia is a handy photographic pocket guide to the most widely seen birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, and habitats of Australia. The guide features more than 400 stunning color photographs, and coverage includes 350 birds, 70 mammals, 30 reptiles, and 16 frogs likely to be encountered in Australia's major tourist destinations. Accessible species accounts are useful for both general travelers and serious naturalists, and the invaluable habitat section describes the Australian bush and its specific wildlife. Animal species with similar features are placed on the same plates in order to aid identification. Wildlife of Australia is an indispensable and thorough resource for any nature enthusiast interested in this remarkable continent. * Easy-to-use pocket guide * More than 400 high-quality photographs * Accessible text aids identification * Habitat guide describes the Australian bush and its specific wildlife * Coverage includes the 350 birds, 70 mammals, 30 reptiles, and 16 frogs most likely to be seen on a trip around Australia

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Reissue of a 1973 classic Would you like to meet a witch? What would happen if she popped you into a sack and stole you away? In illustrating Ian Serraillier’s striking poem, Ed Emberley shows us what took place when such a thing happened to two clever and resourceful children. Anthology is thrilled to present 1973’s Suppose You Met a Witch, a beautiful and wondrous book that lets us all experience what it must be like to be under a witch’s spell.

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Amid wars, failed revolutions and the shifting of frontiers, the bit-part players often have the best tales to tell - an astonishing, genre-blurring travelogue from Italian master Claudio Magris.In the tiny borderlands of Istria and Italy, from the forests of Monte Nevoso, to the hidden valleys of the Tyrol, to a Trieste café, Microcosms pieces together a mosaic of stories - comic, tragic, picaresque, nostalgic - from life's minor characters. Their worlds might be small, but they are far from minimalist: in them flashes the great, the meaningful, the unrepeatable significance of every existence.

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This text is comprised of three essays which focus on different periods in Frances Hodgkins work, followed by 40 full-colour reproductions. This edition features an afterword with details of some newly discovered works and an updated bibliography and list of exhibitions.

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MOLA (Museum of London Archaeology) undertook excavations over 2003-4 at the former St Martin’s churchyard, Wallingford, Oxfordshire. St Martin’s, one of perhaps eight churches of late Saxon Wallingford, was located in a prominent position in the centre of the burh. No middle Saxon activity was found and the earliest remains consisted of a layer sealing the natural subsoil which contained a probable late Saxon lead cross. Earliest use of the churchyard has been dated to the late 10th to early 11th century by radiocarbon dating, and burials continued until the end of the 14th century, serving a dwindling parish population, before the cemetery rapidly fell out of use thereafter. No burials post-date 1412. Part of the cemetery has not been disturbed by the present development. The unexcavated areas and previous post-medieval and modern disturbances has meant the original size of the cemetery remains unknown. A late Saxon mortar mixer found on the site has added to a growing number of this distinctive early constructional feature. While its presence indicates the vicinity of the late Saxon church, no foundations of St Martin’s church appear to have survived cellar digging and quarrying for gravel that occurred in the early 18th century. Osteological analysis of 187 of the 211 excavated skeletons of the cemetery has depicted a lay population which was almost equally split between males and females, with only a slight bias towards males. Their distribution showed no observable cluster within the churchyard by age or gender. A high proportion of children is notable but newborns and very young children were comparatively rare. The significance of this is unclear since so many disarticulated remains were also present due to later disturbance. Both degenerative pathologies and inherited conditions affecting bone were noted, as were a high frequency of trauma, some of it violent. Generally the population could be shown to have led healthy early lives compared to other urban assemblages, although evidence of tuberculosis and iron deficiency suggest that living conditions and diet at the heart of medieval Wallingford were far from ideal. Within the excavated area of the cemetery, a number of the burials demonstrated known pre-Conquest burial rites and there are some aspects which may be peculiar to the area, suggesting local variations to common rites. Eight pre-Conquest burials had their heads supported mostly by stones, but one had his head supported by two disarticulated skulls. One 30-40 year old male was buried wearing a pierce scallop-shell, presumably a pilgrim badge from Santiago de Compostella. Four burials were interred in stone-built cists and these ranged from a c1 year old to adults of both sexes. A further six burials lay in stone-built cists without a cover. All post-Conquest burials were earth-cut examples.

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A quirky collection of true stories from the weird and wonderful world of Shakespearean theatre, featuring distinguished actors falling off stages, fluffed lines, performances in the dark, and why you must never, ever say the name of that Scottish play, especially if you are Peter O'Toole. A fascinating playbill of stories from the weird and wonderful world of Shakespearean theatre through the centuries, including distinguished actors falling off stages, fluffed lines, performances in the dark, and why you must never, ever say the name of that Scottish play, especially if you are Peter O'Toole. Discover a wealth of Shakespearean shenanigans over the years, including the terrible behaviour of the groundlings at Shakespeare's Globe, how the 'rude mechanicals' in A Midsummer Night's Dream got recast as a bunch of ladies from the WI, and how Dame Maggie Smith got even with Sir Laurence Olivier. Published to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, this treasury of curious tales is a must-read for all Shakespeare lovers and theatre fans. Word count: 45,000

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Philip Dixon is down on his luck. A hair-raising escape from a lucrative but botched bank robbery lands him gushing blood and on the verge of collapse in a quaint college town in New Hampshire. How can he find a place to hide out in this innocent setting? But peering into the window of the nearest house, he sees a glimmer of hope: a man in his mid-thirties, obviously some kind of academic, is rolling around on the living-room floor with an attractive high-school student...And so Professor Elias White is blackmailed into harbouring a dangerous fugitive, as Dixon - with a cool quarter-million in his bag and dreams of Canada in his head - gets ready for the last phase of his escape. But the last phase is always the hardest...FBI agent Denise Lupo is on his trail, and she's better at her job than her superiors think. As for Elias White, his surprising transition from respected academic to willing accomplice poses a ruthless threat that Dixon would be foolish to underestimate...

