Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas is the third book of Maya Angelou's six-volume autobiography series. Set between 1949 and 1955, the book largely spans Angelou's twenties. In this volume, Angelou describes her struggles to support her young son, form meaningful relationships and forge a successful career in the entertainment world. The work's 1976 publication was the first time an African American woman had expanded her life story into a third volume. Scholar Dolly McPherson called the book "a graphic portrait of the adult self in bloom", while critic Lyman B. Hagen called it "a journey of discovery and rebirth". In Swingin' and Singin, Angelou examines many of the same subjects and themes in her previous autobiographies, including travel, music, race, conflict, and motherhood. Angelou depicts the conflict she felt as a single mother, despite her success as a performer as she travels Europe with the musical Porgy and Bess. Her depictions of her travels, which take up 40 percent of the book, have roots in the African American slave narrative. Read the rest of this article: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singin%27_and_Swingin%27_and_Gettin%27_Merry_Like_Christmas> _______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries: 1513: Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León set foot on Florida, becoming the first European known to do so, purportedly while searching for the Fountain of Youth in the New World. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Ponce_de_Le%C3%B3n> 1801: War of the Second Coalition: British forces led by Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson defeated the Dano-Norwegian fleet at the Battle of Copenhagen off the coast of Copenhagen. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Copenhagen> 1956: As the World Turns premiered on American television as the first half-hour soap opera . <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/As_the_World_Turns> 1973: The Liberal Movement broke away from the Liberal and Country League in South Australia. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Movement_%28Australia%29> 2002: Operation Defensive Shield: Approximately 200 Palestinian militants fled the advancing Israel Defense Forces into the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, starting a month-long standoff. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_the_Church_of_the_Nativity_in_Bethlehem> _____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day: antsy (adj): Restless, apprehensive and fidgety <http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/antsy> ___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day: My spirit to yours dear brother, Do not mind because many sounding your name do not understand you, I do not sound your name, but I understand you, I specify you with joy O my comrade to salute you, and to salute those who are with you, before and since, and those to come also, That we all labor together transmitting the same charge and succession, We few equals indifferent of lands, indifferent of times, We, enclosers of all continents, all castes, allowers of all theologies, Compassionaters, perceivers, rapport of men, We walk silent among disputes and assertions, but reject not the disputers nor any thing that is asserted, We hear the bawling and din, we are reach'd at by divisions, jealousies, recriminations on every side, They close peremptorily upon us to surround us, my comrade, Yet we walk unheld, free, the whole earth over, journeying up and down till we make our ineffaceable mark upon time and the diverse eras, Till we saturate time and eras, that the men and women of races, ages to come, may prove brethren and lovers as we are. --Walt Whitman <http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Walt_Whitman>