Steven Karl Zoltán Brust
Steven Brust in 2010
Born	Steven Karl Zoltán Brust (1955-11-23) November 23, 1955 (age 56)
Occupation	writer novelist
Ethnicity	Hungarian
Citizenship	American
Genres	fantasy science fiction
Notable work(s)	See below
dreamcafe.com

Steven Karl Zoltán Brust (born November 23, 1955) is an American fantasy and science fiction author of Hungarian descent. He was a member of the writers' group The Scribblies, which included Emma Bull, Pamela Dean, Will Shetterly, Nate Bucklin, Kara Dalkey, and Patricia Wrede; he also belongs to the Pre-Joycean Fellowship.

He is best known for his novels about the assassin Vlad Taltos. His novels have been translated into German, Russian, Polish, Dutch, Czech, French, Spanish, Hebrew and Bulgarian. Most of his short stories are set in shared universes. These include Emma Bull's and Will Shetterly's Liavek, Robert Asprin's Thieves' World, Neil Gaiman's Sandman and Terri Windling's Borderland Series.

Bibliography[link]

Dragaera[link]

There are two series set in the world of Dragaera, namely The Khaavren Romances and The Vlad Taltos novels. They are set in different periods in the world, but some characters are common to both series.

Vlad Taltos[link]

There are currently 13 novels in the series (19 are planned).

1. Jhereg (1983)
2. Yendi (1984)
3. Teckla (1987)
4. Taltos (1988)
5. Phoenix (1990)
6. Athyra (1993)
7. Orca (1996)
8. Dragon (1998)
9. Issola (2001)
10. Dzur (2006)
11. Jhegaala (2008)
12. Iorich (2010)
13. Tiassa (2011)

Chronological order of novels:

1. Taltos (1988)
2. Dragon (1998)
3. Yendi (1984)
4. Tiassa, section 1 (2011)
5. Jhereg (1983)
6. Teckla (1987)
7. Phoenix (1990)
8. Jhegaala (2008)
9. Athyra (1993)
10. Orca (1996)
11. Issola (2001)
12. Dzur (2006)
13. Tiassa, section 2 (2011)
14. Iorich (2010)
15. Tiassa, section 3 (2011)

Omnibus volumes:

1. The Book of Jhereg (contains Jhereg, Yendi and Teckla)
2. The Book of Taltos (contains Taltos and Phoenix)
3. The Book of Athyra (contains Athyra and Orca)
4. Dragon & Issola (contains Dragon and Issola - SFBC hardcover)
5. The Book of Dragon (contains Dragon and Issola - Tor paperback)
6. The Book of Dzur (contains Dzur and Jhegaala)

The Khaavren Romances[link]

The series consists of three books and has been completed.

1. The Phoenix Guards (1991)
2. Five Hundred Years After (1994)
3. The Viscount of Adrilankha, published in three volumes:
   1. The Paths of the Dead (2002)
   2. The Lord of Castle Black (2003)
   3. Sethra Lavode (2004)

Stand-alone[link]

• Brokedown Palace (1986)

Other novels[link]

• To Reign in Hell (1984)
• The Sun, the Moon, and the Stars (1987)
• Cowboy Feng's Space Bar and Grille (1990)
• The Gypsy (1992) with Megan Lindholm
• Agyar (1993)
• Freedom & Necessity (1997) with Emma Bull
• My Own Kind of Freedom (written 2005, released^[1] under the Creative Commons license February 8, 2008), a novel based on the Firefly television series

Short stories[link]

