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List of Famous Dead People: Category - Writers
Bernard Waber, 91, was a famous children’s book author. His most famous works are The House On East 88th Street and the Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile series of books. He also wrote a book called Bravery to help children cope with the September 11 attacks.
Joyce Brothers was a psychologist well known for her TV appearances. She also wrote a daily advice column in newspapers from 1960 to 2013.
Al Neuharth was the founder of USA Today, and former chairman of Gannett. He was also a columnist From South Dakota, Neuharth started out co-founding SoDak Sports, a local newspaper covering the sports scene in South Dakota. It went bankrupt within a year, but that didn’t stop him from becoming a hugely successful publisher, obviously.
Roger Ebert was a film critic, journalist, and overall titan of the movie industry. Ebert, whose first film review column appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times in 1967, was also known for his series of review shows with fellow critic Gene Siskel. He was the first film critic to ever receive a Pulitzer Prize.
Ruth Prawer Jhabvala was a Booker prize-winning author and Oscar-winning screenwriter. She won the former for her novel Heat and Dust. She won Academy Awards for Howards End and A Room with a View. She was also nominated for The Remains of the Day.
Don Payne, 48, was a well-known writer for American television and film. He was most well-known for his work on The Simpsons as a writer. He continued to write episodes up until his death, with two episodes scheduled to air posthumously. He was also responsible for the screenplays of five feature films, including the yet [...]
Anthony Lewis, 85, is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and New York Times columnist. He was most well known for his column, “Abroad at Home,” which tackled subjects like free speech, human rights and constitutional law. He won Pulitzers in 1955 and 1963. The latter was for a book called, “Gideon’s Trumpet” that followed a [...]
Chinua Achebe was a Nigerian author. He is most famous for writing the novel Things Fall Apart. (Image courtesy Stuart C. Shapiro)
James Herbert was a horror writer, who also designed his own covers and publicity. He had previously worked as the art director for an ad agency. His books included: The Rats, The Fog, The Survivor, Fluke, The Spear, Lair, The Dark, The Jonah, Shrine, Domain, Moon, The Magic Cottage, Sepulchre, Haunted, Creed, Portent, The Ghosts [...]
Henry Bromell was an author, screenwriter and director who worked on a number of popular television shows. He wrote and produced episodes of Chicago Hope, Northern Exposure, Homicide: Life on the Street, Brotherhood, Carnivàle, and Rubicon. He was Executive Producer of the Showtime series Homeland during the time of his death. He wrote four episodes [...]
Addison Beecher Colvin Whipple is an author and historian who was once an executive editor at Time-Life Books. He is best-known for convincing President Franklin D. Roosevelt to allow the publishing of a World War II photo of dead U.S. soldiers.
Martin Zweig was a financial analyst, investor, and author of the book Winning on Wall Street. He also created the Zweig Forecast in 1971, which ran for 26 years. In 1987, Zweig famously predicted the stock market crash known as Black Monday. Zweig was known as a pioneer in technical analysis.
Debbie Ford was an American author of self-help books. Her first book, “The Dark Side Of The Light Chasers”, spawned eight more books in the genre and dealt with confronting one’s “dark side” rather than ignoring it. Ford also hosted television and radio shows related to her books.
Chris Kyle was a U.S. Navy SEAL, and is said to have been the most lethal sniper in United States military history, with 160 confirmed kills (out of 255 claimed kills). He served from 1999 to 2009. Kyle wrote a best-selling book about his experiences called American Sniper.
Hal Drake was a famous reporter, spending most of his career covering the news for Star and Stripes, the editorially independent news body working inside the Department of Defense. Stars and Stripes covers matter affecting those involved with the U.S. Armed Forces. Drake was a noted reporter during the Vietnam War, and his career spanned [...]
Stanley Karnow was a well-respected American Journalist and Historian whose book “In Our Image: America’s Empire in the Philippines” won him the coveted Pulitzer Prize for History. Karnow was a World War II veteran who graduated from Harvard and began his journalism career in the early 1950s. He is probably best known for his coverage [...]
