Otis Spofford
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Otis Spofford
''Otis Spofford'' is a 1953 children's novel by Beverly Cleary. The story revolves around the antics of the title character, a precocious fourth-grader with a knack for getting into trouble. Otis lives with his mother, who is often absent from the household due to teaching classes at her dance school, and therefore Otis is required to entertain himself, by "stirring up a little excitement". His trademarks are his glow-in-the-dark shoelaces (one pink, one green), the rabbit's foot he keeps attached to his jacket zipper, and his particular fondness for irritating his classmate Ellen Tebbits although he never understands the reason for it. Plot summary Otis Spofford is a young boy with a propensity for causing trouble. He is an only child and he lives with his mother. One of the reasons why Otis likes to cause trouble is because he yearns to make life more exciting. Unfortunately, his behavior means that he does not have any close friends and his classmates are reluctant to form ...
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Beverly Cleary
Beverly Atlee Cleary (née Bunn; April 12, 1916March 25, 2021) was an American writer of chapter books, children's and young adult fiction. One of America's most successful authors, 91 million copies of her books have been sold worldwide since her first book was published in 1950. Some of her best known characters are Ramona Quimby and Beezus Quimby, Henry Huggins and his dog Ribsy, and Ralph S. Mouse. The majority of Cleary's books are set in the Grant Park, Portland, Oregon, Grant Park neighborhood of northeast Portland, Oregon, where she was raised, and she has been credited as one of the first authors of children's literature to figure emotional literary realism, realism in the narratives of her characters, often children in middle-class families. Her first children's book was ''Henry Huggins (novel), Henry Huggins'' after a question from a kid when Cleary was a librarian. Cleary won the 1981 National Book Award for Young People's Literature, National Book Award for ''Ram ...
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Louis Darling
Louis Darling, Jr. (April 26, 1916 – January 21, 1970) was an American illustrator, writer, and environmentalist, best known for illustrating the Henry Huggins series and other children's books written by Beverly Cleary. He and his wife Lois provided illustrations for the first edition of ''Silent Spring''. Biography Darling was born in Stamford, Connecticut, and would live in Connecticut for most of his life. He attended the Grand Central School of Art in New York City. After graduation and two years of private study, he worked at an agency for a time before enlisting in the United States Army Air Forces, Army Air Force in 1942. He served in the Air Force as a photographer for four years. He married zoologist and artist Lois Darling, Lois MacIntyre in 1946. They would remain married until his death, and frequently collaborated on both writing and illustration. They had no children. His mother-in-law, Grace Hamilton McIntyre, Grace, was a painter as well. Also in 1946, Darlin ...
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Children's Novel
Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader. Children's literature can be traced to traditional stories like fairy tales, that have only been identified as children's literature in the eighteenth century, and songs, part of a wider oral tradition, that adults shared with children before publishing existed. The development of early children's literature, before printing was invented, is difficult to trace. Even after printing became widespread, many classic "children's" tales were originally created for adults and later adapted for a younger audience. Since the fifteenth century much literature has been aimed specifically at children, often with a moral or religious message. Children's literature has been shaped by religious sources, like Puritan traditions, or by more philosophical and scientifi ...
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William Morrow & Co
William Morrow and Company is an American publishing company founded by William Morrow in 1926. The company was acquired by Scott Foresman in 1967, sold to Hearst Corporation in 1981, and sold to News Corporation (now News Corp) in 1999. The company is now an imprint of HarperCollins. William Morrow has published many fiction and non-fiction authors, including Ray Bradbury, Michael Chabon, Beverly Cleary, Neil Gaiman, Erle Stanley Gardner, B. H. Liddell Hart, Elmore Leonard, Steven D. Levitt, Steven Pinker, Judith Rossner, and Neal Stephenson. Francis Thayer Hobson was president and later chairman of the board of William Morrow and Company. Morrow authors * Christopher Andersen * Harriet Brown * Karin Slaughter * Harry Browne * Stephen Brusatte * Meg Cabot * Beverly Cleary * Charles Dickinson * Warren Ellis * Bruce Feiler * Neil Gaiman * David J. Garrow * Nikki Giovanni * John Grogan * Andrew Gross * Jean Guerrero * Joe Hill * Ismail Kadare * Steven D. Levitt * Mar ...
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Hardcover
A hardcover, hard cover, or hardback (also known as hardbound, and sometimes as case-bound) book is one bound with rigid protective covers (typically of binder's board or heavy paperboard covered with buckram or other cloth, heavy paper, or occasionally leather). It has a flexible, sewn spine which allows the book to lie flat on a surface when opened. Modern hardcovers may have the pages glued onto the spine in much the same way as paperbacks. Following the ISBN sequence numbers, books of this type may be identified by the abbreviation Hbk. Hardcover books are often printed on acid-free paper, and they are much more durable than paperbacks, which have flexible, easily damaged paper covers. Hardcover books are marginally more costly to manufacture. Hardcovers are frequently protected by artistic dust jackets, but a "jacketless" alternative has increased in popularity: these "paper-over-board" or "jacketless" hardcover bindings forgo the dust jacket in favor of printing the cove ...
