Ripped from the Headlines: December 2019: This Week In Culture: December 28, 2019–January 3, 2020

K-pop boy band sensations BTS headlined at the Times Square New Year's Eve party, which an estimated one million people watched on various screens around the world. Bespoke is an old-fashioned way of saying "spoken for." If a customer ordered a suit from a tailor, the bolt of cloth was reserved for that suit: bespoke. While it's most commonly used to refer to suits, it can also describe any fine piece of custom work.

After staying sealed for 60 years, a huge trove of letters from Nobel Prize-winning poet T.S. Eliot will be made available to the public. The letters are between Eliot and his longtime friend Emily Hale. The exact nature of their relationship is not fully understood, and the letters may shed light on that and other subjects. Eliot was also the author of the book of comic verse that became the basis for Cats.

The trailer for A Quiet Place II dropped, and it appears to pick up not long after the first film ended, with the characters struggling to survive in a world full of monsters that track them using sound. The first movie made over $300 million and got an Oscar nomination for sound design. Co-star Emily Blunt won a SAG award for Best Supporting Actor. John Krasinsky, who is married to Blunt, directed the film and also co-stars.

A 2,500-year-old tomb containing the bodies of four female warriors was discovered in Russia. The Scythians were nomadic tribes who roamed widely. Women warriors, particularly as archers on horseback, were part of their culture. Lore is an Old Germanic word, from the same root as learn; its origins are in teaching, specifically in spoken lessons.

A young man attacked a Picasso painting at the Tate Modern in London, ripping the canvas. He is in custody, charged with criminal damage. The painting is a portrait of Dora Maar, an artist and poet who had a decade-long abusive relationship with Picasso beginning in 1935.

Fallon Sherrock is the first woman to win the World Championship at darts. Her victory has brought new attention to the game, and observers hope it will increase its popularity, especially among women. Of Scandinavian origin, the word mire means a swamp or bog, with thick mud that gets your feet or wheels seriously stuck and prevents any progress.

A new type of material is able to stay cooler than the surrounding air, even in full sunlight, by reflecting a specific part of the infrared spectrum through the atmosphere and out into space. This material may have extensive applications as the planet continues to warm; by cladding roofs and other surfaces with them, in conjunction with solar panels, a form of passive air conditioning can be created that saves energy.

The end of a year, and especially a decade, is full of "best of" lists, and this one deals with the most memorable and delicious meals eaten by a food writer. Because taste is so subjective, and the setting and company of meal are so important to their enjoyment, any list like this is bound to be personal and unique. Opulentus means "rich," "grand," or "sumptuous" in Latin.

LeBron James has three championship rings, ten MVP titles, and is the only player to ever achieve a combination of 30,000 points, 9,000 rebounds, and 9,000 assists. Despite these accomplishments, he's evidently still sore that he was not named "Most Athletic" in his eighth grade yearbook. To make matters worse, his name was also misspelled and switched with another student's photo. Plethora originally comes from Greek, meaning "full" or "satisfied."

A new version of West Side Story opens on Broadway featuring new choreography by Anne Theresa De Keersmaeker. Combining the influence of dance styles like hip-hop and salsa with her own avant-garde modern ideas, the choreography is dramatically different from the original work by Jerome Robbins. Sardonic originated in Greek, where it referred to the facial convulsions, resembling laughter, that were a symptom of poisoning that resulted from eating a toxic plant native to Sardinia.