"Biographies" (95)
Theodore Dreiser is a famous American writer and publicist. He was born in 1871 in the state of Indiana. He was the 12th child in the family. His mother came from the family of Czech immigrants and his father came to America from Germany and was a factory worker. Since his early childhood the boy knew what poverty was. In 1887 he moved to Chicago where he worked in restaurants washing dishes and cleaning. For a short period of time he studied at the University of Indiana. Working at the newspaper "Chicago Daily Globe" he started to publish his first sketches and stories.
His first novel "Sister Carrie" is a story about real life. One of his elder sisters, Emma, was the main character of the novel. The story about the girl, who became an actress at a high price of losing her best human qualities was considered to be immoral by critics. The feature of American literature that struck Dreiser most of all was the contradiction between the real life and the life described in literary works. That is why Dreiser's works always depicted the life of common people, the cruelty of their existence in American society. His novel "An American Tragedy" was the sign of critical realism in the American literature of the 20th century. In his three novels "The Financier", "The Titan", and "The Stoic" Dreiser described the life of financier Cauperwood. He is not only a cruel American businessman, a person without "soul and heart", but a very tragic figure. Having an extraordinary personality, he can't fully realize himself in American society. His love of arts, his unusual talent stay deep inside him.
In 1928 Dreiser came to Russia, as he was always interested in the country and especially its literature. The works of Tolstoy and Dostoyevskyi influenced his creative work. Till nowadays Dreiser remains the largest master of realistic American literature of the 20th century.
Almost everybody dreams about being famous sport star or a great actor. But does everybody know how hard it is to have such kind of job?
In my opinion being famous is very difficult and people who are famous deserve all the money they earn. A star should be polite and kind because he or she is an example to be followed for many young people. Famous people work hard long hours every day and do their best for their fans. Also I think that famous people don't have private lives, they don't see their relatives and friends often. A lot of stars lose themselves and pretend a lot. They are who their fans want them to be.
It is not always easy to be famous. Even for the famous, beautiful princess like Diana, life was certainly very difficult at times.
She was born on the first of July in 1961 in Norfolk, England. Her parents divorced when she was a little girl. Diana studied at a boarding school in Kent, and then in Switzerland. She was just twenty years old when she married Prince Charles, and from that moment millions of people around the world watched every move she made.
She was kind and helpful; Diana helped poor, homeless and sick people, so her nickname was "the people's princess". But Diana's life wasn't as happy as it seemed to be – she and Prince Charles had problems with their marriage and they finally divorced in 1996. Diana continued traveling round the world and helping people, photographers still followed her everywhere - even on that terrible night in Paris when Diana's young life ended. She died on the thirty-first of August in 1997. She was only 36 years old.
As for me, I agree that being famous sounds nice, but it is very hard. I guess I don't want to be really famous. Yes, famous people have everything – money, popularity and fame, but stars lose much more – their private lives and their
The Life of a Great Mathematician. (Nina Karlovna Bari)
Written by buxdu.uzNina Karlovna Bari is a great example of a woman who contributed to mathematics. Nina Bari provided the advancement of the theory of trigonometry. She dedicated her life to solving theory functions. Once Bari solved many questions regarding trigonometric series, she shared her findings with many students and colleagues through teaching, lecturing, and giving seminars.
On November 19, 1901, Nina Karlovna Bari was born in Moscow, Russia. She was a daughter to Doctor Karl Adolfovich and Olga Eduardovna Bari. Nothing is recorded about Nina's childhood and very little is known about her high school years. She attended a private high school for girls called L. O. Vyazemska's. When she was studying in high school she showed a great potential in mathematics. By 1918 she has passed the high school graduation examination that was usually given for high school boys. (Soublis)
Once she finished high school she attended Moscow State University. Originally, Moscow State was a university "exclusively for men." (Campbell and Grinstein) However, after the Revolution, Moscow State University became available for men and women alike. Nina Bari was the first woman to enroll in it.
