10 Writers With Crazier Life Stories Than William Shakespeare

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You’d be forgiven for thinking that Anonymous, the new explosion-free movie from director Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, 2012), was just another mushy, lovesick costume drama that we’d need to convince you to actually watch. Looks-wise, the dramatic thriller (opening in theaters this Friday) unquestionably resembles the cinematic likes of Shakespeare In Love, and it’s even centered on the same iconic bard, William Shakespeare (played by Rife Spall).

But, unlike those stuffy period flicks that your girl insists on dragging you to (and that you begrudgingly see in hopes of post-credits nookie), Anonymous has more in common with hard-boiled mysteries. The plot takes on the divisive theory that aristocrat Edward de Vere (Rhys Ifans), not Shakespeare, wrote the English scribe’s famous plays and poems.

It’s a fine set-up for a movie, yet Anonymous also has us thinking about the many authors whose biographies are more deserving of the big-screen treatment, for various reasons. Some frequently grappled with pills and the bottle; others succumbed to lifelong demons and offed themselves in manners suited for the strangest and darkest of fiction. But all matched the enigmatic virtuosity of their writing with equally dense and beguiling personal histories, the most captivating of which can be found in our list of 10 Writers With Crazier Life Stories Than William Shakespeare.

RELATED: 25 Actors Who May Be Completely Crazy

Written by Matt Barone (@MBarone)

10. Robert E. Howard

Most celebrated stories: The many tales of Conan The Barbarian and Solomon Kane

Life story: Need some motivation to get up off your asses and do something, twentysomethings? Just look back at the life of Robert E. Howard, the oft-overlooked young writer who created both the “sword and sorcery” genre and the vast, mythological adventures of fantasy staple Conan The Barbarian before he turned 30-years-old.

No easy feat for a guy who, according to literary lore, combatted depression and mental instability. The Texas lifer is also the subject of Oedipal complex accusations, claims given credence by the fact that he followed the news that his mother had entered a permanent coma in June 1936 by sticking a gun into his mouth in the parking lot.

Think that’s a downer? You haven’t read anything yet....

9. Virginia Woolf

Most celebrated books: Mrs. Dalloway (1925), To The Lighthouse (1927), A Room Of One’s Own (1929)

Life story: Any writer will tell you that the act of penning original stories is the purest, and often most therapeutic, form of escapism available to any- and everyone. Virginia Woolf knew this better than most writers; plagued by domestic traumas all throughout her life, the London-born introvert suffered through a string of nervous breakdowns, chiefly ascribed to the deaths of her mother (when Woolf was only 13) and half-sister (when she was 15). She was even sent to a loony bin as a 22-year-old after her father passed away and she mentally collapsed harder than ever before.

After her home was blown to shit during the Nazis’ “Blitz” bombing of London (from September 1940 through May 1941), Woolf’s dark life ended when she stuffed an overcoat’s pockets full of stones and jumped into a nearby river. Crazy, yes, but also crazy depressing.

8. Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Most celebrated stories: The Double (1846), The House Of The Dead (1862), Notes From The Underground (1864), Crime And Punishment (1866)

Life story: Fittingly, the literary trailblazer behind the epic novel Crime And Punishment was no stranger to harsh chastisement in real life. Along with several other free-thinking writers and intellectuals, the Moscow-born Dostoyevsky was sent to the slammer for his participation in a group known as the Petrashevsky Circle, a rebellious sect dedicated to pissing off and challenging Russia’s tsarist regime.

Dostoyevsky was sentenced to death, but when he and some fellow Circle members were forced to freeze their asses off before a patient firing squad, their captors decided to let the game-changing author live. Not that his next move was all that agreeable, though; Dostoyevsky was sent to a prison camp where he was stuck doing hard labor and living in filth for four years. Those days spent inside the wretched camp inspired some of his best stories, as did his later gambling addiction (see: 1867’s The Gambler).

