Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Pilnyak, Boris

(Encyclopedia)Pilnyak, Boris əndrāˈyəvĭch vôˈgou [key], 1894–1937?, Russian novelist and short-story writer. Pilnyak first attracted wide attention with his novel The Naked Year (1921, tr. 1928), a loosely...

Owens, Jesse

(Encyclopedia)Owens, Jesse, 1913–80, U.S. track star, b. Alabama. He was also called John Cleveland Owens, although his original name was said to be simply J. C. Owens. After his family moved to Cleveland he exce...

Vigée-Lebrun, Élisabeth

(Encyclopedia)Vigée-Lebrun, Élisabeth ālēzäbĕtˈ vēzhāˈ-ləbröNˈ [key], 1755–1842, French portrait painter; pupil of her father, the painter Louis Vigée. She was influenced by Greuze. Summoned to Vers...

Stanley, Sir Henry Morton

(Encyclopedia)Stanley, Sir Henry Morton, 1841–1904, Anglo-American journalist, explorer, and empire builder, b. Denbigh, Wales. He grew up in poverty and came to America as a worker on a ship, which he jumped (18...

Eisler, Hanns

(Encyclopedia)Eisler, Hanns häns īsˈlər [key], 1898–1962, German composer, pupil of Arnold Schoenberg. In 1926, he joined the German Communist party, thereafter producing protest songs and other music express...

Delbrück, Max Ludwig Henning

(Encyclopedia)Delbrück, Max Ludwig Henning dĕlˈbrük [key], 1906–1981, American biophysicist, b. Berlin, Germany. Ph.D, Univ. of Göttingen, 1930. He spent most of his career as a professor at the California I...

Duccio di Buoninsegna

(Encyclopedia)Duccio di Buoninsegna do͞otˈchō dē bwōnēnsāˈnyä [key], fl. 1278–1319, early Italian artist, first great painter of Siena. Infusing new life into the stylized Byzantine tradition, he initiat...

Dunning, William Archibald

(Encyclopedia)Dunning, William Archibald, 1857–1922, American historian, b. Plainfield, N.J., grad. Columbia (B.A., 1881; Ph. D., 1885). After studying in Berlin, he returned (1886) to spend a lifetime at Columbi...

Ertl, Gerhard

(Encyclopedia)Ertl, Gerhard gĕrˈhärt ârˈtəl [key], 1936– German chemist, b. Stuttgart, grad. Univ. of Stuttgart (1961), Technical Univ., Munich (Ph.D 1965). After holding a number of lecturer and research p...

Genet, Edmond Charles Édouard

(Encyclopedia)Genet, Edmond Charles Édouard ĕdmôNˈ shärl ādwärˈ zhənāˈ [key], 1763–1834, French diplomat, known as Citizen Genet. He had served as a French representative in Berlin, Vienna, and St. Pet...