During her time at Moscow State University, she was involved with a group called the "Luzitania." (Soublis) The group was named after its leader Nikolai Nikolaevich Luzin. Luzin worked at Moscow State University as Professor of Pure Mathematics. Luzin's area of specialty was the foundation of mathematics and measure theory. While at Moscow State, he formed a research group, which many of the students labeled "Luzitania." The group included many impressive students that included Aleksandrov, Suslin, Menshov, Khinchin, Urysohn, Kolmogorov, and also Bari. This group mainly studied function theory because that was all Luzin preferred. While Bari was a member of the Luzitania, she discovered the uniqueness of the trigonometric series. This was the birth to her life's quest. She spent the rest of her life focused on trigonometric series. (O'Connor and Robertson)
Since Bari finished college early in 1921, she was the first woman to graduate from Moscow State University. After college, Bari went into teaching. From 1921-1925, Nina Bari taught at the Moscow Forestry Institute. Still wanting more, Bari taught at the Sverdlov Communist Institute for one year and the Moscow Polytechnic Institute for two years while maintaining her original job at Moscow Forestry Institute. A short while after, Moscow State University opened a Research Institute of Mathematics and Mechanics. Bari kept teaching, but she also became one of the first researchers at Moscow State University. She focused on the analysis of various trigonometric series. The second year after she graduated, she presented the findings of her research to the Moscow Mathematical Society. She again was the first woman to give a presentation to the Moscow Mathematical Society. (Campbell and Grinstein pg 6-7)
Keeping with her original love for trigonometric series, Bari based her thesis topic on the theory of trigonometric series. By 1926, Bari defended her thesis, which revealed many solutions to complicated problems of the trigonometric series. From this great achievement, she received the Glavnauk Prize. "Glavnauk was the acronym for the Central Administration of Scientific, Scholarly, Artistic and Museum Institutions, 1922-1930." (Campbell and Grinstein pg7) After obtaining her Ph.D, Nina Bari traveled throughout the world attending seminars and lectures. Through many lectures, seminars, and publications of her own work, Bari created a reputation as a great mathematician. Bari was the leading mathematician in the theory of functions of a real variable and also received the degree of Doctor of the Physical-Mathematical Sciences. By 1950, Bari kept her position as a full professor at Moscow State University. However, she still gave lectures and attended some mathematical events such as the International Congress of Mathematicians in Edinburgh and presented on the state of the theory of trigonometric series at the Third All-Union Congress in Moscow. (Campbell and Grinstein pg 8)
Though her love for the theory of functions remained strong, Nina had other interests as well such as art, music, and ballet. But Bari's main interest would be her love for the sport of hiking. She enjoyed climbing in the mountains with her husband, Viktor Vladmirovich Nemytski, who shared both the love of mathematics and hiking in the mountains. (O'Connor and Robertson) Viktor, also a mathematician, was a Moscow State University graduate. He ultimately became a professor at Moscow State University too. The Caucasus, Altai, Lamir are just some of the mountains that Viktor and Nina hiked across. (Campbell and Grinstein pg 8-9)
In 1961 on July 12, Nina Bari's life ended. Her death was reported a tragic accident where she fell in front of a train in the Moscow Metro. Her former friend and colleague, P.L. Ul'yanov, wrote:
"The ultimate death of N. K. Bari is a great loss for Soviet mathematics and a great misfortune for all who know her. The image of Bari as a lively, straightforward person with an inexhaustible reserve of cheerfulness will remain forever in the hearts of all who knew her. (Campbell and Grinstein pg 9)"
Nina Karlovna Bari was a woman mathematician who lived a life full of accomplishments. She dedicated her life to the theory of trigonometric series. She has studied, analyzed, and done extensive research on trigonometric series that assisted her in solving many problems that were unanswered in the early 1900s. Not only has Nina enriched her life through the dedication for mathematics, but she has also shared with many others her breakthroughs on the theory of functions. Nina Karlovna Bari, a woman mathematician, gained much respect from all mathematicians of her time and will not easily be forgotten for her remarkable work.
The English rock music band The Beatles gave the 1960s its characteristic musical flavor and had a profound influence on the course of popular music, equaled by few performers. The guitarists John Winston Lennon, Oct. 9, 1940; James Paul McCartney, June 18, 1942; and George Harrison, Feb. 25, 1943; and the drummer Ringo Starr, Richard Starkey, July 7, 1940, were all born and raised in Liverpool.
