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Trissino, Gian Giorgio

(Encyclopedia)Trissino, Gian Giorgio jän jôrˈjō trēs–sēˈnō [key], 1478–1550, Italian poet and philologist. His play Sofonisba (written 1515, produced 1557) introduced classical Greek dramatic techniques...

Cankar, Ivan

(Encyclopedia)Cankar, Ivan ēvänˈ tsänˈkär [key], 1876–1918, Slovenian poet. Considered one of the great Slovenian literary figures, he was influential in the development of modern satire, symbolic drama, an...

Reuter, Christian

(Encyclopedia)Reuter, Christian krĭsˈtēän roiˈtər [key], 1665–c.1712, German writer of satiric fiction and drama. Reuter's Schelmuffsky (1696, tr. 1962) was among the first picaresque novels in German. His ...

melodrama

(Encyclopedia)melodrama [Gr.,=song-drama], originally a spoken text with musical background, as in Greek drama. The form was popular in the 18th cent., when its composers included Georg Benda, J. J. Rousseau, and W...

Lemmon, Jack

(Encyclopedia)Lemmon, Jack (John Uhler Lemmon 3d), 1925–2001, American actor, b. Newton, Mass., grad. Harvard (1947). He became famous in roles ranging from sardonic comedy to compelling drama, ultimately achievi...

Weaver, Sigourney

(Encyclopedia) Weaver, Sigourney , 1949- , American actress, b. New York, N.Y., as Susan Alexandra Weaver, Stanford Univ. (B.A., 1972), Yale Univ. (M.F.A., 1974). Wea...

Tell, William

(Encyclopedia)Tell, William, legendary Swiss patriot. According to legend, Tell was a native of Uri, one of the Swiss forest cantons. Gessler, the canton's Austrian bailiff, decreed that Swiss citizens must remove ...

Kara

(Encyclopedia)Kara kärˈə [key], river, c.140 mi (230 km) long, NE European and NW Siberian Russia. It flows N from the N Urals into the Kara Sea, forming part of the traditional border between European and Asian...

Wesleyan University

(Encyclopedia)Wesleyan University, at Middletown, Conn.; coeducational; chartered and opened 1831. There are special cooperative study programs with the California Institute of Technology and the engineering depart...

Wallace's line

(Encyclopedia)Wallace's line, imaginary line postulated by A. R. Wallace as the dividing line between Asian and Australian fauna in the Malay Archipelago. It passes between Bali and Lombok islands and between Borne...