Thursday
Feb. 18, 1999
The Dial Tone
Poem: Greg Williamson, "The Dial Tone," from The Silent Partner (Story Line Press).
It's the birthday of poet AUDRE LORDE, in New York, 1934. She helped found The Kitchen Table, a press devoted to the work of African American women; her own books include the collections Coal; The Black Unicorn; and probably her best-known book, The Cancer Journals, written in 1980 when her doctors discovered she had breast cancer. She wrote a sequel to The Cancer Journals in 1988, A Burst of Light, which won the National Book Award.
It was on this day in 1884 that Mark Twain published THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN, the story of Huck and Jim floating down the Mississippi on a raft. It was his best-selling novel.
JEFFERSON DAVIS was inaugurated the Confederacy's president at a ceremony in Montgomery, Alabama on this day in 1861.
It's the birthday of SHOLEM ALEICHEM He emigrated to the U.S. around the turn of the century and as his work got translated into English he became known as the "Jewish Mark Twain." His collection of stories on Jewish life in Russia was made into the musical, "Fiddler on the Roof."
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.®