Lennon and McCartney had played together in a group called The Quarrymen. With Harrison, they formed their own group, The Silver Beatles, in 1959, and Starr joined them in 1962. As The Beatles, they developed a local following in Liverpool clubs, and their first recordings, "Love Me Do" (1962) and "Please Please Me" (1963), quickly made them Britain's top rock group. Their early music was influenced by the American rock singers Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley, but they infused a hackneyed musical form with freshness, vitality, and wit. The release of "I Want to Hold Your Hand" in 1964 marked the beginning of the phenomenon known as "Beatlemania" in the United States. The Beatles' first U.S. tour aroused a universal mob adulation. Their concerts were scenes of mass worship, and their records sold in the millions.
Their first film, the innovative A Hard Day's Night (1964), was received enthusiastically by a wide audience that included many who had never before listened to rock music. Composing their own material (Lennon and McCartney were the major creative forces),The Beatles established the precedent for other rock groups to play their own music. Experimenting with new musical forms, they produced an extraordinary variety of songs: the childishly simple "Yellow Submarine"; the bitter social commentary of "Eleanor Rigby"; parodies of earlier pop styles; new electronic sounds; and compositions that were scored for cellos, violins, trumpets, and sitars, as well as for conventional guitars and drums. Some enthusiasts cite the albums Rubber Soul (1965) and Revolver (1966) as the apex of Beatle art, although Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967), perhaps the first rock album designed thematically as a single musical entity, is more generally considered their triumph.
The group disbanded in 1970, after the release of their final album, Let It Be, to pursue individual careers. On Dec. 8, 1980, John Lennon was fatally shot in New York City. In 1991, Paul McCartney's classical composition Liverpool Oratorio was performed to some acclaim in Britain and the United States.
Taras Shevchenko is a great Ukrainian poet. He is the founder of the modern Ukrainian literary language. Shevchenko was born in the family of a serf in the village of Moryntsy in 1814. Young Taras became an orphan very early. He was a shepherd, a labourer to a priest and, when he was fourteen, his master took him into the manor house as a boy-servant — "kozachok". In 1829 Shevchenko's master moved to Vilno and then — to St Petersburg. He took his boy-servant with him, too. Still in his early childhood Shevchenko was very fond of drawing and his master decided to make a serf painter of him. For this purpose he sent Taras to study painting. The boy was so talented that several Russian artists decided to free him from slavery. Karl Brulov, the great Russian artist, painted a portrait of Vasiliy Zhukovsky and sold it for 2 500 roubles. With this money they bought out Shevchenko from his master. Later on the young painter continued his studies at the Petersburg Academy of Arts. Karl Brulov influenced Shevchenko greatly. Soon they became close friends. In 1838 Shevchenko wrote his first poems in Ukrainian. In 1840 he published his first book of poems which he named "Kobzar". His first poetical works are mainly examples of romanticism. The subject of many poems was unhappy love. He also wrote several poems about historical past of Ukraine. In these works he glorified the heroic struggle of the Ukrainian people against their oppressors and their fight for national liberation (the long poem "Gaidamaky"). In 1843 Shevchenko returned to Ukraine. He travelled a lot about the country and learned to know the heavy life of the Ukrainian serfs. In 1846 Shevchenko joined a revolutionary organisation — Cyril and Mephodiy Society, which aimed to liberate the serfs. He wrote several revolutionary poems directed against the tsarist despotism ("Dream", 1844, "The Caucasus", 1845, and his famous "Testament"). In 1847 he was arrested and exiled as a soldier to Orsk fortress in Kazakhstan. Here, being a soldier, he wrote several novels in Russian. He also painted several of his best pictures. In 1857 Shevchenko returned from the exile to St Petersburg. Here he published several of his masterpieces in which he criticised the tsarist regime and demanded liberty for serfs. In St Petersburg he made close friends with well-known Russian writers — N. Chernyshevskyi, N. Dobrolubov, N. Nekrasov and others. In 1859, when Shevchenko went to Ukraine, he was arrested and forced to return to St Petersburg — the tsarist government was afraid of the elderly poet. On the 10th of March, Shevchenko died. His death was a great loss for Ukrainian literature and liberation movement — A. Gertsen published a big article on Shevchenko's death in his magazine "Kolokol" in London. Shevchenko is the favourite author of millions of Ukrainians, a real people's poet. His works are translated into many languages.
