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The Literature Portal

Introduction

Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include oral literature, much of which has been transcribed. Literature is a method of recording, preserving, and transmitting knowledge and entertainment, and can also have a social, psychological, spiritual, or political role.

Literature, as an art form, can also include works in various non-fiction genres, such as biography, diaries, memoir, letters, and the essay. Within its broad definition, literature includes non-fictional books, articles or other printed information on a particular subject. (Full article...)

Outline
Index

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The following are images from various literature-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Photograph of a printing press in Egypt, c. 1922 (from History of books)
Image 2The New England Primer (from Children's literature)
Image 3Statue of C. S. Lewis in front of the wardrobe from his Narnia book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (from Children's literature)
Image 4A Tagore illustration of a Hindu myth (from Children's literature)
Image 5Woman holding wax tablets in the form of the codex. Wall painting from Pompeii, before 79 CE. (from History of books)
Image 6Jikji, Selected Teachings of Buddhist Sages and Seon Masters, the earliest known book printed with movable metal type, 1377. Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. (from History of books)
Image 7The character which means "poetry", in the ancient Chinese Great Seal script style. The modern character is 詩/诗 (shī). (from History of poetry)
Image 8European output of manuscripts 500–1500 (from History of books)
Image 9Illustration from Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 pirate adventure Treasure Island (from Children's literature)
Image 10Page from a Jain manuscript depicting the birth of Mahavira, c. 1400 (from History of books)
Image 11Ivan Bilibin's illustration of the Russian fairy tale about Vasilisa the Beautiful (from Fairy tale)
Image 12Estimated medieval output of manuscripts in terms of copies (from Medieval literature)
Image 13Calliope, the muse of heroic poetry (from History of poetry)
Image 14Illustration from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, 1865 (from Children's literature)
Image 151865 illustration of Hop-o'-My-Thumb and the ogre by Alexander Zick (from Fairy tale)
Image 16A Sumerian clay tablet, currently housed in the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago, inscribed with the text of the poem Inanna and Ebih by the priestess Enheduanna, the first author whose name is known
Image 17Page from the Blue Quran manuscript, ca. 9th or 10th century CE (from History of books)
Image 18The Crescent Moon by Rabindranath Tagore illus. by Nandalal Bose, Macmillan 1913 (from Children's literature)
Image 19From The Facetious Nights of Straparola by Giovanni Francesco Straparola (from Fairy tale)
Image 20European output of printed books c. 1450–1800 (from History of books)
Image 21Newbery's A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, originally published in 1744 (from Children's literature)
Image 22The Adventures of Pinocchio (1883) is a canonical piece of children's literature and one of the best-selling books ever published. (from Children's literature)
Image 23The Book of the Dead of Hunefer, c. 1275 BCE, ink and pigments on papyrus, in the British Museum (London) (from History of books)
Image 24Gabriel García Márquez, the most famous of the Boom writers (from Latin American literature)
Image 25French author Albert Camus was the first African-born writer to receive the award. (from Nobel Prize in Literature)
Image 26Folio from a manuscript of the Shanamah (Book of Kings) (from History of books)
Image 27The Violet Fairy Book (1906)
Image 28The scene in Botticelli's Madonna of the Book (1480) reflects the presence of books in the houses of richer people in his time. (from History of books)
Image 29A poet with a few enraptured fans (from Performance poetry)
Image 30Cutlery for children. Detail showing fairy-tale scenes: Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel. (from Fairy tale)
Image 31Roberto Bolaño is considered to have had the greatest United States impact of any post-Boom author (from Latin American literature)
Image 32A mother reads to her children, depicted by Jessie Willcox Smith in a cover illustration of a volume of fairy tales written in the mid to late 19th century. (from Children's literature)
Image 33Charles G. D. Roberts was a poet that belonged to an informal group known as the Confederation Poets. (from Canadian literature)
