BRIDGET JONES'S DIARY, THE EDGE OF REASON & BABY

Bridget Jones's Diary

Today, The Grandma has been resting at home. Saint Stephen is festivity in Catalonia like in the rest of the Carolingian lands. She has been watching television and she has chosen the saga of Bridget Jones, a British trilogy based on the novels of Helen Fielding. The main characters of the movies are Bridget Jones (Renée Zellweger), Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) and Jack Qwant (Patrick Dempsey).

Bridget Jones's Diary is a 2001 romantic comedy film directed by Sharon Maguire and written by Richard Curtis, Andrew Davies, and Helen Fielding.

It is based on Fielding's 1996 novel of the same name, which is a reinterpretation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. The adaptation stars Renée Zellweger as Bridget; Colin Firth as Bridget's true love, Mark Darcy; and Hugh Grant as the caddish Daniel Cleaver. Production began in August 2000 and ended in November 2000, and took place largely on location in London and the Home Counties. The film premiered on 4 April 2001 in the United Kingdom and was released to theatres on 13 April 2001 simultaneously in the United Kingdom and in the United States.

Bridget Jones's Diary received positive reviews and was a commercial success, grossing over $280 million worldwide. Zellweger was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in the film.

A sequel, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, was released in 2004, and another sequel, Bridget Jones's Baby, was released in 2016.

Bridget Jones (Renée Zellweger) is 32, single, engagingly imperfect, and worried about her weight. She works at a publishing company in London where her main focus is fantasizing about her boss, Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant). At her parents' New Year party Bridget is introduced to Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), a childhood acquaintance and barrister, son of her parents' friends. Mark finds Bridget foolish and vulgar and Bridget thinks Mark arrogant and rude, and is disgusted by his novelty Christmas jumper. Overhearing Mark grumble to his mother about her attempt to set him up with a verbally incontinent spinster who smokes like a chimney, drinks like a fish and dresses like her mother, Bridget decides to turn her life around. She begins keeping a diary to chronicle her attempts to stop smoking, lose weight, and find her Mr. Right.

Bridget and Daniel begin to flirt heavily at work, ahead of an important book launch, at which Bridget bumps into Mark and his glamorous but haughty colleague Natasha (Embeth Davidtz). Bridget leaves with Daniel and they have dinner, despite Daniel's notorious reputation as a womaniser. Daniel tells Bridget that he and Mark were formerly friends but says Mark slept with Daniel's fiancée, for which they now hate each other. Bridget and Daniel start dating.

Bridget is invited to a family party, originally a Tarts & Vicars costume party which is tied into a mini break weekend with Daniel. They spend the day before the party at a country inn where Mark and Natasha are also staying. The morning of the party Daniel says he must return to London for work and leaves Bridget to endure the party alone. When she returns to London & drops in on Daniel, she discovers his American colleague, Lara en flagrante (Lisa Barbuscia), naked in his flat. Bridget cuts ties with him and immediately searches for a new career. She lands a new job in television, and when Daniel pleads with her to stay, she declares that she would rather have a job wiping Saddam Hussein's arse.

Bridget attends a friend's long-standing dinner party, where she is the only single person. Once again she crosses paths with Mark and Natasha. Mark privately confesses to Bridget that, despite her faults, he likes her just as you are. Some time later, as a well known barrister, he allows Bridget an exclusive TV interview in a landmark legal case which boosts her career and allows her to begin to see him in a different light.

Bridget begins to develop feelings for Mark, and when she misguidedly and somewhat disastrously, attempts to cook her own birthday dinner party, he comes to her rescue. A drunken Daniel arrives after a happy dinner celebration with Bridget's friends and Mark, and temporarily monopolizes Bridget's attention. Mark leaves, but returns to challenge Daniel and the two fight in the street, eventually smashing through a window of a Greek restaurant. They eventually call a draw only to have Daniel mutter wanker at Mark as he turns away and which only Mark can hear; Mark knocks Daniel down; shocked, Bridget chides Mark and he leaves, but after a self-serving appeal from Daniel, she rejects him as well.

Bridget's mother, Pamela (Gemma Jones) has left Bridget's father, Colin (Jim Broadbent) and begun an affair with perma-tanned shopping channel presenter Julian. When the affair ends, she returns to the Jones's family home with an unintentional revelation: Mark and Daniel's falling-out resulted from Daniel (then Mark's best friend at Cambridge University) sleeping with Mark's wife which Mark walked in on, not the other way around.

At the Darcys' ruby wedding anniversary party the same day, Bridget confesses her feelings for Mark, only to learn that he and Natasha have accepted jobs in New York and are on the verge of an engagement, according to Mark's father. Bridget interrupts the toast with an emotionally moving speech which peters out as she realizes the hopelessness of her position; her words clearly have an effect on Mark, but he still flies to New York. Bridget's friends rally to repair her broken heart with a surprise trip to Paris, but as they are about to leave, Mark appears at Bridget's flat.

Just as they are about to kiss for the first time, Bridget flies to her bedroom to change into sexier underwear. Mark peeks at her diary, finds her older unflattering opinions of him, and leaves. Bridget, realising what he has read and that she might lose him again, runs outside after him in the snow in her tiger skin-print underwear and a skimpy jumper, but is unable to find him. Disheartened, she is about to return home when Mark appears with a new diary for her to make a fresh start. They kiss in the snow-covered street, and Bridget remarks that nice boys don't kiss like that, to which Mark retorts Oh, yes, they fucking do.

More information: The Guardian

 

Well, better dash. I’ve got another party to go to.