7. Charles Dickens

Most celebrated books: The Adventures Of Oliver Twist (1837), The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby (1838), A Christmas Carol (1843), Great Expectations (1860)

Life story: Near death experiences. Morbid fantasies. When you think of Charles Dickens, those aren’t exactly the kinds of subjects that quickly come to mind; understandably, the Victorian-era literary giant’s name conjures up positively sentimental thoughts, resulting from his universally beloved, and whimsically poignant, tales, such as Oliver Twist, A Christmas Story, and A Tale Of Two Cities.

What’s not so routinely acknowledged, however, is Dickens’ late-game dabbling in the freaky-deeky. In June 1865, Dickens was one of the few passengers to walk away unscathed from a massive rail accident in Staplehurst, England, the violent and abrupt conclusion to a trip he’d taken with his mistress, Ellen Ternan. Though he survived, the brush with death was right up his alley; for years prior to that destructive event, Dickens was part of The Ghost Club, a paranormal-obsessed society that held séances and actively tried to understand life after death.

Recommended reading: Dan Simmons’ remarkable 2009 novel Drood, a fictionalized account of Dickens’ final living years that suggests the prolific author turned to the occult after the Staplehurst incident. If that were truth, not fiction, Dickens would be number one on this list, without question.

6. Edgar Allan Poe

Most celebrated stories: “The Fall Of The House Of Usher” (1839), “The Murders In The Rue Morgue” (1841), “The Masque Of Red Death” (1842), “The Tell-Take Heart” (1843), “The Raven” (1845)

Life story: After years of Hollywood conjecture and hearsay, a film based on the life of Edgar Allan Poe will finally premiere next year; only, it’ll be a fictional, Se7en-like serial killer flick, The Raven, in which Poe (John Cusack) investigates a string of murders inspired by his writings. A nifty concept, no doubt, but not the straightforward biography that seems like a no-brainer for any confident, research-loving screenwriter.

A dark and intelligent man, Poe loved the booze, repeatedly sipping the hard stuff throughout his wife Virginia Clemm’s bout with tuberculosis—oh, and he married he was 26 and she was merely 13. And she was his cousin. How’s that for “creepy”?

Yet that pales in comparison to the bizarreness of Poe’s death in October 1849. Found stumbling through the streets of Baltimore, wearing someone else’s clothes, Poe, at that point a man in shambles, was brought into a local hospital where he passed away four days later. As if the random attire and his incoherent ramblings weren’t sketchy enough, he, as the story goes, kept saying the name “Reynolds” before his final breaths. Poe couldn’t have written it any weirder himself.

5. Kurt Vonnegut

Most celebrated books: Cat’s Cradle (1963), Slaughterhouse-Five (1969), The Breakfast Of Champions (1973)

Life story: Kurt Vonnegut’s entire life was a productive haze of cigarette smoke (he was addicted to Pall Malls) and narrative genius, but to grasp the sheer craziness that no doubt bounced around his psyche, one needs to look no further than the year 1944, when the Indianapolis native was a 21-year-old.

First, in May, his mother killed herself by overdosing on sleeping pills…on Mother’s Day. Then, seven months later, Vonnegut, serving in World War II, was taken prisoner during the infamous Battle of the Bulge; initially, he was chosen as the prisoners’ leader due to his ability to speak German, but his hot head led to beatdowns and the relinquishing of his subordinate power. To ultimately escape from the prison camp, dude locked himself inside a slaughterhouse meat locker until he was rescued by Russian soldiers.

And when did he officially step foot back onto American soil? May 1945, a full calendar’s worth of days after his mother’s suicide. Worst. Year. Ever.

4. Graham Greene

Most celebrated books: Stamboul Train (1932), Brighton Rock (1938)

Life story: In all cases of literary greatness, there’s an inherent skill at work inside the scribes; from the moment they’re squeezed out of their mother’s privates, natural born writers harbor the knack for storytelling, whether it emerges on its own or needs a few classes and scholarly professors to pull it out. In most instances, though, life experience plays an equal, if not bigger, role, such as the chops of one Graham Greene.

