Authors

Every writer with a work in the canon, from the ancients to the moderns. Each profile carries a life in brief and the works to begin with.

A.A. Milne1882–1956 Abbé Prévost1697–1763 Aeschylus525 BCE–456 BCE Agatha Christie1890–1976 Ágota Kristóf1935–2011 Aimé Césaire1913–2008 Alain Robbe-Grillet1922–2008 Alan Paton1903–1988 Albert Camus1913–1960 Albert Cohen1895–1981 Albert Einstein1879–1955 Aldous Huxley1894–1963 Alejo Carpentier1904–1980 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn1918–2008 Alessandro Manzoni1785–1873 Alex Haley1921–1992 Alexander Hamilton1755–1804 Alexander Pope1688–1744 Alexander Pushkin1799–1837 Alexandre Dumas1802–1870 Alexis de Tocqueville1805–1859 Alexis Wrightb. 1950 Alfred Döblin1878–1957 Alfred, Lord Tennyson1809–1892 Alice Walkerb. 1944 Allen Ginsberg1926–1997 Álvaro Mutis1923–2013 André Breton1896–1966 André Gide1869–1951 André Malraux1901–1976 Andrei Bely1880–1934 Andrew Marvell1621–1678 Anna Akhmatova1889–1966 Anna Sewell1820–1878 Anne Frank1929–1945 Anne Rice1941–2021 Anthony Burgess1917–1993 Anthony Powell1905–2000 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry1900–1944 Anton Chekhov1860–1904 Apuleius124–170 Aristophanes446 BCE–386 BCE Aristotle384 BCE–322 BCE Arnold Bennett1867–1931 Arthur Conan Doyle1859–1930 Arthur Koestler1905–1983 Arthur Miller1915–2005 Arthur Rimbaud1854–1891 Arthur Schnitzler1862–1931 Arthur Schopenhauer1788–1860 Arundhati Royb. 1961 Astrid Lindgren1907–2002 August Strindberg1849–1912 Ayn Rand1905–1982 Azar Nafisib. 1955 Baruch de Spinoza1632–1677 Ben Okrib. 1959 Benito Pérez Galdós1843–1920 Benjamin Constant1767–1830 Bertolt Brecht1898–1956 Betty Smith1896–1972 Blaise Pascal1623–1662 Boethius477–524 Bohumil Hrabal1914–1997 Boris Pasternak1890–1960 Boris Vian1920–1959 Bram Stoker1847–1912 Bret Easton Ellisb. 1964 Brothers Grimm1785–1863 Bruno Schulz1892–1942 Buchi Emecheta1944–2017 Cao Xueqin1715–1763 Carl Jung1875–1961 Carson McCullers1917–1967 Cesare Pavese1908–1950 Charles Baudelaire1821–1867 Charles Darwin1809–1882 Charles Dickens1812–1870 Charles Robert Maturin1780–1824 Charlotte Brontë1816–1855 Charlotte Perkins Gilman1860–1935 Cheikh Hamidou Kaneb. 1928 Chimamanda Ngozi Adichieb. 1977 Chinua Achebe1930–2013 Cho Se-hui1942–2022 Christina Stead1902–1983 Christopher Marlowe1564–1593 Clarice Lispector1920–1977 Clarín1852–1901 Claude Lévi-Strauss1908–2009 Comte de Lautréamont1846–1870 Cormac McCarthy1933–2023 C.P. Cavafy1863–1933 C.S. Forester1899–1966 C.S. Lewis1898–1963 Curzio Malaparte1898–1957 Czesław Miłosz1911–2004 Dalton Trumbo1905–1976 Daniel Defoe1660–1731 Danilo Kiš1935–1989 Dante Alighieri1265–1321 Daphne du Maurier1907–1989 Dashiell Hammett1894–1961 David Foster Wallace1962–2008 David Mitchellb. 1969 Dee Alexander Brown1908–2002 Denis Diderot1713–1784 Derek Walcott1930–2017 D.H. Lawrence1885–1930 Dino Buzzati1906–1972 Djuna Barnes1892–1982 Dodie Smith1896–1990 Domingo Faustino Sarmiento1811–1888 Don DeLillob. 1936 Donna Tarttb. 