The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.
We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.
To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
See additional learning tools, study tips, features on campus life and much more at our Student Resources Headquarters.
List of the most influential people in Literature,
#10201
Shi Nai'an
1296 - 1372 (76 years)
Shi Nai'an was a Chinese writer from the Yuan and early Ming periods. Shuihu zhuan , one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, is traditionally attributed to him. There are few reliable sources for his biography, much less his literary activity.
Go to Profile#10202
Theodor Gartner
1843 - 1925 (82 years)
Theodor Gartner was an Austrian linguist, Romance philologist and professor. Biography He is also known for his study of the Ukrainian language and as a co-author of the monograph and textbook on the grammar of the Ukrainian language. After graduating from the University of Vienna, from 1868 to 1885 he taught in schools in Hungary. Since 1885, he was a professor of Romance Philology at the University of Chernivtsi. He conducted studies of Romanian accents on the territory of Bukovina.
Go to Profile#10203
M. Ageyev
1898 - 1973 (75 years)
M. Ageyev was the pen name of the writer of the Russian Novel with Cocaine. He is believed to be Mark Lazarevich Levi . Biography His best-known work, Novel With Cocaine , was published in 1934 in the Parisian émigré publication, Numbers. Nikita Struve alleged it to be the work of another Russian author employing a pen name - Vladimir Nabokov; this idea was debunked by Nabokov's son Dmitri in his preface to "The Enchanter", where he claims Ageyev is Mark Levi. Levi's life is shrouded in mystery and conjecture. He seems to have returned to the U.S.S.R. in 1942 and spent the rest of his life...
Go to Profile#10204
Heciyê Cindî
1908 - 1990 (82 years)
Heciyê Cindî was a Kurdish linguist and researcher from Armenia. Cindî was born into a Yazidi Kurdish family in the village of Yemençayir near Kars in modern Turkey. During World War I and Turkish and Soviet invasions, his family fled to Armenia and settled in the village of Elegez. Later on, he lost all his family to disease and massacre. In 1919, he stayed in the American orphanage in Alexandropol, and in 1926 was transferred to the orphanage in Leninakan, Armenia.
Go to Profile#10205
Jan F. E. Celliers
1865 - 1940 (75 years)
Jan Francois Elias Celliers, almost universally known as Jan F.E. Celliers, but occasionally as Jan F.E. Cilliers was an Afrikaans-language poet, essayist, dramatist and reviewer. Celliers was one of the three outstanding Afrikaans-language poets who wrote in the immediate wake of the Second Boer War; together with Totius and C. Louis Leipoldt, Celliers' youthful poetry writes of the devastation of the war in the youthful language of Afrikaans. His best poems appear in the 1908 collection Die Vlakte en ander gedigte .
Go to Profile#10206
Ignjat Đurđević
1675 - 1737 (62 years)
Ignjat Đurđević was a baroque poet and translator from the Republic of Ragusa, best known for his long poem Uzdasi Mandaljene pokornice . He wrote poetry in three languages: Latin, Italian and Croatian.
Go to Profile#10207
Otto Basler
1892 - 1975 (83 years)
Otto Basler was a German philologist. Basler studied German, Romance studies, English and history at the University of Freiburg. In World War I, he was a reserve officer. After his graduation, he was a librarian at the University of Freiburg until 1936, when he became the librarian at the German army library from 1936 to 1945 in Berlin. In 1943, he started teaching at the University of Munich, first with a training order for German philology and folklore, and in 1947, he became a professor at the university. From 1952 to his retirement, he taught at Freiburg University. He left Freiburg im Breisgau, where he taught since 1952 as a fee professor to 1959.
Go to Profile#10208
Marcel Aymé
1902 - 1967 (65 years)
Marcel Aymé was a French novelist and playwright, who also wrote screenplays and works for children. Biography Marcel André Aymé was born in Joigny, in the Burgundy region of France, the youngest of six children. His father, Joseph, was a blacksmith, and his mother, Emma Monamy, died when he was two years old, after the family had moved to Tours. Marcel was sent to live with his maternal grandparents in the village of Villers-Robert, a place where he would spend the next eight years, and which would serve as the model for the fictitious village of Claquebue in what is perhaps the most well-known of his novels, La Jument verte.
