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Gish, Lillian

(Encyclopedia)Gish, Lillian, 1896–1993, American stage and movie actress, b. Springfield, Ohio. In 1912 she began her film career with D. W. Griffith. A fragile, delicate beauty, Gish often played a heroine rescu...

Irving, Edward

(Encyclopedia)Irving, Edward, 1792–1834, Scottish preacher, under whose influence the Catholic Apostolic Church was founded; its members have sometimes been called Irvingites. He was tutor to Jane Welsh, later th...

Colette

(Encyclopedia)Colette (Sidonie Gabrielle Colette) sēdōnēˈ gäbrēĕlˈ kōlĕtˈ [key], 1873–1954, French novelist. Colette achieved popularity with numerous novels, characterized by sensitive observations—...

Chatterton, Thomas

(Encyclopedia)Chatterton, Thomas, 1752–70, English poet. The posthumous son of a poor Bristol schoolmaster, he was already composing the “Rowley Poems” at the age of 12, claiming they were copies of 15th-cent...

Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

(Encyclopedia)Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, 1797–1851, English author; daughter of William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft. In 1814 she fell in love with the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, accompanied him abroad, and ...

Pickett, George Edward

(Encyclopedia)Pickett, George Edward, 1825–75, Confederate general in the American Civil War, b. Richmond, Va. After distinguishing himself in the Mexican War (especially at Chapultepec), Pickett served on the Te...

propagation of plants

(Encyclopedia)propagation of plants is effected in nature chiefly sexually by the seed and the spore, less often by rhizomes and other methods (see reproduction). Vegetative means include cutting, layering, graftin...

Bacon, Francis, English painter

(Encyclopedia)Bacon, Francis, 1910–92, English painter, b. Dublin. A self-taught artist, Bacon rejected abstraction in painting to explore a repertoire of strange, fractured, and often bizarre figurative images, ...

Orphic Mysteries

(Encyclopedia)Orphic Mysteries or Orphism, religious cult of ancient Greece, prominent in the 6th cent. b.c. According to legend Orpheus founded these mysteries and was the author of the sacred poems from which the...

network

(Encyclopedia)network, in computing, two or more computers connected for the purpose of routing, managing, and storing rapidly changing data. A local area network (LAN), which is restricted by distances of up to on...