ṢUḤBAH (lit., "companionship"). In mystical parlance, ṣuḥbah can refer to (1) a mystic's return from seclusion (ʿuzlah) to human society; (2) the company of the spiritual mentor, whic...

[The following excerpt was first published as "Back to the Cactus" in SF Commentary, November, 1970.] I have always enjoyed Dick's work on the superficial level of entertainment and yet have been aware of dissatisfaction on deeper levels. A...

SOURCE: Fisher, Ben. “Jarry and Florian: Ubu's Debt to Harlequin.” Nottingham French Studies 27, no. 2 (November 1988): 32-9. In the following essay, Fisher explores the significance of the eighteenth-century writer, Florian, whose harl...

UCHIMURA KANZŌ (1861–1930), Japanese essayist, scholar of the Bible, and Christian leader. Uchimura's unique place in modern Japanese thought results from his insistence on human independence before the biblical Christ...

If a person goes outside on a clear, moonless night in the countryside, far from city lights, he or she will be treated to a breathtaking sight. Above stretches a velvet black canopy studded with thousands of pin- points of light, some brig...

country in east-central Africa. About the size of Great Britain, Uganda is populated by dozens of ethnic groups. The English language and Christianity help unite these diverse peoples, who come together in the cosmopolitan capital of Kampa...

Ugliness Aesthetics has often been described as the philosophical study of beauty and "ugliness." It is important at the outset to see what is involved in this familiar definition, for it embodies a view of ugliness and of it...

Ugly Betty (2006– ) is a television show based on the Colombian telenovela, Yo Soy Betty La Fea , and follows the life of Betty Suarez, a young, Latino woman who has been hired as an executive assistant at Mode fashion magazine. Contents...

SOURCE: Cunningham, Valentine. “The Weight of War.” Times Literary Supplement, no. 3810 (14 March 1975): 269. In the following excerpt, Cunningham accuses Wolff of treating the horrors of war lightly in Ugly Rumours. Ugly Rumours is les...

1877-1963 Italian psychiatrist and neurologist who developed the method of electroconvulsive shock (electroshock) therapy (ECT) to treat certain mental pathologies. While chair of the Department of Mental and Neurological Diseases at the U...

Feast of Francis of Assisi, Friar, Deacon, Founder of the Friars Minor, 1226 Be not afraid that thou art tempted, for the more thou art assailed by temptations, the greater friend and servant of God do I hold thee, and the greater love do ...

The mathematical research conducted by Karen Uhlenbeck (born 1942) has applications in theoretical physics and has contributed to the study of instantons. For her work in geometry and partial differential equations, she was awarded a MacAr...

Bodo Uhse's career as a writer was marked by the rise of National Socialism in Germany; by exile in France, Spain, the United States, and Mexico; and by the division of postwar Germany into two political and cultural entities. While Uhse w...

country located in eastern Europe, the second largest on the continent after Russia. The capital is Kiev (Kyiv), located on the Dnieper River in north-central Ukraine. A fully independent Ukraine emerged only late in the 20th century, afte...

Concave sore on the skin or lining of an organ, with well-defined, sometimes raised edges. Erosion of surface tissue may extend to deeper layers. The main symptom is pain. The term most often refers to peptic ulcer but also includes skin u...

ʿULAMĀʾ ("the learned"), the religious scholars of Islam, are the guardians, transmitters, and interpreters of its sciences, doctrines, and laws and the chief guarantors of continuity in the spiritual and...

Ulf von Euler devoted his life to searching for the chemical signals that control physiological processes. In a career spanning six decades and during which he published four hundred and sixty-five scientific papers, von Euler achieved rem...

Julio G. Arce, who wrote as Jorge Ulica, was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco. He was the son of a prominent surgeon, Fortunato G. Arce. Although he studied pharmacy he had a preference for journalism. He founded two student newspapers, El hij...

1522-1605 Italian naturalist who advanced work in the natural sciences through emphasis on direct study and observation of the world. Appointed professor at the University of Bologna (1560), Aldrovani established Bologna's botanical...

Renowned literary critic, essayist, biographer, and recipient of many literary prizes for fiction, Ferruccio Ulivi published his first book of fiction, E le ceneri al vento (Ashes in the Wind) in 1977 at the age of sixty-five. Despite his ...

fl. 1300s German inventor who established a paper mill in Nuremberg, Germany, after seeing similar paper mills in Italy. Stromer's mill used water-powered hammers to beat the material, a method that the Chinese had already developed...

A fault is sooner found than mended....

Ulrich (Engelbert) of Strasbourg(Fl. 1248–1277) Ulrich (Engelbert) of Strasbourg was a scholastic philosopher and theologian, priest, and author. A member of the Dominican priory at Strasbourg in the German province, Ulrich studied u...

The German imperial knight and humanist Ulrich von Hutten (1488-1523) advocated the dissolution of Germany's ties with the papacy. He advanced an unrealistic program, however, for solving German national problems by reversion to medieval k...