1981 in literature
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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1981.
Events
- May 31 – Burning of Jaffna library: An organized mob of police and government-sponsored paramilitias began burning the public library in Jaffna, Sri Lanka, destroying over 97,000 volumes in one of the most violent examples of ethnic book burning in the modern era.
- John Gardner successfully revives the James Bond novel series originated by Ian Fleming with Licence Renewed (not counting a faux biography of Bond and a pair of film novelizations, the first original Bond novel since 1968's Colonel Sun). The revived Bond book series will run uninterrupted until 2002.
- Colin MacCabe is denied tenure at the University of Cambridge apparently in consequence of his position at the centre of a much publicised dispute within the Faculty of English concerning the teaching of structuralism.[1]
- PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction given for the first time.
New books
Fiction
- Kingsley Amis – The Golden Age of Science Fiction
- Martin Amis – Other People
- V. C. Andrews – If There Be Thorns
- Louis Auchincloss – The Cat and the King
- René Barjavel – Une rose au paradis
- Samuel Beckett – Ill Seen Ill Said
- Thomas Berger – Reinhart's Women
- Pierre Berton – Flames Across the Border
- Simon Bond – 101 Uses for a Dead Cat
- William Boyd – A Good Man in Africa
- Pascal Bruckner – Evil Angels
- William S. Burroughs – Cities of the Red Night
- Robert Olen Butler – The Alleys of Eden
- Peter Carey – Bliss
- Raymond Carver – What We Talk About When We Talk About Love
- David Case – The Third Grave
- James Clavell – Noble House
- Bernard Cornwell
- L. Sprague de Camp – The Hand of Zei
- L. Sprague de Camp & Catherine Crook de Camp – Footprints on Sand
- Régine Deforges – La Bicyclette bleue (The Blue Bicycle)
- Samuel R. Delany – Distant Star
- Michel Déon – Where Are You Dying Tonight?
- Cynthia Freeman – No Time for Tears
- Gabriel García Márquez – Chronicle of a Death Foretold (Crónica de una muerte anunciada)
- John Gardner – Licence Renewed
- Charles L. Grant – Tales from the Nightside
- Alasdair Gray – Lanark
- Jan Guillou – Ondskan
- Thomas Harris – Red Dragon
- Frank Herbert – God Emperor of Dune
- Douglas Hill – Planet of the Warlord
- Robert E. Howard and L. Sprague de Camp – The Flame Knife
- John Irving – The Hotel New Hampshire
- Alan Judd – A Breed of Heroes
- Ismail Kadare – The File on H (Dosja J)
- Stephen King – Cujo
- Joe R. Lansdale – Act of Love
- Stanisław Lem – Golem XIV
- Colleen McCullough – An Indecent Obsession
- Elliot S! Maggin – Miracle Monday
- Naguib Mahfouz – Arabian Nights and Days (ليالي ألف ليلة)
- Ian McEwan – The Comfort of Strangers
- Toni Morrison – Tar Baby
- Robert B. Parker
- A Savage Place
- Early Autumn
- Ellis Peters
- Terry Pratchett – Strata
- Jean Raspail – Moi, Antoine de Tounens, roi de Patagonie
- Alain Robbe-Grillet – Djinn
- Harold Robbins – Goodbye, Janette
- Lawrence Sanders – The Third Deadly Sin
- Martin Cruz Smith – Gorky Park
- Anja Snellman – Sonja O. kävi täällä
- Muriel Spark – Loitering with Intent
- Botho Strauß – Couples, Passersby (Paare, Passanten)
- Paul Theroux – The Mosquito Coast
- D. M. Thomas – The White Hotel
- Jack Vance – The Book of Dreams
- Mario Vargas Llosa – The War of the End of the World (La guerra del fin del mundo)
- Gore Vidal – Creation
- Joseph Wambaugh – The Glitter Dome
- Kit Williams – Masquerade
- Gene Wolfe
- Roger Zelazny
Children and young people
- Judy Blume – Tiger Eyes
- Roald Dahl – George's Marvellous Medicine
- Rumer Godden – The Dragon of Og
- Roger Hargreaves – Little Miss (first 13 books in the Little Miss series of 21)
- Michael de Larrabeiti – The Borribles Go for Broke
- Janet Lunn – The Root Cellar
- Patricia Lynch – The Turf-Cutter's Donkey
- Michelle Magorian – Goodnight Mister Tom
- Uri Orlev – The Island on Bird Street (האי ברחוב הציפורים)
- Ruth Park – The Muddle-Headed Wombat is Very Bad
- Alvin Schwartz – Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
- Maurice Sendak – Outside Over There
- Chris Van Allsburg – Jumanji
- Dennis Nolan - The Joy of Chickens
- Bill Peet - Encore for Eleanor
- Robert Westall – The Scarecrows
Drama
- Samuel Beckett – Rockaby
- Edward Bond – Restoration
- John Krizanc – Tamara
- Larry Shue – The Nerd
- Barney Simon – Woza Albert!
