The Writer's Almanac
Summary: The Writer's Almanac is a daily podcast of poetry and historical interest pieces, usually of literary significance, hosted by Garrison Keillor.
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- Artist: Garrison Keillor
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On this date in 1849, Edgar Allan Poe was found unkempt and delirious outside a pub in Baltimore. No one knows what had happened to him, and he died four days later.
On this day in 1950, Charles M. Schulz's comic strip Peanuts was first published. Schulz began every morning with a jelly doughnut, sitting down to think of an idea that might come after minutes or hours.
It's the birthday of novelist Tim O'Brien, author of The Things They Carried, who said, "A true war story is never moral."
On this day in 1949, the Berlin Airlift ended after more than a year of delivering food to West Berliners.
Today we celebrate the birthday of Miguel de Cervantes, author of what is considered to be the first modern novel: Don Quixote.
Today is the birthday of real-life scrivener and alchemist Nicholas Flamel (1300), known to millennials as the 600-year-old friend of Albus Dumbledore.
It's the birthday of Scottish writer Irvine Welsh (1958). His first novel, Trainspotting (1993), was an instant cult classic that was made into a very popular movie.
It's the birthday of poet T. S. Eliot (1888), who managed to finish both his undergraduate work and master's degree in just four years at Harvard University.
On this day in 1957, nine African-American students were successfully registered at Little Rock Central High School, breaking the state's longstanding policy of segregation.
It's the birthday of F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896), whose daughter said, "People who live entirely by the fertility of their imaginations are fascinating, brilliant and often charming, but they should be sat next to at dinner parties, not lived with."
It's the birthday of the dramatic poet Euripides, whose contemporaries made fun of him for enjoying solitude and for writing in a large, 10-chambered cave now known as the Cave of Euripides.
It was on this day in 1888 that the first issue of National Geographic was published. Photographs were included later as a way to fill extra pages.
It's the birthday of prolific horror writer Stephen King (Portland, Maine, 1947), who said, "The road to hell is paved with adverbs."
It's the birthday of one of the greatest editors of the 20th century, Maxwell Perkins (1884). His first big success at Scribner's was his decision to publish a manuscript by a young man named F. Scott Fitzgerald called This Side of Paradise.
On this day in 1982, computer scientist Scott Fahlman suggested on an online bulletin board that the users type a colon, a hyphen, and a closing parenthesis when their post was intended as a joke. :-)
