The Best Writers Ever!
Points from my "The Best Films Ever Made"-Lists. Vol. 1 = 100%, Vol. 2 = 50%, Vol. 3 = 33%, Vol. 4 = 25%, Vol. 5 = 20 %, Vol. 6 = 17%
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William Shakespeare's birthdate is assumed from his baptism on April 25. His father John was the son of a farmer who became a successful tradesman; his mother Mary Arden was gentry. He studied Latin works at Stratford Grammar School, leaving at about age 15. About this time his father suffered an unknown financial setback, though the family home remained in his possession. An affair with Anne Hathaway, eight years his senior and a nearby farmer's daughter, led to pregnancy and a hasty marriage late in 1582. Susanna was born in May of 1583, twins Hamnet and Judith in January of 1585. By 1592 he was an established actor and playwright in London though his "career path" afterward (fugitive? butcher? soldier? actor?) is highly debated. When plague closed the London theatres for two years he apparently toured; he also wrote two long poems, "Venus and Adonis" and "The Rape of Lucrece". He may have spent this time at the estate of the Earl of Southampton. By December 1594 he was back in London as a member of the Lord Chamberlain's Men, the company he stayed with the rest of his life. In 1596 he seems to have purchased a coat of arms for his father; the same year Hamnet died at age 11. The following year he purchased the grand Stratford mansion New Place. A 1598 edition of "Love's Labors" was the first to bear his name, though he was already regarded as England's greatest playwright. He is believed to have written his "Sonnets" during the 1590s. In 1599 he became a partner in the new Globe Theatre, the company of which joined the royal household on the accession of James in 1603. That is the last year in which he appeared in a cast list. He seems to have retired to Stratford in 1612, where he continued to be active in real estate investment. The cause of his death is unknown.6916 points- Writer
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Stephen Edwin King was born on September 21, 1947, at the Maine General Hospital in Portland. His parents were Nellie Ruth (Pillsbury), who worked as a caregiver at a mental institute, and Donald Edwin King, a merchant seaman. His father was born under the surname "Pollock," but used the last name "King," under which Stephen was born. He has an older brother, David. The Kings were a typical family until one night, when Donald said he was stepping out for cigarettes and was never heard from again. Ruth took over raising the family with help from relatives. They traveled throughout many states over several years, finally moving back to Durham, Maine, in 1958.
Stephen began his actual writing career in January of 1959, when David and Stephen decided to publish their own local newspaper named "Dave's Rag". David bought a mimeograph machine, and they put together a paper they sold for five cents an issue. Stephen attended Lisbon High School, in Lisbon, in 1962. Collaborating with his best friend Chris Chesley in 1963, they published a collection of 18 short stories called "People, Places, and Things--Volume I". King's stories included "Hotel at the End of the Road", "I've Got to Get Away!", "The Dimension Warp", "The Thing at the Bottom of the Well", "The Stranger", "I'm Falling", "The Cursed Expedition", and "The Other Side of the Fog." A year later, King's amateur press, Triad and Gaslight Books, published a two-part book titled "The Star Invaders".
King made his first actual published appearance in 1965 in the magazine Comics Review with his story "I Was a Teenage Grave Robber." The story ran about 6,000 words in length. In 1966 he graduated from high school and took a scholarship to attend the University of Maine. Looking back on his high school days, King recalled that "my high school career was totally undistinguished. I was not at the top of my class, nor at the bottom." Later that summer King began working on a novel called "Getting It On", about some kids who take over a classroom and try unsuccessfully to ward off the National Guard. During his first year at college, King completed his first full-length novel, "The Long Walk." He submitted the novel to Bennett Cerf/Random House only to have it rejected. King took the rejection badly and filed the book away.
He made his first small sale--$35--with the story "The Glass Floor". In June 1970 King graduated from the University of Maine with a Bachelor of Science degree in English and a certificate to teach high school. King's next idea came from the poem by Robert Browning, "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came." He found bright colored green paper in the library and began work on "The Dark Tower" saga, but his chronic shortage of money meant that he was unable to further pursue the novel, and it, too, was filed away. King took a job at a filling station pumping gas for the princely sum of $1.25 an hour. Soon he began to earn money for his writings by submitting his short stories to men's magazines such as Cavalier.
On January 2, 1971, he married Tabitha King (born Tabitha Jane Spruce). In the fall of 1971 King took a teaching job at Hampden Academy, earning $6,400 a year. The Kings then moved to Hermon, a town west of Bangor. Stephen then began work on a short story about a teenage girl named Carietta White. After completing a few pages, he decided it was not a worthy story and crumpled the pages up and tossed them into the trash. Fortunately, Tabitha took the pages out and read them. She encouraged her husband to continue the story, which he did. In January 1973 he submitted "Carrie" to Doubleday. In March Doubleday bought the book. On May 12 the publisher sold the paperback rights for the novel to New American Library for $400,000. His contract called for his getting half of that sum, and he quit his teaching job to pursue writing full time. The rest, as they say, is history.
Since then King has had numerous short stories and novels published and movies made from his work. He has been called the "Master of Horror". His books have been translated into 33 different languages, published in over 35 different countries. There are over 300 million copies of his novels in publication. He continues to live in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, and writes out of his home.
