Thought of the Day

Thought of the Day is where you’ll find my little snippets of daily knowledge, historical happenings and newsworthy notes; plus of course the inevitable ‘too good not to add them’ quotes.

I’ve linked them to literary quotes and the books or authors they came from. There’s no rhyme nor reason to them, if it catches my eye then it’s likely to be here, and if you know of an upcoming important happening, or historical even that we should feature on our literary calendar, let us know at;

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“Fate is like a strange, unpopular restaurant filled with odd little waiters who bring you things you never asked for and don’t always like.”

born February 28, 1970

Daniel Handler  is an American writer and journalist. He is best known for his work under the pen name Lemony Snicket, having published children’s series A Series of Unfortunate Events and All the Wrong Questions under this pseudonym. He has also published adult novels under his real name; his first book The Basic Eight was rejected by many publishers for its dark subject matter. His most recent book is We Are Pirates. Handler has also played the accordion in several bands.

A Series of Unfortunate Events US
A Series of Unfortunate Events UK

“All war is a symptom of man’s failure as a thinking animal.”

February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968

John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American author of twenty-seven books, including sixteen novels, six non-fiction books, and five collections of short stories. He is widely known for the comic novels Tortilla Flat and Cannery Row,  East of Eden, and the novellas Of Mice and Men and The Red Pony. The Pulitzer Prize-winning The Grapes of Wrath, widely attributed to be part of the American literary canon, is considered Steinbeck’s masterpiece. In the first 75 years since it was published, it sold 14 million copies

Of Mice and Men US
Of Mice and Men UK

“Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.”

26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885

Victor Marie Hugo  was a French poet, novelist, and dramatist of the Romantic movement. He is considered one of the greatest and best-known French writers. In France, Hugo’s literary fame comes first from his poetry and then from his novels and his dramatic achievements.

Les Misérables US
Les Misérables UK

“We can destroy what we have written, but we cannot unwrite it.”

25 February 1917 – 22 November 1993

John Anthony Burgess Wilson, who published under the pen name Anthony Burgess – was an English writer and composer. From relatively modest beginnings in a Catholic family in Manchester, he eventually became one of the best known English literary figures of the latter half of the twentieth century.

 A Clockwork Orange US
 A Clockwork Orange UK

“He who helped you when you were in trouble ought not afterwards be despised by you”

24 February 1786 – 16 December 1859

Wilhelm Carl Grimm  was a German author, the younger of the Brothers Grimm.

Grimm Tales US
Grimm Tales UK

“Families are great sources of comedy because they are about people trapped together. Only the parents chose to be there and the rest of you are stuck with these people that you might not necessarily like”

born 23 February 1955

Francesca Isabella Simon  is a British American author living in London, who is mostly known for writing the popular Horrid Henry series of children’s books..

Horrid Henry US
Horrid Henry UK

“No one says a novel has to be one thing. It can be anything it wants to be, a vaudeville show, the six o’clock news, the mumblings of wild men saddled by demons.”

born February 22, 1938

Ishmael Scott Reed  is an American poet, novelist, essayist, songwriter, playwright, editor and publisher, who is known for his satirical works challenging American political culture, and highlighting political and cultural oppression.

Mumbo Jumbo US
Mumbo Jumbo UK

“To give another person the benefit of the doubt was about as difficult an everyday task as anyone faced.”

born February 21, 1977

Owen King like his famous parents Stephen King and Tabitha King, this Maine native had a successful career as a writer. Eight years after publishing the acclaimed work We’re All in This Together: A Novella and Stories, he penned his first novel, Double Feature.

Double Feature US
Double Feature UK

“That which you believe becomes your world.”

February 20, 1926 – June 23, 2013

Richard Burton Matheson  was an American author and screenwriter, primarily in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres. He is best known as the author of I Am Legend. Matheson also wrote 16 television episodes of The Twilight Zone for Rod Serling, including “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” and “Steel”.

