I use ‘illegitimate’ for the lack of a better word…its certainly better than the b-word.
Anyway I just wanted to compile a list…for personal reasons. I suppose if we count children of celebrities in the last ten years it would be too long! Lets limit it to people who became famous in their own right, or just maybe children of famous people who had a baby out of wedlock when it was still very scandalous (like Ingrid Bergman).
The ones I can think of are…
William the Conqueror
Oprah Winfrey
Fidel Castro
Sophia Loren
and as far as ‘illegitimate’ parents…
Thomas Jefferson (Sally Hemmings is a whole other issue I suppose), Grover Cleveland, and Warren Harding…of course some dispute those. I think every president has been accused of that at one time or another.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Also while adopted children are often assumed to be born out of wedlock, I don’t think they were usually described as ‘illegitimate’ as children: but of course have their own unique issues to deal with in many cases - if they learn of their background.
And to make the thread more germaine to the ‘Cafe Society’…fictional characters or literary works are ok too if significant to the topic.
IIRC, David Bowie was born out of wedlock, but his biological parents did marry not long afterwards.
Although probably not illegitimate, rock singer Eddie Vedder had came from particularly bizarre and Gothic beginnings. His parents divorced while he was a baby, and his mother quickly remarried an old high school sweetheart. The truth of young Eddie’s paternity was not revealed to him until his late teens, after his biological father died and his mother and stepfather divorced.
Eric Clapton - as far as I know he never knew his father.
For years his mother told him, she was his sister, and his grandmother was his mother. The truth came out eventually, but Clapton was a young man by then. How’s that for twisted.
I remember reading something about Clapton’s father, who was eventually revealed to have been living in Canada. He died before Clapton knew who he was though.
Desiderius Erasmus was an illegitimate child. Lady Mary Wroth, a semi-famous seventeenth century poet, had a notorious affair with her cousin which resulted in the birth of two illegitimate children; Aemilia Lanyer, another semi-famous woman poet, probably had an illegitimate son (she married before he was born, but her husband seems not to have been the father). Ben Jonson may have had several illegitimate kids, but there were so many Johnsons in 17th-century London that it’s hard to be sure.
The nice thing about being a grad student is you get to know a lot of gossip about dead people.
John James Audabon
Giovanni Boccacio
Giovanni Casanova
Paul Cezanne
Pope Clement VII
Macauley Culkin
Bobby Darin
Frederick Douglass
Alexander Dumas fils
George Foreman
Jean Genet
James Kier Hardie
Billie Holliday
Bo Jackson
Jesse Jackson
T.E. Lawrence
Jack London
Anna Magnani
Tobey Maguirre
Rod McKuen
Maria Montessori
Shaquille O’Neal
Evita Peron
Fransisco Pizzaro
August Strindberg
Richard Wagner
Booker T Washington
Reggie White
I know I’ve heard the story about Clapton and his Sister/Mom is true about Bobby Darin. Could that be incorrect? Also, I’ve met Oprah’s Dad. His name is Winfrey and they know each other!
You’re half right- that is his family history, but he didn’t kill himself. Complications during heart surgury. Certainly, though, the shock of the discovery can aggrevate a heart condition.
Jack Nicholson also was grown before he discovered that his ‘sister’ Lorraine was his mother.
