Authors and Poets

Rita Dove is one of America's best-known and most honored poets. Her collection of poems, Thomas and Beulah, based on the lives of her grandparents, earned her the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. She was only the second African-American to win this prize. In 1993, she was appoint ...  Show more

Erma Bombeck was an American humorist who achieved great popularity for her newspaper column that described suburban home life from the mid-1960s until the late 1990s. Bombeck also published 15 books, most of which became best-sellers. From 1965 to 1996, Erma Bombeck wrote over 4 ...  Show more

One of America's most respected and honored poets, Mona Van Duyn (1921 - 2004) served as Poet Laureate of the United States from 1992 to 1993. Born and raised in rural Iowa, she was drawn to literature at an early age, but her parents were unsympathetic to her literary ambitions. ...  Show more

One of the most acclaimed and controversial filmmakers of our times, Oliver Stone's compelling dramas are steeped in the great social conflicts of our history, and grounded in his own experience. After dropping out of Yale University, he enlisted in the U.S. Army and served in co ...  Show more

Michael Crichton (1942 - 2008) was a literary phenomenon. He sold his first article to The New York Times when he was only 14, and worked his way through Harvard Medical School writing detective stories. He struck gold with his 1969 bestseller The Andromeda Strain, a taut thrille ...  Show more