Bram Stoker – despite the existence of a wonderfully bad movie version of Lair of the White Worm, starring Hugh Grant, and other books that are still in print, it seems pretty clear that Stoker is really only remembered for Dracula.
Similarly, although Mary Wollestonecraft Shelley did write other books, including other speculative fiction, you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who remembers anything but Frankenstein
I know that he wrote The Yellow Room, too, but I couldn’t even begin to tell his other works. Gaston Leroux is pretty much known only for The Phantom of the Opera.
You can buy his other works in paperback from Penguin, but most people only now Niccolo Machiavelli for The Prince
Similarly, Chaucer wrote other things besides The Canterbury Tales.
He composed a large body of sacred and secular music, and his contributions to the development of the chorale prelude and fugue have earned him a place among the most important composers of the middle Baroque era
…
Pachelbel’s music enjoyed enormous popularity during his lifetime; he had many pupils and his music became a model for the composers of south and central Germany. Today, Pachelbel is best known for the Canon in D
Heh, no. I was doing an Alec Guinness impression. As in, Alec “look people, I’ve done a lot more than Star Wars so please stop asking me about it” Guinness.
Of course, I still hope that you’re discrete in pointing out my failings.
Isn’t Roald Dahl known for lots of other things? Granted, not so much his adult fiction, which is great, but he’s definitely known for lots of children’s books like Mathilda, James and the Giant Peach, and the Witches.
Golden Earring and Status Quo have been among the most popular hard rock bands in Europe for decades, but in the USA, they’re regarded as “one-hit wonders,” and remembered solely for “Radar Love” and “Pictures of Matchstick Men,” respectively.
LITERATURE
Among authors… William Golding had a long, productive career, but is known almost exclusively for Lord of the Flies.
And Erskine Caldwell is known almost exclusively for Tobacco Road.
Jazz buffs, of course, know that Dave Brubeck has been a remarkably prolific composer and musician over his astonishingly long career, but I’d wager "Take Five"is the only Brubeck piece 99% of the population could name.
I think if you asked a lot of people they’d know only “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.” If they know “The Weight,” they might recognize the tune but have no idea what the name of the song is or who did it.
The OP saved me the effort of writing a post as I’ve been considering doing since re-configuring Pandora – to the effect that the Gin Blossoms sure did produce a sizable volume of albums that no one’s really heard of (or probably needed to) after Hey Jealousy and Found Out About you got big airplay off of their second (?) album. But that might need an asterisk attached to it, because their return to relative obscurity came after their main songwriter on the hit songs killed himself, so technically you’re not talking about the same “artist” you could argue.
S. Morgenstern wrote a ridiculous number of scholarly works while at Columbia University, but is only really remembered for his satirical allegory of European monarchies.
[sub]You forgot The Likes of Us, Jesus Christ Superstar, Jeeves, By Jeeves, Tell Me On A Sunday, Variations, Song & Dance, Requiem, Cricket, Aspects of Love, Sunset Boulevard, Whistle Down the Wind, The Beautiful Game, The Woman in White and Love Never Dies.[/sub]
