Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2007 September 21

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[edit] September 21

[edit] Japanese in Shanghai

Who was Captain Pick and what had he to do with Japanese espionage in Shanghai before and after 1937?K Limura —Preceding signed but undated comment was added at 12:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Evgenij Pick (Captain Pick) is a character in the last section of Nowhere Man, a novel by Aleksandar Hemon. Pick is a charismatic Russian adventurer, impresario and raconteur who has fled from the Russian revolution and lives at the Cathay Hotel in Shanghai. As background material, Hemon cites Secret War in Shanghai: An Untold Story of Espionage, Intrigue, and Treason in World War II by Bernard Wasserstein. Xn4 18:55, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
There's an interesting article by Bernard Wasserstein, "Collaborators and renegades in occupied Shanghai" in History Today, 48:9, September 1998, ISSN 0018-2753
"Captain" Eugene Pick alias Hovans alias "Doctor" Clige was born Evgeny Mihailovich Kojevnikoff either 1899 or 1900 in Riga, Latvia. He fought it the First World War and claimed to have been captured by and to have escaped the Germans eleven times. In 1925 he became an assistant to the Russian military mission in China and began working for the Comintern. In 1927 he provide a detailed report to British intelligence on the Comintern, a report which was well received at Whitehall, but according to a later U.S. intelligence account he had

..bled them [the British] for large sums of money for long and devious reports on Communist activities in China. When he had exhausted the British, subject [Pick] went to work for the US Treasury Department and doublecrossed them out of US$600 and sold a tip-off to the group the Department was after on his first assignment for $2,000.

In the following years, using the stage name Eugene Hovans, he became a stage manager, actor, opera singer, ballet dancer and opened his own theater the Far Eastern Grand Opera. In 1929 he was sentenced to nine months in jail for forgery, then a year for fraud and extortion in 1931 when he represented himself as a military adviser to the Chinese government in Canton in order to obtain arms contracts. He was accused of blackmailing an American judge who he found out was homosexual—the judge's body later found floating in the Whangpoo River, of white slavery, and of keeping a "house of assignation".
In 1937 he began working for the Japanese Naval Intelligence Bureau and organized ring of more than forty counter-intelligence agents to spy against British and American targets. In November of 1941 he was sentenced to a long jail term for murder, but released shortly after the Japanese attack on the international settlement and was appointed an advisor to the foreign affairs section of the Japanese Naval Intelligence Bureau. According to our author : "For the next three-and-a-half years he exploited this position to establish a veritable reign of terror over the foreign residents of Shanghai."
Near the wars end Pick fled to Japan, where he would later surrender to occupation authorities. He was returned to Shanghai where he was imprisoned by the Nationalists, but then released at the instigation of the American Counter-Intelligence Corps. In 1949 he escaped to Taiwan ahead of the Communist occupation of Shanghai, tried to sell his services there as an expert on Communism, but was soon jailed and was last heard of in a Taipei prison.
The article lists some further reading:
  • Boyle, John Hunter (1972). China and Japan at War 1937-1945. OCLC 370332
  • Elphick, Peter (1997). Far Eastern File: the intelligence war in the Far East, 1930-1945. OCLC 37794939
  • Wakeman, Frederic Jr (1996). The Shanghai Badlands OCLC 61400598
  • Wasserstein, Bernard (1998). Secret War in Shanghai OCLC 41503389
  • Yeh, Wen-hsin (1998). Wartime Shanghai OCLC 39181233
—eric 20:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
Well done! You'll be pasting all that into Evgeny Mihailovich Kojevnikoff, right? - Eron Talk 20:50, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
It's a summary of a single article, so seems a bit plagiaristic to paste it as is?—eric 21:16, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
Well, it's your call as to how direct a copy it is. If you are concerned that it is too close to the original I'd be happy to take a crack at summarizing your summary. He looks like an interesting and notable character and I think the encyclopedia would be improved by an article on him. - Eron Talk 21:43, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
I would also welcome an article about this character. The proper title would be Yevgeny Kozhevnikov. --Ghirla-трёп- 21:23, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] myth in eugene o'neill's plays

I am conducting a paper on myth in some plays of Eugene o'Neill's plays. If anyone can help me he is welcome. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.109.90.118 (talk) 12:39, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