1963 Doris May Lessing1919–2013 Dorothy Allison1949–2024 Dorothy L. Sayers1893–1957 Douglas Adams1952–2001 Dylan Thomas1914–1953 E.B. White1899–1985 Eça de Queirós1845–1900 Edgar Allan Poe1809–1849 Edgar Rice Burroughs1875–1950 Edith Wharton1862–1937 Edmund Burke1729–1797 Edmund Spenser1552–1599 Edward Albee1928–2016 Elias Canetti1905–1994 Elizabeth Barrett Browning1806–1861 Elizabeth Bishop1911–1979 Elizabeth Gaskell1810–1865 Elsa Morante1912–1985 E.M. Forster1879–1970 Émile Zola1840–1902 Emily Brontë1818–1848 Emily Dickinson1830–1886 Emine Sevgi Özdamarb. 1946 Epictetus50–135 Erich Maria Remarque1898–1970 Ernest Hemingway1899–1961 Es'kia Mphahlele1919–2008 Eugène Ionesco1909–1994 Eugene O'Neill1888–1953 Euripides480 BCE–406 BCE Evelyn Waugh1903–1966 Ezra Pound1885–1972 F. Scott Fitzgerald1896–1940 Federico García Lorca1898–1936 Ferdowsi940–1020 Ferit Edgü1936–2024 Fernanda Melchorb. 1982 Fernando de Rojas1470–1541 Fernando Pessoa1888–1935 Fernando Vallejob. 1942 Flann O'Brien1911–1966 Flannery O'Connor1925–1964 Ford Madox Ford1873–1939 Francesco Petrarca1304–1374 François-Auguste-René de Chateaubriand1768–1848 François Rabelais1494–1553 Françoise Sagan1935–2004 Frank Herbert1920–1986 Franz Kafka1883–1924 Frederick Forsyth1938–2025 Friedrich Engels1820–1895 Friedrich Nietzsche1844–1900 Fyodor Dostoevsky1821–1881 Gabriel García Márquez1927–2014 Geoffrey Chaucer1343–1400 George Eliot1819–1880 George Orwell1903–1950 Georges Perec1936–1982 Gerard Manley Hopkins1844–1889 Gerard Reve1923–2006 Gertrude Stein1874–1946 Giacomo Casanova1725–1798 Giacomo Leopardi1798–1837 Gillian Flynnb. 1971 Giorgio Bassani1916–2000 Giorgio Vasari1511–1574 Giovanni Boccaccio1313–1375 Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa1896–1957 G.K. Chesterton1874–1936 Graham Greene1904–1991 Guanzhong Luo1330–1400 Guillaume Apollinaire1880–1918 Guillermo Cabrera Infante1929–2005 Günter Grass1927–2015 Gustave Flaubert1821–1880 Guy de Maupassant1850–1893 Hafez1315–1390 Halldór Laxness1902–1998 Han Kangb. 1970 Hannah Arendt1906–1975 Hans Christian Andersen1805–1875 Harper Lee1926–2016 Harriet Beecher Stowe1811–1896 Haruki Murakamib. 1949 Helen Fieldingb. 1958 Henri Alain-Fournier1886–1914 Henrik Ibsen1828–1906 Henry Adams1838–1918 Henry David Thoreau1817–1862 Henry Fielding1707–1754 Henry James1843–1916 Henry Miller1891–1980 Henry Roth1906–1995 Henryk Sienkiewicz1846–1916 Herman Melville1819–1891 Hermann Broch1886–1951 Hermann Hesse1877–1962 H.G. Wells1866–1946 Hilary Mantel1952–2022 Homer800 BCE–701 BCE Honoré de Balzac1799–1850 Horace65 BCE–8 BCE Horace Walpole1717–1797 Hunter S. Thompson1937–2005 Ian Fleming1908–1964 Ian McEwanb. 1948 Immanuel Kant1724–1804 Imre Kertész1929–2016 Iris Murdoch1919–1999 Isaac Asimov1920–1992 Isaac Bashevis Singer1902–1991 Isabel Allendeb. 1942 Isak Dinesen1885–1962 Italo Calvino1923–1985 Italo Svevo1861–1928 Ivan Goncharov1812–1891 Ivan Turgenev1818–1883 Ivo Andrić1892–1975 Jack Kerouac1922–1969 Jack London1876–1916 Jamal al-Ghitani1945–2015 James Agee1909–1955 James Baldwin1924–1987 James Boswell1740–1795 James D. Watson1928–2025 James Fenimore Cooper1789–1851 James Hogg1770–1835 James Joyce1882–1941 James M. Cain1892–1977 James Madison1751–1836 Jane Austen1775–1817 Jaroslav Hašek1883–1923 Javier Marías1951–2022 J.D. Salinger1919–2010 Jean Cocteau1889–1963 Jean-Jacques Rousseau1712–1778 Jean-Paul Sartre1905–1980 Jean Racine1639–1699 Jean Rhys1890–1979 Jeffrey Eugenidesb. 