# 1969 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1969.

## Events

* February 8 – After 147 years, the last issue of The Saturday Evening Post in its original form appears in the United States.
* March 23 – German-born writer Assia Wevill, a mistress of the English poet Ted Hughes and ex-wife of the Canadian poet David Wevill, gasses herself and their daughter at her London home.
* April 22 – The first Booker-McConnell Prize for fiction is awarded to P. H. Newby for Something to Answer For.
* August – "Penelope Ashe", purported author of a bestselling novel, Naked Came the Stranger, is revealed as a group of Newsday journalists.
* unknown date – The Times Literary Supplement begins using the abbreviation "TLS" on its title page.

## New books
### Fiction

* Eva Alexanderson – Kontradans (Counter-dance)
* Eric Ambler – The Intercom Conspiracy
* Jorge Amado – Tenda dos Milagres (Tent of Miracles)
* Kingsley Amis – The Green Man
* William H. Armstrong – Sounder
* Penelope Ashe – Naked Came the Stranger
* Margaret Atwood – The Edible Woman
* René Barjavel – Les Chemins de Katmandou
* Ray Bradbury – I Sing the Body Electric
* Melvyn Bragg – The Hired Man
* Christianna Brand – Court of Foxes
* William S. Burroughs – The Last Words of Dutch Schultz
* Victor Canning – Queen's Pawn
* Louis-Ferdinand Céline – Rigadoon
* Agatha Christie – Hallowe'en Party
* Michael Crichton – The Andromeda Strain
* John Cheever – Bullet Park
* A. J. Cronin – A Pocketful of Rye
* Henry de Montherlant – Les Garçons (The Boys)
* L. Sprague de Camp – The Golden Wind
* Philip K. Dick – Ubik
* Marion Eames – Y Stafell Ddirgel (The Secret Room)
* John Fowles – The French Lieutenant's Woman
* George MacDonald Fraser – Flashman
* Sarah Gainham – A Place in the Country
* Paul Gallico – The Poseidon Adventure
* Rumer Godden – In This House of Brede
* Graham Greene – Travels with My Aunt
* Sam Greenlee – The Spook Who Sat by the Door
* Günter Grass – Local Anaesthetic (Örtlich betäubt)
* Frank Herbert – Dune Messiah
* Raymond Hitchcock – Percy
* Richard Horn – Encyclopedia
* Robert E. Howard, L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter – Conan of Cimmeria
* B. S. Johnson – The Unfortunates
* David H. Keller – The Folsom Flint and Other Curious Tales
* Derek Lambert
** Angels in the Snow
** The Kites of War
* Ursula Le Guin – The Left Hand of Darkness
* Elmore Leonard – The Big Bounce
* Doris Lessing – The Four-Gated City
* H. P. Lovecraft and Others – Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos
* John D. MacDonald – Dress Her in Indigo
* Félicien Marceau – Creezy
* Yukio Mishima (三島 由紀夫) – Runaway Horses
* Michael Moorcock – Behold the Man
* C. L. Moore – Jirel of Joiry
* Vladimir Nabokov – Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle
* M. T. Vasudevan Nair – Kaalam ("Time")
* Patrick O'Brian – Master and Commander
* Don Pendleton – War Against The Mafia
* Chaim Potok – The Promise
* Manuel Puig – Little Painted Mouths
* Mario Puzo – The Godfather
* Ellery Queen – The Campus Murders
* Pauline Réage – Retour à Roissy
* Mordecai Richler – The Street
* Harold Robbins – The Inheritors
* Philip Roth – Portnoy's Complaint
* Gabriel Ruhumbika – Village in Uhuru
* Giorgio Scerbanenco
** I milanesi ammazzano al sabato
** Milano calibro 9
* Irwin Shaw – Rich Man, Poor Man
* Dag Solstad – Irr! Grønt!
* Rex Stout – Death of a Dude
* Jacqueline Susann – The Love Machine
* Theodore Taylor – The Cay
* Colin Thiele – Blue Fin
* Jack Vance
** The Dirdir
** Emphyrio
** Servants of the Wankh
* Mario Vargas Llosa – Conversation in The Cathedral
* Kurt Vonnegut – Slaughterhouse-Five
* Charity Waciuma – Daughter of Mumbi
* Irving Wallace – The Seven Minutes
* Keith Waterhouse – Everything Must Go
* Colin Wilson – The Philosopher's Stone
* Roger Zelazny
** Creatures of Light and Darkness
** Damnation Alley
** Isle of the Dead

### Children and young people

* Rev. W. Awdry – Oliver the Western Engine (twenty-fourth in The Railway Series of 42 books by him and his son Christopher Awdry)
* Eric Carle – The Very Hungry Caterpillar
* Frances Carpenter – South American Wonder Tales
* Penelope Farmer – Charlotte Sometimes
* Rumer Godden – Operation Sippacik
* Gary Paulsen – Mr. Tucket (first in Mr. Tucket series)
* Barbara Sleigh – The Snowball
* William Steig – Sylvester and the Magic Pebble
* John Rowe Townsend – The Intruder
* Elfrida Vipont with Raymond Briggs – The Elephant and the Bad Baby
* Anne de Vries – Into the Darkness (first in the Reis door de nacht series of five books)

### Drama

* Leilah Assunção – Fala Baixo Senão Eu Grito (Speak Quietly or I’ll Scream)
* Aimé Césaire – Une Tempête
* Dario Fo – Mistero Buffo
* Athol Fugard – Boesman and Lena
* Joe Orton – What the Butler Saw (posthumously premiered and published)
* Michael Pertwee – She's Done It Again
* Dennis Potter – Son of Man (television)
* Dalmiro Sáenz – Quién yo? (Who me?)
* David Storey – In Celebration
* Paul Zindel – Let Me Hear You Whisper