This is a reference desk, rather than a homework-help service. If you have a specific question, please ask away! --Sean 15:34, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] British kings

Who fathered the most kings in the British Isles? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.43.14.222 (talk) 13:02, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Mr and Mrs King, of course. Well, Mrs. King didn't exactly "father" them, but it takes two to tango, nudge nudge, wink wink. -88.111.190.248 14:00, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
King Ethelwulf (839-855), and King Edward the Elder (899-924), both of whom had 4 sons who were king at some point. In modern history, however, no one person has fathered more than 2 kings. Neil ム 14:52, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
British Isles? Well, that would be Niall of the Nine Hostages, who handily beats Æthelwulf and Edward the Elder in that his eight sons were all kings of something, allegedly.
Less mythically, for Irish kings a quick skim through Frank Byrne's Irish Kings and High Kings doesn't find any more than four, that for Murchad son of Bran Mut (d. 738) and Dúnlaing son of Tuathal (d. 1014), both of the Uí Dúnlainge of Leinster. In Anglo-Saxon kingdsoms, Oswiu may draw with Æthelwulf and Edward. In Scotland Máel Coluim mac Donnchada equals them with with four - Donnchad, Edgar, Alexander and David - and would once have been reckoned the outright winner with five, but Edmund is no longer thought to have been king. Angus McLellan (Talk) 20:20, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] DLC

I've read the article about Driver's license Compact and I still cannot find an answer to my question. If I currently have an Arkansas license that is going to be suspended upon my conviction for a speeding ticket, can I move to Texas, get a license before the conviction/suspention (NOTE: I have checked and verified that I can get a Texas license), can then Arkasnas supend my Texas lisense even if I pay the fine ? (NOTE: There is no supension for points under the texas law as long as I pay a fee for each violation--I think) XM 17:20, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

You have asked about this situation so many times, and people have very patiently tried to answer, with the clear caveat that we can't give legal advice. The best advice for you now is to consult a real lawyer, who can give you advice based on local knowledge and all the relevant information. SaundersW 18:44, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
Surely someone on Wikipedia should know if the DLC honors suspension attempts by non-resident states made after the license is issued? It's not *that* hard of a question...XM 18:49, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
With all due respect, can't you find a suitable lawyer to advise you, XM? If you find the right person, you'll know where you stand in half an hour. Xn4 20:11, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
If you're here because you are trying to get free legal advice, you should now that most localities in the United States offer free legal aid to the indigent. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 23:43, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
Have you bothered to consider the possibility that regardless of whether or not Arkansas can suspend your Texas license driving when you have a suspended Arkansas license in Arkansas could easily be illegal. This is one of the many reasons why you should consult a lawyer Nil Einne 19:04, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Please give it up.You fought the law and the law won...hotclaws 07:18, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Comparative analysis of prison conditions

Which countries' prisons are thought to have the worst conditions? Which countries' prisons have the best?--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 17:31, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Obviously, the Cebu Detention and Rehabilitation Center in the Philippines is the best. -- kainaw™ 19:45, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Billy Jean is not my lover... she's just a girl who thinks that I am the one... but the kid is not my sonǃ--Mostargue 21:20, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not asking about specific or unique prisions. I'm talking about prison systems as a whole within certain countries.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 22:13, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
You could try looking at some of the work by Amnesty International. From memory, I know they've published concerns about prisons in Thailand and Iran and have also called Guantanamo Bay detention camp one of the world's worst prisons. It used to be said that the USA's worst prisons were in Alabama, but if that was ever so, it may be out of date? Xn4 23:13, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Morris and Orwell

Are there any similarities between William Morris' utopian News From Nowhere and George Orwell's anti-utopian Nineteen Eighty-Four? Martinben 17:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Why not read both books and find out for yourself? AnonMoos 19:04, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
What the two books have in common is that they are both set in the future, as seen from the writer's point of view, and aim to predict a completely new order of society. But Morris, writing in 1889 and 1890, was a socialist trying to set out the utopian possibilities of socialism, whereas Orwell, writing in 1948 and looking forward a generation to 1984, was a self-proclaimed revolutionary patriot of the left who was bitterly disillusioned by the socialism then being practised in the Soviet Union and wished to warn where it might all end. Morris's protagonist falls asleep at a political meeting and wakes up a generation later in a new world which Morris approves of. Orwell's (born during the Second World War and christened 'Winston') is an independent thinker who finds himself barely surviving in a totalitarian state run in the name of Big Brother. Morris holds out hope, whereas Orwell gives us a terrible warning. Xn4 19:16, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
Its a very long time since I read them, but as far as I recall NFN was a utopia, NEF was a dystopia. William Morris was in favour of hand-made crafts and nature, so NFN would be set in a nature setting, while NEF was in an industrial setting. I read NFN so long ago I cannot remember anything about the plot or characters, so that may not be reliable. As someone else suggested, try reading them. 62.253.52.156 19:39, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

