Biographical
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Gaetano Donizetti *XI 29 1797 — The Life You Give
Gaetano Donizetti, born on Nov. 29, 1797, in Bergamo, Cisalpine Republic, was an Italian opera composer whose numerous operas in both Italian and French represent a transitional stage in operatic development between Rossini and Verdi. Among his major works are Lucia di Lammermoor (1835), La fille du régiment (1840), and La favorite (1840). In his…
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Friedrich von Schiller *XI 10 1759 The Life You Give
Friedrich Schiller, born Johann Christoph Friedrich Schiller, Nov. 10, 1759, in Marbach, Württemberg [Germany], is a leading dramatist, poet, and literary theorist, best remembered for such dramas as Die Räuber (1781; The Robbers), the Wallenstein trilogy (1800–01), Maria Stuart (1801), and Wilhelm Tell (1804). Friedrich Schiller was the second child of Lieut. Johann Kaspar Schiller…
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The Life You Give: Søren Kierkegaard *1813
Søren Kierkegaard, born Søren Aabye Kierkegaard, on May 5, 1813, in Copenhagen, Denmark, is the philosopher, theologian, and cultural critic who was a major influence on existentialism and Protestant theology in the 20th century. He attacked the literary, philosophical, and ecclesiastical establishments of his day for misrepresenting the highest task of human existence—namely, becoming oneself…
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The Life You Give: Ethel Smyth *1858
Dame Ethel Smyth, born Ethel Mary Smyth, on April 22, 1858, in London, is the composer whose work was notably eclectic, ranging from conventional to experimental. Born into a military family, Smyth studied at the Leipzig Conservatory and was encouraged by Johannes Brahms and Antonín Dvořák. She first gained notice with her sweeping Mass in…
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The Life You Give: Maya Angelou *1928
Maya Angelou, born Marguerite Annie Johnson, on April 4, 1928, in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A., is the poet, memoirist, and actress whose several volumes of autobiography explore the themes of economic, racial, and sexual oppression. Although born in St. Louis, Angelou spent much of her childhood in the care of her paternal grandmother in rural…
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The concept of The Life You Give, and why Frédéric Chopin
As a pianist, Chopin was unique in acquiring a reputation of the highest order on the basis of a minimum of public appearances—few more than 30 in the course of his lifetime. His original and sensitive approach to the keyboard allowed him to exploit all the resources of the piano of his day. He was…
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The Life You Give: J.R.R. Tolkien *1892
J.R.R. Tolkien, born John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, January 3 1892, in Bloemfontein, South Africa, is the English writer and scholar who achieved fame with his children’s book The Hobbit (1937) and his richly inventive epic fantasy The Lord of the Rings (1954–55). At age four Tolkien, with his mother and younger brother, settled near Birmingham,…
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Celebration Day I: January 1 2022 — Happy Birthday, Edmund Burke *1.1.1729
Edmund Burke, born January 1, [Old Style], 1729, in Dublin, Ireland, was statesman, parliamentary orator, and political thinker prominent in public life from 1765 to about 1795 and important in the history of political theory. He championed conservatism in opposition to Jacobinism in Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790). Early life Burke, the son…
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The Life You Give: Gaetano Donizetti *1797
Gaetano Donizetti, born on Nov. 29, 1797, in Bergamo, Cisalpine Republic, was an Italian opera composer whose numerous operas in both Italian and French represent a transitional stage in operatic development between Rossini and Verdi. Among his major works are Lucia di Lammermoor (1835), La fille du régiment (1840), and La favorite (1840). In his…
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The Life You Give: William Blake! *1757
William Blake, born Nov. 28, 1757, in London, England, was engraver, artist, poet, and visionary, author of exquisite lyrics in Songs of Innocence (1789) and Songs of Experience (1794) and profound and difficult “prophecies,” such as Visions of the Daughters of Albion (1793), The First Book of Urizen (1794), Milton (1804[–?11]), and Jerusalem (1804[–?20]). These…
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I
That is the selfSimpleSingularMajusculeQuite a featIn the mind with the English tonguewriting it displays a highly concerted and concentrated effortIn that which I prepare to drink or eatand in how I drink or eat itIn the sounds with timing I wish to composethe words I conveyeither for poetryor conversation In the frames I freeze through…
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In her no longer singing words
I miss singing every day. I can’t sing anymore. My voice doesn’t work. I have Parkinson’s disease, and it sometimes takes my words away from me. Linda Ronstadt— born this day in 1946
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Happy Birthday, Frida Kahlo!
Celebrate with us the life of who remains a popular and impressive figure, appreciated for her presence, as woman, as artist, even today — seven decades after her death. The painter Frida Kahlo was born Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón, on July 6 1907, in Coyoacán, Mexico. Join us in celebration of her wonderful…
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The Bible Weight
One of my sketching books looks like a Bible. I stepped out of church decades ago. But today, as I was handling a couple of books, and was about to put them on top of the sketch book, all my nerves stopped my hand. Suddenly, my eyes saw this structure, and all of me recalled…
Sila Blume 