← Fame through time1900-1999
The 20th century
Whose names filled the books of the 20th century - anyone at all, however long dead - counted as mentions per million words printed, so a period that simply published more does not inflate anyone.
Talked about then
Whose names appeared most in English books during the 20th century, whenever they lived.
- 1
Jesus30 - 2
Aristotle7.1 - 3
Plato7.1 - 4
Homer7.1 - 5
Augustus4.9 - 6
Johns Hopkins4.4 - 7
Cicero4.0 - 8
George Washington3.8 - 9
Socrates3.4 - 10
Virgil3.3 - 11
Abraham Lincoln2.0 - 12
Euclid1.9 - 13
Thomas Jefferson1.6 - 14
Ovid1.6 - 15
Mark Twain1.5 - 16
Plutarch1.5 - 17
Cleopatra1.4 - 18
Theodore Roosevelt1.4 - 19
Woodrow Wilson1.4 - 20
William Henry1.3 - 21
Benjamin Franklin1.3 - 22
Herodotus1.3 - 23
Charlemagne1.3 - 24
Rembrandt1.3 - 25
Euripides1.2
Lived then
The most notable people whose working lives fell in the 20th century, ranked where coverage and readership agree.
- 1
Charlie Chaplin11 decades - 2
Audrey Hepburn7 decades - 3
Elizabeth Taylor9 decades - 4
Sean Connery6 decades - 5
Rowan Atkinson3 decades - 6
Michael Caine6 decades - 7
Gary Oldman3 decades - 8
Christopher Lee6 decades - 9
Helen Mirren4 decades - 10
Julie Andrews7 decades - 11
David Attenborough5 decades - 12
Maggie Smith6 decades - 13
Alan Rickman3 decades - 14
Emma Thompson3 decades - 15
Judi Dench5 decades - 16
Ian McKellen4 decades - 17
Richard Burtonnot measured- - 18
Ralph Fiennes3 decades - 19
Vivien Leigh8 decades - 20
Roger Moore7 decades - 21
Hugh Grant3 decades - 22
Ben Kingsley4 decades - 23
Peter O'Toole6 decades - 24
Jeremy Irons4 decades - 25
Colin Firth2 decades - 26
Hugh Laurie1 decades - 27
Laurence Olivier9 decades - 28
Malcolm McDowell5 decades - 29
Richard Attenborough7 decades - 30
Ian McShane0 decades - 31
Patrick Stewart4 decades - 32
Charlotte Rampling3 decades - 33
Andy Serkis0 decades - 34
Tim Curry4 decades - 35
Angela Lansbury6 decades - 36
Vanessa Redgrave6 decades - 37
Kenneth Branagh4 decades - 38
Timothy Dalton3 decades - 39
Tilda Swinton2 decades - 40
Sean Bean0 decades - 41
Alec Guinness8 decades - 42
Peter Ustinov8 decades - 43
Jeremy Clarkson1 decades - 44
Hugo Weaving0 decades - 45
Bob Hoskins4 decades - 46
Julie Christie6 decades - 47
Michael Gambon4 decades - 48
John Hurt6 decades - 49
Jane Birkin0 decades - 50
Robbie Coltrane1 decades - 51
Natasha Richardson2 decades - 52
Diana Rigg5 decades - 53
David Niven9 decades - 54
Tim Roth2 decades - 55
Jane Seymournot measured- - 56
Jacqueline Bisset4 decades - 57
Billy Connolly3 decades - 58
Donald Pleasence6 decades - 59
Michael Palin4 decades - 60
Joan Fontaine8 decades - 61
Albert Finney6 decades - 62
Richard Griffiths4 decades - 63
Joan Collins6 decades - 64
Alfred Molina2 decades - 65
Clive Owen1 decades - 66
Charles Dance1 decades - 67
Mark Strong0 decades - 68
Deborah Kerr8 decades - 69
Glenda Jackson6 decades - 70
Jason Isaacs0 decades - 71
Ian Holm4 decades - 72
Imelda Staunton0 decades - 73
Simon Cowell2 decades - 74
Jean Simmons7 decades - 75
Jim Broadbent1 decades - 76
Rupert Everett2 decades - 77
Bill Nighy0 decades - 78
James Masonnot measured- - 79
Jessica Tandy8 decades - 80
David Thewlis0 decades - 81
Stan Laurel6 decades - 82
Charles Laughton9 decades - 83
Tom Wilkinson1 decades - 84
Timothy Spall0 decades - 85
John Rhys-Davies0 decades - 86
Julie Walters3 decades - 87
David Suchet2 decades - 88
Terence Stampnot measured- - 89
Boris Karloff9 decades - 90
Brian Coxnot measured- - 91
Peter Cushing5 decades - 92
Terry Jones4 decades - 93
Jonathan Prycenot measured- - 94
Miranda Richardson0 decades - 95
Rex Harrison8 decades - 96
Graham Chapman4 decades - 97
Peter Capaldinot measured- - 98
Robert Carlylenot measured- - 99
Glynis Johns5 decades - 100
Joan Plowrightnot measured-
How to read these rankings
- Attention, not reputation. A place on these lists reflects the attention a person still draws in the public record. It is not a judgement on the life.
- Fame in print. The curves show how often a name appeared in the books of each decade from 1800 to 2019, drawn from the Google Books Ngram corpus.
- Gaps are left as gaps. Where the record is too thin to be fair, we would rather show nothing than guess.