As 2011 fades into a memory and the champagne has been uncorked, welcoming in the new year, we thought it would be a good time to revisit some of the interviews that graced the pages of The BottomLine in the past calendar year and let our interviewees do the talking.

Many thanks to the multitude of celebrities, interviewers and writers who shared their work with us these past 12 months to bring some of the most fascinating people of 2011 to TBL.

“A picture is worth a thousand words.”

This old adage is wrongly attributed to many men. Some claim Confucius uttered it first as part of an ancient Chinese proverb. Others give the nod to Russian novelist, Ivan S. Turgenev as the first to coin the term. And often a Google search will ascribe the term to the French dictator Napoleon Bonaparte, who actually said, “Un bon croquis vaut mieux qu’un long discours,” which is more correctly transliterated as, “A good sketch is better than a long speech.”

PALM SPRINGS -- Among the gay literati, the Lambda Literary Awards signify welcome recognition for authors writing about LGBT topics. Whether fiction, memoir or nonfiction, it’s a great honor to get nominated for the prestigious award.

So it was a real pleasure to revisit with our very own local columnist Dr. Jallen Rix when we got word his book, "Ex-Gay No Way," was nominated for a 2011 Lambda Literary Award for LGBT Nonfiction.

PALM SPRINGS -- There’s a very short list of entertainers who can claim five decades of practicing their craft. And Dionne Warwick is one of them. The New Jersey native has been belting out hits throughout her career, firmly etching an indelible spot in American music.

Throughout the years, Warwick has had 56 singles chart in Billboard’s Hot 100 between 1962 and 1998. Only Aretha Franklin has more female vocalist singles than her.