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☆ Opinion | The Radical Message of ‘Sweet Valley High’
▼ + stars: | 2024-08-03 | by ( Sally Franson | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

When news broke that Francine Pascal, creator of the “Sweet Valley High” universe, died last weekend at the age of 92, appreciations began rolling across the internet like a certain red Spider through a high school parking lot. Nostalgic and bereaved, I drove to the library to check out a few, only to discover they had been removed from the catalog. “But I loved them.”This backhanded praise would have been familiar to Ms. Pascal, whose literary talents were either sneered at or dismissed for decades. Even as her franchise blanketed best-seller lists — 200 million books and counting, thanks to teenage readers like me — she, and they, received astonishingly little media coverage. For those affected by the blackout, the Sweet Valley universe comprises hundreds of novels and numerous spinoffs, all set in the eponymous Southern California town and starring Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, identical twins with blue-green eyes, shining blond hair and sky-high ambitions — Elizabeth’s literary, Jessica’s social.

Persons: Francine Pascal, appreciations, Pascal, Jessica, Elizabeth Wakefield, — Organizations: Guardian, Playboy Locations: Sweet, Southern California

☆ King Charles III takes the reins at Royal Ascot
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-21 | by ( Billy Stockwell | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

London CNN —Arriving in a horse-drawn open carriage, King Charles III and Queen Camilla attended Royal Ascot in style this week. “We wish all the participants this week the very best of luck in seeking that unique thrill of a Royal Ascot winner.”Last year’s Royal Ascot saw an unlikely win for Charles, with his horse, Desert Hero, overcoming odds of 18 to 1 to land first place. This love of horses has bound together multiple generations of the royal family, from the time of Queen Anne in the 18th century, when Royal Ascot was created, to the present day. Queen Elizabeth II and John Warren cheer on her horse Estimate to win the Gold Cup at Royal Ascot on June 20, 2013. Getty ImagesAnd given Charles’ good fortune at last year’s Royal Ascot, it seems Queen Elizabeth’s lucky streak has passed down to her son.

Persons: King Charles III, Queen Camilla, Camilla, Charles, King George V, ”, Francis Brooke, Charles ’, ” Brooke, “, Queen Anne, Queen Elizabeth II, Anne, Elizabeth, John Warren, Mark Cuthbert, ” John Warren, wasn’t, Princess Anne, Queen, Queen Victoria, Grey, CNN’s Max Foster, Lauren Said, Moorhouse, Ben Church, Aly Vance Organizations: CNN’s Royal, London CNN —, Royal Ascot, Ascot, Hero, Jockey, Central Press, Getty, Royal, Press, CNN, British, Montreal Olympic Games, Jockey Club, Epsom Downs, Windsor , Windsor Greys Locations: London, Berkshire, England, Epsom, Windsor, Quebec, Canada, Windsor , Windsor

☆ King Charles’ first official portrait vandalized by activists
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-11 | by ( Niamh Kennedy | Louis Mian | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

Video Ad Feedback Video shows King Charles' portrait being vandalized by activists 00:51 - Source: CNNLondon CNN —Activists from an animal rights group have vandalized the first official portrait of King Charles, currently on display in a London gallery. Campaign group Animal Rising posted a video on its social media channels on Tuesday showing two activists using a paint roller to stick signs over the portrait of the monarch. The painting, which is the first official portrait of King Charles as monarch, raised eyebrows when it was officially unveiled earlier this year. Activists covered the king’s head with a sign of British cartoon character Wallace, from the “Wallace and Gromit” comedy series. One British newspaper suggested the activist group chose “Wallace and Gromit” because of a remark made by Queen Camilla in 2012.

Persons: King Charles, Philip Mould, Jonathon Yeo, Wallace, “ Wallace, Gromit, Queen Camilla, Elizabeth’s, Camilla, Mould Organizations: CNN London CNN —, Royal Society for, RSPCA ., Clarence House, CNN Locations: London, British

☆ The UK’s royal family as you’ve never seen them before
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-17 | by ( Lianne Kolirin | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

Alongside them are the Queen’s sister, Princess Margaret, plus Princess Alexandra and the Duchess of Kent, all holding their newborn babies. The Royal Family at Royal Lodge, 1943, conveying a reassuring sense of domesticity and calm during the war. Royal Collection TrustBeaton was the official photographer for Elizabeth’s coronation in 1953. Snowdon/Royal Collection TrustAnother highlight is the earliest surviving color print of a member of the royal family. Paolo Roversi/Royal Collection TrustGET OUR FREE ROYAL NEWSLETTER • Sign up to CNN’s Royal News, a weekly dispatch bringing you the inside track on the royal family, what they are up to in public and what’s happening behind palace walls.

