Founded 1904, merged with the National Institute of Arts and Letters (founded 1898) in 1976 as the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters.
| Name | Occupation | Birth | Death | Known for |
|---|
| Chinua Achebe |
Novelist |
16-Nov-1930 |
22-Mar-2013 |
Things Fall Apart |
| Conrad Aiken |
Poet |
5-Aug-1889 |
17-Aug-1973 |
Earth Triumphant |
| Woody Allen |
Film Director |
1-Dec-1935 |
|
Annie Hall |
| Charles McLean Andrews |
Historian |
22-Feb-1863 |
9-Sep-1943 |
The Colonial Period of American History |
| Louis Auchincloss |
Author |
27-Sep-1917 |
26-Jan-2010 |
Portrait in Brownstone |
| W. H. Auden |
Poet |
21-Feb-1907 |
29-Sep-1973 |
The Age of Anxiety |
| Irving Babbitt |
Philosopher |
2-Aug-1865 |
15-Jul-1933 |
Early leader of Neohumanism |
| Milton Babbitt |
Composer |
10-May-1916 |
29-Jan-2011 |
Music for Synthesizer |
| Jacques Barzun |
Historian |
30-Nov-1907 |
25-Oct-2012 |
From Dawn to Decadence |
| Eric Bentley |
Critic |
14-Sep-1916 |
|
The Life of the Drama |
| Elizabeth Bishop |
Poet |
8-Feb-1911 |
6-Oct-1979 |
North & South |
| Marc Blitzstein |
Composer |
2-Mar-1905 |
22-Jan-1964 |
The Cradle Will Rock |
| Louise Bogan |
Poet |
11-Aug-1897 |
4-Feb-1970 |
The New Yorker poetry critic |
| William Bolcom |
Composer |
26-May-1938 |
|
Songs of Innocence and of Experience |
| Yves Bonnefoy |
Poet |
24-Jun-1923 |
|
Du Mouvement et de l'immobilité de Douve |
| Jorge Luis Borges |
Author |
24-Aug-1899 |
14-Jun-1986 |
The Garden of Forking Paths |
| Joseph Brodsky |
Poet |
24-May-1940 |
28-Jan-1996 |
"Social parasite" turned Poet Laureate |
| Gwendolyn Brooks |
Poet |
7-Jun-1917 |
3-Dec-2000 |
Annie Allen |
| Van Wyck Brooks |
Critic |
16-Feb-1886 |
2-May-1963 |
Finders & Makers |
| Robert Brustein |
Educator |
21-Apr-1927 |
|
Founder, American Reportory Theatre |
| Art Buchwald |
Columnist |
20-Oct-1925 |
17-Jan-2007 |
Syndicated columnist and humorist |
| William S. Burroughs |
Author |
5-Feb-1914 |
2-Aug-1997 |
Naked Lunch |
| Frederick Busch |
Novelist |
1-Aug-1941 |
23-Feb-2006 |
Don't Tell Anyone |
| Nicholas Murray Butler |
Educator |
2-Apr-1862 |
7-Dec-1947 |
President of Columbia University, 1901-45 |
| John Cage |
Composer |
5-Sep-1912 |
12-Aug-1992 |
Experimental composer |
| Hortense Calisher |
Novelist |
20-Dec-1911 |
15-Jan-2009 |
In the Absence of Angels |
| Willa Cather |
Novelist |
7-Dec-1873 |
24-Apr-1947 |
O Pioneers! |
| Chuck Close |
Painter |
5-Jul-1940 |
|
Photo-realist portrait painter, printmaker |
| Henry Steele Commager |
Historian |
25-Oct-1902 |
2-Mar-1998 |
The American Mind |
| Luigi Dallapiccola |
Composer |
3-Feb-1904 |
19-Feb-1975 |
Canti di Prigionia |
| Walter Damrosch |
Conductor |
30-Jan-1862 |
22-Dec-1950 |
Conductor, popularizer of music |
| Mario Davidovsky |
Composer |
4-Mar-1934 |
|
