1954 in literature

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This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1954.

Events

• January – Kingsley Amis's first novel, the comic campus novel Lucky Jim, is published by Victor Gollancz Ltd in London.^[1]
• January 7 – The Georgetown–IBM experiment is the first public demonstration of a machine translation system, held in New York at the IBM head office.
• January 25 – Dylan Thomas's radio play Under Milk Wood is first broadcast in the U.K. on the BBC Third Programme, two months after its author's death, with Richard Burton as "First Voice".
• February – The London Magazine is revived as a literary magazine, with John Lehmann as editor.
• March 31 – A. L. Zissu is sentenced in Bucharest to life imprisonment for "conspiring against the social order". This has been a focal point in the anti-Zionist clampdown in Communist Romania.^[2]
• May 29 – The rediscovered and restored early 17th-century Corral de comedias de Almagro in Spain is re-inaugurated with a play by Calderon de la Barca.^[3]
• June 16 – The first public celebration of "Bloomsday" takes place in Dublin: writers Flann O'Brien, Patrick Kavanagh and Anthony Cronin travel in a horse-drawn coach, stopping at numerous bars to retrace the steps of the characters from James Joyce's novel Ulysses.
• June 22 – In the Parker–Hulme murder case, the 15-year-old Julia Hulme, a future writer of English historical detective fiction as Anne Perry, takes part in the murder of her best friend's mother in Christchurch, New Zealand.
• July 29 – The first volume of J. R. R. Tolkien's epic The Lord of the Rings – The Fellowship of the Ring – is published in London by George Allen & Unwin. The Two Towers follows on November 11 and publication will be completed in 1955. By 2007, 150 million copies will have been sold worldwide.^[4]
• September 1 – Lawrence Quincy Mumford becomes the U.S.Librarian of Congress.
• September 17 – William Golding's first novel, the allegorical dystopian Lord of the Flies, is published by Faber and Faber in London.
• September 22 – Terence Rattigan's two linked plays Separate Tables is first performed, at St James's Theatre, London.
• October 30 – John Updike's first story for The New Yorker, "Friends from Philadelphia", is published. He graduates from Harvard with a thesis on George Herbert, and begins a year's Frank Knox Memorial Fellowship to the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art at England's University of Oxford.
• November 19 – Brendan Behan's first play, The Quare Fellow is premièred at the Pike Theatre, Dublin.
• unknown date – Jack Kerouac reads Dwight Goddard's A Buddhist Bible (1932, found in San Jose library), which will influence him greatly.

