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The Steel Tsar
''The Steel Tsar'' is a sci-fi/alternate history novel by Michael Moorcock, first published in 1981 by Granada. Being a sequel to '' The Warlord of the Air'' (1971) and '' The Land Leviathan'' (1974), it is the final part of Moorcock's '' A Nomad of the Time Streams'' trilogy regarding the adventures of Captain Oswald Bastable and which has been seen as an early example of steampunk fiction. The same cover image was used for the 1984 reissue of Judas Priest album ''Rocka Rolla'' and also the 1989 video game '' Ballistix''. Plot summary In a story introduced by the ubiquitous Una Persson (who is also found in other works by Moorcock), the trilogy's hero, Captain Oswald Bastable, finds himself in an alternative twentieth century in which the Confederate States of America won the American Civil War and neither the First World War nor the October Revolution ever occurred. Over the course of the story Oswald witnesses the destruction of Singapore at the hands of the Imperial Japane ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Melvyn Grant
Melvyn "Mel" Grant (born 1944) is an English artist and illustrator. Trained traditionally, he originally worked with oil paints, but in the late 1990s Grant switched to creating most of his work digitally with a digitizing tablet and the software Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter. Mel now lives and works on the coast in the Southeast of England, although the bulk of his work is commissioned internationally. Grant was born in London, England. Always interested in illustrated arts, he attended the Brassey School of Fine Art from the age of twelve before dropping out at the age of eighteen. After studying electronics and working in a variety of short-term jobs, including as a guitarist, Grant travelled throughout Europe to improve his painting style. Upon his return to England, he worked as an illustrator in various media, including animation. Soon he found a niche creating covers for books, mostly fantasy work, but also science fiction. He worked in various styles, ranging from c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Una Persson
Una Persson is a recurring character in many of Michael Moorcock's 'multiverse' novels. She has also been used as a character in stories by other writers. She was the character Moorcock chose to start a round-robin story in ''The Guardian''. Often appearing as a cool, anarchistic revolutionary in the many alternate histories, futures and worlds created by Moorcock, she is bisexual in her private life, having been the lover of both Jerry and Catherine Cornelius. In some ways a more dedicated, less dissolute female version of Jerry Cornelius, she is revealed in '' The Condition of Muzak'' as playing the role Harlequin. In '' The End of All Songs'' she appears as a member of the "Guild of Temporal Adventurers". She has appeared in the Jerry Cornelius novels '' A Cure for Cancer'', '' The English Assassin'', ''The Condition of Muzak'' and '' The Adventures of Una Persson and Catherine Cornelius in the Twentieth Century''. She was in all three of the Nomad of the Time Streams trilogy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1922 to 1952 and as the fourth Premier of the Soviet Union, premier from 1941 until his death. He initially governed as part of a Collective leadership in the Soviet Union, collective leadership, but Joseph Stalin's rise to power, consolidated power to become an absolute dictator by the 1930s. Stalin codified the party's official interpretation of Marxism as Marxism–Leninism, while the totalitarian political system he created is known as Stalinism. Born into a poor Georgian family in Gori, Georgia, Gori, Russian Empire, Stalin attended the Tiflis Theological Seminary before joining the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. He raised f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Demagogue
A demagogue (; ; ), or rabble-rouser, is a political leader in a democracy who gains popularity by arousing the common people against elites, especially through oratory that whips up the passions of crowds, Appeal to emotion, appealing to emotion by scapegoating out-groups, exaggerating dangers to stoke fears, lying for emotional effect, or other rhetoric that tends to drown out reasoned deliberation and encourage fanatical popularity. Demagogues overturn established norms of political conduct, or promise or threaten to do so. Historian Reinhard Luthin defined ''demagogue'' as "a politician skilled in oratory, flattery and invective; evasive in discussing vital issues; promising everything to everybody; appealing to the passions rather than the reason of the public; and arousing racial, religious, and class prejudices—a man whose lust for power without recourse to principle leads him to seek to become a master of the masses. He has for centuries practiced his profession of ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Theocratic
Theocracy is a form of autocracy or oligarchy in which one or more deities are recognized as supreme ruling authorities, giving divine guidance to human intermediaries, with executive and legislative power, who manage the government's daily affairs. Etymology The word theocracy originates from the () meaning "the rule of God". This, in turn, derives from θεός (theos), meaning "god", and κρατέω (''krateo''), meaning "to rule". Thus the meaning of the word in Greek was "rule by god(s)" or human incarnation(s) of god(s). The term was initially coined by Flavius Josephus in the first century AD to describe the characteristic government of the Jews. Josephus argued that while mankind had developed many forms of rule, most could be subsumed under the following three types: monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy. However, according to Josephus, the government of the Jews was unique. Josephus offered the term ''theocracy'' to describe this polity in which a god was soverei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cossacks
