Born this week
Wednesday December 24th, 2025
Benjamin Disraeli
December 21, 1804 – April 19, 1881
Youth is a blunder Manhood a struggle, Old Age a regret.
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, KG, PC, FRS, was a British Conservative politician, writer and aristocrat who twice served as ...
Henry Miller
December 26, 1891 – June 7, 1980
An artist is always alone - if he is an artist. No, what the artist needs is loneliness.
Henry Valentine Miller was an American writer. He was known for breaking with existing literary forms, developing a new sort of ...
Frank Zappa
December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993
Art is making something out of nothing and selling it.
Frank Vincent Zappa was an American musician, bandleader, songwriter, composer, recording engineer, record producer, and film director. In ...
Mao Zedong
December 26, 1893 – September 9, 1976
The people, and the people alone, are the motive force in the making of world history.
Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese Communist revolutionary and the ...
Rebecca West
December 21, 1892 – March 15, 1983
Any authentic work of art must start an argument between the artist and his audience.
Dame Cicely Isabel Fairfield DBE, known as Rebecca West, or Dame Rebecca West, was a British author, journalist, literary critic and travel ...
Marlene Dietrich
December 27, 1901 – May 6, 1992
Most women set out to try to change a man, and when they have changed him they do not like him.
Marie Magdalene "Marlene" Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer. Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by ...
Matthew Arnold
December 24, 1822 – April 15, 1888
The freethinking of one age is the common sense of the next.
Matthew Arnold was an English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed ...
Quentin Crisp
December 25, 1908 – November 21, 1999
For an introvert his environment is himself and can never be subject to startling or unforeseen change.
Quentin Crisp was an English writer and raconteur. From a conventional suburban background, Crisp grew up with effeminate tendencies, ...
Samuel Smiles
December 23, 1812 – April 16, 1904
Lost wealth may be replaced by industry, lost knowledge by study, lost health by temperance or medicine, but lost time is gone forever.
Samuel Smiles, was a Scottish author and government reformer. He is most known for writing Self-Help, which "elevated [Smiles] to celebrity ...
Jean Racine
December 22, 1639 – April 21, 1699
A tragedy need not have blood and death it's enough that it all be filled with that majestic sadness that is the pleasure of tragedy.
Jean Racine, baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine, was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, and an ...
Anwar Sadat
December 25, 1918 – October 6, 1981
There can be hope only for a society which acts as one big family, not as many separate ones.
Muhammad Anwar El Sadat was the third President of Egypt, serving from 15 October 1970 until his assassination by fundamentalist army ...
Muhammad Ali Jinnah
December 25, 1876 – September 11, 1948
Expect the best, Prepare for the worst.
Muhammad Ali Jinnah was a lawyer, politician, and the founder of Pakistan. Jinnah served as leader of the All-India Muslim League from 1913 ...
Oscar Levant
December 27, 1906 – August 14, 1972
Schizophrenia beats dining alone.
Oscar Levant was an American pianist, composer, author, comedian, and actor. He was as famous for his mordant character and witticisms, on ...
Louis Pasteur
December 27, 1822 – September 28, 1895
Science knows no country, because knowledge belongs to humanity, and is the torch which illuminates the world.
Louis Pasteur was a French chemist and microbiologist renowned for his discoveries of the principles of vaccination, microbial fermentation ...
Frank B. Kellogg
December 22, 1856 – December 21, 1937
It is not to be expected that human nature will change in a day.
Frank Billings Kellogg was an American lawyer, politician and statesman who served in the U.S. Senate and as U.S. Secretary of State. He ...
Charles Simmons
December 24, 1885 – February 15, 1945
Never go backward. Attempt, and do it with all your might. Determination is power.
Charles Simmons (December 24, 1885 - July 5, 1945) was a British gymnast who competed in the 1912 Summer Olympics. He was born on December ...
Clara Barton
December 25, 1821 – April 12, 1912
Everybody's business is nobody's business, and nobody's business is my business.
Clarissa Harlowe "Clara" Barton was a pioneer nurse who founded the American Red Cross. In addition to being a hospital nurse, she worked ...
Charles Babbage
December 26, 1791 – October 18, 1871
At each increase of knowledge, as well as on the contrivance of every new tool, human labour becomes abridged.
Charles Babbage, FRS was an English polymath. A mathematician, philosopher, inventor and mechanical engineer, Babbage is best remembered ...
Charles Olson
December 27, 1910 – January 10, 1970
This morning of the small snow I count the blessings, the leak in the faucet which makes of the sink time, the drop of the water on water.
Charles Olson was a second generation American modernist poet who was a link between earlier figures such as Ezra Pound and William Carlos ...
James Lane Allen
December 21, 1849 – February 18, 1925
He who has conquered doubt and fear has conquered failure.
James Lane Allen was an American novelist and short story writer whose work, including the novel A Kentucky Cardinal, often depicted the ...
Walter Hagen
December 21, 1892 – October 6, 1969
It is the addition of strangeness to beauty that constitutes the romantic character in art.
Walter Charles Hagen was an American professional golfer and a major figure in golf in the first half of the 20th century. His tally of 11 ...
Cab Calloway
December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994
90%, 100% are going there to hear the singing. The story is another thing. Nobody's interested in the story. Happiness is happiness.
Cabell "Cab" Calloway III was a jazz singer and bandleader. He was strongly associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City, where ...
Carlos Castaneda
December 25, 1925 – April 27, 1998
A man of knowledge lives by acting, not by thinking about acting.
Carlos Castaneda, was an American author with a Ph.D. in anthropology. Starting with The Teachings of Don Juan in 1968, Castaneda wrote a ...
Carlos Castenada
December 25, 1925 – April 27, 1998
A man of knowledge chooses a path with a heart and follows it and then he looks and rejoices and laughs and then he sees and knows.
Carlos Castaneda, was an American author with a Ph.D. in anthropology. Starting with The Teachings of Don Juan in 1968, Castaneda wrote a ...
Steve Allen
December 26, 1921 – October 30, 2000
Humor is a social lubricant that helps us get over some of the bad spots.
Stephen Valentine Patrick William "Steve" Allen was an American television personality, musician, composer, actor, comedian, and writer. ...
Julien Benda
December 26, 1867 – June 7, 1956
Peace, if it ever exists, will not be based on the fear of war but on the love of peace.
Julien Benda (December 26, 1867, Paris—June 7, 1956, Fontenay-aux-Roses) was a French philosopher and novelist. He remains famous for his ...
Helena Rubinstein
December 25, 1872 – April 1965
Leave the table while you still feel you could eat a little more.
Helena Rubinstein, a Polish-born American business magnate. A cosmetics entrepreneur she was the founder and eponym of company Helena ...
Bill Ayers
December 26, 1944 – September 24, 1980
It's amazing where the paranoid mind can take you.
William Charles "Bill" Ayers is an American elementary education theorist and a former leader in the counterculture movement that opposed ...
Thomas Gray
December 26, 1716 – July 30, 1771
Poetry is thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.
Thomas Gray was an English poet, letter-writer, classical scholar and professor at Cambridge University. He is widely known for his Elegy ...