10,807 articles
Appointment in Samarra
Appointment in Samarra is John O'Hara's 1934 debut novel about Julian English, a Cadillac dealer in fictional Gibbsville, Pennsylvania, whose three-day social collapse ends in suicide; title from Maugham's Sheppey.
Appointment with Death
Appointment with Death is Agatha Christie's 1938 Hercule Poirot novel set at Petra, where the tyrannical Mrs Boynton is found dead; adapted by Christie as a 1945 play with a changed killer, and for the 1988 Ustinov film, Suchet TV, and Japanese TV.
April O'Neil
April O'Neil, first appearing in TMNT #2 (October 1984) by Eastman and Laird, is the Turtles' human ally: a Baxter Stockman programmer in Mirage comics, a Channel 6 reporter in the 1987 cartoon, played by Judith Hoag, Paige Turco, and Megan Fox, and voiced by Ayo Edebiri in Mutant Mayhem.
Apt Pupil
Apt Pupil is a 1982 Stephen King novella from Different Seasons ('Summer of Corruption') in which 13-year-old Todd Bowden blackmails Nazi war criminal Kurt Dussander into recounting the Holocaust, with fatal results for both; adapted by Bryan Singer in 1998.
Aquis Submersus
Aquis Submersus, Latin for "in water sunk", is an 1876 novella by Theodor Storm about the tragic love between the painter Johannes and the noblewoman Katharina in postwar Germany.
Arabian Nights and Days
Arabian Nights and Days (Layālī alf laylah) is a 1979 novel by Naguib Mahfouz that reworks The Thousand and One Nights into an allegory of power and corruption.
Arabic detective fiction
Arabic detective fiction (الرواية البوليسية العربية) is crime fiction written in Arabic, begun through translations in the late 19th century and developed as original Arabic literature from the 1960s.
Arabic essay
The Arabic essay (المقالة, maqāla) is a modern prose genre in Arabic literature presenting an organized argument from the writer's viewpoint; it emerged with Arabic journalism in Egypt.
Arabic novel
The Arabic novel (الرواية العربية) is the modern novel written in Arabic, emerging as an artistic genre around 1914 with Muhammad Husayn Haykal's Zaynab and maturing under Naguib Mahfouz.
Arabic poetry (الشعر العربي)
Arabic poetry (الشعر العربي), measured rhymed verse in Arabic from the pre-Islamic era onward: al-Khalil's sixteen metres, the monorhyme qasida, the Mu'allaqat, Abbasid and Andalusian forms, and the Nahda revival.
Arabic popular poetry
Arabic popular poetry (الشعر الشعبي), also called shiʿr al-ʿāmmiyya, is poetry composed in spoken Arabic dialects rather than Classical Arabic, transmitted by performance and song.
Arabic short story
The Arabic short story (القصة القصيرة) is a prose-fiction genre of modern Arabic literature defined by brevity, thematic unity, and a concentrated climax, with roots in the nineteenth century.
Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age
Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, الفكر العربي في عصر النهضة in Arabic, is Albert Hourani's 1962 intellectual history of Arab political thought from 1798 to 1939.
Aragorn
Aragorn II (Strider, Elessar) is the Dúnedain chieftain and heir of Isildur in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings who becomes King of the Reunited Kingdom; distinct from Aragorn I, an earlier chieftain of the same name.
Aralu Maralu
Aralu Maralu (ಅರಳು ಮರಳು) is a 1957 Kannada-language anthology of 273 lyric poems by D. R. Bendre, published in Dharwad and honored with the 1958 Sahitya Akademi Award for Kannada poetry.
Aramis
Aramis (René d'Herblay) is a fictional musketeer in Alexandre Dumas's d'Artagnan Romances (1844–1850), based on the real Musketeer Henri d'Aramitz; later Bishop of Vannes and Jesuit general in the Man in the Iron Mask plot.
Árbol adentro
Árbol adentro is the final book of poems by the Mexican writer and Nobel laureate Octavio Paz, published by Seix Barral in Barcelona in 1987.
Archaic Torso of Apollo
"Archaic Torso of Apollo" (Archaïscher Torso Apollos) is a 1908 sonnet by Rainer Maria Rilke, opening part two of Neue Gedichte and dedicated to Rodin. It describes a headless Louvre marble torso that seems to see the viewer, ending "You must change your life."
Archie (comic book)
Archie (comic book): American teen-humor comic debuting in Pep Comics #22 (December 1941), created by Bob Montana with writer Vic Bloom at MLJ; publisher renamed Archie Comics; spans Riverdale TV, horror imprints, and the 2026 Oni Press partnership.
Archie Andrews
Archie Andrews, fictional American teenager of Archie Comics, debuted in Pep Comics #22 (1941). Known for Riverdale setting, red hair, and the Betty-Veronica love triangle; adapted as Riverdale and a planned film.
Archive of Our Own
Archive of Our Own (AO3), the nonprofit fanwork archive of the Organization for Transformative Works; volunteer-run, open-source, donation-funded; launched 2008 in beta, exited beta April 2026, with a maximum-inclusiveness content policy and millions of works.
Ardhakathanak
Ardhakathanak (अर्धकथानक, "Half a Tale") is an autobiographical poem completed in 1641 by Banārasīdās, a Jain merchant, generally regarded as the first autobiography in Hindi.
Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.
Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. is Judy Blume's 1970 Bradbury Press middle-grade novel about Margaret Simon, a New York girl in Farbrook, New Jersey, whose interfaith family, secret Four PTS's club, and private talks with God made it a classic and a frequent censorship target.
Argentine fantastic literature
Argentine fantastic literature (literatura fantástica argentina) is Argentine fiction in which supernatural or impossible events disrupt ordinary reality, conventionally dated to the 1940s around Borges.
Argonautica (Ἀργοναυτικά)
Argonautica (Ἀργοναυτικά), also The Voyage of Argo: Greek epic in four books, 5,835 hexameters, by Apollonius Rhodius, 3rd-century BC Alexandria, retelling Jason and Medea's quest for the golden fleece.
Argos (Ἄργος) (dog)
Argos (Ἄργος) is Odysseus's faithful dog in Homer's Odyssey, Book 17, the only being to recognize the disguised hero on his return to Ithaca before dying 'in the twentieth year'; his name means swift-footed, and the scene founded the archetype of the loyal dog.
Aria Montgomery
Aria Montgomery is a fictional character in Pretty Little Liars, played by Lucy Hale, 2010-2017; the artsy Liar whose teacher romance with Ezra Fitz (#Ezria) drew scholarly critique.
Aria the Scarlet Ammo (緋弾のアリア)
Aria the Scarlet Ammo (緋弾のアリア, Hidan no Aria) is a 2008 MF Bunko J light novel series by Akamatsu Chuugaku about armed detectives at Tokyo Butei High School, with a 2011 J.C.Staff anime, the 2015 spinoff AA, over 9 million copies sold, and a 2026 15th-anniversary short anime.
Ariel (The Tempest)
Ariel is the airy spirit in Shakespeare's The Tempest, servant to Prospero, freed from Sycorax's pine, granted liberty in Act 5; distinct from Caliban and from the ESA Ariel exoplanet mission.
Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe
Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, Benjamin Alire Sáenz's 2012 YA novel, follows Mexican American teens Ari Mendoza and Dante in 1987 El Paso; Printz Honor, Stonewall, Pura Belpré, and Lambda winner, with a 2021 sequel and 2023 film.