Historical Archives & Public Figures

Marcel Proust

France

10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922 (51 years old)

Titan of 20th-century literature who worked from his cork-lined Paris bedroom to compose the monumental seven-volume epic À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time)—immortalizing involuntary memory through the madeleine dipped in tea.

Paris, France

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Literature & Poetry

30

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Mori Ogai

森鴎外 (Mori Rintaro)

Japan

1862 – 1922 (60 years old)

Surgeon General of the Imperial Japanese Army and towering literary master (1862–1922) who introduced modern German literature to Japan, authored psychological classics like 'The Dancing Girl' and 'The Wild Geese', and shaped Meiji modernization.

Mitaka (Tokyo), Japan

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Literature & Poetry

2

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Mohamed Ben Cherif

محمد بن الشريف

Algeria

1879 – 1921 (42 years old)

Pioneering early 20th-century Algerian writer and intellectual whose 1920 work 'Ahmed ben Mostapha, goumier' is one of the earliest French-language novels by an Algerian.

Djelfa, Algeria

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Dan Andersson

Daniel Andersson

Sweden

1888-04-06 – 1920-09-16 (32 years old)

Beloved poet of the Bergslagen wilderness whose haunting charcoal burner ballads and collections 'Kolvaktarens visor' and 'Svarta ballader' form an eternal part of Swedish folk culture.

Ludvika, Sweden

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Karl Adolph Gjellerup

Denmark

1857-06-02 – 1919-10-11 (62 years old)

Danish poet and novelist awarded the 1917 Nobel Prize in Literature for his varied and rich poetry inspired by lofty ideals, author of The Pilgrim Kamanita.

Dresden, Germany

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Literature & Poetry

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Maryana Marrash

مريانا مراش

Syria

1848 – 1919 (71 years old)

Pioneering Syrian woman of letters from Aleppo who established the first modern Arab literary salon in her home in the 1880s.

Aleppo, Syria

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Literature & Poetry

9

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Malak Hifni Nasif

ملك حفني ناصف

Egypt

1886 – 1918 (31 years old)

Pioneering feminist writer and poet who wrote under the pen name 'Bahithat al-Badiya', delivering the first public lectures for women in modern Egypt and presenting the 10-point feminist manifesto in 1911.

Cairo, Egypt

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Literature & Poetry

0

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John McCrae

Canada

30 November 1872 – 28 January 1918 (45 years old)

Canadian military surgeon whose haunting 1915 poem In Flanders Fields gave birth to the global symbol of the Remembrance Poppy.

Wimereux, France

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Literature & Poetry

36

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Natsume Kinnosuke (Natsume Sōseki)

夏目漱石

Japan

9 February 1867 – 9 December 1916 (49 years old)

Preeminent novelist of Meiji Japan and former 1000-yen banknote portrait who captured the agonizing spiritual collision between Western individualism and Japanese traditional community in Kokoro, Botchan, and I Am a Cat.

Tokyo, Japan

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Emile Verhaeren

Émile Adolphe Gustave Verhaeren

Belgium

1855 – 1916 (61 years old)

Foremost Belgian poet of the nineteenth century whose visionary social collections Les Campagnes hallucinées and Les Villes tentaculaires captured the brutal power of the modern industrial age.

Sint-Amands (Antwerp), Belgium

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Literature & Poetry

29

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Ruben Dario

Félix Rubén García Sarmiento

Nicaragua

1867 – 1916 (49 years old)

Nicaraguan poet widely celebrated as the father of modernismo, whose 1888 collection Azul... revolutionized Spanish literature across both Latin America and Spain.

Leon, Nicaragua

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Jurji Zaydan

جرجي زيدان

Lebanon

14 December 1861 – 21 July 1914 (52 years old)

Prolific Lebanese-Egyptian scholar who founded the monumental monthly 'Al-Hilal' in 1892 and pioneered the Arabic historical novel.

Cairo, Egypt

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Ruhi al-Khalidi

روحي الخالدي

Palestine

1864 – 6 August 1913 (49 years old)

Pioneering Ottoman-Palestinian comparative literature scholar, author of 'Tarikh Ilm al-Adab', and member of the Ottoman Parliament for Jerusalem.

Jerusalem, Palestine

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Camille Lemonnier

Belgium

1844 – 1913 (69 years old)

Fierce naturalist novelist and art critic known as 'the Belgian Zola' whose 1881 masterpiece Un Mâle provoked obscenity trials and heralded the late nineteenth-century renaissance of Belgian French-language letters.

Ixelles (Brussels), Belgium

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Literature & Poetry

0

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Pauline Johnson

Tekahionwake

Canada

10 March 1861 – 7 March 1913 (51 years old)

Celebrated Mohawk-Canadian poet and theatrical performer whose dramatic recitations and lyrical verse brought Indigenous heritage to Victorian audiences worldwide.

Vancouver, Canada

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Literature & Poetry

0

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E. Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake)

Emily Pauline Johnson

Canada

1861 – 1913 (51 years old)

Celebrated Mohawk poet and dramatic performer who toured the world in dual Indigenous and Victorian costume, reciting verses such as The Song My Paddle Sings and preserving coastal Salish legends in Vancouver.

Vancouver, Canada

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Literature & Poetry

35

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August Strindberg

Johan August Strindberg

Sweden

1849 – 1912 (63 years old)

Visionary Swedish playwright, novelist, and painter whose naturalistic and expressionist masterpieces Miss Julie and A Dream Play pioneered modern European drama.

Stockholm, Sweden

35 Full Record →