Paul Eltzbacher was a German law professor and author. Eltzbacher was born in Cologne.

Paul Gerhardt was a German theologian, Lutheran minister and hymnodist.

Paul Johann Ludwig von Heyse was a distinguished German writer and translator. A member of two important literary societies, the Tunnel über der Spree in Berlin and Die Krokodile in Munich, he wrote novels, poetry, 177 short stories, and about sixty dramas. The sum of Heyse's many and varied productions made him a dominant figure among German men of letters. He was awarded the 1910 Nobel Prize in Literature "as a tribute to the consummate artistry, permeated with idealism, which he has demonstrated during his long productive career as a lyric poet, dramatist, novelist and writer of world-renowned short stories." Wirsen, one of the Nobel judges, said that "Germany has not had a greater literary genius since Goethe." Heyse is the fifth oldest laureate in literature, after Alice Munro, Jaroslav Seifert, Theodor Mommsen and Doris Lessing.

Paul Hutchens was an American author. In addition to writing The Sugar Creek Gang, a series of 36 Christian-themed juvenile fiction books about the adventures of a group of young boys, he also wrote numerous adult fiction books, many with a romance theme. The author was a graduate of Moody Bible Institute. The Sugar Creek Gang books have been popular in evangelical Christian homes and have remained in print through multiple format and cover art changes. The books have also been dramatized on the radio, and in 2004, the stories were made into a series of movies, directed by Joy Chapman and Owen Smith. His books were originally published by Wm. B. Eerdmans, and later reprinted by other publishers such as Van Kampen Press and Moody Press.

Paul Alexandre René Janet was a French philosopher and writer.

Paul Klapper was a Romanian-born Jewish-American educator from New York.

Paul Lafargue was a Cuban-born French revolutionary Marxist socialist, political writer, economist, journalist, literary critic, and activist; he was Karl Marx's son-in-law, having married his second daughter, Laura. His best known work is The Right to Be Lazy. Born in Cuba to French and Saint Dominican Creole parents, Lafargue spent most of his life in France, with periods in England and Spain. At the age of 69, he and 66-year-old Laura died together by a suicide pact.

Paul Laurence Dunbar was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Born in Dayton, Ohio, to parents who had been enslaved in Kentucky before the American Civil War, Dunbar began writing stories and verse when he was a child. He published his first poems at the age of 16 in a Dayton newspaper, and served as president of his high school's literary society.

Paul Leicester Ford was an American novelist and biographer, born in Brooklyn, the son of Gordon Lester Ford and Emily Fowler Ford.

Paul Leland Haworth (1876–1936) was an American author, educator, explorer and politician, born at West Newton, Indiana.