In June 1999 King was severely injured in an accident, he was walking alongside a highway and was hit by a van, that left him in critical condition with injuries to his lung, broken ribs, a broken leg and a severely fractured hip. After three weeks of operations, he was released from the Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston.3885 points- Writer
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Marcel Pagnol was born on 28 February 1895 in Aubagne, Bouches-du-Rhône, France. He was a writer and producer, known for The Well-Digger's Daughter (1940), Jean de Florette (1986) and Le schpountz (1938). He was married to Jacqueline Pagnol and Simone Collin. He died on 18 April 1974 in Paris, France.3458 points- Writer
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Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was born in 1860, the third of six children to a family of a grocer, in Taganrog, Russia, a southern seaport and resort on the Azov Sea. His father, a 3rd-rank Member of the Merchant's Guild, was a religious fanatic and a tyrant who used his children as slaves. Young Chekhov was a part-time assistant in his father's business and also a singer in a church choir. At age 15, he was abandoned by his bankrupt father and lived alone for 3 years while finishing the Classical Gymnazium in Taganrog. Chekhov obtained a scholarship at the Moscow University Medical School in 1879, from which he graduated in 1884 as a Medical Doctor. He practiced general medicine for about ten years.
While a student, Chekhov published numerous short stories and humorous sketches under a pseudonym. He reserved his real name for serious medical publications, saying "medicine is my wife; literature - a mistress." While a doctor, he kept writing and had success with his first books, and his first play "Ivanov." He gradually decreased his medical practice in favor of writing. Chekhov created his own style based on objectivity, brevity, originality, and compassion. It was different from the mainstream Russian literature's scrupulous analytical depiction of "heroes." Chekhov used a delicate fabric of hints, subtle nuances in dialogs, and precise details. He described his original style as an "objective manner of writing." He avoided stereotyping and instructive political messages in favor of cool comic irony. Praised by writers Lev Tolstoy and Nikolai Leskov, he was awarded the Pushkin Prize from the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1888.
In 1890, Chekhov made a lengthy journey to Siberia and to the remote prison-island of Sakhalin. There, he surveyed thousands of convicts and conducted research for a dissertation about the life of prisoners. His research grew bigger than a dissertation, and in 1894, he published a detailed social-analytical essay on the Russian penitentiary system in Siberia and the Far East, titled "Island of Sakhalin." Chekhov's valuable research was later used and quoted by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn in his "Gulag Archipelago." In 1897-1899, Chekhov returned to his medical practice in order to stop the epidemic of cholera.
Chekhov developed special relationship with Stanislavsky and Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko at the Moscow Art Theater. He emerged as a mature playwright who influenced the modern theater. In the plays "Uncle Vanya," "Three Sisters," "Seagull," and "Cherry Orchard," he mastered the use of understatement, anticlimax, and implied emotion. The leading actress of the Moscow Art Theater, Olga Knipper-Chekhova, became his wife. In 1898, Chekhov moved to his Mediterranean-style home at the Black Sea resort of Yalta in the Crimea. There he was visited by writers Lev Tolstoy, Maxim Gorky, Ivan Bunin, and artists Konstantin Korovin and Isaac Levitan.3277 points- Writer
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Tennessee Williams met long-term partner Frank Merlo in the summer of 1948 (Merlo died of lung cancer in the fall of 1963). Though separated briefly in 1961 and again in 1962, the two were partners for 15 years. Merlo acted as his personal manager/secretary.
Williams spent much of his most prolific years in Rome, Italy, and his enduring friendship with Italian stage and screen legend Anna Magnani lasted 24 years and inspired both "The Rose Tattoo" and "Orpheus Descending". Magnani realized the lead parts of these two plays, which were written for her, in their film versions. The turbulent and inspirational friendship shared between Williams and Magnani is the subject of the internationally acclaimed play "Roman Nights" by Franco D'Alessandro.
Aside from his published "Memoirs", the only authorized biographical book on Williams is by Bruce Smith, entitled "Costly Performances - Tennessee Williams; The Last Stage." This book deals with the last four years of Williams' life (1979-1983).2972 points- Writer
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Charles Dickens' father was a clerk at the Naval Pay Office, and because of this the family had to move from place to place: Plymouth, London, Chatham. It was a large family and despite hard work, his father couldn't earn enough money. In 1823 he was arrested for debt and Charles had to start working in a factory, labeling bottles for six shillings a week. The economy eventually improved and Charles was able to go back to school. After leaving school, he started to work in a solicitor's office. He learned shorthand and started as a reporter working for the Morning Chronicle in courts of law and the House of Commons. In 1836 his first novel was published, "The Pickwick Papers". It was a success and was followed by more novels: "Oliver Twist" (1837), "Nicholas Nickleby" (1838-39) and "Barnaby Rudge" (1841). He traveled to America later that year and aroused the hostility of the American press by supporting the abolitionist (anti-slavery) movement. In 1858 he divorced his wife Catherine, who had borne him ten children. During the 1840s his social criticism became more radical and his comedy more savage: novels like "David Copperfield" (1849-50), "A Tale of Two Cities" (1959) and "Great Expectations" (1860-61) only increased his fame and respect. His last novel, "The Mystery of Edwin Drood", was never completed and was later published posthumously.2646 points- Writer
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Ferenc Molnár was born on 12 January 1878 in Budapest, Austria-Hungary [now Hungary]. He was a writer and actor, known for Carousel, Tales of Manhattan (1942) and I'll Be Yours (1947). He was married to Lili Darvas, Sári Fedák and Margit Vészi. He died on 1 April 1952 in New York City, New York, USA.2629 points- Writer
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Georges Simenon was a Belgian novelist, writing in the French language. He published nearly 500 different novels, and a large number of short stories. He became internationally famous for creating the French police detective Jules Maigret, as the protagonist in a celebrated series of mystery novels. Between 1931 and 1972, Simenon published 75 novels and 28 short stories about Maigret and his supporting cast. The Maigret stories have often been adapted into films, television series, and radio shows.
