title: Geto Boys

text: In the early 1990s, several American politicians attacked rap artists associated with the subgenre gangsta rap, including the Geto Boys. A high-profile incident in which Bushwick Bill lost an eye in a shooting helped boost sales of the group's 1991 album "We Can't Be Stopped". The album cover features a graphic picture of the injured Bushwick being carted through a hospital by Scarface and Willie D. On the album's title track, the group responded to Geffen Records ending its distribution deal with Def American. The album featured the single "Mind Playing Tricks on Me," which became a hit and charted at No. 23 on the "Billboard" Hot 100.


title: Geto Boys

text: After Willie D left the group, Scarface and Bushwick Bill continued with the Geto Boys with the addition of Big Mike, who made his debut appearance with the group on 1993's album "Till Death Do Us Part". "Till Death Do Us Part" was certified gold. The album spawned one top 40 hit in "Six Feet Deep" which peaked at #40 on the "Billboard" Hot 100. Subsequently, Big Mike was dropped and Willie D returned for 1996's critically acclaimed "The Resurrection", and the 1998 followup "Da Good Da Bad & Da Ugly", of which Bushwick Bill was not a part. After three years on hiatus, the group reunited in 2002 to record its seventh album, "The Foundation", which was released on January 25, 2005. The Geto Boys were featured on Scarface's "My Homies Part 2" album.


title: Geto Boys

text: The song "Street Life" from "Till Death Do Us Part" was featured on the motion picture "South Central". A video clip for the song with footage from the film was released. Although the band rarely releases albums or perform together, the group came together for a reunion at Cypress Hill's SmokeOut festival in San Bernardino, California on October 23, 2009. In 2010, Bushwick Bill was threatened with deportation to Jamaica. In a 2015 DJ Vlad interview, Scarface stated that he will not be involved in another Geto Boys album.


title: Geto Boys

text: On August 24, 2018, founding member DJ Ready Red died at the age of 53, from an apparent heart attack.


title: Geto Boys

text: Following the stage 4 pancreatic cancer diagnosis of Bushwick Bill, a farewell tour, titled "The Beginning of a Long Goodbye, The Final Farewell" was announced, with a portion of the proceeds being donated to pancreatic cancer awareness. But this tour was cancelled at the last minute. On June 9, 2019, Bushwick Bill died at the age of 52 of pancreatic cancer.


title: Geto Boys

text: The group's name, Geto Boys, comes from an alternate spelling of the word "ghetto". For its first two albums, "Making Trouble" (1988) and "Grip It! On That Other Level" (1989), the spelling was the English standard "Ghetto Boys". For their third album, "The Geto Boys", they changed it to the "Geto" spelling, which the group has used since. The Geto Boys' lyrics push gangsta rap themes to extremes, and sometimes focus on murder, explicit sex, and violence. The group is credited for putting Southern hip hop on the hip hop music map and inspired a legion of acts, including 2Pac, Eminem, UGK, T.I., Goodie Mob, Outkast, 50 Cent, Chamillionaire, Jay-Z, Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, Young Jeezy, Juvenile, Mystikal, Mac Lethal, Esham and Insane Clown Posse. Insane Clown Posse's Violent J (Joseph Bruce) described the Geto Boys as the first rappers to perform horrorcore, with their song "Assassins", released on their debut album, "Making Trouble". Bruce says that the Geto Boys continued to pioneer the style with their second release "Grip It! On That Other Level", with songs such as "Mind of a Lunatic" and "Trigga-Happy Nigga". Conversely, "The Unseen", a song which appears on the group's compilation "Uncut Dope", expresses anti-abortion views.


title: Geto Boys

text: The Geto Boys' popularity was boosted somewhat in 1999 by the prominent use of two songs—"Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangsta" (released as a promotional single for the 1992 compilation album "Uncut Dope") and "Still" (from "The Resurrection")—in Mike Judge's comedy satire film "Office Space". The song "Mind of a Lunatic" has been covered by many recording acts including Marilyn Manson in 2003, as a B-side off the album "The Golden Age of Grotesque". The single "Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangsta" has also been covered by the band Aqueduct and country singer Carter Falco. Their song "Mind Playing Tricks on Me" was featured in the video game "Grand Theft Auto V" and also in the Netflix series "Maniac".


title: Geto Boys

text: The Geto Boys are also heavily influenced by the social politics of the day. Their lyrics have consistently included themes ranging from police brutality (such as in "Crooked Officer") to concerns over the negative impact of violence on the urban community (such as "The World Is a Ghetto", "Geto Fantasy", and "Six Feet Deep").


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The "Olympic"-class ocean liners were a trio of British ocean liners built by the Harland & Wolff shipyard for the White Star Line during the early 20th century. They were (1911), "Titanic" (1912) and (1915). All three were designed to be the largest and most luxurious passenger ships at that time, designed to give White Star an advantage in the transatlantic passenger trade.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: While "Olympic", the lead vessel, had a career spanning 24 years and was retired and sold for scrap in 1935, her sisters would not see similar success: "Titanic" struck an iceberg and sank on her maiden voyage and "Britannic" was lost during World War I after hitting a mine off Kea in the Aegean Sea before she could enter passenger service.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Although two of the vessels did not have successful careers, they are among the most famous ocean liners ever built. Both "Olympic" and "Titanic" enjoyed the distinction of being the largest ships in the world. "Olympic" was the largest British-built ship in the world for over 20 years until the commissioning of in 1936. "Titanic"s story has been adapted into many books, films, and television programs and "Britannic" inspired a film of the same name in 2000.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The "Olympic" class had its origins in the intense competition between the United Kingdom and Germany in the construction of the liners. The Norddeutscher Lloyd and Hamburg America Line, the two largest German companies, were indeed involved in the race for speed and size in the late 19th century. The first in service for the Norddeutscher Lloyd was , which won the Blue Riband in 1897 before being beaten by HAPAG's in 1900.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Then followed the three sister ships to "Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse": , and all of whom were part of a "". In response to this, the British Cunard Line ordered two vessels whose speed earned them the nickname "'greyhounds of the seas"': and . "Mauretania" kept the Blue Riband for more than twenty years, from 1909 to 1929.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The White Star Line knew that their Big Four, a quartet of ships built for size and luxury, were no match for the Cunard's new liners in terms of speed. In 1907, J. Bruce Ismay, president of the White Star and William J. Pirrie, director of the Harland & Wolff shipyards decided to build three vessels. The "Olympic"-class ships were built to surpass rival Cunard's "Lusitania" and "Mauretania" in size and luxury. "Olympic", along with "Titanic" and the soon to be built "Britannic"–, were intended to be the largest and most luxurious ships to operate on the North Atlantic, but not the fastest, as the White Star Line had already switched from high speed to size and luxury. The three vessels were designed by Thomas Andrews and Alexander Carlisle.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Construction of "Olympic" started in December 1908 and "Titanic" in March 1909. The two ships were built side by side. The construction of "Britannic" began in 1911 after the commissioning of "Olympic" and "Titanic" launch. Following the sinking of "Titanic", the two remaining vessels underwent many changes in their safety provisions.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: All three of the "Olympic"-class ships had nine decks, seven of which were for passenger use. From top to bottom, the decks were:


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Propulsion was achieved through three propellers: two outboard or wing propellers had three blades, while the central propeller had four. The two lateral propellers were powered by reciprocating steam triple expansion, while the central shaft was driven by a steam turbine. All power on board was derived from a total of 29 coal-fired steam boilers in six compartments. However, "Olympic"s boilers were adapted for firing by oil at the end of the First World War, which reduced the number of engine crew required from 350 to 60.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The "Olympic"-class ships were long, displacing normally (their draft at this displacement being ), and their tonnage was around 45–46,000 GRT. "Olympic" became the largest ship in the world when it was completed in May, 1911 before losing the title to its sister "Titanic" when she was completed in April, 1912. After the loss of "Titanic", the third sister ship "Britannic" claimed the title of largest British-built ship, until her own sinking in November 1916. After this "Olympic" had the title for 20 years until the commissioning of in 1936.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: All three vessels had four funnels, with the fourth being a dummy which was used for ventilation and aesthetic purposes. Smoke from the galleys and Smoking Room fireplaces and fumes from the engine rooms was exhausted through a chimney up the forward portion of this funnel. While it was a decoration to establish a symmetry in the ships' profile, it acted as a huge ventilation shaft, replacing a large amount of ventilation cowls on deck, as on Cunard's "Lusitania" and "Mauretania".


