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From today's featured article

Yuma, Colorado, served as an inspiration for Haruf's small-town settings.

Alan Kent Haruf (1943–2014) was an American writer born and raised in Colorado. He wrote six novels and several short stories set on the High Plains. As a young man Haruf enrolled in the Peace Corps in lieu of military service before receiving a master's degree from the University of Iowa. He initially struggled to establish a career as a writer. Haruf spent years teaching English at a high school and at universities. His writing was first published in 1984 when he was 41. Commercial success eluded him until the publication of Plainsong in 1999, which became a bestseller. Throughout Haruf's career, critics praised his spare and elegant prose, authentic portrayals of rural life, and attention to the beauty found in ordinary things, although he was occasionally criticized for redundancy. A Colorado magazine, 5280, wrote that Haruf is "widely considered Colorado's finest novelist", and the Dublin Review of Books called his work "both uniquely American and profoundly universal". (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Marie Engle

... that Marie Engle (pictured) was one of the earliest operatic singers to be recorded on rare Bettini cylinders?
... that the Enrei Onodachi Memorial Festival can last for only 15 seconds?
... that The Tigress of Forlì earned its title because its protagonist was accused of being "willing to eat her young to gain power"?
... that a woman died of water intoxication after participating in a contest held by a California radio station?
... that the author of an 1887 book on British whisky distilleries didn't know how to distill whisky?
... that a wealthy councillor's house in the ancient Egyptian desert city Trimithis preserves a line from a lost tragedy by Euripides?
... that counting songs such as "Yo tenía diez perritos" were once thought to have been used as chants for curing illnesses?
... that the "nonproductivity" office software The Laffer Utilities was created as a spin-off of the adult-themed franchise Leisure Suit Larry?
... that Colleen McCullough described the television adaptation of her best-known novel as "instant vomit"?

In the news

Paul Thomas Anderson

One Battle After Another (Best Director winner Paul Thomas Anderson pictured) wins Best Film at the British Academy Film Awards.
Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, is killed by the Mexican Army.
José Jerí is removed as the president of Peru by Congress, and replaced by José María Balcázar.
American civil rights leader Jesse Jackson dies at the age of 84.

On this day

February 24: Independence Day in Estonia (1918)

Louis Thomas Villaret de Joyeuse

1711 – George Frideric Handel's Rinaldo, the first Italian-language opera written specifically for the London stage, premiered.
1809 – Napoleonic Wars: The British invasion of Martinique ended with the unconditional surrender of French admiral Louis Thomas Villaret de Joyeuse (pictured), beginning a five-year occupation of the island.
1979 – Uganda–Tanzania War: Ugandan government forces fled Masaka as the Tanzania People's Defence Force bombarded and captured the town.
1989 – United Airlines Flight 811 experienced uncontrolled decompression after leaving Honolulu International Airport, Hawaii, blowing seats out of the aircraft and killing nine passengers.

Æthelberht of Kent (d. 616)
Judah Folkman (b. 1933)
Gabriele Schnaut (b. 1951)
Leo Ornstein (d. 2002)

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Today's featured picture

The orbicular batfish (Platax orbicularis) is a species of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Ephippidae, the spadefishes and batfishes. It is native to the Indo-Pacific region, ranging from eastern Africa (including South Africa and Madagascar) eastwards to southern Japan and Australia, and in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. The species has also been recorded outside its native range in the western Atlantic Ocean. It inhabits shallow, protected coastal waters, including mangroves, coral reefs, and deeper areas with silty substrates. Juveniles typically shelter among mangrove roots and in protected lagoons. The orbicular batfish has a deep, highly compressed, round body, and adults can grow to more than 40 centimetres (16 in) in length. Larger individuals develop a slightly indented snout and a bony intraorbital protuberance. Adults are silvery grey in colour, with black vertical bars running through the eye and across the base of the pectoral fin. The dorsal and anal fins are yellowish with black margins. This orbicular batfish was photographed in the Red Sea off the coast of Egypt.

Photograph credit: Diego Delso

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