• “An Act of Contrition” in Liavek (1985, edited by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly; Locus Poll Award, Best Anthology)
• “An Act of Trust” in Liavek: The Players of Luck (1986, edited by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly)
• “A Dream of Passion” in the convention chapbook for Ad Astra (1986)
• “An Act of Mercy” in Liavek: Wizard's Row (1987, with Megan Lindholm; edited by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly)
• “An Act of Love” in Liavek: Spells of Binding (1988, with Gregory Frost and Megan Lindholm; edited by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly)
• “Csucskári” (Excerpt from The Sun, The Moon, and the Stars) in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: First Annual Collection (1988, edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling)
• “A Hot Night at Cheeky's” in Liavek: Festival Week (1990, edited by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly)
• “Looking Forward: Excerpt from Athyra” in Amazing Stories, March 1993 (1993, edited by Kim Mohan)
• “Attention Shoppers” in Xanadu (1993, edited by Jane Yolen)
• “Abduction from the Harem” in Timewalker Issue 14 (October 1996, published by Valiant Comics)
• “Drift” in Space Opera (1996, edited by Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough)
• “Valóság and Élet” in Sandman: Book of Dreams (1996, edited by Neil Gaiman and Edward E. Kramer)
• "Calling Pittsburgh" in Lord of the Fantastic: Stories in Honor of Roger Zelazny (1998, edited by Martin H. Greenberg)
• “When the Bow Breaks” in The Essential Bordertown (1998, edited by Terri Windling and Delia Sherman)
• “The Man From Shemhaza” in Thieves' World: Enemies of Fortune (2004, edited by Lynn Abbey), reprinted in Year's Best Fantasy 5 (2005, edited by David Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer)
• "Klava with Honey" in Eeriecon Chapbook #4 for the convention EerieCon (2005, via the Buffalo Fantasy League)
• "Chapter One" in Eeriecon Chapbook #6 for the convention EerieCon (2007, via the Buffalo Fantasy League)

Convention chapbooks[link]

• In 1986, Steven Brust was a Guest of Honor at the Per Ardua Ad Astra science fiction convention in Toronto, and he contributed the Vlad Taltos short story "A Dream of Passion" to the convention chapbook.
• Brust included "Klava with Honey" in Eeriecon Chapbook #4 for the 2005 EerieCon convention. This very brief excerpt was initially part of the novel Dzur. He could not attend the convention for medical reasons.
• He also contributed "Chapter One" for Eeriecon Chapbook #6 which was featured at EerieCon 9, 2007.

Introductions by Steven Brust[link]

• In 1987, Tor Books published the gamebook Dzurlord (A Crossroads Adventure in the World of Steven Brust's Jhereg). Steven Brust wrote the introduction for this book, which introduced readers to the world of Dragaera and its inhabitants.
• Tor also published The Three Musketeers in paperback in 1994. Steven Brust introduced the edition, saying that this translation (anonymous, originally published in 1888) was his favorite.
• Steven Brust contributed the introduction for Manna from Heaven. Wildside Press published this collection of stories from the late Roger Zelazny in 2003.

The Dragaeran books[link]

The Vlad Taltos series is set on what is apparently another planet, in an Empire mostly inhabited and ruled by the Dragaerans, who are humanoid but have such differences as greatly extended lifespans and heights averaging about 7 feet. Referred to as "elfs" by some humans, they refer to themselves as "human". The Dragaeran Empire controls the majority of the landmass known to it on the planet, and does not greatly concern itself with the rest. Vlad Taltos is one of the human minority (known by Dragaerans as "Easterners"), which exists as a lower class in the Empire. Vlad also practices the human art of witchcraft; "táltos" is Hungarian for a kind of supernatural person in folklore. Though human, he is a citizen of the Empire because his social-climbing father bought a title in one of the less reputable of the 17 Dragaeran Great Houses. The only Great House that sells memberships this way is, not coincidentally, also the one that maintains a criminal organization. Vlad proves surprisingly successful in this organization. Despite being a human and a criminal, he has a number of high-ranking Dragaeran friends, and often gets caught up in important events.

Brust has written thirteen novels in the series, which is proposed to run to nineteen novels — one named for each of the Great Houses, one named for Vlad himself, and a final novel which Brust has said will be titled The Final Contract. The first three novels resemble private-eye detective stories, perhaps the closest being Robert B. Parker's Spenser series. The later novels are more varied than the first three. Though they read like fantasy, there are science-fictional explanations for some things.

