Max Frisch
"I'm Not Stiller" started with a print-run that provided for sales of 3,000 in its first year, but thanks to strong and growing reader demand it later became the first book published by Suhrkamp to top one million copies. The next novel, "Homo Faber", was another best seller, with four million copies of the German language version produced by 1998. "The Fire Raisers" and "Andorra" are the most successful German language plays of all time, with respectively 250 and 230 productions up till 1996, according to an estimate made by the literary critic Volker Hage. The two plays, along with "Homo Faber" became curriculum favourites with schools in the German-speaking middle European countries. Apart from a few early works, most of Frisch's books and plays have been translated into around ten languages, while the most translated of all, "Homo Faber", has been translated into twenty-five languages.
Robert Montgomery Bird
In a small notebook labeled "Useful Works- if well prepared," Bird set his goal to write nine biographies, thirty volumes of miscellaneous studies, three volumes of tales, some select novels of Boccaccio, the Arabian nights, eleven tragedies, twelve comedies, thirty three melodramas, and twenty-five novels. He did not approach his career casually. When he learned of Forrest's contest, he entered. And, in 1828, Bird's play "Pelopidas" won a $1000 prize offered by the actor Edwin Forrest, but was never produced because Forrest found the play unsuitable to highlight his strengths as a performer. With Forrest's guidance, Bird wrote another play, "The Gladiator", which was produced in 1831. It was perfect to showcase Forrest's muscular acting style. It also went really well in the theatre. It was the first play to be performed so often in the author's lifetime. This launched Bird as a playwright. Bird and Forrest quickly became friends. Bird wrote several other plays for Forrest, some of them being "Oralloossa, Son of the Incas" and "The Broker of Bogota." Forrest had promised to pay Bird more for these plays if they proved successful. Though they were, Forrest refused to give Bird additional money. He did not want to share in his success (which must have been at least a hundred thousand dollars on "Gladiator" alone).Bird's frustration with Forrest pushed him into writing novels. These include "Calavar" (1834), "The Infidel" (1835), "The Hawks of Hawk-Hollow" (1835), "Sheppard Lee" (1836), "Nick of the Woods" (1837) (his most successful novel), and "The Adventures of Robin Day" (1839). "Calavar" and "The Infidel" are notable for their graphic and accurate details and descriptions of Mexican history. His final novel was "A Belated Revenge", and it was finished by his son, Frederick M. Bird (1889).