The first similarity is that they were both written by professed socialists, though one is optimistic and the other pessimistic. Orwell's pessimism was born of the times he lived through; a time of betrayal, of cynicism, of brutality and of dictatorship. Perhaps if he had been born a generation or two earlier he would have taken the same hopeful view of a potential future than Morris. And who can say that if Morris had witnessed the Moscow Trials and the ideological contortions of the Nazi-Soviet Pact then Nineteen Eighty-Four may have come more easily than News from Nowhere.

But look a little more deeply and it is possible to detect other similarities between Orwell and Morris, similarities beyond that of mere politics. Both have a vision that might almost be said to be 'reactionary' in the literal sense of the term, where looking forward is looking back. Both writers are alert to what is being lost in the modern world, a world where traditional values, rural values, it might even be said, are being destroyed under an urban juggernaut, which pollutes and dehumanises at one and the same time. The only thing that lightens the darkness of Nineteen Eighty-Four is the myth, the dream of the 'Golden Country.' Morris would certainly have been sympathetic to this rural idyll. Among the first things his narrator notices on waking in the future is that the Thames is free of pollution and full of salmon; and is this not the same world that George Bowling saw destroyed in Coming Up For Air, Orwell's pessimistic 'prequel' to Nineteen Eighty-Four? Morris and Orwell have, in other words, the same pastoral dream of perfection. It may be barely discernable in Nineteen Eighty-Four-but it's still there. And is it any surprise that the one toast that Winston Smith chooses to make is to the past, a place as 'idylic', and as elusive, as Morris' future. Clio the Muse 02:07, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

It's an awful moment in Coming up for Air when George Bowling arrives at the end of his journey back into his childhood, the lovely hidden lake in the woods with big fish in it he has dreamed all his life of catching, to find the lake has gone, turned into a Pixie Glade for a new housing estate. Xn4 02:19, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Germany and Vichy France

Was the relationship between Germany and the France of Marshall Petain as close as usually assumed?86.147.191.30 17:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

In short, yes, although he had less complete authority than his titles and your question may imply. Certainly, after the Second World War the French considered him to be a traitor: he was tried for treason and convicted to be guillotined, although this was commuted to life imprisonment. He lived to be ninety-five and died in prison on the Île d'Yeu. It's arguable that Pétain was treated very harshly, in all the circumstances. There are some articles you will find useful at Philippe Pétain, Battle of France, Vichy France, Révolution nationale, Free French and Charles de Gaulle. Xn4 19:59, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
I think it might be helpful if I broadened the focus slightly, thinking more generally of Vichy and Germany, rather than the career of Pétain specifically. The important thing to understand here is that France and Germany only signed an armistice at Compiègne in June 1940, and were thus still technically in a state of war, attempts at collaboration notwithstanding. Even though Germany occupied two-thirds of metropolitan France after the armistice, this was still only 10% of the total French territory, including the overseas empire. The French also retained control of a powerful navy.
So, for this reason, and others, France continued to be viewed as a potential threat, and was monitored as such, not just by the control commission allowed for by the Compiègne agreement, but by agents sent in to the unoccupied zone by both the Sicherheitsdienst and the Abwehr. Ironically, the Germans were aware of the Versailles precedent, and were determined that the French should be given none of the 'loopholes' that they themselves were formerly accorded by the victorious powers. They were also alert to the possibility of clandestine rearmament, for any sign of a French version of the Black Reichswehr. Of particular concern here was arms dumps in North Africa, French troop movements and even the rate of recruitment into the French Foreign Legion.
Senior Vichy politicians, even Pierre Laval himself, generally reckoned to be one of the architects of Franco-German collaboration, were kept under close scrutiny. Much of Laval's correspondence was forwarded to the Abwehr by an agent in his office. German intelligence agents, and locally recruited operatives, were active at all levels of government and adminstration, from Laval downwards. The French were alert to this and set up their own, highly effective, counter-intelligence operation. Indeed, there was something of a proxy war going on between the Germans and the French at the level of espionage. In the two years after the armistice close on 2000 people were arrested in the unoccupied zone, charged with spying for the Germans, some of whom were executed as traitors. This last vestige of political sovereignty only ended with the German occupation of southern France in November 1942. Clio the Muse 01:04, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Petain was sentenced to be executed by firing squad, not by guillotine, although his sentence was commuted. Pierre Laval was executed by firing squad.

