• John Greenleaf Whittier was born on 12/17/1807. “For all sad words of tongue and pen, The saddest are these, It might have been.” (Snow-bound)
• Ford Madox Ford was born on 12/17/1873. “Only two classes of books are of universal appeal. The very best and the very worst.” (The Good Soldier; The Parade’s End tetralogy; The Fifth Queen trilogy)
• Dorothy L. Sayers died on 12/17/1957. “The only sin passion can commit is to be joyless.” (Lord Peter Wimsey novels and short stories)
• Marguerite Yourcenar died on 12/17/1987. “When two texts, or two assertions, perhaps two ideas, are in contradiction, be ready to reconcile them rather than cancel one by the other; regard them as two different facets, or two successive stages, of the same reality, a reality convincingly human just because it is complex.” (Alexis; Memoirs of Hadrian)
• Saki (Hector Hugh Munro) was born on 12/18/1870. “He’s simply got the instinct for being unhappy highly developed.” (The Westminster Alice; When William Came)
• Louis Untermeyer died on 12/18/1977. “She has something to say about what life is like-which is all we ask of poetry.” (Long Feud: Selected Poems; Bygones; The Pursuit of Poetry; Moses)
• Emily Brontë died on 12/19/1848. “Honest people don’t hide their deeds.” (Wuthering Heights)
• Jean Genet was born on 12/19/1910. “To achieve harmony in bad taste is the height of elegance.” (The Thief’s Journal; Our Lady of the Flowers; The Balcony)
• James Hilton died on 12/20/1954. “Surely there comes a time when counting the cost and paying the price aren’t things to think about anymore. All that matters is value-the ultimate value of what one does.” (Knight Without Armour; Lost Horizon; Goodbye, Mr. Chips; Random Harvest)
• John Steinbeck died on 12/20/1968. “A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.” (The Red Pony; Tortilla Flat; Of Mice and Men; The Grapes of Wrath; Cannery Row; The Pearl; East of Eden)
• Denise Levertov died on 12/20/1997. “Images/split the truth/in fractions.” (The Double Image; Breathing the Water; A Door in the Hive)

John Greenleaf Whittier

Ford Madox Ford

Saki (Hector Hugh Munro)

Emily Brontë by Branwell Brontë

Jean Genet Signature

John Steinbeck Signature

[All images are in the Public Domain and are courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]