This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1948.
Events
- January 6 â The poet Pablo Neruda speaks out in the Senate of Chile against political repression and is forced into hiding.
- January 28 â A debate between Bertrand Russell and Frederick Copleston on the existence of God is broadcast by the BBC.
- February 5 â A private assembly of 50 major literary and artistic figures listens to a recording of Antonin Artaud's play Pour en Finir avec le Jugement de dieu (To Have Done With the Judgment of God), whose broadcast on French radio three days earlier has been prohibited.
- February 17âÂÂNovember 24 â Venezuelan novelist Rómulo Gallegos serves as his country's first correctly elected President, until overthrown in a military coup.
- March 21 â Halldor Laxness's The Atom Station (Atómstöðin) sells out all copies on its first day of publication.
- May â Bertolt Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle (1944) is first performed as a student production, in English, at Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota. This year also sees the première of Brecht's adaptation of Antigone, at the Chur Stadttheater in Switzerland, with Helene Weigel in the title rôle.
- May 4 â Sir Laurence Olivier's film of Shakespeare's Hamlet is shown. It will be the first British film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture.
- c. June 1 â The first volume of Winston Churchill's The Second World War (1948âÂÂ1953) is published.
- September 8 â Terence Rattigan's one-act plays The Browning Version and Harlequinade are first performed at the Phoenix Theatre (London).
- September 17 â The Irish poet W. B. Yeats, who died at Menton, France, in 1939, is reburied at Drumcliffe, County Sligo, "Under bare Ben Bulben's head", having been moved from the original burial place, Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, on the Irish Naval Service corvette LàMacha. His grave at Drumcliffe, with an epitaph from "Under Ben Bulben", one of his final poems ("Cast a cold Eye/On Life, on Death./Horseman, pass by"), becomes a place of literary pilgrimage.
- November 13 â Alice's Adventures Under Ground, the original manuscript of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, bought by a group of American Anglophiles in 1946, is presented by Luther H. Evans (Librarian of Congress) to the British Museum Library.
- unknown dates
- The 20th and last edition of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum is published by the Holy See.
- The London publisher Weidenfeld & Nicolson is founded by George Weidenfeld and Nigel Nicolson.
- The Pulitzer Prize for the Novel is renamed the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
- The Palatino serif typeface, designed by Hermann Zapf, is released by the Mergenthaler Linotype Company.
New books
Fiction
Children and young people
Drama
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Poetry
Non-fiction
Births
- January 1 â Lynn Abbey (Marilyn Lorraine Abbey), American writer
- January 2 â Joyce Wadler, American writer and memoirist
- January 20 â Nigel Williams, English author, playwright and screenwriter
- February 3 â Henning Mankell, Swedish crime novelist, children's author and dramatist (died 2015)
- February 5 â Christopher Guest, English-American writer, actor and director
- February 15 â Art Spiegelman, American cartoonist
- February 19 â Clive Sinclair, English short-story writer
- February 28 â Mike Figgis, English writer, director and composer
- February 29
- Hermione Lee, English biographer
- Patricia A. McKillip, American fantasy and science fiction novel author (died 2022)
- March 4 â James Ellroy, American crime fiction author
- March 17 â William Gibson, American-born speculative novelist
- March 28 â Iman Budhi Santosa, Indonesian poet
- April 4 â Dan Simmons, American science fiction and horror writer (died 2026)
- April 21 â Clare Boylan, Irish novelist (died 2006)
- April 28 â Terry Pratchett, English comic fantasy author (died 2015)
- May 31 â Svetlana Alexievich, Belarusian writer of literary reportage, Nobel Prize in Literature recipient
- June 14 â Laurence Yep, American author
- June 16 â F. van Dixhoorn, Dutch poet
- June 21 â Andrzej Sapkowski, Polish fantasy author
- June 30 â Wolf Erlbruch, German children's book illustrator and writer (died 2022)
- July 22 â Susan Eloise Hinton, American young-adult author
- August 2 â Snoo Wilson, English playwright and screenwriter (died 2013)
- August 8 â Miranda Seymour, English novelist and biographer
- August 24 â Alexander McCall Smith, Scottish writer
- August 28 â Vonda N. McIntyre, American science fiction writer (died 2019)
- August 29 â Nick Darke, Cornish playwright (died 2005)
- September 2 â Manfred Böckl, German novelist and writer of popular history
- September 16 â Julia Donaldson, English author and children's writer
- September 20 â George R. R. Martin (George Raymond Martin), American fantasy author
- October 5 â Zoran Ã
½ivkoviÃÂ, Serbian author and academic
- October 6 â Zakes Mda (Zanemvula Kizito Gatyeni Mda), South African novelist, poet and playwright
- October 9 â Ciaran Carson, Northern Irish poet and novelist
- October 17 â Robert Jordan (James Oliver Rigney, Jr), American fantasy author (died 2007)
- October 18 â Ntozake Shange (Paulette L. Williams), African American playwright, poet and novelist (died 2018)
- November 18 â Frances Fyfield, English jurist and crime writer
- December 7 â Gertrud Leutenegger, Swiss novelist and poet (died 2025)
- December 20 â Abdulrazak Gurnah, Zanzibar-born novelist, Nobel Prize in Literature recipient
- unknown dates
- Ibrahim al-Koni, Libyan novelist
- Suzanne Robert, French Canadian novelist (died 2007)
- Edward Rutherfurd (Francis Edward Wintle), English novelist
Deaths
- January 2 â Vicente Huidobro, Chilean poet (b. 1893)
- March 6 â Ross Lockridge Jr., American author (suicide, born 1914)
- March 10 â Zelda Fitzgerald, American novelist (killed in fire, born 1900)
- April 22 â Prosper Montagné, French chef and food author (born 1865)
- May 5 â Sextil PuÃÂcariu, Romanian linguist, philologist and journalist (heart failure, born 1877)
- May 20 â Victor Ido, Dutch East Indian journalist, novelist and dramatist (born 1869)
- May 22 â Claude McKay, Jamaican American writer (born 1889)
- June 13 - Dazai Osamu, Japanese writer (born 1909)
- June 16 â Holbrook Jackson, English journalist, writer, publisher and bibliophile (born 1874)
- June 21 â Alice Brown, American novelist, poet and dramatist (born 1857)
- July 3 â Phelps Putnam, American poet (born 1894)
- July 4 â Monteiro Lobato, Brazilian fiction writer, particularly for children (born 1882)
- July 5 â Georges Bernanos, French novelist (born 1888)
- July 21 â J.-H. Rosny jeune (Séraphin Justin François Boex), French science fiction writer (born 1859)
- July 27 â Susan Glaspell, American dramatist and novelist (born 1876)
- August 3 â Venetia Stanley, English correspondent (cancer, born 1887)
- August 19 â Frederick Philip Grove, German-born Canadian novelist and essayist (born 1879)
- August 25 â Gordon Bottomley, English poet, writer of verse drama (born 1874)
- September 8 â Thomas Mofolo, Sotho novelist (born 1876)
- September 9 â Lajos BÃÂró, Hungarian novelist, dramatist and screenwriter (born 1880)
- September 20 â Husain Salaahuddin, Maldivian writer (born 1881)
- October 12 â Alfred Kerr, German theatre critic (suicide, born 1867)
- December 13 â Michael Roberts, English poet and critic (born 1902)
- unknown date â Eraclie Sterian, Romanian science writer and playwright (born 1872)
Awards
References