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The trio of ships incorporated advanced safety precautions into their designs, intended to mitigate the risk of flooding and all but eliminate the chances of foundering. Each ship featured an inner skin, a second layer of thick steel above the keel which created a watertight box along the bottom of the hull known as a "double bottom." 15 transverse steel bulkheads reaching up to E Deck (D Deck in the case of the two forward most bulkheads) divided the hulls of each ship into 16 watertight compartments, each equipped with an electric pump to remove floodwater. The compartments could be sealed by automatic doors from the bridge in the event of a collision, preventing water from spreading to other parts of the ship. "Olympic" and "Titanic" were so designed that either could stay afloat with four compartments breached. The "Olympic"-class liners also eliminated longitudinal bulkheads, such as those on "Lusitania" and "Mauretania", which separated the coal bunkers along either side of the hull from the engine rooms and boiler rooms in the center. Such an arrangement was believed to increase the risk of a ship capsizing by trapping water lengthwise along the ship and increasing her list to one side.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The sinking of "Titanic" revealed serious faults in the design of the "Olympic"-class liners, needing a major refit for "Olympic" in late 1912 and major design changes to "Britannic", which was still in the early phases of construction. "Titanic" had sunk because her five forward compartments had been breached, above the keel but below the waterline, bypassing the double-bottom completely. The low height of the bulkheads had also failed the ship, allowing for uncontrolled flooding once the water in the breached compartments had reached E Deck. The refit on "Olympic" raised the middle five bulkheads to B Deck, the others to D Deck and also extended the double-bottom along the hull up to G Deck. These improvements were incorporated into "Britannic", along with two additional bulkheads. Such improvements meant that both "Olympic" and "Britannic" could survive the scenario that had caused their sister ship to founder. The three ships were fitted with brass three-chime triple-chambered steam whistles on all four funnels. Only the whistles on the first and second funnels functioned however, as those on the third and fourth funnels were dummies fitted for aesthetic reasons and had no valves or bellows.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Each ship could accommodate a maximum of 64 lifeboats. However, only 20 boats were installed on "Olympic" and "Titanic" during construction to avoid cluttering the deck and provide more space for passengers. Shipbuilders of the era envisaged the ocean liner itself as the ultimate lifeboat and therefore imagined that a lifeboat's purpose was that of a ferry between a foundering liner and a rescue ship. Despite the low number of lifeboats, both "Olympic" and "Titanic" exceeded Board of Trade regulations of the time. Following the sinking of "Titanic", more lifeboats were added to "Olympic" (some lifeboats might even have been from the foundered "Titanic"). "Britannic", meanwhile, was equipped with eight huge gantry davits, six along the Boat Deck and two on the Poop Deck at the stern. Each contained six lifeboats and were individually powered by electric motors with their own night time illumination. In the event that the ship should develop a list and make the lowering of lifeboats impossible along one side, the davits could be manoeuvred to pick up lifeboats from the other side of the deck.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The three vessels had a total of 8 levels of passenger accommodation, with slight variations between the ships. However, no class was neglected. The first class passengers enjoyed luxurious cabins and many were mostly equipped with private bathrooms, a novelty at the time. The two most luxurious suites included a private promenade deck, sitting room, two walk-in wardrobes, two bedrooms, a private bath, and lavatory. Each class had its own large dining saloon, while first class also featured a lavish Grand Staircase descending in seven levels through the ship,(a second smaller grand staircase which only transcended down three decks.) a Georgian-style smoking room, a Veranda Cafe decorated with palm trees, a swimming pool, Turkish bath, gymnasium, and several other places for meals and entertainment. The "Olympic"-class liners were the first British ships to contain separate restaurants independent of the dining saloons. These were in imitation of the precedent set on the German Hamburg-America liner (1905), which had included a restaurant serving French "haute cuisine" run by the famous hotelier César Ritz. "Olympic" and "Titanic" had "À la Carte" restaurant aft on B-Deck run by the London restaurateur Luigi Gatti and his staff, all of whom died in the sinking of "Titanic".


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The second class also included a smoking room, a library, a spacious dining room, and an elevator. "Britannic"s second class also featured a gymnasium.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Finally, the third-class passengers enjoyed reasonable accommodation compared to other ships, if not up to the second and first classes. Instead of large dormitories offered by most ships of the time, the third-class passengers of the "Olympic" class lived in cabins containing two to ten bunks. The class also had a smoking room, a common area, and a dining room. "Britannic" provided third-class passengers more comfort than its two sister ships.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: First of the "Olympic"-class liners, "Olympic" was launched on 20 October 1910 and commissioned on 14 June 1911. She made her maiden voyage on 14 June 1911, under the command of Captain Edward J. Smith, to great fanfare and acclaim. On 20 September of the same year, while under the command of a harbour pilot she was involved in a collision with the cruiser in the port of Southampton, leading to her repair back at Harland and Wolff and delaying the completion of "Titanic". When her sister sank, "Olympic" was on her way across the Atlantic, in the opposite direction. She was able to receive a distress call from "Titanic" but she was too far away to reach her before she sank. After the sinking of "Titanic", "Olympic" was returned to dry dock in October 1912, where she underwent a number of refinements to improve her safety. She then resumed her commercial service.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: During the First World War, the ship served as a troop transport. On 12 May 1918, she rammed and sank the German submarine . Once she was returned to commercial service in 1920, she crossed the Atlantic as one of a trio of grand White Star liners. The other two were seized as war reparations from Germany –the HAPAG's unfinished which was renamed "Majestic", and NDL's which became the "Homeric".


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: During the 1920s "Olympic" would enjoy great popularity on the transatlantic route, earning the nickname "'The Ship Magnificent"'. She often carried famous celebrities of the day, included the actor Charlie Chaplin and the then Prince of Wales Edward VIII. In 1934 she inadvertently collided with and sank , leading to the death of seven of the lightship's eleven crewmembers.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Despite a major refit later in her career, "Olympic" struggled to compete with her newer competitors. Following the merger of the White Star Line and Cunard Line in 1934, the ship was taken out of service in April 1935, and scrapped in Jarrow between 1935 and 1937.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Second in line of the "Olympic" class, "Titanic" was launched on 31 May 1911, and her commissioning was slightly delayed due to ongoing repairs of "Olympic". The ship left the port of Southampton 10 April 1912 for her maiden voyage, narrowly avoiding a collision with , a ship moored in the port pulled by the propellers of "Titanic". After a stopover at Cherbourg, France and another in Queenstown, Ireland, she sailed into the Atlantic with 2,200 passengers and crew on board, under the command of Captain Edward J. Smith headed for New York City. The crossing took place without major incident until Sunday, 14 April at 23:40.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: "Titanic" struck an iceberg at while sailing about 400 miles south of the Grand Banks of Newfoundland at 11:40 pm ships time. The strike and the resulting shock sheared the rivets, thus opening a leak in the hull below the waterline. This caused the first five compartments to be flooded with flooding in a sixth compartment controlled by the pumps; the ship could only stay afloat with four compartments flooded. "Titanic" sank 2 hours and 40 minutes after the collision. There were not enough lifeboats for all the passengers and the nearest responding ship () being too far away, 1,514 of the 2,224 people on board died, making it one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The third of the "Olympic"-class trio, "Britannic" was ordered in 1911 and launched on 26 February 1914 at the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast and fitting out began. In August 1914, before "Britannic" could commence transatlantic service between New York and Southampton, World War I began. Immediately, all shipyards with Admiralty contracts were given top priority to use available raw materials. All civil contracts (including "Britannic") were slowed down.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: On 13 November 1915, "Britannic" was requisitioned as a hospital ship from her storage location at Belfast. Repainted white and from bow to stern with large red crosses and a horizontal green stripe, she was renamed HMHS (His Majesty's Hospital Ship) "Britannic".


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: At 08:12 am on 21 November 1916, HMHS "Britannic" struck a mine at , and sank. Survivors numbered 1,036, and 30 men lost their lives in the disaster. One survivor, nurse Violet Jessop was notable as having also previously survived the sinking of "Titanic" in 1912, and had also been on board "Olympic", at the time when it collided with HMS "Hawke" in 1911. "Britannic" was the largest ship lost during World War I, but her sinking did not receive the same attention as the sinking of her sister ship, or the sinking of the Cunard liner , when she was sunk by a torpedo in the Irish Sea.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: When "Titanic" sank in 1912 and "Britannic" sank in 1916, their sinkings did not receive the same attention, due to the death toll (1,517 on "Titanic" and 30 on "Britannic") and the ongoing First World War. Because the exact position of the sinking of the "Britannic" is known and the location is shallow, the wreck was discovered relatively easily in 1975. "Titanic", however, drew everyone's attention in 1912. After several attempts, the wreck was finally located by Jean-Louis Michel of Ifremer and Robert Ballard following a top secret mission for the US Navy to investigate the wreckage of and , two nuclear submarines that sank in the North Atlantic in the 1960s. The discovery of the wreck occurred on 1 September 1985, at 25 kilometres from the position given of the sinking. The wreck lies about 4,000 metres deep, broken in two. The bow is relatively well preserved, but the stern partially imploded, and to a large extent disintegrated during the descent and impact on the seabed.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: The wreck of "Britannic" was discovered in 1975 by Jacques Cousteau. It has a large tear in the front caused by the bow hitting the ocean floor before the rest of the ship sank, as the ship's length is greater than the depth of the water. After the discovery, she has been seen regularly as part of many other expeditions. In contrast to "Titanic", which lies at the very bottom of the North Atlantic and is being fed on by iron-eating bacteria, "Britannic" is in remarkably good condition, and is much more accessible than her infamous sister. Many external structural features are still intact, including the propellers, and a great deal of the superstructure and hull.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Museums and exhibitions pay tribute to the ships, and the two tragedies have inspired many movies, novels and even musicals and video games.