Persons: Elizabeth II, Prince Edward, Princess Margaret, Princess Alexandra, Duchess, Kent, Princess Margaret’s, Antony Armstrong, Jones, Lord Snowdon, Princess Elizabeth, Cecil Beaton, “, ”, King George VI, Queen Elizabeth, Elizabeth, Margaret, Windsor . King George VI, comfortingly, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Collection Trust Beaton, Martin Charteris, Beaton, Charles, Princess Anne, Anne, Pippin, Norman Parkinson, Snowdon, Madame Yevonde, Princess Alice , Duchess of Gloucester, Edward VIII, Andy Warhol’s, Andy Warhol, Todd, Ben Fitzpatrick, Paolo Roversi’s, Princess, Catherine, Alexandra , Princess of Wales, Franz Xaver Winterhalter, Wales, Cambridge, Paolo Roversi, Alessandro Nasini, Dorothy Wilding, Annie Leibovitz, David Bailey, Rankin Organizations: CNN, Royal, Royal Archives, Collection Trust, CNN’s Royal Locations: Royal, Windsor ., Buckingham, Wales

☆ Friends From the Old Neighborhood Turn Rivals in Big Tech’s A.I. Race
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-29 | by ( Cade Metz | Nico Grant | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Today, they are two of the most powerful executives in the tech industry’s race to build artificial intelligence. Dr. Hassabis, 47, is the chief executive of Google DeepMind, the tech giant’s central research lab for artificial intelligence. Mr. Suleyman, 39, was recently named chief executive of Microsoft AI, charged with overseeing the company’s push into A.I. In 2010, they were two of the three founders of DeepMind, a seminal A.I. research lab that was supposed to prevent the very thing they are now deeply involved in: an escalating race by profit-driven companies to build and deploy A.I.

Persons: Mustafa Suleyman, Hassabis, Demis, —, Suleyman Organizations: National Health Service, Queen Elizabeth’s, Google, Microsoft, Big Tech, DeepMind Locations: Syrian, Cypriot, London

☆ Britain Memorializes a Queen, With Smiles and Bronze Corgis
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-22 | by ( Alex Marshall | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

On Sunday afternoon in Oakham, a quaint English market town, hundreds of local residents stood behind a temporary barrier and craned their necks to see the 50 or so dogs waddling past in the local library’s gardens. The yapping mutts were just a sideshow, however, to the main event, which was announced from a dais by Sarah Furness, a local dignitary: the unveiling of Britain’s first memorial statue to Queen Elizabeth II. The seven-foot bronze work, by the London-based sculptor Hywel Pratley, shows the queen in flowing robes, with three corgis at her feet. “What most of us remember about Queen Elizabeth is her warmth,” Furness said in a speech. “By showing Queen Elizabeth’s love of dogs, we show her humanity,” she added.

Persons: Sarah Furness, Britain’s, Queen Elizabeth II, Hywel Pratley, Queen Elizabeth, ” Furness, Queen Elizabeth’s, ” Organizations: corgi Locations: Oakham, London

☆ Opinion: In its final season, ‘The Crown’ has lost itself
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-17 | by ( Opinion Holly Thomas | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —The most anticipated season of “The Crown” has arrived, and no one’s losing much sleep over the Queen this time. One of the many things that captivated viewers when “The Crown” arrived in 2016 was its cinematic scale. The lines between episodes one and three of season six, by contrast, are impossible to draw. As “The Crown” tells it, Al-Fayed’s relentless campaign to see his son Dodi and Diana engaged and thus secure British citizenship is almost as culpable for their deaths as the crash itself. Diana’s final night in Paris is rendered as the fatal culmination of Al-Fayed’s engineering of their relationship, and his pressure on Dodi to propose.

