Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Shostakovich, Dmitri dyĭmēˈtrē shŏstŏkôˈvĭch [key], 1906–75, Russian composer, b. St. Petersburg. Shostakovich studied at the Leningrad Conservatory (1919–25). The early success of his Fi...

(Encyclopedia) warbler, name applied in the New World to members of the wood warbler family (Parulidae) and in the Old World to a large family (Sylviidae) of small, drab, active songsters, including the hedge sparro...

(Encyclopedia) Troy. 1 City (1990 pop. 13,051), seat of Pike co., SE Ala., on the Conecuh River; inc. 1843. Products include lumber and wood items, textiles, truck bodies, feed, plastics, and pecans. Troy Univ. and ...

(Encyclopedia) Plath, Sylvia, 1932–63, American poet, b. Boston. Educated at Smith College and Cambridge, Plath published poems even as a child and won many academic and literary awards. Her first volume of poetry...

(Encyclopedia) Chagall, Marc märk shəgälˈ [key], 1887–1985, Russian painter. In 1907, Chagall left his native Vitebsk for St. Petersburg, where he studied under L. N. Bakst. In Paris (1910) he began to assimil...

(Encyclopedia)  Ono, Yoko, 1933- , Japanese-American conceptual artist, songwriter, and recording artist, b. Tokyo, Japan. Ono’s father was a banker and her mother ...

(Encyclopedia) performance art, multimedia art form originating in the 1970s in which performance is the dominant mode of expression. Perfomance art may incorporate such elements as instrumental or electronic music,...

(Encyclopedia) Diderot, Denis dənēˈ dēdərōˈ [key], 1713–84, French encyclopedist, philosopher of materialism, and critic of art and literature, b. Langres. He was also a novelist, satirist, and dramatist. D...

(Encyclopedia) Dos Passos, John Roderigo, 1896–1970, American novelist, b. Chicago, grad. Harvard, 1916. He subsequently studied in Spain and served as a World War I ambulance driver in France and Italy. In his fi...

(Encyclopedia) International Geophysical Year (IGY), 18-month period from July, 1957, through Dec., 1958, during a period of maximum sunspot activity, designated for cooperative study of the solar-terrestrial enviro...