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: When she was decommissioned in 1935, "Olympic" –the only surviving ship of her class– was previously set to be converted into a floating hotel, but the project was cancelled. However, its decorative elements were auctioned. The first class lounge and part of the aft grand staircase can be found in the White Swan Hotel, in Alnwick, Northumberland, England. The wood panels of the ship's À la Carte' restaurant are now restored on board the .


title: Olympic-class ocean liner

text: Due to the history and the story behind the sinking of the "Titanic", several attempts to recreate the ship, partly or totally, were made throughout the years, from floating replicas, inland recreations, to an actual reimagining of the ship.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: In Okinawa, a group of hardcore skaters participate in a secret, no-holds-barred competition after midnight known as "S", racing each other on skateboards down a winding road carved out of an abandoned mine and occasionally forming rivalries, also known as "beefs", with each other. Reki, a high school sophomore and hardcore skater, takes new transfer student Langa to S one night, and ends up pulling him into the world of skateboarding.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: In an interview with Wakanim, Studio No Border founder Thomas Romain said that after meeting with Bones about "Carole and Tuesday", him and the other crew at his studio ran into Suzuki, a producer on the show. She asked the studio if they were interested in designing skateboards for an original show, of which they ended up agreeing to do. The skateboards were specifically designed so that they could work if built in real life. Juliette Mercier, who had previous experience designing skateboards, ended up doing most of the designs. After some small changes, they were approved. When it came to the decals, they were purposely stylized to be unique to each character in order to symbolize their personalities. Ayumi Kakei did the designs for Reki and Langa's skateboards, with a "pop" style. French comic book artist Loic Locatelli did the decals for Shadow and Joe, while Thomas Romain did Adam's himself. In total, five different artists from the studio worked on the series, which was a first for them.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: The skaterboarders' moves were also inspired by real people, with one example being Miya's style, which has striking similarities to Rodney Mullen's style.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: Bones also ran a weekly blog for the series, where they shared various concepts sketches by Hiroko Utsumi alongside each episode's release.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: On September 13, 2020, it was reported that Hiroko Utsumi and Bones were working on an anime television series project. Further details were not revealed until the following week. On September 20, 2020, the series was officially announced. Utsumi directed the series, while Ichirō Ōkouchi oversaw the series' scripts, Michinori Chiba designed the characters and served as chief animation director, and Ryō Takahashi composed the series' music. The series aired from January 10 to April 4, 2021 on ABC and TV Asahi's programming block. The opening theme song is "Paradise" performed by Rude-α, while the ending theme song is performed by . The series ran for 12 episodes.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: On July 4, 2021, a new anime project for the series was announced. On August 14, 2022, the project was revealed to be a second season and an original video animation (OVA). The main staff from the previous season are reprising their roles.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: Aniplex of America licensed the series outside of Asia and streamed it on Funimation, AnimeLab, and Wakanim in their territories. In Southeast Asia, the series is licensed by Muse Communication, who streamed it on Bilibili. Muse later licensed the anime to Animax Asia for TV airings. Funimation produced a SimulDub for the series.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: A comedy manga spin-off by Toriyasu, titled "Sk8 Chill Out!", began serialization on Kadokawa Shoten's "Young Ace Up" manga website on January 11, 2021. A manga adaptation of the television series by Kazuto Kōjima released on the BookLive! e-book store under their Nino imprint starting on March 5, 2021.


title: SK8 the Infinity

text: Two stage play adaptations were announced on July 4, 2021. "SK8 Part 1" ran from December 2 to December 12, 2021. "SK8 Part 2" was scheduled to take place from January 15 to January 24, 2022, but the shows were canceled after a staff member tested positive for COVID-19.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Winnie the Pooh (Commonly shortened to Pooh Bear or simply Pooh) is a fictional teddy bear created by English author A. A. Milne, is one of the most popular characters adapted for film and television by The Walt Disney Company. Disney first received certain licensing rights to the Winnie the Pooh stories, characters, and trademarks from Stephen Slesinger, Inc. and the estate of A. A. Milne in 1961.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In 1961, Walt Disney Productions licensed certain film and other rights to the Winnie-the-Pooh characters, stories and trademarks from Stephen Slesinger, Inc. and the estate of A. A. Milne. and made a series of animated films about him. These early films were based on several of the original stories and the distinctive artwork made popular by Stephen Slesinger, Inc. during the 1930s through the 1960s. Alongside the animated versions, which Disney adapted from Slesinger, Slesinger's simplified lines and pastel color adaptations of Shepard's original illustrations are now marketed under the description "Classic Pooh".


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In 1977, Disney released the animated feature film "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh", introducing a new character named Gopher (which Gopher acknowledges by proclaiming, "I'm not in the book, you know"). The film constitutes three stories originally released as separate featurettes: "Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree" (1966), "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day" (1968), and "Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too" (1974). The 1977 release featured new bridging material and a new ending. A fourth featurette, "Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore", was released in 1983.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: The live-action TV series "Welcome to Pooh Corner" ran on the Disney Channel from 1983 to 1986. In 1988, Disney launched an animated TV series "The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh", which aired from 1988 to 1991 with a total of 83 episodes. Pooh appeared with Tigger in the anti-drug animated TV special "Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue".


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In 2000, Disney released the feature film "The Tigger Movie" in which the character of Tigger played the leading role. Due to its success, two more feature-length Pooh movies based on other characters were released to theaters: "Piglet's Big Movie" in 2003 and "Pooh's Heffalump Movie" in 2005. Pooh also made appearances in episodes of the animated series "House of Mouse", however he doesn't have any speaking lines and is mostly seen in the background.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Disney, along with Shadow Projects produced a puppet TV series for preschoolers, called "The Book of Pooh" which aired on Playhouse Disney from 2001 to 2003. Disney produced another series for preschoolers, called "My Friends Tigger & Pooh", which aired on Playhouse Disney from 2007 to 2010 and done in CGI. Pooh also makes a cameo appearance in the DreamWorks animated film, "Bee Movie" along with Piglet, at one point, a man spies Pooh and Piglet eating honey and Barry tells him to "take him out" with a tranquilizer dart.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: "Winnie the Pooh" was released in 2011. In April 2015, Deadline reported that Disney would develop a live action Winnie the Pooh movie with Brigham Taylor producing and Alex Ross Perry writing. The film focuses both on Pooh and the adult Christopher Robin returning to the Hundred Acre Woods and his reunion with Pooh and friends. "Christopher Robin" was released on August 3, 2018 by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures in the United States.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Sterling Holloway was the original voice of Pooh, starting with the 1966 theatrical featurette, "Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree", although the Disneyland Records version was actually released in 1965. Holloway continued to voice the character for over a decade, which included the next two theatrical featurettes, "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day" (1968) and "Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too" (1974), as well as several albums for Disneyland Records. Holloway's last performance as Pooh was for the bridging material in "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" (1977).


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Hal Smith, who also voiced Owl in the original theatrical featurettes, took over as the voice of Pooh in 1977, starting with the Disney Read-Along adaptation of "Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too". His first performance as Pooh in animation was for the 1981 short, "Winnie the Pooh Discovers the Seasons". He would continue to voice Pooh regularly for various projects up until the late 1980s, which included the theatrical featurette "Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore" (1983) and the TV series "Welcome to Pooh Corner".


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Jim Cummings was chosen to voice the character for the 1988 TV series, "The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh". Cummings has since become the official voice for the character, having voiced him in various TV series, video games, and movies, including the 2018 live-action film, "Christopher Robin".


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Pooh is a common character in the Disney Parks and the most common in the "Winnie the Pooh" franchise. He is also usually seen with Tigger and Eeyore, and occasionally Piglet, and is located in Fantasyland.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In the "Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom" attraction, Pooh has his own spell card known as "Winnie the Pooh's Honey Bees." Pooh also has his own show in Disneyland Paris, called "Winnie the Pooh and Friends, too!." In the same park, Pooh takes part on his own float in Disney Magic on Parade.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In the 2015 rendition of "World of Color", Pooh made a cameo appearance during the opening sequence, in honor of Walt Disney.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: During his lifetime, Milne was liberal with his grant of rights. At times he licensed the same exclusive rights to more than one entity.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In the United States, E. P. Dutton and Company acquired exclusive volume publication rights and Stephen Slesinger, Inc., acquired sole and exclusive rights to virtually all uses outside of the Dutton books as well as rights to any sorts of future uses. Beginning in 1930 Stephen Slesinger created all of the distinctive and colorful images of Pooh outside of the books. Under license from Slesinger, Pooh made his debuts in radio, film, animation, children's theatre, advertising and a host of consumer products and services protected by trademark. Outside of the U.S. and Canada, Milne retained most of his literary copyright rights which he left to four beneficiaries of his trust: The Garrick Club, Westminster School, The Royal Literary Fund and the A. A. Milne Family. By direction of Milne's will, the Pooh Properties Trust was formed. Mrs. Milne, trustee of the Milne Estate, and Spencer Curtis Brown, Trustee, licensed certain exclusive film rights to Disney in 1961. Christopher Robin Milne sold his rights to the other copyright holders, in order to raise money to support his daughter, before his death in 1996.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Sometime around 2000, the Pooh Properties Trust licensed additional rights to Disney and accepted a buyout of their claims to royalties as defined in a 1991 lawsuit brought by Stephen Slesinger, Inc. Although Slesinger's rights are arguably more valuable, the combined value paid by Disney to The Pooh Properties Trust is said to be approximately $300 million for Milne's portion of those rights.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: To further minimize Disney's legal exposure to Slesinger, Disney paid money to the Pooh Properties attorneys and trusts to use the name of Clare Milne, daughter of Christopher Robin, in an attempt to terminate certain of the copyright rights of Stephen Slesinger Inc, in the wake of the Sonny Bono "Copyright Term Extension Act" of 1998. The district court found in favor of Stephen Slesinger, Inc., as did the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. On June 26, 2006, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the case, thus sustaining the Appeals Court ruling.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In December 2005, Disney announced that Pooh's friend and owner Christopher Robin would be replaced as Pooh's main friend by a six-year-old "tomboyish" red-haired girl Darby for the Disney Channel animated television series, "My Friends Tigger & Pooh". Christopher Robin appeared intermittently in the series.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: In 2002, TV Guide compiled a list of the 50 greatest cartoon characters of all time as part of the magazine's 50th anniversary. Winnie the Pooh was given the honor of number 27.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: On April 11, 2006, Pooh was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, being the fourth Disney character to receive one after Mickey Mouse, Snow White and Donald Duck. The star is located on 6834 Hollywood Blvd.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Winnie the Pooh has been used in political satire and has created controversies in China since 2013. In that year, critics compared an image of Pooh and his friend Tigger to a picture of Chinese leader Xi Jinping and US president Barack Obama, who met at the G20 in Saint Petersburg, Russia.