It’s single people… mainly poofs. Bye!

Bridget Jones

Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason is a 2004 romantic comedy film directed by Beeban Kidron and written by Adam Brooks, Richard Curtis, Andrew Davies, and Helen Fielding, based on Fielding's 1999 novel of the same name. It stars Renée Zellweger as Bridget Jones, Colin Firth as Mark Darcy, and Hugh Grant as Daniel Cleaver.

The sequel to Bridget Jones's Diary (2001), the film was released in the United Kingdom on 12 November 2004 and in the United States a week later on 19 November 2004 to generally negative reviews from film critics. Despite this, the film was a box office success, grossing over $260 million worldwide.

Bridget Jones (Renée Zellweger) is ecstatic about her new relationship with Mark Darcy (Colin Firth). However, Bridget's confidence is shattered when she meets Mark's assistant, the beautiful, slim, quick-witted Rebecca Gillies (Jacinda Barrett). At her job on TV morning show Sit-Up Britain, Bridget crosses paths with her ex, Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant), and is offered a position alongside Cleaver in a new travel series. Bridget initially refuses, declaring Daniel a deceitful, sexist, disgusting specimen of humanity, but eventually signs on, despite her friends' misgivings.

Bridget Jones, The Edge of Reason

Bridget is delighted when Mark invites her to his Law Council Dinner, believing he will propose afterward. However, a series of fashion/cosmetic mishaps make the evening a debacle, culminating in the team trivia quiz: Bridget makes a critical error on a question about Madonna, which Rebecca Gillies wins, leaving Bridget thoroughly deflated.

After the dinner, Mark and Bridget argue and she leaves in a huff. Mark goes to Bridget's apartment, apologizes, and tells her he loves her for the first time. Later that night, Mark invites Bridget on a ski holiday to Lech, Austria. On the slopes, she learns Rebecca recommended the vacation spot and that she is there as well with a few other colleagues. Bridget suspects that she is pregnant since her period is late, but after an argument over the upbringing and education of their future children, the pregnancy test proves negative. Returning home, Bridget and Mark attend a lunch with their parents, where Bridget is hurt by Mark's dismissal of their prospective marriage.

Bridget overhears a suspicious message from Rebecca on Mark's answering machine and dissects it with her friends, who advise her to confront him; Bridget does, Mark refuses to dignify the question with an answer, and Bridget breaks up with him. She travels to Thailand with her friend, Shazzer (Sally Phillips) and Daniel Cleaver to film The Smooth Guide. Bridget and Daniel visit several exotic locations and flirtily reconnect, but Bridget's trust in Daniel is again demolished by the arrival of a prostitute he ordered, and she realizes he has not changed his boorish ways.

Shazzer has a fling with the much younger Jed (Paul Nicholls), who gives her an ivory tusk as a gift to take back to Britain, which winds up in Bridget's bag. When security dogs at the airport detect a large stash of cocaine inside the tusk, Bridget is arrested and sent to a Thai prison and locked in a cell with almost 50 other Thai female inmates. Feeling low and scared but glad at the friendliness of the inmates, Bridget shares relationship advice with the other inmates and teaches them to sing and dance to Madonna's Like a Virgin. Mark arrives to tell Bridget that her release has been put in motion. After confirming Jed as the true perpetrator and that Bridget spent the night with Daniel Cleaver, he declares that her sex life does not interest him; Bridget does not correct his presumption, and he departs, leaving Bridget certain he no longer loves her. Back in Britain, Mark confronts Daniel for abandoning Bridget in Thailand, and they fight outside an art gallery in Kensington Gardens. Daniel swears off Bridget for good and sarcastically suggests to Mark, Why don't you just marry her?

Bridget arrives at Heathrow Airport as an international human rights celebrity. She is greeted by her parents, who have been busy planning their vow renewal ceremony. At home, Bridget is surprised by her friends, who reveal that Mark personally tracked down the drug trafficker Jed, secured his custody and extradition, and forced him to admit Bridget's innocence. Hopeful that Mark still loves her, Bridget immediately runs to his house. She finds Rebecca there and assumes she is romantically involved with Mark, but Rebecca reveals that she is actually infatuated with Bridget and kisses her; though flattered, Bridget politely turns her down.

Bridget confronts Mark at his legal chambers and asks him to give her another chance. Mark proposes to Bridget and she accepts. The film ends with Bridget's parents renewing their vows and Bridget catching the bouquet.

More information: The Guardian

I truly believe that happiness is possible...

even when you're thirty-three and have a bottom

the size of two bowling balls.
 

Bridget Jones

Bridget Jones's Baby is a 2016 romantic comedy film directed by Sharon Maguire and written by Helen Fielding, Dan Mazer and Emma Thompson, based on the fictional columns by Fielding. It is the third film in the franchise and a sequel to 2004 film Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. The film stars Renée Zellweger as Bridget Jones, who after becoming pregnant is unsure if Mark Darcy (Colin Firth, also reprising his role) or Jack Qwant (Patrick Dempsey) is the father.

Filming began on 2 October 2015 in London. The film was released theatrically on 16 September 2016 in the United Kingdom and United States and on 5 October in France. It received generally positive reviews and grossed over $211 million worldwide.

On her forty-third birthday, Bridget Jones attends the funeral of Daniel Cleaver, presumed dead after a plane crash. She sees her ex Mark Darcy with his new wife Camilla.

