Daily Content Archive
(as of Tuesday, January 29, 2019)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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epitomize
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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End Punctuation with Quotation MarksIf a quoted sentence ends in a question mark or exclamation point that belongs to the quotation, it will appear within the quotation marks. If the question mark or exclamation point belongs to the overall sentence (that is, it isn't actually part of the quotation), where will it appear? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Pas d'ArmesPas d'Armes was a knightly chivalric phenomenon that evolved in the late 14th century and remained popular through the 15th century. It involved a knight or group of knights laying claim to a traveled spot, such as a bridge or city gate, and declaring that any other knight who wished to pass must first fight—or be disgraced. A traveling knight who was not adequately armed could be provided with weapons. If a passing knight chose not to fight, what would he leave behind as a sign of humiliation? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Edgar Allan Poe Publishes "The Raven" (1845)Like Poe's other works, "The Raven" conveys the dreamlike and often macabre forces that pervaded the author's sensibility. While his wife suffered from a protracted illness, Poe composed this poem, which became an instant sensation when it appeared in the Evening Mirror in 1845. In the poem, the speaker, who is mourning the death of his love, Lenore, is mysteriously visited by a talking raven and asks the bird a series of questions. What is the raven's one-word response to each query? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860)Chekhov was a Russian short-story writer, dramatist, and physician who earned enduring international acclaim for his stories and plays. His early works were broad humorous sketches and tales published under a pseudonym, written to support himself and his family while he studied for his medical degree in Moscow. His first full-length play, Ivanov, was produced while he was practicing as a doctor. Why was a statue of Chekhov in the town of Tomsk modeled on the perspective of a drunkard? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 Creative writers are always greater than the causes that they represent.E. M. Forster (1879-1970) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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funny feeling— An intuition or premonition about something; a sense of foreknowledge about a situation, condition, or set of circumstances. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Zora! Festival (2023)The Zora Neale Hurston Festival of the Arts and Humanities (also known as the Zora! Festival) is an eight-day, multi-disciplinary event held every year in late January in Eatonville, Florida. The Zora! Festival was launched in 1990 to showcase her life and work, as well as to celebrate her hometown and the cultural contributions of people of African descent. It features a three-day street festival of the arts, art exhibits, literary readings, and academic presentations, conferences, and lectures devoted to Hurston and African-American arts in general. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: podpod - A group of whales (or seals or dolphins), or a small flock of birds. More... boll weevil - From Old English wifel, "beetle," and boll, the pod of the cotton plant, which this beetle attacks. More... chalice - From Latin calix, "cup," and Greek kalux, "pod." More... vanilla - Once thought to be an aphrodisiac because its pod resembled the vagina; its name comes from the Spanish for "little vagina." More... | |