Literati and Libations

October/Part I

Photo by Laura Chouette on Unsplash

It’s 5 pm… somewhere, and because it is, why not raise a glass in celebration of literary greats with October birthdays, including:

• 1^st

  Sergey Aksakov, novelist (1791); Louis Untermeyer, poet (1885); Faith Baldwin, novelist (1893); and Daniel Boorstin, historian (1914);

• 2^nd

  Wallace Stevens, poet (1879); and Graham Green, novelist (1904);

• 3^rd

  Sir Fulke Greville, poet (1554); Mikhail Lermontov, poet and novelist (1814); Henri Alain-Fournier, novelist (1886); Thomas Wolf, novelist (1900); James Herriot, writer (1916); and Gore Vidal, playwright and writer (1925);

• 4^th

  Edward Stratemeyer, creator of the Stratemeyer Syndicate (1862); Damon Runyon, short-story writer and humorist (1884); Jackie Collins, author (1941); Anne Rice, author (1941); and Luis Sepúlveda, writer (1949);

• 5^th

  Jonathan Edwards, sermon writer (1703); Denis Diderot, encyclopedist, literary critic, and man of letters (1713); John Addington Symonds, historian and writer (1840); Frederic Morton, aka Fritz Mandelbaum, writer (1924); Vaclav Havel, playwright (1936); and Marie-Claire Blais, novelist (1939);

“’Tis a pity wine should be so deleterious, for tea and coffee leave us much more serious.” -Lord Byron

• 6^th

  Caroline Gordon, writer (1895); and Thor Heyerdahl, adventure writer (1914);

• 7^th

  James Whitcomb Riley, poet (1849); Everett LeRoy Jones -aka- Leroi Jones -aka- Amiri Baraka, poet and playwright (1934); Thomas M. Keneally, novelist (1935); Vivian Leopold James -aka- Clive James, literary critic, poet, lyricist, novelist and memoirist (1939); and Anita Shreve, novelist (1946);

• 8^th

  John Hay, poet (1838); John Cowper, novelist, essayist, poet, and orator (1872); Frank Herbert, sci-fi writer (1920); Faith Ringgold, children’s author (1930); and R[ichard] L[awrence] Stine, YA author (1943);

• 9^th

  Tadeusz Różewicz, poet, dramatist, and writer (1921); Jill Ker Conway, writer (1934); and Ciaran Carson, poet (1948);

• 10^th

  Aleksis Kivi, playwright, novelist, and poet (1834); Ivo Andric, novelist (1892); and Harold Pinter, playwright (1930);

“The man that isn’t jolly after drinking is just a driveling idiot, to my thinking.” -Euripides

• 11^th

  Steen Steensen Blicher, poet and short-story writer (1782); François Mauriac, novelist, poet, and playwright (1885); and Elmore Leonard, crime fiction writer (1925);

• 12^th

  George Washington Cable, novelist and short story writer (1844); Maurice Donnay, playwright (1859); Eugenio Montale, poet and translator (1896); Ann Lane Petry, novelist, short story writer, children’s author (1908); Alice Childress, playwright and novelist (1920); Charles Gordon, playwright (1925); Robert Coles, author (1929); and William J[ames] Raspberry, syndicated newspaper columnist (1935);

• 13^th

  Conrad Richter, novelist (1890); Arna Bontemps, poet, novelist, children’s author, and librarian (1902); and Frank Gilroy, playwright and screenwriter (1925);

• 14^th

  Masaoka Shiki, haiku and tanka poet and diarist (1867); Katherine Mansfield, short story writer (1888); and e(dward) e(stlin) cummings, poet and playwright (1894); and

• 15^th – Virgil, poet (79 B.C.); Helen Hunt Jackson, novelist (1830); Sir P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, novelist (1881); C[harles] P[ercy] Snow, novelist (1905); John Kenneth Galbraith, political writer (1908); Arthur Schlesinger Jr., historian and biographer (1917); Mario Puzo, author (1921); Italo Calvino, novelist (1923); and Evan Hunter -aka- Ed McBain, crime writer (1926).

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“There is an ancient Celtic axiom that says, ‘Good People Drink Good Beer.’ Which is true, then as it is now”. - Hunter S. Thompson

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Saúde!

Thanks for reading,