Bridget Jones's Baby

Bridget now works as a television producer and is close friends with anchor Miranda. After spending the night of her birthday alone, Bridget embraces her single life, accepting Miranda's offer to go to a music festival where she meets a man called Jack. Later that evening a drunk Bridget crawls into a yurt she thinks belongs to her and Miranda, but actually belongs to Jack. Despite the surprise, Jack invites her to stay and the two have a one-night stand. In the morning, finding the bed empty, Bridget leaves, unaware Jack is out getting breakfast for both of them.

Returning home, Bridget goes to the christening of Jude's youngest child, where she is the godmother and Mark has been asked to be the godfather at the last minute. Mark tells her that he and his wife are divorcing and Camilla was only at the funeral for moral support. Realising they are still in love, Bridget and Mark spend the night together. Mark says he is travelling for work early the next day, so Bridget exits before he wakes up, leaving behind a note telling him that reconnecting with him is too painful.

A few weeks later, Bridget realises she is pregnant. She decides that she wants to keep the baby despite being single, as it might be her last chance to have a child. After a visit to the clinic of Dr. Rawling, she realises that the father could be Mark or Jack. She is unable to contact Jack until Miranda spots him on an TV ad and they realise he is Jack Qwant, a billionaire inventor of a dating website.

Miranda conspires with Bridget to have Jack as a guest on their news show so that they can take DNA samples to work out if Jack is the father. Although Bridget tries to stay incognito, Jack recognises her and asks her why she left after their night together. She apologises and decides to tell him that she is pregnant and that he is the father, without mentioning Mark. Initially taken aback at the responsibility of having a child with a stranger, Jack throws himself into the role of being a father. Bridget also tells Mark the news who is so thrilled at the prospect that she cannot find the courage to tell him about Jack. Dr Rawlings tries to administer a DNA test, but Bridget decides not to go ahead with it while her child is still in the womb as she is terrified by the risk of miscarriage.

Bridget invites Jack to a work event, and is startled when Mark shows up as well. The two men meet, and the three go out to dinner, where Bridget finally admits that she is unsure who the father is. Although disappointed, Jack takes the news well, but Mark is upset and walks out though he eventually becomes supportive as well. Mark and Jack eventually become jealous of each other and when Jack implies that he and Bridget had sex without condoms Mark leaves and ignores Bridget's calls. Jack asks her to move in with him, but he eventually confesses to Bridget what he told Mark. Upset, Bridget rushes to talk to Mark, but sees his wife arriving at his house, so she walks away.

Nine months into her pregnancy Bridget finds herself locked out in the rain. Mark arrives and breaks into the flat for her. After Bridget asks him about his wife at his flat, he informs her that she was there to pick up the last of her things. Just as they are about to kiss, Bridget's water breaks. When his phone rings for work, Mark throws it out the window, which, although romantic, leaves them without a means to call help. They eventually make it to the hospital with some help from Jack. Later Jack apologises to Mark for his behaviour. Bridget gives birth to a boy, and her friends and parents come to visit them. Rawlings takes Mark and Jack away to perform the DNA test, and they genuinely wish each other luck.

A year later, Bridget is at church for her wedding to Mark. Jack Qwant attends as a guest and holds onto Bridget and Mark's son William.

Later a newspaper lying on a bench reveals that Daniel Cleaver has been found alive.

More information: The Guardian

Sometimes you love someone

because he is not the same as you.

And sometimes you love someone

because it feels like home.

Bridget Jones

M. GORBACHEV RESIGNS AS PRESIDENT OF THE USSR

USSR

Today is Christmas Day. The Grandma and her friends want to congratulate all people who celebrate this feast.

December, 25 is not only Christmas Day but an important day in recent European history. On a day like today in 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as President of the Soviet Union and the union itself was dissolved the next day. The Grandma wants to talk about this important event that changed the history of the world because of it was the end of the cold war and about Mikhail Gorbachev, an important figure in the USSR and in the European history.

Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (born 2 March 1931) is a Russian and formerly Soviet politician. The eighth and last leader of the Soviet Union, he was the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991.

He was also the country's head of state from 1985 until 1991, serving as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet from 1988 to 1989, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet from 1989 to 1990, and President of the Soviet Union from 1990 to 1991. Ideologically, he initially adhered to Marxism-Leninism although by the early 1990s had moved toward social democracy.

Of mixed Russian and Ukrainian heritage, Gorbachev was born in Privolnoye, Stavropol Krai to a poor peasant family. Growing up under the rule of Joseph Stalin, in his youth he operated combine harvesters on a collective farm before joining the Communist Party, which then governed the Soviet Union as a one-party state according to Marxist-Leninist doctrine. While studying at Moscow State University, he married fellow student Raisa Titarenko in 1953 prior to receiving his law degree in 1955.

Moving to Stavropol, he worked for the Komsomol youth organisation and, after Stalin's death, became a keen proponent of the de-Stalinization reforms of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. He was appointed the First Party Secretary of the Stavropol Regional Committee in 1970, in which position he oversaw construction of the Great Stavropol Canal.

More information: The Cold War Museum

In 1978 he returned to Moscow to become a Secretary of the party's Central Committee and in 1979 joined its governing Politburo. Within three years of the death of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, following the brief regimes of Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko, the Politburo elected Gorbachev as General Secretary, the de facto head of government, in 1985.

Although committed to preserving the Soviet state and to its socialist ideals, Gorbachev believed significant reform was necessary, particularly after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. He withdrew from the Soviet-Afghan War and embarked on summits with United States President Ronald Reagan to limit nuclear weapons and end the Cold War.

Domestically, his policy of glasnost, openness allowed for enhanced freedom of speech and press, while his perestroika restructuring sought to decentralise economic decision making to improve efficiency. His democratisation measures and formation of the elected Congress of People's Deputies undermined the one-party state.

Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev

Gorbachev declined to intervene militarily when various Eastern Bloc countries abandoned Marxist-Leninist governance in 1989-90. Internally, growing nationalist sentiment threatened to break up the Soviet Union, leading Marxist-Leninist hardliners to launch the unsuccessful August Coup against Gorbachev in 1991.

In the wake of this, the Soviet Union dissolved against Gorbachev's wishes and he resigned. After leaving office, he launched his Gorbachev Foundation, became a vocal critic of Russian Presidents Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin, and campaigned for Russia's social-democratic movement.

Widely considered one of the most significant figures of the second half of the 20th century, Gorbachev remains the subject of controversy. The recipient of a wide range of awards -including the Nobel Peace Prize-he was widely praised for his pivotal role in ending the Cold War, curtailing human rights abuses in the Soviet Union, and tolerating both the fall of Marxist-Leninist administrations in eastern and central Europe and the reunification of Germany.

Conversely, in Russia he is often derided for not stopping the Soviet collapse, an event which brought a decline in Russia's global influence and precipitated an economic crisis.

Gorbachev's leadership style differed from that of his predecessors. He would stop to talk to civilians on the street, forbade the display of his portrait at the 1985 Red Square holiday celebrations, and encouraged frank and open discussions at Politburo meetings.

More information: The Gorbachev Foundation

To the West, Gorbachev was seen as a more moderate and less threatening Soviet leader; some Western commentators however believed this an act to lull Western governments into a false sense of security. His wife was his closest adviser, and took on the unofficial role of a first lady by appearing with him on foreign trips; her public visibility was a breach of standard practice and generated resentment. His other close aides were Georgy Shakhnazarov and Anatoly Chernyaev.

Gorbachev was aware that the Politburo could remove him from office, and that he could not pursue more radical reform without a majority of supporters in the Politburo. He sought to remove several older members from the Politburo, encouraging Grigory Romanov, Nikolai Tikhonov, and Viktor Grishin into retirement.

He moved Gromyko from his role in foreign policy to that of head of state and replaced Gromyko's former role with his own ally, Eduard Shevardnadze. Other allies whom he saw promoted were Yakovlev, Anatoly Lukyanov, and Vadim Medvedev. Another of those promoted by Gorbachev was Boris Yeltsin, who was made a Secretary of the Central Committee in July 1985.

Five key moments in the fall of the USSR

Most of these appointees were from a new generation of well-educated officials who had been frustrated during the Brezhnev era. In his first year, 14 of the 23 heads of department in the secretariat were replaced. Doing so, Gorbachev secured dominance in the Politburo within a year, faster than either Stalin, Khrushchev, or Brezhnev had achieved. In January 1987, Gorbachev attended a Central Committee plenum where he talked about perestroika and democratisation while criticising widespread corruption. He considered putting a proposal to allow multi-party elections into his speech, but decided against doing so.

After the plenum, he focused his attentions on economic reform, holding discussions with government officials and economists. Many economists proposed reducing ministerial controls on the economy and allowing state-owned enterprises to set their own targets; Ryzhkov and other government figures were sceptical.

In June, Gorbachev finished his report on economic reform. It reflected a compromise: ministers would retain the ability to set output targets but these would not be considered binding. That month, a plenum accepted his recommendations and the Supreme Soviet passed a law on enterprises implementing the changes.

Economic problems remained: by the late 1980s there were still widespread shortages of basic goods, rising inflation, and declining living standards. These stoked a number of miners' strikes in 1989.

By 1987, the ethos of glasnost had spread through Soviet society: journalists were writing increasingly openly, many economic problems were being publicly revealed, and studies appeared that critically reassessed Soviet history. Gorbachev was broadly supportive, describing glasnost as the crucial, irreplaceable weapon of perestroika.

He nevertheless insisted that people should use the newfound freedom responsibly, stating that journalists and writers should avoid sensationalism and be completely objective in their reporting. Nearly two hundred previously restricted Soviet films were publicly released, and a range of Western films were also made available. In 1989, Soviet culpability for the 1940 Katyn massacre was finally revealed. 

More information: Norwich University

In September 1987, the government stopped jamming the signal of the British Broadcasting Corporation and Voice of America.

The reforms also included greater tolerance of religion; an Easter service was broadcast on Soviet television for the first time and the millennium celebrations of the Russian Orthodox Church were given media attention.

Independent organisations appeared, most supportive of Gorbachev, although the largest, Pamyat, was ultra-nationalist and anti-Semitic in nature. Gorbachev also announced that Soviet Jews wishing to migrate to Israel would be allowed to do so, something previously prohibited. 

In February 1990, both liberalisers and Marxist-Leninist hardliners intensified their attacks on Gorbachev. A liberaliser march took part in Moscow criticising Communist Party rule, while at a Central Committee meeting, the hardliner Vladimir Brovikov accused Gorbachev of reducing the country to anarchy and ruin and of pursuing Western approval at the expense of the Soviet Union and the Marxist-Leninist cause.

Gorbachev was aware that the Central Committee could still oust him as General Secretary, and so decided to reformulate the role of head of government to a presidency from which they could not remove him. He decided that the presidential election should be held by the Congress of People's Deputies. He chose this over a public vote because he thought the latter would escalate tensions and feared that he might lose it; a spring 1990 poll nevertheless still showed him as the most popular politician in the country.

