#OTD in 1726.
The novel Gulliver's Travels written by Jonathan Swift satirising both human nature and the "travellers' tales" literary subgenre is published. Swift claimed that he wrote it "to vex the world rather than divert it".
literature
Settling accounts
Before he was famous, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was Louise Dupin’s scribe. It’s her ideas on inequality that fill his writings.
by Rebecca Wilkin via @aeonmag
https://aeon.co/essays/inequality-was-a-feminist-idea-before-it-was-rousseaus
In November 1886.
Rudyard Kipling's Plain Tales from the Hills begin to appear in the Lahore Civil and Military Gazette under the British Raj. He had worked as a journalist for the CMG—his first job—since 1882, when he was not quite 17.
#art #history:
‘kiss me & you will see how important i am.’
i'm wishing a sketchy birthday to la plath, born #otd in 1932 - &, even though i've not a chance in high hades of achieving a scintilla of the written eloquence that she displayed, here's my scribbled ode. [cheeky wee thread follows]
#sylviaPlath #illustration #poet #literature #poetry
"The spirit of truth and the spirit of freedom — these are the pillars of society."
#OTD in 1877.
Henrik Ibsen's first contemporary realist drama The Pillars of Society is premièred at the Odense Teater.
The Pillars of Society at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/2296
Three women translators who bridged cultures
Stories of Birgitte Thott, Sarah Austin, and Émilie du Châtelet.
by Małgorzata Szynkielewska via @Europeanaeu
https://www.europeana.eu/en/stories/three-women-translators-who-bridged-cultures
In November 1852.
The Merchant of Venice becomes the first of Shakespeare's plays to be performed publicly in India in an Indian language, Gujarati, as Nathari Firangiz Thekani Avi presented by a Parsi company at Surat.
"Surely all art is the result of one's having been in danger, of having gone through an experience all the way to the end, where no one can go any further."
´
Letter to his wife (June 24, 1907)
Rainer Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 – 29 December 1926)
Books by Rainer Maria Rilke at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/846
Franz Kafka’s papers metamorphose into National Library exhibit.
Wide-ranging exhibition ‘Kafka: Metamorphosis of an Author’ features the institution’s singular archives and marks 100 years since the Czech author’s death
By Jessica Steinberg
https://www.timesofisrael.com/franz-kafkas-papers-metamorphose-into-national-library-exhibit/
In December 1891.
Thomas Hardy writes "The Son's Veto" (collected in Life's Little Ironies), which he regards as his best short story.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life%27s_Little_Ironies
Life's Little Ironies at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3047
"Time drops in decay
Like a candle burnt out.
And the mountains and woods
Have their day, have their day;
But, kindly old rout
Of the fire-born moods,
You pass not away."
In December 1893.
W. B. Yeats publishes The Celtic Twilight, a collection of lore and reminiscences from the West of Ireland, giving a popular name to the Irish Literary Revival.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Literary_Revival
The Celtic Twilight at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10459
In November 1907.
While tutoring a Trieste businessman in English, James Joyce reveals that he is a writer, and his pupil, known to Joyce as Ettore Schmitz, proves to be the published novelist Italo Svevo. A literary friendship ensues.
In November 1852.
Leo Tolstoy's debut novel, Childhood («Детство», Detstvo), is published under the initials L. N. in this month's issue of the Saint Petersburg literary journal Sovremennik.
"All stories are like those about the creation of the universe, no one was there, no one witnessed anything, yet everyone knows what happened."
Blindness
José Saramago was born #OTD in 1922.
"[...] people always live for ever when there is any annuity to be paid them."
#OTD in 1811.
Jane Austen publishes her first novel: Sense and Sensibility at her own expense in 3 volumes, priced at 15 s., in Thomas Egerton's Military Library.
In November 1868.
Robert Browning's narrative poem The Ring and the Book begins four-part publication by Smith, Elder & Co. in London. It is a major commercial and critical success.
"My hair is grey, but not with years,
Nor grew it white
In a single night,
As men's have grown from sudden fears:..."
#OTD in 1816.
Lord Byron's The Prisoner of Chillon, and Other Poems is published in London. John Murray, his publisher, is able to sell 7,000 copies of this and of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto III (published November 18) to booksellers at a dinner this month.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prisoner_of_Chillon
The Prisoner of Chillon at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20158
French poet and philosopher Paul Valéry was born #OTD in 1871.
In addition to his poetry and fiction, his interests included aphorisms on art, history, letters, music, and current events.
Paul Valéry at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/49451
#OTD in 1938.
Orson Welles broadcasts a radio adaptation of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, causing a massive panic in some of the audience in the United States.
The War of the Worlds at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/36
In November 1867.
The Leipzig publisher Reclam launches its Universal-Bibliothek series of cheap reprints with Goethe's Faust following the lifting of copyright restrictions in the new North German Confederation for authors dead for more than 30 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goethe%27s_Faust
Faust by Goethe at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/45806
Becoming Beatrice
Dante adored her so much that he cast her as his guide in the Divine Comedy. But who was Beatrice Portinari?
By: Emily Zarevich
https://daily.jstor.org/becoming-beatrice/
Divine Comedy at PG
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1004
#OTD in 1802.
Washington Irving makes a first appearance in print at the age of nineteen, with observational letters to the New York Morning Chronicle under the name Jonathan Oldstyle.
Books by Washington Irving at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/34
In November 1868.
Norman MacLeod, editor of Good Words (U.K.), begins publishing its companion juvenile version, Good Words for the Young. The first issue begins the serial publication of George MacDonald's At the Back of the North Wind.
Le Corbeau = The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe, illustrated by Édouard Manet and translated by Stéphane Mallarmé at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14082
The Raven illustrated by Gustave Doré:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17192
"If one cannot state a matter clearly enough so that even an intelligent twelve-year-old can understand it, one should remain within the cloistered walls of the university and laboratory until one gets a better grasp of one's subject matter."
Margaret Mead died #OTD in 1978.