title: Winnie the Pooh (Disney character)

text: Cartoons of Xi as Winnie the Pooh were regarded as disrespectful, but they continued to be used by critics. Dissident Liu Xiaobo and his wife Liu Xia were photographed holding Pooh mugs as an act of protest. Some commentators have speculated that the movie "Christopher Robin" has been banned in China as a result of these controversies.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The Batavian Republic (; ) was the successor state to the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands. It was proclaimed on 19 January 1795 and ended on 5 June 1806, with the accession of Louis Bonaparte to the Dutch throne. From October 1801 onward, it was known as the Batavian Commonwealth (). Both names refer to the Germanic tribe of the "Batavi", representing both the Dutch ancestry and their ancient quest for liberty in their nationalistic lore.


title: Batavian Republic

text: In early 1795, intervention by the French Republic led to the downfall of the old Dutch Republic. The new Republic enjoyed widespread support from the Dutch populace and was the product of a genuine popular revolution. However, it was founded with the armed support of the French revolutionary forces. The Batavian Republic became a client state, the first of the "sister-republics", and later part of the French Empire of Napoleon. Its politics were deeply influenced by the French, who supported no fewer than three "coups d'état" to bring the different political factions to power that France favored at different moments in its own political development. Nevertheless, the process of creating a written Dutch constitution was mainly driven by internal political factors and not by French influence until Napoleon forced the Dutch government to accept his brother, Louis Bonaparte, as monarch.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The political, economic, and social reforms that were brought about during the relatively short duration of the Batavian Republic have had a lasting impact. The confederal structure of the old Dutch Republic was permanently replaced by a unitary state. For the first time in Dutch history, the constitution that was adopted in 1798 had a genuinely democratic character. For a while, the Republic was governed democratically although the coup d'état of 1801 put an authoritarian regime in power after another change to the constitution. The influence of this democratic period helped smooth the transition to a more democratic government in 1848 (the constitutional revision by Johan Rudolph Thorbecke, limiting the power of the king). A type of ministerial government was introduced for the first time in Dutch history and many of the current government departments date their history back to this period.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Though the Batavian Republic was a client state of France, its successive governments tried to maintain a degree of independence and to serve Dutch interests even where they clashed with the interests of the French. This clash of interests led to the eventual demise of the Republic when the short-lived experiment with the regime of "Grand Pensionary" Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck proved unsatisfactory to Napoleon. The subsequent king Louis Bonaparte also refused to follow French dictates, which ultimately lead in turn to his downfall in 1810 when the territory was annexed into the French Empire.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Due to the disastrous Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, the Patriot party revolted against the authoritarian regime of stadtholder William V but were quickly struck down through the intervention of William's brother-in-law Frederick William II in September 1787. Most Patriots went into exile in France, while The Netherlands's own "Ancien Régime" strengthened its grip on Dutch government chiefly through the Orangist Grand Pensionary Laurens Pieter van de Spiegel. This "de facto" status of Anglo-Prussian protectorate was internationally formalized in 1788 by the Act of Guarantee (for which Great Britain and Prussia acted as guarantors) and the Triple Alliance between the Dutch Republic, Prussia, and Great Britain. The Netherlands was little more than a pawn for the major powers.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The French Revolution embraced many of the political ideas that the Patriots had espoused in their own revolt. The Patriots enthusiastically supported the Revolution, and when the French revolutionary armies started to spread the revolution, the Patriots joined in, hoping to liberate their own country from its authoritarian yoke. The Stadtholder joined the ill-fated First Coalition of countries in their attempt to subdue the suddenly anti-Austrian French First Republic. The Patriots sought French revolutionary aid in their struggle against the stadholder, but did not want to be considered territory conquered by France, but rather a "sister republic". There was open warfare, with the Patriots' cause dependent on its success on the battlefield. With the defeat of allies of the stadholder at Battle of Fleurus, Austria abandoned its interest in the southern Netherlands. French revolutionary forces were able to take advantage of the freezing of rivers in December 1794 and forced the stadholder into exile.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The French Revolutionary War proceeded disastrously for the forces of the Stadtholder. In the severe winter of 1794/95 a French army under general Charles Pichegru, with a Dutch contingent under general Herman Willem Daendels, crossed the great frozen rivers that traditionally protected the Netherlands from invasion. Aided by the fact that a substantial proportion of the Dutch population looked favorably upon the French incursion, and often considered it a liberation, the French were quickly able to break the resistance of the forces of the Stadtholder and his Austrian and British allies. However, in many cities revolution broke out even before the French arrived and Revolutionary Committees took over the city governments, and (provisionally) the national government also. William was forced to flee to England on a fishing boat on 18 January 1795.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The French presented themselves as liberators. But there were acrimonious negotiations between the representatives of the new Batavian Republic and those of the French Republic, and a harsh Treaty of The Hague was concluded on 16 May 1795. In addition to imposing territorial concessions and a huge indemnity, the treaty obligated the Dutch to maintain a French army of occupation of 25,000 men. To fulfill its responsibilities, Dutch financier Pieter Stadnitski joined a committee at the end of July 1795. To beat hyperinflation it was announced that from 3 August French soldiers in the Batavian Republic would be paid in sound Dutch currency and going forward no one could be obliged to accept French assignats. This changed the Dutch republic from a client state of Great Britain and Prussia into a French one; henceforth it would conduct a foreign and military policy dictated by France, where its predecessor had followed British dictates since 1787 (an offensive and defensive alliance of the two republics was part of the treaty). With the treaty, economic policies would in effect also be made subservient to the interests of France, but this did not mean that it lost its independence in all respects. The program of reform that the Dutch revolutionaries attempted to put in place, constrained by the political realities of the French revolution, was mostly driven by Dutch needs and aspirations. The political events in the Netherlands were mainly derived from Dutch initiative, with some notable exceptions. The French were responsible for at least one of the coups d'état, and the French ambassador often acted as a proconsul.


title: Batavian Republic

text: At first, the revolutionaries used the constitutional machinery of the old confederal republic. They resumed where they had left off after the purge in 1787 of Patriot regents, taking over the offices of the Orangist regents that were now purged in their turn. (For instance, the States of Holland and West Friesland were replaced by having the 18 cities that formally were represented in those States send representatives to a constituent assembly that formally abolished the States and founded a new body, the Provisional Representatives of the People of Holland, that took over the functions of the States of Holland as long as the States General continued to exist). Though the political make-up of the States-General changed appreciably because of this change in personnel, it retained a number of defenders of the old particularist interests. The first order of business of the revolutionaries therefore was to strive for the reform of the confederal state, with its discrimination of the Generality Lands, and of particular minorities (Catholics, Jews), in the direction of a unitary state, in which the minorities would be emancipated, and the old entrenched interests superseded by a more democratic political order. As a first step the representatives of Brabant were admitted to the States-General.


