Aarushhh/wikipedia-simple-splitted huggingface dataset:
Mansa Musa made Timbuktu a center of trade, culture and of Islam, which also helped increase the spread of Islam throughout Western Africa. He was a devoted Muslim, and built many schools based on the teachings of the Qur'an. He sent students to Islamic universities in northern Africa. 

After his Hajj, European cartographers began to draw Mansa Musa on maps. As the empire of Mali fell apart, Mansa Musa's reputation did as well; he was no longer drawn as a noble king on maps.  Instead, artists drew him to look uncivilized. He was drawn as a parody of European royalty and a normal person with a crown.

Mansa Musa was married to Inari Kunate.
References 
 "Mansa Musa." World History: Ancient and Medieval Eras. ABC-CLIO, 2013. Web. 4 Dec. 2013.
 MacDonald, Kevin C. "Mansa Musa." World Book Advanced. World Book, 2013. Web.  4 Dec. 2013.
 Kane, Ousmane. "Musa, Sultan of Mali." Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World. Ed. Richard C. Martin. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2004.Biography in Context. Web. 4 Dec. 2013.

Other websites 

 History Channel: Mansa Moussa: Pilgrimage of Gold
 Al-Umari's description of Mansa Musa's 1324 visit to Cairo 
 Sondiata and Mansa Musa on the Web  web directory
 African Legends page
 African Events Mansa Musa page 
 Mansa Musa , from Black History Pages

1280 births
1337 deaths

Malian emperors
Macon is a city in central Georgia, USA. It is among the largest metropolitan areas in Georgia, and the county seat of Bibb County. It is near the center of Georgia, about 75 miles (129 km) south of Atlanta, that's why the city's called the Heart of Georgia. As of the 2020 census, Macon had a population of 157,346. Macon is the fourth-largest city by population of the state.

References

Other websites 
 Official City Government Website
 Greater Macon Chamber of Commerce
 Macon-Bibb County Convention and Visitors Bureau
 Macon  (the New Georgia Encyclopedia)

 
County seats in Georgia
is a classic work of Japanese literature.

It is believed to have been written by the Japanese noblewoman Murasaki Shikibu at the beginning of the 11th century, around the highest point of the Heian Period. The form of the language used at that time is called Late Old Japanese. The Tale of Genji is sometimes called the world's first novel, the first modern novel, or the first novel to still be considered a classic, but many readers do not agree on this.

Japanese cultural scholar Motoori Norinaga first used the term Mono no aware in his review of the book.  This term in now important in understanding Japanese literature.
The first translation of part of Genji Monogatari into English was by Suematsu Kencho. It was notably translated by Japanese nun Jakucho Setouchi in 1998. Arthur Waley made a free translation of the work, except for one chapter.  Edward Seidensticker made the first complete translation into English, using a more literal way than Waley.  The most recent English translation, by Royall Tyler (2002), also tries to respect the original text.

Other websites 
 The Tale of Genji 1976 Seidensticker translation 
 Tale of the Genji woodcuts 
 Murasaki Shikibu: Genji monogatari (1987) An animated film based on The Tale of Genji.
 The Picture Scroll of The Tale of Genji Some scans of the Genji Monogatari Emaki (Tale of Genji Scroll).
 The Tale of Genji - La novela de Genji Site dedicated to The Tale of Genji .
 The Tale of Genji A photographic guide to The Tale of Genji.
 The Tale of Genji: Genealogical chart

References 

Japanese novels
11th-century books
was a Japanese shogun of the Edo period.  His ruled started in 1716 and ended in 1745.<ref name="nussbaum979">Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). [https://books.google.com/books?id=p2QnPijAEmEC&pg=PA979&dq= "Tokugawa Yoshimune"] in Japan Encyclopedia, p. 979.</ref>

Early life
Yoshimune was the son of Tokugawa Mitsusada, the grandson of Tokugawa Yorinobu, and the great-grandson of Tokugawa Ieyasu.

Shogun
Yoshimune was the eighth shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate.

Yoshimune's government worked to control the price of rice.  This earned him the nickname "Rice Shogun" or "Shogun of Rice" (kome-shōgun'').

References

1684 births
1751 deaths
Shoguns
People from Wakayama Prefecture
(February 2, 1536 or March 26, 1537–September 18, 1598) was a military leader of Japan. He was born in Owari (which is now called Nagoya city, Aichi prefecture). He grew up to become a daimyo. Hideyoshi came to power after his master, Oda Nobunaga, died. He built the Osaka Castle in Osaka. Then, Hideyoshi unified Japan. He became a regent for the Emperor. The time of Hideyoshi's rule is usually called the Momoyama period.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi made many changes in laws and culture. For example, he made a law that only the samurai could carry weapons.

Other websites 

 SengokuDaimyo.com The website of Samurai Author and Historian Anthony J. Bryant

Daimyo
1536 births
1598 deaths
People from Aichi Prefecture
was a Japanese author of the Shōwa period. He wrote several famous poetic short stories such as "The Lemon", "Winter Days", and "Under the Cherry Trees".

He died at a young age and wrote few works, but his stories have become influential in Japanese culture. For example, many high school students imitate the protagonist of his short story "Lemon", leaving a lemon in a department store. And his first line  is usually said by Japanese people about the cherry-blossoms-watching custom of hanami.