Image 34H. O. Tanager performs at a bookstore in Boise, Idaho. (from Performance poetry)
Image 35Goethe's Italian Journey between September 1786 and May 1788 (from Travel literature)
Image 36Selma Lagerlöf, the first female writer to be awarded a Nobel Prize in literature, faced major controversies. Illustration from Svenska Dagbladet, 11 December 1909 (from Nobel Prize in Literature)
Image 37Walter Crane's chromolithograph illustration for The Frog Prince, 1874. (from Children's literature)
Image 38Albert Edelfelt's illustration of Adalmina's Pearl, a Finnish fairy tale by Zachris Topelius. (from Fairy tale)
Image 39John Bauer's illustration of trolls and a princess from a collection of Swedish fairy tales (from Fairy tale)
Image 40Folio from the Shah Jahan Album, c. 1620, depicting the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan (from History of books)
Image 41The Story of Mankind (1921) by Hendrik van Loon, 1st Newbery Award winner (from Children's literature)
Image 42Gabrielle Roy was a notable French Canadian author. (from Canadian literature)
Image 43Statuta Mutine Reformata, 1420–1485; parchment codex bound in wood and leather with brass plaques worked the corners and in the center, with clasps. (from Medieval literature)
Image 44Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens, London (from Children's literature)
Image 45The former Canadian Parliamentary Poet Laureate George Elliott Clarke (2015) (from Canadian literature)
Image 46Willy Wonka (from Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), and the Mad Hatter (from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) in London (from Children's literature)
Image 47Dresden Codex (page 49) (from History of books)
Image 48Statue of Minnie the Minx, a character from The Beano. Launched in 1938, the comic is known for its anarchic humour, with Dennis the Menace appearing on the cover. (from Children's literature)
Image 49J. K. Rowling reads from her novel Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (from Children's literature)
Image 5012-metre-high (40 ft) stack of books sculpture at the Berlin Walk of Ideas, commemorating the invention of modern book printing (from History of books)
Image 51Short story writer Alice Munro won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013. (from Canadian literature)
Image 52A picture by Gustave Doré of Mother Goose reading written (literary) fairy tales (from Fairy tale)
Image 53An author portrait of Jean Miélot writing his compilation of the Miracles of Our Lady, one of his many popular works. (from History of books)
Image 54A late 18th-century reprint of Orbis Pictus by Comenius, the first children's picture book. (from Children's literature)
Image 55A Chinese bamboo book (from History of books)
Image 56European output of books 500–1800 (from History of books)
Image 57In 1901, French poet and essayist Sully Prudhomme (1839–1907) was the first person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "in special recognition of his poetic composition, which gives evidence of lofty idealism, artistic perfection and a rare combination of the qualities of both heart and intellect." (from Nobel Prize in Literature)
Image 58A 15th-century Incunable. Notice the blind-tooled cover, corner bosses, and clasps. (from History of books)
Image 59The codex Manesse, a book from the Middle Ages (from History of books)
Image 601900 edition of the controversial The Story of Little Black Sambo (from Children's literature)
Image 61Handwritten notes by Christopher Columbus on a Latin edition of The Travels of Marco Polo (from Travel literature)
Image 62Father Frost acts as a donor in the Russian fairy tale Father Frost, testing the heroine before bestowing riches upon her (from Fairy tale)
Image 63Galway Kinnell performing a poetic piece in Vermont (from Performance poetry)
Image 64Beauty and the Beast, illustration by Warwick Goble (from Fairy tale)
Image 65The first page of Beowulf (from Medieval literature)
Image 66Kings' Fairy Tale, 1909, by Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis (from Fairy tale)
Image 67Peruvian poet César Vallejo, considered by Thomas Merton "the greatest universal poet since Dante" (from Latin American literature)
Image 68An early Mexican hornbook pictured in Tuer's History of the Horn-Book, 1896. (from Children's literature)
Image 69Postal stamp of Russia celebrating children's books. (from Children's literature)
Image 70Alfonso Reyes writer of influential pieces of Mexican surrealism. (from Latin American literature)
Image 71Pages from the 1819 edition of Kinder- und Haus-Märchen by the Brothers Grimm (from Children's literature)
Image 72Octavio Paz helped to define modern poetry and the Mexican personality. (from Latin American literature)

