A Child of Our Time is a secular oratorio by the British composer
Michael Tippett (1905–98). It was inspired by events in 1938 that had
affected Tippett profoundly: the assassination of a German diplomat by a
young Jewish refugee (Herschel Grynszpan, pictured) and the Nazi
government's reaction in the form of the so-called Kristallnacht—a
vicious pogrom against Germany's Jewish population on the night of
9–10 November. Tippett uses these incidents to represent the
experiences of all oppressed peoples, in the context of a pacifist
message of ultimate understanding and reconciliation. The text's
recurrent themes of shadow and light reflect the Jungian psychoanalysis
which Tippett underwent in the years immediately before writing the
work. The oratorio's most original feature is the use of African
American spirituals, which perform the function allocated in Bach's
Passions to chorales; Tippett believed that these songs of oppression
possess a universality absent from specifically Christian and other
hymns. A Child of Our Time was well received on its first performance in
1944 at the Adelphi Theatre, London, and has since been performed all
over the world in many languages.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Child_of_Our_Time>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1799:
The coup of 18 Brumaire led by Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès and
Napoleon deposed the French government, replacing the Directory with the
Consulate.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/18_Brumaire>
1888:
Mary Jane Kelly was murdered in London, widely believed to be
the fifth and final victim of the notorious unidentified serial killer
Jack the Ripper.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Jane_Kelly>
1913:
The "Big Blow" storm reached its maximum intensity in the Great
Lakes Basin of North America, destroying 19 ships and 68,300 tons of
cargo, and killing over 250 people.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Lakes_Storm_of_1913>
1989:
East Germany announced the opening of the inner German border
and the Berlin Wall, marking the symbolic end of the Cold War, impending
collapse of the Warsaw Pact, and beginning of the end of Soviet
communism.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_German_border>
1998:
With the passing of the Human Rights Act, the United Kingdom
abolished capital punishment for all criminal offences.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Rights_Act_1998>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
dematerialize:
1. (intransitive) to disappear by becoming immaterial.
2. (transitive) to cause something to disappear by becoming immaterial.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dematerialize>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
In the fabric of space and in the nature of matter, as in a great
work of art, there is, written small, the artist's signature.
--Carl Sagan
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Carl_Sagan>