I Am Legend US
I Am Legend UK

“There are wounds that never show on the body that are deeper and more hurtful than anything that bleeds.”

born February 19, 1963

Laurell Kaye Hamilton  is an American fantasy and romance writer. She is best known as the author of two series of stories. Her New York Times-bestselling Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series and her Merry Gentry series.

Guilty Pleasures US
Guilty Pleasures UK

“You learn to write by writing, and by reading and thinking about how writers have created their characters and invented their stories. If you are not a reader, don’t even think about being a writer.”

born February 18, 1936

Jean Marie Auel is an American writer. She is best known for her Earth’s Children books, a series of novels set in prehistoric Europe that explores interactions of Cro-Magnon people with Neanderthals. As of 2010 her books have sold more than 45 million copies worldwide

Earth’s Children US
Earth’s Children UK

“Suicide seemed to me the greatest kind of freedom, a release from everything, from a life that had been ruined a long time ago.”

born 17 February 1988

Natascha Maria Kampusch  is an Austrian woman notable for her abduction at the age of 10 on 2 March 1998. Kampusch was held in a secret cellar by her kidnapper Wolfgang Přiklopil for more than eight years, until she escaped on 23 August 2006. She penned her memoirs of her time in captivity calling the book 3,096 Days.

3,096 Days US
3,096 Days UK

“The funny thing about stop signs is that they’re also start signs.”

born February 16, 1973

Maureen Johnson  is an American author of young adult fiction. She has published ten young adult novels to date, including the Shades of London series and the Suite Scarlett series.

13 Little Blue Envelopes US
13 Little Blue Envelopes UK

“Writing is not a profession, occupation or job; it is not a way of life: it is a comprehensive response to life.”

February 15, 1937 – September 7, 2008

Gregory Mcdonald was an American mystery writer best known for his creation of the character Irwin Maurice Fletcher, an investigative reporter who preferred the nickname “Fletch.” Two of the Fletch books earned Edgar Awards from the Mystery Writers of America: Fletch was named Best First Novel in 1975, and Confess, Fletch won for Best Paperback Original in 1977. This is the only time a novel and its sequel won back-to-back Edgars.

Fletch US
Fletch UK

“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.”

14 February 1818 – February 20, 1895

Frederick Douglass was an African-American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, he became a national leader of the abolitionist movement from Massachusetts and New York, gaining note for his dazzling oratory and incisive antislavery writings. He stood as a living counter-example to slaveholders’ arguments that slaves lacked the intellectual capacity to function as independent American citizens. Even many Northerners at the time found it hard to believe that such a great orator had once been a slave

Narrative of the Life US
Narrative of the Life UK

““To quench my longing I bent me low
By the streams of the spirits of Peace that flow
In that magical wood in the land of sleep.” ”

13 February 1879 – 2 March 1949

Sarojini Naidu  also known by the sobriquet as The Nightingale of India, was an Indian independence activist and poet. Naidu served as the first governor of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh from 1947 to 1949; the first woman to become the governor of an Indian state. She was the second woman to become the president of the Indian National Congress in 1925 and the first Indian woman to do so

The Golden Threshold US
The Golden Threshold UK

“An American monkey, after getting drunk on brandy, would never touch it again, and thus is much wiser than most men.”

12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882

Charles Robert Darwin, was an English naturalist and geologist, best known for his contributions to evolutionary theory. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestors, and in a joint publication with Alfred Russel Wallace introduced his scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection, in which the struggle for existence has a similar effect to the artificial selection involved in selective breeding.

On the Origin of Species US
On the Origin of Species UK

“Life is like a novel. It’s filled with suspense. You have no idea what is going to happen until you turn the page.”

February 11, 1917 – January 30, 2007

Sidney Sheldon  was an American writer and producer. He came to prominence in the 1930s, first working on Broadway plays and then in motion pictures, notably writing the successful comedy The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer (1947) which earned him an Academy Award. He is the seventh best selling fiction writer of all time

If Tomorrow Comes US
If Tomorrow Comes UK

“Hungry man, reach for the book: it is a weapon.”