title: Batavian Republic

text: However, a grass-roots democratic movement began to form in the Summer of 1795, consisting of popular societies (clubs) and "wijkvergaderingen" (precinct meetings), demanding popular influence on the government. A kind of parallel government in the form of "general assemblies" sprang up next to the city governments and the provincial States that repeatedly came into conflict with the established order. In the Fall of 1795 the States-General started to work on a procedure to peacefully replace itself, "by constitutional means", with a National Assembly that would possess full executive, legislative and constituent powers. This project at first met with sharp resistance from the conservatives. In some cases even force was used (as in Friesland and Groningen) to overcome this opposition. The new National Assembly convened in The Hague on 1 March 1796.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Like the old revolutionary States-General, the new National Assembly contained radically opposed parties: the unitary democrats, led by Pieter Vreede, Johan Valckenaer and Pieter Paulus, and the federalists, such as Jacob Abraham de Mist and . But there was a broad continuum of opinion between these poles. In this force-field the federalists held the upper hand after the sudden demise of Paulus (who might otherwise have acted as a unifier). The conservative federalists were more adept at parliamentary manoeuvering. Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck proved himself especially adept at this. The frustration this engendered among the democrats led them to appeal to popular opinion and to extra-parliamentary action. Meanwhile, the Assembly installed a constitutional commission that in November 1796 presented a report that amounted to a continuation of the old federal arrangements. As this was totally unacceptable to the unitarists, this draft was subsequently amended into its opposite, by a compromise that finally formed a basis for a new Constitution. The Assembly now began discussing other important matters, such as the separation between church and state, and the emancipation of minorities. The organs of the state were to be a bicameral "Legislative Corps", to be elected in indirect elections, and a Directoire-like Executive of five members. The end result looked much like the French Constitution of 1795. This was approved by the Assembly on 10 May 1797.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The draft-Constitution was to be subjected to a referendum on 8 August 1797, after a very lively campaign in which the French ambassador Noël weighed in with a supportive appeal. This probably contributed to the resounding defeat of the proposal (108,761 votes to 27,995). The Assembly was back at square one. At this moment foreign events in the form of the 18 Fructidor coup of general Pierre Augereau intervened. This brought the more radical faction to power in France, which proved to be ultimately less patient with the vagaries of the Dutch political process, and more prone to intervene. Elections for a second National Assembly returned one in which the balance of power had shifted to the unitarists in the Fall of 1797. Nevertheless, the federalists managed to retain control of the new constitutional commission by a bare majority. This led to more dawdling and the unitarists in the Assembly now came with their own proposal in the form of the "Declaration of 43" on 12 December 1797, containing a nine-point manifesto concerning the minimum conditions to which the new constitution should conform.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Now the course of events started to speed up. The new French ambassador Charles-François Delacroix took the side of the radicals. His behavior sufficiently intimidated the opponents of the radical proposals to actually fall in line. The coup that was to follow was therefore in reality superfluous. Nevertheless, the radicals, led by Wybo Fijnje and , in cohorts with Pierre Auguste Brahain Ducange, the secretary of the French ambassador, now started to plot the coup d'état of 21–22 January 1798, which, with the assistance of general Daendels, put the radicals in power. A rump assembly of about fifty radicals declared itself a Constituante, which in one fell swoop enacted the entire radical program, while the other members of the Assembly were forcibly detained. All provincial sovereignties were repealed; the dissident members of the Assembly expelled; an "interim Executive Directory" empowered; and the constitutional commission reduced to seven radical members.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Though the resulting Constitution has sometimes been depicted as a French project, it was actually a result of the constitutional commission's discussions between October 1797 and January 1798. Except for the purge of the electoral rolls of "crypto-Orangists" and other reactionaries, it might therefore have been acceptable for the moderates, obviating the need for the January coup. In any case, the "suggestions" of Delacroix were rejected and the constitutional commission insisted on the following three essential points: universal manhood suffrage, without fiscal qualifications. the right of revision of the constitution at quinquennial intervals by the voters; and finally the rejection of the principle of a bicameral legislature, in which each House would have a separate electoral base.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Though the coup of 22 January 1798 did not bode well for a genuinely democratic approval process for the new constitution (and the French would have preferred going the "safe" way of approval by the rump assembly) the plebiscite that started on 17 March (in the usual form of elections in "primary" assemblies of about 100–500 voters) had a reasonably democratic quality. On 23 April 1798, the "Staatsregeling voor het Bataafsche Volk" was approved with 153,913 votes against 11,587 (i.e., just 641 more people voted for approval in 1798 than had voted for rejection of the previous draft in 1797; about 50% of the electorate had voted.) The new regime therefore seemed well-grounded in the new doctrine of popular sovereignty.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The new constitution addressed many of the reformist concerns of the Patriots since 1785, including no hereditary offices; no sinecures; and accountability of officials. It also came down on the side of economic liberalism, as opposed to mercantilism, in the economic debate then raging in republican circles, and therefore promised to do away with guilds and internal impediments to trade. The old provincial-repartition system of public finance was to be replaced by a system of national taxation. There was to be a five-man "Uitvoerend Bewind" as a collective Executive, with eight national "Agenten" (government ministers) doing the actual Administration, directing Foreign Affairs, Police and Interior, Justice, Finance, War, Navy, National Education, and National Economy. Most importantly, as historian Simon Schama states: "[i]ts central aim was to change the nature of the Dutch state and to bind its new institutions into the framework of an electoral democracy." As such it had an importance that outlasted the Batavian Republic and set up an ideal to emulate for its successor states.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Giddy with their success, the radicals now pushed further. Their legitimacy was already tenuous, because of the way they had seized power. Now they also lost support in the rump-Assembly because of their partisanship. Not wishing to repeat the mistakes of the French Jacobins they moved against the popular political clubs that formed their political base, thereby alienating their most enthusiastic supporters. On the other hand, at the behest of Delacroix they also moved against "counter-revolutionaries" by having purging commissions removing these men from the electoral rolls, further undermining the legitimacy of the regime, as moderate Patriots were also disenfranchised. The final blow was that the new regime reneged on its promise to elect an entirely new Representative Assembly.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Meanwhile, the "22 Floréal" coup in France undermined Delacroix, because it inspired more sympathy by French foreign minister Talleyrand for the Dutch opposition members who demanded the ambassador's recall. At the same time, Daendels became disaffected with the regime he had helped put into power because of the depredations of the purging commissions. His French colleague General Joubert was displeased with the radicals because of conflicts about the co-dominion of Flushing. Finally, the newly appointed "Agenten" were disturbed about the inefficiency of the "Uitvoerend Bewind". All these disaffections came together with the putsch on June 12, 1798, of that recidivist, general Daendels, in which he disturbed a dinner party of Delacroix and three members of the "Uitvoerend Bewind", violating the diplomatic immunity of the ambassador by putting pistols to his chest. The members of the "Representative Assembly" were arrested in session.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The fall of the Vreede-Fijnje "Bewind" opened the way for the actual implementation of the new constitution. The "Interim Directory" that now came to power (consisting of a few of the dissenting "Agenten") made haste with organizing elections for the Representative Assembly that convened on 31 July. By the middle of August a new "Uitvoerend Bewind" had been appointed and the "Agenten" who had been behind the coup, resumed their original positions. This new regime now started to implement the policies that their radical predecessors had written into the constitution. The coup of June therefore was not a reactionary revolution, but only brought about a change in personnel. Soon most of the people that were arrested at both the January and June coups were released in the spirit of reconciliation that the new regime advocated. The make-up of the Representative Assembly closely resembled that of the second National Assembly of 1797.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The new regime was soon to discover that changes don't easily come about by legislative fiat. The part of the constitution that worked adequately was the experiment with indirect democracy. During the period in which the constitution was in force, the system of primary assemblies that elected delegates who voted for the respective organs of government worked efficiently, and kept the voters engaged. However, exactly because the Republic was a genuine democracy, other goals of the regime were less easy to attain. The elections often put people into office that were very much opposed to the unitary state that was now enshrined in the constitution, and to other innovations that it entailed, or in any case were of a conservative inclination.


title: Batavian Republic

text: This already applied at the top: the constitution contained an age-requirement for the members of the "Uitvoerend Bewind", which favored the election of staid Patriot regents, and discriminated against the more talented appointed "Agents", like Jacobus Spoors, and Isaac Jan Alexander Gogel. The tenor of the "Bewind" became more conservative in the ensuing years. The agents went to work energetically, however, and started with an onslaught on the old administrative organization of the country, in a deliberate attempt to liquidate the very identity of the old federal structure. The once mighty province of Holland was carved into three pieces: "Amstel" (Amsterdam and immediate vicinity), "Texel" (the northern peninsula) and "Delf" (the southern part); and the other provinces were often merged in larger entities, like Overijssel and Drente into "Ouden Yssel", and Frisia and Groningen into the "Eems department". The aim was to organize the country into units with equal numbers of primary assemblies (hence the small Amstel department with its large population). The first elections for the administrative organs of these new entities were held in March 1799. But, of course, such a reorganization did not suddenly change the old allegiances of the people living in these areas. In any case, the new local and departmental administrations, though elected, were supposed to execute the policies as centrally laid down by the national government. As the elections often put people in power who represented the old order (like in Ouden Yssel) this was exceedingly unlikely. To put it differently, the political effort to attain "national unity" through reconciliation of the diverse Patriot factions of all stripes, got in the way of the effort to create an efficient national unitary state, as envisioned by Gogel.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The unitary state was not an end in itself, but a means to higher ends. The republic had been in dire financial straits even before the revolution of 1795. The system of public finance that had been the envy of the world in its Golden Age, enabling it to throw far beyond its weight in world politics up to the Peace of Utrecht in 1713, had become a millstone around its neck. By 1713 the public debt of the province of Holland had reached 310 million guilders; the debt of the Generality was 68 million; and the debts of the smaller provinces, and of the cities came on top of this. The debt service of Holland alone in that year required 14 million guilders, which exceeded its regular tax revenue. Most of this humongous public debt was held by Dutch private citizens, so in a sense it merely engendered an internal money circuit in the Dutch economy. However, it was mostly concentrated in the hands of the "rentier" class, while the debt was serviced by mainly regressive taxes that weighed on the working population. Most importantly, these were taxes levied by the individual provinces, who serviced their own debt, and paid into the Generality coffers according to a repartition schedule last changed in 1616. Attempts to reform this structure during the 18th century were mainly fruitless.


title: Batavian Republic

text: To ameliorate the situation the old Republic maintained a policy of severe austerity during the century, especially economizing on its defense outlays (which in large part explains why its military and political role declined so much). Up to the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War this policy succeeded in bringing down the level of debt, but this war brought a large uptick in the public debt: between 1780 and 1794 the province of Holland alone issued 120 million guilders of new bonds. In 1795, its total debt stood at 455 million guilders. To this should be added the debts of the United East India Company and its sister, the WIC, and the five Dutch Admiralties for a total of about 150 million guilders. The other provinces owed 155 million guilders. The grand total in 1795, at the beginning of the Batavian Republic, came to 760 million guilders; this imposed a debt service of 25 million guilders annually. The indemnity of the Treaty of The Hague immediately added 100 million guilders to this total, and the maintenance of the French army of occupation added about 12 million annually (while the other funding requirements of the republic added another 20 million annually). To fulfill its engagements to the French Republic, Pieter Stadnitski joined a committee at the end of July 1795. On August 3 it was announced that from that date French soldiers would be paid in sound Dutch currency and no one could be obliged to accept French assignats anymore. In 1814 the public debt stood at 1.7 billion guilders.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The average ordinary revenue of the republic at this time amounted to between 28 and 35 million guilders. However, since the outbreak of the war in 1793 the expenditure had been running at between 40 and 55 millions. For the year 1800 the republic had to find 78 million guilders for its expenditures. In other words, the new Agent of Finance, Gogel, was faced with a financial emergency. He needed to generate about 50 million guilders annually in ordinary revenue on a permanent basis urgently. Besides, as the Dutch tax system was heavily skewed toward highly regressive indirect taxes, which inordinately burdened the impoverished population, he wanted to change this to a system that depended more on direct (income and wealth) taxes. Finally, he wanted to do away with the provincial differentiation in the taxation, and construct a nationally standardized system. When he put these reform proposals to the Representative Assembly on 30 September 1799, they met with massive resistance. This led to so much delay in its acceptance that by the time it was to be implemented (in 1801) the re-federalisation of the state by the new "Staatsbewind" regime was already underway. Eventually, Gogel's reforms were only implemented under the successor state of the Kingdom of Holland.


