I saw and heard something remarkable just a few hours ago, something I’m not likely to forget until all the mechanisms of remembering are shot and I’m tucked away for good. Philip Roth celebrated his eightieth birthday in the Billy Johnson Auditorium of the Newark Museum last night with the most astonishing literary performance I’ve ever witnessed….

David Remnick on the Roth-endorsed, Roth-attended 80th birthday celebration of Philip Roth: http://nyr.kr/160afX8

(Source: newyorker.com)

Listen to the podcast of “Happy Birthday,” Adam Gopnik’s Comment on Philip Roth at eighty: http://nyr.kr/10Dw2EX

Happy Birthday, Bob Marley!

Revisit these classic pictures of Marley, taken by Kate Simon.  In addition to being the official photographer for Marley’s European Exodus Tour, in 1977, Kate has been a friend of Bob’s since they first met, at a concert, in 1975. Not only did Kate supply us with some amazing photos of Bob, she also shared a few words about her time with him: http://nyr.kr/YUmjcs

Rosa Parks was born a hundred years ago yesterday, on February 4, 1913. In 2008, David Remnick wrote about her funeral, held in Detroit, where she lived for many years. Here’s a look: http://nyr.kr/XGHpGe

(Source: newyorker.com)

Today, on Noam Chomsky’s 84th birthday, Gary Marcus reflects on the legacy he’s created, and his influence on linguistics: “Chomsky may not always have the right answers. But he has always had the wisdom to pose the right questions.”

Continue reading: http://nyr.kr/VnwY7Z

Photograph by Philip Jones Griffiths/Magnum.

Group portrait at Mark Twain’s seventieth-birthday party.

There are several indicators one might use to judge the level of one’s fame. One is being the highest-paid writer in the history of the world. Another is not being dissuaded by anyone from writing over two thousand pages of autobiography. And another is feeling comfortable asking the President of the United States to move Thanksgiving for your birthday celebration…

Macy Halford on the time Mark Twain tried to move Thanksgiving.

And, for those who are interested, see the menu from Twain’s seventieth-birthday bash.

Henri Cartier-Bresson travelled the world for four decades, both documenting and participating in the art, political, and social movements that would move twentieth-century culture from the old to the modern world. Originally a student of Surrealist painting, Cartier-Bresson was advised by Gertrude Stein, after she saw one of his paintings, that he’d be better off joining his family’s textile business. Instead he committed to photography, and a new type of fast portable camera: the Leica. He eventually become one of the first photographers to join the famed photo cooperative Magnum. “Joining Magnum didn’t mean leaving a coherent artistic sphere for an alien job; and being a photo-journalist didn’t mean being a photographer,” the late scholar and photo-curator Peter Galassi writes. “It meant being a student, a diplomat, a traveler, an investigator, a reporter, a historian. To Cartier-Bresson it meant engaging the whole of the world.” Today, in honor of Cartier-Bresson’s birthday, we take a look at some of the more celebratory photographs from his extraordinary career. 

Click-through for a slideshow of Cartier-Bresson’s work: http://nyr.kr/R0WkpT

(Source: newyorker.com)

Close Read: Ali at Seventy

King would have been eighty-three yesterday; Ali turned seventy today. To celebrate, we’ve liberated two pieces about him from behind our paywall. One was written in 1962, by A. J. Liebling, about his first professional fight. (“Now Cassius, having mixed the mind, began to dig in.”) The other is by David Remnick, from 1998, and tells the story of how Clay became Muhammad Ali.