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The Writer’s Almanac for Friday, January 3, 2025

Posted on January 3, 2025 - Writer's Almanac

It was on this day in 1882 that the Irish playwright Oscar Wilde docked in New York. Customs asked him if he had anything to declare. Oscar Wilde replied, “Nothing but my genius.”

The Writer’s Almanac for Thursday, January 2, 2025

Posted on January 2, 2025 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov, born in Petrovichi, Russia (1920). His family immigrated to the United States when he was three years old, and his parents opened a candy shop in Brooklyn. He spent most of his time working in the family store, and he was fascinated by the shop’s newspaper stand, which sold the latest issues of popular magazines. When his father finally relented and let him read pulp fiction, Asimov started reading science fiction obsessively.

The Writer’s Almanac for Wednesday, January 1, 2025

Posted on January 1, 2025 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of J.D. (Jerome David) Salinger, born in New York City (1919). Salinger had started his career as a writer back in 1940, at a time when the short stories published in magazines were still one of the most popular forms of entertainment in the United States. He published a number of short stories in the group of magazines known as “the slicks,” magazines that included The Saturday Evening Post, Mademoiselle, Good Housekeeping, and Collier’s. But the magazine that he most wanted to publish a story in was The New Yorker.

The Writer’s Almanac for Tuesday, December 31, 2024

Posted on December 31, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of the woman Martin Luther King Jr. called “The Queen of American Folk Music”: Odetta, born Odetta Holmes Felious, in Birmingham, Alabama (1930). She thought at first that she’d be an opera singer, but she heard folk music in San Francisco and decided that was the kind of music that said what she wanted to say.

The Writer’s Almanac for Monday, December 30, 2024

Posted on December 30, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

It’s the birthday of the man who said, “I always prefer to believe the best of everybody, it saves so much trouble.” That’s (Joseph) Rudyard Kipling, born in Bombay, India (1865), best known for his books Kim (1901) and The Jungle Book (1894).

The Writer’s Almanac for Sunday, December 29, 2024

Posted on December 29, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

Today is the birthday of playwright, novelist, and screenwriter Paul Rudnick, born in Piscataway Township, New Jersey (1957). He finds that being from New Jersey is a useful excuse for a host of social missteps: “Whenever I stumble over my own feet, or blurt out a thought that makes no sense at all, or leave the house wearing one pattern too many, I always think, It’s okay, I’m from New Jersey.

The Writer’s Almanac for Saturday, December 28, 2024

Posted on December 28, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

It was on this day in 1895 that Auguste and Louis Lumière opened the first movie theater at the Grand Café in Paris. Other inventors, including Thomas Edison, were working on various moving picture devices at the time. But most of those other devices could only be viewed by one person at a time. The Lumières were the first to project moving pictures on a screen, so that they could be viewed by a large audience.

The Writer’s Almanac for Friday, December 27, 2024

Posted on December 27, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

Radio City Music Hall opened on this date in 1932. John D. Rockefeller Jr. had originally planned to build a new Metropolitan Opera House on some land he owned in Midtown Manhattan, but the stock market crash of 1929 put an end to that plan. He decided to build a block of buildings anyway, which he called “Rockefeller Center.” The cornerstone of the center was a vast Art Deco theater that offered lavish entertainment at reasonable prices.

The Writer’s Almanac for Thursday, December 26, 2024

Posted on December 26, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

Today is also the first day of Kwanzaa (Swahili for “first fruits”), a seven-day African-American holiday created in the 1960s as a harvest festival — a time to re-establish links to the community and to an African past.

The Writer’s Almanac for Wednesday, December 25, 2024

Posted on December 25, 2024 - Writer's Almanac

Today is Christmas Day, and we’re celebrating with quotes and literature about the holiday.

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