title: Batavian Republic

text: These are (important) examples of instances in which the good intentions of the "Uitvoerend Bewind" and its "Agenten" met with the political and economic realities of the times. Other necessary reforms (the abolition of the guilds, the reform of the system of poor relief to mention but a few examples) equally came to nothing. These defeats progressively led to disenchantment of the population with the regime, that already was in an awkward position because it was also brushed with the tar of the depredations of the French "sister republic" that mainly viewed the Batavian Republic as a milk cow, both collectively (in its demands for loans at very low interest rates) and individually (in the demands of French officials for bribes and other extortions).


title: Batavian Republic

text: The sagging popularity of the Republic did not escape the attention of the British intelligence services. However, because this intelligence was filtered through the eyes of Orangist agents in the Republic and émigrés in England, it was erroneously interpreted as possible support for an Orangist restoration. This caused the miscalculation that led to the ill-fated Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland in the peninsula of North Holland in 1799.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Though the expedition ended in failure the members of the "Uitvoerend Bewind" became very nervous in the days before the Battle of Bergen. The Agent for Foreign Affairs, Van der Goes who had been in favor of distancing the Republic from the French, chose this inopportune moment to secretly approach the King of Prussia as a mediator, with a scheme in which the Hereditary Prince was to become a kind of constitutional monarch in a constitution on the model of the American Constitution. The Republic would revert to its traditional neutrality, while Britain would occupy North Holland, and France Zeeland. The overture was rejected, and it caused a lot of embarrassment in the relations with the French "Directoire". At this time Napoleon Bonaparte performed his coup of 18 Brumaire, establishing the French Consulate. The Franco-Batavian relations now entered a whole new era.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Though Napoleon had a warlike reputation, his policies in his first years as First Consul were aimed at restoring peace in Europe, albeit at terms favorable to France. The animus of the members of the Second Coalition was mostly against the French Revolution, its ideas and its consequences. By this time Napoleon himself was convinced of their perfidy. Talleyrand and Napoleon therefore saw a possibility of a compromise, in which France would retain its chain of docile client states, but with the "revolutionary" sting removed, to appease the Allies. That unrevolutionary docility was to be assured by constitutions designed to eliminate not only domestic conflict (as was the new French political order), but also any flashes of impertinent nationalism. France therefore embarked on a program of constitutional reform in the dependent republics, first in the Helvetic Republic, where Napoleon as Mediator imposed the Constitution of Malmaison in 1801 (followed by the Second Helvetic Constitution a year later), restoring the old confederal order.


title: Batavian Republic

text: A similar "solution" seemed appropriate for the Batavian Republic. The Batavian government, and its constitution, were particularly disliked by the Consul (no friend of democracy in any case), because of the snub that Amsterdam bankers gave in 1800 to his request for a big loan at the usual generous rate of interest the French expected as a matter of right. He blamed the "Uitvoerend Bewind" for this, and many other foibles, like undermining the boycott of British goods. To remedy these ills, a new Batavian constitution on the political principles of the Consulate (union, authority, political office for men of ability and social station) was needed. The new French ambassador Charles Louis Huguet, marquis de Sémonville he sent to The Hague in 1799 was just the man for this job.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Meanwhile, even the minds of reformers like Gogel had become receptive to the need for change. The frustrations of the stalemate between unitarist reformers and democratically elected federalist obstructionists had caused a certain disillusionment with democratic politics in the former (the latter were already convinced). An alliance was therefore forming between the would-be reformers, who would like to finally push their reforms through, by "Bonapartist" means, if necessary, and the people who wished to restore the old federal order, in the hands of the old regent class. Director Besier in particular was amenable to a project that would extend executive power (and curtail that of the Assembly), and revert the constitution to federal devolution. With the help of Sémonville he now started to push a project of constitutional reform that followed the French Constitution of the Year VIII in important respects: a bicameral legislature would be appointed by a "National College" (akin to the French Senate) from a list of names produced by a convoluted system of national elections. This met with little enthusiasm by two of the other Directors François Ermerins and Jean Henri van Swinden, and by the Representative Assembly, that rejected the project on 11 June 1801, by fifty votes to twelve.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The majority in the "Uitvoerend Bewind" (Gerrit Pijman in particular) therefore amended the project in a sense that gave re-federalization even more emphasis. They unilaterally convened the primary assemblies by a proclamation on 14 September 1801, have a referendum on this new draft constitution. The Assembly defiantly ruled this proclamation illegal on 18 September. Then General Augereau (he of the Fructidor-coup), now commander-in-chief of the French forces in the Netherlands, routinely closed the doors of the Assembly (by previous arrangement with Pijman) on 19 September, and arrested the dissident Directors. Despite this military putsch the campaign for the plebiscite took place in an atmosphere of political freedom unthinkable in France. Nevertheless, this did not result in great enthusiasm for the new constitution. When the votes were counted on 1 October, out of 416,619 voters only 16,771 voted in favor and 52,219 against. The Directors then used a sleight of hand that unfortunately would also become familiar in the Dutch constitutional politics of the successor states: they counted the 350,000 abstentions as "tacit affirmations".


title: Batavian Republic

text: Unlike the coup of June 1798, the Augereau coup did present a sharp break with the recent past. The new constitution reduced the role of the legislative branch (which now did not have the right of initiative), and expanded the powers of the Executive, which now became known as the "Staatsbewind" (Regency of State). The elective principle was reduced to a formality: the "Staatsbewind", originally consisting of the three directors taking part in the coup, expanded its membership by co-optation to twelve. This executive then appointed the first 35 members of the legislature. As vacancies arose, these were filled, as far as possible, on a provincial rota and according to national quotas of representatives of each province (much like the old States-General). Except for Holland, the old provinces were reconstituted. The local and provincial administrative organs continued to be elected – no longer by universal manhood suffrage, but by a system of census suffrage.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Most important was the change in personnel of these organs, mostly as a consequence of this electoral change. The "democrats" were mostly replaced by Patriot regents, who had no patience with democracy, and by the old Orangist regents, who did not even have to disguise their allegiance as in early 1801 a convenient amnesty was proclaimed. One surprising example is Egbert Sjuck Gerrold Juckema van Burmania Rengers, the Orangist burgomaster of Leeuwarden before 1795, a notorious reactionary.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The coup represented a counter-revolution. This became clear in the way the iconography of the 1795 revolution disappeared: the epigraph "Vrijheid, Gelijkheid, Broederschap" (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity) which had adorned all official publications, was henceforth removed, and the last Liberty Trees were removed from the town squares. Soon the "good old days" of nepotism and venality were restored. Equally, though the abolition of the guilds formally remained, in practice regulation of crafts and trades was reimposed by local ordinances.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Against this background the negotiations for the Treaty of Amiens started in October 1801. The minor participants in the negotiations between Great Britain and France (the Batavian Republic and Spain) were immediately presented with faits accomplis: the preliminary agreement ceded Ceylon, and guaranteed free British shipping to the Cape of Good Hope, without the Dutch even being consulted. The Dutch ambassador in France, Schimmelpenninck, who acted as the Dutch plenipotentiary, vainly protested that the Treaty of The Hague had guaranteed the Dutch colonies, and that France had promised not to make a separate peace. After this separate peace had been concluded, the British were left to negotiate with the minor French allies separately. This did not mean that the Dutch were completely left to their own devices: whenever French interests seemed to be in danger, France decisively intervened on its own behalf, as in the attempt to deduct the value of the Dutch fleet, surrendered in 1799, that the British had purchased from the Stadtholder, from the indemnification of the Prince of Orange.


title: Batavian Republic

text: That indemnification was an important sideshow in the negotiations. The consequence of the Peace Treaty was that the Batavian Republic now received international recognition, even by the British, and that the old Dutch Republic was now irreversibly dead. This put an end to all pretensions of the Stadtholder and his heirs, such as they were. It may be important to note that these pretensions were dubious to begin with. The Stadtholder was never the sovereign power in the Netherlands, despite understandable misconceptions by foreigners, who may have thought that a country needed a head of state, and the Stadtholder was it. Instead he was an officeholder, appointed by the provincial States, who also was captain-general and admiral-general of the Union (there was originally no stadtholder on the confederal level).


title: Batavian Republic

text: In the Orangist revolution of 1747 this office had been revamped to "Stadhouder-generaal" and made hereditary, and after the Prussian intervention of 1787 the powers of the Stadtholder had become dictatorial. But formally the States-General had been sovereign since 1588, and the Stadtholder was merely their "first servant." The British may have entertained certain fantasies about his formal status, but never seriously considered it. An example of this would the British acceptance of the surrender of the Batavian fleet in the name of the Stadtholder in 1799, as though he was a sovereign prince. But this was all make-believe, and it ended with the peace of 1802 (though it was revived in 1813).


title: Batavian Republic

text: The Prince had reason to feel aggrieved by this. He did have large patrimonial estates in the Netherlands that now were forfeit. Besides, the loss of his hereditary offices entailed a loss of income. According to his own calculations the arrears in all these incomes since 1795 amounted to 4 million guilders. The "Staatsbewind" refused to pay this, or any sum, point blank, and the peace treaty specifically exempted the Dutch from paying anything. Instead, an arrangement between the French, British and Prussians (the former stadtholder's champions) in the matter was reached that in return for dropping any and all claims William was to be compensated with the abbatial domains of Fulda and Corvey Abbey (see also Principality of Nassau-Orange-Fulda).


