Coco Chanel, Kubla Khan and Samuel Taylor Coleridge

On May 5th, 1921, Coco Chanel introduced the perfume she called Chanel No. 5. She was 37. In 1926, she created her signature "little black dress." She managed to survive World War II by living with a Nazi officer at the Ritz Hotel. She was 57. A thoroughly interesting figure, Chanel appears on pages 80. 134, 165, 213, 250 and 275 in A Book of Ages.

On May 5th, 1260, Kubla Khan ascended the throne of the Mongol Empire. Five centuries later, in the autumn of 1797, Samuel Taylor Coleridge took two