Synchronisms |
| Peter De Vries |
Novelist |
27-Feb-1910 |
28-Sep-1993 |
The Tunnel of Love |
| Anita Desai |
Novelist |
24-Jun-1937 |
|
Cry, the Peacock |
| Joan Didion |
Author |
5-Dec-1934 |
|
Slouching Toward Bethlehem |
| E. L. Doctorow |
Novelist |
6-Jan-1931 |
21-Jul-2015 |
The Book of Daniel |
| Henry van Dyke |
Author |
10-Nov-1852 |
10-Apr-1933 |
The Unknown Quantity |
| Bob Dylan |
Musician |
24-May-1941 |
|
The Times They Are A-Changin' |
| Umberto Eco |
Author |
5-Jan-1932 |
|
Foucault's Pendulum, The Name of the Rose |
| Robert Fagles |
Translator |
11-Sep-1933 |
26-Mar-2008 |
Translator of Greek literature |
| Vivian Fine |
Composer |
28-Sep-1913 |
20-Mar-2000 |
Drama for Orchestra |
| Lukas Foss |
Conductor |
15-Aug-1922 |
1-Feb-2009 |
Director, Buffalo Philharmonic, 1963-71 |
| Llyn Foulkes |
Painter |
1935 |
|
Assemblage artist |
| Helen Frankenthaler |
Painter |
12-Dec-1928 |
27-Dec-2011 |
Mountains and Sea |
| Daniel Chester French |
Sculptor |
20-Apr-1850 |
7-Oct-1931 |
Lincoln Memorial |
| Brian Friel |
Playwright |
9-Jan-1929 |
2-Oct-2015 |
Dancing at Lughnasa |
| R. Buckminster Fuller |
Architect |
12-Jul-1895 |
1-Jul-1983 |
Futurist, invented the geodesic dome |
| Ernest J. Gaines |
Novelist |
15-Jan-1933 |
|
A Lesson Before Dying |
| John Kenneth Galbraith |
Economist |
15-Oct-1908 |
29-Apr-2006 |
Modern economics renegade |
| William H. Gass |
Novelist |
30-Jul-1924 |
|
The Tunnel |
| Cass Gilbert |
Architect |
24-Nov-1859 |
17-May-1934 |
Woolworth Building |
| Allen Ginsberg |
Poet |
3-Jun-1926 |
5-Apr-1997 |
Howl! |
| Ellen Glasgow |
Novelist |
22-Apr-1873 |
21-Nov-1945 |
In This Our Life |
| Stephen Greenblatt |
Critic |
7-Nov-1943 |
|
The Swerve |
| John Guare |
Playwright |
5-Feb-1938 |
|
Six Degrees of Separation |
| Charles Gwathmey |
Architect |
19-Jun-1938 |
3-Aug-2009 |
Designed extension to the Guggenheim |
| Childe Hassam |
Painter |
17-Oct-1859 |
27-Aug-1935 |
American impressionist, one of "The Ten" |
| John Hay |
Government |
8-Oct-1838 |
1-Jul-1905 |
US Secretary of State, 1898-1905 |
| Shirley Hazzard |
Novelist |
30-Jan-1931 |
|
The Transit of Venus |
| Lillian Hellman |
Playwright |
20-Jun-1905 |
30-Jun-1984 |
Little Foxes |
| Edward Hopper |
Painter |
22-Jul-1882 |
15-May-1967 |
American realist painter, Nighthawks |
| Richard Hughes |
Author |
19-Apr-1900 |
28-Aug-1976 |
A High Wind in Jamaica |
| Louis Kahn |
Architect |
20-Feb-1901 |
17-Mar-1974 |
Prominent architect |
| Leon Kirchner |
Composer |
24-Jan-1919 |
17-Sep-2009 |
Quartet No. 3 |
| Kenneth Koch |
Poet |
27-Feb-1925 |
6-Jul-2002 |
On the Great Atlantic Rainway |
| Arthur Kopit |
Playwright |
10-May-1937 |
|
Mama's Hung You in the Closet |
| Joseph Wood Krutch |
Naturalist |
25-Nov-1893 |
22-May-1970 |
The Modern Temper |
| Stanley Kunitz |
Poet |
