Daily Content Archive
(as of Saturday, September 12, 2015)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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danseuse
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Defining VoiceVoice is a grammatical feature that describes the relationship between the verb and the subject in a sentence. There are two main types of voice: active voice and passive voice. There is also a third type of voice that is less commonly used. What is it called? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Salman RushdieRushdie is a British-Indian novelist known for the allusive richness of his language and the wide variety of Eastern and Western characters and cultures he explores. After his 1988 novel The Satanic Verses was deemed sacrilegious, Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa, or legal ruling, sentencing him to death. Rushdie was forced into hiding, where he wrote Haroun and the Sea of Stories, a novelistic allegory against censorship. What is the fatwa's current status? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Elizabeth Barrett Elopes with Robert Browning (1846)Elizabeth Barrett's Poems, published in 1844, brought her immediate fame and became a favorite of the poet Robert Browning. The two began to correspond, fell in love, and, after a courtship kept secret from her tyrannical father, married and settled in Italy. The once frail and sickly Elizabeth grew stronger and, at age 43, gave birth to a son. Her poetic reputation rests chiefly on the love poems written during their courtship, Sonnets from the Portuguese. Who is "the Portuguese"? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Alfred A. Knopf (1892)Knopf was a leading American publisher of the 20th century who founded Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., in 1915. He emphasized translations of great contemporary European literature, at that time neglected by American publishers, and paid special attention to the printing, binding, and design of his books, earning a reputation as a purist in both content and presentation. By the time of his death, authors published by the firm had won 16 Nobel and 27 Pulitzer prizes. What was his colophon? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 Every secret of a writer's soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind is written large in his works.Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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canary in a coal mine— Something or someone who, due to sensitivity to his, her, or its surroundings, acts as an indicator and early warning of possible adverse conditions or danger. Refers to the former practice of taking caged canaries into coal mines. The birds would die if methane gas became present and thereby alert miners to the danger. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Bera Festival (Bera Utsav) (2019)Wherever there is a large body of water in Bengal, agricultural communities are likely to celebrate the Bera Festival. Holy men known as fakirs supervise the preparation of ornately decorated floats (bera means "raft" or "float" in Hindi), which are constructed in honor of Khaja Khizir, the patron saint of the waters. The centerpiece of the festival, the raft, is made out of local banana trunks that are lashed together to make a square platform. The float is then decorated with flags, flowers, and other trappings, and finally is pushed into the water to be received by Khaja Khizir. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: signatureallograph - A signature or writing done for another person. More... moniker - Originally meant a mark left by a tramp on a building or fence to indicate he/she had been there; therefore, a tramp's moniker identified him/her like a signature. More... signature block - The typed or printed name and title of a person appearing below a signature at the bottom of a letter, e-mail, etc. More... paraph - As a verb, to divide into paragraphs; the noun can mean a flourish made after a signature, especially to make it unique. More... | |