William Makepeace Thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray (July 18, 1811 - December 24, 1863) was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a satire of middle class English society.

He was born in Calcutta, India, where his father worked for the British East India Company, but his family returned to England in 1817.

Thackeray was prolific and wrote under a number of amusing pseudonyms: "Charles James Yellowplush, a footman"; "Michael Angelo Titmarsh"; and "George Savage Fitz-Boodle". In addition, he worked as a widely travelled journalist, who met many celebrities of his time, for example Goethe. Charlotte Brontë was one of his fans and dedicated the second edition of Jane Eyre to him.

Novels

• A Shabby Genteel Story (1840)
• The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq (1844), filmed as Barry Lyndon by Stanley Kubrick
• The Book of Snobs (1846), which popularized that term
• On Being Found Out
• Vanity Fair (1848), featuring the terrifying Becky Sharp
• The Wolves and the Lamb
• The History of Henry Esmond
• Pendennis
• The Virginians
• The Newcomes (1855)

• Project Gutenberg e-texts of some of William Makepeace Thackeray's works