Casino Royale (1953) is a James Bond novel, the first of twelve
featuring the British secret agent by Ian Fleming. At a casino in
Royale-les-Eaux, Bond beats Le Chiffre, the treasurer of a French trade
union and a member of the Russian secret service, in a high-stakes
baccarat game; Bond wins 80 million francs belonging to SMERSH, the
Soviet counterintelligence agency. He is supported by Vesper Lynd, a
member of his own service, as well as Felix Leiter of the CIA and René
Mathis of the French Deuxième Bureau. Fleming took plot elements from
his wartime experiences in the Naval Intelligence Division and based
some characters on people he met during the war; the character of Bond
also reflected many of Fleming's personal tastes. Looking for
distraction in advance of his forthcoming wedding, Fleming wrote the
draft in early 1952 at his Goldeneye estate in Jamaica. The book was
given broadly positive reviews by critics at the time and sold out in
less than a month after its UK release, although US sales upon release a
year later were much slower. The story has been adapted several times,
including in a daily comic strip and twice on film, a 1967 adaptation
starring David Niven and a 2006 version starring Daniel Craig.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casino_Royale_(novel)>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1742:
Messiah, an oratorio by baroque composer George Frideric
Handel, premiered in Dublin.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messiah_(Handel)>
1829:
The Roman Catholic Relief Act was granted Royal Assent,
removing the most substantial restrictions on Catholics in the United
Kingdom.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_Relief_Act_1829>
1919:
British Indian Army troops massacred hundreds of unarmed men,
women and children who were attending a peaceful gathering at the
Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, Punjab, India.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jallianwala_Bagh_massacre>
1945:
World War II: Soviet and Bulgarian forces captured Vienna in
German-occupied Austria.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vienna_Offensive>
2009 - Twenty-three people died in a homeless hostel fire in Kamień
Pomorski, Poland, the country's deadliest fire since 1980.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamie%C5%84_Pomorski_homeless_hostel_fire>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
pink slime:
1. (paper manufacture) An undesirable pink-colored microbial mass occurring
in the slurry used in making paper.
2. (informal) A meat byproduct produced from otherwise unusable material
such as skin and connective tissue, spinal bones, and digestive tissue
by heating and then mixing with ammonia in a centrifuge to produce a
food additive.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pink_slime>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
I am for freedom of religion, & against all maneuvres to bring
about a legal ascendancy of one sect over another, for freedom of the
press, and against all violations of the Constitution to silence by
force and not by reason the complaints or criticisms, just or unjust, of
our citizens against the conduct of their agents.
--Thomas Jefferson
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thomas_Jefferson>