In 1903, Simenon was born in Liège, Belgium. His parents were the accountant Désiré Simenon and his wife Henriette Brüll. His father worked as an accountant for an insurance company. They were members of the wider Simenon family, a line of peasants from Limburg whose history had been recorded since the 1580s. Simenon's maternal ancestry was primarily German and Dutch. His mother was reputedly a distant descendant of the famed robber Gabriel Brühl (died in 1743). Simenon would later use the family name "Brühl" as one of his pen names.
In 1905, the Simenon family moved to the Outremeuse neighborhood of Liège, where Simenon would spend most of his childhood. In 1911, they moved to a larger house in the same neighborhood. The family started taking in lodgers to supplement their income. The young Simenon regularly interacted with these lodgers, who were apprentices and students of various nationalities. These interactions gave him his first taste of cosmopolitanism.
In September 1914, Simenon started attending the Collège Saint-Louis, a Jesuit high school. He dropped out of high school in June 1918, deciding against taking his year-end exams. He supported himself through a series of odd-jobs. In January 1919, the adolescent Simenon was hired as a journalist by the newspaper "Gazette de Liège". His assignments consistent of "human interest" stories, which were thought to be of trivial importance. Simenon grew interested in the seamier side of life in Liège, and started to frequent bars and cheap hotels in search of information. He also grew interested in police investigations, and attended lectures on police technique by the famed criminologist Edmond Locard (1877-1966).
Simenon wrote his first novel in June 1919, but it was not published in book form until 1921. During the early 1920s, Simenon started hanging out with members of "La Caque", a group of Bohemian artists. He was introduced by them to Régine "Tigy" Renchon, who became his girlfriend. In 1922, Simenon's father died. Simenon took the decision to move with Tigy to Paris, where he got acquainted with ordinary working-class Parisians. The city's bistros, cheap hotels, bars and restaurants would later become settings for his novels.
In 1928, Simenon took an extended sea voyage for a journalistic assignment. He discovered that he liked water travel. In 1929, he had a boat house constructed for himself and his wife, called the "Ostrogoth". They used it to travel through the French canal system. Joining them in their travels was their housekeeper Henriette "Boule" Liberge, who became Simenon's mistress. Their romantic relationship lasted for decades, unlike Simenon's previous short-lived affairs.
In 1930, Simenon wrote the first Maigret story during a boat trip in the Netherlands. It was published the following year. In 1932, Simenon's journalistic assignments caused him to travel across Africa, eastern Europe, Turkey, and the Soviet Union. In 1933, Simenon interviewed the exiled politician Leon Trotsky in Istanbul. Simenon took a trip around the world from 1934 to 1935. For much of the 1930s, Simenon was a permanent foreign resident in France.
During World War II, Simenon lived in Vendée, France. He maintained decent relationships with the German occupation authorities, and negotiated film rights of his books with German studios. Following the end of the war, Simenon was accused of being a German collaborator, but with little apparent evidence. In 1950, the French authorities temporarily forbid him to publish new works as punishment for his supposed collaboration, but the sentence was not enforced.
In 1945, Simenon left France with his wife for an extended stay in Quebec, Canada. He wrote three novels in the local city of Sainte-Marguerite-du-Lac-Masson. For the following decade, Simenon and his family moved constantly across Canada and the United States. He learned to speak English with relative ease, and so did his mistress Boule. In 1949, Simenon divorced Tigy, but continued living in close proximity with her, in accordance with the divorce agreement. In 1950, Simenon married his second wife Denyse Ouimet (a French-Canadian) in Reno, Nevada. She was 17 years younger than Simenon himself. Denyse was his former secretary, and they had been romantically involved since 1945.
In 1952, Simenon briefly returned to Belgium, as he was made a member of the "Académie Royale de Belgique" (Royal Academy of Belgium). He had not actually lived in Belgium since 1922, but he remained a Belgian citizen and had become the country's most famous writer. Simenon permanently left the United States in 1955. He initially settled back in France, but then decided to move to Switzerland. In 1963, he had a new house constructed for himself in Épalinges, Vaud.
In 1964, Simenon and his wife Denyse separated permanently. His housekeeper Teresa had become his new long-term mistress. In 1978, Simenon was shocked when his daughter Marie-Jo committed suicide at the age of 25. In 1984, Simenon underwent surgery for a brain tumor. He recovered well, but his health further deteriorated during the last years of his life. In September 1989, he died in his sleep while staying in Lausanne,. He was 86-years-old at the time of his death, and had not published any major work for several years.
Simenon's works have remained popular into the 21st century. According to the 2019 version of the Index Translationum by UNESCO, Simenon was the 17th most translated writer on a global scale. In the Index, Simenon outranked the likes of of Astrid Lindgren (18th) and Pope John Paul II (19th). He ranked just below Fyodor Dostoevsky (16th) and Mark Twain (15th).2564 points- Writer
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The German novelist Erich Maria Remarque was born in Osnabrück in 1898. His first novel, the famous anti-war epic All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), was written based on his experiences as a soldier in WWI, and published in 1929. He moved to Switzerland until 1939 and later emigrated to the US. He died in 1970 in Locarno, Switzerland.2440 points- Writer
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Graham Greene was one of the greatest novelists of the 20th century and his influence on the cinema and theatre was enormous. He wrote five plays and almost all of his novels, including "Brighton Rock", "The Ministry of Fear" and "The End of the Affair", have been brought to the screen. A superb storyteller, he also wrote the screenplays for such classics as The Fallen Idol (1948) and The Third Man (1949).
