On this day in 1933, Cormac McCarthy was born. The great American novelist moved around a lot, and served in the Air Force for four years. After returning to the University of Tennessee in 1957, he was awarded an Ingram-Merrill Award for …
Category: birthdays

Happy Birthday, Pablo Neruda: Quotes about Life (and Love)
Born in Chile on July 12, 1904, we recognize Pablo Neruda 112 years later as a political activist and eclectic poet. As a Communist holding several Chilean governmental posts, Neruda faced danger when Radical Party presidential candidate Gabriel González Videla turned …
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Happy Birthday, Beckett! Celebrate the (Absurd) “Waiting for Godot” Author
Samuel Beckett was a most interesting man—a fact that can be immediately confirmed by the author’s influential contributions to the Absurdist Movement (but we’ll get to what that is in a moment). Though born and raised in Ireland, Beckett fell in …
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Les Misérables: A Tale of Victor Hugo
In honor of what would be Victor Hugo’s 214th birthday (wow), enjoy a tribute to his most famous and longest-lived work, Les Misérables. Let’s start by defining what “les misérables” means. The literal translation is “the miserable ones,” but there remains the distinct possibility …
The Old Men and the Sea: 150 Hemingway Look-Alikes Descend on the Florida Keys
If you happened to be in Key West, Florida during the third week of July, you may have found yourself caught in a sudden and strange upsurge in the local population of white-bearded men sporting cable-knit fishermen’s turtlenecks. You may …
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Ten Things You (Probably) Didn’t Know About the Fourth of July
There are lots of things we expect on the Fourth: fireworks, friends, family. There are things we love (sparklers, Roman candles, cold beer) and things we despise (sauerkraut, ambrosia, Lee Greenwood… all right, haters… this was from a friend. Direct …
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Big Brother, Where Art Thou?
Oh yes, there you are, with your party hat on. What with the recent NSA scandal, George Orwell’s dystopian caution that “Big Brother is watching you” has never seemed so relevant. In fact, sales of 1984 skyrocketed just after news …