Spatially Dispersive Inhomogeneous Electromagnetic Media with Periodic Structure

Spatially dispersive (also known as non-local) electromagnetic media are considered where the parameters defining the permittivity relation vary periodically. Maxwell's equations give rise to a difference equation corresponding to the Floquet modes. A complete set of approximate solutions is calculated which are valid when the inhomogeneity is small. This is applied to inhomogeneous wire media. A new feature arises when considering spatially dispersive media, that is the existence of coupled modes.Comment: Full Paper available from Journal of optics. http://iopscience.iop.org/2040-8986/17/2/025105 17 Pages 7 Figure

Inhomogeneous Spatially Dispersive Electromagnetic Media

Two key types of inhomogeneous spatially dispersive media are described, both based on a spatially dispersive generalisation of the single resonance model of permittivity. The boundary conditions for two such media with different properties are investigated using Lagrangian and distributional methods. Wave packet solutions to Maxwell's equations, where the permittivity varies and is periodic in the medium, are then found.Comment: Conference: Progress In Electromagnetics Research Symposium Proceedings, Stockholm, Sweden, Aug. 12-15, 2013 Published version available at http://piers.org/piersproceedings/piers2013StockholmProc.php?searchname=gratu

The Profligate Son: Or, A True Story of Family Conflict, Fashionable Vice and Financial Ruin in Regency Britain by Nicola Phillips (review)

The narrative of “the rake’s progress” was all too familiar to Georgian Britons. Today, we would probably think of William Hogarth’s famous series of eight images, which depict Tom Rakewell’s “progress” from newfound wealth to poverty and insanity, via sexual immorality, social pretension, drink, gaming, debt, and criminality. At the time, this was a stock cautionary tale, which was reiterated in sermons, novels, and advice literature. It was the product of a society where social standing was, for the first time, up for grabs to those who could present themselves in a certain way and negotiate the complex rules of polite society—but where, at the same time, reputation was fragile and fortunes could quickly be dashed. The rake’s progress therefore functioned as a warning, steering Georgians away from vice and keeping them on the straight path to the good life. If ever there was a real-life embodiment of the rake’s progress, it would appear to be William Jackson. He is the subject of Nicola Phillips’s superb new book, which takes the form of a biography but also uses the life of Jackson—and also those around him—to explore various aspects of late-Georgian social, criminal, imperial, and sexual history. William was the son of a colonial administrator who had worked for the East India Company in Madras. His family were therefore new money, and his father combined the stern morality of the middle classes with a burning ambition to become accepted by the establishment. (As Phillips points out, Jackson senior’s high opinion of himself is ironically in stark contrast to his reputation in Indian historiography, where he is demonized as “an archetypical arrogant British official” [276]). As is often the way with the newly wealthy, his plans for respectability focused on his son. William, however, was unpromising material for such a scheme, and The Profligate Son tells the story of the terrible consequences that it would have for father and son alike. Without wishing to spoil Phillips’s story, it is useful briefly to relate Jackson’s life story, as he was not a well-known figure. William Collins Burke Jackson was born in India in 1791. He was a slight boy with a weak constitution, which would be severely tested by some of the predicaments in which he was to find himself. On the family’s return to England, his father set about trying to place William in a school, with a view to easing his entry into elite society but also where he would receive instruction in suitable moral discipline. Brief spells followed at a succession of establishments, where he rebelled against his tutors, acquired enemies and unsuitable friends, and began a lifetime’s habit of running up debts. Where school failed, his father hoped that a commission in the army might succeed, but the outcome was similar: instead of discipline and responsibility, Jackson took full advantage of the army’s opportunities for fashionable high living, and of the further credit that he could acquire on the strength of his uniform. Phillips describes how Jackson’s schooling and military career ironically exposed him to an aristocratic lifestyle and morality that was in direct opposition to the bourgeois values of his father. Eventually, Jackson’s debts caught up with him and he served spells in debtors’ prisons. Phillips offers a vivid account of life in these quintessentially Georgian institutions, where those with money could buy a higher standard of living: even at his lowest ebb, Jackson refused to relinquish his pretensions to gentility. Of course, his financial situation could always have been solved at a stroke by the intercession of his wealthy father, but Jackson senior was adamant that William was the author of his own misfortune and should learn his lesson. This did not happen, however, and he resorted to fraud and forgery as his situation became more desperate. Remarkably, his father even refused him assistance when he was up for a potentially capital charge at the assizes. When he was sentenced to transportation—which was in effect a civil death, as the prisoner was removed both legally and physically from society— his father could wash his hands..

