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…
Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1343 – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for The Canterbury Tales. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternativel…
Edmund Spenser (c. 1552 - 1599) was an important English poet and Poet Laureate best known for The Faerie Queene, an epic poem celebrating, through fantastical allegory, the Tudor dynasty and Elizabet…
Christopher "Kit" Marlowe (baptised 26 February 1564) was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. The foremost Elizabethan tragedian next to William Shakespeare, he is known …
Elizabeth Cary, Lady Falkland, nee Tanfield, was an English poet, translator, and dramatist. Precocious and studious, she was known from a young age for her learning and knowledge of languages.
Chrétien de Troyes, commonly regarded as the father of Arthurian romance and a key figure in Western literature, composed in French in the latter part of the twelfth century. Virtually nothing is know…
Aphra Behn, or Ayfara Behn, of the first professional women authors in English on Britain wrote plays, poetry, and her best known work, the prose fiction Oroonoko (1688).
Christine de Pizan (also seen as de Pisan) (1363–c.1434) was a writer and analyst of the medieval era who strongly challenged misogyny and stereotypes that were prevalent in the male-dominated realm o…
Work of Greek lyric poet Sappho, noted for its passionate and erotic celebration of the beauty of young women and men, after flourit circa 600 BC and survives only in fragments.
Historia Regum Britanniae circa 1139 of Geoffrey of Monmouth as English chronicler, popularized Arthurian legend and contains the source material for several plays of William Shak…
Cornuälle, Heldris de Heldris de Cornouailles Heldris de Cornuaille Heldris de Cornuälle Heldris de Cornvalle Heldris di Cornovaglia Heldris of Cornwall
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 story-teller, Boccaccio, and the poet, Petrarch, he forms…
Early church father and philosopher Saint Augustine served from 396 as the bishop of Hippo in present-day Algeria and through such writings as the autobiographical Confessions in 397 and the volum…
Juana Inés de la Cruz was born in a town in the Valley of Mexico to a Creole mother Isabel Ramírez and a Spanish military father, Pedro Manuel de Asbaje. As a child, she learned Nahuatl (Uto-Aztec lan…
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…