Known for worldly thriller novels like Brighton Rock and international potboiler scripts such as the one used for the Orson Welles-starring classic The Third Man, Greene benefitted greatly from his curiousity about settings beyond the streets of his native Hertfordshire, England, surroundings. Original tales emerged from Greene’s extended stays in Haiti, Liberia, and Mexico, and he even spent some time working for the M16, Britain’s answer to the CIA. Imagine the stories that he didn’t put down on paper.

Aside from his globetrotting pursuits, Greene was also quick to smash women other than his wife, a streak of infidelity commonly attributed to a bipolar disorder. Extensive traveling, secretive intelligence-gathering, and numerous sexual partners—that’s right, Greene was like James Bond, only armed with a typewriter instead of a pistol.

3. Sylvia Plath

Most celebrated books: The Colossus And Other Poems (1960), The Bell Jar (1963)

Life story: To describe Sylvia Plath’s short life as “crazy” feels somewhat inappropriate, but, when pondered for a bit, the downbeat yet brilliant young author’s existence remains a fascinating study of unbeatable depression. From the early age of eight, Plath battled through a downward mental spiral triggered by the death of her father; though her burgeoning writing career was full of potential, she repeatedly tried to kill herself, including one attempt when she hid underneath her house and gorged upon sleeping pills.

She eventually married fellow poet Ted Hughes, but, in 1962, she learned about his bed-hopping ways and promptly showed him the exit. Which, of course, didn’t help uplift her spirits any; less than a year later, Plath, then merely 30-years-old, finally managed to achieve suicide by sticking her head in an oven to ingest the carbon monoxide fumes.

One thing’s for sure: Plath’s life is certainly more of a downer than William Shakespeare’s. And also more psychologically intriguing, an opinion that’s strengthened by one read-through of Plath’s semi-autobiographical novel The Bell Jar. It’s the kind of brutally personal narrative that could only come from the author’s own woes—no Shakespeare-like accusations of ghostwriting necessary.

2. Hunter S. Thompson

Most celebrated books: Hell’s Angels (1966), Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas (1971), The Rum Diary (1998)

Life story: It doesn’t take much effort to understand why Hunter S. Thompson is the first name that hits brains whenever the words “crazy” and “writer” are lumped together. After all, we’re talking about the guy singlehandedly responsible for the term “Gonzo journalism.”

A non-secretive expert in all kinds of drug use, the Kentucky transplant battled against more personal demons than an entire fraternity of exorcists; he was also an outspoken hater of politicians (namely Richard Nixon) whose love was reserved for guns, a predilection that fittingly brought him into the afterlife in February 2005 when he shot himself in the head, while locked up in seclusion, rather than grow old with his medical ailments. In his 67 years, though, Thompson lived harder than within some weeks than most people do for months on end.

1. Philip K. Dick

Most celebrated books: The Man In The High Castle (1961), Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep? (1966), A Scanner Darkly (1973), Minority Report (2002, short story collection)

Life story: You can’t write the kinds of ambitious and heady science fiction that Philip K. Dick produced and not be a little batty. But here’s the thing: Dick was a whole lot of batty.

Hailed as one of sci-fi’s most influential writers of all time (arguably the most influential), the late Chicago native is responsible for the novels and stories that spawned such genre masterworks as Blade Runner (based on Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep) and Minority Report, as well as slightly inferior, though still commendable, flicks like Total Recall (“We Can Remember It For You Wholesale”) and The Adjustment Bureau.

All of which are works of incredible imagination, something that Dick possessed so greatly that it even seeped into his daily life. He suffered intense hallucinations, some triggered by prescription drug use (he once thought his medicine delivery woman’s stylish pendant was an otherworld religious symbol). Other times, he saw laser beams flashing all around him and assumed the identity of “Thomas,” an alter-ego he claimed was persecuted by Romans centuries prior.

Here’s one theory why we’ve yet to see a Philip K. Dick biopic: There’s no screenwriter out there who’d do such a bonkers life-story justice quite like the man himself would, were he still alive today.