Marco Polo

Marco Polo (1254-1324) travelled overland to China 1271-1275, and served under the emperor Kublai Khan until he returned to Europe by sea 1292-1295. He was then captured while fighting...

Ann Coulter

Ann Coulter was born on 8th December 1961 in New York City, New York, U.S. She is an American social and political commentator, author, and syndicated columnist. Biography and Career...

Rasheda Ali

Rasheda Ali is an international speaker. She has traveled the globe, including London, Madrid, Australia, New Zealand and Canada to create awareness and give encouragement and hope...

Stefan Zweig

Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) is noted for plays, poems, and many biographies of writers (Balzac, Dickens) and historical figures (Marie Antoinette, Mary Stuart). He and his wife, exiles...

Marguerite Yourcenar

Pen name of Marguerite de Crayencour (1903-1987) achieved a reputation as a novelist in France in the 1930s (for example with La Nouvelle Euridyce/The New Euridyce in 1931), but after...

Arthur Young

Arthur Young (1741-1820) was appointed secretary when the Board of Agriculture was established 1792, and was the guiding force behind the production of a county by county survey of...

P. C. Wren

Percival Christopher Wren (1885-1941) was drawing on his experiences in the French and Indian armies, he wrote martial adventure novels including Beau Geste in 1924, dealing with the...

Dorothy Wordsworth

Dorothy Wordsworth (1771-1855) lived with her brother William Wordsworth as a companion and support from 1795 until his death, and her many journals describing their Life at Grasmere...

Tom Wolfe

Tom Wolfe (born in 1931) in the 1960s a founder of the "New Journalism", which brought the techniques of fiction to reportage, Wolfe recorded US mores and fashions in Pop style in The...

P. G. Wodehouse

Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (1881-1975) humorous novels portray the accident-prone world of such characters as the socialite Bertie Wooster and his invaluable and impeccable manservant...

Owen Wister

Owen Wister (1860-1938) was born in Philadelphia, a grandson of the British actress Fanny Kemble, and became known for stories of cowboys in the American West; for example, The Virginian...

Edmund Wilson

Edmund Wilson (1895-1972) book "Axel's Castle" in 1931 is a survey of symbolism and The Wound and the Bow in 1941 a study of art and neurosis. He also produced the satirical sketches...

Tennessee Williams

Thomas Lanier Williams (1911-1983) work is characterised by fluent dialogue and searching analysis of the psychological deficiencies of his characters. His plays, usually set in...

Emlyn Williams

George Emlyn Williams (1905-1987) plays, in which he appeared, include Night Must Fall in 1935 and The Corn is Green in 1938. His play How Green Was My Valley was filmed (Academy...

Thornton Wilder

Thornton Niven Wilder (1897-1975) won the Pulitzer Prize for the novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey in 1927, and for the plays Our Town in 1938 and The Skin of Our Teeth in 1942. His...

Patrick White

Patrick White (1912-1990) was born in London, he settled in Australia in the 1940s. Short Biography: His novels (with allegorical overtones) include The Aunt's Story in 1948...

Edith Wharton

Edith Newbold Jones (1862-1937) work was influenced by her friend Henry James, and mostly set in New York society. It includes The House of Mirth in 1905, the rural Ethan Frome...

Nathanael West

Pen name of Nathan Weinstein (1904-1940) surrealist influenced novels capture the absurdity and extremity of modern American life and the dark side of the American dream. Short...

Arnold Wesker

Arnold Wesker (born in 1932) socialist beliefs were reflected in the successful trilogy Chicken Soup with Barley, Roots, and Tm Talking About Jerusalem 1958-1960. Short Biography...

Eudora Welty

Eudora Welty (1909-2001) works reflect life in the US South and are notable for their creation of character and accurate rendition of local dialect. Her novels include Delta Wedding...

H. G. Wells

Herbert George Wells (1866-1946) first made his name with "scientific romances" such as The Time Machine in 1895 and The War of the Worlds in 1898. Short Biography: Later novels...

Fay Weldon

Fay Weldon (born in 1931) novels include The Fat Woman's Joke in 1967, Female Friends in 1975, Remember Me in 1976, Puffball in 1980, and The Life and Loves of a She-Devil in 1984....

Frank Wedekind

Frank Wedekind (1864-1918) was a forerunner of Expressionism with Fruhlings Erwachen/The Awakening of Spring in 1891, and Der Erdgeist/The Earth Spirit in 1895 and its sequel Der Marquis...

John Webster

John Webster (c.1580-1634) ranks after Shakespeare as the greatest tragedian of his time, and is the Jacobean whose plays are most frequendy performed today. His two great plays...