#OtD 19 May 1925 El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, aka Malcolm X, was born in Omaha, Nebraska. He became one of the most influential advocates of self-defence for Black people as well as one of the foremost critics of America's institutional racism https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9128/malcolm-x-born
otd
"Our national epic has yet to be written."
#OTD in 1904.
Irish author James Joyce begins a relationship with Nora Barnacle and subsequently uses the date to set the actions for his novel Ulysses; this date is now traditionally called "Bloomsday" in honour of the novel's main character Leopold Bloom.
Happy Bloomsday Day!
Ulysses is available at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4300
Italian mathematician, astronomer and engineer Giovanni Domenico Cassini was born #OTD in 1625.
His observations & calculations helped to confirm & refine Kepler’s laws of planetary motion. He formulated Cassini’s Law, describing the rotational behavior of the Moon, which was crucial for understanding the Moon's synchronous rotation with the Earth. He was involved in measuring the meridian arc of Paris, contributing to the accurate determination of the shape of the Earth.
Edited 2y ago
#OnThisDay, 25 Oct 1996, the last “Magdalene laundry” in Ireland closes.
In 2013, the Irish government issued a formal state apology to the women forced to work in the homes.
Here's archive film: https://ifiplayer.ie/father-delaney-collection-magdalene-laundry/
And here's more about how the laundries operated: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/last-days-of-a-laundry-1.89388
#IrishHistory #WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #Histodons
Irish mathematician Alicia Boole Stott was born #OTD in 1860.
She discovered & described many four-dimensional polytopes & coined the term “polytope” to generalize polygons & polyhedra to higher dimensions. She extensively used Schläfli symbols to categorize and describe polytopes. Later in life, Alicia worked with Harold Coxeter and their collaboration furthered the understanding of regular polytopes and three-dimensional projections of four-dimensional figures.
French novelist, memoirist and journalist George Sand died #OTD in 1876.
Sand's writing combines elements of Romanticism and early Realism, with rich descriptions, strong emotions, and detailed character studies. Her novels often critique societal norms, particularly the limitations placed on women and the injustices faced by the lower classes.
Books by George Sand at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/851
"The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is Reason."
The Age of Reason (1794)
Thomas Paine died #OTD in 1809.
He had a great influence on the thoughts and ideas which led to the American Revolution and the United States Declaration of Independence. He wrote three of the most influential and controversial works of the 18th Century: Common Sense, Rights of Man, and The Age of Reason.
Books by Thomas Paine at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/91
#OnThisDay, 25 Oct 1947, women in Malta vote for the first time. Almost 35,000 women go to the polls.
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #VotesForWomen #MalteseHistory #Histodons
"Destiny and history are untidy."
Nightwood (1936)
American writer, journalist, and artist Djuna Barnes died #OTD in 1982.
"Ryder" was Barnes's first novel, a semi-autobiographical and highly experimental work. "Nightwood" is widely regarded as Barnes's masterpiece. The novel is a dense, poetic exploration of love, identity, and despair, set in the bohemian world of Paris and Berlin in the 1920s and 1930s.
Books by Djuna Barnes at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/51179
#OnThisDay, 8 Jun 1944, Violette Szabo returns to occupied France by parachute for her second posting with the British Special Operations Executive.
She is captured two days later, after a gun battle. She's tortured and sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp. She is killed in Jan 1945. Her daughter Tania received the George Cross on her behalf in 1947.
Violette Szabo's story was filmed as Carve Her Name With Pride (1958).
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #WorldWar2 #Histodons
"The strongest of all psychic forces in the world is unsatisfied desire."
A Glastonbury Romance
English novelist John Cowper Powys died #OTD in 1963.
He appeared with a volume of verse in 1896 and a first novel in 1915, but gained success only with his novel Wolf Solent in 1929. He has been seen as a successor to Thomas Hardy, and Wolf Solent, A Glastonbury Romance, Weymouth Sands, and Maiden Castle have been called his Wessex novels.
"To dwellers in a wood almost every species of tree has its voice as well as its feature."
Opening line.
#OTD in 1872.
Thomas Hardy's second novel (and the first set in Wessex), Under the Greenwood Tree: A Rural Painting of the Dutch School, is published in London (as "by the author of Desperate Remedies").
A movie (1929) was made based on this book, directed by Harry Lachman and starring Marguerite Allan, Nigel Barrie and Wilfred Shine.
Somhairle MacGill-Eain (Sorley MacLean, 1911–1996), one of the greatest European poets of the 20th century, was born #OTD, 26 Oct. A 🎂 🧵
Watch “Sorley MacLean’s Island” via the National Library of Scotland – Sorley MacLean in conversation with fellow writer Iain Crichton Smith
1/8
https://movingimage.nls.uk/film/3141
#Scottish #literature #Hebrides #Skye #Raasay #Gaelic #Gaidhlig #poetry #20thcentury #modernism
Edited 319d ago
#OTD "in 1917, Virginia Woolf and Leonard Woolf purchase a used handpress. A month later, Hogarth Press is born."
https://lithub.com/lit-hub-daily-march-23-2026/
Books by Woolf at PG:
In Gránada, in Gránada,
They dumbed the mou o a makar,
In Gránada, in Gránada,
They strak doun Garcia Lorca…
—“In Gránada, in Gránada (Llanto por Federico Garcia Lorca)”, by Syndey Goodsir Smith (1915–1975) – a major figure in the 20th-century Scottish renaissance, born #OTD, 26 Oct
1/4
https://asls.org.uk/publications/books/volumes/a-kist-o-skinlan-things/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Scots #Scotslanguage #20thcentury #Lorca
66 years ago, on October 26, 1959, Linus mentioned the Great Pumpkin in the Peanuts comic strip for the first time, kicking off an annual Halloween storyline that ran for 40 years and received its very own animated special.
