David Prashker's Book Of Days: Navigate by Names: S-Z

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra: April 23 with Shakespeare; Alberto Manguel’s account of him on June 27; his portrait on Nov 25; he is mentioned on Jan 18, March 29 and July 10, and performed à la Brel on Nov 22

Daniel Ortega Saavedra: born Nov 11

Albert Bruce Sabin: born Aug 26

Oliver Wolf Sacks: died Aug 30

Muhammad Anwar es-Sadat: dared to visit Israel on Nov 19; regretted it on Oct 6

Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade: born June 2: appears from a window on July 14; died Dec 2; (mentioned somewhat obscurely on Dec 16). Hugo de Sade, who was presumably an ancestor, married Laura de Neves on Jan 16

Carl Edward Sagan: two entries sourced in his splendid "Cosmos”, one on Aug 18, the other on Aug 23

Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns: born Oct 9

Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov: translated by Anatoly Shcharansky on Jan 20; born May 21; atom bombs versus peace prizes on Oct 9; referenced on July 10

Jerome David (J.D) Salinger: born Jan 1, banned Dec 6

Jonas Edward Salk: vaccinated against polio on Oct 28. Listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1

Margaret (Higgins) Sanger (aka Margaret Sanger Slee): brought birth control to the USA, clearly unsuccessfully to judge by its birth rate, on Sept 14

Santorio Santori (Sanctorius): born March 29; died Feb 22 (this page gets mentioned on Sept 13, and the March 29 page gets mentioned on March 30, but Feb 22 is the one that matters)

José de Sousa Saramago: rethinking Pessoa on Feb 8

Tibors de Sarenom: amongst the Trobairitz on Jan 13

Félix Rubén García Sarmiento (Rubén Dario): compared with Cervantes on Jan 18

Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre: June 21 (unpublished); “Les Mouches” on May 30; gave up both essence and existence on April 15; mentioned on Jan 9 and Feb 21

Siegfried Loraine Sassoon: his “Alcuin” poem on May 19; born Sept 8; mentioned on Feb 28

Érik Alfred Leslie Satie (Virginie Lebeau was his pen-name for his writings): born May 17

Richard Savage: biographied by Samuel Johnson on Jan 16

Louise de Savoie: mentoned with her daughter Marguerte de Navarre on April 11; writing her astronomical journal on the Mediaeval page of "Woman-Blindness"

Antoine Joseph (“Adolphe”) Sax: born Nov 6

Giuseppe Doménico Scarlatti: born Oct 26

Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller: born Nov 10

Ettore Schmitz (Italo Svevo): pseudonymed on Feb 8; born on Dec 19; mentioned on Feb 2 and March 15

Leonard Alfred Schneider (Lenny Bruce): died on Aug 3; first arrest on Oct 4; also mentioned on Aug 4

Christian Friedrich Schönbein, or Schoenbein: obtained the patent for cellulose nitrate explosive on Dec 5, but he is also the man who named “ozone” and was the first to describe guncotton (nitrocellulose). Listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1

Arthur Schopenhauer: born Feb 22; Menckened on Sept 13 (and mentioned as such on Sept 12); simply mentioned on April 22

Franz Peter Schubert: born Jan 31

Erwin Schulhoff: performed on April 1; mentioned on July 27

Charles Monroe Schulz: "Peanuts" first published on Oct 2; born Nov 26

Robert Schumann: born June 8; played by Gideon Klein on April 1, and by Pablo Casals on Nov 13; created the FAE Sonata on Oct 27 (pianist Clara Schumann)

Ludwig Philipp Albert Schweitzer: born on Jan 14 (and a cartoon for a birthday present)

Robert Falcon Scott (of the Antarctic): with Shackleton on Jan 5; beaten by Amundsen on Jan 15 and Dec 14; Oates and the camp at Mount Buckley on March 17; born July 16

Walter Scott: born Aug 15; referenced on June 24; breeding bulls for beef-eaters on Sept 8

Winfried Georg (“Max”) Sebald: described the destruction of Yuan Ming Yuan on Jan 11; attempted the dramatic monologue on April 6; mentioned with Magris on April 10