References

Other websites
 A complete list of stories by Kajii (with literal English and Romaji titles) at Griffe - World's Literature
 "An Inner Landscape" (tr. Tony Gonzalez)
 "Caress"  (tr. Ursula Owen)
 "The Feeling on the Bluff" text  and annotated Word format  (tr. Ursula Owen)
 "Lemon"  plus a comment  (tr. Candace Seu)

1901 births
1932 deaths
Writers from Osaka
Staff may mean:
 Staff (stick), a stick or pole to help with walking, or to use as a weapon.
Employees, a group of people who work for a firm or other organization.
 Staff (music) (or stave),  five horizontal lines used for writing musical notes.
 Staff of office, a stick or pole used for ceremony by someone important.
 Staff (building material), artificial stone product for ornamental uses.
 Staff (military), the people of military command and planning.
 Jacob's staff, a tool used in surveying.
 Quarterstaff, a long pole used as a Medieval weapon.
 Bō, a long stick used as a weapon, usually in Japanese martial arts.
 Leopold Staff (1878–1957), a Polish poet.
 Gun (staff), a weapon in Chinese martial arts.
 staff is a safeworking apparatus used on single track railways.

NB
The plural of “staff” is staves.  The word  stave can also be used as a singular noun to mean:
 a single staff (music).
 a curved wooden member which is used with others to form the side of a barrel.
Dumplings may be any of a wide variety of dishes, both sweet and salty, in several different cuisines. They are either made from balls of dough or are small bits of food put into pastry, dough, batter, or leaves.they are mostly cooked in southern Africa in a pot covered by an airtight,strong plastic so that it gets to boil and observe the steam then the dough's size increases while boiling  They can be cooked in different methods, either by boiling or steaming.

References 

Foods
Hank Williams, Sr. (September 17, 1923 – January 1, 1953), born Hiram King Williams, was an American singer-songwriter and musicians. Williams is known as "the Father of Country and Western Music", because his songs were some of the first to come from that genre. As with many musical pioneers, Williams did not set out to create a new kind of music. He simply wanted to make music that his listeners would enjoy, that he would also enjoy making for them.

Some of Williams's songs are "Your Cheatin' Heart", "Hey Good Lookin'", "Jambalaya", and "Cold, Cold Heart". The songs were easy to remember, and many fans sang along when they heard them. Other singers began to include Hank Williams songs in their repertoires. Williams made recordings, performed on radio and early television, and also made live appearances.

Early life
Early life

Williams's parents, Elonzo Huble "Lon" Williams and Jessie Lillybelle "Lillie" Skipper married on November 12, 1916. Hank Williams was of English-American ancestry. Elonzo Williams worked as an engineer for the railroads of the W.T. Smith lumber company. He was drafted during World War I, serving from July 1918 until June 1919. He was severely injured after falling from a truck, breaking his collarbone and sustaining a severe hit to the head. After his return, the family's first child, Irene, was born on August 8, 1922. Another son of theirs died shortly after birth. Their third child, Hiram, was born on September 17, 1923, in Mount Olive. Since Elonzo Williams was a Mason, and his wife was a member of Order of the Eastern Star the child was named after Hiram I of Tyre (one of the three founders of the Masons, according to Masonic legend), but his name was misspelled as "Hiriam" on his birth certificate.
As a child, he was nicknamed "Harm" by his family and "Herky" or "Poots" by his friends.
Personal life
Williams was one of the first superstars to have problems with alcohol and drugs. Well-meaning fans and friends would buy Williams drinks, or invite him to parties, and he would lose control. He began to miss shows, and to give bad performances because of the effects of drugs and alcohol. He lost many of his best engagements, and his reputation suffered.

Death
Williams died at age 29 on January 1, 1953, after a binge of alcohol drinking. He left behind a wife and son, Hank Williams Jr., who also grew up to become a country musician. Williams' songs are still popular, and sung by many musicians. Hank Jr. performed his father's music for many years, but later found success with songs of his own.

Discography

Singles
"Lost Highway"

Studio albums
Hank Williams Sings (1951)
Moanin' the Blues (1952)

Related pages
List of country musicians from Alabama

References

Other websites
Other websites

 Official website
 Official Hank Williams Fan Club 
 Hank Williams' Boyhood Home & Museum
 at the Country Music Hall of Fame – 1961 Inductee
 at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame &ndasg 1987 Inductee
 at the Alabama Music Hall of Fame – 1985 Inductee 
 PBS – American Masters
 Image of Hank Williams' death certificate
 Sites related to final day

1923 births
1953 deaths
Country musicians from Alabama
American guitarists
American singer-songwriters
Drug-related accidental deaths
Blues musicians
American gospel musicians
Singers from Alabama
The Sui Dynasty (, ) was an imperial dynasty of China between the years 581 and 618. It followed the "Jin period" and was followed by the Tang Dynasty. It ended nearly four centuries of division between rival regimes.

The Sui Dynasty was founded by Emperor Wen, or Yang Jian. Its capital was Chang'an (present-day Xi'an). The dynasty is important because it reunited Southern and Northern China and the Grand Canal was built in that time.

Related pages
History of China

Other websites

Sui Dynasty at mnsu.edu 

Chinese dynasties
581 establishments
Establishments in China
618 disestablishments
7th-century disestablishments in Asia
6th-century establishments in Asia
Disestablishments in China
is a meal that is common in Japanese cuisine, made to take away to be eaten somewhere else. A traditional bento consists of rice, fish or meat, and one or more pickled or cooked vegetables as a side dish. Various kinds of containers are used, from disposable mass produced to handcrafted lacquerware. They usually have compartments for different kinds of food. While bento meals can be bought at many stores and  in all of Japan, it is still considered a very important skill for a Japanese housewife to be able to prepare a good boxed lunch.

