Franz Kafka
1883 – 1924 · 41 years · Prague · Europe
German-language writer from Prague, author of The Metamorphosis, The Trial and The Castle, mostly published posthumously.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 20th century
Portrait: Atelier Jacobi: Sigismund Jacobi (1860–1935) · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Marie Curie — physicist and chemist, twice Nobel laureate, 16 years older
- Winston Churchill — Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, 9 years older
- Albert Einstein — physicist, creator of relativity, 4 years older
- Pablo Picasso — painter and sculptor, 2 years older
- Adolf Hitler — dictator of Nazi Germany, 6 years younger
- Queen Victoria — Queen of the United Kingdom, 64 years older
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Vladimir Lenin — revolutionary, head of the Soviet government, 13 years older
- Joseph Stalin — leader of the Soviet Union, 5 years older
- Leo Tolstoy — novelist, 55 years older
- Dmitri Mendeleev — chemist, creator of the periodic table, 49 years older
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky — composer, 43 years older
- Ivan Pavlov — physiologist, Nobel laureate, 34 years older
Middle East
- Mustafa Kemal Atatürk — founder and first President of Turkey, 2 years older
- Mehmed VI — last Ottoman sultan, 22 years older
- Abdul Hamid II — the 'Red Sultan' who dissolved the first parliament, 41 years older
- Golda Meir — Prime Minister of Israel, 15 years younger
- Mehmed V Reşad — sultan under whom the empire entered World War I, 39 years older
- Umm Kulthum — singer, 15 years younger
Africa
- Haile Selassie — Emperor of Ethiopia, 9 years younger
- Menelik II — Emperor of Ethiopia, 39 years older
- Albert Schweitzer — physician and philosopher, Nobel laureate, 8 years older
- Yaa Asantewaa — Queen Mother of Ejisu, war leader, 43 years older
- Taytu Betul — Empress of Ethiopia, 32 years older
- Léopold Sédar Senghor — poet, first president of Senegal, 23 years younger
Asia
- Mahatma Gandhi — leader of the Indian independence movement, 14 years older
- Mao Zedong — Chairman of the CCP, founder of the PRC, 10 years younger
- Rabindranath Tagore — poet and writer, Nobel laureate, 22 years older
- Sun Yat-sen — revolutionary, founding father of the ROC, 17 years older
- Emperor Taishō — ailing emperor of the 'Taishō democracy' era, 4 years older
- Jawaharlal Nehru — first Prime Minister of India, 6 years younger
Americas
- Thomas Edison — inventor and businessman, 36 years older
- Nikola Tesla — inventor and electrical engineer, 27 years older
- Charlie Chaplin — comic actor and filmmaker, 6 years younger
- Woodrow Wilson — 28th US president, World War I and the League of Nations, 27 years older
- Henry Ford — industrialist, founder of Ford Motor Company, 20 years older
- Franklin D. Roosevelt — 32nd President of the United States, 1 year older
Oceania
- Ernest Rutherford — physicist who discovered the atomic nucleus, 12 years older
- Howard Florey — pharmacologist who made penicillin a drug, 15 years younger
- Kate Sheppard — suffragist, 36 years older
- Nellie Melba — operatic soprano, 22 years older
- Douglas Mawson — geologist and Antarctic explorer, 1 year older
- Katherine Mansfield — short-story writer, 5 years younger
The world in their lifetime
- 1883 Eruption of Krakatoa — aged 0, Asia
- 1884–1885 Berlin Conference — aged 1, Europe
- 1885 Founding of the Indian National Congress — aged 2, Asia
- 1885 The Mahdists take Khartoum — aged 2, Africa
- 1885–1908 The Congo Free State — aged 2, Africa
- 1886 Benz's first automobile — aged 3, Europe
- 1886 The Witwatersrand Gold Rush — aged 3, Africa
- 1888 Golden Law abolishes slavery in Brazil — aged 5, Americas
- 1889 Eiffel Tower — aged 6, Europe
- 1889 Van Gogh's The Starry Night — aged 6, Europe
- 1891 Discovery of Java Man — aged 8, Asia
- 1893 New Zealand women win the vote — aged 10, Oceania
- 1893 Overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom — aged 10, Oceania
- 1894–1895 First Sino-Japanese War — aged 11, Asia
- 1894 Yersin identifies the plague bacterium — aged 11, Asia
- 1895 Discovery of X-rays — aged 12, Europe
- 1895 Popov's radio receiver — aged 12, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1896–1898 Philippine Revolution — aged 13, Asia
- 1897 The British sack Benin City — aged 14, Africa
- 1901 First Nobel Prizes — aged 18, Europe
- 1903 Wright brothers' first flight — aged 20, Americas
- 1904–1908 The Herero and Nama genocide — aged 21, Africa
- 1905 Einstein's miracle year and relativity — aged 22, Europe
- 1905–1907 Russian Revolution of 1905 — aged 22, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1905–1911 Persian Constitutional Revolution — aged 22, Middle East
- 1906 San Francisco earthquake — aged 23, Americas
- 1908 Oil struck at Masjed Soleyman — aged 25, Middle East
- 1908 Tunguska event — aged 25, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1908 Young Turk Revolution — aged 25, Middle East
- 1910–1920 Mexican Revolution — aged 27, Americas
- 1911–1912 Xinhai Revolution — aged 28, Asia
- 1911 Amundsen reaches the South Pole — aged 28, Oceania
- 1914–1918 World War I — aged 31, Whole world
- 1914 Opening of the Panama Canal — aged 31, Americas
- 1915 Armenian genocide — aged 32, Middle East
- 1916 Sykes–Picot Agreement — aged 33, Middle East
- 1917 October Revolution — aged 34, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1917–1922 Russian Civil War — aged 34, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1918–1920 Spanish flu pandemic — aged 35, Whole world
- 1919 Treaty of Versailles — aged 36, Europe