Literary Fact of the Day Round-Up: October 15-28, 2011
Those of you who follow Book Riot on Twitter know that we run a daily nugget of literary trivia there called, well, “Literary Fact of the Day.”
Here’s what we ran over the last two weeks:
Oct 15: Mario Puzo’s eyesight was so bad that he was excused from combat duty in WWII and instead served in public relations.
Oct 16: In 1793, Noah Webster founded the the US’s first daily newspaper, THE AMERICAN MINERVA
Oct 17: The Starbucks at the corner of 43rd & Broadway in NYC was once the location of the Barrett Hotel, where Eugene O’Neil was born.
Oct 18: Gunter Grass is often associated with the artistic movement Vergangenheitsbewältigung, which means “coming to terms with the past”
Oct 19: In 1939, Congress ended the Federal Theater Project, fearing communist infiltration.
Oct 20: Arthur Miller died on the 56th anniversary of the Broadway premiere of A DEATH OF SALESMAN.
Oct 21: 6 years after meeting Terry McMillan, John Plummer, the inspiration for HOW STELLA GOT HER GROOVE BACK announced that he was gay and the two divorced.
Oct 22: Due to agency policy, David Cornwell had to use a pseudonym to publish his stories, and so A MURDER OF QUALITY appeared under the name John Le Carre.
Oct 23: In 2009, Ursula K Le Guin resigned from the Authors Guild after it endorsed Google’s book digitization project.
Oct 24: Doris Lessing’s formal education ended at age 14, when she decided to leave school.
Oct 25: In 1984, Michael Crichton created a video game called AMAZON that would go on to sell 100,000 copies.
Oct 26: Believing he had betrayed family secrets, members of Pat Conroy’s family picketed book signings of THE GREAT SANTINI.
Oct 27: Despite a lifetime of heavy drinking, Dylan Thomas’ autopsy showed little liver damage.
Oct 28: Evelyn Waugh’s wife’s name was…Evelyn. They went by “he-velyn and she-velyn.”
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So, follow Book Riot on Twitter to get these (and links not only to good stuff here but elsewhere on the literary internet). You can also search for the hashtag, #lfotd. If you’re not on Twitter, you’ll just have to wait patiently for semi-regular wrap-ups here.
Also, if you know of a tasty little morsel of bookish knowledge, let us know in the comments or on Twitter. (If we use it, we’ll give you full credit.)