Go to Profile#10209
Wolfgang Golther
1863 - 1945 (82 years)
Wolfgang Golther was a German philologist who specialized in Germanic studies. A professor at the University of Rostock, Golther was a prominent authority on Medieval German literature and Germanic religion.
Go to Profile#10210
Theophan Prokopovich
1681 - 1736 (55 years)
Feofan/Theophan Prokopovich was a Russian Imperial Orthodox theologian, writer, poet, mathematician, and philosopher of Ukrainian origin. Rector of the Academia Mohileana in Kiev , and Archbishop of Novgorod. He elaborated upon and implemented Peter the Great's reform of the Russian Orthodox Church. Prokopovich wrote many religious verses and some of the most enduring sermons in the Russian language.
Go to Profile#10211
Samson Eitrem
1872 - 1966 (94 years)
Samson Eitrem was a Norwegian philologist, an expert in ancient literature, religion and magic. Personal life Eitrem was born in Kragerø to Samson Eitrem and Anine Marie Nielsen, and he was a brother of . In 1910 he married Wilhelmina Galtung.
Go to Profile#10212
Mary Sidney
1561 - 1621 (60 years)
Mary Herbert, Countess of Pembroke was among the first Englishwomen to gain notice for her poetry and her literary patronage. By the age of 39, she was listed with her brother Philip Sidney and with Edmund Spenser and William Shakespeare among the notable authors of the day in John Bodenham's verse miscellany Belvidere. Her play Antonius is widely seen as reviving interest in soliloquy based on classical models and as a likely source of Samuel Daniel's closet drama Cleopatra and of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra . She was also known for translating Petrarch's "Triumph of Death", for the ...
Go to Profile#10213
Karel van de Woestijne
1878 - 1929 (51 years)
Carolus Petrus Eduardus Maria "Karel" van de Woestijne was a Flemish writer and brother of the painter Gustave van de Woestijne. He went to highschool at the Koninklijk Athenaeum at the Ottogracht in Ghent. He also studied Germanic philology at the University of Ghent, where he came into contact with French symbolism. He lived at Sint-Martens-Latem from April 1900 up to January 1904, and from April 1905 up to November 1906. Here he wrote Laetemsche brieven over de lente, for his friend Adolf Herckenrath . In 1907 he moved to Brussels, and in 1915 he moved to Pamel, where he wrote De leemen t...
Go to Profile#10214
Joseph Addison
1672 - 1719 (47 years)
Joseph Addison was an English essayist, poet, playwright, and politician. He was the eldest son of Lancelot Addison. His name is usually remembered alongside that of his long-standing friend Richard Steele, with whom he founded The Spectator magazine. His simple prose style marked the end of the mannerisms and conventional classical images of the 17th century.
Go to Profile#10215
Adolf Michaelis
1835 - 1910 (75 years)
Adolf Michaelis was a German classical scholar, a professor of art history at the University of Strasbourg from 1872, who helped establish the connoisseurship of Ancient Greek sculpture and Roman sculpture on their modern footing. Just at the cusp of the introduction of photography as a tool of art history, Michaelis pioneered supplementing his descriptions with sketches.
Go to Profile#10216
Anwar Pasha
1928 - 1971 (43 years)
Anwar Pasha was a Bangladeshi novelist. He was killed in 1971. Life Anwar Pasha was born in the village Dabkai in Murshidabad . He passed the High Madrassah examination in 1946 then went on to do his BA and then his MA in Bengali from Calcutta University in 1953. He started his career as teacher of Manikchak High Madrasah and later on taught at Bhabta Azizia High Madrasah in 1954 and Sadikhan Diar Bohumukhi Higher Secondary School in 1957. In 1958 he joined Pabna Edward College and in 1966 he joined Department of Bengali, Dhaka University.