Bento can be very elaborate, aesthetically pleasing cuisine arrangements. Often the food is arranged in such a way as to resemble other objects: dolls, flowers, leaves, and so forth. For some special occasions like hanami, more elaborate and bigger bentos are prepared. People often take bento for a picnic.
Bento are often sold in train stations. These are called ekiben (駅弁). Those sold in airports are called Soraben (空弁). Kyaraben (キャラ弁), is a shortened form of the two words character and bento and is becoming more popular.

Ingredients 
Here are some foods that are often contained in a bento:
 Tamagoyaki (Japanese style omelette)
 Karaage (deep-fried chicken)
 Onigiri (rice ball) 
 Takosan Viennese (sausage like octopus)
 Shogayaki (pork grilled ginger and soy sauce)
 Sandwich
 Fruit

Other websites
Other websites

 Bento*弁当 An artistic Bento blog site (Japanese & English).
 Bento Corner An English language blog about creating bentos, especially bentos for children.
 O-Bento Net 
 Bento Business  A UK bento site with a gallery of bento shops and accessories in Japan, plus illustrated bento recipes.
 Cooking Cute: a bento site 
 Science Channel's The Making Series: #33 Making of Convenience Store Bento (video in Japanese)
 My Lunch Can Beat Up Your Lunch! FAQ An American site on making Bento.
 Instructions How-To Traditional Asian recipe cooking step by step..
 ekiben*駅弁 An explanation of ekiben.
  club of kyaraben*キャラ弁  A Japanese kyaraben site. 

Japanese food
A clown is a kind of entertainer, or performance artist, who performs physical comedy and stunts to amuse others. They usually wear grease paint makeup that hides their real face, a large wig with brightly-colored hair, and baggy, padded clothing.

Many clowns belong to a circus, while others freelance or have a talent agent who helps them find work. Some clowns study at a clown college or clown school, where they learn acrobatics, juggling and other physical skills, and ways to interact with an audience. Others learn from experienced clowns, or through study and practice.

Clowns in popular culture 

Clowns are sometimes mentioned in other forms of entertainment. Pagliacci is an opera by Ruggero Leoncavallo, about clowns. This theme was borrowed by Smokey Robinson, when he wrote "The Tears of a Clown" working with Stevie Wonder. Red Skelton was a popular entertainer, who performed clown routines on television.
Ronald McDonald is a clown character who is the mascot of McDonald's restaurants. (Jeff Giuliano, who performed Ronald for many years on television, later became a vegetarian.)

In many different media, clowns are often villains due to the possibility of them being creepy. Examples are Pennywise from Stephen King's It and the Joker from the Batman universe.

Entertainment occupations
Comedy
Circuses
is a Japanese dumpling made from mochiko (rice flour). It is sticky and filling.  It is often served with green tea.

Dango are eaten throughout the year, but the different types are traditionally eaten in certain seasons. Three to four dango are often served on a skewer. One variety of dango from Hokkaidō is made from potato flour and baked with shoyu (soy sauce).

A common Japanese proverb  is related to the custom of cherry blossom viewing (hanami).

Types of dango
Types of dango

There are many different varieties of dango which are usually named after the various seasonings served on or with it.
Botchan dango: Dango that is three colors.  One is colored by red beans, the second by eggs, and the third by green tea.  Botchan dango are often seen in Japanese anime, and are a common dish during hanami.
Chichi dango: Slightly-sweet, usually eaten as a dessert.
Goma: sesame seeds. It is both sweet and salty.
Kinako: A toasted soy flour.
Kushi dango: Dangos held by a skewer
Mitarashi: A syrup made from shoyu (soy sauce), sugar and starch.  Popular with children and women.
Nori: dried and seasoned seaweed
Kibidango: made from millet, and are actually dumplings.

References

Other websites

Japanese food
A music stand is something musicians can use to put sheet music on when they are performing.

There are several different sorts of music stand, but almost all of them can be adjusted in height so that they can be used by tall or short players, and by players whether they are sitting down or standing up.

The most popular type of music stand is the metal one that can be folded up so that it is easy to carry about.  Some music stands are made of wood.  These are sometimes very  and therefore quite expensive.  

Orchestras usually give their players very heavy metal music stands.  This is because the light, fold-up ones are easily knocked over.  It is also very difficult to write on music on a fold-up metal stand because there is nothing to press against (in rehearsals musicians often have to write fingering, bowing and other markings in the music).
There are also very small music stands that do not have legs and are designed to be put on a table.  These can be used for any kind of instrument that can be played sitting at a table.

There are also small ones that can be attached to the instrument itself.  These are used in marching bands. Thomas Jefferson, former president of the United States, invented a revolving music stand which he never patented because he wanted people to be able to use his invention for free.

There are also digital music stands.  When the violinist Tasmin Little played the Ligeti Violin Concerto at a Prom in 2003 she used a special, computerized music stand that had been made for her.  There were no gaps in the music where she could have turned the pages of an ordinary music score.  Instead, the music was on a computer screen, and she moved to the next page by pressing a pedal with her foot.  There was also another pedal for turning back a page which was important to have when practising and for rehearsal.

