It’s the birthday of Zimbabwean author Tsitsi Dangarembga (b. 1959), whose 1988 debut novel Nervous Conditions was included in the BBC’s 2018 list of the top 100 books that have shaped the world. (The WORLD, people. So pay attention.) The novel tells the story of Tambu, a teenager in war-torn Rhodesia determined to escape poverty [...]
It’s the birthday of Muriel Spark (1918-2006), best known for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961) and for writing novels “as slim as stiletto blades—and as deadly” (“The Guardian view on Muriel Spark: gauzy wit and philosophical depth,” editorial, The Guardian, Feb. 1, 2018). Spark was born Muriel Camberg in a suburb of Edinburgh, [...]
It’s the birthday of one of Japan’s most important authors, Kenzaburo Oe (b. 1935), who won Japan’s prestigious Akutagawa Prize for his short story “The Catch” (1957) and who won the Nobel in 1994. His work reflects the disillusionment and ambiguities of his post-WWII generation as well as the difficulties of his own life, including [...]
It’s the birthday of Australian-American author Shirley Hazzard (1931-2016), known for her beautifully written literary fiction full of portent and disaster, in particular the novels The Transit of Venus (winner of the 1980 National Book Critics Circle Award) and The Great Fire (winner of the 2003 National Book Award). Hazzard was born in Sydney, Australia, [...]
Susan’s Almanac Project for January 29, 2019 It’s the birthday of author, illustrator, and screenwriter Bill Peet (1915-2002), who spent 27 years working for Walt Disney (with whom he famously clashed again and again) and also wrote over 30 children’s books, which sold in the millions. Peet was born in Grandview, Indiana. His father was [...]
It’s the birthday of Colette (1873-1954), one of the 20th century’s most important French writers. Colette is known for her outstanding evocation of sensory details, sexual and otherwise. (Ooh-la-la.) It’s also a K-12 Conference Day in certain fine school districts (such as ours), leaving children wild and free at home and many parents hard-pressed to [...]
It’s the birthday of Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), of whom I am in fact just the least bit afraid due to wigging out after reading Mrs. Dalloway (1925) while experiencing culture shock abroad. (Great novel. Maybe don’t read it while you’re feeling iffy.) Woolf is known for fluid, nonlinear experiments with narration (think stream of consciousness) [...]
It’s the birthday of Hadrian (76-138), known not so much for his contributions to contemporary literature as for being one of the least worst of the Roman emperors. (Not kidding, this is a thing. You can read about Five Good Emperors at britannica.com. Hadrian is the third.) Hadrian was born in either Italica (that’s a [...]
It’s the birthday of Caribbean-born poet and playwright Derek Walcott (1930-2017), who won the Nobel in 1992 and whose work has been called “a poetic oeuvre of great luminosity, sustained by a historical vision, the outcome of a multicultural commitment” (Nobel committee). (Anytime your work is described as an “oeuvre” instead of a mere collection, [...]
It’s the birthday of former LAPD cop Joseph Wambaugh (b. 1937), known as the father of the modern police novel. Wambaugh’s books have been so successful that his fame interfered with his police work and he had to quit being a cop. Wambaugh was born in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the son of an Irish-American Roman [...]
It’s the birthday of doctor and mathematician Peter Mark Roget (1779-1869), best known today for his Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases (1852), a little something he knocked together in his retirement. Roget was born in London to the son of a Swiss clergyman and the daughter of a jeweler; his father died when Roget [...]
It’s the birthday of Anne Brontë (1820-1849, #diedtooyoung), youngest of the Brontë sisters and usually in their shadow but the first of them—not Charlotte—to write a brilliant novel featuring a plain governess as the heroine, Agnes Grey (1847). Brontë was born in Thornton, Yorkshire, England, the youngest of six children, and raised in Haworth Parsonage; [...]