Go to Profile#10217
Bob Brown
1886 - 1959 (73 years)
Robert Carlton Brown II was an American writer and publisher in many forms from comic squibs to magazine fiction to advertising to avant-garde poetry to business news to cookbooks to political tracts to novelized memoirs to parodies and much more.
Go to Profile#10218
Pyotr Bykov
1843 - 1930 (87 years)
Pyotr Vasilyevich Bykov was a Russian literary historian, editor, poet and translator. A University of Kharkiv alumnus, Bykov moved to Saint Petersburg in the early 1860s and started writing short stories, poems and bibliographical articles, published in Syn Otechestva, Russkiy Mir, Iskra, Otechestvennye Zapiski. Later Bykov edited Delo , Russkoye Bogatstvo , Vsemirnaya Illyustratsia , Slovo newspaper and Sovremennik .
Go to Profile#10219
Ödön von Horváth
1901 - 1938 (37 years)
Edmund Josef von Horváth was an Austro-Hungarian playwright and novelist who wrote in German, and went by the nom de plume Ödön von Horváth. He was one of the most critically admired writers of his generation prior to his untimely death. He enjoyed a series of successes on the stage with socially poignant and romantic plays, including Revolte auf Côte 3018 , Sladek , Italienische Nacht , Hin und Her and Der Jüngste Tag . His novels include Der ewige Spießer , Ein Kind unserer Zeit and Jugend ohne Gott .
Go to Profile#10220
Yevgenia Ginzburg
1904 - 1977 (73 years)
Yevgenia Solomonovna Ginzburg was a Soviet writer who served an 18-year sentence in the Kolyma Gulag. Her given name is often Latinized to Eugenia. Family and early career Born in Moscow, her parents were Solomon Natanovich Ginzburg and Revekka Markovna Ginzburg. The family moved to Kazan in 1909. In 1920, she began to study social sciences at Kazan State University, later switching to pedagogy. She worked as a rabfak teacher. In April 1934, Ginzburg was officially confirmed as a docent , specializing in the history of the All-Union Communist Party. Shortly thereafter, on May 25, she was named head of the new department of the history of Leninism.
Go to Profile#10221
Arthur Leist
1852 - 1927 (75 years)
Arthur Leist was a German writer, journalist and translator of Georgian and Armenian literature. He was born and educated at Breslau. During the Russo-Turkish War , he got interested in the Caucasus. After his three visits to Georgia between 1884 and 1892, Leist decided to permanently settle in Tiflis. He regularly wrote on the history, ethnography and culture of Georgia, and translated many pieces of classic Georgian and Armenian literature. He compiled the first anthology of Georgian poetry in German in 1887 and, with the help of the Georgian writer Ilia Chavchavadze, published the complete...
Go to Profile#10222
Jón Helgason
1899 - 1986 (87 years)
Jón Helgason was an Icelandic philologist and poet. He was head of the Danish Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies from 1927 to 1972 and professor of Icelandic studies at the University of Copenhagen from 1929 to 1969. He made significant contributions to his field. As a poet, he was not prolific but noted for his highly polished and effective traditional poetry. His best-known poems are Áfangar and Í Árnasafni.
Go to Profile#10223
M. D. Taseer
1902 - 1950 (48 years)
Muhammad Din Taseer , also known as Deen Muhammad Taseer and popularly known as M. D. Taseer, was a Pakistani Urdu poet, writer, and literary critic. He is considered one of the pioneers of the progressive movement in Urdu literature.
Go to Profile#10224
Hugo Gering
1847 - 1925 (78 years)
Hugo Gering was a German philologist who specialized in Germanic studies. Biography Hugo Gering was born in Lipienica, Prussia on 21 September 1847. His father was a landowner. He was educated at Toruń and Chełmno. Since 1867, Gering studied philology, philosophy and history at the universities of Leipzig and Bonn. He served in the Prussian Army during the Franco-Prussian War. He subsequently gained his Ph.D. at the University of Halle under the supervision of Julius Zacher. His thesis was on the Gothic language.
