William Faulkner, American Novelist
William Faulkner, revered modernist writer, historian and sociologist, is known for capturing the raw beauty of the rural South in all its dark complexity....
Melvin Van Peebles, Writer, Director and Actor
Melvin Van Peebles has been called a renaissance man, displaying his multi-genre talents writing screenplays, novels, plays and music, in addition to acting in...
Saul Bellow, American Novelist
“The backbone of 20th-century American literature”—this was novelist Philip Roth’s assessment of Saul Bellow. His struggle with modernism, his Jewish upbringing, his feelings of...
Nat King Cole, Singer and Jazz Pioneer
Nat King Cole’s musical upbringing forged a career that would delve the nuances of the jazz trio and fashion a more subtle approach to...
Paul McCartney, Legendary Musician and Songwriter
Paul, the “cute” Beatle, attained international fame as one of the Fab Four at the age of 21. He launched a second and a...
William Shakespeare, Playwright, Poet and Actor
“He was not for an age but for all time,” said Ben Jonson in the dedication to William Shakespeare’s 1623 First Folio. It may...
Richard Wright, Groundbreaking Author of “Black Boy” and “Native Son”
Richard Wright, the first African-American man to make a living as an author, is known for landmark books like “Native Son” and “Black Boy.”
Richard...
Billie Jean King, Tennis Star and Feminist Pioneer
Tennis star Billie Jean King spent her career campaigning for gender equality in sports. Her win in 1973’s highly publicized “Battle of the Sexes”...
Gabriel García Márquez, Author of “One Hundred Years of Solitude”
Gabriel García Márquez grew up in a home filled with storytelling and the supernatural. His seminal work of fiction, “One Hundred Years of Solitude,”...
Carole King, Chart-Topping Singer-Songwriter
Carole King started playing the piano at age 4 and hasn’t stopped since. Out of college in the 1960s King was writing some of...