Persons: Holly Thomas, Katie Couric, ”, Holly Thomas Holly Thomas, Princess Diana, Elizabeth Debicki, irresistibly, Joy ”, Prince Phillip, Margaret, Diana, Prince Charles ’, Camilla Parker, Bowles, Mohamed Al, Dodi, Spencer, Diana cavorting, Margaret Thatcher, Prince Philip, Charles, paparazzo, Fayed, Harry, capitulates, Peter Morgan, Prince Charles, Salim Dau Organizations: Katie Couric Media, CNN, Al Locations: London, Al, Paris

Cast members Jonny Lee Miller, Dominic West, Elizabeth Debicki, Jonathan Pryce, Imelda Staunton and Lesley Manville attend the premiere for the TV series The Crown Season 5 in London, Britain, November 8, 2022. The two-part sixth, and final, season of “The Crown” explores Princess Diana’s final days before she perishes in a car accident. Debicki believes it’s a common experience for "The Crown" actors to struggle to “let go” and stop “observing” themselves while filming the show. Similarly, Khalid Abdalla - who portrays Dodi Fayed, Egyptian billionaire Mohamed al-Fayed's son, who was in a romantic relationship with Princess Diana - viewed his work with Debicki as a huge responsibility. He went into the final season also thinking about how the loss of Princess Diana is still a “cultural trauma” for “millions of people around the world.”Abdalla said the sacredness of what “The Crown” cast was recreating was something to which he wanted to give dignity.

Persons: Jonny Lee Miller, Dominic West, Elizabeth Debicki, Jonathan Pryce, Imelda Staunton, Lesley Manville, Henry Nicholls, Princess Diana, “, Debicki, Diana’s, Peter Morgan, Queen Elizabeth’s, ” Debicki, Khalid Abdalla, Dodi Fayed, Mohamed al, ”, ” Abdalla, Rollo Ross, Danielle Broadway, Mary Milliken, Jonathan Oatis Organizations: REUTERS, Reuters, Netflix, Debicki, Thomson Locations: London, Britain

☆ Basketball-sized gold coin worth ‘around $23M’ honors late Queen Elizabeth II
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-04 | by ( Oscar Holland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

It was produced by the East India Company, a luxury lifestyle brand with rights to the name of the corporation that once controlled large swathes of Britain’s empire. Businessman Sanjiv Mehta, who acquired the rights to the East India Company in 2005, poses with the diamond-encrusted coin. The East India Company said its multi-million-dollar valuation was partly due to the quality of the materials and crafting processes, which involved artisans and experts from the UK, India, Singapore, Germany and Sri Lanka. The original East India Company operated for almost 300 years before its dissolution in 1874. “The Crown” took over a year to produce, meaning that it was underway before Queen Elizabeth died at Balmoral Castle in Scotland last September.

Persons: Queen Elizabeth II, Queen Elizabeth’s, Sanjiv Mehta, tiaras, ”, Queen Elizabeth, Mehta Organizations: CNN, East India Company, Sotheby’s, NBA, British Overseas, Government, Royal Household, Royal, Foreign and Commonwealth Office Locations: York, India, Singapore, Germany, Sri Lanka, Scotland, British Overseas Territory, St Helena

☆ Kate Winslet, Ben Whishaw win at BAFTA Television Awards
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-15 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON, May 15 (Reuters) - Kate Winslet and Ben Whishaw were among the winners at the BAFTA Television Awards in London on Sunday night, with the Oscar-winning actress using her acceptance speech to call for action against harmful content on social media. To people in power and to people who can make change: please, criminalise harmful content. Please eradicate harmful content. Dublin-set "Bad Sisters" won the drama series categories as well as a supporting actress prize for Anne-Marie Duff. A sketch showing the late monarch having tea with Paddington Bear, voiced by Whishaw, won the memorable moment award, voted for by the public.

☆ Fact Check-Sand on streets to protect horses, soldiers during King Charles’ coronation
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-11 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

An image of King Charles’ coach passing through London’s streets where patches of sand are visible was shared with the misleading suggestion that the sand temporarily filled potholes for the coronation day. A Westminster City Council spokesperson told Reuters that sand was used to cover drain holes and roads for the safety of the horses and is a standard practice. “The council works closely with the armed forces ahead of major events such as this to ensure the safety of horses and soldiers”, the spokesperson added. Reuters’ pictures from Queen Elizabeth’s funeral proceedings in Sept. 2022 show a similar use of sand on the roads (here), (here), (here). Sand was used to cover drains and inspection covers on the ceremonial coronation route for safe passage of horses, not cover potholes.

London CNN —The coronation of King Charles III on Saturday was a historic day, jam-packed with events – some planned, others not. The crowning eventCharles was hidden from view for the most dramatic part of the service at London’s Westminster Abbey on Saturday. King Charles III sits as he receives The St Edward's Crown during the coronation ceremony at Westminster Abbey, London, Saturday, May 6, 2023. Lady in bluePenny Mordaunt leads King Charles III during his coronation ceremony in Westminster Abbey. Queen Camilla and King Charles III arrive for their coronation at Westminster Abbey.

