February 9

In literary history

• 1881Dostoevsky died from a pulmonary haemorrhage in Saint Petersburg, tens of thousands of mourners following his coffin through the streets. He had survived a mock execution, four years of hard labour, and exile to write every major novel after thirty-nine.

Writers born on February 9

• Thomas Paine (1737),
• Natsume Sōseki (1867),
• Thomas Bernhard (1931),
• J.M. Coetzee (1940),
• Alice Walker (1944)

The Daily Canon for February 9

The Iliad by Homer (-750).