References
References 

Musical equipment
Cumulative voting is a system for doing an election. There are a certain number of choices. Each voter has a certain number of points he or she can spread over the choices. That way it is possible to choose more than one option, and to weigh the choices. Usually, this applies when there is more than one position being elected at the same time.  For example, it can be used to elect more than one member of a governing board.  In cumulative voting, if five positions are to be elected, a voter could cast one vote for each of five different candidates, or the voter could give all five of his votes to one candidate, or two votes to one candidate and three votes to a different candidate.  Bullet voting is giving all of the votes to one candidate.

Cumulative voting is used to elect representatives in many companies. It is also used to elect some governments. Switzerland and Germany use it for some elections. 

It will lead to a proportional representation.

Voting systems
Proportional representation is a system used to elect seats in a country's parliament or other type of legislature.  

Proportional representation works by taking the results of an election to decide how many seats each political party receives. It is calculated out of a political party's total number of votes in the election what that number is as a percentage (%) of all the votes cast in the election. This percentage is then equal to the amount of votes the party will receive. For example, if a party gets 20% of the vote, it will receive 20% of the seats in the legislature. Most countries have a minimum percentage a party has to recieve to get seats. This minimum is usually between 3% and 5% of the total overall vote.

Another way to do this is to take the first-past-the-post system in which constituencies vote in one member. The United Kingdom works this way.
In most western countries, there is more than one political party. Each elected representative will be a member of one or another party. If one party has an overall majority, then it forms the government. Otherwise the government must have members of more than one party.

Countries which use proportional representation include: Austria, Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey.

Countries which have systems that are similar or use semi-proportional representation include: Australia, Germany, Hungary, India, Republic of Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, and Thailand. 

Similar principles apply to sub-regions, who may have their own parliament or assembly.

References

Voting systems
William "Smokey" Robinson (born February 19, 1940 in Detroit, Michigan) is an American R&B singer-songwriter. Most of his hit records were on Motown Records or one of its labels, and many of them were performed with The Miracles, his longtime band. 

Robinson is an African American. His mother died when he was young; his sister raised him afterwards. Robinson met Berry Gordy when Motown first became famous. He showed Gordy the lyrics to a song he had written. When Gordy asked if Smokey had any other songs, the young man pulled out a notebook with nearly a hundred of them. Few of the songs had potential, but Gordy liked what he saw in Robinson, and signed him and his band to Motown. Gordy helped Robinson become a better songwriter, and sometimes they wrote together. Some of Robinson's songs, like "My Girl" and "My Guy", were hits for other Motown artists.
Robinson's hits with the Miracles included "Goin' to a Go-Go", "You Really Got a Hold On Me", "Shop Around", "Ooh Baby Baby", "Mickey's Monkey", and "Baby, Baby Don't Cry". Stevie Wonder gave Robinson an unfinished song he'd begun in the studio, to see if he could add lyrics and a tune. The song reminded Robinson of circus music, and he remembered I Pagliacci, an opera about clowns. The finished song was called "The Tears of a Clown", and it became another hit.

Robinson left the Miracles during the 1970s, and began a solo career. The Miracles still had hits (like "Love Machine"), and so did Robinson, with songs like "Cruisin'" and "Being With You".

In the 2000s, Robinson went into the frozen food business, with a line of gumbos and similar cuisine.

Other websites

1940 births
Living people
African American musicians
American R&B musicians
American singer-songwriters
Singers from Detroit
Sir Andrew Frank Davis CBE (born 2 February 1944) is a British conductor.

Andrew Davis was born in Ashridge in Hertfordshire to Robert J. Davis and his wife Florence J. (née Badminton), Davis grew up in Chesham, Buckinghamshire, and in Watford. He studied at the Royal College of Music, King's College, Cambridge where he was organ scholar, and in Rome with Franco Ferrara.

In 1970 he took his first important job:  associate conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.  In 1975, he took the job of principal conductor with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.  He gave up this job in 1988, but has continued to be called their Conductor Laureate (honorary conductor).

In 1988, Davis became music director at Glyndebourne, where he met the American soprano Gianna Rolandi, whom he later married.  Davis returned to the BBC in 1989 to become chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, where he held the post until 2000.
Queen Elizabeth II made Davis a CBE in May 1992.  In January 1999, she appointed him a Knight Bachelor in the New Year Honours List. In 2002, he conducted the Prom at the Palace concert, held in the gardens of Buckingham Palace as part of the celebrations for the Queen's Golden Jubilee.

Davis became the music director and principal conductor of the Lyric Opera of Chicago in 2000.  In 2005, he took on the post of Music Advisor to the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra for three years.
 
Davis has conducted lots of music.  He is especially fond of music by British composers such as Michael Tippett and Harrison Birtwistle.  He was a great favourite at the BBC Proms during his years with the BBC Symphony Orchestra.  He often conducted the Last Night of the Proms and made a witty speech.

Sir Andrew Davis is not related to the conductor Sir Colin Davis

References

Other websites

Sir Andrew Davis official website
1944 births
Living people
British conductors
Knights Bachelor
Commanders of the Order of the British Empire
Alumni of King's College, Cambridge
is a type of Japanese poetry. Previously called hokku, haiku was given its current name by the Japanese writer Masaoka Shiki at the end of the 19th century.

The traditional hokku usually was written in six verses or more or less 5, 7, 5 syllables and they had to follow (on-ji).  The Japanese word cow, meaning "sound", corresponds to a mora, a phonetic unit similar but not identical to the syllable of a language such as English.  A haiku has a special season word (the kigo) to represent the season in which the poem is set, or a reference to the natural world.