Brust has also written another series set in Dragaera, the Khaavren Romances, set centuries before Vlad's time. Since Dragaerans live for thousands of years, many characters appear in both series. It is partly an homage to Alexandre Dumas, père's novels about the Three Musketeers, and is five volumes long, following the pattern of Dumas' series. The books are presented as historical novels written by Paarfi of Roundwood, a Dragaeran roughly contemporary with Vlad. Paarfi's old-fashioned, elaborate, and highly verbose writing is explicitly based on Dumas', though with a dialogue style that is, at times, based on Tom Stoppard's wordgames in Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (according to Pamela Dean's introduction to Five Hundred Years After).

The two series are finally brought together in the thirteenth novel in the Vlad series, Tiassa, which can also be viewed as the sixth novel in the Khaavren series. Tiassa comprises what are in effect three related novellas, each told in a different style and connected by a common theme. The first section reads like the first three novels in the series, with a first-person narration by Vlad but including Khaavren’s son, Piro; the second section has a different viewpoint character in each of its chapters; and the third section is narrated by Paarfi in the style of the earlier Khaavren Romances, with Khaavren as the viewpoint character and interacting with Vlad.

There is a certain amount of variation in the writing style amongst the Taltos novels as well. Brust uses a different narrative approach in almost every novel in the series. Some of these approaches are more purely stylistic and have minor effects on the actual story-telling; some are profound and involve the point of view of characters whom the reader never expected to get to know so well.

Further, as the writing of the Taltos novels has spanned over two decades, they have been influenced by events in Steven Brust's own life. A fascination with the Mafia — subsequently brought into a somewhat shocking perspective by the murder of a friend — profoundly influenced his storylines, as did the breakup of his marriage. The events and arguments of his books, especially Teckla, are acknowledged by Brust to be influenced by his life-long interest in Marxist theory and practice, especially as advocated by Leon Trotsky. Since Brust is a self-identified "Trotskyist sympathizer", this topic frequently comes up in interviews with him.^[2]

Lastly, Brust has a decided knack for slipping absorbing mysteries into the minor details of his stories; mysteries that tend to fascinate his readers, once they notice them, and often form the kernel around which later books coalesce, even though their resolution still springs upon the reader unexpectedly when it finally comes.

Trivia[link]

Devera[link]

The same character, usually a cute brown-eyed girl of about nine, appears as a motif in all of Brust's novels. In the Dragaeran books her name is Devera. She is the (future) daughter of another character and seems to be able to appear anywhere in time and space. In Brust's non-Dragaeran books her appearances are usually brief and not always obvious.

Title nicknames[link]

Brust is known for his propensity to give his books alternate titles for his own amusement. These have cropped up in numerous interviews and online forums, starting with "Jarhead" for Jhereg. ^[3]

Examples are:

• The Rain in Spain (To Reign in Hell)
• Aw Gee (Agyar)
• The Kleenex Guards (The Phoenix Guards)
• Tacky (Teckla)
• Tucson (Phoenix)
• Ripple (Brokedown Palace)
• Crosby, Stills and Nash (The Sun, The Moon, And The Stars)
• Jar Head (Jhereg)
• Milqtoast [sic] (Taltos)
• Stir (Dzur)
• Giggolo [sic] (Jhegaala)
• Your Itch (Iorich)
• My Own Kind of Whedon (My Own Kind of Freedom, his Firefly fanfic)
• Hadassah (Tiassa)

Only his collaborative books escape being nicknamed.

Influences[link]

Music & other media[link]

Brust played drums, specifically in the Minneapolis-based folk rock band Cats Laughing and also in the Albany Free Traders.^[4] He released his only solo album, A Rose for Iconoclastes, in 1993. Two songs from this album were played by Doctor Demento: "I Was Born About Ten Million Songs Ago" (co-written with Nathan A. Bucklin) and "Backward Message."^[5]

The 1995 Boiled in Lead enhanced CD Songs from the Gypsy featured songs by Brust and Adam Stemple, as well as the full text of the novel The Gypsy.^[6]

Cats Laughing also appears in issue #5 of a Marvel comic book called Excalibur. Steve is the only member of the band who is both seen onstage and named. Emma Bull also appears but names everyone in the band except herself.^[7] Steve was seen again in a one-shot special issue, Excalibur: Mojo Mayhem, in which the mutant superhero Shadowcat attends a Cats Laughing concert in Edinburgh and mentions previously having seen the band at Windycon.