A colorful and larger-than-life figure, Greene traveled widely throughout the world, from the jungles of Liberia to the Mexican desert to the Far East and the Soviet Union. In World War Two was a member of MI-6 (the British intelligence service) working with the double-agent Kim Philby, and he numbered among his friends such diverse personalities as Evelyn Waugh, Noël Coward and Panamanian dictator Gen. Omar Torrijos. A notorious womanizer, he married only once but had a string of extra-marital affairs and confessed he was "a bad husband and a fickle lover." During the 1920s and 1930s he confessed that he had had relationships with over 50 prostitutes.
Born in Hertforshire, England, in 1904, the son of the headmaster of Berkhamstead School, Greene was educated at Berkhamstead and later Oxford. At Oxford he published more than 60 poems and stories and soon after graduation converted to Roman Catholicism. "I had to find a religion to measure my evil against" he said. His first novel, "The Man Within", came out in 1929, to public and critical acclaim. "Stamboul Train" (1934), a topical political thriller, was the first to reach the screen (as Orient Express (1934)) and a string of other taut suspense dramas followed: "This Gun For Hire" (1942), "The Ministry of Fear" (1943) and "The Confidential Agent" (1945). It was his novel "Brighton Rock", however, which depicted Pinkie, a teenage gangster with demonic spirituality, that eventually became a milestone in British cinema. Originally a successful stage play starring Richard Attenborough as Pinkie, Greene co-wrote the 1947 screenplay Brighton Rock (1948)) with Terence Rattigan.
Greene's collaboration with director _Carol Reed' produced three distinctive films: The Fallen Idol (1948), starring Ralph Richardson, The Third Man (1949) and Our Man in Havana (1959). One of the peaks in British filmmaking, "The Third Man", starring Orson Welles as Harry Lime, was a skillful tale of deception and drug trafficking. Greene developed the screenplay from a single sentence: "I had paid my last farewell to Harry a week ago, when his coffin was lowered into the frozen February ground, so that it was with incredulity that I saw him pass by, without a sign of recognition, amongst a host of strangers in the Strand". The character of Harry Lime later inspired an American radio series starring Orson Welles, short stories published by the News of the World and the TV series The Third Man (1959), starring Michael Rennie. In Peter Jackson's Heavenly Creatures (1994). Kate Winslet fantasizes about Harry.
As well as writing novels, Greene reviewed films for "The Spectator", then for the short-lived "Night and Day", which folded after he was accused of a "gross outrage" on 'Shirley Temple (I)'--then nine years old--in his review of Wee Willie Winkie (1937). He wrote that "her admirers--middle-aged men and clergymen--respond to her dubious coquetry, to the sight of her well-shaped and desirable little body, packed with enormous vitality". In the view of the prosecuting counsel it was "one of the most horrible libels one could well imagine."
Greene was an intelligent and sophisticated playwright. His first play written directly for the stage was "The Living Room" (1953), a powerful drama of suicide and despair which starred Dorothy Tutin. It was followed by "The Potting Shed" (1957), a drama about an atheist's pact with God, and "The Complaisant Lover" (1959), a comedy of manners in which a husband and lover knowingly share a wife's favors, which starred Michael Redgrave. Many of his played were televised.
Greene's work continues to fascinate actors, filmmakers and cinema goers throughout the world. In 1973 Maggie Smith and Alec McCowen starred in "Travels With My Aunt" (Smith's role had originally been offered to Katharine Hepburn), Nicol Williamson and Ann Todd starred in The Human Factor (1979) and Ralph Fiennes and Julianne Moore starred in a remake of The End of the Affair (1999).
Greene said of his writing: "When I describe a scene . . . I capture it with the moving eye of the cine-camera rather than with the photographer's eye--which leaves it frozen. In this precise domain I think the cinema has influenced me."
Towards the end of his life Greene lived in Vevey, Switzerland, with his companion Yvonne Cloetta. He died there peacefully on April 13, 1991.2404 points- Writer
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John Steinbeck was the third of four children and the only son born to John Ernst and Olive Hamilton Steinbeck. His father was County Treasurer and his mother, a former schoolteacher. John graduated from Salinas High School in 1919 and attended classes at Stanford University, leaving in 1925 without a degree. He was variously employed as a sales clerk, farm laborer, ranch hand and factory worker. In 1925, he traveled by freight from Los Angeles to New York, where he was a construction worker. From 1926-1928, he was a caretaker in Lake Tahoe, CA. His first novel, "Cup of Gold," was published in 1929. During the 1930s, he produced most of his famous novels ("To a God Unknown," "Tortilla Flat," "In Dubious Battle," "Of Mice and Men," and his Pulitzer Prize-winning "The Grapes of Wrath"). In 1941, he moved with the singer who would become his second wife to New York City. They had two sons, Thom (b. 1944) and John IV (b. 1946). In 1948, his close friend Ed Ricketts died, he went through a divorce, he took a a tour of Russia, and he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His wrote the screenplay for Viva Zapata! (1952), and 17 of his works have been made into movies. He received three Academy Award nominations. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962. US President Lyndon B. Johnson awarded him the United States Medal of Freedom in 1964, and he was commemorated on a U.S. postage stamp on what would have been his 75th birthday. His ashes lie in Garden of Memories Cemetery in Salinas.2269 points- Writer
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James M. Cain was a 'Film Noir' author. His father was a professor, and president, of 'Washington College'. His mother was an opera singer in Maryland.