Haiku usually breaks in three parts, called kireji, normally placed at the end of the first five or second seven morae. In Japanese, there are actual kireji words. In English, kireji is often replaced with commas, hyphens, elipses, or breaks in the haiku. Japanese haiku are normally written in one line, while English language haiku are traditionally separated into three lines.
In Japanese, nouns do not have different singular and plural forms, so "haiku" is used as both a singular and plural noun in English as well.

Examples 
Japanese hokku and haiku are traditionally printed in one vertical line.

 An example of classic hokku by poet Bashō:
古池や蛙飛込む水の音　
Furu ike ya kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto
An old pond
When the frogs jump in
The sound of water

 Another haiku by Bashō:
初しぐれ猿も小蓑をほしげ也
Hatsu shigure saru mo komino wo hoshige nari
The first cold shower;
Even the monkey seems to want
A little coat of straw.
(Coats and straw hats were normally used in Japan to protect from rain at the time)

Famous writers

Pre-Shiki period (hokku) 
 Matsuo Bashō (1644–1694)
 Onitsura (1661–1738)
 Yosa Buson (1716–1783)
 Kobayashi Issa (1763–1827)

Shiki and later (haiku) 
 Masaoka Shiki (1867–1902)
 Kawahigashi Hekigotō (1873–1937)
 Takahama Kyoshi (1874–1959)
 Taneda Santoka (1882–1940)
 Iida Dakotsu (1885–1962)
 Nakamura Kusatao (1901–1983)
Non-Japanese poets 
All of the poets below have some haiku. However, only Hackett and Virgilio are known for writing haiku. Richard Wright wrote some 4000 haiku in the last eighteen months of his life. Amiri Baraka recently wrote a collection of what he calls "low coup." This is his own version of  haiku. Poet Sonia Sanchez is also known for putting together haiku and the blues musical genre.

 Jake Dalton
 W. H. Auden
 Amiri Baraka
 Jorge Luis Borges
 Billy Collins
 Cid Corman
 Allen Ginsberg
 Nicolas Grenier

 James W. Hackett
 Dag Hammarskjöld
 Jack Kerouac
 Lenard D. Moore
 Octavio Paz
 José Juan Tablada
 Raymond Roseliep
 Kenneth Rexroth
 Sonia Sanchez

 Edith Shiffert
 Gary Snyder
 José Juan Tablada
 Nick-Kizzy-Virgilio
 Gerald Vizenor
 Richard Wright
 Jane Reichold
 Christos Dimitroulopoulos

Other websites
Other websites 

 Haiku for You
 "Aha! poetry" : Website with essays on and examples of haiku and related forms
 "Daily Haiku by Wisteria Press": Website offering a free daily haiku via email
 Haiku Society of America
 Wonder Haiku Worlds: A community portal for haiku and related forms
 In the moonlight a worm… : Ideas for teaching haiku writing that go beyond the syllable rule
 Haiku for People  – Haiku definitions and samples, online since 1995
 Shiki Haikusphere and NOBO list 
 Spanish Haikus
 "Young Leaves": Website of the Yuki Teikei Haiku Society showing the use of Japanese traditions in English-language haiku
 "Versions" : International community of haiku and tanka translators
 Haiku Society
 Haiku poems at Irreferencias (spanish)
 Random Haiku - random haikus with an API for your blog, myspace, Facebook profile

Hokku 
 Page on Yone Noguchi and hokku at Ehime University 
 David Coomler's blog with essays and information on hokku 

Japanese poetry
Poetry forms
Gennady Rozhdestvensky (4 May 1931, Moscow – 16 June 2018) was a Russian conductor. Rozhdestvensky was born into a musical family.  His name at first was Gennady Nikolayevich Anosov. When he started his musical career, he took his mother's maiden name. 

Rozhdestvensky studied conducting with his father Nikolai Anosov at the Moscow Conservatory. He studied piano with the great pianist Lev Oborin. When he was 20 years old, he conducted Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker ballet at the Bolshoi Theatre.  He soon became famous.  He gave the first performances of many works of Soviet composers, as well as the first Russian performance of Benjamin Britten's ''A Midsummer Night's Dream''.

Rozhdestvensky has conducted many orchestras and made many recordings.

In 1969, he married the pianist Viktoria Postnikova.
Rozhdestvensky is known for keeping his rehearsals short. He does this so that the orchestra do not get tired and are fresh for the performance.  Sometimes he walks about the stage while he conducts.  He does not stand on a podium (a raised platform).

Orchestras he has conducted

1951-61 Orchestra of the Bolshoi Theatre (conductor)
1961-74 Symphony Orchestra of All-Union Radio and Television (Moscow)
1964-70 Orchestra of the Bolshoi Theatre (principal conductor)
1974-85 Chamber Theatre Orchestra
1974-77 Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra (artistic director)
1978-81 BBC Symphony Orchestra (chief conductor)
1980-82 Vienna Symphony Orchestra
1983-91 USSR Ministry of Culture Symphony Orchestra
1992-95 Royal Stockholm Philharmonic

He has also conducted many of the world's greatest orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, the Royal Concertgebouw, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, and the London Symphony Orchestra.

Trivia
Trivia

His name "Rozhdestvensky" means "Christmas".
Sometimes, when he feels the orchestra are well prepared for a concert, he cancels a rehearsal so that the orchestra have some free time.  In Russia, the players in the orchestra sometimes call this "Rozhdestvensky kanikuli" ("Christmas holidays").