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Selected work

Featured articles are displayed here, which represent some of the best content on English Wikipedia.

The Diary of a Nobody is an English comic novel written by the brothers George and Weedon Grossmith, with illustrations by the latter. It originated as an intermittent serial in Punch magazine in 1888–89 and first appeared in book form, with extended text and added illustrations, in 1892. The Diary records the daily events in the lives of a London clerk, Charles Pooter, his wife Carrie, his son Lupin, and numerous friends and acquaintances over a period of 15 months.

Although its initial public reception was muted, the Diary came to be recognised by critics as a classic work of humour, and it has never been out of print. It helped to establish a genre of humorous popular fiction based on lower or lower-middle class aspirations, and was the forerunner of numerous fictitious diary novels in the later 20th century. The Diary has been the subject of several stage and screen adaptations, including Ken Russell's "silent film" treatment of 1964, a four-part TV film scripted by Andrew Davies in 2007, and a widely praised stage version in 2011, in which an all-male cast of three played all the parts.

Selected biographies - load new batch

Featured articles are displayed here.

Walpole c. 1920–1925
Image 2
Portrait of Rădulescu

Ion Heliade Rădulescu or Ion Heliade (also known as Eliade or Eliade Rădulescu; Romanian pronunciation: [ˈi.on heliˈade rəduˈlesku]; January 6, 1802 – April 27, 1872) was a Wallachian, later Romanian academic, Romantic and Classicist poet, essayist, memoirist, short story writer, newspaper editor and politician. A prolific translator of foreign literature into Romanian, he was also the author of books on linguistics and history. For much of his life, Heliade Rădulescu was a teacher at Saint Sava College in Bucharest, which he helped reopen. He was a founding member and first president of the Romanian Academy.

Heliade Rădulescu is considered one of the foremost champions of Romanian culture from the first half of the 19th century, having first risen to prominence through his association with Gheorghe Lazăr and his support of Lazăr's drive for discontinuing education in Greek. Over the following decades, he had a major role in shaping the modern Romanian language, but caused controversy when he advocated the massive introduction of Italian neologisms into the Romanian lexis. A Romantic nationalist landowner siding with moderate liberals, Heliade was among the leaders of the 1848 Wallachian revolution, after which he was forced to spend several years in exile. Adopting an original form of conservatism, which emphasized the role of the aristocratic boyars in Romanian history, he was rewarded for supporting the Ottoman Empire and clashed with the radical wing of the 1848 revolutionaries. (Full article...)
Image 3
Daguerreotype taken in 1842

Honoré de Balzac (/ˈbælzæk/ BAL-zak, more commonly US: /ˈbɔːl-/ BAWL-, French: [ɔnɔʁe d(ə) balzak]; born Honoré Balzac; 20 May 1799 – 18 August 1850) was a French novelist and playwright. The novel sequence La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of post-Napoleonic French life, is generally viewed as his magnum opus.

Owing to his keen observation of detail and unfiltered representation of society, Balzac is regarded as one of the founders of realism in European literature. He is renowned for his multi-faceted characters; even his lesser characters are complex, morally ambiguous and fully human. Inanimate objects are imbued with character as well; the city of Paris, a backdrop for much of his writing, takes on many human qualities. His writing influenced many famous writers, including the novelists Émile Zola, Charles Dickens, Marcel Proust, Gustave Flaubert, and Henry James, and filmmakers François Truffaut and Jacques Rivette. Many of Balzac's works have been made into films and continue to inspire other writers. (Full article...)
Image 5
Meeker in 1921

Ezra Morgan Meeker (December 29, 1830 – December 3, 1928) was an American pioneer who traveled the Oregon Trail by ox-drawn wagon as a young man, migrating from Iowa to the Pacific Coast. Later in life he worked to memorialize the Trail, repeatedly retracing the trip of his youth. Once known as the "Hop King of the World", he was the first mayor of Puyallup, Washington.

Meeker was born in Butler County, Ohio, to Jacob and Phoebe Meeker. His family relocated to Indiana when he was a boy. He married Eliza Jane Sumner in 1851; the following year the couple, with their newborn son and Ezra's brother, set out for the Oregon Territory, where land could be claimed and settled on. Although they endured hardships on the Trail in the journey of nearly six months, the entire party survived the trek. Meeker and his family briefly stayed near Portland, then journeyed north to live in the Puget Sound region. They settled at what is now Puyallup in 1862, where Meeker grew hops for use in brewing beer. By 1887, his business had made him wealthy, and his wife built a large mansion for the family. In 1891, an infestation of hop aphids destroyed his crops and took much of his fortune. He later tried his hand at a number of ventures, and made four largely unsuccessful trips to the Klondike, taking groceries and hoping to profit from the gold rush. (Full article...)
Image 6
Mary Wollstonecraft by John Opie, c. 1797

Mary Wollstonecraft (/ˈwʊlstənkræft/, also UK: /-krɑːft/; 27 April 1759 – 10 September 1797) was a British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. Until the late 20th century, Wollstonecraft's life, which encompassed several unconventional personal relationships at the time, received more attention than her writing. Today Wollstonecraft is regarded as one of the founding feminist philosophers, and feminists often cite both her life and her works as important influences.