James graduated from the same college in 1910, and became a writer for 'Baltimore American', then 'Baltimore Sun' [still being published] by 1914. He was drafted in 1916, and spent 1918 in France as a writer for the 'Army Times'. When released, he did writing for various publications, and by 1934, his first novel,"The Postman Always Rings Twice", was published. Of Course, a very popular movie in 1946.
With adaptations of his novels[credit only as 'story contributor'],he was much in demand in the 40's in the 'Film Noir' category. But, in 1946, he formed a 'Cain Plan' ["American Authors' Authority"]whereby The writers would have authority of copyrights, and be the representative for them in negotiations with the movie producers and court disputes. Resembling 'S.A.G.', it was opposed by an org. called, "The American Writers' Assoc.". There was a debate carried on in the 'Saturday Review'.
He was married 4 times.2210 points- Writer
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Although Hugo was fascinated by poems from childhood on, he spent some time at the polytechnic university of Paris until he dedicated all his work to literature. He was one of the few authors who were allowed to reach popularity during his own lifetime and one of the leaders of French romance.
After the death of his daughter Leopoldine in 1843, he started a career in politics and became member of the Paris chamber where he fought for leftist ideas. After the re-establishing of monarchy, he had to go into exile to Guernesey (1851-1870) where his literary work became more important, e.g. "Les Miserables" was written during that period. After his return to Paris he did not join politics anymore.2046 points- Writer
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Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was born on November 11, 1821, in Moscow, Russia. He was the second of seven children of Mikhail Andreevich and Maria Dostoevsky. His father, a doctor, was a member of the Russian nobility, owned serfs and had a considerable estate near Moscow where he lived with his family. It's believed that he was murdered by his own serfs in revenge for the violence he would commit against them while in drunken rages. As a child Fyodor was traumatized when he witnessed the rape of a young female serf and suffered from epileptic seizures. He was sent to a boarding school, where he studied sciences, languages and literature. He was devastated when his favorite writer, Alexander Pushkin, was killed in a duel in St. Petersburg in 1837. That same year Dostoevsky's mother died, and he moved to St. Petersburg. There he graduated from the Military Engineering Academy, and served in the Tsar's government for a year.
Dostoevsky was active in St. Petersburg literary life; he grew out of his early influence by Nikolay Gogol, translated "Eugenia Grande" by Honoré de Balzac in 1844 and published his own first novel, "Poor Folk", in 1845, and became friends with Ivan Turgenev and Nikolai A. Nekrasov, but it ended abruptly after they criticized his writing. At that time he became indirectly involved in a revolutionary movement, for which he was arrested in 1849, convicted of treason and sentenced to death. His execution was scheduled for a freezing winter day in St. Petersburg, and at the appointed hour he was blindfolded and ordered to stand before the firing squad, waiting to be shot. The execution was called off at the last minute, however, and his sentence was commuted to a prison term and exile in Siberia, where his health declined amid increased epileptic seizures. After serving ten years in prison and exile, he regained his title in the nobility and returned to St. Petersburg with permission from the Tsar. He abandoned his formerly liberal views and became increasingly conservative and religious. That, however, didn't stop him from developing an acute gambling problem, and he accumulated massive gambling debts.
In 1862, after returning from his first major tour of Western Europe, Dostoevsky wrote that "Russia needs to be reformed, by learning the new ideas that are developing in Europe." On his next trip to Europe, in 1863, he spent all of his money on a manipulative woman, A. Suslova, went on a losing gambling spree, returned home flat broke and sank into a depression. At that time he wrote "Notes from Underground" (1864), preceding existentialism in literature. His first wife died in 1864, after six years of a childless marriage, and he adopted her son from her previous marriage. Painful experiences caused him to fall further into depression, but it was during this period that he wrote what many consider his finest work: "Crime and Punishment" (1866).
After completion of "The Gambler" (1867), the 47-year-old Dostoevsky married his loyal friend and literary secretary, 20-year-old Anna Snitkina, and they had four children. His first baby died at three months of age, causing him to sink further into depression and triggering more epileptic seizures. At that time Dostoevsky expressed his disillusionment with the Utopian ideas in his novels "The Idiot" (1868) and "The Devils" (aka "The Possessed") (1871), where the "devils" are destructive people, such as revolutionaries and terrorists. Dostoevsky was the main speaker at the opening of the monument to Alexander Pushkin in 1880, calling Pushkin a "wandering Russian, searching for universal happiness". In his final great novel, "The Brothers Karamazov" (1880), Dostoevsky revealed the components of his own split personality, depicted in four main characters; humble monk Alyosha, compulsive gambler Dmitri, rebellious intellectual Ivan, and their cynical father Fyodor Karamazov.
