I would find it an interesting opening, whether I was one side of the interview table or the other, into a discussion about whose papers/book had been worth reading. This list could be a starting point but, even as a professional developer (I am considering as a SQL Server site some DBAs have less emphasis on this skill) I only knew two of the top of my head (Knuth and Thompson). I recognised others in the same way some describes someone from school and it "rings a bell" but only just.

I don't think anyone here are questioning the contributions by the people on this list (and to refer to Knuth as "not relevant" is, in my not some humble opinion, just plain wrong - not wanting to pick a fight though Gift).

In conclusion, excluding someone on the basis that they cannot remember or, perhaps, never knew of someone else's (valuable) contribution to the industry is ridiculous.

I do think it is valid to use some of the these peoples works as suggested reading - even with experienced colleagues. An example of this for me was when I recommended to an extremely talented TA that he read the chapter on Design by Contract in Bertrand Meyer's Object Oriented Software Construction book - which incidentally, Mark, you still have!!!