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Richler, Mordecai

(Encyclopedia)Richler, Mordecai, 1931–2001, Canadian novelist, b. Montreal. He fled his native city in the early 1950s and lived mainly in London, returning to Canada in 1972 and from then on spending part of his...

Wajda, Andrzej

(Encyclopedia)Wajda, Andrzej änˈjā vīˈdä [key], 1926–2016, Polish film director, leading member of the Polish Film School, which began in the 1950s. His films are typically studies of Poland's modern histor...

Benton, Thomas Hart, American painter

(Encyclopedia)Benton, Thomas Hart, 1889–1975, American regionalist painter, b. Neosho, Mo.; grandnephew of Sen. Thomas Hart Benton and son of Rep. Maecenas E. Benton. In 1906 and 1907 he attended the Art Institut...

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...

Bingham, George Caleb

(Encyclopedia)Bingham, George Caleb, 1811–79, American painter and politician, b. Augusta co., Va. His family moved (1819) to Missouri, which was the site of most of Bingham's activities. In 1837 he studied for a...

Celtic art

(Encyclopedia)Celtic art kĕlˈtĭk, sĕlˈ– [key]. The earliest clearly Celtic style in art was developed in S Germany and E France by tribal artisans of the mid- to late 5th cent. b.c. With the dispersal of Cel...

Brautigan, Richard

(Encyclopedia)Brautigan, Richard brôˈtəgăn [key], 1935–84, American novelist and poet, b. Tacoma, Wash. He was a counterculture hero of the 1960s and 70s, and his work is an indictment of America's cultural e...

Blair, Francis Preston, 1791–1876, American journalist and politician

(Encyclopedia)Blair, Francis Preston, 1791–1876, American journalist and politician, b. Abingdon, Va. Through the Frankfort, Ky., journal Argus of Western America, which he edited with Amos Kendall, Blair was an ...

utilitarianism

(Encyclopedia)utilitarianism yo͞oˌtĭlĭtrˈēənĭzəm, yo͞otĭˌ– [key], in ethics, the theory that the rightness or wrongness of an action is determined by its usefulness in bringing about the most happines...

poster

(Encyclopedia)poster, placard designed to be posted in some public place for purposes of commercial announcement or propaganda. Advertising makes wide use of posters, as do charitable and political organizations. I...