New books

Fiction

• Kingsley Amis – Lucky Jim^[1]
• Poul Anderson – The Broken Sword
• Thomas Armstrong – Pilling Always Pays
• Isaac Asimov – The Caves of Steel
• Hamilton Basso – The View from Pompey's Head
• John Bingham – The Third Skin
• Boileau-Narcejac – The Living and the Dead (D'entre les morts)
• Lucy M. Boston – Yew Hall
• Pierre Boulle – The Bridge over the River Kwai (Le Pont de la Rivière Kwaï)
• Taylor Caldwell – Never Victorious, Never Defeated
• Victor Canning – Castle Minerva
• John Dickson Carr
  • The Third Bullet and Other Stories
  • The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes (with Adrian Conan Doyle)
• Henry Cecil – According to the Evidence
• Agatha Christie – Destination Unknown
• Robertson Davies – Leaven of Malice
• Cecil Day-Lewis – The Whisper in the Gloom
• Simone de Beauvoir – The Mandarins (Les Mandarins)
• Daphne du Maurier – Mary Anne
• Ian Fleming – Live and Let Die
• Max Frisch – I'm Not Stiller (Stiller)
• Anthony Gilbert – Snake in the Grass
• William Golding – Lord of the Flies
• Richard Gordon – The Captain's Table
• Walter Greenwood – What Everybody Wants
• James Hadley Chase – The Sucker Punch
• Cyril Hare – That Yew Tree's Shade
• Joan Henry – Yield to the Night
• Hergé – Explorers on the Moon (On a marché sur la Lune)
• Hwang Sun-won – The Descendants of Cain (카인의 후예)
• Mac Hyman – No Time for Sergeants
• Hammond Innes – The Strange Land
• Michael Innes – Appleby Talking
• Randall Jarrell – Pictures from an Institution: a comedy
• Elizabeth Jenkins – The Tortoise and the Hare
• Yasunari Kawabata (川端 康成) – The Sound of the Mountain (Yama no Oto; serialization concludes)
• Frances Parkinson Keyes – The Royal Box
• Kalki Krishnamurthy
  • Amara Thara
  • Ponniyin Selvan (பொன்னியின் செல்வன், "The Son of Ponni"; publication concludes)
• Manuel Mujica Láinez – La casa (The House)
• George Lamming – The Emigrants
• Jacques Laurent – Mata Hari's Daughter
• Camara Laye – Le Regard du roi
• Ira Levin – A Kiss Before Dying
• Astrid Lindgren – Mio, My Son
• E. C. R. Lorac
  • Let Well Alone
  • Shroud of Darkness
• Ross Macdonald – Find a Victim
• Compton Mackenzie – Ben Nevis Goes East
• Kamala Markandaya – Nectar in a Sieve
• John Masters – Bhowani Junction
• Richard Matheson – I Am Legend
• John Metcalfe – The Feasting Dead
• James A. Michener – Sayonara
• Paul Morand – Hecate and Her Dogs
• Alberto Moravia – Il disprezzo (A Ghost at Noon)
• Iris Murdoch – Under the Net
• Louis Pauwels – L'Amour monstre
• J. B. Priestley – The Magicians
• Maurice Procter – Hell Is a City
• Marcel Proust – Jean Sauteuil (posthumously published)
• Ellery Queen – The Glass Village
• Pauline Réage (Anne Desclos) – Story of O (Histoire d'O)
• Mordecai Richler – The Acrobats
• Lillian Roth – I'll Cry Tomorrow
• Françoise Sagan – Bonjour Tristesse^[5]
• Ahmed Sefrioui – La Boîte à merveilles
• Anya Seton – Katherine
• Margit Söderholm – Clouds Over Hellesta
• John Steinbeck – Sweet Thursday
• Irving Stone – Love Is Eternal
• Rex Stout
  • The Black Mountain
  • Three Men Out
• Edward Streeter – Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation
• Julian Symons – The Narrowing Circle
• Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar – Saatleri Ayarlama Enstitüsü (The Time Regulation Institute)
• Morton Thompson – Not as a Stranger
• J. R. R. Tolkien
  • The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
  • The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
• Amos Tutuola – My Life in the Bush of Ghosts
• Tarjei Vesaas – Spring Night
• Gore Vidal – Messiah
• Douglass Wallop – The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant
• Monique Watteau – La Colère végétale
• Vaughan Wilkins – Fanfare for a Witch
• Frank Yerby
  • Benton's Row
  • Bride of Liberty

Children and young people

• Rev. W. Awdry – Edward the Blue Engine (ninth in The Railway Series of 42 books by him and his son Christopher Awdry)
• Viola Bayley – Paris Adventure (first in the Adventure series of 16 books)
• Lucy M. Boston – The Children of Green Knowe (first in the Green Knowe series of six books)
• Eleanor Cameron – The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet
• Meindert DeJong – The Wheel on the School (illustrated by Maurice Sendak)
• Rumer Godden – Impunity Jane: The Story of a Pocket Doll
• Joseph Krumgold – ...And Now Miguel
• C. S. Lewis – The Horse and His Boy
• Dr. Seuss – Horton Hears a Who!
• Rosemary Sutcliff – The Eagle of the Ninth
• Henry Treece
  • Legions of the Eagle
  • The Eagles Have Flown
• Ronald Welch – Knight Crusader

