Wikipedia:Main Page history/2016 March 20

Amir Hamzah (1911–1946) was an Indonesian poet and national hero. Born into an aristocratic Malay family in the Sultanate of Langkat, Sumatra, he began writing poetry while still a teenager. Though his works are undated, the earliest are from around 1930, when he first travelled to Java for schooling. He continued writing while studying in Surakarta and Batavia. He helped establish the literary magazine Poedjangga Baroe in 1932, and published his two poetry collections in it, Nyanyi Sunyi (1937) and Buah Rindu (1941). Amir stopped writing in 1937, when he grudgingly returned to Sumatra to marry the sultan's daughter and take on responsibilities of the court. After Indonesia proclaimed its independence in 1945, he served as the government's representative in Langkat; the following year he was killed in a socialist revolution and buried in a mass grave. His poetry deals with themes of love and religion, and often reflects a deep inner conflict. He has been called the "King of the Poedjangga Baroe-era Poets" and the only international-class Indonesian poet from before the Indonesian National Revolution. (Full article...)

• Recently featured:

  • Eraserhead
  • Quietly Confident Quartet
  • Final Fantasy Type-0

• ... that as chair of the Inter-American Commission of Women, Doris Stevens (pictured) presented data on laws affecting women, resulting in the passage of the first international agreement on women's rights?
• ... that the Reich Harvest Thanksgiving Festival was attended by more people than any other Nazi ceremony, including the Nazi party rally at Nuremberg?
• ... that Tessa Hadley's second novel has been described as "mysteriously, bewitchingly compelling" despite being a "virtually plotless portrait ... of breathtakingly ordinary mortals"?
• ... that the format of the Mindanao leg of PiliPinas Debates 2016 was modeled after the Republican presidential debates in the United States?
• ... that a 94-million-year-old fossil egg from Zhejiang Province, eastern China, was named Paraelongatoolithus by paleontologists in 2010?
• ... that "This Transformation" decries the societal discrimination against beggars?
• ... that in a 1994–97 study, 769 species of plant were identified in the Hatila Valley National Park in northeastern Turkey?
• ... that Theodosia Bartow Prevost used her home as George Washington's headquarters during the American Revolutionary War, despite being married to a British Army officer?

• A suicide bombing in Istanbul kills 5 people and injures 36 others, six days after the Ankara bombing killed 37 people.
• Flydubai Flight 981 (aircraft pictured) crashes while attempting to land at Rostov-on-Don Airport, Russia, killing all 62 people on board.
• Salah Abdeslam is arrested in Molenbeek, Belgium, in connection with the November 2015 Paris attacks.
• Marcel Hirscher and Lara Gut win the overall titles in the Alpine Skiing World Cup.
• Andrew Wiles wins the Abel Prize for his proof of Fermat's Last Theorem.

• Ongoing events:

  • Zika virus outbreak
  • European migrant crisis

• Recent deaths:

  • Guido Westerwelle
  • Meir Dagan
  • Paul Daniels

March equinox (04:30 UTC, 2016); March 20: Nowruz in Iran, Central Asia, and Zoroastrianism (2016); Independence Day in Tunisia (1956)

• 1602 – The Dutch East India Company—the first company to issue stock, one of the first multinational corporations, and possibly the first megacorporation—was established.
• 1760 – A fire of unknown cause broke out in Boston, Massachusetts, destroying 349 buildings and left over a thousand people homeless.
• 1942 – World War II: After being forced to flee the Philippines, US Army General Douglas MacArthur announced in Terowie, South Australia, "I shall return."
• 1987 – The antiretroviral drug zidovudine (AZT) became the first antiviral drug approved for use against HIV and AIDS.
• 2006 – Cyclone Larry (pictured) made landfall in Far North Queensland, eventually causing nearly AU$1 billion in total damage and destroying over 80 percent of Australia's banana crop.

• More anniversaries:

  • March 19
  • March 20
  • March 21

{| style="margin:0 3px 3px; width:100%; text-align:left; background-color:transparent; border-collapse: collapse; "

|style="padding:0 0.9em 0 0;" | File:Pinctada margaritifera MHNT.CON.2002.893.jpg

|style="padding:0 6px 0 0"|

A black-lip oyster (Pinctada margaritifera) specimen. This species of clam in the genus Pinctada is a marine bivalve mollusc that is harvested for its pearls in the Persian Gulf and southwestern part of the Indian Ocean, Fiji, Tahiti, Myanmar, Baja California, and the Gulf of Mexico.

Photograph: Didier Descouens

• Recently featured:

  • Wells Cathedral
  • Mary I of England
  • Armenian illuminated manuscript