Word: und
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...some critics say Wagner's early sketches of the character Siegfried were based on Mikhail Bakunin, the mid-nineteenth century anarchist. But in the decade between the composition of acts II and III of Siegfried, the third opera in the cycle--during which Wagner wrote Die Meistersinger and Tristan und Isolde--he latched on to Schopenhauer's eastern mystic fatalism, and suddenly the philosophy of the Ring cycle took a sharp turn to the right...
Inspired by Gscheidle's revolutionary idea, the finance ministry of Bavaria recently issued a 24-page booklet to its civil servants titled Behörde und Bürger, (Authorities and Citizens). A kind of Emily Post primer for bureaucrats, it offers the provocative thought that bureaucracy is a public service for the benefit of West German citizens. It suggests that civil servants should try to put themselves in their clients' place. Avoid bawling out citizens for making mistakes on application forms, advises the booklet. Try to understand that they do not know all laws...
...been on the job for a year or less. (The reason for bypassing more senior bureaucrats, explained a finance ministry official tactfully, is that they "have gained the necessary experience, or if they haven't, they might feel miffed.") But requests for copies of Behörde und Bürger have come in from other governments across West Germany. A first printing of 20,000 brochures sold out; another 10,000 or so are scheduled to be run off this month...
...public response to this onslaught of civility in the civil service has been mild astonishment-and gratitude. One woman, flabbergasted as a solicitous postal employee repacked a badly parceled piece of mail, could only stammer, "Danke, danke." In Bavaria, a local department store took Behörde und Bürger to heart and started its own courtesy campaign. The wave of Teutonic tact even seems to be paying dividends for the civil servants. Says one graduate of the postal service deportment course: "Somehow, I feel much less insecure...
Boston University opera workshop--opera scenes selected from Bartered Bride, Hansel und Gretel, Hin und Zurueck, and others. At 855 Comm. Ave., Boston...