The Office of Public Sector Information (OPSI) is the body responsible for the operation of Her Majesty's Stationery Office (usually abbreviated as HMSO) and of other public information services of the United Kingdom. OPSI is part of The National Archives of the United Kingdom and it is responsible for Crown copyright.

OPSI announced on 21 June 2006 that it was merging with The National Archives to create a joined-up approach to information management within government. This merger took place in October 2006. OPSI continues to discharge its roles and responsibilities from within the structure of The National Archives.

Controller of HMSO and Director of OPSI[link]

The Controller of HMSO is also the Director of OPSI. HMSO continues to operate from within the expanded remit of OPSI. The Controller of HMSO also holds the offices of Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament, Queen's Printer for Scotland and Government Printer for Northern Ireland.

By virtue of holding these offices OPSI publishes, through HMSO, the London Gazette, Edinburgh Gazette, Belfast Gazette and all legislation in the United Kingdom, including Acts of Parliament, Acts of the Scottish Parliament and Statutory Instruments.

The Controller of HMSO is appointed by Letters Patent to the office of Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament. This office is separate from the functions of OPSI. Historically the role of Queen's [or King's] Printer extended to other official publishing responsibilities, e.g. the rights to print, publish and import the King James Bible and Book of Common Prayer within England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The current holder of this office is Cambridge University Press.

History[link]

HMSO was established as a new department of HM Treasury on 5 April 1786, when John Mayor was appointed as its first "Superintendent".^[1] The creation of the Office was a result of the advocacy of Edmund Burke for reforms of the corrupt, expensive and inefficient Royal Household and the Civil Service. Before the establishment of HMSO, the Crown would grant patents (exclusive rights) for the supply of stationery; the patentee could buy these supplies cheaply and then charge highly inflated prices.^[2]

At first HMSO was the agent for various government departments^[2] but, from 1822, all government departments were required to buy stationery through the open competitions and tenders operated by HMSO.^[1]

HMSO also took over as official publisher for both houses of Parliament from Hansard in 1882.^[1][3]

In 1889, HMSO was granted Letters Patent under which it was appointed as Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament ("printer to Her Majesty of all Acts of Parliament"). These letters patent also appointed the Controller of HMSO as administrator of the rights of Crown copyright. HMSO also took over publication of the London Gazette in the same year.^[1][2][3]

In 1986 HMSO celebrated its bicentenary:

Since 1947 it has printed 86 million copies of the Highway Code. It is one of the biggest publishers in the world, having published 9,300 titles last year and holding 49,000 titles in stock. It produces nearly 600 pages of Hansard and other parliamentary papers overnight, as well as Bills, Acts, White Papers, 2.3 million passports a year, 28.2 million pension and allowance books a year, and all sorts of other publications from the British Pharmacopoiea to guides to long-distance footpaths. The Stationery Office also supplies 1,500 million envelopes a year (at a cost of £11 million) as well as 18 million ball-point pens and 188 million paper-clips.^[4]

Most of its publishing functions were privatised in 1996 as a separate company known as The Stationery Office (TSO), but HMSO continued as a separate part of the Cabinet Office. Prior to 1996, it was the publisher of virtually all government material, such as command papers, legislation and official histories. After 1996 the Controller of HMSO remained Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament and retained the role of administering Crown copyright.^[1][5]

The privatisation was not the final stage in HMSO's changing role. As part of the implementation of the European Union directive on the re-use of public sector information, it was decided that there was a need for a dedicated body to be the principal focal point for advising on and regulating the operation of public sector information re-use. That new body, created in 2005 is the OPSI.^[1][5]

See also[link]

United Kingdom portal

• ePSIplus
• The Stationery Office

References[link]

External links[link]

• Office of Public Sector Information website
  • OPSI - About
• The Stationery Office website
• eContentplus Thematic Network to support the implementation of the European Directive on Public Sector Information (PSI) Re-use
• The (OpenPSI project), an OPSI-led community effort to create a UK government linked data service that supports research.

Hanns Johst (July 8, 1890 – November 23, 1978) was a German playwright and Nazi Poet Laureate.

Hanns Johst was born in Seehausen as the son of an elementary school teacher. He grew up in Oschatz and Leipzig. As a juvenile he planned to become a missionary. When he was 17 years old he worked as an auxiliary in a Bethel Institution. In 1910 he earned his Abitur in Leipzig and then started studying medicine and philosophy and—later—history of art.

He volunteered for the army in 1914. In 1918 he settled down in Allmannshausen (part of Berg) at the Starnberger See.

Early work[link]

His early work is influenced by Expressionism. Examples include Der Anfang [The Beginning] (1917) and Der König [The King] (1920). Later, he turned to a naturalist philosophy in plays such as Wechsler und Händler [Money changers and Traders] (1923) and Thomas Paine (1927).