Notes

Rozhdestvensky, Gennady
1931 births
2018 deaths
Waka () or Yamato uta is a genre of Japanese poetry. Waka literally means "Japanese poem" in Japanese. The word waka was originally created by poets during the Heian Period to make clear the difference between native Japanese poetry and the kanshi (, "Chinese poems"). This meant that they put together several different styles, one of them being tanka ( lit. "short poem") and the other chōka ( lit. "long poem"). There are others: bussokusekika ( lit. "rock of the Buddha's footprint poem"), sedōka ( lit. "whirling head poem") and katauta ( lit. "poem fragment").

These last three forms were no longer used at the beginning of the Heian Period, and chōka also disappeared a short time after. So, the term waka came in time to mean the same as tanka. Tanka is a much older form of Japanese poetry than haiku.

Waka did not follow any rules of rhyme, nor line; it was a free style kind of poetry. This can be seen in this example of tanka written by poet Yamanoue no Okura (660 - 733)

Hyakunin Isshu
Hyakunin Isshu

Other websites
Ogura Hyakunin Isshu - 100 Poems by 100 Poets at University of Virginia Library Japanese Text Initiative
 2001 Waka for Japan 2001 
American Tanka magazine 
Tanka Society of America
Selected Tanka Bibliography with notes 

Japanese poetry
Poetry forms
Amiri Baraka (born Everett Leroy Jones; October 7, 1934 – January 9, 2014), previously known as LeRoi Jones, was an American writer. He has written poetry, drama, essays and music criticism. He is also the father of Newark city mayor Ras Baraka.

Baraka has been called "one of the most influential and prolific African American writers of the twentieth century."

Baraka's poetry and other writing have been both praised and hated. In the African-American community, some compare Baraka to James Baldwin. They see him as one of the most respected and most widely published black writers of his time. Others have said that his work shows much violence, misogyny, and homophobia.

Racism
Baraka's writings have made controversy over the years, mostly because of his advocacy of rape and violence towards (at many times) women, gay people, white people, and Jews. Critics of his work have said such words are examples of racism, sexism, homophobia, and anti-Semitism in his work.

The following is from a 1965 essay:
Most American white men are trained to be fags. For this reason it is no wonder their faces are weak and blank. … The average ofay [white person] thinks of the black man as potentially raping every white lady in sight. Which is true, in the sense that the black man should want to rob the white man of everything he has. But for most whites the guilt of the robbery is the guilt of rape. That is, they know in their deepest hearts that they should be robbed, and the white woman understands that only in the rape sequence is she likely to get cleanly, viciously popped.

Death
Baraka died January 9, 2014 in Newark, New Jersey after being hospitalized in the facility's intensive care unit for one month prior to his death. He was 79 years old. The cause of death was complications of surgery. Baraka had diabetes.
Works
Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note, poems, 1961
Blues Peple: Negro Music in White America, 1963
Dutchman and The Slave, drama, 1964
The System of Dante's Hell, novel, 1965
Home: Social Essays, 1965
Tales, 1967
Black Magic, poems, 1969
Four Black Revolutionary Plays, 1969
It's Nation Time, poems, 1970
Raise Race Rays Raize: Essays Since 1965, 1971
Hard Facts, poems, 1975
The Motion of History and Other Plays, 1978
Poetry for the Advanced, 1979
reggae or not!, 1981
Daggers and Javelins: Essays 1974-1979, 1984
The Autobiography of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka, 1984
The Music: Reflections on Jazz and Blues, 1987
Transbluesency: The Selected Poems of Amiri Baraka/LeRoi Jones, 1995Wise, Why’s Y’s, essays, 1995Funk Lore: New Poems, 1996Somebody Blew Up America'', 2001

References

Other websites 

homepage of Amiri Baraka 
Modern American Poetry Page: Amiri Baraka 
Amiri Baraka at PennSound
African American writers
American activists
American Muslims
American playwrights
American poets
American communists
Deaths from surgical complications
Writers from Newark, New Jersey
1934 births
2014 deaths
Jorge Luis Borges (August 24, 1899 – June 14, 1986) was an Argentine writer. He was best known in the English-speaking world for his short stories and fictive essays. Borges was also a poet, critic, translator and man of wisdom.

He was influenced by authors such as Dante Alighieri, Miguel de Cervantes, Franz Kafka, H.G. Wells, Rudyard Kipling, Arthur Schopenhauer and G. K. Chesterton.

Quotations 

 "The earth we inhabit is an error, an incompetent parody. Mirrors and paternity are abominable because they multiply and affirm it." — (dogma of a fictional religion in "Hakim, the masked dyer of Merv".  Part of this quote is also attributed to a heresiarch of Uqbar in "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius".)

 "The central fact of my life has been the existence of words and the possibility of weaving those words into poetry."
"I do not write for a select minority, which means nothing to me, nor for that adulated platonic entity known as 'The Masses'. Both abstractions, so dear to the demagogue, I disbelieve in. I write for myself and for my friends, and I write to ease the passing of time." — Introduction to The Book of Sand

 "I have always imagined that paradise will be a kind of library."

