U Nu (1907-1995) was the first prime minister of independent Burma (now called Myanmar) after freedom was obtained in 1948 from British colonial rule. He was also a leader of the Buddhist revival and a noted writer. After being ousted by t...

The Italian playwright Ugo Betti (1892-1953) was one of the major figures of Italian theater in the 20th century. In his plays the question of guilt, justice, and redemption is of central concern. Ugo Betti was born on Feb. 4, 1892, in Cam...

The mathematical research conducted by Karen Uhlenbeck (born 1942) has applications in theoretical physics and has contributed to the study of instantons. For her work in geometry and partial differential equations, she was awarded a MacAr...

Ulf von Euler devoted his life to searching for the chemical signals that control physiological processes. In a career spanning six decades and during which he published four hundred and sixty-five scientific papers, von Euler achieved rem...

Julio G. Arce, who wrote as Jorge Ulica, was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco. He was the son of a prominent surgeon, Fortunato G. Arce. Although he studied pharmacy he had a preference for journalism. He founded two student newspapers, El hij...

The German imperial knight and humanist Ulrich von Hutten (1488-1523) advocated the dissolution of Germany's ties with the papacy. He advanced an unrealistic program, however, for solving German national problems by reversion to medieval k...

Al-Hajj Omar ibn Said Tal (ca. 1797-1864) was a West African Moslem leader who started a holy war and established a far-reaching empire on the Upper Niger. Al-Hajj Omar was born in the Futa Toro near the town of Podar on the Senegal River....

Umberto Eco (born 1932) is a best-selling author of mystery novels that reflect his many intellectual interests and wide-ranging knowledge of philosophy, literature, medieval history, religion, and politics. His academic work in semiotics,...

José Hipólito Unánue (1755-1833) was a Peruvian intellectual, educator, scientist, and journalist. He was one of the foremost physicians and thinkers of the transition period from the colonial to the independence era. ...

Upton Sinclair was a writer whose main concerns were politics and economics. His ideas about literature—his own, written over more than six decades, and that of others—were inseparable from his dreams of social justice. Consequ...

The writing of Milo Urban has been acknowledged by many literary critics and historians as a unique type of expressionism and the highlight of literary realism. His works are among the most frequently read and published Slovak literature o...

Queen Urraca (c. 1078--1126), who ruled the Kingdom of Leon-Castilla (also known as Castille-Leon) in northern Spain from 1109 to 1126, was the only woman during the Spanish medieval era to rule in her own right. The failure of her politic...

From The Sea Gull, her 1938 Broadway debut, to the 1995 off-Broadway hit Mrs. Klein, Uta Hagen (born 1919) keeps bringing down the house. Many critics consider her the first lady of theater. Uta Hagen was born to Oskar Frank Leonard and Th...