The New York Times announced the end of the USSR

At the 28th Communist Party Congress in July, hardliners criticised the reformists but Gorbachev was re-elected party leader with the support of three-quarters of delegates and his choice of Deputy General Secretary, Vladimir Ivashko, was also elected.

Seeking compromise with the liberalisers, Gorbachev assembled a team of both his own and Yeltsin's advisers to come up with an economic reform package: the result was the 500 Days programme. This called for further decentralisation and some privatisation.

Gorbachev described the plan as modern socialism rather than a return to capitalism but had many doubts about it. In September, Yeltsin presented the plan to the Russian Supreme Soviet, which backed it. Many in the Communist Party and state apparatus warned against it, arguing that it would create marketplace chaos, rampant inflation, and unprecedented levels of unemployment.

The 500 Days plan was abandoned. At this, Yeltsin rallied against Gorbachev in an October speech, claiming that Russia would no longer accept a subordinate position to the Soviet government.

By mid-November 1990, much of the press was calling for Gorbachev's resignation and predicting civil war. Hardliners were urging Gorbachev to disband the presidential council and arrest vocal liberals in the media.

  More information: The University of North Caroline at Chapel Hill

In November, he addressed the Supreme Soviet where he announced an eight-point program, which included governmental reforms, among them the abolition of the presidential council. By this point, Gorbachev was isolated from many of his former close allies and aides. Yakovlev had moved out of his inner circle and Shevardnadze had resigned. His support among the intelligentsia was declining, and by the end of 1990 his approval ratings had plummeted.

Amid growing dissent in the Baltics, especially Lithuania, in January 1991 Gorbachev demanded that the Lithuanian Supreme Council rescind its pro-independence reforms. Soviet troops occupied several Vilnius buildings and clashed with protesters, 15 of whom were killed.

Gorbachev was widely blamed by liberalisers, with Yeltsin calling for his resignation. Gorbachev denied sanctioning the military operation, although some in the military claimed that he had; the truth of the matter was never clearly established. Fearing more civil disturbances, that month Gorbachev banned demonstrations and ordered troops to patrol Soviet cities alongside the police. This further alienated the liberalisers but was not enough to win-over hardliners.

Wanting to preserve the Union, in April Gorbachev and the leaders of nine Soviet republics jointly pledged to prepare a treaty that would renew the federation under a new constitution; six of the republics -Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Georgia, and Armenia- did not endorse this. A referendum on the issue brought 76.4% in favour of continued federation but the six rebellious republics had not taken part. Negotiations as to what form the new constitution would take took place, again bringing together Gorbachev and Yeltsin in discussion; it was planned to be formally signed in August.

The fall of the USSR

On 30 October, Gorbachev attended a conference in Madrid trying to revive the Israeli–Palestinian peace process.

The event was co-sponsored by the U.S. and Soviet Union, one of the first examples of such cooperation between the two countries. There, he again met with Bush. En route home, he travelled to France where he stayed with Mitterrand at the latter's home near Bayonne. After the coup, Gorbachev continued to pursue plans for a new union treaty but found increasing opposition to the idea of a continued federal state as the leaders of various Soviet republics bowed to growing nationalist pressure. Yeltsin stated that he would veto any idea of a unified state, instead favouring a confederation with little central authority. Only the leaders of the Kazakhstan and Kirghizia supported Gorbachev's approach. On 1 December a referendum in Ukraine produced over 90% support for secession from the Union; Gorbachev had expected Ukrainians to reject independence.

Without Gorbachev's knowledge, Yeltsin met with Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk and Belarusian President Stanislav Shushkevich in Belovezha Forest, near Brest, Belarus, on 8 December and signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union had ceased to exist and formed the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as its successor.

Gorbachev only learned of this development when Shushkevich phoned him; Gorbachev was furious. He desperately looked for an opportunity to preserve the Soviet Union, hoping in vain that the media and intelligentsia might rally against the idea of its dissolution.

More information: Business Insider

Ukrainian, Belarussian, and Russian Supreme Soviets then ratified the establishment of the CIS. On 10 December, he issued a statement calling the CIS agreement illegal and dangerous. On 20 December, the leaders of 11 of the 12 remaining republics -all except Georgia– met in Alma-Ata and signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, agreeing to dismantle the Soviet Union and formally establish the CIS. They also provisionally accepted Gorbachev's resignation as president of what remained of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev revealed that he would resign as soon as he saw that the CIS was a reality.

Yeltsin was tasked with overseeing the transfer of power from Gorbachev to its successor states. He and Gorbachev agreed that the latter would formally announce his resignation as Soviet President and Commander-in-Chief on 25 December, before vacating the Kremlin by 29 December.

Yakovlev, Chernyaev, and Shevardnadze joined Gorbachev to help him write a resignation speech. Gorbachev then gave his speech in the Kremlin in front of television cameras, allowing for international broadcast. In it, he announced, I hereby discontinue my activities at the post of President of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

He expressed regret for the breakup of the Soviet Union but cited what he saw as the achievements of his administration: political and religious freedom, the end of totalitarianism, the introduction of democracy and a market economy, and an end to the arms race and Cold War.

Gorbachev was only the second Soviet leader, after Khrushchev, not to die in office.

The Soviet Union officially ceased to exist at midnight on 31 December 1991.

More information: The Guardian

Sometimes it's difficult to accept, to recognise one's own mistakes,

but one must do it. I was guilty of overconfidence and arrogance,

and I was punished for that.

