- Condoleezza Rice
Condoleezza Rice (born November 14 1954) is the 66th United States Secretary of State, and the second in the administration of President George W. Bush to hold the office. Rice is the first African American woman, second African American (after Colin Powell, who served before her from 2001 - 2005), and second woman (after Madeleine Albright who served from 1997 to 2001, before Colin Powell) to serve as Secretary of State. - Ho Chi Minh
Hồ Chí Minh was a Vietnamese revolutionary and statesman, who later became Prime Minister (1946–1955) and President (1946–1969) of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Ho is most famous for leading the Viet Minh independence movement from 1941 onward, establishing the communist-governed Democratic Republic of Vietnam in 1945 and defeating the French Union in 1954 at Dien Bien Phu. Ho was fluent in Vietnamese, several dialects of Chinese, English and French. - Kofi Annan
Annan must also be commended for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria and for his sustained advocacy to increase access to drugs and diagnostics for poor people especially in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Eastern Europe. The United Nations and Annan won the Nobel Peace Prize back in 2001, one of the highest accolades he had received during his career as secretary-general. - Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand (March 6 1982), born Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum, was a Russian-born American novelist and philosopher, best known for creating a philosophy she named "Objectivism" and for writing the novels "We the Living," "The Fountainhead," "Atlas Shrugged" and the novella "Anthem." Her influential and controversial ideas have attracted both enthusiastic admiration and scathing denunciation. <br - José Rizal
José Rizal (June 19, 1861 - December 30, 1896), was a Filipino polymath, nationalist and the most prominent advocate for reforms in the Philippines during the Spanish colonial era and its eventual independence from Spain. He is considered a national hero and the anniversary of Rizal's death is commemorated as a Philippine holiday called "Rizal Day". Rizal's 1896 military trial and execution made him a martyr of the Philippine Revolution. - Michel Thomas
Michel Thomas (February 3, 1914 - January 8, 2005) was a polyglot linguist, language teacher and decorated war veteran. He survived Nazi persecution, served in the French Resistance and worked with the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps during World War II. Over the years, several aspects of his war record were challenged, most notably by the Los Angeles Times, which Thomas sued for libel, and by Pierre Truche, … - Richard Francis Burton
Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS (March 19, 1821 - October 20, 1890) was a British explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, ethnologist, linguist, poet, hypnotist, fencer and diplomat. He was known for his travels and explorations within Asia and Africa as well as his extraordinary knowledge of languages and cultures. According to one count, he spoke twenty-nine European, Asian, and African languages. - Joseph Campbell
Joseph John Campbell was an American mythology professor, writer, and orator best known for his work in the fields of comparative mythology and comparative religion. - Brian Walton
Brian Walton (1600 - November 29, 1661) was an English divine and scholar. He was born at Seymour, in the district of Cleveland, Yorkshire, and went to Cambridge as a sizar of Magdalene College in 1616, migrated to Peterhouse in 1618, was bachelor in 1619 and master of arts in 1623. After holding a school mastership and two curacies, he was made rector of St Martin's Ongar in London in 1628, … - Paul Celan
Paul Celan was the most frequently used pseudonym of Paul Antschel, one of the major poets of the post-World War II era. Celan is widely considered one of the finest European lyric poets of his time and one of the most profound, innovative and original poets of the 20th century. - Ziad Fazah
Ziad Youssef Fazah (born June 10, 1954 in Monrovia, Liberia) is reputed to be the world's most accomplished hyperpolyglot. It is said that he speaks, reads and understands 58 languages, most of which learned before the age of 20. His skills have been successfully tested on TV shows around the world by speakers of such languages as Mongolian, Czech, Korean and Hungarian. Raised in Lebanon, he has lived in Brazil since the 1970s. - Wesley Clark
Wesley Kanne Clark (born December 23 1944) is a retired four-star general of the United States Army. Clark was valedictorian of his class at West Point, was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford where he obtained a degree in PPE, and later graduated from the Command and General Staff College with a master's degree in military science. He spent 34 years in the Army and the Department of Defense, receiving many military decorations, … - Washington Irving