During her brief career, she wrote novels, treatises, a travel narrative, a history of the French Revolution, a conduct book, and a children's book. Wollstonecraft is best known for A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), in which she argues that women are not naturally inferior to men, but appear to be only because they lack education. She suggests that both men and women should be treated as rational beings and imagines a social order founded on reason. (Full article...)
Image 7
Photo by Tee Corinne, 1983

Ann Weldy (born September 15, 1932), better known by her pen name Ann Bannon, is an American author who, from 1957 to 1962, wrote six lesbian pulp fiction novels known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. The books' enduring popularity and impact on lesbian identity has earned her the title "Queen of Lesbian Pulp Fiction". Bannon was a young housewife trying to address her own issues of sexuality when she was inspired to write her first novel. Her subsequent books featured four characters who reappeared throughout the series, including her eponymous heroine, Beebo Brinker, who came to embody the archetype of a butch lesbian. The majority of her characters mirrored people she knew, but their stories reflected a life she did not feel she was able to live. Despite her traditional upbringing and role in married life, her novels defied conventions for romance stories and depictions of lesbians by addressing complex homosexual relationships.

Her books shaped lesbian identity for lesbians and heterosexuals alike, but Bannon was mostly unaware of their impact. She stopped writing in 1962. Later, she earned a doctorate in linguistics and became an academic. She endured a difficult marriage for 27 years and, as she separated from her husband in the 1980s, her books were republished; she was stunned to learn of their influence on society. They were released again between 2001 and 2003 and were adapted as an award-winning Off-Broadway production. They are taught in women's and LGBT studies courses, and Bannon has received numerous awards for pioneering lesbian and gay literature. She has been described as "the premier fictional representation of US lesbian life in the fifties and sixties", and it has been said that her books "rest on the bookshelf of nearly every even faintly literate Lesbian". (Full article...)
Image 8
Daguerreotype taken at Mount Holyoke, December 1846 or early 1847; the only authenticated portrait of Dickinson after early childhood

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) was an American poet. Little-known during her life, she has since been regarded as one of the most important figures in American poetry.

Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, into a prominent family with strong ties to its community. After studying at the Amherst Academy for seven years in her youth, she briefly attended the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary before returning to her family's home in Amherst. (Full article...)
Ezra Pound photographed in 1913 by Alvin Langdon Coburn
Sarah Trimmer painted by Henry Howard

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Selected excerpt

“

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way—in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

”

— Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

More excerpts... Read at Wikisource...

More Did you know

... that though Amir Hamzah was a Muslim, analyses of his poem "Padamu Jua" have found Christian influences?
... that Claude Houghton's novel I Am Jonathan Scrivener may have influenced the film Citizen Kane?
... that in one of his 75 poems, Chairil Anwar predicted his place of burial?
... that the first edition of the Star Trek novel Killing Time included overtones of Kirk/Spock slash fiction?
... that publication of one of Adam Mickiewicz's first poems, "Ode to Youth", was delayed due to censorship?

More Did you know facts

Selected illustration

Image 1
The Bride of Lammermoor
Artist: Charles Robert Leslie; Engraver: J. Cooper
Restoration: Adam Cuerden
A scene from an 1886 edition of Sir Walter Scott's historical novel The Bride of Lammermoor, originally published in 1819. Although fictional, the story is based on an actual incident of the family of James Dalrymple: Dalrymple's daughter Janet was betrothed to one man in an arranged marriage, but in love with another. On her wedding night, Janet stabbed her husband. She was judged to be insane and died within a month. The book is part of Scott's Tales of My Landlord series and is the basis for Gaetano Donizetti's 1835 opera Lucia di Lammermoor.
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Image 2
The Sleeping Beauty
Illustration: W. E. F. Britten; restoration: Adam Cuerden
"The Sleeping Beauty" is a poem written by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and published in 1830; it was later expanded and published in 1842 as "The Day-Dream". Based on the fairy tale Sleeping Beauty, the poem (as with many of Tennyson's adaptations of existing literary works) focuses on a single aspect of the story, the appearance of the eponymous character as she sleeps.

