"Webster was standing on the windowsill. He was panting slightly... but on his face was the satisfied smile of a victor. He moved his head... as if looking for the microphone through which his public expected him to speak a modest word or two." —Cats Will Be Cats, PG Wodehouse #BookologyThursday

"[Toto] was a little black dog, with long silky hair and small black eyes that twinkled merrily on either side of his funny, wee nose. Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly." —The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum #BookologyThursday

"Fern loved Wilbur more than anything... Every morning, as soon as she got up, she warmed his milk... Wilbur loved his milk, and he was never happier than when Fern was warming up a bottle for him. He would stand and gaze up at her with adoring eyes." —Charlotte's Web, EB White #BookologyThursday

"Like many other much-loved humans, they believed that they owned their dogs, instead of realizing that their dogs owned them. Pongo and Missis found this touching and amusing and let their pets think it was true." —101 Dalmatians, Dodie Smith #BookologyThursday

"How a Mosquito Operates" (1912) is a six-minute animated film made by the groundbreaking cartoonist Winsor McCay. It was first screened as part of McCay's vaudeville act. In this film, a giant mosquito torments a sleeping man, and gets his comeuppance. #WyrdWednesday youtu.be/77cn30IeZPU?...

"The Metamorphosis" by Franz Kafka is a surreal 1915 novella about Gregor Samsa, who wakes up one morning to find he's transformed into a giant insect. Interpretations vary, but academic discussions have involved its themes of alienation, identity, and dehumanization. #WyrdWednesday

The Mothman—described as a 7-foot-tall humanoid creature with a 15-foot wingspan and two large, red, glowing eyes—was first sighted in West Virginia in 1966. Terrified witnesses have described him chasing cars and pounding on the roofs, flying faster than any bird. #WyrdWednesday

"Lady Meng Jiang" is the Chinese tale about a woman whose husband is forced into slave labor at the Great Wall of China, and dies by the time she arrives to bring him a change of clothes. She weeps for days until part of the Great Wall collapses, revealing his bones. #LegendaryWednesday

In the ancient Persian epic "Khosrow and Shirin," the Sasanian king Khosrow romantically pursues the Armenian princess Shirin. Soon after she finally agrees to marry him, Khosrow is murdered by his son, who wants Shirin for himself. Shirin then dies by suicide. #LegendaryWednesday

In the Spanish legend "The Lovers of Teruel," a poor man, Diego, leaves town to build a fortune so he can marry the wealthy Isabel. He returns just after she weds another man, and dies of heartbreak. Isabel wears her wedding dress to his funeral, where she dies too. #LegendaryWednesday

In the Japanese tale "The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter," a bamboo cutter and his wife raise a baby girl they find in a stalk of bamboo. She later reveals she's a princess of the moon and must return there. When she dons her celestial robe, her memories of life on earth are erased. #FairyTaleTuesday

In Ojibwa legend, the sun becomes entangled in a tall tree and needs a squirrel's help to get free. The squirrel's proximity to the sun burns away his fur and tail. Once free, the sun thanks the squirrel by giving him wings, transforming him into the first bat. #FairyTaleTuesday

"The Buried Moon" is an English tale about the moon being trapped and buried under a rock by creatures of the night. With her out of the way, they're free to terrorize humans. A wise woman guides a group of men in freeing the moon, and the creatures are banished. #FairyTaleTuesday

The lotus—once considered The Sacred Lily of the Nile—was valued by Ancient Egyptians as a divine symbol of rebirth and a source of both medicine and perfume. The sun god Amun-Ra was born from a lotus. Nefertum, god of perfume, began life as a lotus. #MythologyMonday

Tabib al-Bahr (Doctor of the Sea) is a humanoid fish with a gemstone in its forehead that heals the sick and injured. In the writings of alchemist Jabir ibn Hayyan, he claims his ship's crew captured a female, who healed their sick and was impregnated by a sailor. #MythologyMonday

Li Tieguai, one of the Eight Immortals in the Taoist Pantheon, walks with an iron crutch and carries a gourd containing medicine, which he uses to heal the sick. Though portrayed as an unkempt, ill-tempered old man, he's compassionate to the poor and needy. #MythologyMonday