He seems to be the all-power wizard and a cinematic magician for us. His films make us scream with laughter or shiver with horror.
The son of a computer scientist and a gifted pianist, Spielberg spent his early childhood in New Jersey and, later, in Arizona. He was eleven when he first got his dad's camera and began shooting short films about flying saucers and World War Two battles.
At the age of 13 he won a contest with his 40-minute film Escape to Nowhere. At the age of 16 he produced the movie 'Firelight' and it was shown at the local cinema.
But a real success came in 1975, when Spielberg created 'Jaws'. That little fish tale became the biggest hit of its time. This movie opened up the doors for Spielberg to work on many more great projects. And he went on to shake Hollywood with 'Close Encounters', 'Raiders of the Lost Ark', 'ET', and 'Jurassic Park'.
Today, Spielberg is one of the most financially successful filmmakers ever. But his talents aren't limited to the movie set. Spielberg has also proved to be one of Hollywood's most nimble entrepreneurs. His business empire includes video games, toys and even restaurants.
But what is his source of inspiration? He draws it from his 7 children (two of them are adopted). Spielberg likes to spend time with his children. His house resembles a large playground — he keeps there 2 parrots, several snakes, and a fish tank. Ask him where he gets his ideas and he shrugs. "The process for me is mostly intuitive," he says. "There are movies I feel that I need to make, for a variety of reasons, for personal reasons, for reasons that I want to have fun, that the subject matter is cool, that I think my kids will like it."
He was a philosopher. He was 70 years old, baldheaded, with an absurd pug nose and an unkempt beard. He wore nothing but a cloak — no shoes, no shirt; no underwear. He had the merriest of dispositions, no one had ever seen him angry or unkind. He was very brave: he had served as a foot soldier in four battles. He was a philosopher. He did nothing but talk — talk to anyone who would listen to him, in the streets and marketplaces, discussing philosophy with students or sailors, or tradesmen, questioning men about what they believed in and why, always why – and how they could prove it. He met every answer with a new question, and each answer after that with another question.
Some Athenians called him a dangerous idler' who did nothing but engage "in irony and jest on mankind." The Oracle at Delphi had called him the wisest man alive, but Socrates, with his cool skepticism, said that his wisdom lay only in this: that unlike other men, he knew how great was his ignorance . He refused to accept a penny for teaching. Indeed, he was sure he could never teach anyone anything; he said he tried to teach men how to think. His enemies hated him. They said he made young minds doubt, if not mock everything, and it was undermining respect for democracy itself . How did he defend himself? "I shall not change my conduct even if I must die a hundred deaths. Death does not matter, what matters is that I should do no wrong," he said. They voted him guilty. The prosecutor demanded the death penalty. Under the law of Athens it was now for the defendant to propose an alternative. Socrates could suggest that he be exiled, but he did not. His friends wanted to smuggle him out of prison but he refused to escape. When his wife Xantippe broke into hysterics in the death cell, he sent her and his sons away. He spent his last hours discussing the problems that had always intrigued him: good and evil. His mind was never idle. When his disciples saw him drink the cup of poison with dignity they wept.
The man is gone but the "Socratic" method of questioning and teaching has always been respected since then
Sergey Pavlovich Korolev was the Founder of Practical Cosmonautics. Academician Korolev is a famous scientist and a founder of practical cosmonautics. He was the chief constructor of the first Earth sputniks and spaceships.
Korolev was born in 1906 in the small Ukrainian town of Zhitomir into a family of teachers. He spent his childhood with his grandparents in the town of Nezhin where he studied at home with a teacher. He was interested in maths, literature and he read a great deal.
In 1923 Sergey Korolev joined a Glider Pilots' Club where he learned to construct gliders and to fly them.In 1925 Korolev entered the Kiev Polytechnical Institute where he studied aviation and maths, but in the evening he had to work for money.
