On February 1812, the English writer and social critic known as one of the greatest novelists of the Victorian period, Charles John Huffam Dickens was born.
On January 22, 1788, George Gordon Noel Byron, 6. Baron Byron of Rochdale, commonly known simply as Lord Byron, English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement was born.
On December 9, 1602, English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant John Milton, was born. He is best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost, the Biblical story of the Fall of Man: the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden.
Only a few 19th century literary works have become an icon in today's popular culture. Among them are the detective story and its most prominent protagonist Sherlock Holmes as well as some of the gothic horror novels, primarely Bram Stoker's Dracula and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.