South Pacific is a musical composed by Richard Rodgers, with lyrics by
Oscar Hammerstein II and book by Hammerstein and Joshua Logan. The work
was an immediate hit on Broadway in 1949, running for 1,925 performances
and winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The plot is based on several
stories in James A. Michener's Pulitzer Prize–winning 1947 book Tales
of the South Pacific. Rodgers and Hammerstein believed that the musical
could be successful and send a strong progressive message on racism.
They wrote several of the songs with the particular talents of their
stars, Ezio Pinza and Mary Martin, in mind. Most of its songs became
popular, including "Some Enchanted Evening" and "I'm Gonna Wash That
Man
Right Outa My Hair" (performance pictured). The original Broadway
production won ten Tony Awards, including Best Musical; its original
cast album was the bestselling record of the 1940s. The show has enjoyed
many successful revivals and tours, spawning a 1958 film and later
television adaptations.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pacific_%28musical%29>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1724:
Johann Sebastian Bach premiered his St John Passion, a musical
setting of the Passion of Jesus, at Good Friday Vespers in St. Nicholas
Church, Leipzig.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_John_Passion>
1945:
World War II: U.S. forces sank the Japanese battleship Yamato,
then the largest in the world, during Operation Ten-Go in the East China
Sea.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ten-Go>
1995:
First Chechen War: Russian paramilitary troops began a massacre
of hundreds of civilians in Samashki, Chechnya.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samashki_massacre>
2010:
Violent protests started in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek in
response to perceived corruption and rising living expenses, eventually
resulting in the collapse of President Kurmanbek Bakiyev's government.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyrgyz_Revolution_of_2010>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
chivvy:
1. (transitive, Britain) To coerce or hurry along, as by persistent
request.
2. (transitive, Britain) To subject to harassment or verbal abuse.
3. (transitive, Britain) To sneak up on or rapidly approach.
4. (transitive, Britain) To pursue as in a hunt.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/chivvy>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the
impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science …
In spite of difference of soil and climate, of language and manners, of
laws and customs, — in spite of things silently gone out of mind, and
things violently destroyed, the Poet binds together by passion and
knowledge the vast empire of human society, as it is spread over the
whole earth, and over all time … Poetry is the first and last of all
knowledge — it is as immortal as the heart of man.
--William Wordsworth
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Wordsworth>