Early carboniferous athyridid brachiopods from the Qaidam Basin, Northwest China

Four new Early Carboniferous athyridid species in three genera, including one new genus, Bruntonathyris, are described from the Qaidam Basin, northwest China: Lamellosathyris qaidamensis, Bruntonathyris amunikeensis, Bruntonathyris? heijianshanensis, and Lochengia qinghaiensis. Based on the new material and also on published information, we also reviewed the taxonomic composition and the stratigraphic and paleogeographic distributions of the three genera. As a result, Lamellosathyris is considered to be indicative of late Famennian to Viséan age, originating in late Famennian in central North America and Armenia of Russia, respectively. Later, the genus appears to have two migratory directions: one branch rapidly dispersed over Mississippi Valley, Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico of central North America in Tournaisian; alternatively, another branch from Armenia migrated westerly to Belgium, France, Spain, Britain, Ireland, via the Moscow Basin and Ural seaway, eastward to the Tienshan Mountains and Qaidam Basin of northwest China during the Tournaisian to Viséan, and easterly along the southern shelves of the Paleo-Tethys to Iran and western Yunnan of southwestern China in Tournaisian. Both Bruntonathyris and Lochengia are restrictedly Tournaisian to Viséan in age, and probably originated in the Qaidam Basin. Later, Bruntonathyris migrated easterly to South China and Japan, and westerly to Urals, Moscow Basin, Donetsk Basin and Britain; Lochengia migrated easterly to South China and westerly to the Urals seaway and the adjoined Russian Platform (i.e., both the Moscow and Donetsk Basins).

Poetry, terrorism, and the uncanny : “Timothy McVeigh’s ‘invictus’”

While Timothy McVeigh—the Oklahoma City Bomber—made no verbal statement before being executed in 2001, he did offer as his ‘final written statement’ a poem (without attribution): W.E. Henley’s ‘Invictus’. This paper offers a reading of this text as ‘Timothy McVeigh’s “Invictus”’, a limit case for our understanding of poetry, quotation, and the relationship between literary and non-literary discourses. The paper will demonstrate how McVeigh’s enigmatic act of appropriation produces a poetry of the uncanny, so that categories such as ‘poet’ and ‘terrorist’ become disquietingly porous. It will also demonstrate how ‘Timothy McVeigh’s “Invictus”’ offers unexpected insights into some basic concerns of contemporary literary theory, especially with regard to quotation, obscurity, and poetic address. Lastly, it will show how ‘Timothy McVeigh’s “Invictus”’ illustrates the unpredictable ways that a supposedly marginal cultural practice—poetry—can act in times of crisis.