Word: caligula
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Every volume was a bestseller. The tenth, Rousseau and Revolution, won a 1968 Pulitzer Prize. Yet the very qualities that helped sell his books often earned the sneers of scholars. He gave history's eccentrics (Casanova, Caligula) more than their due. He was often glib ("Voltaire + Rousseau = Diderot"). On the other hand, he was capable of aphoristic wisdom that any academician would envy ("A nation is born Stoic, dies Epicurean...
...politics at the Catholic University of America in Washington have taken a vote and come up with the "ten most villainous people in history," a collection of rotters guilty of sins even more grievous than wearing brown shoes with a blue suit. The envelope, please. In chronological order: Caligula, despotic Emperor of Rome from A.D. 37 to 41; Nero, full-time Emperor and sometime violinist who struck sour notes in Rome from 54 to 68; Attila the Hun, who led his barbaric tribe from 433 to 453; Ivan the Terrible, nogoodnik Tsar of Russia from 1547 to 1584; Catherine...
...sequel to I, Claudius? Part 2 of Caligula? No, an opera: Claudio Monteverdi's The Coronation of Poppea, first performed in 1642 in Venice. History's first great opera, Poppea is infrequently performed not because of the plot, which set a high standard of treachery and lubricity, but because of the special demands of Baroque convention, which included the casting of castrati in principal roles. Further, the musical idiom of early 17th century opera sounds strange to audiences accustomed to the ripe lyricism of Bellini, Verdi and Puccini...
BORN. To Malcolm McDowell, 37, British actor (A Clockwork Orange, Caligula), and his wife of four months, Mary Steenburgen, 27, American actress (Melvin and Howard); their first child, a daughter; in New York City. Name: Lilly Amanda. Weight...
...West views Prince Sihanouk as "a wronged man tormented by circumstances around him," he says, adding that "I see him as sort of a Caligula figure, manipulative, weak, somewhat crazy." Sihanouk accepted all proposals, and thus will remain a "false hope as long as he's alive...