Good Grief, Charlie Brown! Celebrating Snoopy and the Enduring Power of Peanuts

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'I thought my ordinary appearance was a perfect disguise' – Charles M. Schulz. #CharlieBrown, the lead protagonist of #PEANUTS, embodied many character traits of his creator Charles M. Schulz and indeed took his name from the cartoonist. Born on 26 November 1922 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Schulz grew up in a small town in the American midwest to a German father and Norwegian mother. His parents did not encourage him to stand out from the crowd or aspire to success, yet instilled a strong work ethic that can be seen his lifelong commitment to the daily Peanuts strips. Good Grief, Charlie Brown! Celebrating Snoopy and the Enduring Power of Peanuts is open now until 3 March 2019 #goodgrief

A post shared by Somerset House (@somersethouse) on Oct 30, 2018 at 11:20am PDT

The exhibition on Peanuts runs at Somerset House until March 3, 2019

An exhibition, titled Good Grief, Charlie Brown! Celebrating Snoopy and the Enduring Power of Peanuts is currently being held at Somerset House. It explores the world of Peanuts – a daily comic strip created by Charles M. Schulz in 1950, with the help of some its strips and more. Peanuts feature many interesting characters, such as Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Lucy, Woodstock and Peppermint Patty.

In my outlook, Peanuts is more than just a daily comic strip which can make you laugh because it is a comic strip where characters remark on social, cultural and political subjects of its time; that is why Peanuts has an enduring appeal – its strips include good stories and also puts the spotlight on serious topics such as feminism, religion and war which the exhibition explores. I think Peanuts is not just a comic strip which can make you feel good when you read it because of its comic nature, it is also a comic strip which can make you aware of what life can be like and also make you look on the bright side.

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The Great British Seaside

An exhibition at the National Maritime Museum recently put on display more than one hundred photographs from photographers such as Simon George and Tony Ray-Jones. The photographs are from the sixties onwards, and they do a good job in capturing British people’s feelings, sentiments and moods regarding their sea sides. The exhibition has presented great shots of seas and people enjoying them, plus beautiful shots of British sea sides when it was pouring. In my outlook, the photographs showcases very special angles of British sea sides, such as the relationship it shares with the evolution of bathing suits over the course of many years and also the manner in which different people enjoy the British sea sides.

Ancient Egypt

What is Ancient Egypt?

Ancient Egypt is the name given to an African civilization which used to exist a very long time ago in what is present-day Egypt. The civilization had existed for several centuries. Ancient Egypt had produced many pharaohs (meaning: rulers) such as Djoser, Khafre and Ramses I. Hallmarks of this era include the pyramids, some stunning temples and illustrious tombs of pharaohs. In my outlook, Ancient Egypt was a very remarkable civilization because it had demonstrated that an African civilization which used to exist many, many years ago could create marvelous architectures (for example: the pyramids) which can still be considered as some of the greatest in the world; this is in spite of the fact that, since then, building styles have evolved and advanced a lot.

The Man Booker Prize (2018) Shortlist Forecast

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What type of book should make the Man Booker Prize (2018) shortlist?

The longlist for the Man Booker Prize this year includes thirteen books: Washington Black, Warlight, The Long Take, Normal People, The Water Cure, Everything Under, From a Low and Quiet Sea, In Our Mad Furious City, The Overstory, Snap, The Mad City and Sabrina. The shortlist for the British book prize will be revealed on September 20, 2018 and in my outlook, the books which should make the shortlist are books which have an element of romance about them or are books which are pieces of fiction based during a particular time in the past; I think those books clearly outshine the others in this year’s selections for the longlist.

Consider Normal People by Sally Rooney, for example, which has a romantic story: the book is about two people who attend Trinity College Dublin (in Ireland); one used to be an admired figure in football at school, whilst the other was a person with an uncommunicative nature. However, at college, the situation turns around for the two: the boy becomes a reserved person, whilst the girl becomes sure of oneself in a new recreational setup and the romance which eventually occasionally transpires between the two is fractured but shocking; it is a romance which holds an entertaining value.

Also, consider Warlight by Michael Ondaatje which is based in 1945 -the year in which the Second World War ended. In the book, two children are looked after by a person called The Moth who the children think is a villain; The Moth has a bunch of friends who strangely want to teach and also keep the children safe from harm. The book fictionally puts the spotlight on people living in the British capital in 1945 and in doing so, mixes history with a great story; it is a piece of fiction which helps to nicely visualize what life had some possibilities to be like a very long time ago.

The Assassination Of A Great Leader

What does the assassination of a good leader signify?

Many figures in history such as Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Julius Caesar and Henry VI were sadly assassinated, in spite of the fact that they were great leaders. In my outlook, the assassination of a leader does significant damage to a country because when one is killed off then the nation loses both a major talent and a person who could have done good things for the state for a much longer period of time; if they had been alive then then the history of the country could have even been different from the one which succeeded the assassination.

I think the purpose of assassination of a good leader is probably jealousy, hatred and the desire to remove somebody good by force because their goodness has perhaps grown overtly intolerable. But an act of assassination cannot trump the contribution the leader made to a state. So, even if the leader is no longer there in the world and their death was so tragic, what the episode also signifies is that, no matter what, good always wins over the rotten.

Top 5 Continents To Travel To

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Which continent is the greatest to travel to?

I think it is not easy to choose the best continent to travel to because the changing face of the world means that continents always get better with time. So, what makes a top continent? In my outlook, the greatest continent in the world is one which constantly preserves its historic sites but also has great contemporary additions such as amusement parks and shopping malls; also important, is a big variety for historic sites and contemporary additions which can be found in the number of countries that comprise a continent – it means that going on a big (and wonderful) journey across a continent, from one great country to another, can be a possibility with a few continents. My picks:

1. Europe
2. Asia
3. North America
4. Australia
5. South America

Why Did The Vietnam War Occur?

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The Vietnam War was a local battle over political ideals

The Vietnam War was fought because of a conflict over political ideologies. Vietnam was kind of separated into two parts: one favored Communism and the other opposed it. It all began when Vietnam began to desire freedom from foreign control. Before the end of the Second World War, an alliance called Viet Minh was formed in the Asian nation to make it independent from foreign rule. So, after the alliance had fought off the French and also Japan from controlling Vietnam, the nation got divided into two parts with each part supporting a separate political ideology.

Meanwhile, the aggression that had occurred locally in Vietnam to remove foreign control had frightened the United States because it did not want to see Communism spread. The fear, in my outlook, was not an irrational one: the situation at the time appeared as if the ‘domino theory’ was going to be implemented if Vietnam fell under the influence of Communism because after the end of the Second World War, China had already totally become a Communist power. The ‘domino theory’ suggested that if one nation (in South East Asia) was influenced by Communism, then other nations would follow suit – this would happen similar to how tiles fall in a domino show after the first tile is pushed over.

So then the Vietnam War began in the mid-fifties which lasted approximately two decades. The war had made countries around the world separate and group together behind both camps, as a deadly conflict raged between the two parts of Vietnam.