James Mercer Langston Hughes was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. One of the earliest innovators of the literary art form called jazz poetry, Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. He famously wrote about the period that "the Negro was in vogue", which was later paraphrased as "when Harlem was in vogue."

Laozi, also romanized as Lao Tzu and various other ways, was a semi-legendary ancient Chinese Taoist philosopher, credited with writing the Tao Te Ching. Laozi is a Chinese honorific, generally translated as "the Old Master". Although modern scholarship generally regards him as a fictional person, traditional accounts say he was born as Li Er in the state of Chu in the 6th century BC during China's Spring and Autumn Period, served as the royal archivist for the Zhou court at Wangcheng, met and impressed Confucius on one occasion, and composed the Tao Te Ching in a single session before retiring into the western wilderness.

Lascelles Abercrombie, was a British poet and literary critic, one of the "Dymock poets". After the First World War he worked as a professor of English literature in a number of English universities, writing principally on the theory of literature.

Laura Dayton Fessenden was an American author of romances and other books between 1878 and 1923. She was a contributor to magazines and a writer of songs. She was the founder of the Highland Park Woman's Club. Before marriage, she wrote as Laura C. S. Dayton.

Laura Jean Libbey was an American writer.

Laura Lee Hope is a pseudonym used by the Stratemeyer Syndicate for the Bobbsey Twins and several other series of children's novels. Actual writers taking up the pen of Laura Lee Hope include Edward Stratemeyer, Howard and Lilian Garis, Elizabeth Ward, Harriet (Stratemeyer) Adams, Andrew E. Svenson, June M. Dunn, Grace Grote and Nancy Axelrad.

Laura Katharina Marholm (1854–1928) was a Baltic-German writer of literary criticism, biographies about women, and novels. The main characters in her novels were women who felt fulfilled in marriage. Marholm was a New Woman feminist that wrote about feminist issues. Due to some of her beliefs, some other feminists did not consider Marholm to be among them. She believed that literature could be used to help gender relations. Some of Marholm's works were part of "feminist literary criticism" known as gynocriticism, 70 years before the term was coined, with much of that work being focused on Nordic women authors.

Robert Laurence Binyon, CH was an English poet, dramatist and art scholar. Born in Lancaster, England, his parents were Frederick Binyon, a clergyman, and Mary Dockray. He studied at St Paul's School, London and at Trinity College, Oxford, where he won the Newdigate Prize for poetry in 1891. He worked for the British Museum from 1893 until his retirement in 1933. In 1904 he married the historian Cicely Margaret Powell, with whom he had three daughters, including the artist Nicolete Gray.

Sir George Laurence Gomme, FSA was a public servant and antiquarian. Two of his main interests were folkore and old buildings. He helped found both the Victoria County History and the Folklore Society, and persuaded the London County Council to administer the blue plaque commemorative scheme.

Laurence Housman was an English playwright, writer and illustrator whose career stretched from the 1890s to the 1950s. He studied art in London. He was a younger brother of the poet A. E. Housman and his sister was writer/illustrator Clemence Housman.