Mikhail Gorbachev

'SILENT NIGHT' IN ST. NIKOLAUS, OBERNDORF, AUSTRIA

Franz Xaver Gruber & Stille Nacht Kapelle, Salzburg

Today, The Grandma has been preparing her home to receive Christmas Day. Although she is not a believer, she likes these celebrations from the point of view of culture and history and she likes searching information about them.

She has been talking with her closer friend Tina Picotes about Christmas carols, and they have chosen Silent Night as one of the most popular and beautiful songs ever composed.

Silent Night is a popular Christmas carol composed on a day like today in 1818 by Franz Xaver Gruber to lyrics by Joseph Mohr in the small town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg in Austria. The Grandma and Tina spent their winter holiday in Austria last year with the rest of their friends and they visited Salzburg and these places that have a relation with this popular Christmas carol.
 

Silent Night, in German Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,  is a popular Christmas carol, composed in 1818 by Franz Xaver Gruber to lyrics by Joseph Mohr in the small town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg, Austria.

It was declared an intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO in 2011. The song has been recorded by many singers across many music genres. The version sung by Bing Crosby in 1935 is the fourth best-selling single of all-time.

The song was first performed on Christmas Eve 1818 at St Nicholas parish church in Oberndorf, a village in the Austrian Empire on the Salzach river in present-day Austria. A young priest, Father Joseph Mohr, had come to Oberndorf the year before. He had written the lyrics of the song Stille Nacht in 1816 at Mariapfarr, the hometown of his father in the Salzburg Lungau region, where Joseph had worked as a co-adjutor.

More information: WRTI

The melody was composed by Franz Xaver Gruber, schoolmaster and organist in the nearby village of Arnsdorf. Before Christmas Eve, Mohr brought the words to Gruber and asked him to compose a melody and guitar accompaniment for the Christmas Eve mass, after river flooding had damaged the church organ. The church was eventually destroyed by repeated flooding and replaced with the Silent-Night-Chapel. It is unknown what inspired Mohr to write the lyrics, or what prompted him to create a new carol.

According to Gruber, Karl Mauracher, an organ builder who serviced the instrument at the Obendorf church, was enamoured with the song, and took the composition home with him to the Zillertal. From there, two travelling families of folk singers, the Strassers and the Rainers, included the tune in their shows. 

Silent Night

The Rainers were already singing it around Christmas 1819, and once performed it for an audience that included Franz I of Austria and Alexander I of Russia, as well as making the first performance of the song in the U.S., in New York City in 1839. By the 1840s the song was well known in Lower Saxony and was reported to be a favourite of Frederick William IV of Prussia. During this period, the melody changed slightly to become the version that is commonly played today.

Over the years, because the original manuscript had been lost, Mohr's name was forgotten and although Gruber was known to be the composer, many people assumed the melody was composed by a famous composer, and it was variously attributed to Haydn, Mozart, or Beethoven. However, a manuscript was discovered in 1995 in Mohr's handwriting and dated by researchers as c. 1820. It states that Mohr wrote the words in 1816 when he was assigned to a pilgrim church in Mariapfarr, Austria, and shows that the music was composed by Gruber in 1818. This is the earliest manuscript that exists and the only one in Mohr's handwriting.

In 1859, the Episcopal priest John Freeman Young, then serving at Trinity Church, New York City, wrote and published the English translation that is most frequently sung today, translated from three of Mohr's original six verses. The version of the melody that is generally used today is a slow, meditative lullaby or pastorale, differing slightly particularly in the final strain from Gruber's original, which was a moderato tune in 6 8 time and siciliana rhythm. Today, the lyrics and melody are in the public domain, although newer translations usually are not.

More information: The Conversation

In 1998 the Silent Night Museum in Salzburg commissioned a new English translation by Bettina Klein of Mohr's German lyrics. Whenever possible, and mostly, Klein leaves the Young translation unchanged, but occasionally Klein and Mohr varies markedly. For example, Nur das traute hochheilige Paar, Holder Knabe im lockigen Haar is translated by Young: Round yon Virgin mother and child, Holy infant so tender and mild whereas Klein rewords it: Round yon godly tender pair, Holy infant with curly hair, a translation closer to the original.
The carol has been translated into about 140 languages.

Alfred Schnittke composed an arrangement of Stille Nacht for violin and piano in 1978, as a holiday greeting for violinist Gidon Kremer. Due to its dissonant and nightmarish character, the miniature caused a scandal in Austria.

Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Alles schläft; einsam wacht
Nur das traute hochheilige Paar.
Holder Knabe im lockigen Haar,
Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh!
Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh!

Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Hirten erst kundgemacht
Durch der Engel Halleluja,
Tönt es laut von fern und nah:
Christ, der Retter ist da!
Christ, der Retter ist da!

Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Gottes Sohn, o wie lacht
Lieb' aus deinem göttlichen Mund,
Da uns schlägt die rettende Stund'.
Christ, in deiner Geburt!
Christ, in deiner Geburt!

More information: Stille Nacht

The 'Story of Silent Night', which was given to me one Christmas

when I was six -it was the story of a down and out composer

who had no ideas left, and it was Christmas,

and he came up with the hymn 'Silent Night.'

Adriana Trigiani

THE TRANSISTOR IS FIRST DEMONSTRATED IN BELL LABS

Transistor

Today, The Grandma has received the visit of Joseph de Ca'th Lon, one of her closest friends. They have been talking about Christmas holiday and the arrival of the new year. They expect interesting events for this new year, especially new technologic discoveries. We are living under the effects of a digital revolution and our society has changed a lot in the last decade thanks to it but it is also time to remember and homage old discoveries that are still important and needed in our times.

