Famous Literary Characters And Their Inspirations: The Tempest's “Prospero” is most likely based on William Shakespeare himself. As his final play written alone, Shakespeare wondered what the future would be like without him and his power. The play discusses all of the issues haunting Shakespeare’s imagination throughout his career. With frequent allusions to “the Globe” (the world, but also Shakespeare’s theater), it's difficult to miss "Prospero’s" likeness to his great creator.
Famous Literary Characters And Their Inspirations: The real "Robinson Crusoe," whose memoir Daniel Defoe adapted for his own novel, was Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish privateer and Royal Navy officer who spent four years and four months as a castaway (1704-1709) after being marooned by his captain on an uninhabited island in the South Pacific Ocean. He published a memoir of his adventures, but died on a privateering mission before he could read Defoe’s adaption of his little-noticed book.
Famous Literary Characters And Their Inspirations: It has often been suggested John Gray was the inspiration behind Oscar Wilde's fictional “Dorian Gray” despite evidence to the contrary. He was an English poet and later in life became a Catholic priest. A member of Oscar Wilde’s lively literary circle, John Gray was a lovely, boyish poet who could pass for a fifteen-year-old at age twenty-five. After the publication of The Picture of Dorian Gray people began to call John Gray “Dorian,” which made him so uncomfortable he went so far as to sue a London publication for libel for making the association.
Famous Literary Characters And Their Inspirations: Anna Pavelka is most well known as the real life inspiration for the character “Antonia Shimerda” in Willa Cather's 1918 novel, My Ántonia. Willa Cather was born in Virginia and at age nine moved to the untamed plains of Red Cloud, Nebraska. In Red Cloud Cather became friends with Annie Pavelka, the daughter of Bohemian immigrants recently transplanted there. Many years after leaving, Cather returned to Red Cloud and renewed her friendship with Annie in 1916. She published My Ántonia just two years later.
Famous Literary Characters And Their Inspirations: Nora Barnacle was the muse and wife of James Joyce and his inspiration for the character “Molly Bloom” in Ulysses. Joyce eyed a tall brunette (Nora) in the street one afternoon and set all of Ulysses to take place on the same date as his first date with Nora. “Molly Bloom” is a sensual, unfaithful woman in the novel, a part Nora pretended to play more than she actually carried out. She and Joyce wrote intensely erotic, longing letters to one another when they were apart, and often she mentioned the attractions of various other men, though she never indulged in them.