Washington Irving was an American author of the early 19th century. Best known for his short stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip van Winkle" (both of which appear in his book "The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon"), he was also a prolific essayist, biographer and historian. Irving and James Fenimore Cooper were the first American writers to earn acclaim in Europe, and Irving is said to have encouraged authors such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, … - William Jones
Sir William Jones (September 28, 1746 - April 27, 1794) was an English philologist and student of ancient India, particularly known for his proposition of the existence of a relationship among Indo-European languages. - Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski (born August 18, 1933) is a film director, writer, actor and producer. After beginning his career in Poland, he became a celebrated arthouse filmmaker, and Hollywood director of such films as "Rosemary's Baby" (1968) and "Chinatown" (1974). He is also known for his tumultuous personal life. In 1969, his wife, Sharon Tate, was murdered by the Manson Family. - Ban Ki-Moon
Ban Ki-moon (born June 13 1944 in Eumseong, North Chungcheong, Korea) is a South Korean diplomat and the current Secretary-General of the United Nations. He succeeded Kofi Annan in this capacity on January 1 2007. Ban was the Foreign Minister of the Republic of Korea from January 2004 to November 1 2006. On October 13 2006, he was elected to be the eighth Secretary-General by the United Nations General Assembly and was sworn in on December 14 2006. - Marguerite Annie Johnson
Maya Angelou is hailed as one of the great voices of contemporary literature and as a remarkable Renaissance woman. A poet, educator, historian, best-selling author, actress, playwright, civil-rights activist, producer and director, Dr. Angelou continues to travel the world making appearances, spreading her legendary wisdom. A mesmerizing vision of grace, swaying and stirring when she moves, Dr. Angelou captivates her audiences lyrically with vigor, fire and perception. - Leon Trotsky
"' (– August 21 1940), born Leon Davidovich Bronstein"', was a Ukrainian-born Jewish Bolshevik revolutionary and Marxist theorist. He was an influential politician in the early days of the Soviet Union, first as People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs and later as the founder and commander of the Red Army and People's Commissar of War. He was also among the first members of the Politburo. - Salma Hayek
Salma Hayek Jiménez (born September 2, 1966) is an Academy Award, Golden Globe and Emmy-nominated Mexican/American actress, Daytime Emmy-winning director, and an Emmy-nominated tv and film producer. Hayek has appeared in more than thirty films and performed as an actress outside of Hollywood in Mexico and Spain. Hayek's charitable work includes increasing awareness on violence against women and discrimination against immigrants. [1] - Madeleine Korbel Albright
Madeleine Albright (1937 - ) was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia. As the Nazis invaded that country before World War II, Albright and her family fled and eventually settled in the U.S. She graduated from Wellesley College in Massachusetts, and she later received master's and doctorate degrees from Columbia University in New York. By the late 1970s, she was working in the White House for President Jimmy Carter 's national security team. - Benito Arias Montano
Benito Arias Montano or Benedictus Arias Montanus (1527-1598), Spanish orientalist and editor of the "Antwerp Polyglot", was born at Fregenal de la Sierra, in Extremadura, in 1527. After studying at the universities of Seville and Alcala, he took orders about the year 1559. He became a clerical member of the Military Order of St. James, and accompanied the Bishop of Segovia to the Council of Trent (1562) where he won great distinction. - Viggo Mortensen
Young Viggo was an artistic kid, always to be seen with a pencil and paper on hand. This would continue back in New York State when, his parents divorcing in 1969, he and his brothers would move with their mother from Argentina back to Watertown. - Milla Jovovich
Milla Jovovich /Milica Jovović, Ukrainian: Мілла Йовович/Mіlla Jovovič (Born Milica Nataša Jovović on December 17, 1975)) is an Ukrainian-born supermodel, actress, musician, singer, and fashion designer. Jovovich has been described by Paul W.S. Anderson, director of her film "Resident Evil", … - Ayaan Hirsi Ali
This individual dismissed Warraq's unique and important collection on apostasy in Islam, because Warraq (and by extension, all Muslim apostates) was (were), '... no longer in the game.' It was astonishing to hear such a glib assessment from a conservative intellectual and self-appointed doyen (subsequently, government-appointed) examining Islamic terrorism. - Paul Robeson
Paul LeRoy Bustill Robeson (April 9, 1898 - January 23, 1976) was a multi-lingual American actor, athlete, bass-baritone concert singer, writer, civil rights activist, Communist sympathizer, Spingarn Medal winner, and Stalin Peace Prize laureate. - Sarah Connor