Drama

• Tawfiq al-Hakim – El Aydi El Na'mah (Soft Hands)
• Brendan Behan – The Quare Fellow
• Dharamvir Bharati – Andha Yug (The Blind Age)
• William Douglas Home – The Manor of Northstead
• Peter Jones – The Party Spirit
• Saunders Lewis – Siwan
• Ronald Millar – Waiting for Gillian
• Hugh Mills – The Little Glass Clock
• Terence Rattigan – Separate Tables
• Reginald Rose – Twelve Angry Men (original version as live teleplay)
• Dylan Thomas – Under Milk Wood (radio play)
• Thornton Wilder – The Matchmaker
• Herman Wouk – The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial

Poetry

• Tomas Tranströmer – 17 Poems (17 dikter)

Non-fiction

• Gordon Allport – The Nature of Prejudice
• L. Sprague de Camp – Lost Continents
• Rodney Collin – The Theory of Celestial Influence
• Albert Einstein – Ideas and Opinions
• Gerald Gardner – Witchcraft Today
• Aldous Huxley – The Doors of Perception
• Arthur Koestler – The Invisible Writing: The Second Volume Of An Autobiography, 1932–40
• D. R. Matthews – The Social Background of Political Decision-Makers
• Mervyn Peake – Figures of Speech
• Mihai Ralea – Caracterul antiștiințific și antiuman al psihologiei americane (The Anti-Science and Anti-Humanity Nature of American Psychology)
• A. J. P. Taylor – The Struggle for Mastery in Europe 1848–1918
• Alice B. Toklas – The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook
• William Kurtz Wimsatt, Jr. – Verbal Icon: Studies in the Meaning of Poetry (collected essays including "The Intentional Fallacy" and "The Affective Fallacy", cowritten with Monroe Beardsley)^[6]
• Barbara Woodhouse
  • Dog Training my Way
  • Talking to Animals (autobiography)

Births

• January 5 – László Krasznahorkai, Hungarian novelist and screenwriter
• January 15 – Jose Dalisay, Jr., Filipino writer
• January 29 – Oprah Winfrey, American actress and talk show host
• January – Cao Wenxuan (曹文軒), Chinese children's book writer and academic
• February 2 – Moniza Alvi, Pakistani-British poet and writer
• March 4 – Irina Ratushinskaya, Russian writer
• May 6 – Nicholas Crane, English writer, geographer and broadcaster
• March 16 – S. A. Griffin, American actor and poet
• March 20
  • Christoph Ransmayr, Austrian writer
  • Louis Sachar, American children's author
• April 14 – Bruce Sterling, American science-fiction writer
• May 5 – Hamid Ismailov, Uzbek writer
• May 23 – Anja Snellman, Finnish writer
• June 6 – Cynthia Rylant, American children's author and poet
• June 28 – A. A. Gill, British journalist and critic (died 2016)
• July 17 – J. Michael Straczynski, American author
• July 26 - Michael Grant, American young-adult fiction writer
• August 1 – James Gleick, American non-fiction author
• August 15 – Mary Jo Salter, American poet and academic
• August 17 – Anatoly Kudryavitsky, Russian-Irish writer
• September 14 – Mikey Smith, Jamaican dub poet (killed 1983)
• November 8 – Kazuo Ishiguro, Japanese-born English novelist and Nobel laureate
• November 10 – Marlene van Niekerk, South African novelist
• November 11 – Mary Gaitskill, American novelist, essayist and short story writer
• November 12 – Christopher Pike (Kevin Christopher McFadden), American children's author
• December 3 – Grace Andreacchi, American author
• December 7 – Mark Hofmann, American rare book dealer, forger and murderer
• December 20 – Sandra Cisneros, American writer
• unknown dates
  • Esther Delisle, French Canadian author and historian
  • Ibrahim Nasrallah, Jordanian/Palestinian poet and novelist
  • Roma Tearne (Roma Chrysostom), Sri Lankan novelist and artist