Charles Louis Secondat (Montesquieu): quoted and quoted on Jan 18; the innocent source of the world’s most anti-Semitic book on Aug 26; referenced on June 19

Peter (Pete) Seeger: born May 3

Alexander Selkirk (though there is some suggestion that it may have been Selcraig originally): rescued by Woodes Rogers on Feb 1

Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna (“Che”): killed on Oct 9; mentioned on June 15

Miguel Servet (aka Miguel Serveto, Michel Servet, Michael Servetus, Miguel de Villanueva, and Michel de Villeneuve): condemned to death for blasphemy on Oct 26

Robert William Service: with Jack London in the Yukon on Aug 16; "Sam McGee" and "Dan McGrew" referenced on April 18; mentioned on Feb 9 and Feb 28

Georges Pierre Seurat: born Dec 2

Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, Marquise de Sévigné: born Dec 5; in full on the Ancien Régime page of "Woman-Blindness"

Ernest Henry Shackleton: died on Jan 5; beaten by Amundsen on Dec 14

Anthony Joshua Shaffer, screenplay writer, and Peter Levin Shaffer, playwright, born within seconds of each other, and completely identical, May 15; Anthony’s “Wicker Man” is mentioned on Nov 5

Rabindra (“Ravi”) Shankar Chowdhury: born April 7

Gulielmus Shakspere (William Shakespeare): despised for coming from the wrong class on Jan 5; R&J on Jan 30; Deutschified by Voß on Feb 8; bite-sized by Charles and Mary Lamb on Feb 10 and Dec 3; recovered by David Garrick on Feb 19; Roderigo Lopes on Feb 28 and June 29 (the night The Globe burned down); with Richard Tarlton on March 15; “The Tempest” on March 29; with Cervantes on April 23 and Ben Jonson on June 11; doing Midsummer Night on June 23; his patron the Earl of Leicester on July 19; getting Macbeth completely wrong on Aug 15, and Richard III mis-shapen on Aug 22 and Nov 5; R&G from Hamlet on Sept 2; Elizabeth Montagu on Oct 2; Emperor Claudius as Hamlet on Oct 13, and Hamlet alone on Nov 20; merely mentioned on Jan 3, Jan 8, Jan 9, April 30, May 11, May 16, June 24, July 6 and Sept 23

George Bernard Shaw: at home in Fitzroy Square on May 18; “St Joan” and “Man and Superman” on May 30; born July 26; performed in “Hamlet” on Sept 2; not doing much on Sept 10

Anatoly Borisovich Shcharansky (Natan Sharansky): born Jan 20

Percy Bysshe Shelley: hymned Adonais on Feb 23; drowned July 8, but see Aug 13 as well; also mentioned on Jan 1, Feb 1, Feb 21, March 11 and Aug 10

Richard Brinsley Sheridan: born Oct 30

Christopher Latham Sholes: needs Tippex on June 23

Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich: set Yevtushenko on July 18; born Sept 25; initially on Oct 27

Johan Julius Christian Sibelius (Jean) Sibelius: born Dec 8; mentioned on June 9

Philip Sidney: born Nov 30

Jerry Silverman: start of WW2 on July 22

Paul Frederic Simon (with or without Art Garfunkel, whose date is Oct 13): in Central Park on Sept 19; at Bunjies on Oct 3

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni: born March 6; offered to build a tomb for Dante on June 24; “can’t do fresco” on Aug 21 and Nov 1; referenced by Victor Hugo on Oct 18; mentioned May 18

Clive Marles Sinclair: born July 30

Upton Beall Sinclair: born Sept 20; banned Dec 6

Isaac Merritt Singer, the sewing machine man; or was he? see Elias Howe on Oct 3: born Oct 27. Not to be confused with Isaac Bashevis Singer, who you will find under Z!