This illustration by W. E. F. Britten was published in 1901 to accompany a reprinting of "The Sleeping Beauty". It accompanies the poem's final lines: "She sleeps, nor dreams, but ever dwells / A perfect form in perfect rest."
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Image 3
Headless Horseman
Painting: John Quidor
The Headless Horseman is a mythical figure who has appeared in folklore around the world since at least the Middle Ages. Depending on the legend, the Horseman is either carrying his head, or missing it altogether, and is searching for it. Examples include the dullahan from Ireland, who is a demonic fairy usually depicted riding a horse and carrying his head under his arm; the titular knight from the English tale Gawain and the Green Knight; and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," a short story written in 1820 by American Washington Irving which has been adapted into several other works of literature and film including the 1999 Tim Burton movie Sleepy Hollow.

This picture, titled The Headless Horseman Pursuing Ichabod Crane, is an 1858 painting by American artist John Quidor, depicting a scene from "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow". It is in the collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C.
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Image 4
Three Little Pigs
Artist: Leonard Leslie Brooke; Restoration: Jujutacular
The wolf blows down the straw house in a 1904 adaptation of Three Little Pigs, a fairy tale featuring anthropomorphic animals. Printed versions date back to the 1840s, but the story itself is thought to be much older. The story in its arguably best-known form appeared in English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs, first published in 1890. The phrases used in the story, and the various morals which can be drawn from it, have become embedded in western culture. The story uses the literary rule of three, expressed in this case as a "contrasting three", as the third pig's brick house turns out to be the only one which is adequate to withstand the wolf.
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Image 5
Scientific romance
Artist: Albert Robida
A typical 20th-century aerial rotating house, as drawn by Albert Robida. The drawing shows a dwelling structure in the scientific romance style elevated above rooftops and designed to revolve and adjust in various directions. An occupant in the lower right points to an airship with a fish-shaped balloon in the sky, while a woman rides a bucket elevator on the left. Meanwhile, children fly a kite from the balcony as a dog watches from its rooftop doghouse.
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Image 6
Divine Comedy
Restoration: Adam Cuerden
An engraving of Charon, in Greek mythology the ferryman of Hades who carried souls of the newly deceased across the River Styx that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead. This illustration is from French engraver Gustave Doré's 1857 set of illustrations for Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, an Italian epic poem depicting an allegorical vision of the Christian afterlife. Here, Charon is shown coming to ferry souls across the river Acheron to Hell. The caption is from Henry Francis Cary's translation, from which this particular copy is taken:

And, lo! toward us in a bark
Comes on an old man, hoary white with eld,
Crying "Woe to you, wicked spirits!"
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Image 7
The Hunting of the Snark
Illustration credit: Henry Holiday, after Lewis Carroll; restored by Adam Cuerden
The Hunting of the Snark is a poem composed by the English writer Lewis Carroll between 1874 and 1876, typically characterised as a nonsense poem. The plot follows a crew of ten who cross the ocean to hunt the Snark, which may turn out to be a highly dangerous Boojum. This is the second of Henry Holiday's original illustrations for the first edition of the poem. It introduces some of the crew, whose names all start with "B"; the Bellman and Baker are on the upper deck, with the Barrister seated in the background; below are the Billiard-marker, the Banker and the Broker, with the maker of Bonnets and Hoods visible behind.
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Image 8
Layla and Majnun
Artist: Unknown; Restoration: Lise Broer
A scene from a late-16th century publication of Nezami Ganjavi's adaptation of the classical Persian story Layla and Majnun, which is based on the real story of Qays ibn al-Mulawwah, a young man from the northern Arabian Peninsula and his love Layla. There are two versions of the story, but in both, Majnun goes mad when her father prevents him from marrying her. In the depicted scene, the eponymous star-crossed lovers meet for the last time before their deaths. Both have fainted and Majnun's elderly messenger attempts to revive Layla while wild animals protect the pair from unwelcome intruders.
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Image 9
Don Quixote
Restoration: Adam Cuerden
An engraving by Gustave Doré of a scene from Miguel de Cervantes's Don Quixote, the most influential work of literature from the Spanish Golden Age in the Spanish literary canon. The scene illustrated here occurs early in the novel, when Alonso Quixano (Quixote's real name) has become obsessed with books of chivalry, and believes their every word to be true, despite the fact that many of the events in them are clearly impossible. Don Quixote was published in two separate volumes, ten years apart. It is considered a founding work of modern Western literature, and it regularly appears high on lists of the greatest works of fiction ever published.
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Image 10
Midas
Artist: Walter Crane; Restoration: Lise Broer
An illustration from an 1893 version of A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys by Nathaniel Hawthorne, which recounted the tale of King Midas. In Greek mythology, Midas was given ability to turn everything he touched into gold by the god Bacchus. However, he soon discovered that he was unable to even eat. Bacchus told him to wash in the river Pactolus, and the power flowed in the river, which was supposedly the reason for why the river was so rich in gold in later years. In Hawthorne's version, Midas' touch even turned his daughter to gold (pictured here).
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Image 11
The Song of Los
Illustration: William Blake
The Song of Los is an epic poem by William Blake first published in 1795 and considered part of his prophetic books. The poem consists of two sections, "Africa" and "Asia": in the first section Blake catalogues the decline of morality in Europe, which he blames on both the African slave trade and enlightenment philosophers, whereas in the second section he describes a worldwide revolution, urged by the eponymous Los.

