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columnist

(Encyclopedia)columnist, the writer of an essay appearing regularly in a newspaper or periodical, usually under a constant heading. Although originally humorous, the column in many cases has supplanted the editoria...

Chinese examination system

(Encyclopedia)Chinese examination system, civil service recruitment method and educational system employed from the Han dynasty (206 b.c.–a.d. 220) until it was abolished by the Ch'ing dowager empress Tz'u Hsi in...

Vidal, Gore

(Encyclopedia)Vidal, Gore (Eugene Luther Gore Vidal, Jr.), 1925–2012, American writer, b. West Point, N.Y. He grew up in Washington, D.C., where a formative influence was his witty and scholarly grandfather, Sena...

garden

(Encyclopedia)garden, land set aside for the cultivation of flowers, herbs, vegetables, or small fruits, for either utility or ornament. Gardens range in size from window boxes and small dooryard plots to the publi...

Twain, Mark

(Encyclopedia)Twain, Mark, pseud. of Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835–1910, American author, b. Florida, Mo. As humorist, narrator, and social observer, Twain is unsurpassed in American literature. His novel The Ad...

Nobel Prizes (table)

(Encyclopedia)Nobel Prizes

Ford, Gerald Rudolph

(Encyclopedia)Ford, Gerald Rudolph, 1913–2006, 38th president of the United States (1974–77), b. Omaha, Nebr. He was originally named Leslie Lynch King, Jr., but his parents were divorced when he was two, and w...

games, theory of

(Encyclopedia)games, theory of, group of mathematical theories first developed by John Von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern. A game consists of a set of rules governing a competitive situation in which from two to n i...

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

(Encyclopedia)Emerson, Ralph Waldo ĕmˈərsən [key], 1803–82, American poet and essayist, b. Boston. Through his essays, poems, and lectures, the “Sage of Concord” established himself as a leading spokesman...

science fiction

(Encyclopedia)science fiction, literary genre in which a background of science or pseudoscience is an integral part of the story. Although science fiction is a form of fantastic literature, many of the events recou...