Joseph and The Grandma have been talking about the transistor, a semiconductor device used to amplify or switch electronic signals and electrical power, that was first demonstrated at Bell Laboratories on a day like today in 1947.

A transistor is a semiconductor device used to amplify or switch electronic signals and electrical power. It is composed of semiconductor material usually with at least three terminals for connection to an external circuit. A voltage or current applied to one pair of the transistor's terminals controls the current through another pair of terminals. Because the controlled (output) power can be higher than the controlling (input) power, a transistor can amplify a signal. Today, some transistors are packaged individually, but many more are found embedded in integrated circuits.

More information: Spectrum

Austro-Hungarian physicist Julius Edgar Lilienfeld proposed the concept of a field-effect transistor in 1926, but it was not possible to actually construct a working device at that time.

The first working device to be built was a point-contact transistor invented in 1947 by American physicists John Bardeen and Walter Brattain while working under William Shockley at Bell Labs.

They shared the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics for their achievement. The most widely used transistor is the MOSFET (metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor), also known as the MOS transistor, which was invented by Egyptian engineer Mohamed Atalla with Korean engineer Dawon Kahng at Bell Labs in 1959. The MOSFET was the first truly compact transistor that could be miniaturised and mass-produced for a wide range of uses.

Transistors revolutionized the field of electronics, and paved the way for smaller and cheaper radios, calculators, and computers, among other things. The first transistor and the MOSFET are on the list of IEEE milestones in electronics. The MOSFET is the fundamental building block of modern electronic devices, and is ubiquitous in modern electronic systems. An estimated total of 13 sextillion MOSFETs have been manufactured between 1960 and 2018 (at least 99.9% of all transistors), making the MOSFET the most widely manufactured device in history.

Transistors

Most transistors are made from very pure silicon, and some from germanium, but certain other semiconductor materials can also be used. A transistor may have only one kind of charge carrier, in a field-effect transistor, or may have two kinds of charge carriers in bipolar junction transistor devices.

Compared with the vacuum tube, transistors are generally smaller, and require less power to operate. Certain vacuum tubes have advantages over transistors at very high operating frequencies or high operating voltages. Many types of transistors are made to standardized specifications by multiple manufacturers.

The thermionic triode, a vacuum tube invented in 1907, enabled amplified radio technology and long-distance telephony. The triode, however, was a fragile device that consumed a substantial amount of power. In 1909, physicist William Eccles discovered the crystal diode oscillator. Austro-Hungarian physicist Julius Edgar Lilienfeld filed a patent for a field-effect transistor (FET) in Canada in 1925, which was intended to be a solid-state replacement for the triode. 

Lilienfeld also filed identical patents in the United States in 1926 and 1928. However, Lilienfeld did not publish any research articles about his devices nor did his patents cite any specific examples of a working prototype. Because the production of high-quality semiconductor materials was still decades away, Lilienfeld's solid-state amplifier ideas would not have found practical use in the 1920s and 1930s, even if such a device had been built. In 1934, German inventor Oskar Heil patented a similar device in Europe.

More information: BBC

From November 17, 1947, to December 23, 1947, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain at AT&T's Bell Labs in Murray Hill, New Jersey, performed experiments and observed that when two gold point contacts were applied to a crystal of germanium, a signal was produced with the output power greater than the input.

Solid State Physics Group leader William Shockley saw the potential in this, and over the next few months worked to greatly expand the knowledge of semiconductors. 

Transistor as a Switch

The term transistor was coined by John R. Pierce as a contraction of the term transresistance. According to Lillian Hoddeson and Vicki Daitch, authors of a biography of John Bardeen, Shockley had proposed that Bell Labs' first patent for a transistor should be based on the field-effect and that he be named as the inventor. 

Having unearthed Lilienfeld's patents that went into obscurity years earlier, lawyers at Bell Labs advised against Shockley's proposal because the idea of a field-effect transistor that used an electric field as a grid was not new. Instead, what Bardeen, Brattain, and Shockley invented in 1947 was the first point-contact transistor. In acknowledgement of this accomplishment, Shockley, Bardeen, and Brattain were jointly awarded the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics for their researches on semiconductors and their discovery of the transistor effect.

Shockley's research team initially attempted to build a field-effect transistor (FET), by trying to modulate the conductivity of a semiconductor, but was unsuccessful, mainly due to problems with the surface states, the dangling bond, and the germanium and copper compound materials. In the course of trying to understand the mysterious reasons behind their failure to build a working FET, this led them to instead inventing the bipolar point-contact and junction transistors.

In 1948, the point-contact transistor was independently invented by German physicists Herbert Mataré and Heinrich Welker while working at the Compagnie des Freins et Signaux, a Westinghouse subsidiary located in Paris. Mataré had previous experience in developing crystal rectifiers from silicon and germanium in the German radar effort during World War II. Using this knowledge, he began researching the phenomenon of interference in 1947.

 More information: Toshiba

By June 1948, witnessing currents flowing through point-contacts, Mataré produced consistent results using samples of germanium produced by Welker, similar to what Bardeen and Brattain had accomplished earlier in December 1947. Realizing that Bell Labs' scientists had already invented the transistor before them, the company rushed to get its transistron into production for amplified use in France's telephone network and filed for his first transistor patent application on August 13,1948.

The first bipolar junction transistors were invented by Bell Labs' William Shockley, which applied for patent (2,569,347) on June 26, 1948. On April 12, 1950, Bell Labs chemists Gordon Teal and Morgan Sparks had successfully produced a working bipolar NPN junction amplifying germanium transistor. Bell Labs had announced the discovery of this new sandwich transistor in a press release on July 4, 1951.

