William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's…
Gary Edward "Garrison" Keillor is an American author, singer, humorist, voice actor, and radio personality. He created the Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) show A Prairie Home Companion (called Garrison K…
Margaret Atwood was born in 1939 in Ottawa and grew up in northern Ontario, Quebec, and Toronto. She received her undergraduate degree from Victoria College at the University of Toronto and her master…
Annie Dillard (born April 30, 1945) is an American author, best known for her narrative prose in both fiction and non-fiction. She has published works of poetry, essays, prose, and literary criticism,…
Amy Tan (Chinese: 譚恩美; pinyin: Tán Ēnměi; born February 19, 1952) is an American writer whose novels include The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses, The Bonesetter’s Daug…
Anne Fadiman is the author, most recently, of the essay collection Frog (2026). Her first book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down (1997), won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Los Ang…
Susanna Clarke was born in Nottingham in 1959. A nomadic childhood was spent in towns in Northern England and Scotland. She was educated at St Hilda's College, Oxford, and has worked in various areas …
Thomas Stearns Eliot was a poet, dramatist and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948 "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry." He wrote the poems …
Mary Jane Oliver was an American poet who won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Her work is inspired by nature, rather than the human world, stemming from her lifelong passion for solita…
Wilbur was born in New York City and grew up in North Caldwell, New Jersey.He graduated from Montclair High School in 1938, having worked on the school newspaper as a student there. He gr…
Kimiko Hahn is the author of seven poetry collections. The Unbearable Heart won the Before Columbus Foundation’s American Book Award. She has received numerous grants, including a National Endowment f…
Czesław Miłosz was a Nobel Prize winning poet and author of Polish-Lithuanian heritage. He memorialised his Lithuanian childhood in a 1955 novel, The Issa Valley, and in the 1959 memoir Native …
McClatchy is an adjunct professor at Yale University and editor of the Yale Review. He also edits the "Voice of the Poet" series for Random House AudioBooks.
Carmela Ciuraru is the author of Nom de Plume: A (Secret) History of Pseudonyms, and her anthologies include First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems That Captivated and Inspired Them and Soli…
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien: writer, artist, scholar, linguist. Known to millions around the world as the author of The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien spent most of his life teaching at the University of Ox…
Layli Long Soldier is the author of WHERREAS, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the PEN/Jean Stein Award and was a finalist for the National Book Award. She is a citizen of the Ogla…
Books can be attributed to "Unknown" when the author or editor (as applicable) is not known and cannot be discovered. If at all possible, list at least one actual author or editor for a book instead o…
Dante Alighieri, or simply Dante (May 14/June 13 1265 – September 13/14, 1321), is one of the greatest poets in the Italian language; with the comic story-teller, Boccaccio, and the poet, Petrarch, he…
After walking the South West Coast Path, Raynor Winn became a long distance walker and now writes about nature, homelessness and wild camping. She lives in Cornwall.