Bertolt Brecht's first play Baal was written in response to Johst's play Der Einsame [The Lonely], a dramatization of the life of playwright Christian Dietrich Grabbe. In 1928 Johst joined Alfred Rosenberg's "Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur" (Militant League for German Culture) designed to combat "Jewish" influence in German culture. In 1932 he joined the Nazi party, explaining his agreement with Hitler's ideology in the essay "Standpunkt und Fortschritt" [Standpoint and Progress] in 1933.

[edit] Schlageter

When the Nazis achieved power in 1933, Johst wrote the play Schlageter, an expression of Nazi ideology performed on Hitler's 44th birthday, April 20, 1933 to celebrate his victory. It was a heroic biography of the proto-Nazi martyr Albert Leo Schlageter. The famous line "when I hear the word culture, I reach for my gun", often associated with Nazi leaders, derives from this play. The actual original line from the play is slightly different: "Wenn ich Kultur höre ... entsichere ich meinen Browning!" "Whenever I hear of culture... I release the safety catch of my Browning!" (Act 1, Scene 1). It is spoken by another character in conversation with the young Schlageter. In the scene Schlageter and his wartime comrade Friedrich Thiemann are studying for a college examination, but then start disputing whether it is worthwhile doing so when the nation is not free. Thiemann argues he would prefer to fight than to study.

SCHLAGETER: Good old Fritz! (Laughing.) No paradise will entice you out of your barbed wire entanglement!

THIEMANN: That's for damned sure! Barbed wire is barbed wire! I know what I'm up against.... No rose without a thorn!... And the last thing I'll stand for is ideas to get the better of me! I know that rubbish from '18..., fraternity, equality, ..., freedom..., beauty and dignity! You gotta use the right bait to hook 'em. And then, you're right in the middle of a parley and they say: Hands up! You're disarmed..., you republican voting swine! — No, let 'em keep their good distance with their whole ideological kettle of fish.... I shoot with live ammunition! When I hear the word culture..., I release the safety on my Browning!"

SCHLAGETER: What a thing to say!

THIEMANN: It hits the mark! You can be sure of that.

SCHLAGETER: You've got a hair trigger.

—Hans Johst's Nazi Drama Schlageter. Translated with an introduction by Ford B. Parkes-Perret. Akademischer Verlag Hans-Dieter Heinz, Stuttgart, 1984.

The famous line is regularly misattributed, sometimes to Hermann Göring and sometimes to Heinrich Himmler. In December 2007, historian David Starkey misattributed it to Joseph Goebbels in comments criticizing Queen Elizabeth II for being "poorly educated and philistine".^[1] It has also been adapted, for example by Stephen Hawking as "When I hear of Schrödinger's cat, I reach for my pistol" and by filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard in 1963's film Le Mépris, when a producer says to Fritz Lang: "Whenever I hear the word culture, I bring out my checkbook." Lang evokes the original line as he answers "Some years ago—some horrible years ago—the Nazis used to take out a pistol instead of a checkbook."

Role in Nazi Germany[link]

In 1933, Johst signed the Gelöbnis treuester Gefolgschaft, a declaration of loyalty to Hitler by pro-Nazi writers.^[2] In 1935, Johst became the President of the Reichsschrifttumskammer (writer's union) and of the Deutsche Akademie für Dichtung (poetry academy), powerful organisations for German writers. In the same year the last prominent Jewish writers, e.g. Martin Buber, were expelled from the Reichsschrifttumskammer. By this time these organisations restricted membership to writers whose work was either explicitly pro-Nazi or at least approved of by the Nazis as non-"degenerate". Johst achieved many other positions of importance within the Nazi state, and he was named in the Gottbegnadeten list of September 1944 as one of the Reich's most important artists. During the war he held various positions within the SS.

After the war Johst was interned by the Allies. In 1949 he was tried for his activities, and was imprisoned for three and a half years. On his release he was unable to reestablish his career as a writer.

Works[link]

Novels, Stories, Novellas[link]

• Der Anfang, 1917 [The Beginning]
• Der Kreuzweg, 1921 [Stations of the Cross]
• Consuela, 1924
• Consulea. Aus dem Tagebuch einer Spitzbergenfahrt, 1925 [Consuela. Out of a Diary about a trip to Spitsbergen]
• So gehen sie hin, 1930 [So they vanish]
• Die Begegnung, 1930 [The encounter]
• Die Torheit einer Liebe, 1931 [The Foolishness of a Love]
• Ave Maria, 1932
• Mutter ohne Tod. Die Begegnung, 1933 [Mother without Death (i.e. undying). The encounter]
• Maske und Gesicht, 1935 [Mask and Face]
• Erzählungen, 1944 [Stories]
• Gesegnete Vergänglichkeit, 1955 [Blessed Mortality]