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Marketing for Growth is a guide to how the marketing function within a business can and should become its most important driver of growth. Marketers play a crucial role in generating revenue and they can play an equally important role in how revenues translate into profit. Growth is also about becoming a better business by being smarter or more efficient, and growing in a sustainable way. This involves developing and improving products, processes and standard of service. Marketers have their ear to the ground and therefore are often the first to pick up on changing customer needs and behaviour and the forces at play in markets. This increases the impact marketing should have on all those aspects of a business. The book is in three parts: the first part explores who are the most valuable customers, the second the most effective ways to drive revenue growth and the third the best ways to improve profitability. It combines insight and practical guidance, and is supported by a wealth of hard data and anecdotal evidence based on the experiences of a wide range of business in Britain, America, Europe and Asia. Among the firms featured are Amazon, China Mobile, Dove, Goldman Sachs, Haier, ING Direct, Lenovo, Mini, Procter & Gamble, Red Bull, Target, Twitter, Virgin and Zara.

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Everything we come to know and experience of the world depends on the way we attend to it. For reasons of survival, our brains have evolved to pay two kinds of attention to the world at the same time, though for the same reasons we cannot normally become aware of this neurological fact. This delivers two versions of the world with distinct qualities. In the one, associated with the right hemisphere of the brain, we experience the world as live, complex, embodied, implicit, full of individual, unique wholes which are nonetheless inseparably connected, as are we with it as a whole. In the other, associated with the left, we encounter the world as a representation, full of static, explicit, separable, bounded, but essentially fragmented entities, grouped into classes - but mechanistic and lifeless. As their civilisations declined, the world picture of first the Greeks and then the Romans moved from a fruitful balance of these to the triumph of the left hemisphere's view. We are busily repeating the pattern, perhaps for the last time.

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Focusing on the importance of Martineau's contribution to the development of the early Victorian press, this book highlights the degree to which the public quarrel between her and Dickens in the mid-1850s represented larger fissures within nineteenth-century liberalism. It places Martineau and Dickens within the context of Anglo-American liberalism and demonstrates how these fissures were embedded within a transatlantic conversation over the role of the press in forming a public sphere essential to the development of a liberal society.

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Globalization, it seems, has propelled the world's uber-wealthy to new heights of power and money, with tremendous repercussions for the other 99.9 percent of us. At a time when neoliberalism has propelled the world into a new Gilded Age, with rising inequality everywhere, an aggressive class war being waged by the wealthy, and billionaires inserting themselves bluntly into the political arena, understanding the behavior and spatiality of the super-rich has acquired a pressing urgency. This volume offers a richly textured suite of essays concerning how the super-rich have restructured local places, transforming landscapes as varied as London and Kentucky, Ireland and St. Barts, as well as domains as varied as art, thoroughbred horses, and housing.'- Barney Warf, University of Kansas, US'The world's super-rich, made up of just 11 million people, have access to about US$42.0 trillion of wealth. These are people who each have a spare million of 'liquid' wealth. Their wealth is roughly equal to two thirds of global GDP. They own most of everything. As the editor of this books states '. . . library shelves and the pages of journals remain largely devoid of geographical work on the super-rich a startling lacuna this volume sets out to fill'. The super-rich now own most of the planet. During the last year their share fell slightly. Times may be changing. Now is the time to begin to study the super-rich in detail, especially if you are worried about where all the wealth has gone.'- Danny Dorling, University of Sheffield, UKThis timely and path-breaking book brings together a group of distinguished and emerging international scholars to critically consider the geographical implications of the world's super-rich, a privileged yet remarkably overlooked group.Emerging from this unique collection is an enlightening picture of the influence of the super-rich over a diverse range of affairs, extending from the shape of urban and rural landscapes to the future of art history. By concentrating on those at the apex of the economic pyramid, this book provides valuable insights to the institutions, practices and cultural values of our society, as well as allowing us a more comprehensive view of the consequences of global capitalism. Presenting case studies from across the globe from Singapore to St Barts, London to Lexington - the spatial and cultural span of the book is wide-ranging and diverse.This truly unique book will prove a fascinating read for academics, researchers and students in the fields of geography, regional and urban studies, sociology, political science and development studies.Contributors: J.V. Beaverstock, S. Chauvin, B. Cousin, M. Fasche, S.J.E. Hall, I. Hay, P. McGuirk, P. McManus, L. Murphy, C. Paris, C.-P. Pow, S.M. Roberts, R.H. Schein, J.R. Short, T. Wainwright, K. Wilkins, M. Woods

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Chief Inspector Jacobson and DS Kerr had been on leave when the body of a young black man, Darren McGee, had been fished out of the River Crow. The autopsy had pointed to suicide by drowning. But now Darren's cousin, Paul Shaw, is in town: a top-notch investigative journalist with an axe to grind and a claim that Darren had really been the victim of a racially-motivated murder. Jacobson isn't convinced. But when Paul Shaw turns up as dead and as terminally-wet as his cousin, Jacobson and Kerr are faced with a baffling double-murder to investigate. And a dangerous confrontation lies ahead with the murky world of the Far Right.

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