Review of Britain and the Seventy Years War, 1744-1815: Enlightenment, Revolution and Empire : By Page, Anthony. Palgrave Macmillan. 2015. xiv + 282pp. £21.99.

War formed the backdrop to Britain's long eighteenth century. Some historians have described it as a ‘second hundred years war’, but given that there was a remarkable period of peace between 1713 and 1739, it makes more sense to divide these wars into two phases. Anthony Page's new book focuses on what he terms the ‘Seventy Years War’, an almost‐continuous series of conflicts between Britain and (mostly) France, which started with the shambolic response to the Jacobite rebellion and culminated in the triumph of Waterloo, paving the way for a century of imperial dominance under the Pax Britannica. From the perspective of a Victorian Whig historian, this rise to international pre‐eminence seemed linear and inevitable, but Page reminds us that it did not appear this way to people living through the eighteenth century. France was Europe's leading military power, with immense resources and a population three times that of Britain. The danger of a French invasion recurred throughout the period and on several occasions came very close to happening. If the Duke of Wellington famously described the battle of Waterloo as ‘a damned nice thing – the nearest run thing you ever saw’, Page suggests that the same could be said of the whole Seventy Years War (p. 59). With this in mind, Page offers a novel perspective on the period. On the one hand, this is a military and imperial history. After a gallop through the wars themselves, he examines the nature of the state and the armed forces that made success in war possible. He nuances John Brewer's familiar narrative of the ‘fiscal‐military state’ by emphasizing the fundamental role of the navy in Britain's military strategy, imperial power and industrial base. This was instead a ‘fiscal‐naval state’, in which a large, permanent and expensive navy contrasted with an army that was kept to a minimum in peacetime and expanded to full strength only when required (the reason why Britain's wars tended to get off to a slow start). This is not just a conventional military history, however, since Page offers an excellent introduction to the social and cultural history of the military – something that is a notable growth area in the historiography of the period – and tells us much about the lives of ordinary redcoats and ratings. The second half of the book thinks about the wider cultural, political and religious contexts of these wars. This is not a history of ‘war and society’ that just focuses on wartime civil society, since Page makes it clear that the influence was two‐way. War had an all‐pervasive influence on domestic culture, but it was also fundamentally informed by its political and intellectual context. Britain could only pay for, recruit, locate and deploy its combatants in a way that was acceptable to its political system and its public sphere. It is currently fashionable in cultural studies of the century to emphasize that Britons encountered war vicariously through newspapers, plays, letters and songs, but Page is clear about the extent to which people had a more direct experience of military service. As just one example, many of the great historians of the age served in the military, including William Robertson, Adam Ferguson, David Hume and Edward Gibbon (p. 167). Given the focus on war, this is necessarily an international account of British history. Whereas British Studies in the USA tends to emphasize a transatlantic imperial narrative, this is notably more global than that. Page is based at the University of Tasmania and believes that British history should ‘be done in an Australian accent’ (p. x). Australia appears more often than you might expect in these pages – the conclusion begins by noting that its first steam engine arrived just as Wellington was preparing to face Napoleon in 1815 – but the overall effect is to reorient Britain's story from the northern and western hemispheres to encompass the south and the east. As we embark on ‘The Asian Century’, Page's accessible new book makes a striking claim for the continued relevance of Georgian Britain

Review of George Farquhar, The Recruiting Officer (The Donmar Warehouse, London, 21 February 2012)

‘The Recruiting Officer’ by George Farquhar, directed by Josie Rourke, at the Donmar Warehouse, London, from 9 February to 14 April 201