☆ Why Nearly All the King’s Realms Want to Say Goodbye and Good Riddance
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Damien Cave | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For countries still constitutionally joined to the crown, Charles’s coronation arrived with little fanfare, and some cringing discomfort. In the wave of decolonization that followed World War II, dozens of independent countries climbed out from under British rule, including India, Pakistan and Nigeria. The 14 nations yet to do so stretch from Australia and Papua New Guinea to Canada and Jamaica. In some places that call the new 74-year-old sovereign their king, like the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu, there seems to be little interest in severing royal bonds. Oaths of allegiance have already been switched from queen to king in the courtrooms of remote capitals where wigs are still worn as if in 1680s London.

☆ What King Charles' coronation means for the UK economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Hanna Ziady | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

But the UK economy as a whole could suffer as workers take an extra day’s holiday. John Lewis' Coronation Lewis Bear. John Lewis & PartnersDepartment store John Lewis has had to limit in-store purchases of its Coronation Lewis Bear to two per household, and the teddy is out of stock online. For the coronation, UK luxury brands “have procured unique merchandise at all levels of the economy and we’re seeing people buying it, particularly Americans and EU customers,” she added. (The coronation holiday will be the third holiday Monday this month.)

☆ The British Coronation: A TV Spectacle, Now for the Digital Age
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Alan Cowell | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Some members of the British hierarchy wished to keep cameras out of the inner sanctum of Westminster Abbey, where the queen was crowned. “The world would have been a happier place if television had never been discovered,” the Most Rev. Geoffrey F. Fisher, then the archbishop of Canterbury, who presided over the queen’s coronation, was quoted as saying. Where his mother’s crowning bathed the monarchy in uncontested splendor, Charles’s challenge is to focus a much more diffuse spotlight. While Elizabeth’s coronation required only around 20 cameras, Charles’s crowning is set to be broadcast on the BBC’s hi-definition iPlayer streaming service, alongside television coverage.

Jeremy Selwyn/WPA Pool/Getty Images Camilla stands next to Queen Elizabeth II during a Diamond Jubilee pageant on the River Thames in June 2012. Chris Jackson/Getty Images From left, Camilla, Charles, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip attend the state opening of Parliament in May 2013. From left are Camilla, Charles, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Louis, Duchess Catherine, Princess Charlotte, Prince George and Prince William. Frank Augstein/WPA Pool/Getty Images In pictures: Britain's Queen Camilla Prev NextShe reportedly met Prince Charles at a polo match in Windsor in 1970 and they became friends. From left are Camilla, Charles, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Louis, Duchess Catherine, Princess Charlotte, Prince George and Prince William.

☆ How Queen Elizabeth’s coronation helped start Matchbox cars
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Peter Valdes-Dapena | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

New York CNN —Matchbox, maker of tiny toy cars, is bringing back one if its most important models. It’s not a car, but a little horse-drawn coach, and its success led to the creation of Matchbox toy cars. The new carriage will be in the traditional 1/64 scale used for Matchbox cars. Courtesy MattelDecades later, Elliot Handler, one of the founders of Mattel, noticed his son playing with Matchbox cars. Hot Wheels cars had flashy paint jobs, outsized wheels, impossibly huge (relatively speaking) plastic engines, and only occasionally looked like cars you might actually see on the street.

☆ Overlooked No More: Elizabeth Wagner Reed, Who Resurrected Legacies of Women in Science
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-22 | by ( Rachel May | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Though Elizabeth’s name was listed first as author, a letter of acknowledgment calling the couple’s work “truly magnificent” referred to them as “Dr. In 1950, however, she published a paper on sexism in the sciences based on her study of 70 women working in the field. It found that marriage and childbirth decreased their productivity and sometimes even dissuaded them from continuing their careers. It led her to mentor women in the field through the advocacy group Graduate Women in Science. Reed wrote that it was a testimony to the strengths of these women that they pursued science despite the fact that they were “often denied entry to colleges and unable to attain professional status.”