In addition, Chris Claremont inserted a reference to "Cats Laughing — the Excalibur Sessions" into the DC Comics graphic novel Star Trek Debt of Honor.

Brust owned a Cadillac ambulance in Minnesota. It was painted yellow, light blue and dark blue, with murals. Known as the Catmobile, the car was the band vehicle for Cats Laughing. The same car is also depicted on the "Another Way to Travel" album with the band members. This album, noted by its picture, has a cameo in the beginning of Emma Bull's novel Bone Dance.

Brust performed in several Shockwave Radio Theater productions, notably Closing Ceremonies (aka The Fall of the House of Usherette) and PBS Liavek.

Dragon gets argued over in the webcomic Penny Arcade.^[8] Tycho elaborates on "Fine Distinctions"^[9] that same day.

Award nominations (and dubious honors)[link]

Brust's short story "When The Bow Breaks" was nominated for the 1999 Nebula Award, although it did not reach the final ballot.^[10]

Five Hundred Years After was nominated for the 1995 Locus Poll Award (Best Fantasy Novel). Other novels nominated for various Locus Poll Awards were Brokedown Palace, The Gypsy, Agyar, and Freedom & Necessity.^[11]

Dragon was a finalist for the 1999 Minnesota Book Awards in the Fantasy & Science Fiction category. Freedom and Necessity was a 1998 finalist for the same category, while The Phoenix Guards was a finalist in 1992.^[12]

Brust discovered in August 2006 that he had made the New York Times extended bestseller list at number 30 with Dzur. He mentioned his ambivalence on this subject online.^[13]

SCI FI Wire posted an email interview with Brust after Dzur came out.^[14]

Health[link]

Brust needed five teeth pulled in early April, 2012, and has been diagnosed with Congestive Heart Failure and needs a defibrillator.^[15]

References[link]

1. ^ Dreamcafe.com
2. ^ Olson, Chris. "Interview: Steven Brust," Strange Horizons website
3. ^ Robinson, Tasha (2006-08-07). "Science Fiction Weekly Interview". http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue224/interview.html. 
4. ^ Albany Free Traders publicity flyer
5. ^ Steven Brust, The Mad Music Archive, retrieved August 29, 2006.
6. ^ Olson, Chris (2006-08-07). "Article: Interview: Steven Brust, by Chris Olson". http://www.strangehorizons.com/2003/20030203/brust.shtml. 
7. ^ Steven Who?
8. ^ Fine Distinctions
9. ^ Penny Arcade!
10. ^ 1999 Nebula Final Ballot
11. ^ Award Bibliography on LocusMag.com
12. ^ Past Finalists and Winners on Minnesotahumanities.org
13. ^ "I have a new first name" says SKZB
14. ^ 24 August 2006 interview
15. ^ [1], Brust's blog, see the entry for April 21st, labeled "Health report"

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Steven Brust

• The Dream Café - Steven Brust's own homepage
• Steven Brust's LiveJournal
• Dragaera - a site authorized by Brust, with a mailing list, resources, and links to many fan pages
• Steven Brust at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Bibliography on SciFan
• Cracks and Shards - Observations on Dragaera
• Steven Brust at Fantasy Literature
• Lyorn Records - a wiki dedicated to information and informed speculation about the world of Dragaera

Michael Kremer

Born	(1964-11-12) November 12, 1964 (age 47)
Nationality	American
Institution	Harvard University
Field	Development economics Health economics
Alma mater	Harvard University
Influenced	Esther Duflo
Information at IDEAS/RePEc

Michael Robert Kremer (born November 12, 1964)^[1] is an American development economist and is currently the Gates Professor of Developing Societies at Harvard University. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and a Presidential Faculty Fellowship, and was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. Kremer is also a Research Affiliate at Innovations for Poverty Action, a New Haven, Connecticut based research outfit dedicated to creating and evaluating solutions to social and international development problems. Kremer is founder and president of WorldTeach, a Harvard-based organization which places college students and recent graduates as volunteer teachers on summer and year-long programs in developing countries around the world.