### Poetry

* James Schuyler – Freely Espousing

### Non-fiction

* Dean Acheson – Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department
* Maya Angelou – I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
* Fernand Braudel – Ecrits sur l'Histoire (translated as On History, 1980)
* H. Rap Brown – Die Nigger Die!
* Henri Charrière – Papillon
* L. Sprague de Camp and George H. Scithers (editors) – The Conan Swordbook
* Antonia Fraser – Mary Queen of Scots
* Søren Hansen and Jesper Jensen – The Little Red Schoolbook (Den Lille Røde Bog For Skoleelever)
* Pauline Kael – Going Steady
* Anton LaVey – The Satanic Bible
* Laurie Lee – As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning
* Dwight Macdonald – On Movies
* Desmond Morris – The Human Zoo
* Harold Perkin – The Origins of Modern English Society 1780–1880
* Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull – The Peter Principle: Why Things Always Go Wrong
* David Reuben – Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask)

## Births

* January – Adrian Goldsworthy, Welsh military historian and novelist
* January 12 – David Mitchell, English novelist
* January 17 – Michael Moynihan, American journalist and publisher
* January 21 – M. K. Hobson, American speculative fiction author
* March – Jez Butterworth, English dramatist and screenwriter
* May 6 – Emmanuel Larcenet, French comics author
* May 6 – John Scalzi, American science-fiction author
* May 28 – Muriel Barbery, French novelist
* May 29 – Qiu Miaojin (邱妙津), Korean-born novelist (suicide 1995)
* June 13 – Virginie Despentes, French writer
* July 5 – Armin Kõomägi, Estonian author and screenwriter
* August 4 – Jojo Moyes, English journalist and romantic novelist
* September 12 – James Frey, American writer
* September 30 – Julianna Baggott, American novelist, essayist, and poet
* October 24 – Emma Donoghue, Irish-born Canadian novelist, dramatist, and academic
* November 13 – John Belluso, American dramatist (died 2006)
* November 28 – Hanne Ørstavik, Norwegian novelist
* November 30 – David Auburn, American dramatist
* unknown dates
** John Harris, English writer, journalist and critic
** Tom McCarthy, English novelist

## Deaths

* January 11 – Richmal Crompton, English children's writer (born 1890)
* January 21 – Giovanni Comisso, Italian writer (born 1895)
* March 9 – Charles Brackett, American novelist and screenwriter (born 1892)
* March 11 – John Wyndham, English science fiction novelist (born 1903)
* March 24 – Margery Fish, English gardening writer (born 1892)
* March 25 – Max Eastman, American writer (born 1883)
* March 26 – John Kennedy Toole, American novelist (suicide, born 1937)
* March 27 – B. Traven, presumed German-born novelist (unknown year of birth)
* April 6 – Gabriel Chevallier, French writer (born 1895)
* April 7 – Rómulo Gallegos, Venezuelan novelist and politician, 48th President of Venezuela (born 1884)
* May 4 – Osbert Sitwell, English novelist and poet (born 1892)
* July 24 – Witold Gombrowicz, Polish playwright and novelist (born 1904)
* July 27 – Vivian de Sola Pinto, English poet and memoirist (born 1895)
* August 10 – Maurine Dallas Watkins, American journalist/play and screenwriter (born 1896)
* August 14 – Leonard Woolf, English political theorist (born 1880)
* August 27 – Ivy Compton-Burnett, English novelist (born 1884)
* September 6 – Gavin Maxwell, Scottish naturalist and author (cancer, born 1914)
* September 17 – Greye La Spina, American dramatist and short story writer (born 1880)
* September 20 – Elinor Brent-Dyer, English children's writer (born 1894)
* September 22 – Rachel Davis Harris, African American librarian (born 1869)
* October 14 – August Sang, Estonian poet and literary translator (born 1914)
* October 21 – Jack Kerouac, American novelist and poet (internal hemorrhage, born 1922)
* November 6 – Susan Taubes, Hungarian American writer and Jewish intellectual (suicide, born 1928)
* November 15 – Ignacio Aldecoa, Spanish writer (born 1925)

## Awards

* Nobel Prize for Literature: Samuel Beckett

### Canada

* See 1969 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

### France

* Prix Goncourt: Félicien Marceau, Creezy
* Prix Médicis: Hélène Cixous, Dedans

### United Kingdom

* Booker Prize: P. H. Newby, Something to Answer For
* Carnegie Medal for children's literature: K. M. Peyton, The Edge of the Cloud
* Cholmondeley Award: Derek Walcott, Tony Harrison
* Eric Gregory Award: Gavin Bantock, Jeremy Hooker, Jenny King, Neil Powell, Landeg E. White
* James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Elizabeth Bowen, Eva Trout
* James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Antonia Fraser, Mary Queen of Scots
* Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: Stevie Smith

### United States

* American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Drama: Tennessee Williams
* Hugo Award: John Brunner, Stand on Zanzibar
* Nebula Award: Ursula K. Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness
* Newbery Medal for children's literature: Lloyd Alexander, The High King
* Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Howard Sackler, The Great White Hope
* Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: N. Scott Momaday – House Made of Dawn
* Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: George Oppen: Of Being Numerous

### Elsewhere

* Miles Franklin Award: George Johnston, Clean Straw for Nothing
* Premio Nadal: Francisco García Pavón Las hermanas coloradas
* Viareggio Prize: Fulvio Tomizza, L'albero dei sogni