Sarah Terenzi, better known as Sarah Connor, is a German singer, songwriter, and dancer. She debuted in 2001 under the guidance of producers Rob Tyger and Kay Denar and became the first act to ever have four consecutive chart-topping hits on the German "Media Control" singles chart. Following a major international success with her single "From Sarah with Love", … - Arthur Koestler
Arthur Koestler (September 5, 1905, Budapest - March 3, 1983, London) was a Hungarian polymath who became a naturalized British subject. He wrote journalism, novels, social philosophy, and books on scientific subjects. In 1931, he joined the Communist Party of Germany, but left the party seven years later, after emigrating to the United Kingdom. By the late 1940s, he was one of the most recognized and outspoken British anti-communists, … - John Bowring
Sir John Bowring, KCB (Chinese translated name 寶寧 or 包令) (17 October, 1792 - 23 November, 1872) was an English political economist, traveller, miscellaneous writer and polyglot, and the 4th Governor of Hong Kong. - Mircea Eliade
Mircea Eliade was a Romanian historian of religion, fiction writer, philosopher, and professor at the University of Chicago. He was a leading interpreter of religious experience, who established paradigms in religious studies that persist to this day. His theory that "hierophanies" form the basis of religion, splitting the human experience of reality into sacred and profane space and time, has proved influential. - Monica Bellucci
Monica Anna Maria Bellucci (born September 30, 1964) is an Italian actress and former fashion model. She is considered an Italian sex symbol - Thomas Young
Thomas Young (June 13, 1773-May 10, 1829) was an English polymath, contributing to optics, physiology, and Egyptology, among other fields. - L. L. Zamenhof
Ludvic Lazarus (Ludwik Lejzer, Ludwik Łazarz) Zamenhof was an eye doctor, philologist, and the initiator of Esperanto, the most widely spoken and successful constructed language in the world. According to biographers A. Zakrzewski and E. Wiesenfeld, his native languages were Polish, from the neighborhood where he was raised, and his parents' languages Russian and Yiddish, but his father was a German teacher, … - Charles Berlitz
Charles Frambach Berlitz was a linguist and language teacher known for his books on anomalous phenomena, as well as his language-learning courses. He is listed in People's Almanac as one of fifteen most eminent linguists in the world and was awarded the Dag Hammarskjöld International Prize for Non-fiction in 1976 for "The Bermuda Triangle" (1974), which sold over 20 million copies. He was a brilliant polyglot and spoke 32 languages. - Heinrich Schliemann
Heinrich Schliemann (January 6, 1822 - December 26, 1890) was a German-Russian treasure hunter, an advocate of the historical reality of places mentioned in the works of Homer, and an important excavator of Mycenaean sites, such as Troy, Mycenae and Tiryns. - Teresa Heinz
Maria Teresa Thierstein Simões-Ferreira Heinz is an American philanthropist, the wife of U.S. Senator John Kerry and the widow of the late Senator H. John Heinz III. - Michael Hardt
Michael Hardt (born 1960) is an American literary theorist and political philosopher based at Duke University. Perhaps his most famous work is "Empire" written with Antonio Negri. The sequel to "Empire", called "Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire", was released in August, 2004, and details the idea of the multitude (which Hardt and Negri initially elaborated in "Empire") as the potential site of a global democratic movement. - Mario Pei
Mario Andrew Pei (1901-1978) was an Italian-American linguist and polyglot, who wrote a number of popular books known for their accessibility to readers without a professional background in linguistics. - Barry Farber
Barry Farber (born 1930) is a conservative U.S. radio talk show host, author and language-learning enthusiast. In 2002, industry publication "Talkers magazine" ranked him the 9th greatest radio talk show host of all time. He has also written articles appearing in the "New York Times, Reader's Digest," the "Washington Post, "and the Saturday Review. - Katie Melua
Ketevan "Katie" Melua is a British-Georgian singer and musician, who was born in Georgia, but moved to Northern Ireland at the age of eight and then relocated to England at the age of 14. Melua is signed to the small Dramatico record label, under the management of songwriter Mike Batt, and made her musical debut in 2003. She is, as of 2006, the United Kingdom's biggest-selling female artist and Europe's highest selling European female artist. - Jonas Savimbi
Jonas Malheiro Savimbi was a rebel leader in Angola who founded the UNITA movement in 1966, and ultimately proved a central figure in 20th century Cold War politics. With support from the governments of the United States, China, South Africa, Israel, several African leaders (Félix Houphouët-Boigny of Côte d'Ivoire, Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, King Hassan II of Morocco and Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia), and foreign mercenaries from Portugal, Israel, South Africa, …
|
| |