29-Jul-1905 |
14-May-2006 |
US Poet Laureate, 2000 |
| John La Farge |
Painter |
31-Mar-1835 |
14-Nov-1910 |
Painter, muralist, stained-glass designer |
| Maya Lin |
Artist |
5-Oct-1959 |
|
Designed Vietnam Veterans Memorial |
| Walter Lippmann |
Journalist |
23-Sep-1889 |
14-Dec-1974 |
Today and Tomorrow |
| Janet Malcolm |
Journalist |
1934 |
|
The Journalist and the Murderer |
| John McPhee |
Author |
8-Mar-1931 |
|
Annals of the Former World |
| John Muir |
Activist |
21-Apr-1838 |
24-Dec-1914 |
Patron saint of Yosemite National Park |
| Albert L. Murray |
Author |
12-May-1916 |
18-Aug-2013 |
Stomping the Blues |
| Michael Ondaatje |
Novelist |
12-Sep-1943 |
|
The English Patient |
| Renzo Piano |
Architect |
14-Sep-1937 |
|
Designed the Pompidou Center rehab |
| Reynolds Price |
Author |
1-Feb-1933 |
20-Jan-2011 |
A Long and Happy Life |
| Martin Puryear |
Sculptor |
23-May-1941 |
|
Post-minimalist |
| John Crowe Ransom |
Poet |
30-Apr-1888 |
4-Jul-1974 |
God Without Thunder |
| Steve Reich |
Composer |
3-Oct-1936 |
|
Minimalist composer, Different Trains |
| Adrienne Rich |
Poet |
16-May-1929 |
27-Mar-2012 |
An Atlas of the Difficult World |
| Oliver Sacks |
Doctor |
9-Jul-1933 |
30-Aug-2015 |
Awakenings |
| Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. |
Historian |
15-Oct-1917 |
28-Feb-2007 |
The Age of Roosevelt |
| Martin Scorsese |
Film Director |
17-Nov-1942 |
|
Taxi Driver |
| Sam Shepard |
Playwright |
5-Nov-1943 |
|
Buried Child |
| Georges Simenon |
Novelist |
13-Feb-1903 |
4-Sep-1989 |
Prolific Belgian-French novelist |
| Charles Simic |
Poet |
9-May-1938 |
|
The World Doesn't End |
| Jane Smiley |
Novelist |
26-Sep-1949 |
|
A Thousand Acres |
| Albert Spalding |
Violinist |
15-Aug-1888 |
26-May-1953 |
American violin virtuoso |
| Muriel Spark |
Novelist |
1-Feb-1918 |
13-Apr-2006 |
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie |
| John Steinbeck |
Novelist |
27-Feb-1902 |
20-Dec-1968 |
The Grapes of Wrath |
| Clyfford Still |
Painter |
30-Nov-1904 |
23-Jun-1980 |
Abstract expressionist |
| Meryl Streep |
Actor |
22-Jun-1949 |
|
The Deer Hunter |
| Studs Terkel |
Author |
16-May-1912 |
31-Oct-2008 |
Working |
| Wayne Thiebaud |
Artist |
15-Nov-1920 |
|
California pop artist |
| Helen Vendler |
Critic |
30-Apr-1933 |
|
American poetry critic |
| William Weaver |
Translator |
24-Jul-1923 |
12-Nov-2013 |
Translator from the Italian |
| Eudora Welty |
Author |
13-Apr-1909 |
23-Jul-2001 |
The Optimist's Daughter |
| Edmund White |
Author |
13-Jan-1940 |
|
The Joy of Gay Sex |
| Brand Whitlock |
Diplomat |
4-Mar-1869 |
24-May-1934 |
US Ambassador to Belgium, 1914-21 |
| Robert Wilson |
Theater Director |
4-Oct-1941 |
|
Experimental theater director, designer |
| Charles Wuorinen |
Composer |
9-Jun-1938 |
|
Time's Encomium |
