IN: Herman Melville (August 1, 1819 - September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance period. His best known works include Typee (1846), a romantic account of his experiences in Polynesian life, and his whaling novel Moby-Dick (1851). His work was almost forgotten during his last 30 years. His writing draws on his experience at sea as a common sailor, exploration of literature and philosophy, and engagement in the contradictions of American society in a period of rapid change.

The "Melville Revival" of the late 1910s and 1920s brought about a reassessment of his work. The centennial of his birth was in 1919. Carl Van Doren's 1917 article on Melville in a standard history of American literature was the start of renewed appreciation. Van Doren also encouraged Raymond Weaver, who wrote the author's first full-length biography, Herman Melville: Mariner and Mystic (1921). Discovering the unfinished manuscript of Billy Budd, among papers shown to him by Melville's granddaughter, Weaver edited it and published it in a new collected edition of Melville's works. Other works that helped fan the flames for Melville were Carl Van Doren's The American Novel (1921), D. H. Lawrence's Studies in Classic American Literature (1923), Carl Van Vechten's essay in The Double Dealer (1922), and Lewis Mumford's biography, Herman Melville: A Study of His Life and Vision (1929).  Starting in the mid-1930s, the Yale University scholar Stanley Williams supervised more than a dozen dissertations on Melville that were eventually published as books. Where the first wave of Melville scholars focused on psychology, Williams' students were prominent in establishing Melville Studies as an academic field concerned with texts and manuscripts, tracing Melville's influences and borrowings (even plagiarism), and exploring archives and local publications. Jay Leyda, known for his work in film, spent more than a decade in archives and small-town libraries gathering documents and records for a day by day record, published as Melville Log (1951). Sparked by Leyda, the second phase of the Melville Revival emphasized research rather than accepting Melville's early books as reliable accounts.  The postwar scholars tended to think that Weaver, Harvard psychologist Henry Murray, and Mumford favored Freudian interpretations which read Melville's fiction too literally as autobiography; exaggerated his suffering in the family; and mistakenly inferred a homosexual attachment to Hawthorne. They saw a different arc to Melville's writing career. The first biographers saw a tragic withdrawal after the cold critical reception for his prose works and largely dismissed his poetry. A new view emerged of Melville's turn to poetry as a conscious choice that placed him among the most important American poets.  Other post-war studies, however, continued the broad imaginative and interpretive style. Charles Olson's Call Me Ishmael (1947) presented Ahab as a Shakespearean tragic hero, and Newton Arvin's critical biography, Herman Melville (1950) won the National Book Award for non-fiction in 1951.   Hershel Parker published his two volume Herman Melville: A Biography, in 1996 and 2002, based on extensive original research and his involvement as editor of the Northwestern-Newberry Melville edition.

What sort of revival did Melville enjoy?

OUT: The "Melville Revival" of the late 1910s and 1920s brought about a reassessment of his work.


IN: Mwai Kibaki, C.G.H. (born 15 November 1931) is a Kenyan politician who was the third President of Kenya, serving from December 2002 until April 2013. Kibaki was previously Vice-President of Kenya for ten years from 1978 to 1988 under President Daniel arap Moi. He also held cabinet ministerial positions in the Kenyatta and Moi governments, including time as minister for Finance (1969-1981) under Kenyatta, and Minister for Home Affairs (1982-1988) and Minister for Health (1988-1991) under Moi. Kibaki served as an opposition Member of Parliament from 1992 to 2002.

President Kibaki was married to Lucy Muthoni from 1961 until her death in 2016. They have four children: Judy Wanjiku, Jimmy Kibaki, David Kagai, and Tony Githinji. They also have four grandchildren: Joy Jamie Marie, Mwai Junior, Krystinaa Muthoni. Jimmy Kibaki did have, so far unsuccessful, designs to be his father's political heir.  In 2004, the media reported that Kibaki has a second spouse, whom he allegedly married under customary law, Mary Wambui, and a daughter, Wangui Mwai. State House in response released an unsigned statement that Kibaki's only immediate family at the time was his then wife, Lucy, and their four children. In 2009, Kibaki, with Lucy in close attendance, held an odd press conference to re-state publicly that he only has one wife. The matter of Kibaki's alleged mistress, and his wife's usually dramatic public reactions thereto, provided an embarrassing side-show during his presidency, with the Washington Post terming the entire scandal as a "new Kenyan soap opera".  Ms. Wambui, the rather popular "other woman", who enjoyed the state trappings of a Presidential spouse and became a powerful and wealthy business-woman during the Kibaki Presidency, frequently drove Lucy into episodes of highly embarrassing very publicly displayed rage. Ms. Wambui, despite opposition from Kibaki's family, led publicly by Kibaki's son, Jimmy, and despite Kibaki's public endorsement and campaign for her opponent, succeeded Kibaki as Member of Parliament for Othaya in the 2013 General Election. In December 2014, Senator Bonny Khalwale stated on KTN's Jeff Koinange Live that President Kibaki had introduced Wambui as his wife.  Kibaki enjoys playing golf and is a member of the Muthaiga Golf Club. He is a practicing and a very committed member of the Roman Catholic Church and attends Consolata Shrines Catholic Church in Nairobi every Sunday at noon.  On 21 August 2016, Kibaki, who was ill, was taken to Karen Hospital and later flown to South Africa for specialized treatment.

WHen was Kibaki born?

OUT: