Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Stoppard, Tom, 1937–, English playwright, b. Zlín, Czechoslovakia (now in the Czech Republic), as Tomas Straussler. During his childhood he and his family moved to Singapore, later (1946) settling ...

(Encyclopedia)  Who, The, English rock music group formed in 1964. The members were Peter Dennis Blanford Townshend, 1945–, Chiswick, London, U.K., guitar, ...

(Encyclopedia) Ruskin, John, 1819–1900, English critic and social theorist. During the mid-19th cent. Ruskin was the virtual dictator of artistic opinion in England, but Ruskin's reputation declined after his deat...

(Encyclopedia) McNally, Terrence, 1939–2020, American playwright, b. St. Petersburg, Fla., grad. Columbia, 1960. Known for his dark humor, social satire, and focus on human isolation and the need to connect, he of...

(Encyclopedia) Olivier, Laurence Kerr, Baron Olivier of Brighton ōlĭvˈē-āˌ [key], 1907–89, English actor, director, and producer. He made his stage debut at Stratford-upon-Avon in 1922 and soon achieved reno...

(Encyclopedia) Comanche kəmănˈchē [key], Native North Americans belonging to the Shoshonean group of the Uto-Aztecan branch of the Aztec-Tanoan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). They originated f...

(Encyclopedia) Coen Brothers, American filmmakers Joel Coen, 1955–, and Ethan Coen, 1958–, both b. St. Louis Park, Minn. Joel studied at New York Univ. Film School (B.A., 1978), Ethan at Princeton (B.A., 1979). ...

(Encyclopedia) heraldry, system in which inherited symbols, or devices, called charges are displayed on a shield, or escutcheon, for the purpose of identifying individuals or families. In the Middle Ages the herald,...

(Encyclopedia) Pynchon, Thomas pĭnˈchən [key], 1937–, American novelist, b. Glen Cove, N.Y., grad. Cornell, 1958. Pynchon is noted for his amazingly fertile imagination, his wild sense of humor, and the teeming...

(Encyclopedia) Gilgamesh gĭlˈgəmĕsh [key], in Babylonian legend, king of Uruk. He is the hero of the Gilgamesh epic, written on 12 tablets c.2000 b.c. and discovered among the ruins at Nineveh. The epic was lost...