title: Batavian Republic

text: The Treaty restored most of the colonies that had been captured by the British since 1795, except Ceylon, but including the Cape Colony. This now made the attempts in the Asiatic Council, which had replaced the Directorate of the VOC in 1799, to reform the management of the colonies, more urgent. Dirk van Hogendorp was commissioned to write a proposal, that met with considerable enthusiasm from the more progressive elements on the council, like Samuel Iperusz. Wiselius and J.H.Neethling. He proposed to abolish all perquisites and sinecures; to permit private trade; to permit native subjects to own private property; to substitute the "land levies" by a regulated land tax; and the abolition of all seigneurial rights in the colonies. This met with overwhelming resistance from vested interests. When a new Charter for the colonies was promulgated, Hogendorp's proposals had been whittled down to insignificance. The vestigial democrats on the Council were now purged in favor of Orangist reactionaries like Hendrik Mollerus, and Hendrik Van Stralen. In any case, the Republic did not enjoy the possession of its colonies for long. After the resumption of hostilities in 1803 the returned colonies in most cases were soon recaptured by the British. Java, however, remained Dutch until 1811.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Another potentially important consequence of the peace might have been that a number of provisions of the Treaty of The Hague, that had been conditional on a peace, like the reduction of the French army of occupation, would now have become operational. However, the First Consul proved reluctant to reduce the numbers of French troops, or return the port of Flushing, for the good of the Dutch as he pointed out, as they needed many of their own troops in their restored colonies, so the "protection" of the French troops was considered necessary. On the other hand, the departure of the French troops was an indispensable point for the British as they could not allow the Netherlands to be dominated by a hostile power, and the Batavian Republic was incapable of defending its own neutrality. This was to be an insoluble dilemma in the coming years.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Real advantages of the peace came in the economic field. As an open economy, the Republic needed unhindered trade. It was heavily dependent on exports of agricultural products to the British markets, and on its services sector (especially its large merchant fleet, and the banking sector), whereas its industry (whatever remained of it after a century of being confronted by foreign protectionism) also was dependent on exports. All these sectors had suffered enormously from the war: the British blockade and French and British privateering had almost brought marine trade to a standstill, whereas a commercial treaty with France (which would have ended French discrimination of Dutch trade in industrial goods) proved an ever-receding fata morgana. True, much of the trade had shifted to flags of convenience (especially that of the US and European neutrals like Prussia), but the peace made the resurgence of the Dutch carrying trade fully practicable. Nevertheless, some changes proved irreversible, like the shift of trade patterns to German ports, and the decline of the fisheries.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The peace turned out to be of short duration. On 18 May 1803, slightly more than a year after the peace, war resumed. Napoleon was now intent on the destruction of Great Britain by culminating in an ambitious planned invasion. The French expected the Batavian Republic to play a major supporting role in this. As the Franco-Batavian alliance's embodiment, the "Staatsbewind" was forced to assent to a Convention bringing the total of French and Batavian forces in the Netherlands to 35,000. In addition, 9,000 Batavian troops were slated for the proposed overseas expedition. Even more importantly, the Dutch were to supply five ships-of-the-line, five frigates, 100 gunboats, and 250 flat-bottomed transport craft, capable of holding 60–80 men by December 1803. In total the Dutch were meant to provide transport for 25,000 men and 2,500 horses, the major part of Napoleon's invasion armada, and all at Dutch expense. Napoleon's imposed real burdens on the finances of the Republic and on its economy.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Another real burden was the economic warfare that Napoleon launched against the British, which was answered by a British counter-boycott. This foreshadowed the Continental System which was written into law in 1806. However already in 1803 it started to choke off Dutch trade. Ostensibly, the "Staatsbewind" did its part by prohibiting the import of all goods from the enemy on 5 July 1803. Later it banned cheese exports and butter. These measures were of little practical effect, since in 1804 the volume of general exports to Britain was nearly equal to that in the last year of peace in 1802. British goods reached Dutch destinations via neutral German ports or disguised as "American cargo." The republic was therefore an important "keyhole into Europe" that undermined the French economic sanctions against Britain. Since the members of the "Staatsbewind", and their friends, often profited from this clandestine trade directly, the patience of the French was wearing thin. Matters came to a head when the French commander in the Republic, Auguste de Marmont, ordered in November 1804 that French naval patrols and customs officials were to take over the responsibility for the surveillance of cargoes in Dutch ports, with powers of confiscation without reference to Dutch authorities. The"Staatsbewind" forbade any Batavian official to take orders from the French on 23 November 1804.


title: Batavian Republic

text: This act of defiance sealed the fate of yet another of the Batavian regimes. Napoleon had long been dissatisfied with what he viewed as the foot-dragging and inefficiency of the Dutch. As a matter of fact, since the Spring of 1804 informal talks, mediated by Talleyrand, had been under way with the Batavian envoy in Paris, Schimmelpenninck, who had a good personal rapport with Napoleon (by now emperor). Schimmelpenninck was a power in the Batavian Republic by himself. He had played an important role as the leader of the federalist opposition in the "revolutionary" States-General of 1795, and the first Assembly. Though an opponent of the radicals, he had politically survived the coups of 1798, and served as ambassador to France, and as plenipotentiary to the Amiens negotiations. Now Napoleon saw him as the person to clean the Augean stables of the Dutch client state.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Schimmelpenninck saw himself in the same light. He had long had a woolly vision of a "national conciliation" in the Netherlands, that made him amenable to a rapprochement with conservative and Orangist circles. These were to become his power base. Though Schimmelpenninck was a convinced federalist, he was a pliable character also. When Napoleon indicated that he preferred a centralized organization of the Dutch state (as the re-federalized model of the "Staatsbewind" had clearly not worked out), he did not hesitate to implement this in his project of a new constitution, that he constructed in the Summer of 1804 in consultation with the "Staatsbewind". As a matter of fact, a delegation of the "Staatsbewind", consisting of Schimmelpenninck, and members of the Regency Van der Goes (the former Agent) and Van Haersolte (a former Director), presented the case for this draft to Napoleon in November 1804. When the clash about the French customs men therefore took place later in the month, Napoleon came to a speedy decision and soon thereafter the Batavian Republic had a new constitution and government.


title: Batavian Republic

text: On 10 May 1805, Schimmelpenninck was therefore inaugurated as "Raadpensionaris" (Grand Pensionary) of the Batavian Republic. This venerable title (clearly chosen for sentimental reasons) had little connection with the former office of the States of Holland; as a matter of fact, the new office more resembled that of Stadtholder, though even William V, after 1787, had not possessed the powers Schimmelpenninck was to wield. His was a one-man Executive that would in no way be encumbered by the 19 man Legislative Corps, that had no powers apart from the Pensionary. The Pensionary conducted his business assisted by a "Staatsraad", that resembled the French Conseil d'État more than the old "Raad van State", and by Secretaries of State, who resembled the "Agenten" of the "Uitvoerend Bewind". Of course, such an important change in the constitution had to receive the imprimatur of the popular will. A plebiscite was duly organized which elicited 14,903 Yes-votes (against 136 Noes) from an electorate of 353,322. The abstentions were counted as "tacit affirmatives" in the now well-established tradition.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Despite such unpromisingly reactionary trappings the Schimmelpenninck regime actually accomplished more in its short existence than the previous regimes had accomplished in the ten years since 1795. This was, of course, mainly due to the diligent preparatory work that Agents like the ubiquitous Gogel; Johannes Goldberg, for National Economy; and Johannes van der Palm, for National Education; had done.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Gogel's General Taxation Plan was finally enacted in June 1805; a first government-approved attempt at unification of the Dutch spelling was made; an embryonic Department of Agriculture and Department of Hydraulics were formed, to foreshadow the later government departments; even a "Pharmacopeia Batavia" started the regulation of drugs; and the School Law of 1806 organized a national system of public elementary education. Most importantly perhaps, the local-government law of July 1805 founded the first Dutch system of public administration.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The French reaction to this flurry of reforms was mixed, however. The very zeal of the program might betoken a renascent nationalism that could work against French interests. The debacle of the Battle of Trafalgar had made it clear that the projected invasion had to be scrapped. The Dutch now began to clamor for economies in the form of the return of the Boulogne flotilla, which annoyed Napoleon, because he still had a use for it. The man who had led that flotilla to Boulogne, after repelling a surpirior British fleet, Carel Hendrik Ver Huell, was now Secretary for the Navy. He had also become a confidant of the emperor, and now engaged in a secret correspondence with Talleyrand and Napoleon. The latter had just concluded the Peace of Pressburg and was busy dividing up Europe in client-kingdoms apportioned to his relatives. He saw a good candidate for such a position in the Netherlands in his brother Louis Bonaparte.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Ver Huell started scheming with his French patrons behind the back of Schimmelpenninck and feeding negative information about the Pensionary that found its way into the French press. Schimmelpenninck's position was weakened by the fact that he was slowly going blind. The Dutch Secretaries of State and the "Staatsraad" didn't have much choice: their only options were a complete extinguishing of the national identity in the form of annexation to the Empire, or the lesser evil of a new kingdom under one of Napoleon's relatives. A "Groot Besogne" (Grand Commission) was formed to conduct the unequal negotiations with the Emperor. The latter, however, refused to speak with the Commission, and only communicated to them through the intermediary of Ver Huell. Talleyrand had meanwhile drafted a "Treaty" which contained the conditions under which the crown of "Holland" was to be offered to Louis: no union of the crowns; no conscription; a possible commercial treaty with France; and the basic freedoms of the Netherlands (linguistic, religious, judicial) were to be maintained; while the civil list was fixed at the "modest sum" of 1.5 million guilders. The constitution of the Pensionary was actually to be maintained with a few minor alterations (the title of "raadpensionaris" changed to that of King; and the size of the "Staatsraad" and the legislative corps nearly doubled).


