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The Staircase (novel)
''The Staircase'' is a historical fiction novel by Ann Rinaldi. Plot summary Lizzy Ender's father dumps her at a Santa Fe convent after her mother died on the Santa Fe Trail. A Methodist, Lizzy is an outcast in the school who can't comprehend the dedication to Catholicism. She thinks the nuns who pray to Saint Joseph for help to finish their choir loft (which doesn't have a staircase) are crazy. She befriends an unemployed carpenter and suggests he build the staircase. Her classmates are furious as they were waiting for a miracle to occur. The carpenter, named Jose, proceeds to build the staircase in a matter of weeks armed with three simple tools and his faith. After building the staircase, Jose disappears and Lizzy decides to leave the convent to live with her father, who was currently living on a ranch in Texas. This story is based on the real legend of the miracle occurring at the Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where an unnamed man (said to be Saint Joseph) built a s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ann Rinaldi
Ann Rinaldi (August 27, 1934 – July 1, 2021) - Shannon Maughan. July 15, 2021. Retrieved August 30, 2021. was an American young adult fiction author. She was best known for her historical fiction, including '' In My Father's House'', '''', '' |
English Language
English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the island of Great Britain. Existing on a dialect continuum with Scots, and then closest related to the Low Saxon and Frisian languages, English is genealogically West Germanic. However, its vocabulary is also distinctively influenced by dialects of France (about 29% of Modern English words) and Latin (also about 29%), plus some grammar and a small amount of core vocabulary influenced by Old Norse (a North Germanic language). Speakers of English are called Anglophones. The earliest forms of English, collectively known as Old English, evolved from a group of West Germanic (Ingvaeonic) dialects brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the 5th century and further mutated by Norse-speaking Viking settlers starting in the 8th and 9th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Historical Fiction
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which the plot takes place in a setting related to the past events, but is fictional. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to other types of narrative, including theatre, opera, cinema, and television, as well as video games and graphic novels. An essential element of historical fiction is that it is set in the past and pays attention to the manners, social conditions and other details of the depicted period. Authors also frequently choose to explore notable historical figures in these settings, allowing readers to better understand how these individuals might have responded to their environments. The historical romance usually seeks to romanticize eras of the past. Some subgenres such as alternate history and historical fantasy insert intentionally ahistorical or speculative elements into a novel. Works of historical fiction are sometimes criticized for lack of authe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harcourt (publisher)
Harcourt () was an American publishing firm with a long history of publishing fiction and nonfiction for adults and children. The company was last based in San Diego, California, with editorial/sales/marketing/rights offices in New York City and Orlando, Florida, and was known at different stages in its history as Harcourt Brace, & Co. and Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. From 1919 to 1982, it was based in New York City. Houghton Mifflin acquired Harcourt in 2007. It incorporated the Harcourt name to form Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. As of 2012, all Harcourt books that have been re-released are under the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt name. The Harcourt Children's Books division left the name intact on all of its books under that name as part of HMH. In 2007 the U.S. Schools Education and Trade Publishing parts of Harcourt Education were sold by Reed Elsevier to Houghton Mifflin Riverdeep Group. Harcourt Assessment and Harcourt Education International were acquired by Pearson, the internat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Loretto Chapel
The Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States, is a former Roman Catholic church that is now used as a museum and a wedding chapel. It is known for its unusual helix-shaped spiral staircase (the "Miraculous Stair"). The Sisters of Loretto credited St. Joseph with its construction. It has been the subject of legend, and the circumstances surrounding its construction and its builder were considered miraculous by the Sisters of Loretto. History The chapel was commissioned by the Sisters of Loretto for their girls' school, Loretto Academy, in 1873. Archbishop Jean-Baptiste Lamy had brought in two French architects, Antoine Mouly and his son Projectus, to work on the St. Francis Cathedral project, and suggested that the Sisters could make use of their services on the side to build a much-needed chapel for the academy. Projectus ended up being the main architect for the project, basing his Gothic Revival design—complete with spires, buttresses, and stained glass windows ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Staircase (1998 Film)