1960 Jennifer Eganb. 1962 Jens Peter Jacobson1847–1885 J.G. Ballard1930–2009 J.K. Rowlingb. 1965 J.M. Barrie1860–1937 J.M. Coetzeeb. 1940 Joan Didion1934–2021 Joan Lindsay1896–1984 João Guimarães Rosa1908–1967 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe1749–1832 John Buchan1875–1940 John Dickson Carr1906–1977 John Donne1572–1631 John Dos Passos1896–1970 John Edward Williams1922–1994 John Fowles1926–2005 John Galsworthy1867–1933 John Hersey1914–1993 John Irvingb. 1942 John Jay1745–1829 John Keats1795–1821 John Kennedy Toole1937–1969 John Kenneth Galbraith1908–2006 John le Carré1931–2020 John Locke1632–1704 John Maynard Keynes1883–1946 John Milton1608–1674 John Steinbeck1902–1968 John Updike1932–2009 Jonathan Franzenb. 1959 Jonathan Swift1667–1745 Jorge Amado1912–2001 Jorge Luis Borges1899–1986 José Hernández1834–1886 José Lezama Lima1910–1976 José Saramago1922–2010 Joseph A. Schumpeter1883–1950 Joseph Conrad1857–1924 Joseph Heller1923–1999 Joseph Roth1894–1939 Josephine Tey1896–1952 Joyce Carol Oatesb. 1938 J.R.R. Tolkien1892–1973 Juan Gabriel Vásquezb. 1973 Juan Ramón Jiménez1881–1958 Juan Rulfo1917–1986 Juana Inés de la Cruz1648–1695 Judy Blumeb. 1938 Julio Cortázar1914–1984 Junot Díazb. 1968 Kahlil Gibran1883–1931 Karl Marx1818–1883 Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels1818–1895 Kate Chopin1850–1904 Kazuo Ishigurob. 1954 Ken Kesey1935–2001 Kenneth Grahame1859–1932 Kim Man-jung1637–1692 Kingsley Amis1922–1995 Knut Hamsun1859–1952 Kōbō Abe1924–1993 Kurt Vonnegut1922–2007 L. Frank Baum1856–1919 La Rochefoucauld1613–1680 Langston Hughes1901–1967 Lao She1899–1966 Laozi600 BCE–500 BCE László Krasznahorkaib. 1954 Laurence Sterne1713–1768 Lawrence Durrell1912–1990 Leo Tolstoy1828–1910 Léopold Sédar Senghor1906–2001 Lewis Carroll1832–1898 Li Bai701–762 L.M. Montgomery1874–1942 Lord Byron1788–1824 Lorraine Hansberry1930–1965 Louis-Ferdinand Céline1894–1961 Louisa May Alcott1832–1888 Lu Xun1881–1936 Lucretius99 BCE–55 BCE Ludwig Wittgenstein1889–1951 Luigi Pirandello1867–1936 Luís Vaz Camões1524–1580 Machado de Assis1839–1908 Madame de La Fayette1634–1693 Madeleine L'Engle1918–2007 Malcolm Lowry1909–1957 Marcel Proust1871–1922 Marcus Aurelius121–180 Margaret Atwoodb. 1939 Margaret Mitchell1900–1949 Margaret Wise Brown1910–1952 Marguerite Duras1914–1996 Marguerite Yourcenar1903–1987 Mariama Bâ1929–1981 Marilynne Robinsonb. 1943 Marina Tsvetaeva1892–1941 Mário de Andrade1893–1945 Mario Puzo1920–1999 Mark Twain1835–1910 Mark Z. Danielewskib. 1966 Martin Buber1878–1965 Martin Heidegger1889–1976 Martin Luther King Jr.1929–1968 Mary Shelley1797–1851 Mary Wollstonecraft1759–1797 Matsuo Bashō1644–1694 Matthew Arnold1822–1888 Maurice Sendak1928–2012 Max Frisch1911–1991 Maya Angelou1928–2014 Michael Chabonb. 1963 Michel de Montaigne1533–1592 Miguel de Cervantes1547–1616 Mikhail Bulgakov1891–1940 Mikhail Lermontov1814–1841 Miklós Bánffy1873–1950 Milan Kundera1929–2023 Mohamed Mbougar Sarrb. 