Alfred Sisley 1839-1899: Yet another of the Durand-Ruel finds on Feb 5; born Oct 30

Maria (Marie) Salomea Skłodowska-Curie: isolated radium on April 20; mentioned on March 1 with her husband Pierre. Listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1

Elizabeth (“Bessie”) Smith: born April 15

John Allyn Smith, Jr (John Allyn McAlpin Berryman): died on Jan 7

Joseph Smith: founded the Mormons on April 6

Florence Margaret (“Stevie”) Smith: peeled onions on Sept 20; mentioned on Nov 17

Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley: PM on Dec 4

Jan Sobieski (King John III): stopped the Moslem march at Vienna on May 21; mentioned on May 29

Manoel Dias Soeiro (Menasseh ben Israel): "the return of the Jews" to England under Cromwell on Sept 30

Aleksandr Isayevitch Solzhenitsyn: Nobel Prize on Oct 23; witnessed the Gulag on Dec 28

Ptolemy 1 Soter: "merely mentioned" on Oct 1, but too important not to be included in the Index anyway

Hernando de Soto: born May 21

Akinwande Oluwole (Wole) Babatunde Soyinka: born July 13

Boris Vasilievich Spassky: castled in his chair on Sept 1

Percy L. Spencer: patented the microwave oven on Dec 7 (listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1)

Benedict de Spinoza (Bento or Baruch Spinoza): analysed by Montesquieu on Jan 18, and by Pierre Bayle on November 18; died Feb 21; used as an exemplar on June 3 and Sept 13; excommunicated on July 27, though my account of it is actually on Feb 1; David Nieto on Sept 30; mentioned on Oct 10

The (Decidedly Ir-Reverend) William Archibald Spooner: born July 22

Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein (Mme de Stael): born April 22

Aristotle Stagiritis: rainbowed with Seneca on March 29; in disagreement with Pyrrho on May 11, and Plato on April 5, June 25 and Sept 13; wrong about gravity on Sept 18; mentioned Jan 3, Feb 28, August 26, and somewhat obscurely on Oct 8; died on Oct 2

Henry Morton Stanley: met what he presumed was Dr Livingstone, at Lake Tanganyika, on Sept 29 and Nov 10; at Lake Albert in the Congo on Dec 5

Freya Madeline Stark: born Jan 31

Gertrude Stein: born Feb 3

John Ernst Steinbeck: born Feb 27; his 1962 Nobel Prize is on Oct 25; plus mentions on Jan 1, March 26, Oct 3 and 23; and a localised banning on Oct 6; mentioned on Dec 6

George Robert Stephenson: born on June 9; travelled on his own steam train on Sept 27

György Stern (Georg Solti): taught by Erno Dohnányi on July 27; born Oct 21

Isaac Stern: born July 21

Laurence Sterne: born Nov 24; mentioned on Nov 28

Elizabeth Cleghorn Stevenson (Mrs Gaskell): born Sept 29

Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson: born Nov 13

William Joseph Still: Building electric cars on Dec 5 (listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1)

Daniel Chapman Stillson: patented the 1st adjustable pipe wrench on Dec 5 (what do you mean, I must be joking? In the world of plumbers this ranks as the number one scientific invention in human history, ever; and you trying living without plumbing!) Listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1

Karlheinz Stockhausen: born Aug 22

Antonio Stradivari: died Dec 18

Tomás Straüssler (Tom Stoppard): born July 3, “Rosencrantz and Guildernstern” on Sept 2; mentioned on Dec 3

Israel Strassberg (Lee Strasberg): picked up Stanislavski’s method on Jan 17; used it on Aug 8; born Nov 17; mentioned May 22

Edward L Stratemeyer: born Oct 4

Oscar Solomon Straus: and other members of the family: start on Dec 23 for the overview; Oscar’s plaque for Roger Williams is on Oct 13, and his promotion to Roosevelt’s Cabinet on Oct 23; Ida and Isidor went down with the Titanic on April 14; Dec 27 for Nathan Straus Sr’s surprising connections with Louis Pasteur and the town of Netanya in Israel; June 12 for Nathan Straus Jr and his even more surprising connection with Anne Frank

Richard Georg Strauss: born June 11; “Salome" turned down on July 7; accused of collaborating on July 27; mentioned in much the same regard on Dec 23

Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky: born on June 17; mentioned on April1

Johan August Strindberg: born Jan 22

Eric Oswald (Hans Carl Maria Von) Stroheim (the bits in brackets were added when he moved to America): born Sept 22

Almon B Strowger: patented automatic telephone switching on Dec 5. Listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1

Martina Šubertová (changed to Navratilova in honour of her step-dad/coach): sought asylum in the US on Sept 6

Anne Sullivan: her achievement on April 5 and June 28; and this without the benefit of Braille, who is on Jan 4

Patrick Süskind: born March 26

Joseph Wilson Swan: in partnership with Edison on July 24; born Oct 31

Emanuel Swederg (changed to Swedenborg when he met God in 1741): born Jan 29

Jonathan Swift: alluded to on April 11; Gulliver alluded to on Jan 16, Sept 2 and Sept 20; died Oct 19; among the Reverend Writers on Nov 28; born Nov 30

Hannah Szenes: executed on Nov 7

Henrietta Szold: died on Feb 13

Rabindranath Tagore: born May 6

Oliver Reginald Kaizana Tambo: born Oct 27

Abel Janszoon Tasman: reached Aotearoa on Dec 13

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky: born May 7; (quoted on the MM page on June 2); mentioned Oct 19

Maria de Telkes (but she dropped the “de” when she moved to America): set up the first solar heating system on Dec 24 (listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1)

Wilhelm or Guillaume Tell, depending on whether you are using Schweize-Deutsch or Franco-Suisse (William Tell in English): died Nov 18

Temüjin (“Ghengis Khan”): died on Aug 18

Alfred (Lord) Tennyson: "Charge of the Light Brigade" on April 18, Oct 4 and Oct 25; born Aug 6

William Makepeace Thackeray: in Tolstoy’s diary on Jan 21; multiple pseudonyms on Feb 8; born on July 18

François-Anatole Thibault (Anatole France): quoted on July 12

Dylan Marlais Thomas: born Oct 27; mentioned June 24

Joseph John Thompson: electrons activated on Dec 18 (listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1)

Henry David Thoreau: born July 12

Emmett Louis (“Bobo”) Till: lynched on Aug 28

Michael Kemp Tippett: born on Jan 2; "A Child Of Our Time" on March 19

Alexis Charles Henri Clérel (de Tocqueville was his title): epitomised idealism on July 29

John Ronald Reuel (J.R.R) Tolkien: born Jan 3; mentioned but not important on June 22

Lev (or possibly Lyof, but definitely not Leo) Nikolayevich Tolstoy: Jan 21 has a quote from his diary; born Sept 9; July 1 mentions him

Clyde William Tombaugh: “discovered” Planet Pluto on Feb 18. Listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1

Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa: the Durand-Ruel list just grows and grows on Feb 5; born Nov 24

Edward John Trelawny: died Aug 13; mentioned on Jan 22 and Feb 1

Joseph Philippe Pierre Yves Elliott Trudeau (that’s Trudeau senior): born Oct 18

François Roland Truffaut: died Oct 21; Nouvelle Vague on Dec 3; Film Noir on Dec 5

Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev: born Nov 9; mentioned on Feb 28

Nathanial (“Nat”) Turner: played Spartacus on Aug 21 and 23; his story told on his birthdate, Oct 2; executed on Nov 11; mentioned on May 16, referenced on Aug 30

Desmond Mpilo Tutu: born Oct 7; mentioned Aug 28

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (Lenin): born April 22; shared a coffee bar in Zurich with James Joyce on Bloomsday (June 16); shared a political dream with Trotsky, and especially Victor Serge, on Aug 20; survived an assassination attempt on Aug 30; given to Castro as a prize on Nov 13

Leon Marcus Uris: born Aug 3; “Mila 18” on April 19

Various Valentines where you would expect to find them, on Feb 14: Rudolph Valentino can be found under A, in this Index, and on May 6 on the blog