Go to Profile#10225
Eli Siegel
1902 - 1978 (76 years)
Eli Siegel was a poet, critic, and educator. He founded Aesthetic Realism, a philosophical movement based in New York City. An idea central to Aesthetic Realism—that every person, place or thing in reality has something in common with all other things—was expressed in the title poem of his first volume, Hot Afternoons Have Been in Montana: Poems. His second volume was Hail, American Development.
Go to Profile#10226
Bohdan Lepky
1872 - 1941 (69 years)
Bohdan Teodor Nestor Lepky, was a Ukrainian writer, poet, scholar, public figure, and artist. He was born on November 9, 1872, in the village of Krohulets, in the same house where the Polish insurgent Bogdan Jarocki once lived.
Go to Profile#10227
Duff Cooper
1890 - 1954 (64 years)
Alfred Duff Cooper, 1st Viscount Norwich, , known as Duff Cooper, was a British Conservative Party politician and diplomat who was also a military and political historian. First elected to Parliament in 1924, he lost his seat in 1929 but returned to Parliament in the 1931 Westminster St George's by-election, which was seen as a referendum on Stanley Baldwin's leadership of the Conservative Party. He later served in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for War and First Lord of the Admiralty. In the intense political debates of the late 1930s over appeasement, he first put his trust in the League of Nations, and later realised that war with Germany was inevitable.
Go to Profile#10228
Rafael Dieste
1899 - 1981 (82 years)
Rafael Dieste was a Galician poet, philosopher, short-story writer, and dramatist writing mostly in Galician language, but also in Spanish language. He began to write with the encouragement of another Galician poet, Manuel Antonio, wrote for the theatre and wrote widely on aesthics. His stories have been compared to the other-world approach of the graphic art of M. C. Escher.
Go to Profile#10229
Adalbert Bezzenberger
1851 - 1922 (71 years)
Adalbert Bezzenberger was a German philologist. He was born at Kassel and died at Königsberg. He is considered to be the founder of Baltic philology. He studied the Indo-Germanic languagess at the universities of Göttingen and Munich. In 1874 he became lecturer at Göttingen and in 1879 professor of Sanskrit at the University of Königsberg. From 1890 to 1891 he was rector of this university.
Go to Profile#10230
Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl
1823 - 1897 (74 years)
Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl was a German professor, journalist, novelist, and folklorist. Academic career Riehl was born in Biebrich in the Duchy of Nassau and died in Munich. Riehl was born into a settled middle-class background, was a professor at the University of Munich, and later in life a curator of Bavarian antiquities.
Go to Profile#10231
Grigory Gukovsky
1902 - 1950 (48 years)
Grigory Alexandrovich Gukovsky was a Russian Formalist literary historian and scholar whose work at the Pushkin House led to the rediscovery of 18th-century Russian literature. He graduated from the Petrograd University in 1923 and held the chair in Russian literature there. Gukovsky was considered the foremost authority on 18th-century Russian literature. After spending a winter in besieged Leningrad he read lectures in Saratov University until 1948. Upon his return to Leningrad Gukovsky was arrested as a "rootless cosmopolitan". He died of a heart attack in Lefortovo Prison.
Go to Profile#10232
Raymond Picard
1917 - 1975 (58 years)
Raymond Picard was a French author, prominent Sorbonne professor and Jean Racine scholar. Work Picard is noted for his scathing tract "Nouvelle critique ou nouvelle imposture?" , which was aimed at the "subjective" analytical approach of Roland Barthes and other non-traditional approaches by writers and academics of "New Criticism", including Lucien Goldmann, Charles Mauron, Jean-Paul Weber and Jean-Pierre Richard. Barthes' response to this critique came in the form of Critique et vérité, which postulated a 'science of criticism' to replace the 'university criticism' perpetuated by Picard a...
