Great Thinkers

Meet the great minds whose ideas have shaped the world — philosophers, scientists, artists, leaders, and revolutionaries whose thinking still matters today.

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Subject: Literature × Era: Modern × Page 1 of 2
Literature
Aimé Césaire
1913-2008 · Martinique, Caribbean
Aimé Césaire (1913-2008) was a poet, playwright, and political thinker from Martinique, an island in the Caribbean that was, and still is, a French territory.…
Cultural heritage and identity Critical literacy Citizenship Ethical thinking +1
"A civilisation that proves incapable of solving the problems it creates is a decadent civilisation."
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Literature
Albert Camus
1913-1960 · Algeria / France
Albert Camus (1913-1960) was a French-Algerian novelist, playwright, and philosopher. He was born in Mondovi in French colonial Algeria into a poor working-class family: his…
Ethical thinking Critical thinking Resilience Storytelling and narrative +1
"There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide."
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Literature
Annie Ernaux
1940-present · France
Annie Ernaux is a French writer. In 2022 she became the first French woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. She was born Annie…
Creative expression Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking Emotional intelligence +1
"I shall not say my father, my mother, my sister: I shall name them."
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Literature
Audre Lorde
1934-1992 · United States
Audre Lorde (1934-1992) was an American poet, essayist, teacher, and political activist whose work insisted on the interconnection of race, gender, sexuality, and class in…
Creative expression Ethical thinking Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity +1
"There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives."
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Literature
Chinua Achebe
1930-2013 · Nigeria, West Africa
Chinua Achebe (1930-2013) was a Nigerian novelist, poet, critic, and professor. He was born Albert Chinualumogu Achebe in Ogidi, in southeastern Nigeria, into an Igbo…
Storytelling and narrative Critical literacy Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking +1
"Until the lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter."
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Literature
Christopher Hitchens
1949 - 2011 · United Kingdom (later United States)
Christopher Hitchens was a British-American journalist, essayist, and writer. He was one of the most famous public intellectuals of the late 20th and early 21st…
Creative expression Critical thinking Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."
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Literature
Edward Said
1935-2003 · Palestine / United States
Edward Wadie Said was a Palestinian-American literary critic, public intellectual, and music critic. He was one of the founders of postcolonial studies. He was born…
Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking Research skills +1
"The Orient was almost a European invention, and had been since antiquity a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories…"
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Literature
Flora Tristan
1803-1844 · France and Peru
Flora Tristan was a French-Peruvian writer and activist. She was one of the earliest voices to link women's liberation with workers' liberation. She was born…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Research skills +1
"Workers, unite!"
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Literature
Frederick Douglass
c. 1818-1895 · United States
Frederick Douglass (c.1818-1895) was an American abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. He was born into slavery in Talbot County, Maryland, the son of an enslaved…
Citizenship Critical literacy Ethical thinking Storytelling and narrative +1
"Once you learn to read, you will be forever free."
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Literature
George Orwell
1903-1950 · England
George Orwell was the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair, an English writer, journalist, and essayist. He is one of the most quoted writers of…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Creative expression Research skills +1
"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
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Literature
Harriet Martineau
1802-1876 · United Kingdom
Harriet Martineau was an English writer and social theorist. Many scholars now call her the first woman sociologist. She was born on 12 June 1802…
Critical thinking Research skills Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity +1
"Readers are plentiful: thinkers are rare."
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Literature
James Baldwin
1924-1987 · United States
James Baldwin (1924-1987) was an American novelist, essayist, playwright, and activist. He was born in Harlem, New York, the eldest of nine children. His mother's…
Critical literacy Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Storytelling and narrative +1
"Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced."
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Literature
José Carlos Mariátegui
1894-1930 · Peru
José Carlos Mariátegui was a Peruvian thinker, journalist, and political activist. He was one of the most original political writers in Latin American history. He…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Research skills +1
"We certainly do not want socialism in Latin America to be a copy or an imitation. It must be a…"
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Literature
Mary Shelley
1797-1851 · England
Mary Shelley (1797-1851) was an English novelist whose Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, written when she was eighteen years old, is widely regarded as the…
Creative expression Ethical thinking Critical thinking Scientific thinking +1
"Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge."
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Literature
Maya Angelou
1928-2014 · United States
Maya Angelou (1928-2014) was an American poet, memoirist, essayist, and public figure whose seven-volume autobiography and body of poetry made her one of the most…
Creative expression Ethical thinking Critical thinking Cultural heritage and identity +1
"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget…"
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Literature
Ngugi wa Thiong'o
1938-present · Kenya, East Africa
Ngugi wa Thiong'o (born 1938) is a Kenyan writer, novelist, and thinker. He grew up during British colonial rule in Kenya and lived through the…
Cultural heritage and identity Storytelling and narrative Critical literacy Media literacy +1
"Language carries culture, and culture carries, particularly through orature and literature, the entire body of values by which we come…"
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Literature
Oodgeroo Noonuccal
1920 - 1993 · Australia (Noonuccal people, Stradbroke Island/Minjerribah)
Oodgeroo Noonuccal was an Aboriginal Australian poet, activist, teacher, and artist. She was the first Aboriginal Australian to publish a book of poetry. Her work…
Creative expression Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Critical thinking +1
"We are nature and the past, all the old ways gone now and scattered."
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Literature
Pablo Neruda
1904–1973 · Chile
Pablo Neruda (1904–1973) was a Chilean poet and diplomat, widely regarded as the greatest Spanish-language poet of the 20th century and one of the most…
Critical thinking Critical literacy Resilience Intercultural competence
"They can cut all the flowers, but they cannot keep spring from coming."
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Literature
Peter Drucker
1909-2005 · United States (born Austria)
Peter Ferdinand Drucker (1909-2005) was an Austrian-American writer and teacher whose books and articles over seven decades shaped the practice of management and helped establish…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Research skills Creative expression +1
"The purpose of a business is to create a customer."
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Literature
Rabindranath Tagore
1861-1941 · Bengal, India / South Asia
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) was an Indian poet, philosopher, and educator from Bengal, a region now divided between India and Bangladesh. He was born into a…
Learning how to learn Creativity Citizenship Ethical thinking +1
"The highest education is that which does not merely give us information but makes our life in harmony with all…"
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Literature
Seamus Heaney
1939-2013 · Northern Ireland / Ireland
Seamus Heaney was an Irish poet. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest English-language…
Creative expression Cultural heritage and identity Emotional intelligence Ethical thinking +1
"Between my finger and my thumb / The squat pen rests; snug as a gun."
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Literature
Toni Morrison
1931-2019 · United States
Toni Morrison (1931-2019) was an American novelist, essayist, editor, and professor. She was born Chloe Ardelia Wofford in Lorain, Ohio, into a Black working-class family…
Storytelling and narrative Critical literacy Cultural heritage and identity Ethical thinking +1
"If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else."
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Literature
Ursula K. Le Guin
1929-2018 · United States
Ursula Kroeber Le Guin was an American novelist, essayist, and poet. She is one of the most important writers of science fiction and fantasy in…
Creative expression Critical thinking Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity +1
"We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be…"
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Literature
Vine Deloria Jr.
1933 - 2005 · United States (Standing Rock Sioux)
Vine Deloria Jr. was a Native American scholar, writer, and activist. He was the most influential Native American intellectual of the 20th century. His books…
Critical thinking Ethical thinking Cultural heritage and identity Research skills +1
"We are the only humans who became Indians."
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