1990 Molière1622–1673 Murasaki Shikibu978–1014 Muriel Spark1918–2006 Naguib Mahfouz1911–2006 Natalia Ginzburg1916–1991 Nathanael West1903–1940 Nathaniel Hawthorne1804–1864 Natsume Sōseki1867–1916 Nawal El Saadawi1931–2021 Nâzim Hikmet1902–1963 Nella Larsen1891–1964 Nelson Mandela1918–2013 Niccolò Machiavelli1469–1527 Nicolás Guillén1902–1989 Nikolai Gogol1809–1852 Nikos Kazantzakis1883–1957 Norman Mailer1923–2007 Octavia E. Butler1947–2006 Octavio Paz1914–1998 Oliver Goldsmith1728–1774 Orhan Pamukb. 1952 Oscar Wilde1854–1900 Ousmane Sembène1923–2007 Ovid43 BCE–17 Pablo Neruda1904–1973 Pak Kyongni1926–2008 Patricia Highsmith1921–1995 Patrick White1912–1990 Paul Celan1920–1970 Paulo Coelhob. 1947 Pearl S. Buck1892–1973 Penelope Fitzgerald1916–2000 Percy Bysshe Shelley1792–1822 Peter Careyb. 1943 Peter Høegb. 1957 Philip K. Dick1928–1982 Philip Larkin1922–1985 Philip Pullmanb. 1946 Philip Roth1933–2018 Pier Paolo Pasolini1922–1975 Pierre Choderlos de Laclos1741–1803 Plato428 BCE–348 BCE Plutarch46–120 Primo Levi1919–1987 Rabindranath Tagore1861–1941 Rachel Carson1907–1964 Rainer Maria Rilke1875–1926 Ralph Ellison1913–1994 Ralph Waldo Emerson1803–1882 Ray Bradbury1920–2012 Raymond Carver1938–1988 Raymond Chandler1888–1959 Reinaldo Arenas1943–1990 Richard Adams1920–2016 Richard Wright1908–1960 Robert A. Heinlein1907–1988 Robert Browning1812–1889 Robert Frost1874–1963 Robert Graves1895–1985 Robert Louis Stevenson1850–1894 Robert Lowell1917–1977 Robert Musil1880–1942 Robert Penn Warren1905–1989 Robert Tressell1870–1911 Robert Walser1878–1956 Roberto Arlt1900–1942 Roberto Bolaño1953–2003 Rohinton Mistryb. 1952 Rudyard Kipling1865–1936 Rumi1207–1273 Ṣādiq Hidāyat1903–1951 Saint Augustine354–430 Salman Rushdieb. 1947 Sam Selvon1923–1994 Samuel Beckett1906–1989 Samuel Butler1835–1902 Samuel Pepys1633–1703 Samuel Richardson1689–1761 Samuel Taylor Coleridge1772–1834 Sándor Márai1900–1989 Sappho630 BCE–570 BCE Saul Bellow1915–2005 Seamus Heaney1939–2013 Sei Shōnagon966–1025 Seneca4 BCE–65 Shelby Foote1916–2005 Sherwood Anderson1876–1941 Shin Kyung-sookb. 1963 Shirley Jackson1916–1965 Sigmund Freud1856–1939 Sigrid Undset1882–1949 Simone de Beauvoir1908–1986 Simone Weil1909–1943 Sinclair Lewis1885–1951 Sir Walter Scott1771–1832 Sophocles496 BCE–406 BCE Søren Kierkegaard1813–1855 Stanislaw Lem1921–2006 Stefan Zweig1881–1942 Stella Gibbons1902–1989 Stendhal1783–1842 Stephen Kingb. 1947 Susan Sontag1933–2004 Sylvia Plath1932–1963 Taras Shevchenko1814–1861 Tayeb Salih1929–2009 Ted Hughes1930–1998 Tennessee Williams1911–1983 T.H. White1906–1964 Theodor Fontane1819–1898 Theodore Dreiser1871–1945 Thomas Bernhard1931–1989 Thomas Gray1716–1771 Thomas Hardy1840–1928 Thomas Hobbes1588–1679 Thomas Mann1875–1955 Thomas Mofolo1876–1948 Thomas Paine1737–1809 Thomas Pynchonb. 1937 Thomas Wolfe1900–1938 Tim Wintonb. 1960 Tom Stoppardb. 