Go to Profile#10233
W. K. C. Guthrie
1906 - 1981 (75 years)
William Keith Chambers Guthrie , usually cited as W. K. C. Guthrie, was a Scottish classical scholar, best known for his History of Greek Philosophy, published in six volumes between 1962 and his death. He served as Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy at the University of Cambridge from 1952 to 1973 and as master of Downing College, Cambridge from 1957 to 1972.
Go to Profile#10234
Mikhail Mikhailovich Morozov
1897 - 1952 (55 years)
Mikhail Mikhailovich Morozov was a Russian Shakespeare scholar and translator. Life Morozov was educated in England; later, he attended Petrograd University. After his studies, he worked at several Russian theaters and also taught English. In 1935, he was made professor at the Institute of Red Professors. He was responsible for teaching Western literature, with an emphasis on William Shakespeare's works. He was a leader in scholarly societies devoted to Shakespeare and organized his first annual conference on the English dramatist in 1939.
Go to Profile#10235
Alban Butler
1710 - 1773 (63 years)
Alban Butler was an English Roman Catholic priest and hagiographer. Biography Alban Butler was born in 1710, at Appletree, Aston le Walls, Northamptonshire, the second son of Simon Butler, Esq. His father died when he was young and he was sent to the Lancashire boarding school run by Dame Alice. He went on to a Catholic further education at the English College, Douai, in France. In 1735 Butler was ordained a priest. At Douai, he was appointed professor of philosophy, and later professor of theology. It was at Douai that he began his principal work The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs and Other Principal Saints.
Go to Profile#10236
Vir Singh
1872 - 1957 (85 years)
Bhai Vir Singh was an Indian poet, scholar, and theologian of the Sikh revival movement, playing an important part in the renewal of Punjabi literary tradition. Singh's contributions were so important and influential that he became canonized as Bhai, an honorific often given to those who could be considered a saint of the Sikh faith.
Go to Profile#10237
August Meineke
1790 - 1870 (80 years)
Johann Albrecht Friedrich August Meineke , German classical scholar, was born at Soest in the Duchy of Westphalia. He was father-in-law to philologist Theodor Bergk. He obtained his education at the University of Leipzig as a student of Johann Gottfried Jakob Hermann. After holding an educational post at Danzig , he was director of the Joachimsthal Gymnasium in Berlin from 1826 to 1856. In 1830 he became a member of the Berlin Academy. He died in Berlin on 12 December 1870.
Go to Profile#10238
Alexander Dragunov
1900 - 1955 (55 years)
Alexander Aleksandrovic Dragunov was a Soviet philologist and Sinologist. He is particularly known for his contributions to phonetic reconstruction of the Old Mandarin language of the 12th to 14th centuries and his study of Chinese dialectology. Dragunov was also an early proponent of the 23rd letter of the Tibetan alphabet as representing a voiced fricative in all positions.
Go to Profile#10239
Ludwig Schwabe
1835 - 1908 (73 years)
Ludwig Schwabe was a German classical philologist and professor of classical archaeology born in Giessen. He studied classical philology and archaeology at the Universities of Giessen and Göttingen, receiving his doctorate in 1857 at Giessen. In 1863 he became an associate professor at Giessen, and soon afterwards relocated to the University of Dorpat as a professor of classical philology. In 1872 he was appointed professor of classical philology and chair of classical archaeology at the University of Tübingen, where in 1881–82 he was university rector.
Go to Profile#10240
Marjorie Hope Nicolson
1894 - 1981 (87 years)
Marjorie Hope Nicolson was an American literary scholar. She was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1941 and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1955. Early life and education Nicolson was the daughter of Charles Butler Nicolson, editor-in-chief of the Detroit Free Press during World War I and later that paper's correspondent in Washington, DC, and Lissie Hope Morris.
Go to Profile#10241
Richard August Reitzenstein
1861 - 1931 (70 years)
Richard August Reitzenstein was a German classical philologist and scholar of Ancient Greek religion, hermetism and Gnosticism. He is described by Kurt Rudolph as “one of the most stimulating Gnostic scholars.” With Wilhelm Bousset, he was one of the major figures of the Religionsgeschichtliche Schule .