☆ Fact Check-Facebook post does not show video of Meghan Markle and Princess Charlotte
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-20 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A video Facebook post with the caption, “David Beckham Handed Kate SCARY VIDEO Meg Constantly Poking Charlotte Eyes During Queen’s Funeral” does not show such video. A five minute long video shared on Facebook viewed over 104,000 times contains images of the royal family and David Beckham at Queen Elizabeth’s funeral, but does not include any footage of Markle interacting with Princess Charlotte (here). The video includes a Reuters image of Princess Charlotte crying at Queen Elizabeth’s funeral which is visible on the Reuters website (here) and which is captioned, “Britain's Camilla, the Queen Consort, Princess Charlotte and Prince George attend the state funeral and burial of Britain's Queen Elizabeth, in London, Britain, September 19, 2022. A google search resulted in no credible results for the claim made in the Facebook posts (bit.ly/3ViTLao). A video being shared online does not show Meghan Markle poking Princess Charlotte’s eyes during Queen Elizabeth’s funeral.

☆ A picture and its story 2022
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-06 | by ( Jeremy Schultz | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

I flew to Edinburgh the next morning, where the hearse carrying her coffin from Balmoral Castle was expected to arrive two days later. This would be the first moment that the world would see the Queen’s coffin itself, outside of the hearse. After we had waited for hours, the hearse drove down the Royal Mile, the main road leading to Holyroodhouse. The castle gates opened and the hearse stopped outside, where Princess Anne and princes Edward and Andrew were waiting for their mother. When the hearse was opened, soldiers of the Royal Regiment of Scotland lifted out the Queen’s coffin.

☆ Alabama calls off execution of man convicted in murder-for-hire after problem with IV access
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-18 | by ( The Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +5 min

It is the second execution since September that the state has canceled because of difficulties with establishing an IV. Because the death warrant expired at midnight, the state must go back to court to seek a new execution date. Some three decades ago, a promise was made to Elizabeth’s family that justice would be served through a lawfully imposed death sentence. Smith was initially convicted in 1989, and a jury voted 10-2 to recommend a death sentence, which a judge imposed. The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday denied Smith’s request to review the constitutionality of his death sentence on those grounds.

☆ Ryan Fox: Heir to cricket and rugby excellence, New Zealand golfer blazes his own trail
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-28 | by ( Jack Bantock | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

Central Press / Hulton Archive / Getty ImagesThen came Wallace’s son-in-law Grant Fox, a name that needs no introduction to anyone familiar with rugby. Both Wallace and Fox were individually honored during Queen Elizabeth’s reign for services to their sports. If that wasn’t enough family sporting heritage, Wallace’s brother and son – George and Gregory – both played first-class cricket for Auckland. “It’s pretty cool to be the third generation of my family to represent New Zealand,” Fox told CNN’s The Jazzy Golfer. Marty Melville / Getty ImagesNot playing his first tournament until 18, Fox was a late bloomer, but made up for lost time emphatically.

☆ Coronation of Britain’s King Charles to be held next May
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON — Britain’s King Charles III will be crowned at London’s Westminster Abbey next May in a ceremony set to follow the traditional pageantry used for anointing monarchs over the last 1,000 years, Buckingham Palace announced on Tuesday. Charles, 73, automatically became king on the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth, last month, but the grand coronation ceremony for him and his wife, Camilla, the queen consort, will now take place on Saturday, May 6. Kings and queens of England, and later Britain and the United Kingdom, have been crowned at Westminster Abbey since William the Conqueror in 1066. Charles is the 41st monarch in a line that traces its origins back to William, and he will be the oldest monarch to be crowned. Charles is king and head of state not only of the United Kingdom but of 14 other realms including Australia, Canada, Jamaica, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea.

☆ Fact Check-The Simpsons did not predict the date of Queen Elizabeth’s death
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-27 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Altered and fabricated footage purportedly showing scenes from the animated television show The Simpsons has been shared on social media to claim that the series “predicted” the date of Queen Elizabeth II’s death. Queen Elizabeth, Britain's longest-reigning monarch and the nation's figurehead for seven decades, died on Sept. 8, 2022 aged 96 (here) (here). It highly resembles an edited image, debunked by Snopes in 2017 (here), that was fabricated to show former U.S. president Donald Trump. Matt Selman, executive producer of The Simpsons, tweeted on Sept. 22 an article by Variety that debunked the claim that the show had predicted the death of Queen Elizabeth (here). The Simpsons did not predict the date of Queen Elizabeth’s death.

Queen Elizabeth’s funeral is set for Monday. The event will be rich in pageantry, giving well-wishers one last chance to bid farewell to the long-lived monarch. The proceedings will be attended by the royal family, senior U.K. politicians and foreign dignitaries, as well as thousands of members of the public who are expected to line the route as the Queen’s coffin travels through the streets of London and on to her final resting place at Windsor Castle, where she will be buried in a private ceremony.

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