World Biographical Encyclopedia

Ian Gillan is an English singer-songwriter and musician who rose to prominence as the lead vocalist and frontman of rock band Deep Purple. Perhaps one of the most underrated singers of the rock era, he famously had in-fights with band-mate Ritchie Blackmore prompting him to join other bands, most particularly Black Sabbath.

Maria Montessori

Maria Montessori was an Italian physician, educator and innovator acclaimed for her educational method that builds on the way children naturally learn.

Charles Steinmetz

Charles Steinmetz was a German-born American mathematician and electrical engineer and professor at Union College.

Jean Harlow

Jean Harlow was an American film actress and sex symbol of the 1930s.

Rafael Ferrer

Rafael Ferrer is a Puerto Rican painter, sculptor, graphic artist, performance artist, teacher, musician. His paintings – expressionistic, hard-bitten yet beautiful representations of his native Caribbean - are remarkably alive and potent critiques of both European primitivism and "identity art."

Richard Rorty

Richard McKay Rorty was an American pragmatist philosopher and public intellectual noted for his wide-ranging critique of the modern conception of philosophy as a quasi-scientific enterprise aimed at reaching certainty and objective truth. In politics, he argued against programs of both the left and the right in favor of what he described as a meliorative and reformist "bourgeois liberalism."

René Descartes

René Descartes was a French scientist and philosopher, who invented analytical geometry and introduced skepticism as an essential part of the scientific method. He is regarded as one of the greatest philosophers in history.

George Clooney

George Clooney is a well-known American actor and filmmaker, who appeared in the 1990's as a famous leading man, known for his good looks and versatility. He is best known for his roles in the "Ocean's" film series and for his Oscar-winning performance in "Syriana". Besides, George is a respected director, screenwriter and human rights and political activist, who has served as one of the United N...

Mike Piazza

Mike Piazza is an American former baseball player for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Mets who is considered the best-hitting catcher in the history of the game. He played 16 seasons in Major League Baseball, from 1992 to 2007. Also, Mike manages the Italy national baseball team.

Lindsey Vonn

Lindsey Vonn is a former American alpine skier. A three-time Olympic Champion, she won four women's World Cup overall alpine skiing championships (2008–10 and 2012) and eight World Cup season titles in all five disciplines, in particular, downhill, super-G, slalom, giant slalom, and super combined. She is the all-time leader in women's World Cup race victories with 82.

Étienne-Jules Marey

Étienne-Jules Marey was a French physician and physiologist. He invented the modern cine camera and developed the new field of scientific cinematography. His interest in analyzing the mechanics of physiological movements led to several valuable recording instruments, including the Marey tambour, various specialized cameras for recording the movement of humans and other animals, and high-speed and...

Jean-Luc Nancy

Jean-Luc Nancy is a French philosopher who has written more than twenty books and hundreds of texts or contributions to volumes, catalogues and journals. His philosophical scope is very broad: from On Kawara to Heidegger, from the sense of the world and the deconstruction of Christianity to the Jena romantics of the Schlegel brothers.

Jirō Akagawa

Jirō Akagawa is a Japanese writer, working in a mystery genre. He is one of most successful writers in the history of Japan in terms of popularity of his works. Also known for his productivity, he has written an astounding 500 works since his first novel showed up in 1977.

Karl Popper

Karl Raimund Popper was an Austrian-born British philosopher of natural and social science. He subscribed to anti-determinist metaphysics, believing that knowledge evolves from the experience of the mind.

Ama Aidoo

Ama Ata Aidoo, née Christina Ama Aidoo is a Ghanaian author, poet, playwright and academic. She was also a Minister of Education in Ghana under the Jerry Rawlings administration. She currently lives in Ghana, where in 2000 she established the Mbaasem Foundation to promote and support the work of African women writers