Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Smith, Lillian

(Encyclopedia)Smith, Lillian, 1897–1966, American writer and social critic, b. Jasper, Fla. She was a social worker in Georgia for several years. Her best-selling novel Strange Fruit (1944) is set in the South an...

Sheppard, Jack

(Encyclopedia)Sheppard, Jack, 1702–24, English criminal. Raised in a workhouse, he ran away with Bess Lyon, known as Edgeworth Bess, who, with another girl known as Poll Maggott, incited him to a short but specta...

Smith, Dave

(Encyclopedia)Smith, Dave, 1942–, American poet, b. Portsmouth, Va. His early poetry established him as a sensitive observer of human behavior. His verse is often rooted in his native South and has been praised f...

Ribeiro, Darcy

(Encyclopedia)Ribeiro, Darcy rēbāˈrü [key], 1922–97, Brazilian anthropologist, statesman, and author. An expert on the indigenous peoples of Brazil, he wrote many books, notably the six-volume 1960s work, Stu...

Przybyszewski, Stanisław

(Encyclopedia)Przybyszewski, Stanisław stänēsˈläf pshĭbĭshĕfˈskē [key], 1868–1927, Polish novelist, essayist, and dramatist. He studied in Berlin, where his friendship with a socialist led him to prison...

prose

(Encyclopedia)prose [Lat. prosa oratio=straightforward, or direct, speech], meaningful and grammatical written or spoken language that does not utilize the metrical structure, word transposition, or rhyme character...

Ekkehard

(Encyclopedia)Ekkehard ĕkˈəhärt [key], name of several medieval German authors, monks of the monastery of St. Gall, which is in present-day Switzerland. Ekkehard I wrote the famous Latin epic Waltharius (c.930)...

Droste-Hülshoff, Annette Elisabeth, Freiin von

(Encyclopedia)Droste-Hülshoff, Annette Elisabeth, Freiin or Baroness von änĕtˈə ālēˈzäbĕt frīˈĭn fən drôsˈtə-hülsˈhôf [key], 1797–1848, German poet. Often called the greatest German woman poet...

Coppée, François

(Encyclopedia)Coppée, François fräNswäˈ kôpāˈ [key], 1842–1908, French poet and dramatist. He won fame with the one-act comedy Le Passant (1869, tr. 1881), in which Sarah Bernhardt made her first successf...

Isaacs, Jorge

(Encyclopedia)Isaacs, Jorge hôrˈhā ēˈsäks [key], 1837–95, Colombian novelist. The son of a prosperous Englishman and a creole, Isaacs witnessed the ruin and premature death of his parents and the despoilmen...