1983 in literature

Events

April – Russian samizdat poet Irina Ratushinskaya is sentenced to imprisonment in a labor camp for dissident activity; she continues to write poetry clandestinely in prison.

June 2 – Francophone Senegalese poet and politician Léopold Sédar Senghor becomes the first black African writer elected as a member of the Académie française.

Barbara Cartland, who reaches the age of 82 in July, writes 23 romantic novels this year.

Salvage for the Saint by Peter Bloxsom and John Kruse is published. This is the final book in a series of novels, novellas and short stories featuring the Leslie Charteris creation "The Saint" that started in 1928. (An unsuccessful attempt at restarting the series will occur in 1997.)

Fiction

Isaac Asimov – The Robots of Dawn

Greg Bear – The Wind from a Burning Woman

Samuel Beckett – Worstward Ho

Thomas Berger – The Feud

Thomas Bernhard – The Loser (Der Untergeher)

Jorge Luis Borges – Shakespeare's Memory (La memoria de Shakespeare, short stories)

Marion Zimmer Bradley – The Mists of Avalon

Morley Callaghan – A Time for Judas

Raymond Carver – Cathedral

Hugo Claus – The Sorrow of Belgium (Het verdriet van België)

J. M. Coetzee – Life and Times of Michael K

Jackie Collins – Hollywood Wives

Basil Copper – The House of the Wolf

Bernard Cornwell

Sharpe's Sword

Sharpe's Enemy

Bernard and Judy Cornwell (as Susannah Kells) – A Crowning Glory

György Dalos – 1985

L. Sprague de Camp

The Reluctant King

The Unbeheaded King

Jim Dodge – Fup

Stephen R. Donaldson – White Gold Wielder: Book Three of The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant

Nora Ephron – Heartburn

Ken Follett – On Wings of Eagles

Ernest J. Gaines – A Gathering of Old Men

John Gardner – Icebreaker

Haidar Haidar – Walimah li A'ashab al-Bahr (وليمة لأعشاب البحر, A Feast for the Seaweeds)

Maarten 't Hart – De kroongetuige

Mark Helprin – Winter's Tale

Amado V. Hernandez – Luha ng Buwaya (Crocodile's Tear)

Susan Hill – The Woman in Black

Elfriede Jelinek – The Piano Teacher (Die Klavierspielerin)

Jo Jung-rae – The Tae Baek Mountains (태백산맥, publication begins)

Ernst Jünger – Aladdin's Problem

William Kennedy – Ironweed

Stephen King – Christine

Danilo Kiš – The Encyclopedia of the Dead (Enciklopedija mrtvih)

Dean R. Koontz – Phantoms

Louis L'Amour – The Lonesome Gods

John le Carré – The Little Drummer Girl

Mary Mackey – The Last Warrior Queen

Norman Mailer – Ancient Evenings

James A. Michener – Poland

R. K. Narayan – A Tiger for Malgudi

Robert B. Parker – The Widening Gyre

Ellis Peters

The Sanctuary Sparrow

The Devil's Novice

Tim Powers – The Anubis Gates

Terry Pratchett – The Colour of Magic

Satyajit Ray – Shonku Ekai Aksho (Shonku, All in All, collected Professor Shonku stories)

Salman Rushdie – Shame

Joanna Russ – The Zanzibar Cat

Danielle Steel – Changes

Walter Tevis – The Queen's Gambit

Gore Vidal – Duluth

Evangeline Walton – The Sword is Forged

Fay Weldon – The Life and Loves of a She-Devil

A. N. Wilson – Scandal

Robert Anton Wilson – Prometheus Rising

Christa Wolf – Cassandra (Kassandra)

Roger Zelazny – Unicorn Variations (stories and essays)

Children and young people

Chris Van Allsburg - The Wreck of the Zephyr

Roald Dahl – The Witches

Mem Fox – Possum Magic

Rumer Godden

Four Dolls

The Valiant Chatti-Maker

Dick King-Smith – The Sheep-Pig (also as Babe, the Gallant Pig)

Astrid Lindgren – The Runaway Sleigh Ride! (Titta Madicken, det snöar!)

