On this day
October 18 in literary history
Literary history for October 18: 34 writers born, 13 writers who died and 2 literary events from 1511 to 2015. Born on this day: Amish Tripathi, Charles Stross, Rick Moody.
Writers born on October 18
| Born | Writer | Known as |
|---|---|---|
| 1974 | Amish Tripathi | Indian author |
| 1964 | Charles Stross | British author (born 1964) |
| 1961 | Rick Moody | American novelist (born 1961) |
| 1955 | David Twohy | American film director and screenwriter |
| 1954 | Arliss Howard | American actor, screenwriter, and film director (born 1954) |
| 1952 | Chuck Lorre | American television writer and producer (born 1952) |
| 1952 | Bảo Ninh | Vietnamese writer |
| 1951 | Terry McMillan | American author (born 1951) |
| 1950 | Wendy Wasserstein | American playwright (1950–2006) |
| 1948 | Ntozake Shange | American playwright and poet (1948–2018) |
| 1946 | James Robert Baker | American author (1947–1997) |
| 1939 | Jan Erik Vold | Norwegian writer, jazz vocal reciter, and translator (born 1939) |
| 1931 | Chris Albertson | Music journalist, writer and record producer |
| 1930 | Esther Hautzig | American writer |
| 1929 | Kees Fens | Dutch writer (1929–2008) |
| 1897 | Isabel Briggs Myers | American writer (1897–1980) |
| 1894 | H. L. Davis | American novelist |
| 1894 | Tibor Déry | Hungarian writer and poet |
| 1893 | George Ohsawa | Japanese author and proponent of alternative medicine |
| 1878 | James Truslow Adams | American writer and historian (1878–1949) |
| 1872 | Mikhail Kuzmin | Russian poet, musician and novelist |
| 1869 | Johannes Linnankoski | Finnish author and playwright (1869–1913) |
| 1868 | Ernst Didring | Swedish author |
| 1865 | Arie de Jong | Arie de Jong, Dutch linguist and author (died 1957) |
| 1865 | Logan Pearsall Smith | American-born British essayist (1865–1946) |
| 1831 | Robert Potter (author) | Irish Australian theologian and writer (1831–1908) |
| 1818 | Charles Edward Mudie | English publisher |
| 1785 | Thomas Love Peacock | English novelist and poet (1785-1866) |
| 1777 | Heinrich von Kleist | German Romantic writer (1777–1811) |
| 1741 | Pierre Choderlos de Laclos | French novelist, official, freemason, and army general (1741–1803) |
| 1701 | Charles le Beau | French historical writer |
| 1662 | Matthew Henry | British Nonconformist minister and author (1662–1714) |
| 1587 | Lady Mary Wroth | English noblewoman and poet |
| 1536 | William Lambarde | English antiquarian, writer, and politician |
Writers who died on October 18
| Died | Writer | Known as |
|---|---|---|
| 2015 | Gamal al-Ghitani | Egyptian author, literary editor and commentator |
| 2015 | Paul West (writer, born 1930) | British-born American novelist, poet, and essayist (1930–2015) |
| 2014 | Mariano Lebrón Saviñón | Dominican author (1922–2014) |
| 2014 | Sidney Shapiro | American-born Chinese translator (1915–2014) |
| 2007 | Alan Coren | English humorist and writer (1938–2007) |
| 2003 | Manuel Vázquez Montalbán | Spanish novelist (1939–2003) |
| 1984 | Henri Michaux | Belgian-born French poet, writer and painter |
| 1983 | Diego Abad de Santillán | Spanish anarchist, author, economist (1897–1983) |
| 1980 | Edwin Way Teale | American naturalist, photographer & writer (1899-1980) |
| 1976 | Viswanatha Satyanarayana | Indian Telugu-language writer |
| 1973 | Walt Kelly | American animator and cartoonist (1913–1973) |
| 1739 | António José da Silva | Brazilian-Portuguese dramatist (1705–1739) |
| 1511 | Philippe de Commines | Belgian writer, historian and diplomat |
Literary events on October 18
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1851 | Herman Melville's Moby-Dick is first published as The Whale by Richard Bentley of London. |
| 1775 | African-American poet Phillis Wheatley is freed from slavery. |
Featured
Amish Tripathi (1974) — Amish Tripathi is an author, former diplomat, broadcaster and entrepreneur from India. He is among the fastest-selling authors in Indian publishing history, known best for The Shiva Trilogy and Ram Chandra Series.
Charles Stross (1964) — Charles David George "Charlie" Stross is a British writer of science fiction and fantasy. Stross specialises in hard science fiction and space opera.
Rick Moody (1961) — Hiram Frederick Moody III is an American novelist and short story writer best known for the 1994 novel The Ice Storm, a chronicle of the dissolution of two suburban Connecticut families over Thanksgiving weekend in 1973, which brought him widespread acclaim, became a bestseller, and was made into the film The Ice…
Sources & data
- Compiled from Wikipedia’s “On this day” selections (CC BY-SA 4.0), filtered for writers and literary events.