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Claire Bretécher
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
There is also version.
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Katharina Schratt
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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Born 16 April 1935 in Limlingerode, Thüringen
Died 5 May 2013 in Heide, Schleswig-Holstein
German author and lyric poet
85th birthday on April 16, 2020
Sarah Kirsch, considered in 1989 “die bedeutendste Lyrikerin der Gegenwart” (the most important lyric poet of today),[1] gained initial prominence in the 1960’s as one of a group of young poets in the German Democratic Republic who challenged the official ideology that literature should primarily reflect the values and achievements of socialist society. Her precisely observed imagery, grounded in nature and everyday occurrences, her often surprising associations, use of colloquial expressions and subtle grammatical structures and her sense of rhythm made her an original voice and caused one critic to speak of her unique “Sarah-Sound.”[2] At the same time her willingness to express intimate themes of love, resignation and sadness caused some GDR critics to distance themselves from her, while others – as well as readers in the West – were fascinated by her ability to elicit political and universal meanings through such personal verse. Her early prose and journalistic writing…read more
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Marie Tussaud
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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Hannie Schaft
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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Karoline Schulze–Kummerfeld
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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born September 18, 1905 in Stockholm, Sweden
died April 15, 1990 in New York City, United States
Swedish-American film actress
35th anniversary of her death on April 15, 2025
120th birthday on September 18, 2025
The story of how Greta Gustafsson, a working-class girl with an irrepressible passion for the theater, became first Greta Garbo, then Garbo, and finally the Goddess, is the story of a great career. It is also the story of self-destruction, and of mythical fiction.
She was discovered by Mauritz Stiller. He became her mentor and trainer, “coaxing out of her everything he suspected was in her”: “I am merciless with her. And when she has reduced herself to the maximum degree possible, her acting performance is at its greatest.”
Garbo made her Hollywood debut two years later. Even when she was demonstrably distracted, exhausted or bored, and even when she chose to keep her face expressionless – as, for example, in the famous final scene of Queen Christina – she was able to evoke the most diverse and intense emotions and interpretations in the audience. Garbo’s unhurried approach to acting – fascinatingly economical, and utterly un-American – and the studio’s stylization of her as…read more
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Emmy Noether
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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Anna Ancher
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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born on November 12, 1648 in San Miguel Nepantla/ Mexico
died April 17, 1695 in Mexico City
Mexican nun, poet, polymath
375th birthday on November 12, 2023
Juana, illegitimate child of a Creole, learned to read at the age of three and, with an insatiable thirst for knowledge, studied scholarly works of philosophy, astronomy and medicine.
At the age of 16, she came to the court of the Spanish vicereine, who admired and encouraged the beautiful, gifted girl. Juana wrote countless poems and plays, mostly commissioned, for court and church. Graceful, imaginative verses flowed effortlessly from her pen.
What led Juana to suddenly give up her glamorous life at court four years later to become a nun? Since she had neither money nor family, nor the inclination to marry, she chose the security and community of a Hieronymite convent in order to devote herself entirely to her studies. The most important and difficult of her poems, El Sueño (The Dream), was completed in 1685 and is a masterful demonstration of the breadth of the knowledge she acquired over the years.
Life in the convent was very pleasant. Juana had a spacious apartment,…read more
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Karen Blixen
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
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Lucrezia Borgia
This biography is not yet available in English.
You can find the German version here.
