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The Writer's Almanac from Monday, January 15, 2007
The Writer's Almanac from Monday, January 15, 2007"Nothing is Lost" by Noel Coward, from Collected Verse, edited by Graham Payn & Martin Tickner © Graywolf Press. It was on this day in 1831 that Victor Hugo finished his novel Notre-Dame de Paris, known to us as The Hunchback of Notre Dame. In this epic Gothic novel, Quasimodo, a grotesque, hunchbacked bell ringer, falls in love with a gypsy street dancer named Esmeralda. While the novel was being written, Hugo was asked to compose a poem in honor of Louis-Philippe, France's first constitutional king, who had been brought to power by the July Revolution. Because of the distraction, Victor Hugo had to keep asking his publishers for deadline extensions for The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Once he finally sat down to write it, he finished it in only four months. It's the birthday of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, born in Besançon in the east of France (1809), seven years after Victor Hugo was born in the same town. Proudhon was a socialist journalist, and in 1840 he wrote the pamphlet "What Is Property?" In it, Proudhon said, "Property is theft." It's the birthday of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., born in Atlanta (1929). It was 1955, early in King's new tenure as pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on one of that city's busses. King was elected to lead the Montgomery Improvement Association, which was formed with the intention of boycotting the transit system. He was young — only 26 — and he knew his family connections and professional standing would help him find another pastorate should the boycott fail, so he accepted. In his first speech to the group as its president of that organization, King said: "We have no alternative but to protest. For many years we have shown an amazing patience. We have sometimes given our white brothers the feeling that we liked the way we were being treated. But we come here tonight to be saved from that patience that makes us patient with anything less than freedom and justice." The boycott worked, and King saw the opportunity for more change. He formed the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which provided him a national platform. For the next 13 years, King worked to peacefully end segregation. In 1963, he joined other civil rights leaders in the March on Washington — that's where he gave his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. It was on this day in 1622 that the playwright Moliére was baptized in Paris. Born Jean-Baptiste Poquelin to wealthy parents — his father was the royal upholsterer — Moliére attended school at the well-respected College de Clermont and studied law at Orleans. He was expected to follow in his father's footsteps, but when he was 21, he became involved with a theatrical family, the Béjarts. He joined them and others to produce and play comedy as a company under the name of the Illustre Théâtre. He went on to become the father of French comedic theater. His plays include Tartuffe (1664), Le Misanthrope (1666), and Le Malade Imaginaire (1673). Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.® Share The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor Attach this Writer's Almanac Pop Socketonto the back of your phone to remind you to "keep in touch" with the show daily by checking your podcast app! If you are a paid subscriber to The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor, thank you! Your financial support is used to maintain these newsletters, websites, and archive. If you’re not yet a paid subscriber and would like to become one, support can be made through our garrisonkeillor.com store, by check to Prairie Home Productions, P.O. Box 2090, Minneapolis, MN 55402, or by clicking the SUBSCRIBE button. This financial support is not tax deductible.
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