George de Valero when he was born; Edward de Valera by 1901; only became Éamon de Valera when Eireland achieved its liberation: The Easter Rising on April 24; Roger Casement on Sept 1; born Oct 14

Ambroise Paul Toussaint Jules Valéry: born Oct 30

Marguerite de Valois: born on May 14; her memoir on the Ancien Régime page of "Woman-Blindness"

Cornelius (“the Commodore”) Vanderbilt: born Nov 27

Ralph Vaughan-Williams: born Oct 12

Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez: born June 6; mentioned on April 16

Giuseppi Fortunino Francesco Verdi: his “Requiem” played by Gideon Klein at Terezin on April 1; born Oct 10

Paul-Marie Verlaine: the reason for Pablo Neruda’s pseudonym on Feb 8; tried to kill Rimbaud on July 10

Johannes (Jan) Vermeer: born Oct 31

Eugene Luther Gore Vidal: born Oct 3

Élisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun: her portrait in words on April 16; her portrait of Marie Antoinette on Oct 16

Madame de Villedieu (Marie-Catherine Desjardins); alive and turning it into roman à clef on the Ancien Régime page of "Woman-Blindness"; her death is on Oct 20

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci: born April 15; died May 2; Mona Lisa stolen on Aug 21; drawings on Nov 21

Rodrigo (Ruy) Díaz de Vivar (“El Cid”, which should be al-Sid, from the Arabic): captured Valencia on July 10

Derek Alton Walcott: born Jan 23

Lech Wałęsa: Solidarność on Aug 31; Nobel Prize on Oct 5

Raoul Gustaf Wallenberg: born Aug 4; mentioned on July 10

Robert Walpole: his son’s involvement with the Richmond Common saga on May 16; his own in the Downing Street saga on Dec 4

Arthur Evelyn St. John Waugh: born Oct 28

Robert Clifton Weaver: became the first "black" cabinet member in the US on June 28

Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber: born Nov 19; teaching Wagner on May 22

Noah Webster: defined on April 21

Nathan (von Wallenstein?) Weinstein (Nathanael West): born Oct 17

Chaim Azriel Weizmann: announced on Feb 16; inaugurated on Feb 19; born Nov 27

Eugen (Eugène) Weidmann: lost his head on June 17

George Orson Welles: born May 6; fought the war of the worlds by radio on Oct 30

Herbert George (H.G) Wells: at DHL’s bedside on March 2; born Sept 21

Horace Wells: used N2O as an anaesthetic on Dec 11 (listed among the scientific achievements on Jan 1)

John Wesley: born June 17; at the entrance to Bone Hill Fields on Nov 28

Andries van Wezel (Andreas Vesalius): fully anatomical on June 1

James Abbott McNeill Whistler: born July 10

Gilbert White: born July 18

Patrick Victor Martindale White: Feb 8 for Voß and Leichhardt; born May 28; Nov 17 for Hurtle Duffield; mentioned on July 28

Billie Honor Whitelaw: born June 6, but highlighted on Aug 8

Walter (Walt) Whitman: interesting man was Peter Doyle - see March 15; as to Whitman himself: died March 26; “Leaves of Grass” published on July 4, but banned on Jan 8; also Dec 6 for the publication of his other bans (the means of unmarrying a writer from his readers)

Edward Whymper: thought the horn mattered on July 13

Eliezer (Elie) Wiesel: on Luria on Aug 5; born Sept 30; mentioned on Aug 3 and Dec 28

Leon Wieseltier: saying Kaddish for Rabbi Oshry on Oct 28

Simon Wiesenthal: born Dec 31

William Wilberforce: fictitiously on Jan 8; genuinely born Aug 24 (but the slavery achievement has to go on June 23)

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde: born Oct 16; arrested April 5

Thornton Niven Wilder: Feb 16 (linked to his birthday on April 17)

Allen Lane Williams: born Sept 21

Ella Gwendolen Rees Williams (Jean Rhys): born Aug 24

Hiram King (“Hank”) Williams: born Sept 17

Roger Williams: banned on Oct 13; mentioned on Dec 23

Thomas Lanier (“Tennessee”) Williams: born March 26; “Streetcar” premièred on Dec 3; expurgated on Dec 6; mentioned on Jan 1 and July 18