Bill Peet – No Such Things

Drama

Samuel Beckett – Nacht und Träume (television play, first broadcast)

David Mamet – Glengarry Glen Ross

Tom Murphy – The Gigli Concert

Christina Reid – Tea in a China Cup

Larry Shue – The Foreigner

Neil Simon – Brighton Beach Memoirs

Botho Strauß – The Park (Der Park)

Poetry

Paul Durcan – Jumping the Train Tracks with Angela

Grace Nichols – I is a long-memoried woman

Non-fiction

Benedict Anderson – Imagined Communities

Pascal Bruckner – The Tears of the White Man

L. Sprague de Camp – The Fringe of the Unknown

L. Sprague de Camp, Catherine Crook de Camp and Jane Whittington Griffin – Dark Valley Destiny

Tom Dardis – Harold Lloyd: The Man on the Clock

Nawal El Saadawi – Mudhakkirâtî fî sijn an-nisâʾ (Memoirs from the Women's Prison)

Shantabai Kamble – Majya Jalmachi Chittarkatha (The Kaleidoscopic Story of My Life)

Humbert S. Nelli – From Immigrants to Ethnics: The Italian Americans

Susan Oliver – Odyssey: A Daring Transatlantic Journey

Renée Richards – Second Serve: The Renée Richards Story

Anna Rosmus – Widerstand und Verfolgung am Beispiel Passau 1933–1945 (Resistance and Persecution — The Case of Passau 1933–1945)

Colin Thubron – Among the Russians

Julia Urquidi – Lo que Varguitas no dijo (What Little Vargas Did not Say)

Births

July 2 – Tao Lin (林韬), Chinese novelist and poet

November 17 – Christopher Paolini, American fantasy novelist

Unknown date – Sarah Howe, Hong Kong-born poet writing in English

Deaths

January 5 – Chapman Grant, American historian and publisher (born 1887)

February 14 – Brita von Horn, Swedish theater director, dramatist and novelist (born 1886)

February 25 – Tennessee Williams (Thomas Lanier Williams III), American playwright (born 1911)

March 3 – Hergé (Georges Prosper Remi), Belgian comics creator (born 1907)

April 12 – Desmond Bagley, English novelist (complications from stroke, born 1923))

May 4 – Shūji Terayama (寺山 修司), Japanese poet, dramatist, and film director (cirrhosis, born 1935)

May 21 – Amal Abul-Qassem Donqol, Egyptian poet (born 1940)

June 19 – Vilmundur Gylfason, Icelandic historian, poet and politician (suicide, born 1948)

June 27 – Alden Nowlan, Canadian poet, novelist and playwright (born 1933)

August 12 – Mikey Smith, Jamaican dub poet (stoned to death; born 1954)

September 16 – Roy Andries De Groot, English-born American food writer (born 1910)

December 5 – John Robinson, English religious writer and bishop (born 1919)

Awards

Nobel Prize for Literature: William Golding

Australia

The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Jenny Summerville, Shields Of Trell

Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Vivian Smith, Tide Country

Miles Franklin Award: No award presented

Canada

See 1983 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

France

Prix Goncourt: Frédérick Tristan, Les Égarés

Prix Médicis French: Jean Echenoz, Cherokee

Prix Médicis International: Kenneth White, La Route bleue

Spain

Miguel de Cervantes Prize: Rafael Alberti

United Kingdom

Booker Prize: J. M. Coetzee -Life and Times of Michael K

Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Jan Mark, Handles

Cholmondeley Award: John Fuller, Craig Raine, Anthony Thwaite

Eric Gregory Award: Martin Stokes, Hilary Davies, Michael O'Neill, Lisa St Aubin De Teran, Deidre Shanahan

James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Jonathan Keates, Allegro Postillions

James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Alan Walker, Franz Liszt: The Virtuoso Years

Newdigate prize: Peter McDonald

Whitbread Best Book Award: John Fuller, Flying to Nowhere

United States

Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Kate Daniels, The White Wave

Nebula Award: David Brin, Startide Rising

Newbery Medal for children's literature: Cynthia Voigt, Dicey's Song

Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Marsha Norman, 'Night, Mother

Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Alice Walker – The Color Purple

Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Galway Kinnell – Selected Poems

Pulitzer Prize for History: The Transformation of Virginia, 1740–1790 by Rhys L. Isaac

Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction: Is There No Place on Earth for Me? by Susan Sheehan

Elsewhere

Hugo Award for Best Novel: Foundation's Edge by Isaac Asimov

Premio Nadal: Salvador García Aguilar, Regocijo en el hombre