Other websites
Borges Center, University of Iowa : important internet resources including bibliographies, chronologies, full text articles and books, and information on the journal Variaciones Borges
 BBC Radio 4: In Our Time  Archive page for edition about Borges in a series on the 'History of Ideas'. Includes link to streaming audio.
 The Modern Word: The Garden of Forking Paths . A comprehensive Web site dedicated to exploring Borges and his work, including pages that discuss writers that Borges influenced.
 Internetaleph. Fully bilingual (English/Spanish) portal dedicated to Jorge Luis Borges. Links, recent news, reading suggestions and an introduction for beginners.
 The Borgesian Cyclopaedia. "Being a Virtual Reference to the World of Jorge Luis Borges".
 Hallucinating Spaces, or the Aleph  An essay from Borgesland by Susana Medina
The Friends of Jorge Luis Borges Worldwide Society & Associates  A non-Governmental and not for profit organization with four distinctive entities that aim to promote artistic and intellectual talents along with civic virtues in new generations of mankind. Borges' works ("a writer of writers" for his extensive and insightful readings) are celebrated as a thread of Ariadne to walk the labyrinths of Philosophy and Literature and all fields of knowledge in quest of wisdom.
 Fundación San Telmo's Jorge Luis Borges Collection 
 The Norton Lectures, delivered at Harvard University in the fall of 1967, by Jorge Luis Borges
 Borges' Bad Politics Slate.com presents an essay by Clive James arguing that Borges could have done more to engage with Argentina's political situation
 "El Tango"  on audio MP3 (in Spanish)
 Rend(er)ing L.C.: Susan Daitch Meets Borges & Borges, Delacroix, Marx, Derrida, Daumier, and Other Textualized Bodies William A. Nericcio (1993); pdf full-text
1899 births
1986 deaths
Writers from Buenos Aires
Argentine poets
Argentine translators
was a Japanese poet. He is known for his haiku poems and his journals. He is thought of as one of the four haiku masters in Japan. The others are Bashō, Buson and Shiki.

Other websites 
 Haiku of Kobayashi Issa A searchable online archive of 9000 haiku by David G. Lanoue. Originally housed at Xavier University of Louisiana, this archive was moved after Hurricane Katrina to its present, permanent location.
 一茶発句全集 (The complete haiku of Issa)
 一茶記念館 (Issa Memorial Museum) 

1763 births
1828 deaths

Japanese writers
Japanese poets
People from Nagano Prefecture
was the pen-name of a Japanese author, poet, literary critic, and journalist in Meiji period of Japan. His real name was Masaoka Tsunenori. As a child he was called Noboru.

Other websites 
 Selected Poems (haiku and tanka) of Masaoka Shiki, Translated by Janine Beichman at University of Virginia Library Japanese Text Initiative poem translations from 'Masaoka Shiki' by Janine Beichman
 Ehime University site on Masaoka Shiki with photos, poetry 
 fan site with bio and poems
 National Diet Library bio and photos

Japanese poets
Japanese journalists
1867 births
1902 deaths
People from Ehime Prefecture
Quotations
 (from 1999): As I'm writing, I'm always reader conscious. I have one reader in mind, someone who is in the room with me, and who I'm talking to, and I want to make sure I don't talk too fast, or too glibly. Usually I try to create a hospitable tone at the beginning of a poem. Stepping from the title to the first lines is like stepping into a canoe. A lot of things can go wrong.
 (from 2004): Moving from the position of United States poet laureate to New York State poet laureate might seem like a demotion or a drop in rank to the military-minded. It might even appear that I am heading toward eventually being crowned laureate of my ZIP code. But in fact, it is very gratifying to be honored again as a representative of poetry, this time by my native state where I grew up — more or less — and continue to live.
Other websites 
 Watch a collection of 11 animated poems read aloud by Billy Collins 
 33 poems read aloud by Billy Collins, no charge (Creative Commons)
 Poems by Billy Collins at PoetryFoundation.org
 Griffin Poetry Prize biography (2004 judge and award emcee) 
 Billy Collins at poets.org
 Billy Collins at poetenladen.de (poetshop)

1941 births
Living people
Writers from New York City
Wind power in Texas consists of many wind farms with a total installed generating capacity of 9,410 MW from over 40 different projects. Texas produces the most wind power of any U.S. state, followed by Iowa with 3,670 MW.

Several forces are working to the advantage of wind power in Texas: the wind resource in many areas of the state is very large, large projects are relatively easy to site, and the market price for electricity is relatively high because it is set by natural gas prices. The wind power industry is also creating many jobs and farmers may earn extra income by leasing their land to wind developers.

The Roscoe Wind Farm (781 MW) is the world's largest wind farm. Other large wind farms in Texas include: Horse Hollow Wind Energy Center, Sherbino Wind Farm, Capricorn Ridge Wind Farm, Sweetwater Wind Farm, Buffalo Gap Wind Farm, King Mountain Wind Farm, Desert Sky Wind Farm, Wildorado Wind Ranch, and the Brazos Wind Farm.
Overview
Wind power has a long history in Texas. West Texas State University began wind energy research in 1970 and led to the formation of the Alternative Energy Institute (AEI) in 1977. AEI has been a major information resource about wind energy for Texas.

Texas is firmly established as the leader in wind power development in the USA, ahead of Iowa and California. The expanding wind power market will help Texas meet its 2015 renewable energy goal of 5,000 new megawatts of power from renewable sources.

