Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Knopf, Blanche W.

(Encyclopedia)Knopf, Blanche W.: see under Knopf, Alfred A. ...

Smith, W. Eugene

(Encyclopedia)Smith, W. Eugene (William Eugene Smith), 1918–78, American photojournalist, b. Wichita, Kan. Smith is considered one of the principal masters of modern photojournalism. The distorted newspaper cover...

Quine, W. V.

(Encyclopedia)Quine, W. V. (Willard Van Orman Quine) kwīn [key], 1908–2000, American philosopher and mathematical logician, b. Akron, Ohio, grad. Oberlin, 1930. He studied at Harvard (Ph.D., 1932) under Alfred N...

Pabst, G. W.

(Encyclopedia)Pabst, G. W. (Georg Wilhelm Pabst) gāˈôrkh vĭlˈhĕlm päpst [key], 1885–1967, German film director, b. Austria. He used montage in such works of social realism as The Joyless Street (1925), Pan...

motif, in literature

(Encyclopedia)motif mōtēfˈ [key], in literature, term that denotes the recurrent presence of certain character types, objects, settings, or situations in diverse genres and periods of folklore and literature. Ex...

James, P. D.

(Encyclopedia)James, P. D. (Phyllis Dorothy James White, Baroness James of Holland Park), 1920–2014, English mystery novelist, b. Oxford. From 1964 to 1979 she worked in the forensic science and criminal law divi...

Jayaratne, D. M.

(Encyclopedia)Jayaratne, D. M. (Disanayayaka Mudiyanselage Jayaratne), 1931–, Sri Lankan political leader. A cofounder of the Sri Lanka Freedom party (1951), he was a teacher and postmaster until becoming a membe...

McClatchy, J. D.

(Encyclopedia)McClatchy, J. D. (Joseph Donald McClatchy, Jr.), 1945–2018, American poet, b. Bryn Mawr, Pa., B.A. Georgetown Univ., 1967, Ph.D. Yale, 1974. His first collection of poems, Scenes from Another Life (...

Laing, R. D.

(Encyclopedia)Laing, R. D. (Ronald David Laing) lăng [key], 1927–89, British psychiatrist. After studying at Univ. of Glasgow (M.D., 1951), he taught there (1953–56), later moving to the Tavistock Clinic and I...

Leavis, Q. D.

(Encyclopedia)Leavis, Q. D. (Queenie Dorothy Leavis), 1906–81, British literary critic; wife of F. R. Leavis. After studying at Cambridge, she wrote Fiction and the Reading Public (1932), which analyzed the marke...