ENGLISH_LITERATURE_WRITERS/POETS

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William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616) English poet and playwright Famous plays include Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, Merchant of Venice and Hamlet. Shakespeare is widely considered the seminal writer of the English language.

Jonathan Swift (1667 – 1745) Anglo-Irish writer born in Dublin Swift was a prominent satirist, essayist and author. Notable works include Gulliver’s Travels (1726), A Modest Proposal and A Tale of a Tub.

Samuel Johnson (1709 – 1784) British author best known for his compilation of the English dictionary. Although not the first attempt at a dictionary, it was widely considered to be the most comprehensive – setting the standard for later dictionaries.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749 – 1832) German poet, playwright, and author Notable works of Goethe include: Faust, Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship and Elective Affinities.

Jane Austen (1775 – 1817) English author who wrote romantic fiction combined with social realism. Her novels include: Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Emma (1816).

Honore de Balzac (1799 – 1850) French novelist and short story writer Balzac was an influential realist writer who created characters of moral ambiguity – often based on his own real life examples. His greatest work was the collection of short stories La Comédie humaine.

Alexander Dumas (1802 – 1870) French author of historical dramas, including – The Count of Monte Cristo (1844), and The Three Musketeers (1844). Also prolific author of magazine articles, pamphlets and travel books

Victor Hugo (1802 – 1885) French author and poet Hugo’s novels include Les Misérables, (1862) and Notre-Dame de Paris (1831).

Charles Dickens (1812 – 1870) – English writer and social critic. His best-known works include novels such as Oliver Twist, David Copperfield and A Christmas Carol.

Charlotte Bronte (1816 – 1855) English novelist and poet, from Haworth Her best known novel is ‘Jane Eyre’ (1847)

Henry David Thoreau (1817 – 1862) – American poet, writer and leading member of the Transcendentalist movement. Thoreau’s “Walden” (1854) was a unique account of living close to nature

Emily Bronte (1818 – 1848) English novelist Emily Bronte is best known for her novel Wuthering Heights (1847), and her poetry

George Eliot (1819 – 1880) Pen name of Mary Ann Evans Wrote novels, The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861), Middlemarch (1871–72), and Daniel Deronda (1876)

Leo Tolstoy (1828 – 1910) Russian novelist and moral philosopher Famous works include the epic novels – War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877). Tolstoy also became an influential philosopher with his brand of Christian pacifisms

Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881) Russian novelist, journalist and philosopher Notable works include Notes from Underground, Crime and Punishment and The Idiot

Lewis Carroll (1832-1898) Oxford mathematician and author Famous for Alice in Wonderland, Through the Looking Glass, and poems like The Snark

Mark Twain (1835 – 1910) American writer and humorist, considered the ‘father of American literature’. Famous works include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885)

Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) English novelist and poet Hardy was a Victorian realist who was influenced by Romanticism. He wrote about problems of Victorian society – in particular, declining rural life. Notable works include: Far from the Madding Crowd (1874), Tess of the d’Urbervilles (1891), and Jude the Obscure (1895)

Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900) – Irish writer and poet. Wilde wrote humorous, satirical plays, such as ‘The Importance of Being Earnest‘ and ‘The Picture of Dorian Grey’

Kenneth Graham (1859 – 1932) Author of the Wind in the Willows (1908), a classic of children’s literature

George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950) Irish playwright and wit Famous works include Pygmalion (1912), Man and Superman (1903) and Back to Methuselah (1921)

Barbara Cartland (1901 – 2000) One of most prolific and best selling authors of the romantic fiction genre. Some suggest she has sold over 2 billion copies worldwide

John Steinbeck (1902 – 1968) American writer who captured the social change experienced in the US around the time of the Great Depression. Famous works include – Of Mice and Men (1937), The Grapes of Wrath (1939) and East of Eden (1952)

George Orwell (1903 – 1950) – English author. Famous works include Animal Farm, and 1984. – Both stark warnings about the dangers of totalitarian states, Orwell was also a democratic socialist who fought in the Spanish Civil War, documenting his experiences in “Homage to Catalonia” (1938)

Samuel Beckett (1906-1989) Irish avant grade, modernist writer Beckett wrote minimalist and thought provoking plays, such as ‘Waiting for Godot’ (1953) and ‘Endgame‘ (1957). He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1969

Albert Camus (1913 – 1960) – French author, journalist, and philosopher. Associated with existentialism and absurdisim Famous works included The Myth of Sisyphus, The Stranger and The Plague

Roald Dahl (1916 – 1990) English author, best known for his children’s books, such as Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, James and The Giant Peach and The BFG

Aleksandra Solzhenitsyn (1918 – 2008) Russian author, historian and political critic Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970 for his work in exposing the nature of Soviet totalitarianism. e.g, The Gulag Archipelago (1965-67)

J.D. Salinger (1919 – 2010) American author most influential novel The Catcher in the Rye (1951) Wrote many short stories for New Yorker magazine, such as “A Perfect Day for Bananafish”

Joseph Heller (1923 – 1999) American novelist, who wrote satirical and black comedy His most famous work, is ‘Catch 22’ (1961) – a satire on the futility of war

Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1927 – 2014) Colombian author Wrote: One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967), The Autumn of the Patriarch (1975) and

Love in the Time of Cholera (1985) Nobel Prize in Literature (1982)

Anne Frank (1929 – 1945) Dutch-Jewish diarist. Known for her diary ‘Anne Frank‘Published posthumously by her father – recalling her life hiding from Gestapo in occupied Holland

Salman Rushdie (1947 – ) Anglo-Indian author. His works combine elements of magic realism, satire and historical fiction – often based on Indian sub-continent. Notable works include Midnight’s Children (1981), Shame (1983) and Satanic Verses (1988)

Stephen King (1947 – ) American author of contemporary horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, science fiction, and fantasy One of the best selling authors of modern times

George R.R Martin (1948 – ) American author of epic fantasy series – A Song of Ice and Fire, – his international best-selling series of fantasy, adapted for the screen as a Game of Thrones

Douglas Adams (1952 – 2001) British writer of humorous and abuser science fiction Adams wrote a best selling trilogy (of five books) The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – which began as a BBC play

J.K.Rowling (1965 – ) British author of the Harry Potter Series – which has become the best selling book series of all time. Her first book was Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (1997). Rowling has also published adult fiction, such as The Casual Vacancy (2012) and The Cuckoo’s Calling (2013)

Khaled Hosseini (1965 – ) Afghan born American writer. Notable works include: The Kite Runner (2003) A Thousand Splendid Suns (2007) And the Mountains Echoed (2013

#EARLY_POETS

Homer (c. 8th Century B.C. ) Considered the greatest of the ancient Greek poets Homer was the author of the two epic poems, The Iliad and The Odyssey

Sappho ( c 570 BC) One of the first published female writers. Much of her poetry has been lost but her immense reputation has remained. Plato referred to Sappho as one of the great ten poets.

Virgil (70 BC – 19 BC) Roman poet Wrote three epics Eclogues (or Bucolics), the Georgics, and the Aeneid