The table below lists the larger wind farms in Texas, currently operating or under construction. Wind farms which are smaller than 120 MW in capacity are not shown.
Several forces are driving the growth of wind power in Texas: the wind resource in many areas of the state is very large, large projects are relatively easy to site, and the market price for electricity is set by natural gas prices and so is relatively high. The broad scope and geographical extent of wind farms in Texas is considerable:
"Wind resource areas in the Texas Panhandle, along the Gulf Coast south of Galveston, and in the mountain passes and ridge tops of the Trans-Pecos offer Texas some of the greatest wind power potential in the United States. Currently there are over 2,000 wind turbines in West Texas alone. Most of the new wind capacity added in the last two years has been in the Abilene-Sweetwater area. The Horse Hollow Wind Energy Center is the largest wind power facility in the nation with a total capacity of 735 MW. It is spread across approximately 47,000 acres in Taylor and Nolan County near Abilene."
Wind is a highly variable resource, but with proper understanding it can be readily incorporated into an electric utility's generation mix. Many areas contain areas with winds presently suitable for electric power generation. The number of commercially attractive sites will expand as wind turbine technology improves and development costs continue to drop.

Texas farmers may lease their land to wind developers for either a set rental per turbine or for a small percentage of gross annual revenue from the project. This offers farmers a fresh revenue stream without impacting traditional farming and grazing practices. Although leasing arrangements vary widely, the U. S. Government Accountability Office reported in 2004 that a farmer who leases land to a wind project developer can generally obtain royalties of $3,000 to $5,000 per turbine per year in lease payments. These figures are rising as larger wind turbines are being produced and installed.
The wind power industry is also creating thousands of jobs for communities and for the state. Wind technology and the various aspects of producing electricity from wind power can help to keep employment in Texas after the rigs stop producing oil.

Terrorism and industrial accidents can be potential threats to the large, centrally located, power plants that provide most of Texas’ electricity. Should one of these plants be damaged, repairs could take more than a year, possibly creating power shortages on a scale that Texans have never experienced before. Coal trains and gas pipelines are also vulnerable to disruption. However, wind power plants are quickly installed and repaired. The modular structure of a wind farm also means that if one turbine is damaged, the overall output of the plant is not significantly affected.

References

Wind energy
Texas
is a famous Japanese game designer.  He was born in 1958.  For most of his life, he has worked for Sega.  Some people say he is as famous as Shigeru Miyamoto.  Suzuki created games like Hang-On and Virtua Fighter and Shenmue.  He was person #6 who was added to the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame.

Both of Suzuki's parents were school teachers.  When Suzuki was growing up, he wanted to be a dentist.  But he could not pass the test, so he decided to study computers instead.  In 1983 he started working at Sega.  In 1993 he wrote a famous game called Virtua Fighter.  It was so famous, that it was added to the Smithsonian museum in Washington DC, as an example of an important game.

Personal life
Suzuki said in an interview that he greatly enjoys creating games. However, he has doesn't care much about playing them. he would rather spend his free time watching movies and visiting theme parks.

Games developed

Canceled games
Canceled games

On top of games, Yu Suzuki lead the creation of a technical demo "Tower of Babel" prepared for the Dreamcast showcase at Tokyo New Otani Hotel on May 1st 1998.

Hardware developed
Sega Space Harrier (1985)
Sega Model 1 (1992)
Sega Model 2 (1993)
Sega Model 3 (1996)

Dreamcast (1998)
Sega NAOMI (1998)

References

Japanese video game designers
Sega people
1958 births
Living people
People from Iwate Prefecture
The Isra and Mi'raj are two parts of a story that Muslims tell about Muhammad.  They say that in the year 621, while he was resting in the Kaaba in Mecca, an angel came to him, with an animal called a Buraq.  The Buraq carried Muhammad to a mosque that was far away, and then the Buraq took Muhammad up into heaven.  While in Heaven, Muhammad met Adam and Moses and Allah (God), and then came back down to Earth.

Every year, Muslims hold a festival for the Isra and Mi'raj.  They bring their children to the mosques, where the children can hear the story, and then pray with the grownups.  Afterwards there is a feast and everyone can eat.

History of Islam
Quran
Fustat was the first Arab capital in Egypt.  It was founded in 641 AD, after the Arabs conquered Alexandria.  The Arabs did not want their capital to be so far away as Alexandria, which is why they made Fustat, which was far from the sea and closer to Arabia, and was on their side of the Nile river.

Fustat became a beautiful and powerful city for over 500 years, but then it was destroyed in 1168, when its vizier Shawar told his army to burn the city.  Shawar did not want the crusaders to capture the city, so he burned it instead.

Today there is not much left of Fustat, but some buildings can be seen in Old Cairo.

Cities in Egypt
641 establishments
Establishments in Egypt
7th-century establishments in Africa
Cairo
A vizier  is an Arabic word for a kind of government official in some Muslim countries. A vizier would usually work for a Muslim monarch like a Caliph, Sultan or an Emir.

Related pages
Grand vizier

Notes

References
 Etymology OnLine
 Royal Ark, dynasties in historical context - see each muslim nation quoted in this article, often in the section 'Glossary'
 WorldStatesmen - click on each Islamic present state

Heads of state
Mughal Empire
Government occupations
Randall Hank Williams (born May 26, 1949) is an American musician and songwriter. He is the son of country music legend Hank Williams. His nickname is "Bocephus", given to him by his father. He has a half-sister, named Jett Williams.

From his boyhood, Hank Jr., performed his father's music publicly, because many people were still interested in it, and Hank Sr.'s career was cut short by alcohol and drug abuse. Young Williams wanted to perform music of his own, and to have his own musical career apart from his father's, but it was hard to "get out from his father's shadow", and be recognized for his own talents.

In time, Williams met musicians who liked him for his own ideas, and helped him to develop his own kind of music. He was able to become an original writer and performer, while still being proud to be Hank Sr.'s son. Some of his father's fans were sad that he wanted to do this, but others understood. He also gained new fans, performing his new music.