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Rabbit's Foot
In some cultures, the foot of a rabbit is carried as an amulet believed to bring good luck. This belief is held by individuals in a great number of places around the world, including Europe, China, Africa, and North and South America. In variations of this superstition, the donor rabbit must possess certain attributes, such as having been killed in a particular place, using a particular method, or by a person possessing particular attributes (e.g., by a cross-eyed man). It has been suggested by Benjamin Radford that the rabbit's foot could be connected to a European good luck charm called the Hand of Glory, a hand cut from a hanged man and then pickled. Humorist R. E. Shay is credited with the witticism, "Depend on the rabbit's foot if you will, but remember it didn't work for the rabbit." In North American culture The belief in North American folklore may originate in the system of folk magic known as " hoodoo". A number of strictures attached to the charm are now observed mo ...
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Ellen Tebbits
''Ellen Tebbits'' is a 1951 children's novel written by Beverly Cleary. It is Cleary's second published book, following ''Henry Huggins''. This humorous realistic fiction story tells the adventures of young Ellen and the new girl in her school, Austine Allen. Plot Third-grader Ellen Tebbits lives with her parents on Tillamook Street in Portland, Oregon. The book opens when Ellen heads to her dance class at the studio run by the mother of a classmate, Otis Spofford, who is always teasing her. When she arrives, she heads to change in a broom closet so the other girls cannot see her terrible secret: Ellen is wearing woolen underwear. After class, she accidentally walks in on a new girl in class, Austine Allen, who's also wearing the dreaded underwear. Soon, the two become best friends. Other chapters in the book deal with Ellen's first-ever time going horseback riding, her efforts to bring a giant beet to school for show-and-tell, and Ellen and Austine's efforts to put up with the o ...
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Only Child
An only child is a person with no siblings, Birth, by birth or adoption. Children who have half-siblings, step-siblings, or have never met their siblings, either living at the same house or at a different house—especially those who were born considerably later—may have a similar family environment to only-children, as may children who have much younger siblings from both of the same parents (generally ten or more years). Overview Throughout history, only-children were relatively uncommon. From around the middle of the 20th century, birth rates and average family sizes fell sharply, for a number of reasons including perceived concerns about human overpopulation and more women having their first child later in life due to birth control and women in the workforce. The proportion of families in the United States with only-children increased during the Great Depression but fell during the Post–World War II baby boom.
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Crossed Fingers
To cross one's fingers is a hand gesture commonly used to wish for luck. Occasionally it is interpreted as an attempt to implore God for protection.''Orange Coast Magazine''. Emmis Communications. May 1990. pg. 177. "In early Christian days, a believer confronted by evil or hostile influences implored the power of the Holy Cross for protection by twisting his middle finger over his forefinger and holding the remaining fingers down with his thumb." The gesture is referred to by the common expressions "cross your fingers", "keep your fingers crossed", or just "fingers crossed". The act of crossing one's fingers mainly belongs to Christianity. The earliest use of the gesture had two people crossing their index fingers to form a cross. The use of the gesture is often considered by children as an excuse for telling a white lie. By extension, a similar belief is that crossing one's fingers invalidates a promise being made. Origin Courts of Mosaic law would often render verdicts with ...
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Goodreads
Goodreads is an American social cataloging website and a subsidiary of Amazon that allows individuals to search its database of books, annotations, quotes, and reviews. Users can sign up and register books to generate library catalogs and reading lists. They can also create their own groups of book suggestions, surveys, polls, blogs, and discussions. The website's offices are located in San Francisco. Goodreads was founded in December 2006 and launched in January 2007 by Otis Chandler and Elizabeth Khuri Chandler. In December 2007, the site had 650,000 members and 10,000,000 books had been added. By July 2012, the site reported 10 million members, 20 million monthly visits, and thirty employees. On March 28, 2013, Amazon announced its acquisition of Goodreads, and by July 23, 2013, Goodreads announced their user base had grown to 20 million members. By July 2019, the site had 90 million members. History Founders Goodreads founders Otis Chandler and Elizabeth Khuri Chan ...
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Novels By Beverly Cleary
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself from the la, novella, a singular noun use of the neuter plural of ''novellus'', diminutive of ''novus'', meaning "new". Some novelists, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Ann Radcliffe, John Cowper Powys, preferred the term Romance (literary fiction), "romance" to describe their novels. According to Margaret Doody, the novel has "a continuous and comprehensive history of about two thousand years", with its origins in the Ancient Greek novel, Ancient Greek and Roman novel, in Chivalric romance, and in the tradition of the Italian renaissance novella.Margaret Anne Doody''The True Story of the Novel'' New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1996, rept. 1997, p. 1. Retrieved 25 April 2014. The ancient romance form was ...
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1953 American Novels
Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a Estonian government-in-exile, government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito is chosen President of Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Yugoslavia. ** The Central Intelligence Agency, CIA-sponsored Robertson Panel first meets to discuss the Unidentified flying object, UFO phenomenon. * January 15 – Georg Dertinger, foreign minister of East Germany, is arrested for spying. * January 19 – 71.1% of all television sets in the United States are tuned into ''I Love Lucy'', to watch Lucy give birth to Little Ricky, which is more people than those who tune into Dwight Eisenhower's inauguration the next day. This record has yet to be broken. * January 20 – Dwight D. Eisenhower is First inauguration of Dwight D. Eisenhower, sworn in as the 34th President of the United States. * January 24 ** Mau Mau Upr ...
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