Drama[link]

• Stunde der Sterbenden, 1914 [Hour of the Dying]
• Strof, 1915
• Der junge Mensch, 1916 [The Young Person]
• Der Ausländer, 1916 [The Foreigner]
• Stroh, 1916 [Straw]
• Der Einsame, 1917 [The Lonely]
• Der König, 1920 [The King]
• Propheten, 1922 [Prophets]
• Wechsler und Händler, 1923 [Money changers and Traders]
• Die fröhliche Stadt, 1925 [The happy city]
• Der Herr Monsieur, 1926 [Mister Monsieur]
• Thomas Paine, 1927
• Schlageter, 1933
• Fritz Todt. Requiem, 1943

Poetry[link]

• Wegwärts, 1916 [Way-Bound]
• Rolandruf, 1918 [Roland's Call]
• Mutter, 1921 [Mother]
• Lieder der Sehnsucht, 1924 [Songs of Longing]
• Briefe und Gedichte von einer Reise durch Italien und durch die Wüste, 1926 [Letters and Poems about a journey through Italy and the Desert]
• Die Straße. Gedichte und Gesänge, 1941. [The Road. Poems and Songs.]
• Im Tal der Sterne. Liebeslieder. Mutterlieder, 1943. [In the Valley of Stars. Love Songs. Mother-Songs]

Essays, Speeches, Propaganda Articles et al.[link]

• Dramatisches Schaffen, 1922 [Dramatic Creativity]
• Wissen und Gewissen, 1924 [Knowledge and Conscience]
• Ich glaube! Bekenntnisse, 1928 [I believe! Declarations of Faith]
• Meine Erde heißt Deutschland, 1938 [My World is called Germany]
• Ruf des Reiches, Echo des Volkes, 1940 [Call of the Reich, Echo of the People]
• Hanns Johst spricht zu dir (Sammelausgabe), 1942 [Hanns Johst talks to you. Combined edition]

References[link]

External links[link]

• German text of Schlageter Schauspiel

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (May 2012)

Caro Emerald
Emerald singing in Broek op Langedijk, Netherlands
Background information
Birth name	Caroline Esmeralda van der Leeuw
Born	(1981-04-26) 26 April 1981 (age 31) Amsterdam, Netherlands
Genres	Jazz, easy listening
Occupations	Musician
Instruments	Vocals
Years active	2007-present
Labels	Grandmono Records
Website	www.caroemerald.com

Caroline Esmeralda van der Leeuw (b. 26 April 1981 in Amsterdam), best known by her stage name, Caro Emerald, is a Dutch jazz singer. She debuted on 6 July 2009 with her single "Back It Up". Her debut album Deleted Scenes from the Cutting Room Floor set a new all-time chart record on 20 August 2010, spending its 30th week at number one on the Dutch album chart, beating the previous record set by Michael Jackson's Thriller by one week.^[1] The album has become the biggest selling album of 2010 in the Netherlands, selling over 300,000 copies so far. In total more than a million copies have been sold so far. On 3 October 2010, Van der Leeuw was awarded the Dutch Music Prize "Edison Award" for Best Female Artist.^[2]

Biography[link]

Caroline Esmeralda van der Leeuw was born on 26 April 1981 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.^[3] She was trained as a jazz vocalist at the Amsterdam Conservatory, graduating in 2005.

Music career[link]

In early 2007 Dutch producer Jan van Wieringen invited van der Leeuw to sing the vocal on a demo track he was co-producing with songwriter/producer David Schreurs. The song, "Back It Up", had been written by Schreurs together with Canadian songwriter Vince Degiorgio, and was based on a hip-hop beat created by Jan and Robin Veldman. Caro's jazzy vocal style was considered a "perfect match" for the new song.^[4]

The song demo was pitched to various publishers and labels but although the reaction was positive they struggled to imagine it suiting any particular artist and didn't believe it had a strong enough chart potential.^[4] In the meantime, however, the song was posted on YouTube reaching public notice around the world. Radio stations picked it up, and the song gained popularity.

When Degiorgio, Schreurs, and van Wieringen discovered van der Leeuw's sound had such potential, they set about working on a full album presenting Caro Emerald as the star in the summer of 2008 and used "Back It Up"'s mix of 40s-50s jazz, easy listening, orchestral Latin, combined with infectious beats as a model.^[4] Adopting a sample based approach but with live instrumentation, the writing sessions drew from a wide range of influences including jazz organist Jackie Davis, exotica composer Martin Denny, mambo king Perez Prado, 20s/30s jazz and van der Leeuw's own vocal inspirations of The Andrews Sisters, Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan.^[4] The usual method would be for Schreurs to produce the backing tracks at home and then get together with top line writer and lyricist Degiorgio to write the song. Van der Leeuw would occasionally pitch in her own melody and lyrical ideas, and Van Wieringen co-created the tracks for "The Other Woman" and "Dr Wanna Do".^[4]

After the record labels they approached failed to sign van der Leeuw, Schreurs, van Wieringen and van der Leeuw created their own label Grandmono Records and released "Back It Up" as the first single on 6 July 2009. It was an instant hit and listed in the Dutch Top 40 for 12 weeks, peaking at #12. Kraak & Smaak provided a remix of the song. "Back It Up" was the most played song on Dutch radio station 3FM in 2009.^[5]. Follow up A Night Like This became a #1 hit in The Netherlands.