title: Batavian Republic

text: The Commission was not allowed to refer back to The Hague. Schimmelpenninck made a last-ditch attempt to have the treaty referred to a plebiscite, but he was ignored. He resigned on 4 June 1806. The next day in St. Cloud, after Napoleon had kept them waiting while he received the Turkish ambassador, the hapless commissioners presented their "petition" to Louis to accept the crown of "Holland", which he graciously did, while Napoleon looked on approvingly.


title: Batavian Republic

text: The Kingdom of Holland lasted only four years. Though Louis performed his role beyond all expectations, and did his best to defend the interests of his subjects, this was exactly the reason why Napoleon decided that the Netherlands could no longer be denied the benefits of reunion with his Empire, though over the objections of Louis. Louis abdicated on 2 July 1810, in favor of his son Napoleon Louis Bonaparte, who reigned for ten days. Then the Netherlands were finally reunited with the origins of the "alluvial deposits of the French rivers," of which the country in the view of Napoleon consists.


title: Batavian Republic

text: This reunion did not outlast the effects of the disastrous French invasion of Russia, and the Battle of Leipzig. The Empire melted away, and the independent Netherlands took shape again with every city that the retreating French army of occupation evacuated in the course of 1813.


title: Batavian Republic

text: In the ensuing political vacuum a triumvirate of former Orangist regents, led by Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp, invited the former Hereditary Prince (the old Stadtholder had died in 1806) to assume power as "Sovereign Prince." William VI of Orange landed in Scheveningen on 30 November 1813. He duly established control in the Netherlands and was offered the crown of the combined area of the former 17 provinces of the Netherlands (modern Belgium and the Netherlands) by the Allies in the secret London Protocol (also known as the Eight Articles of London) of 21 June 1814, which he accepted exactly one month later. On 16 March 1815, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands was proclaimed.


title: Batavian Republic

text: According to the British historian Simon Schama, the Batavian Republic has been controversially treated by historians. After the end of the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands during World War II, some historians saw a parallel between the Dutch National Socialist Movement (NSB) and the Patriot revolutionaries, while they pictured William V in the heroic role of Queen Wilhelmina and her government-in-exile. However, Dutch historian Pieter Geyl opposed such comparisons in his "Patriotten en NSBers: een historische parallel" (1946).


title: Batavian Republic

text: Still, by that time the Batavians had already had a bad press in Dutch history writing. This may be explained by the fact that the old ideological struggle between the monarchically-oriented Orangist party and its successive opponents of a more "republican" bent (going back to at least the conflict between Johan van Oldenbarnevelt and Prince Maurice), of which the Patriots were only the latest incarnation, was being refought in the standard works of 19th-century Dutch historians like Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer, who saw plenty to despise in the "popular-sovereignty" philosophy of the Patriot radicals. In his turn Groen was very influential on the way John Lothrop Motley depicted the old Dutch Republic for an American audience.


title: Batavian Republic

text: Motley did not get to deal explicitly with the Batavian Republic, but the way his collaborator William Elliot Griffis dismissed the Patriots speaks for itself: "…whether under the name of the 'Batavian Republic', the Kingdom of Holland, or the provinces of the French empire, the French occupation was virtually a French conquest that had little permanent influence on Dutch history or character."


title: Batavian Republic

text: However most, if not all, characteristics of the current centralized state of the Kingdom of the Netherlands were foreshadowed by the accomplishments of the Batavian Republic, not least the liberal 1848 Constitution. That constitution restored the central tenets of the democratic "Staatsregeling" of 1798, under the guise of a Constitutional monarchy, as its author Johan Rudolph Thorbecke acknowledged.


title: Saga (comics)

text: Saga is an epic space opera/fantasy comic book series written by Brian K. Vaughan and illustrated by Fiona Staples, published monthly by the American company Image Comics. The series is based on ideas Vaughan conceived both as a child and as a parent. It depicts a husband and wife, Alana and Marko, from long-warring extraterrestrial races, fleeing authorities from both sides of a galactic war as they struggle to care for their daughter, Hazel, who is born in the beginning of the series, and who occasionally narrates the series as an unseen adult.


title: Saga (comics)

text: The comic was described in solicitations as ""Star Wars" meets "Game of Thrones"", and by critics as evocative of both science fiction and fantasy epics such as "The Lord of the Rings" and classic works like "Romeo and Juliet". It is Vaughan's first creator-owned work to be published through Image Comics, and is the first time he employs narration in his comics writing. Vaughan indicated that the entire series will span 108 issues.


title: Saga (comics)

text: The first issue of "Saga" was published on March 14, 2012, to positive reviews and a sold-out first printing. It was published in trade paperback form in October 2012. It has also been a consistent sales success, with its collected editions outselling those of "The Walking Dead", another successful Image comic. The series went on hiatus after reaching its midpoint at issue 54 in July 2018, and resumed in January 2022.


title: Saga (comics)

text: The series has been met with wide critical acclaim, and is one of the most celebrated comics being published in the United States. It has also garnered numerous awards, including twelve Eisner and seventeen Harvey Awards between 2013 and 2017. The first trade paperback collection won the 2013 Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story. It has also been noted for its diverse portrayal of ethnicity, sexuality and gender social roles, and for its treatment of war.


title: Saga (comics)

text: Writer Brian K. Vaughan conceived "Saga" in his childhood, calling it "a fictional universe that I created when I was bored in math class. I just kept building it." He was inspired by such influences as "Star Wars", "Flash Gordon", and children's books, and has also invoked the awe and wonder of first seeing the Silver Surfer, which seemed an "incredible and different" concept to him. It was not until his wife became pregnant with his second daughter, however, that he conceived of the protagonists, the winged Alana and the horned Marko, two lovers from warring extraterrestrial races who struggle to survive with their newborn daughter, Hazel, who occasionally narrates the series. It was also at this point that the central theme that Vaughan wanted for the book emerged. Vaughan explains, "I wanted to write about parenthood, but I wanted to Trojan-horse it inside some sort of interesting genre story, to explore the overlap between artistic creation and the creation of a child." Vaughan, who intended to return to writing a comics series following the 2010 conclusion of his previous series, "Ex Machina", and who notes that the publication of "Saga" #1 coincided with the birth of his daughter, saw parallels between the caution advised by colleagues against launching a new book in the poor economy and those who cautioned against bringing a new child into the world, observing:


title: Saga (comics)

text: Vaughan explained that the main characters' romance would be a major theme of the book. Touching upon the juxtaposition of the book's mature subject matter with its "Star Wars" inspirations, Vaughan jokingly described the book as ""Star Wars" for perverts."


title: Saga (comics)

text: The book was announced at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con International, and was billed as ""Star Wars" meets "A Game of Thrones"" in solicitations. "Saga" represents the first time Vaughan has employed narration in his comics writing, a decision influenced by the whimsical interaction between the text and images in the children's books he reads with his children, and by his desire to try something new that he felt would work well with "Saga"s narrator, Hazel. It is also his first series to be published through Image Comics, whom he selected as the series' publisher on the recommendation of the writer Jay Faerber, who cited the creative freedom afforded by that publisher. Vaughan elaborated on his selection of Image thus:


title: Saga (comics)

text: Although Vaughan has written for television and has endeavored to have his previous works adapted into film, he stresses that he developed "Saga" strictly to be a comic book and not to be adapted to other media, explaining "I wanted to do something that was way too expensive to be TV and too dirty and grown-up to be a four-quadrant blockbuster." Vaughan has also indicated that he has an ending in mind for the series and that he plans five issues ahead, having written the first six issues as the first story arc, which would have ended with the two main characters dying on the rocketship launch pad in issue 5 if the series had not been successful. By June 2016, Vaughan indicated that he knew what the last page of the series' final issue would be.


title: Saga (comics)

text: The series is illustrated by Fiona Staples, who was introduced to Vaughan by their mutual friend, writer Steve Niles, with whom Staples worked on "Mystery Society". Vaughan, who did not meet Staples in person until just before their panel at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con, explained his selection of Staples by describing his reaction upon first seeing her work, saying "Her artwork is incredible. [It] doesn't look like anyone else. She is very unique. When I opened up this file I was like, 'This is going to work! Staples is co-owner of "Saga" and has received first billing since issue 25. In addition to designing all the characters, vehicles and alien races in the story, she provides painted covers and hand-letters Hazel's narration using her own handwriting, which is the last thing she does after finishing the artwork on a page. Staples renders the characters in a pen-and-ink style line while using all-color settings inspired by video games and Japanese animation. At the 2012 Image Expo, Staples described the process by which she produces her art as harkening back to animation cels, in which emphasis is placed on figures and backgrounds. Vaughan has stated that Staples's style has influenced the direction of the story. The character Ghüs, for example is entirely Staples's creation. Another example is the organic forms of most of the series' technology, such as the main characters' wooden rocket ship, which is derived from Staples's dislike of drawing mechanical objects. To design the series' various planetary settings, Staples looks to the real world for inspiration and then exaggerates some elements of them. Some rooms on the planet Cleave, for example, were inspired by Cambodian architecture.


title: Saga (comics)

text: The book is priced at $2.99 and will remain at that price for the duration of its run, which Vaughan arranged as part of his contract with Image, along with the stipulation that it never be less than 22 pages long. The first issue features 44 pages of story and no advertisements in both its print and digital versions. At the end of each issue is an old-fashioned letters column called "To Be Continued" which prints readers' letters submitted entirely through postal mail as it does not provide an email address for this purpose. Vaughan usually handles the column himself, including responding to letters.