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comedy

(Encyclopedia)comedy, literary work that aims primarily to provoke laughter. Unlike tragedy, which seeks to engage profound emotions and sympathies, comedy strives to entertain chiefly through criticism and ridicul...

illustration

(Encyclopedia)illustration, any type of picture or decoration used in conjunction with a text to embellish its appearance or to clarify its meaning. Illustration is as old as writing, with both originating in the p...

comic strip

(Encyclopedia)comic strip, combination of cartoon with a story line, laid out in a series of pictorial panels across a page and concerning a continuous character or set of characters, whose thoughts and dialogues a...

St. John, Henry, Viscount Bolingbroke

(Encyclopedia)St. John, Henry, Viscount Bolingbroke sĭn jŭn, bŏlˈĭngbro͝ok [key], 1678–1751, English statesman. He retired from politics in 1735 and spent most his remaining years on his estates in France...

strike

(Encyclopedia)strike, concentrated work stoppage by a group of employees, the chief weapon of organized labor. A suspension of work on the employer's part is called a lockout. Strikes usually result from conflicts ...

law

(Encyclopedia)law, rules of conduct of any organized society, however simple or small, that are enforced by threat of punishment if they are violated. Modern law has a wide sweep and regulates many branches of cond...

acting

(Encyclopedia)acting, the representation of a usually fictional character on stage or in films. At its highest levels of accomplishment acting involves the employment of technique and/or an imaginative ...

Missouri, state, United States

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Missouri mĭzo͝orˈē, –ə [key], one of the midwestern states of the United States. It is bordered by Illinois, Kentucky, and Tennessee, across the Mississippi River (E), Arkansas (S), Okla...

World War I

(Encyclopedia)World War I, 1914–18, also known as the Great War, conflict, chiefly in Europe, among most of the great Western powers. It was the largest war the world had yet seen. World War I and the resul...

Paleolithic art

(Encyclopedia)Paleolithic art pāˌlēəlĭthˈĭk, –lēō–, pălˌ– [key], art produced during the Paleolithic period. Study and knowledge of this art largely have been confined to works discovered at many s...