Dostoevsky died on February 9, 1881, of a lung hemorrhage caused by emphysema and epileptic seizures. He lived his entire life under the pall of epilepsy, much like the mythical "Sword of Damocles", and was fearless in telling the truth. His writings are an uncanny reflection on his own life - the fate of a genius in Russia.1923 points- Writer
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James Jones was born on 6 November 1921 in Robinson, Illinois, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for The Thin Red Line (1998), From Here to Eternity (1953) and The Longest Day (1962). He was married to Gloria Jones. He died on 9 May 1977 in Southampton, New York, USA.1872 points- German playwright and novelist Hermann Sudermann was born into a poor family in Matziken, East Prussia, in 1857. His father was a brewer and descended from a line of very strict fundamentalist Mennonite Christians; one of his ancestors, Daniel Sudermann, was a Protestant clergyman who played a major role in fomenting the religious wars that wracked Europe in the 18th century.
As a young boy Hermann was apprenticed to a pharmacist but he detested the smell of the medicines and formulas in the pharmacy and ran away. He attended Konigsburg University, where he studied history and philology. However, he chafed at the restrictions and conventions of academic life at the time, and one day just stood up in the middle of a class and left, never to return.
He next showed up in Berlin, attempting to break into legitimate theatre as a writer, but met with such little success that he was forced to take a job as a private tutor in order to survive. He managed to get a job as an editor on a small political weekly, but eventually turned out a few novels that met with some success, "Frau Sorge" and "Geschwister", and in 1889 his play "Die Ehre" was produced in Berlin. In 1890 his novel "Katzensteg" (aka "Regina") attracted attention for its sympathetic portrayals of the poor and downtrodden.
His 1891 novel "Sodoms Ende" was declared "immoral" and temporarily banned by court order. His next work, however, is undoubtedly his most famous: the play "Heimat" (aka "Magda"), a major hit on stage (and a favorite of such stage luminaries as Sarah Bernhardt, Eleanora Duse ad Mrs. Patrick Campbell).
Apart from the occasional novel, Sudermann concentrated on writing plays for the next several years, but not entirely successfully. He actually achieved more success as a novelist than as a playwright, although the modern perception of him is generally exactly the opposite.
He died in Berlin, Germany, in 1928.1827 points - Mario Puzo was born October 15, 1920, in "Hell's Kitchen" on Manhattan's (NY) West Side and, following military service in World War II, attended New York's New School for Social Research and Columbia University. His best-known novel, "The Godfather," was preceded by two critically acclaimed novels, "The Dark Arena" and "The Fortunate Pilgrim." In 1978, he published "Fools Die," followed by "The Sicilian" (1984) and "The Fourth K" (1991). Mario Puzo has also written several screenplays, including Earthquake (1974), Superman (1978), and all three "Godfather" movies, for which he received two Academy Awards. Mario's latest novel, 1996's "The Last Don," was made into a CBS television miniseries in May 1997, starring Danny Aiello, Kirstie Alley and Joe Mantegna. In 1997, Part II was aired. Also in 1997, Mario's "The Fortunate Pilgrim" was re-released by Random House. Mario passed away July 2, 1999, at his home in Bay Shore, Long Island. His last novel, "Omerta," will be published July, 2000. He is survived by his companion of 20 years, Carol Gino, and five children.1774 points
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Truman Capote was born on 30 September 1924 in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for Murder by Death (1976), The Innocents (1961) and Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961). He died on 25 August 1984 in Los Angeles, California, USA.1772 points- Writer
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Alberto Moravia was born on 22 November 1907 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was a writer and actor, known for Contempt (1963), The Conformist (1970) and Two Women (1960). He was married to Carmen Llera and Elsa Morante. He died on 26 September 1990 in Rome, Lazio, Italy.1680 points- Vilhelm Moberg is considered to be one of the greatest writers in Sweden of all time. He is most known for The Immigrants-series about the Swedish emigration to the United States in the 19th century. Moberg was also a journalist, author, historian and political debater. He struggled with depression and drowned in an apparent suicide.1635 points
- Ernest Hemingway was an American writer who won the Pulitzer Prize (1953) and the Nobel Prize in Literature (1954) for his novel The Old Man and the Sea, which was made into a 1958 film The Old Man and the Sea (1958).
He was born into the hands of his physician father. He was the second of six children of Dr. Clarence Hemingway and Grace Hemingway (the daughter of English immigrants). His father's interests in history and literature, as well as his outdoorsy hobbies (fishing and hunting), became a lifestyle for Ernest. His mother was a domineering type who wanted a daughter, not a son, and dressed Ernest as a girl and called him Ernestine. She also had a habit of abusing his quiet father, who suffered from diabetes, and Dr. Hemingway eventually committed suicide. Ernest later described the community in his hometown as one having "wide lawns and narrow minds".
In 1916 Hemingway graduated from high school and began his writing career as a reporter for The Kansas City Star. There he adopted his minimalist style by following the Star's style guide: "Use short sentences. Use short first paragraphs. Use vigorous English. Be positive, not negative." Six months later he joined the Ambulance Corps in WWI and worked as an ambulance driver on the Italian front, picking up human remains. In July 1918 he was seriously wounded by a mortar shell, which left shrapnel in both of his legs causing him much pain and requiring several surgeries. He was awarded the Silver Medal. Back in America, he continued his writing career working for Toronto Star . At that time he met Hadley Richardson and the two married in 1921.
