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From today's featured article

Head of Odysseus (Ulisse) – 1st century CE representation

Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria (SV 325, The Return of Ulysses to his Homeland) is an opera by Claudio Monteverdi using a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The opera, first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–40 carnival, is based on the second half of Homer's Odyssey. It tells how Ulisse (Odysseus) returns from the Trojan Wars and recovers his kingdom. The loyal and virtuous characters are ultimately rewarded, while treachery and deception are overcome. After early performances in Venice and Bologna, the opera remained unperformed until the 20th century. Since the 1970s it has become increasingly popular, and has been widely performed and recorded. Monteverdi uses a variety of musical styles to express the feelings and emotions of a great range of characters, divine and human. In a division of critical opinion, Il ritorno has been described as an "ugly duckling", and conversely as the most tender and moving of Monteverdi's surviving operas. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Rideau Cottage in 1892

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In the news

Michelle Payne

Cyclone Chapala becomes the first hurricane-force storm on record to strike mainland Yemen.
In horse racing, Michelle Payne (pictured) becomes the first female jockey to win the Melbourne Cup, riding Prince of Penzance.
In baseball, the Kansas City Royals defeat the New York Mets to win the World Series.
Stanley Biwott wins the men's and Mary Jepkosgei Keitany wins the women's race at the New York City Marathon.
The Justice and Development Party of Turkey, led by Ahmet Davutoğlu regains its parliamentary majority following a snap general election.

Ongoing events:
- European migrant crisis
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On this day...

November 4: Unity Day in Russia

City & South London Railway locomotive

1847 – Scottish physician James Young Simpson discovered the anaesthetic qualities of chloroform.
1890 – London's City and South London Railway (locomotive pictured), the first deep-level underground railway in the world, opened, running a distance of 5.1 km (3.2 mi) between the City of London and Stockwell.
1921 – After a speech by Adolf Hitler in the Hofbräuhaus in Munich, members of the Sturmabteilung, known as "brownshirts", physically assaulted his opposition, an event which assumed legendary proportions over time.
1995 – Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by Yigal Amir while at a peace rally at the Kings of Israel Square in Tel Aviv.
2010 – In the first aviation occurrence for an Airbus A380, Qantas Flight 32 suffered an uncontained engine failure and safely made an emergency landing at Singapore Changi Airport with no casualties.

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Today's featured picture

The red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris) is a species of tree squirrel in the genus Sciurus common throughout Eurasia. This arboreal, omnivorous rodent feeds on seeds, nuts, berries, young shoots, and sap.

Photograph: Peter Trimming

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