Literati and Libations

July/Part I

Photo by Karan Grover on Unsplash

If ever an excuse is required to raise one’s glass, know that several prominent literary figures have or had July birthdays.

That said, join me in toasting:

• 1^st

  Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin (1804), known by her pen name as George Sand;

  William Strunk, Jr. (1869), co-author of The Elements of Style;

  James M. Cain (1892), author of Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice, and Mildred Pierce;

  Walter [Francis] White (1893), Harlem Renaissance novelist and essayist;

  Irna Phillips (1901), radio script and TV soap opera script developer of The Guiding Light;

  Juan Carlos Onetti (1909), author of La Vida Breve, and El Astillero; and

  Lisa Scottoline (1955), author of Think Twice, Dirty Blonde, and I’ve Got Sand in All the Wrong Places;

• 2^nd

  Hermann Hesse (1877), author of Siddhartha & Steppenwolf; and

  Ed Bullins -aka- Kingsley B. Bass, Jr. (1935), dramatist;

• 3^rd

  Charlotte Perkins (1860), author of The Yellow Wallpaper;

  Franz Kafka (1883), author of The Metamorphosis and The Trial; and

  Dave Barry (1947), author of I’ll Mature When I’m Dead, Insane City, and Never Land Adventures;

I sure as hell am not doing shots.

Rachel Leeke Alexis

• 4^th

  Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804), author of The Scarlet Letter and The House of Seven Gables;

  Neil Simon (1927), playwright of The Odd Couple and Barefoot in the Park; and

  Ted Joans (1928), beat poet;

• 5^th

  Naomi Long Madgett -aka- Naomi Cornelia Long and Naomi Long Witherspoon (1923), poet and former Detroit Poet Laureate;

  Mia Couto -aka- António Emílio Leite Couto (1955), journalist and poet;

  Bill Watterson (1958), creator of the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip series;

• 6^th

  Bessie [Amalia Emery] Head (1937), short story writer;

• 7^th

  Robert A. Heinlein (1907), author of Stranger in a Strange Land and Starship Troopers;

  Harriette Arnow (1908), author of The Dollmaker;

  Margaret [Abigail] Walker (1915), poet and novelist;

  Jean Kerr (1923), author of Please Don't Eat the Daisies;

  David McCullough (1933), author of John Adams, Truman, and 1776;

  Eric Jerome Dickey (1961), author of The Blackbirds, Naughty or Nice, and several other titles centering strong Black women; and

  Jeff VanderMeer (1968), author of the Southern Reach Trilogy;

I don’t drink alcohol, it's bad for my legs.

Eric Jerome Dickey

• July 8^th

  Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross (1926), author of On Death and Dying;

  Shirley Ann Grau (1929), short story writer; and

  Anna Quindlen (1952), author of Still Life with Breadcrumbs and Miller’s Valley;

• 9^th

  Ann Radcliffe (1764), author of The Italian;

  David Mandessi Diop (1927), poet known for his contribution to the Négritude Literary Movement;

  Oliver Sacks (1933), author of Awakenings and The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat;

  June Jordan -aka- June Meyer (1936), poet, novelist, children's author, and essayist;

  Dean Koontz (1945), author of False Memory, Odd Thomas, and Fear Nothing; and

  Masami Tsuda (1970), creator of the Kare Kano Manga series;

• 10^th

  Marcel Proust (1871), author of Remembrance of Things Past and In Search of Lost Time;

  John Wyndham -aka- John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris (1903), author of The Day of the Triffids, The Kraken Wakes, and The Chrysalids;

  Alice Munro (1931), author of Runaway, and Dear Life; and

  Karen Russell (1981), author of Swamplandia!, Vampires in the Lemon Grove, and The Antidote;

• 11^th

  Susan Bogert Warner, pen name Elizabeth Wetherell (1819), author of The Wide, Wide World;

  E. B. White (1899), author of Charlotte’s Web, Stuart Little, Charlotte's Web (1952), and The Trumpet of the Swan;

  Harold Bloom (1930), reviewer with Bloom’s Modern Critical Views; and

  Laurel Thatcher Ulrich (1931), author of A Midwife's Tale;

Sip mightily

Eddie Maisonet, III

• 12^th

  Henry David Thoreau (1817), author of Walden and Civil Disobedience;

  Lucy Fitch Perkins (1865), author of the Twins series;

  Pablo Neruda (1904), Nobel Prize-winning Poet; and

  Donald E. Westlake (1933), author of the Hard Case Crime series and the Alan Grofield series;

• 13^th

  David (Malcolm) Storey (1933), author of Saville;

  Akinwande Oluwole Soyinka -aka- Wole Soyinka (1934), dramatist, novelist, poet, and the first Black person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in literature;

  Jane Hamilton (1957), author of The Book of Ruth and A Map of the World;

• 14^th

  Owen Wister (1860), author of The Virginian;

  Irving Stone (1903), author of The Agony and the Ecstasy and Lust for Life;

  Arthur Laurents (1918), playwright of West Side Story and Gypsy;

  Jeff Lindsay (1952), author of the Dexter Morgan series;

  Laura Numeroff (1953), author of the If You Give… series; and

  Brian Selznick (1966) The Invention of Hugo Cabret and The Boy of a Thousand Faces;

• 15th

  Clement Moore (1779), author of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas;

  Iris Murdoch (1909), author of The Sea, The Sea and A Severed Head;

  Clive Cussler (1931), author of the Dirk Pitt series, and the Oregon Files series; and

  Richard Russo (1949), author of Empire Falls, Nobody’s Fool, and That Old Cape Magic.

Cheers!

Thanks for reading,