In 2011 Emerald recorded a version of Brook Benton's 1963 hit "You're All I Want for Christmas", sampling the original song to produce a duet with Benton, who died in 1988. The song was released in December 2011.^[6]

On New Years Eve 2011/2012 Emerald appeared on BBC Two television on the Jools Holland Hootenanny show backed by the Jools Holland Rhythm & Blues Orchestra.

Early 2012, Caro Emerald won two prestigious German awards: a Goldene Kamera for Best Musik International and an Echo Award for Best Newcomer International, beating out other Echo nominees who included Lana Del Rey, Gotye, and LMFAO.

Debut album[link]

Emerald singing in the Netherlands on 9 July 2010

Van der Leeuw's debut album Deleted Scenes from the Cutting Room Floor was released on 29 January 2010 and immediately occupied the number 1 position of the Dutch Album Top 100 charts. On 20 August 2010, the album had been number 1 for 27 weeks, an all time record, beating Michael Jackson's Thriller, which spent 26 weeks at number one in 1983.^[1] The album reached double platinum status in the Netherlands on 5 July 2010.^[7] In August 2010 it reached triple platinum.^[1], in November 2010 four times platinum (200.000)^[8] and in december 2011, six platinum (over 300.000 albums sold). Deleted Scenes From The Cutting Room Floor spent 104 weeks in the official Album charts, until it was removed due to a Dutch chart rule which provided that albums can't spend more than 2 years in the charts.

The second single from the album was "A Night like This". The song was listed in the Dutch Top 40 for 26 weeks and peaked at number 2. In the national single charts, the song peaked at number 1. It was the most played song in The Netherlands in 2010.

The cinematic and upbeat sound of the album has resulted in frequent use of the songs in TV series and advertising campaigns around the world. "A Night Like This" featured in the trailer campaign of NBC series The Playboy Club, a brand campaign by Martini, the trailer of 2 Days in New York (starring Chris Rock and Julie Delpy), and The Secret Circle, amongst others. "Back it Up" featured in a TV ad for Wind Mobile. "That Man" featured in Dancing with the Stars, The Vampire Diaries, a UK advertising campaign for Sky TV, and has been incorporated in the original score of the Disney Nature film Chimpanzee.

On 15 January 2011, she won the Popprijs 2010 for best Dutch pop act of 2010.^{[citation needed]} Also in 2011, the album was released throughout Europe with great commercial success. Deleted Scenes From The Cutting Room Floor became a hit in the UK (1x platinum with sales exceeding 360.000, 8 weeks top 10 peaking at #4), Germany (1x platinum with sales exceeding 280.000, peaking at #5 and Platinum single for A Night Like This with sales exceeding 340.000), Poland (6x platinum), Italy (Gold Single for "Back it Up"), abd Austria (#1 with A Night Like This) In the UK, all 6 singles and even the entire album were A-listed by radio station BBC2. Over 1.000.000 albums have been sold worldwide (certified IFPI Platinum).^{[citation needed]} Due to it's exceptional success, the album was included in an episode of the Dutch version of Classic Albums in April 2012.^{[clarification needed]} In May 2012, Emerald was offered a contract record by Universal Music Group in the USA.

Awards[link]

• 11 April 2010: 3FM Serious Talent Award
• April 15, 2010: Schaal van Rigter
• April 26, 2010: De Eerste Prijs
• Oktober 3, 2010: Edison Best female singer
• MTV EMA Award for best Dutch and Belgian Act.
• January 12, 2011: European Border Breakers Award 2011
• January 15, 2011: 3FM Mega Award 2010
• January 15, 2011: Popprijs 2010
• March 3, 2011: Zilveren Harp 2010
• March 3, 2011: Het Beste Nederlandse lied 2010 (Best song of the year 2010)
• March 14, 2011: 3FM Awards: Best Album and Beste Female Singer
• June 12, 2011: TMF Award for best female
• Februari 4, 2012: Goldene Kamera 2012 Best Music International
• March 2012, Echo (music award) Award Best International Newcomer

^{[9][10][11][12][13][14]}

Discography[link]

Albums[link]

Singles[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Caro Emerald

• Official website
• Official Uvumi Profile
• Caro Emerald Profile and Discography on This is Vintage Now