History’s Footnotes
The addition of footnotes to texts by historians began long before their supposed inventor, Leopold von Ranke, started using them (poorly, as it turns out).
By: Matthew Wills via @JSTOR_Daily
books
Serbian inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist Nikola Tesla was born #OTD in 1856.
Some of Tesla´s inventions and innovations: alternating Current (AC) system; induction motor; Tesla coil; wireless transmission of electricity; radio technology; remote control; neon and fluorescent lighting; X-Ray technology; Tesla turbine; oscillators and frequency generators.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla
Books by Nikola Tesla at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/5067
"Memories should be sharp when one has nothing else to live for."
Save Me the Waltz
Zelda Fitzgerald, American novelist, painter, and socialite was born #OTD in 1900.
Zelda inspired many of Scott's characters and writings. She herself was an author, painter, and dancer.
She published "Save Me the Waltz" (1932), a semi-autobiographical account of her early life in the American South during the Jim Crow era and her marriage to F. Scott Fitzgerald.
“It's not the barbarian who threatens us, it's civilization that frightens us.”
Brazilian sociologist and journalist Euclides da Cunha died #OTD in 1909.
His most important work is Os Sertões (Rebellion in the Backlands), a non-fictional account of the military expeditions promoted by the Brazilian government against the rebellious village of Canudos, known as the War of Canudos.
"It may happen in the next hundred years that the English novelists of the present day will come to be valued as we now value the artists and craftsmen of the late eighteenth century."
First lines
#OTD in 1957.
The largely autobiographical novel The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold by Evelyn Waugh was published. The novel reflects Waugh's own experiences with mental illness, particularly his bout with hallucinations and paranoia.
#OTD in 1856.
Wilkie Collins' "Anne Rodway", a story in diary form about a needlewoman and her fiancé investigating the murder of a friend, appears in Household Words (first chapter), as the first English story to feature a woman as the main detective character.
The story is set in mid-19th century London, depicting the harsh realities of life for the working poor.
https://djo.org.uk/household-words/volume-xiv/page-1.html
Edited 358d ago
"No good book has ever been written that has in it symbols arrived at beforehand and stuck in.... I tried to make a real old man, a real boy, a real sea and a real fish and real sharks. But if I made them good and true enough they would mean many things."
The Old Man and the Sea (ed. 1952)
~Ernest Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961)
Books by Ernest Hemingway at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/50533
"Not uselessly employed,
Might I pursue this theme through every change
Of exercise and play, to which the year
Did summon us in his delightful round."
In July 1850.
William Wordsworth's The Prelude; or, Growth of a Poet's Mind: An Autobiographical Poem, on which he has worked since 1798, is first published about three months after his death by Edward Moxon in London in 14 books, with the title supplied by the poet's widow, Mary.
Reading Jane Austen’s Final, Unfinished Novel
How Jane Austen has remained a phenomenon for more than two centuries.
By Martin Amis. December 31, 1995 via @NewYorker
#OTD in 1906.
Murder of Grace Brown by Chester Gillette in the United States, inspiration for Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy.
Dreiser saved newspaper clippings about the case for several years before writing his novel, during which he studied the case closely. He based Clyde Griffiths on Chester Gillette, deliberately giving him the same initials.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_American_Tragedy
An American Tragedy is being proofreading at @DProofreaders
#OTD in 1598.
William Shakespeare's play, The Merchant of Venice (under the title "the Marchaunt of Venyce or otherwise called the Jewe of Venyce") is entered on the Stationers' Register. By decree of Queen Elizabeth, the Stationers' Register licensed printed works, giving the Crown tight control over all published material.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Merchant_of_Venice
The Merchant of Venice at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/1515
#OTD in 1925.
The first of Ben Travers' "Aldwych farces", A Cuckoo in the Nest, opens at London's Aldwych Theatre in a production by actor-manager Tom Walls featuring the brothers Ralph Lynn, Gordon James and Hastings Lynn.
Travers made a film adaptation, which Walls directed in 1933, with most of the leading members of the stage cast reprising their roles.
#OTD in 1897.
The writer Jack London sails to join the Klondike Gold Rush, where he will write his first successful stories.
