Thursday

May 15, 1997

Song of Myself (excerpt)

by Walt Whitman

THURSDAY 5/15

Today's Reading:Lines from " Song of Myself" by Walt Whitman.

The Calaveras County Fair and Jumping Frog Jubilee begins in Angels Camp, California, today with over 3,000 frogs from around the world competing; an event based on Mark Twain's story " The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County."

The Little Norway Festival, a celebration of Norwegian Independence Day, takes place in Petersburg, Alaska.

It's the 67th birthday of painter Jasper Johns, Jr., a leader in the Pop Art movement; born in Augusta, Georgia, 1930.

It's the birthday of twin-brother playwrights Peter Shaffer (EQUES; AMADEUS) and Anthony Shaffer (SLEUTH), born in Liverpool, England, 1926.

It's the 74th birthday of photographer Richard Avedon, born in New York City, in 1923.

Novelist Mikhail Bulgakov, whose work was so unpopular with Stalin that it wasn't allowed to be published (NOTES OF A DEAD MAN; HEART OF A DOG; THE MASTER AND MARGARITA), was born on this day in Kiev, Russia, 1891.

It's the birthday of short-story writer and novelist Katherine Anne Porter, born in Indian Creek, Texas, near Austin, in 1890.

It was on this day in 1886 that poet Emily Dickinson died in Amherst, Massachusetts, where she had lived in total seclusion for the last 24 years of her life.

Shakespeare scholar Emily Folger, who helped form the famous Folger Library in Washington, D.C., was born on this day in Ironton, Ohio, 1858.

It's the birthday of writer L. Frank Baum (THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ), born in Syracuse, New York, 1856.

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.®

 

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