Literary birthdays for the week of January 3, 2021: J.R.R. Tolkien (January 3, 1892), Umberto Eco (January 5, 1932), Kahlil Gibran (January 6, 1883), E. L. Doctorow (January 6, 1931), Elizabeth Strout (January 6, 1956), Zora Neale Hurston (January 7, 1891), William Peter Blatty (January 7, 1928), Alexandra Ripley (January 8, 1934), Simone de Beauvoir (January 9, 1908), and Judith Krantz (January 9, 1927).