Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

172 results found

Butler, Samuel, 1612–80, English poet and satirist

(Encyclopedia)Butler, Samuel, 1612–80, English poet and satirist. During the Puritan Revolution he served Sir Samuel Luke, a noted officer of Cromwell. After the restoration of Charles II, he wrote his famous moc...

caricature

(Encyclopedia)caricature, a satirical drawing, plastic representation, or description which, through exaggeration of natural features, makes its subject appear ridiculous. Although 16th-century Northern painters, s...

Murner, Thomas

(Encyclopedia)Murner, Thomas tōˈmäs mo͝orˈnər [key], 1475–1537, German satirist and Franciscan monk, b. Strasbourg. He was the most scurrilous writer of his time and spared almost no one in his satire. He a...

Iriarte, Tomás de

(Encyclopedia)Iriarte, Tomás de tōmäsˈ dā ēryärˈtā [key], 1750–91, Spanish poet and dramatist, b. Canary Islands. He spent most of his life in Madrid, where, like many of his contemporaries, he engaged i...

Percy, Walker

(Encyclopedia)Percy, Walker, 1916–90, American novelist, b. Birmingham, Ala. Trained as a physician, Percy turned to writing after he contracted tuberculosis and was forced to retire from practice. His novels The...

Lichtenberg, Georg Christoph

(Encyclopedia)Lichtenberg, Georg Christoph gāˈôrkh krĭsˈtôf lĭkhˈtənbĕrk [key], 1742–99, German physicist and satirist. He taught at the Univ. of Göttingen, where his special field was electricity. Lic...

Halleck, Fitz-Greene

(Encyclopedia)Halleck, Fitz-Greene hălˈĭk [key], 1790–1867, American poet, b. Guilford, Conn. He was joint author, with Joseph Rodman Drake, of the humorous lampoons “Croaker Papers,” most of which were pr...

Hanson, Duane

(Encyclopedia)Hanson, Duane, 1925–96, American sculptor, b. Alexandria, Minn. A member of the superrealist movement of the late 1960s and early 70s, Hanson produced life-sized tableaux of realistic figures and pr...

interlude

(Encyclopedia)interlude, development in the late 15th cent. of the English medieval morality play. Played between the acts of a long play, the interlude, treating intellectual rather than moral topics, often contai...

Tucholsky, Kurt

(Encyclopedia)Tucholsky, Kurt ko͝ort to͞okhôlˈskē [key], 1890–1935, German political satirist and journalist. Ranging over a wide variety of subjects and styles, Tucholsky's pacifist, antifascist writing mar...