List of Day Jobs of Famous Writers: Media
Learn what nonliterary skills paid the bills of famous writers throughout history.
Images
During World War I, Ernest Hemingway was an ambulance driver for the American Red...
Ernest Hemingway Photograph Collection/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library
In the 1960s and '70s writer Eve Babitz designed album covers for Buffalo Springfield...
© David Stokes
Science fiction writer (and former potato chip inspector) Octavia Butler holding...
© Malcolm Ali—WireImage/Getty Images
Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, oil on canvas by Raphael, 1516; in the...
© Fine Art Images—Heritage Images/Getty Images
French writer Colette was one of the outstanding writers in French literature of...
Musée Carnavalet, Histoire de Paris, Paris Musées
American poet and publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti standing in front of City Lights...
Cinematic Collection/Alamy
A scene from the 1944 film To Have and Have Not, directed by Howard Hawks,...
© 1945 Warner Brothers, Inc.; photograph from a private collection
American writer and editor James Martin left his career as a “corporate tool” at...
Courtesy of Father James Martin, reproduced with permission.
English poet and Jesuit priest Gerard Manley Hopkins, detail of a portrait by Harry...
Writer, cultural critic, and raconteur Fran Lebowitz is known for her acerbic, curmudgeonly...
© Axelle/Bauer-Griffin—FilmMagic/Getty Images
Aviator and writer Beryl Markham, 1936.
Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (photo no. cph 3c23400)
Japanese writer, jazz lover, and baseball fan Haruki Murakami, 2012.
© Sinopix/REX/Shutterstock.com
From 2020 to 2025 American poet Kevin Young served as the director of the Smithsonian's...
© Amanda Andrade-Rhoades—The Washington Post/Getty Images
Mexican poet, scholar, dramatist, and nun Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz.
Eraza Collection/Alamy
American author Mark Twain in 1867, about a decade after his riverboat piloting days.
Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (reproduction no. LC-USZ62-28851)
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