Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) banana, name for several species of the genus Musa and for the fruits these produce. The banana plant—one of the largest herbaceous plants—is native to tropical Asia but now cultivated throughout ...

(Encyclopedia) redstart, common name for an Old World thrush of the genus Phoenicurus, family Turdidae. A small, slender-legged songbird, it is found in woodlands, parks, and heaths. The European redstart, P. phoeni...

(Encyclopedia) Goytisolo, Juan (Juan Goytisolo Gay) hwän goitēsōˈlō [key], 1931–2017, Spanish writer, b. Barcelona. Goytisolo is considered among the foremost novelists who wrote in Spanish in the late 20th c...

(Encyclopedia) Cohen, Leonard Norman, 1934–2016, Canadian songwriter, singer, and poet, b. Montreal, B.A. McGill Univ., 1955. He initially wrote poetry, publishing his first collection, Let Us Compare Mythologies,...

(Encyclopedia) hemp, common name for a tall annual herb (Cannabis sativa) of the family Cannabinaceae, native to Asia but now widespread because of its formerly large-scale cultivation for the bast fiber (also calle...

(Encyclopedia) kiwi ăpˈtərĭks [key], common name for the smallest member of an order of primitive flightless birds related to the ostrich, the emu, and the cassowary. The kiwi, named by the Maoris for its shrill...

(Encyclopedia) vulture, common name for large birds of prey of temperate and tropical regions. The Old World vultures (family Accipitridae) are allied to hawks and eagles; the more ancient American vultures and cond...

(Encyclopedia) Proulx, E. Annie (Edna Annie Proulx) pro͞o [key], 1935–, American writer, b. Norwich, Conn., grad. Univ. of Vermont (B.A., 1969), Sir George Williams (now Concordia) Univ., Montreal (M.A., 1973). S...

(Encyclopedia) Murakami, Haruki häro͞oˈkē mo͝orˌäkäˈmē [key], 1949–, Japanese novelist. He lived in Europe and the United States from 1986 to 1995. Widely considered one of Japan's most important contemp...

(Encyclopedia) maple, common name for the genus Acer of the Aceraceae, a family of deciduous trees and shrubs of the Northern Hemisphere, found mainly in temperate regions and on tropical mountain slopes. Acer, the ...