#OTD #Peanuts #CharlieBrown #OnThisDay #Comic #Comics #ComicStrip #Snoopy
Scottish poet and writer Thomas Campbell died #OTD in 1844.
In 1799 he wrote Pleasures of Hope, a traditional 18th-century didactic poem in heroic couplets. He also produced several patriotic war songs— "Ye Mariners of England", "The Soldier's Dream", "Hohenlinden" and, in 1801, The Battle of the Baltic, but was no less at home in delicate lyrics such as "At Love's Beginning".
Books by Thomas Campbell at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/7520
English physician and suffragist Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was born #OTD in 1836.
In 1865, Elizabeth Anderson became the first woman in Britain to qualify as a physician and surgeon. In 1872, she founded the New Hospital for Women in London, which was staffed entirely by women. In 1874, she co-founded the London School of Medicine for Women, where served as the dean of the school, guiding its development and ensuring high standards of education for women students.
"Remember, to the last, that while there is life there is hope."
English novelist and social critic Charles Dickens died #OTD in 1870.
Dickens edited a weekly journal for 20 years; wrote 15 novels, five novellas, hundreds of short stories and nonfiction articles; lectured and performed readings extensively; was an indefatigable letter writer; and campaigned vigorously for children's rights, education, and other social reforms.
Charles Dickens at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/37
#art #history: if most of the people born into privilege were like nancy cunard (born #otd in 1896), maybe we wouldn't have such an itchy collective guillotine finger. this fashionable fash-basher & anti-racism campaigner (& heir to the cunard shipping line) was a writer who became a muse to man ray, james joyce & langston hughes.
when she wasn't busy being effortlessly avant-garde, nancy worked as a translator for the french resistance.
#nancyCunard #antiFascist #antiRacist #poetry
French poet and novelist Marceline Desbordes-Valmore was born #OTD in 1786.
Marceline Desbordes-Valmore published her first book of poetry, "Élégies et romances," in 1819. She was highly regarded by her contemporaries, including Victor Hugo and Alphonse de Lamartine. Her work influenced later poets, including Paul Verlaine and the Symbolists, who admired her emotional expressiveness and musicality.
Books by Marceline Desbordes-Valmore at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/5436
Belgian physicist, mathematician, astronomer Georges Lemaître died #OTD in 1966.
He was the 1st to theorize that the recession of nearby galaxies can be explained by an expanding universe, which was observationally confirmed soon afterwards by Hubble. He 1st derived the Hubble–Lemaître law. He also proposed the "Big Bang theory" of the origin of the universe, calling it the "hypothesis of the primeval atom", and later calling it "the beginning of the world".
#OTD in 1915.
P. G. Wodehouse's novel Something Fresh (first published as "Something New" in the United States) is serialized in The Saturday Evening Post (U.S.), introducing the character of Lord Emsworth of Blandings Castle. It first appears in book form on September 3 in New York, from D. Appleton & Company, and on September 16 in London, from Methuen.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Fresh
Something New at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/2042
![Something Fresh is a novel by P. G. Wodehouse, first published as "Something New" in the United States, by D. Appleton & Company on 3 September 1915.[1] It was published in the United Kingdom as "Something Fresh" by Methuen & Co. on 16 September 1915. There are a number of differences between the American and British versions, but essentially, it is the same book. The novel introduces Lord Emsworth of Blandings Castle, whose home and family reappear in many of Wodehouse's later short stories and novels.](/proxy/post_attachment/276251/093f6d6f0c.jpg "Something Fresh is a novel by P. G. Wodehouse, first published as \"Something New\" in the United States, by D. Appleton & Company on 3 September 1915.[1] It was published in the United Kingdom as \"Something Fresh\" by Methuen & Co. on 16 September 1915. There are a number of differences between the American and British versions, but essentially, it is the same book. The novel introduces Lord Emsworth of Blandings Castle, whose home and family reappear in many of Wodehouse's later short stories and novels.")
Edited 2y ago
Italian physicist and neurophysiologist Carlo Matteucci was born #OTD in 1811.
He conducted experiments to measure the electrical currents generated by muscle & nerve tissues during contraction and stimulation. His work provided quantitative data on these electrical phenomena and confirmed that living tissues could generate electricity. Matteucci´s law describes the relationship between the intensity of the electrical current generated by a muscle & the amount of contraction.
#OTD in 1948.
Shirley Jackson's short story "The Lottery" is published in The New Yorker magazine.
The story describes a fictional small American community that observes an annual tradition known as "the lottery", which is intended to ensure a good harvest and purge the town of bad omens. Jackson and The New Yorker were both surprised by the initial negative response from readers.