List of Famous people who died at 81

William Leonard Langer was the chairman of the history department at Harvard University. He was on leave during World War II as head of the Research and Analysis Branch of the Office of Strategic Services. He was a specialist on the diplomacy of the periods 1870–1900 and 1937–1941. He edited many books, including a series on European history, a large-scale reference book, and a university textbook.

William Clark Styron Jr. was an American novelist and essayist who won major literary awards for his work.

Denys Eyre Lankester Haynes was an English classical scholar, archaeologist, and museum curator, who specialised in the full range of classical archaeology. He was Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities at the British Museum between 1956 and 1976. He was additionally Geddes–Harrower Professor of Greek Art and Archaeology at the University of Aberdeen from 1972 to 1973, and, in retirement, visitor to the Ashmolean Museum from 1979 to 1987. He had served in military intelligence during the Second World War.

Robert Coldwell Wood was an American political scientist, academic and government administrator, and professor of political science at MIT. From 1965 to 1969, Wood served as the Under Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development under President Lyndon B. Johnson, and for two weeks as the Secretary at the end of the Johnson Administration.

Edoardo Amaldi was an Italian physicist. Amaldi coined the term “neutrino” in conversations with Enrico Fermi distinguishing it from the heavier “neutron”.

Margarete Emma Dorothea "Grete" Mosheim was a German film, theatre, and television actress of Jewish ancestry.

Nakamura Tomijūrō V was a Japanese Kabuki actor and Living National Treasures of Japan. Tomijūrō work in Kabuki included the role of Musashibō Benkei, a Japanese warrior monk, in the drama, Kanjinchō. Outside Japan, Tomijūrō toured performed in the United States and Europe.

Dalibor Brozović was a Croatian linguist, Slavist, dialectologist and politician. He studied the history of standard languages in the Slavic region, especially Croatian. He was an active Esperantist since 1946, and wrote Esperanto poetry as well as translated works into the language.

Mieczysław Franciszek Rakowski was a Polish communist politician, historian and journalist who was Prime Minister of Poland from 1988 to 1989. He served as the seventh and final First Secretary of the Polish United Workers' Party from 1989 to 1990.