In 1921, he became a Toronto Star reporter in Paris. There he published his first books, called "Three Stories and Ten Poems" (1923), and "In Our Time" (1924). In Paris he met Gertrude Stein, who introduced him to the circle that she called the "Lost Generation". F. Scott Fitzgerald, Thornton Wilder, Sherwood Anderson and Ezra Pound were stimulating Hemingway's talent. At that time he wrote "The Sun Also Rises" (1926), "A Farewell to Arms" (1929), and a dazzling collection of Forty-Nine stories. Hemingway also regarded the Russian writers Lev Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Ivan Turgenev and Anton Chekhov as important influences, and met Pablo Picasso and other artists through Gertrude Stein. "A Moveable Feast" (1964) is his classic memoir of Paris after WWI.
Hemingway participated in the Spanish Civil War and took part in the D-Day landings during the invasion of France during World War II, in which he not only reported the action but took part in it. In one instance he threw three hand grenades into a bunker, killing several SS officers. He was decorated with the Bronze Star for his action. His military experiences were emulated in "For Whom the Bell Tolls" (1940) and in several other stories. He settled near Havana, Cuba, where he wrote his best known work, "The Old Man and the Sea" (1953), for which he won a Pulitzer Prize and the Nobel Prize in Literature. This was adapted as the film The Old Man and the Sea (1958), for which Spencer Tracy was nominated for an Academy Award as Best Actor, and Dimitri Tiomkin received an Oscar for Best Musical Score.
War wounds, two plane crashes, four marriages and several affairs took their toll on Hemingway's hereditary predispositions and contributed to his declining health. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and insomnia in his later years. His mental condition was exacerbated by chronic alcoholism, diabetes and liver failure. After an unsuccessful treatment with electro-convulsive therapy, he suffered severe amnesia and his physical condition worsened. The memory loss obstructed his writing and everyday life. He committed suicide in 1961. Posthumous publications revealed a considerable body of his hidden writings, that was edited by his fourth wife, Mary, and also by his son Patrick Hemingway.1631 points - Jack London was the best-selling, highest paid and most popular American author of his time.
He was born John Griffith Chaney, on January 12, 1876, in San Francisco. He was raised by his mother Flora Wellman and his stepfather John London (he didn't know who his father was until his adulthood). After graduation from a grammar school he worked 12 to 18 hours a day at a cannery. Jack had a special relationship with his black foster mother, Virginia (Jenny) Prentiss. She loaned him some money and in 1891 he bought a sloop and became an oyster pirate. A few months later he joined the California Fish Patrol. In 1893 he joined the crew of a sealing schooner, bound for Japan. His first story, "Typhoon off the Coast of Japan", based on his sailing experiences, was published in November of 1893. Still unemployed, he became a tramp and hoboed around the country. In 1894 he was arrested for vagrancy and spent a month in jail, where he was a witness to "awful abysses of human degradation." His entire life, after these events, became a race to erase the traumatizing memories of his childhood and youth.
He continued his self-education at the Oakland Public Library. Among his readings were works by Gustave Flaubert and Lev Tolstoy. In 1896 he was admitted to the University of California, but after a year was forced to leave due to financial reasons. In 1897 he went to the Canadian Yukon and joined the Klondike Gold Rush. There he experienced all the hardships of uncivilized life and suffered from--among other things--severe frostbite, scurvy, malaria and dysentery. This left his health seriously impaired. London's struggles for survival inspired "To Build a Fire" (1902), which is considered his best short story. Writing became his ticket out of poverty; a way, in his words, to "sell his brains". His first marriage to Bess Maddern began as a friendship, not love, and ended 3 years later, leaving her with two daughters. His second marriage to Charmian Kittrdge, an editor, lasted until his death.
"The Call of the Wild" (1903) was his biggest success. "The Sea-Wolf" (1904) was turned into the first full-length American movie. Later came "The Iron Heel" (1908), a premonition of the Orwellian world, and the autobiographical "Martin Eden" (1909). The highest-paid writer of his time, he earned over $2 million yet he was always broke. In 1905 he bought a ranch in California, where he designed the first concrete silo in the state. His books provided operating income. He once said, "I would write a book for no other reason than to add three or four hundred acres to my magnificent estate." His ecological approach and effort to adapt the ideas of Asian sustainable agriculture was ahead of his time. In 1913 his Big House was ruined by a devastating fire and Jack was financially and mentally hurt. He built a small cottage and made big plans, but he lived only 3 more years. His 1400-acre ranch is now a National Historic Landmark, named Jack London State Historic Park. The writer's cottage was preserved by his wife Charmian, who lived there until her death in 1955.
His changing views and philosophy were often misunderstood as he grew out of his own mistakes. At one time he wrote, "I have been more stimulated by [Friedrich Nietzsche] than by any other writer in the world." Later London disregarded the "superman" theory of Nietzsche, calling himself Nietschze's "intellectual enemy." His readings of Carl Jung contributed to his complex philosophy. His other influences ranged from Rudyard Kipling and Robert Louis Stevenson to Charles Darwin, Aldous Huxley and Karl Marx. While sympathizing with the Mexican revolution in "The Mexican", he wrote differently about it when he was sent to Mexico as a reporter in 1914. By age 40, somewhat disillusioned, he resigned from the Socialist party and from various clubs. During his last years London was in extreme pain, caused by complications from kidney failure (uremia is recorded on his death certificate). He was laid to rest at his ranch according to his will: "And roll over me a red boulder from the ruins of the Big House."1572 points - Daphne Du Maurier was one of the most popular English writers of the 20th Century, when middle-brow genre fiction was accorded a higher level of respect in a more broadly literate age. For her services to literature, she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1969, the female equivalent of a knighthood. Thus, she achieved a trifecta of sorts, as her father and her husband were both knights.
