March 1

Ralph Ellison

Ralph Ellison (born March 1, 1914) U.S. crime fiction novelist – Invisible Man (1952)

Watch this dramatization of the opening to Ellison's Invisible Man
 here


Akutagawa Ryunosuke

Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (born March 1, 1892) Japanese short story writer – "In a Grove" (1915) (film adaptation: Rashomon)

Read the Authors Calendar biography of Akutagawa Ryunosuke

“With his friends, Kikuchi Kan and Kumé Masao, he founded the literary magazine Shin Shicho, where he published ‘Rashomon’ (or ‘The Rasho Gate’, 1915). The tale, set in 12th-century Kyoto, depicts a ruined city, where a former servant tries to survive and must choose between immorality and virtue.”

Listen to a reading of In a Grove,
a short story by Ryunosuke that is the basis of the Akira Kurosawa film Rashomon


Shantabai Kamble

Shantabai Kamble (born March 1, 1923) Indian writer from the Dalit (untouchable) class of Hindu society – Picturebook of My Life (1983)

Read more about Shantabai Kamble here

After her retirement she penned her seminal autobiography Mazhya ]alamachi Chittarkatha/The Kaleidoscopic Story of My life which was serialized in a magazine in 1983 and is considered the first autobiographical narrative by a Dalit woman writer. It was later teleserialized as “Najuka” on Mumbai Doordarshan in 1990. and has also been translated into French and English.

Read more of Kamble's life
here and here