Daniel M. Grimley and Julian Rushton, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Elgar (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), ISBN 0 521 82623 3 (hb), 0 521 53363 5 (pb)

Abstract

and infirm Alice Stuart-Wortley for a younger woman, Vera Hockman, when, after the death of his wife in 1920 and Alice Stuart-Wortley's husband in 1926, the two erstwhile lovers were free to marry. 7 All of the nostalgic sugar with which Kennedy coats this sorry episode cannot mask fully its bitter aftertaste. The story of the coda of the relationship between Elgar and Stuart-Wortley hardly shows the composer in a sympathetic light. Further, there is a disturbing undertone implicit in Kennedy's strenuous attempts to discredit my hypothesis that the composer may have felt homoerotic yearnings for male friends in light of the sad history of Elgar's callous treatment of Alice Stuart-Wortley (93-4). Kennedy would appear to be more comfortable portraying Elgar as what our grandmothers called a 'cad', than one who might have found musical inspiration in affection for another man. 8 The Life of Elgar is an accomplished short biography by a master of his craft, but despite its many charms, this volume is a footnote to a distinguished career of service to British music. The romanticism enshrined within this book must now give way to the researches of a younger generation of Elgar scholars, who will bring our view of the composer's importance into sharper focus through the clarifying lenses that a variety of approaches can provide, including cultural and musical analysis, as well as new and insightful historical perspectives. Building on an ample foundation constructed by Kennedy, Anderson, Rushton, Moore, McVeagh, and others, the next generation of musicologists, by interrogating the past and eschewing nostalgia, will make scholarly contributions that will only further enhance Elgar's reputation and reveal fully the staggering achievement of this tormented, repressed, impossible, and incessantly blinking man.

Cambio climático y diversidad biológica

“…Other possible system changes include the first signs of positive feedbacks in the climate system as warming releases gases hitherto locked up in a frozen state ('positive feedbacks' are events triggered by change which then cause further change in the same direction, as opposed to 'negative feedbacks' which cause change in the opposite direction). As the tundra warms and permafrost is lost there is potential for major release of methane, a very potent greenhouse gas (22).…”

“…Current levels of greenhouse gas concentrations have led to an increase in average global temperature of 0.75°C since the mid-twentieth century, and because of the lag between an increase in concentrations and the trapping of heat, the planet is due for an equal amount of temperature increase by 2100, even if greenhouse gas emissions were to cease immediately (22). This has led to changes in the physical environment: later freezing of lakes and earlier break-up of ice in the spring (21), retreat of glaciers in Alaska, Greenland and elsewhere.…”