William Carlos Williams: born Sept 17

Brian Douglas Wilson: born June 20

John Anthony (with an “h”!) Burgess Wilson: listed on Feb 8

Samuel (“Uncle Sam”) Wilson: born Sept 13

Karol Wojtyla (Pope John Paul II): born May 18; quoted Dec 28

Thomas Clayton Wolfe: born Oct 3; mentioned Jan 1. Not to be confused with Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr whose ‎”Bonfire of the Vanities” can be found on Jan 8, “The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test” on Sept 17, and a dig at Harold Bloom on July 11

Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin): born April 27 (this is mum, in case you are confused; Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, without the bracket, is the daughter, better known by her married name as Mary Shelley)

Henry Woodward: yet another of Edison’s appropriations on July 24

Adeline Virginia Stephen (Virginia Woolf): born Jan 25; husband Leonard’s birthday is on Nov 25; Bloomsbury is on May 18; see also July 28

William Wordsworth: birthday on April 7; “Tintern Abbey” on July 13; passed into immortality on April 23; mentioned on April 27

Christopher Michael Wren: born Oct 20

Frank Lincoln Wright (Frank Lloyd Wright): born June 8; Taliesen burned down on Aug 15; his Guggenheim helter-skelter can be found on Oct 21; mentioned on Feb 28

Orville Wright: born Aug 19; older brother Wilbur flew with him on Dec 17

John Wycliffe: declared a heretic on May 4

William Butler Yeats: Easter Rebellion on April 24; born June 13; quoted Sept 1; photographed Nov 22; mentioned on June 24

Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki (“Rashi” is an acronym which is why I have included his title): recorded words of Beruriah on Jan 12; destruction of Wurms on Feb 19; mentioned with Maimon on March 30 and Oct 10

Neil Percival Young: singing to Montezuma on March 4 and June 30, and with Buffalo Springfield on June 20 ; debuted with CS and N on July 25; born Nov 12

Marguerite Antoinette Jeanne Marie Ghislaine Cleenewerck de Crayencour (Yourcenar, her pen-name, is an anagram [albeit with a C missing]): born on June 8, but see especially Jan 24

Eliyahu ben Shlomo (Elijah ben Solomon in English) Zalman, aka “the Vilna Ga'on”: died on Oct 10

Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof (Ludoviko Lazaro in Esperanto): born Dec 15

Mao Ze-Dong (Mao Tse-Tung): “The Three Worlds” on April 18; part of the GER debate on Sept 1; died Sept 9; founded the People’s Republic on Oct 19; born Dec 26; but mostly see The China Page

Margaretha Geertruida Zelle (MacLeod), aka Mata Hari: executed as a spy on Oct 15

Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst, sometimes with an added Dornburg, better known as Ekaterina (Catharine) the Great, Empress of Russia - she changed her name when she gave up German Lutheranism for Russian Orthodoxy: listed with the women who ruled on April 17; born April 21, but also on May 2: how is that possible? calendar changes!

Robert Allen Zimmerman (Bob Dylan): Davey Moore on Feb 6; “John Birch” on May 19; born on May 24; dreamed he saw St Augustine on May 26; quoted on June 9; painted on July 22; with MLK on Aug 28; at Bunjies on Oct 3; sang for Rubin Carter on Nov 8; under an alias on Nov 23; produced by John Hammond Jr on Dec 15; mentioned on Feb 18, April 18, June 20 and July 10

Izaak Zynger (Isaac Bashevis Singer, the novelist): born July 14; mentioned Oct 27

Emile Edouard Charles Antoine Zola: forced to flee on Feb 26; born April 2; accusatory on July 12 and Oct 18; Dreyfus again on July 14; assassinated on Sept 28; commissioned Rodin’s sculpture of Balzac on Nov 12

Pinchas Zuckerman: born July 16

Huldrych Zwingli (some prefer Ulrich) born Jan 1; killed on Oct 11; mentioned on May 4 and Dec 16