Flamboyant, cultured and refined, aristocracy is often seen as a national treasure. Lords of Misrule takes a different view and considers the role of an aristocracy behaving badly. This is a book about the political, social and moral failings of aristocracy and the ways in which they have featured in political rhetoric. Drawing on the views of critics of aristocracy, it explores the dark side of power without responsibility. Less 'patrician paragons' than dissolute and debauched debtors, the aristocrats featured here undermined, rather than augmented, the fabric of national life. For the first time, Lords of Misrule recaptures the views of those radicals and reformers who were prepared to contemplate a Britain without aristocrats.

I have been asked to write a brief foreword to this volume honoring Hisako Ikeda, providing a review of the accomplishments in our field over the past four decades, when Hisako was an active participant. This I am delighted to do. It has been a most exciting time in vision research and Hisako has been right in the middle of much of the excitement, publishing on a wide variety of topics and providing much new data and many new insights. Hisako's research career can be divided by decades into four quite distinct areas of inquiry. In the 1950s, as a student in Japan, her research interests were psychophysical in nature, and she was concerned with visual illusions, figural aftereffects, and motion detec tion. In the 1960s, after her move to London, she began electrophysiological studies. Much of her work in the 1960s was concerned with the electroretinogram (ERG), its components, and the use of this electrical response for evaluating spectral sensitivities of the eye and retinal degenerations. This work represented the beginning of her electrodiagnostic clinical work, which continued until her retirement."

I have been asked to write a brief foreword to this volume honoring Hisako Ikeda, providing a review of the accomplishments in our field over the past four decades, when Hisako was an active participant. This I am delighted to do. It has been a most exciting time in vision research and Hisako has been right in the middle of much of the excitement, publishing on a wide variety of topics and providing much new data and many new insights. Hisako's research career can be divided by decades into four quite distinct areas of inquiry. In the 1950s, as a student in Japan, her research interests were psychophysical in nature, and she was concerned with visual illusions, figural aftereffects, and motion detec tion. In the 1960s, after her move to London, she began electrophysiological studies. Much of her work in the 1960s was concerned with the electroretinogram (ERG), its components, and the use of this electrical response for evaluating spectral sensitivities of the eye and retinal degenerations. This work represented the beginning of her electrodiagnostic clinical work, which continued until her retirement."

What happens when all heaven breaks loose? The idyllic setting of a university town on the Mid-Wales coast. New arrivals from various parts of Britain, exhilarated and apprehensive at the prospect of grappling with the unfamiliar, in learning, ideas - and life. Four boys, extrovert, loner, poetry lover, aspiring intellectual. A malapropistic landlady. Three girls, one worldly, one demurely innocent, one full of adolescent ardour. A lecturer and would-be writer romantically inclined towards his students. And ever-present in all its moods, watching the human drama unfold, inspirer and tempter, lovely and sinister, the sea. The situation is ripe for a series of adventures, by turns comic, traumatic, poignant and, for one of the characters, ultimately tragic.

Anthony Taylor's poems and songs offer a range of topics and emotions as varied as life itself - from the warm-hearted humour of The Hugging Song and the playful but touching romanticism of I'd Like To Be The Morning Sun to the despairing voices of Russian Roulette and Commuter's Lament; from the tenderness of Dream Of Me Tonight to the indictments of war in First Moustache and Gorillas Hearing Gunfire; from celebrations of natural beauty in Winter Sun Over Aberystwyth and Samothrace to the grief of The Daffodils Outside My Mother's Window and Skeleton House; from the joyful assurance of Sailboats In The Sky to the ominous note sounded in Dead Hedgehog; from the contentment of Canals to the sad solitariness of Alone Eighty and Missing. In between, the verse takes in such diverse subjects as music, summers and sand, commuting, snow, rugby, busking, faith, cruelty to animals and world conflict and peace. Through all there shines a love of and concern for life and living things.

"WHEN LOVE IS BY CHOICE INSTEAD OF CHANCE"

"When Love Is By Choice Instead Of Chance" takes a fresh look at relationships between lovers and spouses, and parents and children.

We are shown the difference between the strength of making choices, and the weakness of leaving what we value up to chance.

It encourages opening our hearts and minds to a fuller expression of potential for understanding, intimacy, caring, and love.

It shows that taking relationship needs for granted is a sure way of promising that those needs may never be fulfilled.

Author Clarence Taylor introduces us to constructive-acceptance, constructive-compromise, primary-relationship, primary-affection, affection-deficit, and the acronym S.E.L.F.

Taylor also simplifies the meaning of self-love.

There is a real need in society for a deeper respect and responsibility toward relationships. "When Love Is By Choice Instead Of Chance" offers us a reason to take a deeper look at who we ourselves and those we relate to are. It is, in the quintessential meaning of the word, dynamite, in a small package.