Pauline Phillips, 94, was perhaps better known as Abigail Van Buren. Under the pseudonym, she wrote the popular “Dear Abby” advice column that first appeared in 1956. The “Dear Abby” column began at the San Francisco Chronicle after Phillips called in to the paper saying she could do a better job than the current advice [...]
Evan S. Connell, Jr. was an American writer, who wrote novels, short stories and poems. He was nominated for the Man Booker International Prize for lifetime achievement in 2010. His works included: The Anatomy Lesson, Mrs. Bridge, The Patriot, Notes From A Bottle Found On The Beach At Carmel, At The Crossroads, The Diary Of [...]
Sol Yurick, 87, was an American novelist best known for the 1965 novel The Warriors. The book was a reworking of the classic Greek story, Anabasis, but set in a contemporary New York under siege by gang wars. The novel was later adapted into a film in 1979 and a video game in 2005. During [...]
Richard Ben Cramer was a journalist, and a Pulitzer Prize winner, and a New York Times bestselling author who even wrote a documentary that was nominated for an Academy Award. As a journalist, Cramer wrote for The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Baltimore Sun, Esquire Magazine, and Rolling Stone. He won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting [...]
Gerda Lerner was a historian and author who is considered a pioneer in the field of women’s history. She founded the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s grad program in Women’s History (a national first) and was a founding member of the National Organization for Women.
David Oliver Relin was the co-author of the highly successful and controversial book “Three Cups Of Tea”, which told the allegedly true story of Greg Mortenson, who developed a charity foundation to help build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. A “60 Minutes” segment claimed that large sections of the book were fabricated, and accusations were [...]
Zig Ziglar (born as Hilary Hinton Ziglar) was a well-known motivational speaker and book author from Gary, Indiana. Ziglar was mostly known for his motivational speeches and seminars at sports arenas. Ziglar also published various books, such as: Zig Ziglar’s Secrets of Closing the Sale (1982), Top Performance: How to Develop Excellence in Yourself and [...]
Bryce Courtenay was a well-known author from Johannesburg, South Africa, but moved to Sydney, Australia after meeting his future wife Benita. Courtenay is mostly known for his first-published book “The Power of One.” Courtenay’s book “The Power of One” became one of the most-selling books by an Australian author, and later was turned into a [...]
Esme Valerie Eliot, known by her middle name, was a well-known publisher and editor from Leeds, England. Valerie is most known for assisting with her husband T.S. Eliot’s publications. Valerie assisted in the well-known publications of The Waste Land (1971), The Letters of T. S. Eliot: Volume 1, 1898-1922 (1989), and Old Possum’s Book of [...]
Ellen Douglas (real name: Josephine Ayres Haxton) was a well-known author and novelist from Natchez, Mississippi. Douglas was well-known for her National Book Award nominated book Apostles of Light (1973). Douglas also published other various well-known works, such as: A Family’s Affairs (1961), Black Cloud, White Cloud: Two Novellas and Two Stories (1963), Where The [...]
Arthur Ochs Sulzberger was a well-known newspaper publisher from New York, NY. He was known for his contributions and involvement with The New York Times. Along with Sulzberger’s tenure and leadership at The New York Times, Sulzberger was also greatly recognized for his publication of “The Pentagon Papers,” which he earned a Pulitzer prize award [...]
Malcolm Browne was a well-known journalist and photographer from New York, NY. His most well-known work was the self-immolation photo of Thich Quang Duc, the burning monk. Browne’s career was mostly involved with journalism, working for the Stars and Stripes publication during his service in the Korean War, the Associated Press, and The New York [...]
Nina Bawden was a well-known Children’s literature writer from Ilford, Essex in England. The work that Bawden is known for is her award-winning publication of Carrie’s War. Nina Bawden grew up in Essex and attended Somerville College in Oxford. After graduating college, Bawden entered her writing career, and published various well-known books, such as: On [...]
Gore Vidal (born as Eugene Luther Gore Vidal) was a well-known political activist, playwright, and novelist from West Point in New York, NY. Gore Vidal was mostly known for his fiction/non-fiction essays and political writings. Gore Vidal began his writing career at the age of 19 in 1946 with his first fiction novel titled Williwaw, [...]