Deaths

• January 1 – Duff Cooper (1st Viscount Norwich), English poet, biographer and politician (born 1890)
• January 21 – E. K. Chambers, English literary scholar (born 1866)
• January 25 – M. N. Roy, Indian philosopher and politician (born 1887)
• February 2 – Hella Wuolijoki, Estonian-born Finnish writer (born 1886)
• February 6 – Maxwell Bodenheim, American poet and novelist (born 1892; murdered)
• March 28 – Francis Brett Young, English novelist and poet (born 1884)
• April 8
  • Juan Álvarez, Argentinian historian (born 1878)
  • Winnifred Eaton, Canadian author (born 1875)
  • Cicely Fox Smith, English poet and nautical writer (born 1882)
• April 19 – Russell Davenport, American journalist and publisher (born 1899)
• May 3 – Earnest Hooton, American writer on anthropology (born 1887)
• June 18 – Constantin Beldie, Romanian literary promoter and memoirist (born 1887)
• July 13 – Grantland Rice, American sportswriter (born 1880)
• July 14 – Jacinto Benavente, Spanish dramatist and Nobel laureate (born 1866)
• August 2 – Julián Padrón, Venezuelan novelist, journalist and lawyer (born 1910)
• August 3 – Colette, French novelist (born 1873)
• September 19 – Miles Franklin, Australian novelist (born 1879)
• September 29 – W. J. Gruffydd, Welsh-language journal editor (born 1881)
• October 22 – Oswald de Andrade, Brazilian poet and polemicist (born 1890)
• November 17 – Ludovic Dauș, Romanian novelist and dramatist (born 1873)
• December 6 – Lucien Tesnière, French grammarian (born 1893)
• December 20 – James Hilton, English novelist (born 1900)^[7]

Awards

• Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Ronald Welch, Knight Crusader^[8]
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: C. P. Snow, The New Men and The Masters
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Keith Feiling, Warren Hastings
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Joseph Krumgold, ...And Now Miguel
• Nobel Prize for Literature: Ernest Miller Hemingway
• Premio Nadal: Francisco Alcántara, La muerte sienta bien a Villalobos
• Prix Goncourt: Simone de Beauvoir, Les mandarins^[9]
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: John Patrick, The Teahouse of the August Moon
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: no award given
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Theodore Roethke: TheWaking
• Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: Ralph Hodgson

References

1. Zachary Leader (2002). On Modern British Fiction. Oxford University Press. p. 62. ISBN 978-0-19-924933-6.
2. Glass, Hildrun (2010). "Câteva note despre activitatea lui Avram L. Zissu". In Rotman, Liviu; Crăciun, Camelia; Vasiliu, Ana-Gabriela (eds.). Noi perspective în istoriografia evreilor din România. Bucharest: Federation of Jewish Communities of Romania & Editura Hasefer. p. 166.
3. Boletin de la Real Academia de la Historia (in Spanish), vol. CXCVIII, Madrid, 2001, pp. 352–546, OCLC 1460620.
4. Wagner, Vit (2007-04-16). "Tolkien proves he's still the king". Toronto Star. Archived from the original on 2011-03-09. Retrieved 2014-06-04.
5. No. 41 in Le Monde's 100 Books of the Century. Savigneau, Josyane (1999-10-15). "Écrivains et choix sentimentaux". Le Monde. Paris.
6. Leitch, Vincent B.; Cain, William E.; Finke, Laurie A.; Johnson, Barbara E.; McGowan, John; Williams, Jeffrey J. (2001). "William K. Wimsatt Jr. and Monroe C. Beardsley". In Leitch, Vincent B. (ed.). The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton & Co. pp. 1371–1374.
7. Stanley Kunitz (1955). Twentieth Century Authors: A Biographical Dictionary of Modern Literature. Supplement. H. W. Wilson. p. 353.
8. Peter Hunt (2 September 2003). International Companion Encyclopedia of Children's Literature. Routledge. p. 367. ISBN 978-1-134-87993-9.
9. Susan Weiner; Professor Susan Weiner, MS Rdn Cde Cdn (9 May 2001). Enfants Terribles: Youth and Femininity in the Mass Media in France, 1945-1968. JHU Press. p. 215. ISBN 978-0-8018-6539-8.