''The Staircase'' is a 1998 television film about the story of the spiral staircase, believed by some to be miraculously built, at the Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The film stars Barbara Hershey as Mother Madalyn in charge of the chapel and William Petersen as Joad, the traveling carpenter with spiritual talent as well as woodworking skill. It is based on the novel of the same name by Ann Rinaldi. Plot The sisters of the legendary Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico, are nearing completion of a chapel, but architect, contractor, and laborers have all omitted stairs to the choir loft. This becomes a source of disagreement and contention between all parties until one day a mysterious drifter, Joad, arrives in town and is hired by the Reverend Mother Madalyn to design and build the staircase. Cast * Barbara Hershey as Mother Madalyn * William Petersen as Joad * Diane Ladd as Sister Margaret * Louis Ferreira as Mr. Mouly (as Justin Louis) * David Clennon as Simon Filg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Petersen
William Louis Petersen (born February 21, 1953) is an American actor and producer. He is best known for his role as Gil Grissom in the CBS drama series ''CSI: Crime Scene Investigation'' (2000–2015), for which he won a Screen Actors Guild Award and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award; he was further nominated for three Primetime Emmy Awards as a producer of the show. He reprised his role as Gil Grissom in the sequel '' CSI: Vegas'', which premiered on October 6, 2021. He also starred in the films '' To Live and Die in L.A.'' (1985), '' Manhunter'' (1986), ''Young Guns II'' (1990), ''Fear'' (1996), '' The Contender'' (2000), '' Detachment'' (2011), and ''Seeking a Friend for the End of the World'' (2012). Early life Petersen was born in Evanston, Illinois, the youngest of six children of June (née Hoene; 1909–2006) and Arthur Edward Petersen (1907 – 2004), who worked in the furniture business. Of Danish and German descent, he was raised in the Roman Catholic faith of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barbara Hershey
Barbara Lynn Herzstein, better known as Barbara Hershey (born February 5, 1948), is an American actress. In a career spanning more than 50 years, she has played a variety of roles on television and in cinema in several genres, including westerns and comedies. She began acting at age 17 in 1965 but did not achieve widespread critical acclaim until the 1980s. By that time, the ''Chicago Tribune'' referred to her as "one of America's finest actresses". Hershey won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries/TV Film for her role in ''A Killing in a Small Town'' (1990). She received Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Mary Magdalene in '' The Last Temptation of Christ'' (1988) and for her role in '' The Portrait of a Lady'' (1996). For the latter film, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and won the Los Angeles Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actress. She has won two Best Actress a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diane Ladd
Diane Ladd is an American actress. She has appeared in over 120 film and television roles. For the 1974 film '' Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore'', she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She went on to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress on Television for '' Alice'' (1980–81), and to receive Academy Award nominations for '' Wild at Heart'' (1990) and '' Rambling Rose'' (1991). Her other film appearances include '' Chinatown'' (1974), ''National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation'' (1989), ''Ghosts of Mississippi'' (1996), ''Primary Colors'' (1998), '' 28 Days'' (2000), ''American Cowslip'' (2008) and '' Joy (2015 film) '' (2015) . Ladd is the mother of actress Laura Dern, with her ex-husband, actor Bruce Dern. Personal life Ladd was born Rose Diane Ladner, the only child of Mary Bernadette (née Anderson), a housewife and actress, and Preston Paul Ladner, a veterinarian wh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Novels By Ann Rinaldi
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" 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 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 revived by Romanticism, especially the historica ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Historical Novels
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which the plot takes place in a setting related to the past events, but is fictional. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to other types of narrative, including theatre, opera, cinema, and television, as well as video games and graphic novels. An essential element of historical fiction is that it is set in the past and pays attention to the manners, social conditions and other details of the depicted period. Authors also frequently choose to explore notable historical figures in these settings, allowing readers to better understand how these individuals might have responded to their environments. The historical romance usually seeks to romanticize eras of the past. Some subgenres such as alternate history and historical fantasy insert intentionally ahistorical or speculative elements into a novel. Works of historical fiction are sometimes criticized for lack of authe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