- Botho Strauß – Kalldewey, Farce
- Patrick Süskind – Der Kontrabaß
- Tennessee Williams – The Notebook of Trigorin
Poetry
- L. Sprague de Camp – Heroes and Hobgoblins
- Mehr Lal Soni Zia Fatehabadi – Rang-o-Noor (The Colour and the Light)
- Norman Nicholson – Sea to the West
- Sylvia Plath (posthumous) – Collected Poems, edited by Ted Hughes
- Kathleen Raine – Collected Poems, 1935–1980
- Richard L. Tierney – Collected Poems
Non-fiction
- Maya Angelou – The Heart of a Woman
- Mary Chesnut – Mary Chesnut's Civil War
- Hugo Brandt Corstius – Opperlandse taal- & letterkunde
- Daniel Dennett – Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology
- Timothy Findley – Famous Last Words
- Stephen Jay Gould – The Mismeasure of Man
- Dumas Malone – The Sage of Monticello
- Anne Scott-James – The Cottage Garden
- Ian Smith – The Great Betrayal
- Viktor Suvorov – The Liberators
Births
- July 10 – Karen Russell, American novelist
- December 10 – NoViolet Bulawayo (Elizabeth Zandile Tshele), Zimbabwe-born novelist
- September 30 – Cecelia Ahern, Irish novelist
- Unknown dates
- Amy Sackville, English novelist
- Sunjeev Sahota, English novelist
Deaths
- January 9 – A. J. Cronin, Scottish novelist (born 1896)
- February 17 – David Garnett, English novelist (born 1892)
- February 23 – Nan Shepherd, Scottish novelist and poet (born 1893)
- March 7 – Bosley Crowther, American film critic (born 1905)
- March 20 – Pedro García Cabrera, Spanish poet (born 1905)
- March 29 – Clive Sansom, English-born Tasmanian poet and playwright (born 1910)
- April 23 – Josep Pla, Catalan Spanish journalist and writer (born 1897)
- April 26 – Robert Garioch, Scottish poet (born 1909)
- May 8 – Uri Zvi Grinberg, Israeli poet writing in Hebrew and Yiddish (born 1896)
- May 9 – Nelson Algren, American novelist (born 1909)
- May 18 – William Saroyan, American novelist and dramatist (born 1908)
- May 30 – Gwendolyn B. Bennett, African American writer and artist (born 1902)
- June 15 – Philip Toynbee, English novelist and journalist (born 1916)
- September 3 – Alec Waugh, English novelist (born 1898)
- September 12 – Eugenio Montale, Italian poet (born 1896)
- December 26 – Amber Reeves, New Zealand-born English scholar, feminist and novelist (born 1887)
Awards
Australia
- The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Chris Matthews, Al Jazzar; Tim Winton, An Open Swimmer
- Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Alan Gould, Astral Sea
- Miles Franklin Award: Peter Carey, Bliss
Canada
- See 1981 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.
France
- Prix Goncourt: Lucien Bodard, Anne Marie
- Prix Médicis French: François-Olivier Rousseau, L'Enfant d'Édouard
- Prix Médicis International: David Shahar, Le Jour de la comtesse
Spain
United Kingdom
- Booker Prize: Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children
- Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Robert Westall, The Scarecrows
- Cholmondeley Award: Roy Fisher, Robert Garioch, Charles Boyle
- Eric Gregory Award: Alan Jenkins, Simon Rae, Marion Lomax, Philip Gross, Kathleen Jamie, Mark Abley, Roger Crowley, Ian Gregson
- James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children, and Paul Theroux, The Mosquito Coast
- James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Victoria Glendinning, Edith Sitwell: Unicorn Among Lions
- Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: D. J. Enright
- Whitbread Best Book Award: William Boyd, A Good Man in Africa
United States
- Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Kathy Calloway, Heart of the Garfish
- American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Belles Lettres: Malcolm Cowley
- Dos Passos Prize: Gilbert Sorrentino
- Nebula Award: Gene Wolfe, The Claw of the Conciliator
- Newbery Medal for children's literature: Katherine Paterson, Jacob Have I Loved
- Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Beth Henley, Crimes of the Heart
- Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: John Kennedy Toole – A Confederacy of Dunces
- Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: James Schuyler: The Morning of the Poem
Elsewhere
- Hugo Award for Best Novel: The Snow Queen by Joan D. Vinge
- Premio Nadal: Carmen Gómez Ojea, Cantiga de aguero