After two years in Kiev Korolev came to Moscow and entered the Moscow Higher Technical School. During the Great Patriotic War he constructed a jet engine for aeroplanes and rockets. The first man-made sputnik of the Earth was a result of hard work of hard work of scientist Korolev.
Sergey Korolev died in 1966.
For his brilliant work in the name of science and progress he was awarded two Gold Stars of the Hero of Socialist Labour. People will always remember the names of those who opened a new era in the conquest of outer space, and the name of Korolev is one of them.
Rudyard Kipling is one of the outstanding British writers. He was born in 1865 in the family of an Englishman in India. He got his education in England but returned to India in 1882. There he spent 6 years working in colonial English press. There he published his first literary works. In 1890 he published his first novel "The Light that Failed", which brought him fame. He was one of the most popular writers of his time. During his life he visited South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. "Plain Tales from the Plain Hills", "Barrack Room Ballads", "Naulakka" enjoyed great popularity. During the years of Anglo-Boer War Kipling used to visit the English Army. His novel "Kim" was written under the impressions of the War. In October 1902 his "Just so Stories for Little Children" were published. His fairy-tales from the book were rather unusual for the British literature of that period. One can find the influence of Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" in Kipling's work. But this influence didn't prevent Kipling from creating absolutely new, unusual fairy-tales. The unusual effect of his tales is reached by the rhythm and the music of words. Those who were lucky to listen to Kipling reading his fairy-tales noted that they always sounded truthful. Besides, not only children but even adults were very fond of "Just so Stories". Together with "The Jungle Book" it still enjoys great popularity. Every year the children in "Kipling Society" write continuation to his fairy-tales. In 1907 Kipling was awarded the Nobel Prize.
Robert Burns is the national poet of Scotland. In his poems Burns sang the beauty and the glory of his native land.
Burns was born in Alloway, near Ayr, on 25 of January 1759. His father, a small farmer, was a hard-working man. When Robert was 6, he was sent to a school at Alloway Miln. Robert and his brother Gilbert were given a good knowledge of English. They progressed rapidly in reading and writing.
For some years Burns worked on the family field, plugging and reaping. The combination of hard physical labour and poor food in his youth that brought about the first symptoms of the heart disease which troubled him for much of his life and from which he died.
Burns wrote his first poem at the age of 14 for a girl who worked with him in the fields. After father's death he immigrated to Jamaica. His most creative years were probably 1785 and 1786. During this period Burns wrote his most brilliant poems. Burns published his poems in August 1786. The success was great.
Soon, in April 1787, a second edition of his poems appeared in Edinburgh; 3000 copies were printed - a very large number for those times!
Now Burns had the opportunity to see more of his native land which he so dearly loved. He visited some historic places, which made a great impression on him.
During the last 5 years of his life Burns wrote some of his best poems and songs. After a short illness he died on 21 July 1796.
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One of my favourite artists is Rembrant. He is the greatest Dutch master, a supreme genius in the history of art. To this day the art of Rembrant remains one of the most profound witnesses of the progress of the soul in it's earthly pilgrimage towards higher destiny. The son of a prosperous miller, Rembrant was born in Leidenin 1608. He studied at Leiden University, but his real vocation was painting. His rapid success prompted him to move to the Amsterdam in 1631.
In 1632 Rembrant bought a splendid house, started a collection of paintings and rarities.
The universal artist dealt with many world subjects. Rembrant created a number of portraits and some group portraits which were traditional to the Dutch art. The best of them are "Anatomy lesson of Dr. Tulp" and "The Night Watch."
In 1655 Rembrant found himself in the midst of financial troubles. At that period he painted "The Polish Rider", which was an allegory of the man's earthly journey.
Probably in 1669, the year of his own death, Rembrant painted his famous "Return of the Prodigal Son", which stands at the ultimate peak of Cristian spirituality, illuminating the relationship of the self to the eternity.
The biblical theme was very important to Rembrant. He painted "Artakserks, Oman and Eshpir", "The Saint Family".
