Famous Journalists and Nonfiction Authors a to z

Juan Carlos Onetti was an Uruguayan novelist and short-story writer whose existential works, including A Brief Life, chronicled the decay of modern urban life.

George Orwell was an English novelist, essayist, and critic most famous for his novels Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-four (1949).

Broadcast journalist Charles Osgood anchored CBS Morning News, the Sunday Night News and Sunday Morning. More recently, he has hosted The Osgood File.

Mary White Ovington was a civil rights activist and one of the white reformers who helped found the NAACP.

Robert Dale Owen, son of the Welsh social reformer Robert Owen, is best known for being integral to the founding of the Smithsonian Institution.

Thomas Paine was an English American writer and pamphleteer whose "Common Sense" and other writings influenced the American Revolution, and helped pave the way for the Declaration of Independence.

Dorothy Parker was the sharpest wit of the Algonquin Round Table, as well as a master of short fiction and a blacklisted screenwriter.

Lucy Parsons was an activist who was politically radical for her times and one of the first minority activists.

Ann Patchett is an American novelist best known for her PEN/Faulkner Award-winning novel Bel Canto.

Norman Vincent Peale was a minister and author known for works like The Power of Positive Thinking and A Guide to Confident Living.

Pearl Bailey was a Tony Award-winning singer and actress known for her roles in works like Carmen Jones, House of Flowers, Hello, Dolly! and Porgy and Bess.

Annie Smith Peck was a trailblazing scholar, writer and athlete who set records as a mountain climber in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Ty Pennington is a TV host, author and designer whose purview, in all its forms, is home improvement.

British author Chapman Pincher has concentrated on history and espionage-related topics in his investigative journalism as well as his fiction writing.

American author Robert Pirsig is best known for his philosophical novel Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values (1974).

Venetian merchant and adventurer Marco Polo traveled from Europe to Asia from 1271 to 1295. He wrote Il Milione, known in English as The Travels of Marco Polo.

Poet Ezra Pond authored more than 70 books and promoted many other now-famous writers, including James Joyce and T.S. Eliot.

Wolfgang Puck is a chef who expanded his purview into running restaurants, writing cookbooks and hosting cooking shows.

American journalist Ernie Pyle was one of the most famous war correspondents of World War II. He won a Pulitzer Prize for reporting in 1944.

Anna Quindlen is the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and bestselling novelist who wrote the books One True Thing and Object Lessons.

Uruguayan writer Horacio Quiroga penned short stories inspired by the jungle before committing suicide in 1937. Anaconda is considered his greatest work.

Magician James Randi, known as "The Amazing Randi," has spent much of his career debunking the claims of self-proclaimed psychics and paranormalists.

Louis Renault was a French jurist and educator and co-winner in 1907 of the Nobel Prize for Peace.

Adrienne Rich is a U.S. poet, scholar and critic whose work exhibits her commitment to the women's movement and a lesbian/feminist aesthetic influence.

Andy Rooney was an Emmy Award-winning journalist best known for his "A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney" segments which aired on the CBS news program 60 Minutes.

Charlie Rose is an American journalist who hosts the PBS interview show Charlie Rose. He has also held prominent broadcast roles at NBC and CBS.

Tim Russert was a one-time political counsel who became a journalist and the longtime host of the public affairs show Meet the Press.

Morley Safer is a television journalist known for his long tenure at the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes.

William Safire was a writer whose column "On Language" was a long-running feature of The New York Times Magazine.

Journalist Marlene Sanders was both the first woman to anchor a nightly network newscast and the first female field correspondent in the Vietnam War.

Cristina Saralegui hosts the talk show The Cristina Show for the Univision Network. It has been on the air since 1989 and has won 11 Emmys.

José Saramago was a Portuguese novelist and man of letters who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1998.

May Sarton was a writer of poetry, novels and memoirs including her Journal of a Solitude.

Jean-Paul Sartre was a 20th century intellectual, writer and activist who put forth pioneering ideas on existentialism.

Controversial radio host Laura Schlessinger, also known as "Dr. Laura," is an expert at giving listeners—and readers—a piece of her mind when it comes to moral living and leading a successful family life.

Arthur Schopenhauer was a German philosopher best known for his book The World as Will and Representation, and for his pessimistic views of human nature.

Tavis Smiley is a talk show host, political commentator and philanthropist, well-known for work around diversity in journalism. He has hosted various shows on television and radio.

Scottish social philosopher and political economist Adam Smith wrote The Wealth of Nations and achieved the first comprehensive system of political economy.

Patti Smith is a highly influential figure in the New York City punk rock scene, starting with her 1975 album Horses. Her biggest hit is the single "Because the Night."

Zadie Smith is a novelist whose first book, White Teeth, was a sensation, instantly putting her on the literary map.

Susan Sontag was a critical essayist, cultural analyst, novelist and filmmaker. She wrote On Photography, Illness as Metaphor, The Volcano Lover and In America.

Charlotta Spears Bass was a journalist and activist who, as editor of the California Eagle, championed African-American equality and freedom.

Lesley Stahl is an award-winning television journalist. She's served as co-editor of 60 Minutes and anchored the news program 48 Hours Investigates.

William Thomas Stead was a writer of journalistic pieces and ghost stories whose life came to an end on the Titanic.

Gertrude Stein was an American author and poet best known for her modernist writings, extensive art collecting and literary salon in 1920s Paris.

Social activist, writer, editor, and lecturer Gloria Steinem has been an outspoken champion of women's rights since the late 1960s.

Rudolf Steiner was a lecturer and founder of anthroposophy. His works attempted to find a synthesis between science and mysticism.

Lucy Stone was a leading activist and pioneer of the abolition and women's rights movements.

Ida Tarbell was an American journalist best known for her pioneering investigative reporting that led to the breakup of the Standard Oil Company’s monopoly.

Studs Terkel was a Pulitzer Prize-winning oral historian who compiled books of interviews with everyday people.

Helen Thomas was the first female member of the White House press corps and the United Press International’s first female White House bureau chief.

Outspoken and ambitious, Dorothy Thompson became a well-known journalist during the 1930s to the 1950s.

A counterculture icon, Hunter S. Thompson was an American journalist best known for writing 1971's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and creating "Gonzo journalism."

American essayist, poet, and practical philosopher, Henry David Thoreau was a New England Transcendentalist and author of the book Walden.

Mel Torme was a singer, jazz vocalist, and composer active from the 1940s-1990s. He also wrote biographies of Judy Garland and Buddy Rich.

William Monroe Trotter was a Harvard-educated journalist and activist who championed equal rights for African Americans.

Barbara Tuchman, American historian and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, is best known for writing The Guns of August and Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-45.

Irish author Colm Tóibín is famous for literary works about Irish society, creativity and homosexuality. His most popular novels include The Blackwater Lightship and The Master.

Jack Unterweger was an Austrian serial killer who murdered several women before committing suicide in 1994.

Peter Ustinov was an English actor, writer and director who is known for his Oscar-winning performances in Spartacus (1960) and Topkapi (1964).

As a fashion journaist who worked for Harper's Bazaar and Vogue, Diana Vreeland was an influential figure in American fashion during the 20th century.

Australian Aboriginal writer and political activist Kath Walker is considered the first of the modern-day Aboriginal protest writers.

David Foster Wallace was a writer known for his dense short stories, magazine articles and novels, most notably the 1,200-page Infinite Jest.

Mike Wallace is an interviewer and reporter who has been working in TV and radio since 1939. He joined the program 60 Minutes in 1968.

Famed television journalist Barbara Walters is best known as the 11-year star of the Today show, and for being the first female co-anchor of a network evening news program.