The first high-frequency transistor was the surface-barrier germanium transistor developed by Philco in 1953, capable of operating up to 60 MHz. These were made by etching depressions into an N-type germanium base from both sides with jets of Indium(III) sulfate until it was a few ten-thousandths of an inch thick. Indium electroplated into the depressions formed the collector and emitter. 

PNP Transistor

The first prototype pocket transistor radio was shown by INTERMETALL, a company founded by Herbert Mataré in 1952, at the Internationale Funkausstellung Düsseldorf between August 29, 1953 and September 9, 1953. 

The first production pocket transistor radio was the Regency TR-1, released in October 1954. Produced as a joint venture between the Regency Division of Industrial Development Engineering Associates, I.D.E.A. and Texas Instruments of Dallas Texas, the TR-1 was manufactured in Indianapolis, Indiana. It was a near pocket-sized radio featuring 4 transistors and one germanium diode. The industrial design was outsourced to the Chicago firm of Painter, Teague and Petertil. It was initially released in one of four different colours: black, bone white, red, and gray. Other colours were to shortly follow.

The first production all-transistor car radio was developed by Chrysler and Philco corporations and it was announced in the April 28th 1955 edition of the Wall Street Journal. Chrysler had made the all-transistor car radio, Mopar model 914HR, available as an option starting in fall 1955 for its new line of 1956 Chrysler and Imperial cars which first hit the dealership showroom floors on October 21, 1955.

The Sony TR-63, released in 1957, was the first mass-produced transistor radio, leading to the mass-market penetration of transistor radios. The TR-63 went on to sell seven million units worldwide by the mid-1960s. Sony's success with transistor radios led to transistors replacing vacuum tubes as the dominant electronic technology in the late 1950s.

More information: ThoughtCo

The first working silicon transistor was developed at Bell Labs on January 26, 1954 by Morris Tanenbaum. The first commercial silicon transistor was produced by Texas Instruments in 1954. This was the work of Gordon Teal, an expert in growing crystals of high purity, who had previously worked at Bell Labs.

The essential usefulness of a transistor comes from its ability to use a small signal applied between one pair of its terminals to control a much larger signal at another pair of terminals. This property is called gain.

It can produce a stronger output signal, a voltage or current, which is proportional to a weaker input signal; that is, it can act as an amplifier. Alternatively, the transistor can be used to turn current on or off in a circuit as an electrically controlled switch, where the amount of current is determined by other circuit elements. 

Bell Labs-Transistor Team

There are two types of transistors, which have slight differences in how they are used in a circuit. A bipolar transistor has terminals labeled base, collector, and emitter. A small current at the base terminal (that is, flowing between the base and the emitter) can control or switch a much larger current between the collector and emitter terminals. For a field-effect transistor, the terminals are labeled gate, source, and drain, and a voltage at the gate can control a current between source and drain.

The image represents a typical bipolar transistor in a circuit. Charge will flow between emitter and collector terminals depending on the current in the base. Because internally the base and emitter connections behave like a semiconductor diode, a voltage drop develops between base and emitter while the base current exists. The amount of this voltage depends on the material the transistor is made from, and is referred to as VBE.

Transistors are commonly used in digital circuits as electronic switches which can be either in an on or off state, both for high-power applications such as switched-mode power supplies and for low-power applications such as logic gates. Important parameters for this application include the current switched, the voltage handled, and the switching speed, characterised by the rise and fall times.

In a grounded-emitter transistor circuit, such as the light-switch circuit shown, as the base voltage rises, the emitter and collector currents rise exponentially. The collector voltage drops because of reduced resistance from collector to emitter. If the voltage difference between the collector and emitter were zero (or near zero), the collector current would be limited only by the load resistance (light bulb) and the supply voltage. This is called saturation because current is flowing from collector to emitter freely. When saturated, the switch is said to be on.

More information: ROHM

Providing sufficient base drive current is a key problem in the use of bipolar transistors as switches. The transistor provides current gain, allowing a relatively large current in the collector to be switched by a much smaller current into the base terminal. The ratio of these currents varies depending on the type of transistor, and even for a particular type, varies depending on the collector current. In the example light-switch circuit shown, the resistor is chosen to provide enough base current to ensure the transistor will be saturated.

In a switching circuit, the idea is to simulate, as near as possible, the ideal switch having the properties of open circuit when off, short circuit when on, and an instantaneous transition between the two states. Parameters are chosen such that the off output is limited to leakage currents too small to affect connected circuitry, the resistance of the transistor in the on state is too small to affect circuitry, and the transition between the two states is fast enough not to have a detrimental effect.

The common-emitter amplifier is designed so that a small change in voltage (Vin) changes the small current through the base of the transistor; the transistor's current amplification combined with the properties of the circuit means that small swings in Vin produce large changes in Vout.

Various configurations of single transistor amplifier are possible, with some providing current gain, some voltage gain, and some both.

From mobile phones to televisions, vast numbers of products include amplifiers for sound reproduction, radio transmission, and signal processing. The first discrete-transistor audio amplifiers barely supplied a few hundred milliwatts, but power and audio fidelity gradually increased as better transistors became available and amplifier architecture evolved.

Modern transistor audio amplifiers of up to a few hundred watts are common and relatively inexpensive.

More information: PBS

I had this little handheld transistor radio

that I used to sleep next to.

Rod Stewart