Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Cage, John Milton Jr., 1912–92, American composer, b. Los Angeles. A leading figure in the musical avant-garde from the late 1930s, he attended Pomona...

(Encyclopedia) Plutarch plo͞oˈtärk [key], a.d. 46?–c.a.d. 120, Greek essayist and biographer, b. Chaeronea, Boeotia. He traveled in Egypt and Italy, visited Rome (where he lectured on philosophy) and Athens, an...

(Encyclopedia) Atwood, Margaret Eleanor, 1939–, Canadian novelist and poet. Atwood is a skilled and powerful storyteller whose novels, set mainly in the near future, sometimes make use of such popular genres as hi...

(Encyclopedia) Ogden, city (1990 pop. 63,909), seat of Weber co., N Utah, at the confluence of the Ogden and Weber rivers; inc. 1851. Aerospace industries and Hill Air Force Base are the major employers. There is we...

(Encyclopedia) Basile, Giovanni Battista jōvänˈnē bät-tēsˈtä bäsēˈlā [key], 1575–1632, Italian writer. Basile held several important official positions, devoting his spare time to the study of folklore...

(Encyclopedia) snowmobile, vehicle designed to travel over snow, ice, and similar surfaces that offer limited traction and weight-supporting capability. As the performance of the vehicle depends to a large extent on...

(Encyclopedia) Kennedy, Joseph Patrick, 1888–1969, U.S. ambassador to Great Britain (1937–40), b. Boston, grad. Harvard, 1912. The founder of an American dynasty, he was the father of nine children, including Jo...

(Encyclopedia) saga, in Old Norse literature, especially Icelandic and Norwegian, narrative in prose or verse, centering on a legendary or historical figure or family. Sagas may be divided into sagas of the kings, m...

(Encyclopedia) Warburg, Aby (Abraham Moritz Warburg), 1866–1929, German historian of art and culture, b. Hamburg, studied art history in Bonn, Munich, Florence, and Strasbourg, where he received a doctorate with a...

(Encyclopedia) Leonard, Elmore (John Elmore Leonard), 1925–2013, American novelist, b. New Orleans, grad. Univ. of Detroit (1950). “Dutch” Leonard began publishing Western tales in the early 1950s, the best kn...