[edit] If you guys don't mind.

What three things led to the growth of government in ancient Egypt? I read everything in the Ancient Egypt but I couldn't find anything so I would like some help.Arnon Chaffin (Talk) 18:29, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

A very regular flood of the Nile helped - they could coherently organize agriculture, and when people weren't busy with that, they could be recruited to build monuments. If it happened more randomly the government would not have been able to develop their authority like that. A written language was definitely useful, they could organize an effective bureaucracy with it. And I suppose their relative isolation...it was difficult for their neighbours to cross the deserts or the sea to attack them. Thus the government was (usually) stable and peaceful. At least, this is what I remember from high school Ancient Civilizations class, where we had pretty much the same question on a test, but that was a long time ago. Adam Bishop 18:41, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
I would humbly disagree with the previous answer... A regular flood of the Nile wasn't a requirement: States arose in many different regions of the world, even where there weren't regularly flooding rivers. Also, written language in Egypt was a result, not a prerequisite, of state formation. In some other parts of the world, complex societies managed without written language. I would also not call Egypt isolated: there was plenty of trade and regular conflict with other nearby polities. My answer would be: a (relatively) stable agricultural surplus, internal and external competition, and a very powerful and flexible ideology. Random Nonsense 21:24, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
The regular flooding of the Nile is what spawned EGYPTIAN culture - it created a fertile place for them to settle and develop agriculture. In other regions of the world, there are other conditions - in desert regions without regular flooding of rivers, you tend to get nomadic civilizations since there's no reason to stay put if you don't have any crops. Non-desert regions, of course, tend to have fertile soil that doesn't need flooding. If it flooded at random, though, their crops would go under. Kuronue | Talk 22:35, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
Oh, no argument there - I'm just questioning whether the rise of the Egyptian state depended on the flooding's regularity, as Adam Bishop argued. It depended on a surplus of food, yes, and the regularity of the Nile affected the shape of the Egyptian state, massively, and was a cause of its longevity, sure... But for its rise, its emergence, no, the river's regularity was not responsible. As in Mesopotamia, where the rivers were way more irregular, a state could still have developed. Random Nonsense 11:17, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] William IV's heir

If Edward, Duke of Kent had not managed to sire a daughter, Victoria, who would have succeeded William IV as the British monarch? Would it have been Ernest Augustus I of Hanover? Corvus cornix 18:48, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, after Victoria, her father the Duke of Kent's younger brother Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale was the next heir to the British throne. He did, in fact, inherit the throne of Hanover, the succession to which was subject to the Salic law - that is, women were excluded. Ernest Augustus was the Heir presumptive to the British throne until the birth of Victoria, Princess Royal, in 1840. Xn4 19:23, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] a specific inquiry after reading "Cinema of Korea"

"A slow rebirth of the domestic film industry led to South Korea, by 2005, being one of only three nations to watch more domestic than imported films in theatres[1], though this situation has recently changed."

I am curious to know what the other two nations are.

Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.130.232.98 (talk) 19:48, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Probably India and the United States. Corvus cornix 20:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
See also: Bollywood and Hollywood. dr.ef.tymac 22:10, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
India AFAIK makes about 730 films/year - more than any other country. Note that Bollywood isn't India as a whole, only Bombay.martianlostinspace email me 22:13, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Child Support in Canada

So this is just a question, I'm not searching for legal advice. In Canada, is there a point where one parent can ask for child support from let's say 5 years ago, 10 years ago, that is...if the child is still a minor at the time child support is being asked for, and get the money? Or is there a point in time where child support has to have been requested for it to be accepted, and after that period, it is no longer valid?

207.161.45.11 22:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)