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The Writer’s Almanac for Wednesday, August 2, 2023

Posted on August 2, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

Today is the birthday of the American novelist, essayist, and activist James Baldwin, author of Go Tell It on the Mountain. Baldwin was born in Harlem, New York, in 1924, the oldest of nine children in a family that was dominated by his strict, religious stepfather, a Pentecostal minister with whom James had a difficult relationship and who brought his son into the ministry when he was just 14. James Baldwin’s influence on other American artists, whether of spirit or love or style, is undeniable. He and the poet Langston Hughes were responsible for getting the singer Nina Simone involved in the civil rights movement. Maya Angelou, remembering Baldwin in The New York Times after his death, said that he “set the stage” for her to write I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

The Writer’s Almanac for Tuesday, August 1, 2023

Posted on August 1, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

Herman Melville was born on this day in 1819 in New York City. The Melvilles were a family of Revolutionary War heroes and once-prominent merchants but, by young Herman’s time, the family was in decline and the boy was raised in an atmosphere of financial instability and refined pretense. It took readers until the 1920s to catch up to the prose, style, and power of Moby Dick. But once they did, appreciation never again lagged, and Melville’s masterpiece is now regarded as one of the greatest novels ever written.

The Writer’s Almanac for Monday, July 31, 2023

Posted on July 31, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

Today is the birthday of the woman Teddy Roosevelt once called “the most dangerous woman in America” when she was 87 years old. Mary Harris Jones, or “Mother Jones” was born to a tenant farmer in Cork, Ireland, in 1837. Her family fled the potato famine when she was just 10, resettling in Toronto. She trained to be a teacher and took a job in Memphis, where on the eve of the Civil War she married a union foundry worker and started a family. But in 1867, a yellow fever epidemic swept through the city, taking the lives of her husband and all four children

The Writer’s Almanac for Sunday, July 30, 2023

Posted on July 30, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

Emily Brontë was born in Thornton, Yorkshire, England, on this day in 1818. She was the daughter of a clergyman, and the sister of Anne and Charlotte Brontë; there was also a brother, Branwell, who was an artist and poet. Emily’s mother died of cancer when Emily was only three, and because their father was a quiet, solitary man who spent much of his time in his room, the children soon learned to entertain themselves.

The Writer’s Almanac for Saturday, July 29, 2023

Posted on July 29, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of poet Stanley Kunitz, born in Worcester, Massachusetts (1905). His parents were Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. His father committed suicide in a public park before Kunitz was born, and his mother, Yetta, erased all traces of Stanley’s father from the house, and refused to speak about him. She opened up a dry-goods store and sewed clothes in the back room, working overtime to pay off the debts that her husband had left behind, even though legally she was not obligated to pay them.

The Writer’s Almanac for Friday, July 28, 2023

Posted on July 28, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of poet and priest Gerard Manley Hopkins, born in Stratford, near London (1844). He was the eldest of nine children. The whole family drew pictures, wrote stories, and put on plays together. When Hopkins wasn’t drawing or painting, he liked to climb trees, and especially loved the feeling of walking barefoot in the grass.

The Writer’s Almanac for Thursday, July 27, 2023

Posted on July 27, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of writer and critic Elizabeth Hardwick, born in Lexington, Kentucky (1916). She moved to New York to study at Columbia. In 1946, she met the poet Robert Lowell at a party. He was in the middle of an ugly divorce from his first wife, the writer Jean Stafford, but Hardwick and Lowell reconnected at a writers retreat and married in 1949. During their honeymoon, Lowell had a manic depressive attack, and throughout their marriage, he had frequent affairs and breakdowns. She said: “I didn’t know what I was getting into, but even if I had, I still would have married him. He was not crazy all the time — most of the time he was wonderful.”

The Writer’s Almanac for Wednesday, July 26, 2023

Posted on July 26, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of playwright George Bernard Shaw, born in Dublin (1856). He’s the author of dozens of plays, including Man and Superman (1905), Pygmalion (1912), and Saint Joan (1923). Shaw won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1925 and an Oscar in 1938 for his contribution to the film Pygmalion.

The Writer’s Almanac for Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Posted on July 25, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

The Concorde crashed outside Paris on this date in 2000, killing all 109 people aboard. Four people on the ground were also killed when the jet crashed into a small hotel and restaurant. Shortly after take-off, one of the tires burst, and the debris struck a fuel tank, which ruptured and burst into flames.

The Writer’s Almanac for Monday, July 24, 2023

Posted on July 24, 2023 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of Zelda Fitzgerald, born Zelda Sayre in Montgomery, Alabama (1900). She met F. Scott Fitzgerald at one of the military dances when he was stationed in Montgomery. He stood out from the crowd, wearing his Brooks Brothers uniform and his cream-colored boots. Zelda said, “He smelled like new goods.” He told her that she looked like the heroine in the novel he was writing.

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