24 Photographs Of Famous Authors That Most People Have Never Seen

When we hear the names of writers, we usually think of their work first and not of the people who wrote them. But it doesn’t change the fact that these authors existed and had full-blown lives that impacted their work. And so, sometimes it can be very interesting to think about who the people were deep down who wrote the famous books or other texts.Threads like this one shared on X let us catch at least a small glimpse into that. After all, seeing an uncommon photo of a writer can make a reader grasp their work in a light they might not have been able to before.More info:XThis post may includeaffiliate links.

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J.R.R Tolkien In His Study With His Own Hand-Drawn Map Of Middle Earth

Mark Twain With A Cat

Franz Kafka With His Dog

One of the things that might influence how people understand a text is the way they perceive the person who wrote it. Some people might love or hate certain writers depending on the information they learn about them or the way they fit (or don’t fit) their values and expectations of their actions and writing.

Portrait Of Edgar Allan Poe, Believed To Be The Earliest Known Photograph Of Him

A Daguerreotype Of A Young Frederick Douglass

Rare Portrait Of Virginia Woolf

As an example, we can take the currently famous writer Colleen Hoover. The author who skyrocketed due to BookTok has many fans that love her writing, which helped her tosella very high number of book copies.At the same time, some people wholeheartedly dislike her. Someaccuseher of romanticizing abusive relationships and overshadowing important topics in her books with smut scenes. Others dislike her because of hercontroversies. For instance, trying to silence a girl who came forward about her son abusing her. These people refuse to read the author’s books because knowing all this stuff about her, they can’t separate the art from the artist.

At the same time, some people wholeheartedly dislike her. Someaccuseher of romanticizing abusive relationships and overshadowing important topics in her books with smut scenes. Others dislike her because of hercontroversies. For instance, trying to silence a girl who came forward about her son abusing her. These people refuse to read the author’s books because knowing all this stuff about her, they can’t separate the art from the artist.

Oscar Wilde Attending A Garden Party

Rare Daguerreotype Of Charles Dickens

Alexander Solzhenitsyn On The Day Of His Liberation After 8 Years In The Gulag

But information isn’t the only thing that can influence the reader’s perception of the author and their work. A simple photograph of the writer can also have a lot of influence. So,Bored Pandagot in touch withLoreta, an expert teacher of the Lithuanian language, who agreed that pictures can influence the way texts are perceived.

Loreta voiced that “The photos can give an idea about the condition the author was writing or what kind of person they were and how it all influenced what theywrote.”

Ernest Hemingway With His Chauffeur Adamo Simon

C. S. Lewis With A Pipe

The Only Color Picture Of Leo Tolstoy

Yet, thesocialor cultural context isn’t the only thing that an author’s photo can suggest. They help a reader to comprehend that the person who wrote the text is (or was) a real human being and not only a name on abook cover. As Loreta said, “Understanding the personality behind the text helps the readers to connect with it more. And a connection with the text always makes it at least a little bit easier to enjoy it.”At the same time, she noted that relying solely on the author’s photo to influence text comprehension is a bad idea. Sometimes such influence can go too far and skew a proper understanding of the text.For example, if the person perceives an author from their photo as a very serious andintellectualperson, they might start thinking that their text is overly complicated. Or if they see the writer as a simple, down-to-earth person, they might think that the text and its themes are supposed to be the same way.

At the same time, she noted that relying solely on the author’s photo to influence text comprehension is a bad idea. Sometimes such influence can go too far and skew a proper understanding of the text.

For example, if the person perceives an author from their photo as a very serious andintellectualperson, they might start thinking that their text is overly complicated. Or if they see the writer as a simple, down-to-earth person, they might think that the text and its themes are supposed to be the same way.

46-Year-Old Charles Darwin

The The First Known Picture Of Friedrich Nietzsche

Last Photo Of Fyodor Dostoevsky While Alive

That’s why critical thinking is so important. You shouldn’t let one mere photo fully influence how you perceive an entire body of text. Loreta said, “Sometimes an author can look one way, but it doesn’t mean their work reflects that.” She also added that “People are way more complex than their appearance, and so fully judging them and their work according to it isn’t the right thing.”

Basically, while art, including books and photography, is subjective, we need to learn to find a line of objectivity within it. So, while looking through theserarephotos of famous authors, remember that while they show unseen parts of them, they also capture just a fragment of their lives.

William Edward Burghardt Du Bois At Age 4

A Rare Portrait Of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Portrait Of A Young Sigmund Freud

Rare Picture Of John Steinbeck