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It is 125 years today since Yasunari Kawabata was born.
Yasunari Kawabata was a Japanese novelist and short story writer born in Osaka. He came from an educated, wealthy family, but he lost his parents at an early age and his only sibling, a sister, died when he was nine years old. These childhood traumas came to inform his writing. After growing up with his maternal grandfather in the countryside, Kawabata read English and Japanese literature at...
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It is 113 years today since Victor Canning was born.
Victor Canning was a British author of humorous adventure stories and thrillers. He was born in Plymouth, Devon. At the outbreak of the First World War, while his father was doing his military service, he went with his mother and siblings to live with his uncle in Calstock, a few miles north of Plymouth. This was where Canning fell in love with the English countryside, which features prominently...
Sample of Authors
Perse, Saint-John
1887 - 1975
The French poet Saint-John Perse was born Marie-René Alexis Saint-Léger, the only son of five children born to a wealthy f...
Further reading
Heyer, Georgette
1902 - 1974
Georgette Heyer was born in Wimbledon, Surrey, to a wealthy family. She befriended Joanna Cannan and Carola Oman while she...
Further reading
Zola, Émile
1840 - 1902
French author, born in Paris and raised in Aix-en-Provence. His father, who was Italian and a successful site engineer,...
Further reading
Morante, Elsa
1912 - 1985
The Italian author Elsa Morante was born in Rome, where she grew up in the poor working-class district of Testaccio. She...
Further reading