"Trout, incidentally, had written a book about a money tree. It had twenty-dollar bills for leaves... Its fruit was diamonds. It attracted human beings who killed each other around the roots and made very good fertilizer. So it goes." —Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut #BookWormSat

"Maisie had died in the effort to strap up a great portmanteau. She had died so grotesquely that her little body had fallen forward into the trunk, and it had closed upon her, like the jaws of a gigantic alligator... Her heart had just stopped." —The Good Soldier, Ford Madox Ford #BookWormSat

“I had to fast. I can’t do anything else,” said the hunger artist... "Because I couldn’t find a food which I enjoyed. If I had found that, believe me, I would not have made a spectacle of myself and would have eaten to my heart’s content." —A Hunger Artist, Franz Kafka #BookWormSat

Bears are revered creatures in Finnish lore, deeply feared and respected by ancient tribes. The Otso, or Kings of the Forests, are divine bear spirits. Some legends claim they're created when a human flees civilization and becomes transformed by the forest. #FolkyFriday

In Korean myth, a tiger and a bear ask the divine King Hwanung to turn them human. He instructs them to live in a cave for 100 days, eating only garlic and mugwort. The tiger gives up midway, but the bear persists, transforms into a woman, and marries Hwanung. #FolkyFriday

Ninhursag, Sumerian mother goddess and Lady of the Sacred Mountains, has foxes as her messengers. In one myth, she curses her husband Enki for eating sacred plants. Enki becomes deathly ill, and a fox is the only one who can find Ninhursag and convince her to heal him. #FolkyFriday

The character of Grandmama alternates between being Gomez's mother and Morticia's mother throughout different adaptations—an inconsistency that's referenced in the stage musical. #FlashbackFriday discover.hubpages.com/entertainmen...

Surprisingly, the first same-sex kiss on screen did not happen in an LGBTQ+ film. #FlashbackFriday discover.hubpages.com/entertainmen...

The first horror films ever made were supernatural, demonic, and even comedic. #FlashbackFriday discover.hubpages.com/entertainmen...

"I can feel everything. And I want to keep feeling everything. Even the painful, awful, terrible things. Because feeling things is what lets us know that we're alive. And I want to be alive." —My Heart and Other Black Holes, Jasmine Warga #BookologyThursday

"A great desire came over Eepersip. She wanted to fly and swoop through the air like the swallows. She thought to herself that they had always been her favourite birds. She had always marvelled at their flight." —The House Without Windows, Barbara Newhall Follett #BookologyThursday

"My dear girls, I am ambitious for you... I'd rather see you poor men's wives, if you were happy, beloved, contented, than queens on thrones, without self-respect and peace." —Little Women, Louisa May Alcott #BookologyThursday

Don't say you're committed to creating a better world if you're not willing to spill the blood of fascists. Don't be so naive as to think revolution can happen without bloodshed. Remember: if we don't make it dangerous to be a Nazi, Nazis will make it dangerous not to be one.

In 1864 in Cleveland, Tennessee, 7-year-old Nina Craigmiles died in an accident & was buried in a mausoleum where a church was later built. Mysterious red stains have appeared on the mausoleum, & sightings have been reported of a little ghost girl playing nearby. #WyrdWednesday

Renowned herbalist, midwife, & voodoo practitioner Marie Laveau was buried in a family crypt in St. Louis Cemetery in New Orleans, Louisiana. Tourists have left offerings & drawn X marks on her tomb as part of a ritual to get her to grant their wishes. #WyrdWednesday

The Poe Toaster is a title given to an unidentified person who annually visited Edgar Allan Poe's grave for over 70 years, starting in the 1930s. Described as a figure dressed in black, they'd pour a glass of cognac, toast to Poe's memory, & leave three roses. #WyrdWednesday

The Italian fairy tale "The She-Bear" tells the story of Preziosa, a princess who must escape an incestuous marriage to her father. An old woman gives her a piece of wood which, when placed in her mouth, turns her into a bear, and she escapes into a forest. #FairyTaleTuesday