His most famous works include The Call of the Wild and White Fang, both set in Alaska and the Yukon during the Klondike Gold Rush, as well as the short stories "To Build a Fire", "An Odyssey of the North", and "Love of Life".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_London
Books by Jack London at PG:
British lexicographer and philologist James Murray died #OTD in 1915.
His profound knowledge of languages and philology eventually led him to London, where he became involved with the Philological Society. In 1879, James Murray was appointed the chief editor of the "New English Dictionary on Historical Principles," which would later be known as the Oxford English Dictionary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Murray_(lexicographer)
Books by James Murray at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/4072
"Science has "explained" nothing; the more we know the more fantastic the world becomes and the profounder the surrounding darkness."
Along the Road, Part II. Views of Holland (p. 108)
~Aldous Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963)
Books by Aldous Huxley at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/780
Italian journalist and novelist Matilde Serao died #OTD in 1927.
She was the first woman called to edit an Italian newspaper, Il Corriere di Roma and later Il Giorno. Serao was also the co-founder and editor of the newspaper Il Mattino, and the author of several novels. She never won the Nobel Prize in Literature despite being nominated on six occasions.
Books by Matilde Serao at PG:
https://dev.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/7688
German humanist, scholar, & historian Beatus Rhenanus died #OTD in 1547.
Rhenanus worked as a proofreader & editor for the famous printing house of Froben in Basel. His work "Rerum Germanicarum Libri Tres", published in 1531, provided a comprehensive history of Germany from ancient times to the present & was noted for its use of original sources. The Beatus Rhenanus Library houses many of his manuscripts & personal collections, preserving his legacy.
"Science means simply the aggregate of all the recipes that are always successful. All the rest is literature."
Moralités.
~Paul Valéry (30 October 1871 – 20 July 1945)
"Nevertheless, it remains conceivable that the measure relations of space in the infinitely small are not in accordance with the assumptions of our geometry [Euclidean geometry], and, in fact, we should have to assume that they are not if, by doing so, we should ever be enabled to explain phenomena in a more simple way."
Memoir (1854) Tr. William Kingdon Clifford.
~Bernhard Riemann (September 17, 1826 – July 20, 1866)
#OTD in 1493.
Hartmann Schedel's Nuremberg Chronicle, one of the best-documented early printed books, is published. This was quickly followed by a German translation on December 23, 1493.
The publisher and printer was Anton Koberger, the godfather of Albrecht Dürer, who, in the year of Dürer's birth in 1471, ceased goldsmithing to become a printer and publisher.
Canadian writer Mazo de la Roche died #OTD in 1961.
Her first novel, "Possession," was published in 1923. Although it did not achieve significant success, it marked the beginning of her career as a novelist. De la Roche achieved international fame with the publication of "Jalna" in 1927. The "Jalna" series comprises 16 novels, written over a span of more than three decades.
Books by Mazo de la Roche at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/31212
“Ah ! Que la vie est quotidienne !”
Uruguayan poet Jules Laforgue was born #OTD in 1860.
He was a symbolist poet known for his innovative use of free verse and ironic, introspective style. Despite his short life, he left a significant impact on French poetry & literature. His work foreshadowed the modernist movement & influenced poets like T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. His collections include "Les Complaintes" and "L'Imitation de Notre-Dame la Lune".
Italian draughtsman and printmaker Stefano della Bella died #OTD in 1664.
He received significant support from Cardinal Giovanni Carlo de' Medici. His early works included small prints & book illustrations. Della Bella lived in Paris (1639-50), where he worked for publishers & collected engravings. After returning to Florence in 1650, he continued to produce prints & drawings. He also taught etching & drawing, including Pietro Testa.
"We were the Leopards, the Lions; those who'll take our place will be little jackals, hyenas; and the whole lot of us, Leopards, jackals, and sheep, we'll all go on thinking ourselves the salt of the earth."
Il Gattopardo
Italian writer Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa died #OTD in 1957.
A literary man of complex personality and author of the well-known novel The Leopard, he was a taciturn and solitary character and spent much of his time in reading.
In July 1848.
Serial publication of William Makepeace Thackeray's novel Vanity Fair by Punch magazine concludes. It appears in book format by Bradbury and Evans in London, with illustrations by the author.
It was printed in 20 monthly parts between January 1847 and July 1848. The first three had already been completed before publication, while the others were written after it had begun to sell.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanity_Fair_(novel)
Vanity Fair at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/599