His work focuses on the use of incentives, particularly the design of incentive mechanisms to encourage the development of vaccines for use in developing countries, and the use of randomized trials to evaluate interventions in the social sciences. He created the well known economic theory regarding skill complementarities, Kremer's O-Ring Theory of Economic Development.

He has also proposed one of the most convincing explanations for the phenomenon of the World System population hyperbolic growth observed prior to the early 1970s, as well as the economic mechanisms of the demographic transition. Kremer has also presented on his research in the field of human capital at the International Growth Centre's Growth Week 2010.

Notes[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Strong Medicine: Creating Incentives for Pharmaceutical Research on Neglected Diseases, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004, ISBN 0-691-12113-3 
• Making Markets for Vaccines: Ideas to Action, Center for Global Development, 2005 
• "Population Growth and Technological Change: One Million B.C. to 1990", The Quarterly Journal of Economics (The MIT Press) 108 (3): 681–716, 1993, DOI:10.2307/2118405, JSTOR 2118405 

External links[link]

• Home page
• Innovations for Poverty Action

This article includes a list of references, related reading or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. Please improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (May 2011)

Jürgen von der Lippe

Hans-Jürgen Dohrenkamp (born 8 June 1948), better known by his stage name Jürgen von der Lippe, is a German television presenter, entertainer, actor and comedian. His stage name comes from the fact that he was born near the source of the river Lippe.

Life[link]

Jürgen von der Lippe was born Hans-Jürgen Dohrenkamp in Bad Salzuflen, and grew up in Aachen, where he attended the Kaiser-Karls-Gymnasium and was a Catholic altar boy. (Today he is an agnostic). His father was the barkeeper in a striptease bar.

From 1966 to 1970 he trained as a signaller in the Bundeswehr, leaving the armed forces a lieutenant.

In 1976 he, Hans Werner Olm and others founded the music group Gebrüder Blattschuss (The Blattschuss Brothers - literally, Blattschuss is a hunting term for a shot through the shoulder into the heart; figuratively, it means getting one's point across succinctly.)

From 1986 to 1988 he was married (his second marriage) to the famous German television presenter Margarethe Schreinemakers.

Before his career in show business, he began studying German language and literature, philosophy and linguistics in Aachen and Berlin, but without graduating.

Television career[link]

Jürgen von der Lippe's first major success was Donnerlippchen (Little Thunder Lips) on WDR television station. He went on to present another very successful dating show, Geld oder Liebe (Money or Love) on ARD; this finished in 2001 after twelve years on air.

Some other public service broadcasting programmes of his included WWF Club (1980 to 1990), So isses ("That's how it is"), Die Goldene Eins ("The Golden No. 1"), Hast Du Worte ("Got words?", Wat is? ("Whassup?"), Lippes Lachmix ("Lippe's Comedy Mix") and Was liest Du? ("What are you reading?").

On commercial television he presented the show Blind Dinner (Sat.1, 2001), and since 2001 he has presented the humorous Sat.1 review of the year's events, Wer zuletzt lacht ("He who laughs last").

In spring 2004 he played the main role of Father Erdmann in the comedy series Der Heiland auf dem Eiland ("The Saviour on the Island") on RTL Television. The first series of six episodes was very successful. The second series ran from 23 February 2005, this time with eight episodes. Jürgen von der Lippe had already played a Catholic priest in the comedy Nicht mit Leo, in which he also played a brothel manager and a Foreign Legionnaire.

As of 2007, he sometimes appears in the improvisational comedy series Schillerstraße, playing the role of Cordula Stratmann's father. Since 15 July 2006, von der Lippe has also presented the programme Extreme Activity on the commercial station ProSieben.