In the Ojibwe tale "How the Bear Lost His Tail," an otter (or a fox, in some versions) tricks a bear into sticking his long, bushy tail into a hole in a frozen lake to catch fish. His tail freezes and breaks off, which is why bears have short, stubby tails now. #FairyTaleTuesday

In the Wyandot legend "Why the Leaves Have Many Colors," a belligerent bear chases a deer into the sky lands. The deer fights back, goring the bear with his antlers. The blood drips down to earth and lands on the trees, which is why leaves change color in autumn. #FairyTaleTuesday

The Book of Two Ways is the Ancient Egyptian map of the Underworld, found on sarcophagi in the Coptic village Deir el Bersha. It shows two paths across a dangerous, demon-ridden landscape, ultimately leading to the realm of the god of the dead, Osiris. #MythologyMonday

In Japanese myth, earthquakes are caused by the thrashing of Namazu, a giant underground catfish. The famous map Jishin-no-ben depicts earthquake damage to Japan from 1854 to 1855, along with a dragon encircling the continent as a possible reference to Namazu. #MythologyMonday

For centuries, many scholars have attempted to map the travels described in Homer's epic poem The Odyssey. Modern scholars believe the mythical Land of the Cyclopes is now Sicily, while the island home of the nymph Calypso is now the Maltese island of Gozo. #MythologyMonday

In the Iraqi tale "Two Grains of Sand," a desert traveler, Ali, gets caught in a sandstorm and takes shelter in a tower, where he meets a beautiful maiden named Salma, daughter of Hussein. She's gone when Ali wakes the next morning, but they later reunite during a flood. #FairyTaleTuesday

In the Moroccan tale "The Foreign Wife," the prince of a desert tribe abandons his two wives for a woman from a foreign tribe. They have a son, Faris, who the prince favors. His jealous half-brothers pretend to take Faris out on a quest, then abandon him in the desert. #FairyTaleTuesday

In the 7th-century Persian tale "Layla and Majnun," the poet Qays falls so madly in love with the lovely Layla that their tribe dubs him Majnun ("possessed" or "mad"). Layla's father forbids them to marry, so Qays flees and wanders the desert the rest of his days. #FairyTaleTuesday

It's the first day of September, and if you think I'll start putting up Halloween decorations and watching Scooby-Doo and Hocus Pocus, you're absolutely right.

The ancient story of Turandot is believed to have originated in Persia. Turandot is a beautiful yet cruel Chinese princess with a long line of eager suitors. She declares she'll marry whoever can answer three riddles. Those who answer wrong are beheaded. #MythologyMonday

In the Biblical story of Samson, he presents this riddle to his dinner guests: "Out of the eater, something to eat; out of the strong, something sweet." Turns out Samson is referring to a time when he killed a lion and later found bees and honey in its corpse. #MythologyMonday

In Greek myth, a sphinx guards the city of Thebes and won't allow travellers to enter unless they answer a riddle. When they guess wrong, she devours them. Oedipus, crown prince of Corinth, finally answers correctly, and the sphinx throws herself off a cliff to her death. #MythologyMonday

"My love is thine to teach; teach it but how, and thou shalt see how apt it is to learn. Any hard lesson that may do thee good." —Much Ado About Nothing, William Shakespeare #ShakespeareSunday

"This is his uncle’s teaching. This is Worcester, malevolent to you in all aspects, which makes him prune himself, and bristle up the crest of youth against your dignity." —Henry IV, William Shakespeare #ShakespeareSunday

"I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching. The brain may devise laws for the blood, but a hot temper leaps o'er a cold decree." —The Merchant of Venice, William Shakespeare #ShakespeareSunday

The Inuit people of Greenland and Baffin Island have myths of adlet, human/dog hybrids with dog legs and human bodies, born to a woman, Niviarsiang, who married a dog, Ijirqang. When their human grandfather kills their canine father, the adlet kill and eat him in revenge. #FolkyFriday

In Hindu myth, Sarama is the canine goddess, the mother of all dogs, and in some versions, mother to all creatures. She first won favor with the sky god Indra for retrieving his stolen cow herd. Two of her children, Sharvara and Shyama, are messengers of the death god Yama. #FolkyFriday