The illustration here is from the book's frontispiece and shows Urizen presiding over the decline of morality.
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Image 12
Wicked Witch of the West
Illustrator: W. W. Denslow; Restoration: Lise Broer
Dorothy (left) douses the Wicked Witch of the West with water, melting her, in this illustration from the first edition of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The appearance of the witch in the 1939 film adaptation of the novel has become an archetype for human wickedness. This film is the source of the oft-quoted phrase, "I'll get you, my pretty ... and your little dog too!" The unique Broadway musical, Wicked, The Untold Story Of the Witches of Oz, tells of The Wicked Witch of the West, the Tin Man, The Cowardly Lion, The Scarecrow, and Glinda's shared history.
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Image 13
Dan'l Druce, Blacksmith
Artist: Francis S. Walker; Engraving: Brothers Dalziel
Restoration: Adam Cuerden
Hermann Vezin in the title role of Dan'l Druce, Blacksmith, an 1876 play by W. S. Gilbert. In the story, Druce begins as a miser and drunkard whose wife has left him. Two army deserters find shelter at his house, but they rob him and abandon a baby girl there. Many years later, Druce has become a blacksmith, and the two men return to try to claim the girl. The play was a success, running for about 100 performances and enjoying tours and several revivals.
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Image 14
Illustration by John Bauer
Painting: John Bauer
A watercolor illustration by John Bauer (1882–1918) titled "Still, Tuvstarr sits and gazes down into the water", which accompanied Helge Kjellin's fairy tale "The Tale of the Moose Hop and the Little Princess Cotton Grass" in the 1913 edition of Among Gnomes and Trolls. In this scene, Tuvstarr looks for her lost heart in a tarn, symbolizing innocence lost.

Born and raised in Jönköping, Sweden, Bauer moved to Stockholm at age 16 to study at the Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts. He painted and illustrated in a romantic nationalistic style, in part influenced by the Italian Renaissance and Sami cultures. Most of his works are watercolors or prints in monochrome or muted colours; he also produced oil paintings and frescos.
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Image 15
Caterpillar, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Artist: Sir John Tenniel
Sir John Tenniel's illustration of the Caterpillar for Lewis Carroll's classic children's book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. The illustration is noted for its ambiguous central figure, which can be viewed as having either a human male's face with pointed nose and protruding lower lip or as the head end of an actual caterpillar, with the right three "true" legs visible. The small symbol in the lower left is composed of Tenniel's initials, which was how he signed most of his work for the book. The partially obscured word in the lower left-center is the last name of Edward Dalziel, the engraver of the piece.
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Did you know (auto-generated) - load new batch

... that the cultural scholar Hermann Bausinger wrote a book about the history of literature from Swabia from the 18th century to the present, published for his 90th birthday?
... that 17th-century English writers Martha Moulsworth and Alice Sutcliffe are each known for a single literary work?
... that the earliest book in English of Sudanese literature is the memoir of Selim Aga, who was born in 1826 and sold as a slave, but published his autobiography in "faultless idiomatic English"?
... that people have randomly interjected the phrase "Epstein didn't kill himself" as a non sequitur at the end of statements?
... that the cultural and literary journal Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände was most successful under its only female editor, Therese Huber?
... that Gernot Roll, considered an expert in literary adaptations, was the cinematographer for the 11-part television series The Buddenbrooks based on Thomas Mann's novel?

Today in literature

13 November

1714 - William Shenstone, English poet born
1850 - Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish writer born
1862 - Ludwig Uhland, German poet died
1910 - William Bradford Huie, American journalist, editor, publisher and author born
1952 - Margaret Wise Brown, American children's author died
1975 - Olga Berggolts, Russian poet died

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