Career as a singer[link]

In 1976 von der Lippe founded the "Gebrüder Blattschuss", which lasted until 1979. His greatest musical success, however, was Guten Morgen, liebe Sorgen ("Good morning, dear worries"), which made it to first place in the ZDF hit parade in July and August 1987.

Stage programme[link]

Von der Lippe's stage appearances have been sold in large numbers as soundtracks and videos. Typically, he dissects odd quirks and everyday events, expertly poking gentle fun at them, with plenty of self-irony. He makes playful use of amusing borrowed words and synonyms in German.

The main themes are marriage, relationships between men and women and the way people act in certain situations. He often brings in fictitious "autobiographical" stories supposed to be from his youth or childhood, often based on his old "arch enemy" "Udo Lohmeier". Each show generally has a topic running through it. When on tour, von der Lippe also likes to vary the content of his stage shows, integrating current events.

One recurring element over the years has also been von der Lippe's parodies of well-known German stars such as Udo Lindenberg, Peter Maffay and Helge Schneider.

Many of his sketches are literal translations from Bill Cosby (e.g. Rache = revenge) or George Carlin (e.g. interview with Jesus).

During his career, von der Lippe has created many characters who appear and reappear in monologues and songs, often played by von der Lippe himself in costume. These include a naive Catholic priest who reflects on human behaviour (often sexual), a postal worker from the Sauerland, with an appropriate accent, and "Kalle", a Berlin heavy metal fan.

Singles

Guten Morgen, liebe Sorgen (1987)

Germany: 3 (05.6.1987) 15 weeks

Austria: 11 (15.9.1987) 18 weeks

Dann ist der Wurm drin (1987)

G: 28

Is was (1989)

G: 65

König Der City (1992)

G: 83

Albums

Guten Morgen, liebe Sorgen (1987)

G: 4

Is was? (1989)

G: 62

Der Blumenmann (1995)

G: 78

Männer, Frauen, Vegetarier (1998)

G: 23 (23.1.1998) 15 weeks

So bin ich (2001)

G: 59 (20.4.2001) 3 weeks

Albums[link]

• 1977: Sing was Süßes
• 1978: Nicht am Bär packen!
• 1979: Extra Drei
• 1980: Zwischen allen Stühlen
• 1982: Kenn'Se den?
• 1983: Ein Mann Show
• 1985: Teuflisch gut! (LP title; published on CD as "Man kann nicht immer Sieger sein")
• 1987: Guten Morgen, Liebe Sorgen
• 1989: Is was
• 1990: Humor ist Humor
• 1992: König der City
• 1995: Der Blumenmann
• 1998: Männer, Frauen, Vegetarier
• 1999: Die andere Seite
• 2001: Große Männer (Best-of sampler)
• 2001: So bin ich
• 2004: Alles was ich liebe

Awards[link]

• 2006: Deutscher Comedypreis – Ehrenpreis für sein Lebenswerk
• 1999: ECHO for Media Man of the Year
• 1996: Bambi für TV Moderation
• 1994: Adolf Grimme Award for Geld oder Liebe
• 1993: Goldene Kamera for Geld oder Liebe
• 1992: Telestar for Geld oder Liebe
• 1988: Bronzene Kamera, audience choice in comedy category
• 1987: Goldene Schallplatte for "Guten Morgen liebe Sorgen"
• 1987: Goldener Löwe from RTL for Guten Morgen, liebe Sorgen
• 1982: Liederpfennig

Sources[link]

Much of this article was translated from the German version of February 2007.

See also[link]

• German television comedy
• List of German comedians

References[link]

• "Jürgen von der Lippe" (in German). Who's Who. http://www.whoswho.de/templ/te_bio.php?PID=1903&RID=1. Retrieved 2011-05-24. 

External links[link]

• Official homepage, in German
• Jürgen von der Lippe in the German National Library catalogue (German)
• Official homepage of Extreme Activity, in German