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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 21:18:51 GMT -5
6) Count Lyov Nikolayevich Tolstoy... AKA Leo TolstoyAlthough War and Peace and Anna Karenina are not fantastical novels, that is part of what makes them brilliant. Tolstoy channeled his creativity into making his stories believable and showing things as they were. He did not need dragons or fairies or fantastical places to tell a good story... he was able to tell a good story using elements that were familiar to the normal world
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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 21:23:52 GMT -5
5) Ayn RandAlthough much of her career is defined by non-fiction works, Rand's two best known works, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, were works of fiction. Using believable stories, she left her legacy by using these novels as a vehicle to convey her philosophy of Objectivism and even today, her novels are still read.
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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 21:32:35 GMT -5
4) Agatha ChristieA mystery writer like Poe and Doyle, she set herself apart with her twist endings. Eyes, our resident mystery novel enthusiast, put it like this: " she continuously was able to confound the reader with how logical yet shocking the endings of her novels were" Considering the cultural impact of works like And Then There Were None and Murder on the Orient Express, it's pretty clear how even today her twist endings hold up.
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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 21:44:32 GMT -5
3) Samuel Langhorne Clemens... AKA Mark TwainOne of the most famous authors of the 19th century, Mark Twain was well noted for his wit and humor. But he was also a brilliant writer, with The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and its sequel, the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, being among the few books to be considered "The Great American Novel." But he was more than just a story teller of life on the Mississippi River. He also wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, the tale of a then-modern 18th century man traveling back in time to King Arthur and introducing modern technology at an earlier time, in addition to his many short stories and other novels. There is a reason why, despite some controversy over certain aspects of his library, he is still regarded as one of the great American writers
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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 21:56:21 GMT -5
2) Alexandre DumasInitially a playwright, Dumas eventually turned to literature and went on to produce some of the greatest pieces to stand the test of time, including The Three Musketeers (which includes The Man In the Iron Mask), and The Count of Monte Cristo. Although his work is rather historical and stepped in a good level of reality, as Eyes puts it, "He took his personal ideas and ideals and wrote stories steeped in French history but always had the story take the spotlight, not the history... he also had so many ideas he had to hire several other people to write down the stuff spilling out from his mouth"And, in my view, I would argue that if you think about it the right way, The Three Musketeers are, more or less, the progenitors of the idea of a team of protagonists fighting together against an adversary; which would become the basis for many of the comic book superhero teams who would take to the pages centuries later.
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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 22:05:56 GMT -5
1) Miguel de CervantesAs far as literature goes, it's pretty hard to pinpoint the first modern novel. But as my fellow admin Eyes, and many others, will argue, if any should earn the title, it's Don Quixote. While famous for being a satirical novel, it should also be noted that "it's a satire that instead of JUST being a satire, goes above and beyond to become one of the greatest books in the history of the written art form" and it was de Cervantes that went on to inspire future authors, including Dumas and Twain. His masterpiece is among the best Western Literature has to offer, and even today, is so successful, that the only book that has been translated into more languages is the Bible. One could argue that it is the standard to which all fiction is measured against. Amazing to think that one work, written so long ago, went on to inspire generations of authors and millions of stories.
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Post by frankthetriviaman on Jul 14, 2018 22:06:39 GMT -5
And that concludes our look back at 25 of history's most creative minds. A big thanks to Eyes for helping me out when I was having trouble towards the end.
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