Rembrant was not understood when he was alive. He died in poverty. But it is the spirituality of his art that distinguishes Rembrant from his Dutch contemporaries making him the greatest artist of the world.
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria) was born on the 24 May 1819. Queen Victoria was a strong queen. You can see her monument in front of the Buckingham Palace. Queen Victoria ascended the throne in 1837 and reigned until her death in 1901. She ruled for the longest period in the English history, for 64 years. Victoria married a German, Prince Albert, but he died at the age of 42 in 1861. That was a great tragedy for Queen Victoria. She left London and never lived in the city where she had been so happy with her husband and nine children (5 daughters and 4 sons). But there are places in London that reminds us of their love. One of them is the Royal Albert Hall - a very large concert hall where the best musicians of the world perform classical music. In front of the Albert Hall there is a monument to Prince Albert built by Queen Victoria. Another place is the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) with its rich collections of paintings and other works of art. The family life of Queen Victoria touched people's hearts. But this is not only reason why Queen Victoria became very popular. During her reign Britain became a rich industrial country with a developed trade, an empire with a lot of colonies.
Though Victoria ascended the throne at a time when the United Kingdom was already an established constitutional monarchy in which the king or queen held few political powers, she still served as a very important symbolic figure of her time. The Victorian era represented the height of the Industrial Revolution, a period of significant social, economic, and technological progress in the United Kingdom. Victoria's reign was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire; during this period it reached its zenith, becoming the foremost global power of the time.
P. Kapitsa, an outstanding Soviet physicist, was born in Kronstadt in the family of a general in 1894. He graduated from the Petrograd Polytechnic Institute in 1919. Kapitsa took a great interest in physics while still at the institute.
In 1921 Kapitsa was sent to England on Lenin's instructions to renew scientific contacts. He worked in the famous Cavendish Laboratory headed by Rutherford. Kapitsa was elected a member of the Royal Sociaty for his outstanding scientific work in the production of large magnetic fields.
In the middle of 1930s he organized the Institute of Physical Problems near Moscow. It was here that Kapitsa concetrated his attention on the research of superlow temperatures of liquid helium and superconductivity. He showed that helium conducted heat so well becouse it flowed with remarkable ease.
After the WW2 his scientific activity was directed to space research. In 1950s Kapitsa also turned his attention to ball lightning – a phenomenon in which plasma exists for a much longer period than it was supposed.
Kapitsa was awarded a Nobel Prize for his great contribution to world science in 1978. Today there are few names in the history of phisics that can be placed next to his.
Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin on October 16, 1854. His father was a famous Irish surgeon. His mother was well known in Dublin as a writer of verse and prose.At school, and later at Oxford, Oscar displayed gift for art and the humanities.While at the university, Wilde became one of the most famous personalities of the day: he wore his hair long, decorated his room with different beautiful things. His witty sayings were well known among the students.
After graduating from the university, Wilde turned his attention to writing, travelling and lecturing.
Oscar Wilde earned the reputation of being the leader of the Aesthetic Movement and an apostle of beauty.
His most famous works appeared over the next ten years. The most popular are "The Happy Prince and Other Tales", "The Picture of Dorian Gray", and his comedies "Lady Windermere's Fan", "An Ideal Husband", "The Importance of Being Earnest".Wilde also wrote poems, essays, reviews, letters. He attracted the attention of his audiences by the brilliance of his conversation, his knowledge, and the force of his personality.
In his works, especially in his tales, he glorifies beauty, and not only the beauty of nature or artificial beauty, but the beauty of devoted love. He admires unselfishness, kindness and generosity ("The Happy Prince", "The Nightingale and the Rose") and despises egoism and greed ("The Selfish Giant", "The Devoted Friend"). The theme of most of his works, even of his tales, is quite realistic. He shows the contrast between wealth and poverty. His own sympathy for poor, labouring people is quite evident.
At the height of his popularity and success, tragedy struck. He was accused of immorality and sentenced to two years' imprisonment. When released from prison in 1897, he lived mainly on the Continent, settling later in Paris. In 1898 he published his poem "Ballad of Reading Gaol". He died in Paris 1900.