The Cossacks are a predominantly East Slavic languages, East Slavic Eastern Christian people originating in the Pontic–Caspian steppe of eastern Ukraine and southern Russia. Cossacks played an important role in defending the southern borders of Ukraine and Russia, Cossack raids, countering the Crimean-Nogai slave raids in Eastern Europe, Crimean-Nogai raids, alongside economically developing steppes, steppe regions north of the Black Sea and around the Azov Sea. Historically, they were a semi-nomadic and semi-militarized people, who, while under the nominal suzerainty of various Eastern European states at the time, were allowed a great degree of self-governance in exchange for military service. Although numerous linguistic and religious groups came together to form the Cossacks, most of them coalesced and became East Slavic languages, East Slavic–speaking Eastern Orthodox Church, Orthodox Christians. The rulers of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russian Empire en ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Airship
An airship, dirigible balloon or dirigible is a type of aerostat (lighter-than-air) aircraft that can navigate through the air flying powered aircraft, under its own power. Aerostats use buoyancy from a lifting gas that is less dense than the surrounding air to achieve the lift (physics), lift needed to stay airborne. In early dirigibles, the lifting gas used was hydrogen gas, hydrogen, due to its high lifting capacity and ready availability, but the inherent flammability led to several fatal accidents that rendered hydrogen airships obsolete. The alternative lifting gas, helium gas is not flammable, but is rare and relatively expensive. Significant amounts were first discovered in the United States and for a while helium was only available for airship usage in North America. Most airships built since the 1960s have used helium, though some have used thermal airship, hot air. The envelope of an airship may form the gasbag, or it may contain a number of gas-filled cells. An air ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Russian Imperial
The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughly one-sixth of the world's landmass, making it the third-largest empire in history, behind only the British and Mongol empires. It also colonized Alaska between 1799 and 1867. The empire's 1897 census, the only one it conducted, found a population of 125.6 million with considerable ethnic, linguistic, religious, and socioeconomic diversity. From the 10th to 17th centuries, the Russians had been ruled by a noble class known as the boyars, above whom was the tsar, an absolute monarch. The groundwork of the Russian Empire was laid by Ivan III (), who greatly expanded his domain, established a centralized Russian national state, and secured independence against the Tatars. His grandson, Ivan IV (), became in 1547 the first Russian mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rishiri Island
is a volcanic island in the Sea of Japan off the coast of Hokkaido, Japan. Administratively the island is part of Hokkaido Prefecture, and is divided between two towns, Rishiri and Rishirifuji. The island is formed by the cone-shaped extinct volcanic peak of Mount Rishiri. Along with Rebun Island and the coastal area of the Sarobetsu Plain, Rishiri forms the Rishiri-Rebun-Sarobetsu National Park. The main industries of Rishiri are tourism and fishing. The island has a population of 5,102 residents. Etymology Rishiri derives its name from the Ainu language, and means "high island", or "island with a high peak", a reference to the altitude of Mount Rishiri above sea level. Geography Rishiri Island is located roughly west of Hokkaido; Rebun Island is a further to the northwest. Rishiri is roughly circular with a coastline of . The island spans from north to south and from east to west. Mount Rishiri rises to an altitude of and provides a good source of fresh water; ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Imperial Japanese
The Empire of Japan, also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was the Japanese nation state that existed from the Meiji Restoration on January 3, 1868, until the Constitution of Japan took effect on May 3, 1947. From 1910 to 1945, it included the Japanese archipelago, the Kurils, Karafuto, Korea, and Taiwan. The South Seas Mandate and concessions such as the Kwantung Leased Territory were ''de jure'' not internal parts of the empire but dependent territories. In the closing stages of World War II, with Japan defeated alongside the rest of the Axis powers, the formalized surrender was issued on September 2, 1945, in compliance with the Potsdam Declaration of the Allies, and the empire's territory subsequently shrunk to cover only the Japanese archipelago resembling modern Japan. Under the slogans of "Enrich the Country, Strengthen the Armed Forces" and "Promote Industry" which followed the Boshin War and the restoration of power to the emperor from the shogu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Singapore
Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bordering the Strait of Malacca to the west, the Singapore Strait to the south along with the Riau Islands in Indonesia, the South China Sea to the east, and the Straits of Johor along with the State of Johor in Malaysia to the north. In its early history, Singapore was a maritime emporium known as '' Temasek''; subsequently, it was part of a major constituent part of several successive thalassocratic empires. Its contemporary era began in 1819, when Stamford Raffles established Singapore as an entrepôt trading post of the British Empire. In 1867, Singapore came under the direct control of Britain as part of the Straits Settlements. During World ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
October Revolution
The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two revolutions in Russia in 1917. It was led by Vladimir Lenin's Bolsheviks as part of the broader Russian Revolution of 1917–1923. It began through an insurrection in Petrograd (now Saint Petersburg) on . It was the precipitating event of the Russian Civil War. The initial stage of the October Revolution, which involved the assault on Petrograd, occurred largely without any casualties. The October Revolution followed and capitalized on the February Revolution earlier that year, which had led to the abdication of Nicholas II and the creation of the Russian Provisional Government. The provisional government, led by Alexander Kerensky, had taken power after Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich of Russia, Grand Duke Michael, the younger brother of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