Go to Profile#10242
Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen
1780 - 1856 (76 years)
Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen was a German philologist, chiefly distinguished for his researches in Old German literature. He was born at Angermünde-Schmiedeberg in the Uckermark region of the Margraviate of Brandenburg. After studying law at the University of Halle, he obtained a legal appointment in the state service at Berlin, but in 1806 resigned in order to devote himself exclusively to letters. In 1810 he was appointed professor extraordinarius of German literature at the University of Berlin. In the following year he was transferred in a similar capacity to the University of Breslau, and in 1821 returned to Berlin as professor ordinarius.
Go to Profile#10243
Dwight Macdonald
1906 - 1982 (76 years)
Dwight Macdonald was an American writer, editor, film critic, social critic, literary critic, philosopher, and activist. Macdonald was a member of the New York Intellectuals and editor of their leftist magazine Partisan Review for six years. He also contributed to other New York publications including Time, The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, and Politics, a journal which he founded in 1944.
Go to Profile#10244
Ibn Zuhr
1091 - 1162 (71 years)
Abū Marwān ‘Abd al-Malik ibn Zuhr , traditionally known by his Latinized name Avenzoar , was an Arab physician, surgeon, and poet. He was born at Seville in medieval Andalusia , was a contemporary of Averroes and Ibn Tufail, and was the most well-regarded physician of his era. He was particularly known for his emphasis on a more rational, empiric basis of medicine. His major work, Al-Taysīr fil-Mudāwāt wal-Tadbīr , was translated into Latin and Hebrew and was influential to the progress of surgery. He also improved surgical and medical knowledge by keying out several diseases and their treatme...
Go to Profile#10245
Johann Christoph Wilhelm Ludwig Döderlein
1791 - 1863 (72 years)
Johann Christoph Wilhelm Ludwig Döderlein was a German philologist. Biography Ludwig Döderlein was born at Jena. His father was Johann Christoph Döderlein, professor of theology at Jena. After receiving his preliminary education at Windsheim and Schulpforta , he studied at Munich, Heidelberg, Erlangen and Berlin. He devoted his chief attention to philology under the instruction of such men as F. Thiersch, G. F. Creuzer, J. H. Voss, F. A. Wolf, August Boeckh and P. K. Buttmann.
Go to Profile#10246
John Crowne
John Crowne was a British dramatist. His father "Colonel" William Crowne, accompanied the earl of Arundel on a diplomatic mission to Vienna in 1637, and wrote an account of his journey. He emigrated to Nova Scotia where he received a grant of land from Cromwell, but the French took possession of his property, and the home government did nothing to uphold his rights.
Go to Profile#10247
Jovan Đorđević
1826 - 1900 (74 years)
Jovan Đorđević was a Serbian writer, dramatist, Minister of Education and the co-founder of the Novi Sad Serbian National Theatre in 1861, the National Theatre in Belgrade in 1868 and the Academy of Dramatic Art in 1870. He is most famous for writing the lyrics to the Serbian National anthem Bože pravde in 1872. He was also a member of Matica Srpska.
Go to Profile#10248
Arlo Bates
1850 - 1918 (68 years)
Arlo Bates was an American author, educator and newspaperman. Biography Arlo Bates was born at East Machias, Maine. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1876. In 1880 Bates became the editor of the Boston Sunday Courier and afterward became professor of English at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1900.
Go to Profile#10249
Ernst Ludwig von Leutsch
1808 - 1887 (79 years)
Ernst Ludwig von Leutsch was a German classical philologist born in Frankfurt am Main. He studied classical philology at the University of Göttingen, where he had as instructors Georg Ludolf Dissen, Christoph Wilhelm Mitscherlich and Karl Otfried Müller. It was during this time period that he became lifelong friends with Friedrich Wilhelm Schneidewin.
Go to Profile#10250
Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d'Argens
1704 - 1771 (67 years)
Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d'Argens was a French rationalist, author and critic of the Catholic Church, who was a close friend of Voltaire and spent much of his life in exile at the court of Frederick the Great.
Go to Profile