Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Sexton, Anne

(Encyclopedia)Sexton, Anne (Harvey), 1928–74, American poet, b. Newton, Mass. Educated at Garland Junior College and at Radcliffe, she worked briefly as a fashion model in Boston. Her “confessional poetry” is...

Beowulf

(Encyclopedia)Beowulf bāˈəwo͝olf [key], oldest English epic, probably composed in the early 8th cent. by an Anglian bard in the vicinity of Northumbria. It survives in only one manuscript, written c.a.d. 1000 b...

gold rush

(Encyclopedia)gold rush, influx of prospectors, merchants, adventurers, and others to newly discovered gold fields. One of the most famous of these stampedes in pursuit of riches was the California gold rush. The d...

Veblen, Thorstein

(Encyclopedia)Veblen, Thorstein thôrˈstīn vĕbˈlən [key], 1857–1929, American economist and social critic, b. Cato Township, Wis. Of Norwegian parentage, he spent his first 17 years in Norwegian-American far...

Halsted, William Stewart

(Encyclopedia)Halsted, William Stewart hôlˈstĭd [key], 1852–1922, American surgeon, b. New York City, M.D. College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1877. He practiced in New York and in 1886 became the first profes...

Porter, Katherine Anne

(Encyclopedia)Porter, Katherine Anne, 1890–1980, American author, b. Indian Creek, Tex., as Callie Russell Porter. Although she published infrequently, she is regarded as a master of the short story. Her first bo...

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...

Synge, John Millington

(Encyclopedia)Synge, John Millington sĭng [key], 1871–1909, Irish poet and dramatist, b. near Dublin, of Protestant parents. He was an important figure in the Irish literary renaissance. As a young man he studie...

Eadmer

(Encyclopedia)Eadmer or Edmer both: ĕdˈmər [key], d. 1124?, English monk and historian. He was in the monastery of Christ Church, Canterbury, when Anselm became archbishop of Canterbury, and his biography of St....

Aleixandre, Vicente

(Encyclopedia)Aleixandre, Vicente vēthĕnˈtā älāhänˈdrā [key], 1898–1984, Spanish lyric poet. He won the national prize for literature for La destrucción o el amor (1935, tr. 1976) and the Nobel Prize in...