BORN. To Noor el Hussein, 31, American-born Queen of Jordan, and King Hussein, 47: their third child, first daughter; in Amman. Name: Iman (Arabic for faith).

SEEKING DIVORCE. David Merrick, 71, hit-making Broadway producer, from Karen Prunczik, 26, former tap dancer in his blockbuster 42nd Street and his fourth wife; after nine months of marriage; in New York City. Merrick also filed a petition revealing what had been strenuously denied: that he suffered a stroke 2 1/2 months ago and has not yet recovered his power of speech; he is seeking a conservator to protect his interests.

DIED. Muddy Waters, 68, the Grammy award-winning blues singer and guitarist whose vibrant Delta sound influenced a generation of rock musicians, including Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones, who took their name from one of his songs; of cardiac arrest; in the Chicago suburb of Westmont. Born McKinley Morganfield, the son of a Mississippi sharecropper, Waters had a guttural baritone that soared in songs such as Hoochie Coochie Man and Got My Mojo Working.

DIED. George Balanchine, 79, possibly the century's greatest choreographer; of pneumonia; in New York City (see DANCE).

DIED. Bronislau Kaper, 81, Polish-born composer of scores for such MGM films as San Francisco, Gaslight, both versions of Mutiny on the Bounty (with Clark Gable in 1935 and Marlon Brando in 1962) and Lili, for which he won an Oscar in 1953; of cancer; in Beverly Hills.

DIED. Turner Catledge, 82, newspaper reporter and editor who was managing editor and then executive editor of the New York Times from 1951 to 1968; of complications following a stroke; in New Orleans. A courtly Mississippian hired by the Times after impressing Herbert Hoover with his 1927 reporting on devastating Southern floods, Catledge was known for his scrupulous fairness. During his tenure, he increased the Times's national and foreign coverage and pressed for shortened sentences and sharpened stories. In his most debated decision, he approved publication of a report on a planned invasion of Cuba ten days before the 1961 Bay of Pigs debacle, but softened the article by deleting references to CIA involvement and to the invasion's imminence.

DIED. Suzanne La Follette, 89, conservative journalist and founding editor of several magazines, including National Review; in Menlo Park, Calif. An early, ardent feminist, she revived the radical magazine the Freeman in 1930. Gradually departing from leftism, she revived the Freeman yet again in 1950, this time as the voice of the "nontotalitarian right." "I haven't moved," she once said of her views. "The world has moved to the left of me." This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.