Curated playlist
20th-century American short story writers
- Stephen KingA minivan hit Stephen King on a Maine road in June 1999. A dog in the back distracted the driver.
- Mark TwainMark Twain predicted he would die with Halley's Comet, and he did. He died the day after it passed closest to the Sun.
- F. Scott FitzgeraldF. Scott Fitzgerald died in 1940 believing his work was forgotten. The Great Gatsby later sold millions.
- Ernest HemingwayErnest Hemingway, only 18, carried Italian soldiers to safety despite being seriously wounded by mortar fire.
- Tennessee WilliamsTennessee Williams wanted to be sewn into a canvas sack and dropped into the sea.
- H. P. LovecraftH. P. Lovecraft died in 1937 virtually unknown to readers. His monsters later became global touchstones.
- William FaulknerWilliam Faulkner never told his daughter he had won the Nobel Prize. She heard it when the principal called her in.
- John SteinbeckJohn Steinbeck once stole bacon from a produce market to survive. He later won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature.
- Kurt VonnegutKurt Vonnegut survived the bombing of Dresden by hiding in an underground meat locker.
- Langston HughesLangston Hughes's ashes rest beneath the floor of a Harlem research center.
- Vernor VingeWhat happens when machines get smarter than the people who built them? Vernor Vinge kept asking.
- Saul BellowSaul Bellow learned he had entered the U.S. illegally as a child when he tried to enlist. He became a citizen in 1941.
- Jack LondonJack London lost four front teeth to scurvy in the Klondike. It also gave him the wolf dog of The Call of the Wild.
- Philip K. DickPhilip K. Dick died four months before Blade Runner opened. He never saw the film that made his name famous.
- Arthur MillerArthur Miller wrote Death of a Salesman in less than six weeks. He finished the first act in less than a day.
- Ralph EllisonA 1967 fire destroyed more than 300 pages of Ralph Ellison's second novel. He never finished it.
- Joseph HellerJoseph Heller's novel Catch-22 was first called Catch-18. It was renamed to avoid confusion with Mila 18.
- John JakesJohn Jakes wrote fiction at night while working as an advertising copywriter. His Kent series sold 55 million copies.
- George R. R. MartinA chess craze helped save George R. R. Martin's writing career. Bobby Fischer's 1972 win got him a tournament job.
- Joe ShusterSuperman's city of Metropolis was modeled on Toronto, where artist Joe Shuster grew up.
- L. Sprague de CampL. Sprague de Camp turned the word extraterrestrial into a noun. He also coined E.T. in a 1939 magazine article.
- Lin CarterLin Carter printed about 3,000 copies of his fanzine Kadath, and most were thrown away.
- Isaac AsimovIsaac Asimov coined the word "robotics" in a 1941 story, thinking it was just a natural term.
- Timothy ZahnTimothy Zahn wrote a Star Wars trilogy from a box of roleplaying game sourcebooks.
- Ambrose BierceAmbrose Bierce's last known letter said he was leaving for an unknown destination. He then vanished at age 71.
- Robert E. HowardRobert E. Howard, creator of Conan the Barbarian, died at thirty with almost none of his work in a book.
- Roger ZelaznyA story by Roger Zelazny traveled to Mars in 2008. "A Rose for Ecclesiastes" rode on a DVD aboard the Phoenix lander.
- Raymond BensonRaymond Benson became the first non-British author to write James Bond novels.
- Fritz LeiberFritz Leiber is credited with coining the term "sword and sorcery".