Category: people

“The ‘mad, bad, and dangerous to know’ Lord Byron was thought of as the embodiment of the ethereal poet, but he actually had a ‘morbid propensity to fatten’. Like today’s celebrities, he worked hard to maintain his figure. At Cambridge University, his horror of being fat led to a shockingly strict diet” of biscuits and soda water.

“N’dour, 52, announced at a concert at the end of November that he had put performing on hold and formed his own political movement, Fekke ma ci bolle (‘I am involved’ in the Wolof language).”

“[The] ebullient and controversial director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco since 2006,” who was known, and sometimes criticized, for his “flamboyant approach to audience building and institutional growth” by means of blockbuster exhibitions, “died Friday at his San Francisco home of cancer.”

“I emerged … with an unshakable faith that putting words on paper is a form of action not only equally potent as placing a bomb, but possibly even more so. Because once the explosion is gone, all you’re left with is the devastation. Words in someone else’s head will be there for a long time.”

“[It’s] an entity that exists so far only in cyberspace and that the actress is trying to get erected in brick and mortar on a site adjacent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C.”

“[He] was known for his bright, cartoon-like drawings and 3-D constructions and for applying his easily recognizable designs to everyday objects. His playful pastel images adorned everything from Volkswagen cars to Rosenthal china, Lufthansa jets and German postage stamps.”

“[The] American-born singer, teacher and curator of Yiddish music … was a pioneer in the effort to keep the embers of that language smoldering for newer generations.”

Emin – whose support for the Conservatives has been described as nothing short of “criminal” by fellow artist Dinos Chapman – admitted that some people had been “really abusive” about her political preferences.

“Joy was the word that resurfaced again and again when musicians and friends remembered Sam Rivers, a saxophonist, flutist and composer whose long list of credits included work with the legendary Miles Davis … Dizzy Gillespie and Cecil Taylor [as well as] blues musicians T-Bone Walker and John Lee Hooker.”

“The lines and curves of Yanagi’s designs were as distinctly Japanese as they were universal, winning him fans – and a place in homes not only in Japan but around the world – for his teapots, ceramic cups and even the lowly whisk.”