Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Bottomley, Gordon

(Encyclopedia)Bottomley, Gordon, 1874–1948, English poet and dramatist, b. Yorkshire. His major artistic efforts were directed at reviving verse drama in English. Among his plays are The Crier by Night (1902), Th...

Ariosto, Ludovico

(Encyclopedia)Ariosto, Ludovico lo͞odōvēˈkō äryôsˈtō [key], 1474–1533, Italian epic and lyric poet. As a youth he was a favorite at the court of Ferrara; later he was in the service of Ippolito I, Cardin...

MacNeice, Louis

(Encyclopedia)MacNeice, Louis məknēsˈ [key], 1907–63, Irish poet b. Belfast. Educated at Oxford, he became a classical scholar and teacher and later was a producer and traveled the world for the British Broadc...

Murray, Les

(Encyclopedia)Murray, Les (Leslie Allan Murray), 1938–2019, Australia's leading poet of the late 20th and early 21st cent., B.A. Univ. of Sydney, 1969. Son of an impoverished dairy farmer, he grew up in New South...

anthem

(Encyclopedia)anthem [ultimately from antiphon], short nonliturgical choral composition used in Protestant services, usually accompanied and having an English text. The term is used in a broader sense for “nation...

Anderson, Maxwell

(Encyclopedia)Anderson, Maxwell, 1888–1959, American dramatist, b. Atlantic, Pa., grad. Univ. of North Dakota, 1911. His plays, many of which are written in verse, usually concern social and moral problems. Ander...

Verhaeren, Émile

(Encyclopedia)Verhaeren, Émile āmēlˈ vārärĕnˈ, vərhäˈrən [key], 1855–1916, Belgian poet and critic, a Fleming who wrote in French. His dominant passion for social reform found expression successively ...

Ovid

(Encyclopedia)Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso) ŏvˈĭd [key], 43 b.c.–a.d. 18, Latin poet, b. Sulmo (present-day Sulmona), in the Apennines. Although trained for the law, he preferred the company of the literary cote...

Slovak literature

(Encyclopedia)Slovak literature. The earliest documents written in the Slovak language date from the 15th cent. Following the Czech Hussite movement, many Czech cultural leaders emigrated to Slovakia (16th cent.); ...

Brand, Sir John Henry

(Encyclopedia)Brand, Sir John Henry, or Jan Hendrik Brand yän hĕnˈdrək bränt [key], 1823–88, South African politician, president of the Orange Free State, b. Capetown. He was called to the English bar in 184...