She was born on May 13, 1907 in London, the second daughter of the famous actor-manager Gerald du Maurier, who himself was knighted in 1922, and the actress Muriel Beaumont. Her grandfather was the famous anglo-French writer George L. Du Maurier, the creator of Svengali in his 1894 novel "Trilby". (She was also cousin to the Llewelyn Davies boys, through her grandfather Gerald. The boys were the inspiration for the boys in J.M. Barrie' Peter Pan (1924) and his Neverland works.) Her husband was also famous: Frederick A. M. Browning, the WWII Commander "Boy" Browning renowned as the "father of the British airborne forces." He helped plan and execute Operation Market Garden, an airborne operation that put Allied troops into Germany and the Netherlands, an ultimately unsuccessful venture chronicled in Cornelius Ryan's A Bridge Too Far (1977). During the Second World War, Boy Browning achieved the rank of Lieutenant General and a knighthood. Browning's quote that Arnheim was a bridge too far later became famous as a book title and ultimately a movie title. Daphne published her first short story in 1928; her first novel, "The Loving Spirit", was published in 1931, and her last, "Rule Britannia", forty-one year later. In between, she achieved her greatest success with the novel Rebecca (1940), which was adapted by Alfred Hitchcock into a classic film that won the Best Picture Oscar for 1940. Another novel, Don't Look Now (1973), adapted by Nicolas Roeg, is also considered a classic film in Britain.
Along with "Rebecca", she had great successes with her novels Jamaica Inn (1939) and Frenchman's Creek (1944), both of which were adapted into movies. The three novels were set in Cornwall, where she lived. In addition to multiple non-fiction books, Daphne Du Maurier also wrote three plays (including an adaptation of "Rebecca").
She died on April 19, 1989, in Par in her beloved Cornwall, five weeks shy of her 82nd birthday.1508 points - Writer
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Jean Cocteau was one of the most multi-talented artists of the 20th century. In addition to being a director, he was a poet, novelist, painter, playwright, set designer, and actor. He began writing at 10 and was a published poet by age 16. He collaborated with the "Russian Ballet" company of Sergei Diaghilev, and was active in many art movements, but always remained a poet at heart. His films reflect this fact. Cocteau was also a homosexual, and made no attempt to hide it. His favorite actor was his close friend Jean Marais, who appeared in almost every one of his films. Cocteau made about twelve films in his career, all rich with symbolism and surreal imagery. He is now regarded as one of the most important avant-garde directors in cinema.1489 points- Writer
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Here he grew up in the educated Jewish middle class, together with his brother Alfred. The Zweig family was not religious. He passed his high school diploma at the Wasagymnasium in Vienna. Zweig wrote his first poems here. At that time he was influenced by writers such as Hugo von Hofmannstahl and Rainer Maria Rilke. In 1901, Stefan Zweig's first volume of poetry entitled "Silberne Saiten" was published. He also began translating works by French writers at this time. In 1904 he completed his doctorate in German and Romance studies. Until 1910 he traveled extensively through Europe. The focus here was on exchanges with other writers and artists, with whom he mostly maintained friendship through intensive correspondence. By 1911, works such as "Tersites", "The House by the Sea" and "Burning Secret" as well as his first biography "Émile Verhaeren" had been created.
With his work "First Experience. Four Stories from Kinderland," Zweig approached an intuitive psychological style. At the beginning of the First World War, Stefan Zweig signed up as a volunteer. Here he was employed in the war press quarters until 1917. To demonstrate against war in any form, he wrote the drama "Jeremiah", which premiered in Zurich in 1918. From 1918 onwards, Zweig also worked as a journalist and correspondent for the Swiss newspaper "Neue Freie Presse". He also uses this medium to publish his non-partisan views. After the end of the war he settled in Salzburg. His idea was to found a spiritually, holistically and humanistically motivated alliance in Europe. So he began, initially in numerous lectures and essays, to warn against radicalization through nationalism and to call for calm, diplomacy and patience.
In 1920, Zweig published the writings "Fear", "The Compulsion" and, from 1920, three essays about master builders of the world: "Three Masters", in 1925 "The Fight with the Demon" and in 1928 "Three Poets of Their Life". Zweig enjoyed great stage success in 1926 with his adaptation of Ben Jonson's "Volpone". The publication of the book "Star Hours of Humanity" in 1927 was equally successful. In 1928 he traveled to the Soviet Union, where his books were also published in Russian at the instigation of Maxim Gorki, with whom he corresponded. After the NSDAP came to power in Germany, Stefan Zweig fled to London for fear of persecution. The book "Impatience of the Heart" was written here. From 1934 onwards, his works were no longer published in Germany and with the annexation of Austria to the Third Reich in 1938, production in his homeland also stopped. In 1935, Zweig wrote the libretto for the opera "Die schweigsame Frau" for Richard Strauss.
In 1936 the NSDAP immediately banned the sale of all of his works. His first marriage ended in divorce in 1938, and his second marriage was to Charlotte Altmann in 1939. In 1940 he received English citizenship from Great Britain. Nevertheless, he left Europe and traveled on to New York. In 1942 his chess novella and the monograph Brazil were published. After a short stay he visited Argentina and Paraguay. He then settled in Brazil. Here Stefan Zweig fell into deep sadness and depression.
Stefan Zweig committed suicide on February 22, 1942 in Petrópolis, near Rio de Janeiro. In 1944 his autobiography was published posthumously under the title "The World of Yesterday".1426 points