1937 Tom Wolfe1930–2018 Tomas Tranströmer1931–2015 Toni Morrison1931–2019 Tove Ditlevsen1917–1976 Truman Capote1924–1984 T.S. Eliot1888–1965 Umberto Eco1932–2016 Upton Sinclair1878–1968 Ursula K. Le Guin1929–2018 Uwe Johnson1934–1984 Valmiki500 BCE–400 BCE Varlam Shalamov1907–1982 Vasily Grossman1905–1964 Victor Hugo1802–1885 Viktor Frankl1905–1997 Virgil70 BCE–19 BCE Virginia Woolf1882–1941 Vladimir Nabokov1899–1977 Voltaire1694–1778 V.S. Naipaul1932–2018 Vyasa W. Somerset Maugham1874–1965 Walker Percy1916–1990 Wallace Stegner1909–1993 Wallace Stevens1879–1955 Walt Whitman1819–1892 W.B. Yeats1865–1939 W.G. Sebald1944–2001 W.H. Auden1907–1973 Wilkie Collins1824–1889 Willa Cather1873–1947 William Faulkner1897–1962 William Golding1911–1993 William James1842–1910 William Makepeace Thackeray1811–1863 William S. Burroughs1914–1997 William Shakespeare1564–1616 William Wordsworth1770–1850 Winston Churchill1874–1965 Witold Gombrowicz1904–1969 Wole Soyinkab. 1934 Wu Cheng'en1500–1582 Yashar Kemal1923–2015 Yasunari Kawabata1899–1972 Yevgeny Zamyatin1884–1937 Yukio Mishima1925–1970 Zadie Smithb. 1975 Zhuang Zhou369 BCE–286 BCE Zora Neale Hurston1891–1960 Adam Smith1723–1790 Aesop620 BCE–564 BCE Anatole France1844–1924 Ann Radcliffe1764–1823 Anthony Berkeley1893–1971 Anthony Trollope1815–1882 Aphra Behn1640–1689 Apsley Cherry-Garrard1886–1959 Beatrix Potter1866–1943 Benedict de Spinoza1632–1677 Benjamin Franklin1706–1790 Booker T. Washington1856–1915 Carlo Collodi1826–1890 Charles Brockden Brown1771–1810 Charles Maturin1780–1824 Confucius551 BCE–479 BCE David Lindsay1876–1945 E.C. Bentley1875–1956 Edward FitzGerald1809–1883 Edward Gibbon1737–1794 Erasmus1466–1536 Erskine Childers1870–1922 Fanny Burney1752–1840 Frances Hodgson Burnett1849–1924 Francisco de Quevedo1580–1645 François Mauriac1885–1970 Frank Norris1870–1902 Frederick Douglass1818–1895 Gabriela Mistral1889–1957 Gaston Leroux1868–1927 George Bernard Shaw1856–1950 George Gissing1857–1903 George Grossmith1847–1912 Giovanni Verga1840–1922 H. Rider Haggard1856–1925 Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen1622–1676 Heinrich von Kleist1777–1811 Herodotus484 BCE–425 BCE Hope Mirrlees1887–1978 H.P. Lovecraft1890–1937 Jean de La Fontaine1621–1695 Jean Toomer1894–1967 Jerome K. Jerome1859–1927 J.K. Huysmans1848–1907 Johanna Spyri1827–1901 John Bunyan1628–1688 John Stuart Mill1806–1873 Jules Verne1828–1905 Karel Čapek1890–1938 Karl May1842–1912 Lodovico Ariosto1474–1533 Lytton Strachey1880–1932 Maria Edgeworth1768–1849 Matthew Lewis1775–1818 Max Beerbohm1872–1956 Maxim Gorky1868–1936 M.R. James1862–1936 Multatuli1820–1887 Pedro Calderón de la Barca1600–1681 Petrarch1304–1374 Petronius Arbiter27–66 Radclyffe Hall1880–1943 Rene Descartes1596–1650 Samuel Johnson1709–1784 Sheridan Le Fanu1814–1873 Stephen Crane1871–1900 Sun Tzu544 BCE–496 BCE Sylvia Townsend Warner1893–1978 T.E. Lawrence1888–1935 Theodor Herzl1860–1904 Thomas Aquinas1225–1274 Thomas More1478–1535 Thornton Wilder1897–1975 Thorstein Veblen1857–1929 Thucydides460 BCE–400 BCE Tobias Smollett1721–1771 Washington Irving1783–1859 W.E.B. Du Bois1868–1963 William Beckford1760–1844 William Godwin1756–1836 William Hope Hodgson1877–1918 William Morris1834–1896 Xenophon430 BCE–354 BCE Zane Grey1872–1939