10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956

Eugen Bertolt Friedrich Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director of the 20th century. He made contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter through the tours undertaken by the Berliner Ensemble – the post-war theatre company operated by Brecht and his wife, long-time collaborator and actress Helene Weigel.

Life of Galileo US
Life of Galileo UK

“No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.”

born February 9, 1944

Alice Malsenior Walker is an American author and activist. She wrote the critically acclaimed novel The Color Purple (1982) for which she won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. She also wrote Meridian and The Third Life of Grange Copeland, among other works.

The Color Purple US
The Color Purple UK

“We are of opinion that instead of letting books grow mouldy behind an iron grating, far from the vulgar gaze, it is better to let them wear out by being read.”

8 February 1828 – 24 March 1905

Jules Gabriel Verne was a French novelist, poet, and playwright best known for his adventure novels and his profound influence on the literary genre of science fiction. Verne was born to bourgeois parents in the seaport of Nantes, where he was trained to follow in his father’s footsteps as a lawyer, but quit the profession early in life to write for magazines and the stage. His collaboration with the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel led to the creation of the Voyages extraordinaires, a widely popular series of scrupulously researched adventure novels including Journey to the Centre of the Earth, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and Around the World in Eighty Days.

Around The World In 80 Days US
Around The World In 80 Days UK

“Home is the nicest word there is.”

February 7, 1867 – February 10, 1957

Laura Ingalls Wilder  was an American writer known for the Little House on the Prairie series of children’s novels (1932 to 1943) based on her childhood in a settler family.

The Little House Collection US
The Little House Collection UK

“Make me immortal with a kiss.”

6 February 1564 – 30 May 1593

Christopher Marlowe, was an English playwright, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. Marlowe was the foremost Elizabethan tragedian of his day. He greatly influenced William Shakespeare, who was born in the same year as Marlowe and who rose to become the pre-eminent Elizabethan playwright after Marlowe’s mysterious early death. Marlowe’s plays are known for the use of blank verse and their overreaching protagonists.

Dr. Faustus US
Dr. Faustus UK

“Nobody owns life, but anyone who can pick up a frying pan owns death.”

February 5, 1914 – August 2, 1997

William Seward Burroughs II  was an American novelist, short story writer, satirist, essayist, painter, and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author who wrote in the paranoid fiction genre, he is considered to be “one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th century”

Naked Lunch US
Naked Lunch UK

“No woman gets an orgasm from shining the kitchen floor.”

February 4, 1921 – February 4, 2006

Betty Friedan was an American writer, activist, and feminist. A leading figure in the women’s movement in the United States, her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often credited with sparking the second wave of American feminism in the 20th century. In 1966, Friedan co-founded and was elected the first president of the National Organization for Women (NOW), which aimed to bring women “into the mainstream of American society now [in] fully equal partnership with men”.

The Feminine Mystique US
The Feminine Mystique UK

“We are always the same age inside.”

February 3, 1874 – July 27, 1946

Gertrude Stein  was an American novelist, poet, and playwright. Born in the Allegheny West neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and raised in Oakland, California, Stein moved to Paris in 1903, and made France her home for the remainder of her life. A literary innovator and a pioneer of Modernist literature, Stein’s work broke with the narrative, linear, and temporal conventions of the 19th-century.

Tender Buttons US
Tender Buttons UK

“A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.”

2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941

James Augustine Aloysius Joyce  was an Irish novelist and poet. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde, and is regarded as one of the most influential and important authors of the twentieth century.

Ulysses US

Ulysses UK

“Home is everything you can walk to.”

born February 1, 1941

Jerry Spinelli is an Award-winning author of young adult novels whose best known works include Wringer, Stargirl, and Maniac Magee. His first children’s book, Space Station Seventh Grade, was published in the early 1980s.

Stargirl US

Stargirl UK

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