1974 in literature

Events

• February 12 – After publication at the end of 1973 of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago, the author is arrested for treason; the following day he is deported from the Soviet Union. In spring and summer the first translations into French and English begin to appear.
• August 8 – The first of Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City is published as a serial in The Pacific Sun.
• October 21 – New Guildhall Library opens in the City of London.

• Novelist Juan Carlos Onetti is one of a group arrested by the Uruguayan dictatorship for selecting as a competition prizewinner and publishing in the newspaper Marcha a short story implicitly critical of the military regime. He subsequently goes into exile in Spain.
• The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics is founded by Allen Ginsberg and Anne Waldman.

  New books

Fiction

• Kingsley Amis – Ending Up
• René Barjavel – Les Dames à la licorne
• Augusto Roa Bastos – I, the Supreme
• Peter Benchley – Jaws
• Hal Bennett – Wait Until the Evening
• Heinrich Böll – The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum
• Anthony Burgess – The Clockwork Testament, or Enderby's End
• Andrés Caicedo – "Maternidad"
• Robert A. Caro – The Power Broker
• Agatha Christie – Poirot's Early Cases
• Roald Dahl – Switch Bitch
• Philip K. Dick – Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said
• Annie Dillard – Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
• Lawrence Durrell – Monsieur
• Frederick Forsyth – The Dogs of War
• John Fowles – The Ebony Tower
• Donald Goines – Crime Partners
• Imil Habibi –
• John Hawkes – Death Sleep
• Joseph Heller – Something Happened
• James Herbert – The Rats
• Hammond Innes – North Star
• Erica Jong – Fear of Flying
• Anna Kavan – Let Me Alone
• Stephen King – Carrie
• Manuel Mujica Láinez
• *El laberinto
• *El viaje de los siete demonios
• Derek Lambert
• *Blackstone and the Scourge of Europe
• *The Yermakov Transfer
• Margaret Laurence – The Diviners
• John le Carré – Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
• Ursula K. Le Guin – The Dispossessed
• Madeleine L'Engle – A Wind in the Door
• H. P. Lovecraft and August Derleth – The Watchers Out of Time and Others
• Robert Ludlum – The Cry of the Halidon
• Brian Lumley – Beneath the Moors
• Colleen McCullough – Tim
• Nicholas Meyer – The Seven-Per-Cent Solution
• James A. Michener – Centennial
• Elsa Morante – La Storia
• Gerald Murnane – Tamarisk Row
• Meja Mwangi – Carcase for Hounds
• Vladimir Nabokov – Look at the Harlequins!
• Edith Pargeter – Sunrise in the West
• Robert B. Parker – God Save the Child
• Ellen Raskin – Figgs & Phantoms
• Ishmael Reed – The Last Days of Louisiana Red
• Harold Robbins – The Pirate
• Fran Ross – Oreo
• Leonardo Sciascia – Todo modo
• Tom Sharpe – Porterhouse Blue
• Sidney Sheldon – The Other Side of Midnight
• C. P. Snow – In Their Wisdom
• Studs Terkel – Working

  Children and young people

• Richard Adams – Shardik
• Stan and Jan Berenstain – The Berenstain Bears' New Baby
• Robert Cormier – The Chocolate War
• Paula Danziger – The Cat Ate My Gymsuit
• Fynn – Mister God, This Is Anna
• Virginia Hamilton – M. C. Higgins, the Great
• Diana Wynne Jones – The Ogre Downstairs
• Ruth Manning-Sanders – A Book of Sorcerers and Spells
• Jill Murphy – The Worst Witch
• Bill Peet – Merle the High Flying Squirrel
• Miriam Roth – A Tale of Five Balloons
• Richard Scarry – The Best Rainy Day Book Ever
• Jill Paton Walsh – The Emperor's Winding Sheet
• Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman – Collected Ghost Stories

  Drama

• Nezihe Araz – Bozkır Güzellemesi
• Michael Cook – Jacob's Wake
• Dario Fo – Can't Pay? Won't Pay!
• Paavo Haavikko
• *Ratsumies
• *Kuningas lähtee Ranskaan
• *Harald Pitkäikäinen
• Ira Levin – Veronica's Room
• Mustapha Matura – Play Mas
• Harold Pinter – No Man's Land
• David Rudkin – Penda's Fen
• Tom Stoppard – Travesties

  Poetry

• Duncan Bush, Tony Curtis, Nigel Jenkins – Three Young Anglo-Welsh Poets

  Non-fiction

• Maya Angelou – Gather Together in My Name
• Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward – All the President's Men
• Vincent Bugliosi with Curt Gentry – Helter Skelter
• David Clark – Social Therapy in Psychiatry
• Shelby Foote – – Vol 3: Red River to Appomattox
• Dumas Malone – Jefferson the President: Second Term, 1805-1809
• Robert M. Pirsig – Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
• Erin Pizzey – Scream Quietly or the Neighbours Will Hear
• Jonathan Raban – Soft City
• Piers Paul Read –
• Soviet Armenian Encyclopedia
• Lewis Thomas – The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher
• Joseph Wambaugh – The Onion Field

  Births

• January 6 – Romain Sardou, French novelist
• January 26 – Shannon Hale, American fantasy author
• February 15 – Miranda July, American filmmaker, performance artist and fiction writer
• April 13 – K. Sello Duiker, South African novelist
• August 7 – Faisal Tehrani, Malaysian novelist
• August 9 – Ryūsui Seiryōin, Japanese novelist
• August 18 – Nicole Krauss, American novelist
• August 23 – Serhiy Zhadan, Ukrainian poet, novelist and essayist
• September 20 – Owen Sheers, Fijian-born Welsh poet, playwright and novelist
• November 4 – Carlos Be, Spanish playwright
• December 26 – Joshua John Miller, American novelist and screenwriter

• Naomi Alderman, English novelist
• Sarah Hall, English novelist
• Joanna Kavenna, English novelist and travel writer
• Joe Meno, American novelist and journalist
• Chika Unigwe, Nigerian novelist writing in English and Dutch
• Roger Williams, Welsh dramatist and screenwriter

  Deaths

• January 20 – Edmund Blunden, English poet and critic
• January 25 – James Pope-Hennessy, English biographer
• January 29 – H. E. Bates, English novelist
• February 2 – Marieluise Fleißer, German dramatist
• February 24 – Martin Armstrong, English poet and short story writer
• March 3 – Carl Jacob Burckhardt, Swiss historian
• March 19 – Austin Clarke, Irish poet, playwright and novelist
• March 24 – Olive Higgins Prouty, American novelist
• April 14 – Howard Pease, American novelist
• May 9 – L. T. C. Rolt, English biographer and writer of ghost stories
• May 13 – Arthur J. Burks, American writer
• June 2 – Tom Kristensen, Danish novelist and poet
• June 11 – Julius Evola, Italian esotericist, journalist and philosopher
• June 9 – Miguel Ángel Asturias, Guatemalan Nobel Prize-winning novelist
• July 3 – Samuel Roth, American publisher
• July 4 – Georgette Heyer, English novelist
• August 7 – Rosario Castellanos, Mexican writer and diplomat
• August 11 – Jan Tschichold, German-born typographer and writer
• September 21 – Jacqueline Susann, American novelist
• October 4 – Anne Sexton, American poet
• October 28 – David Jones, Anglo-Welsh poet and artist
• October 29 – Victor E. van Vriesland, Dutch writer
• November 5 – William Gardner Smith, expatriate American novelist and journalist
• November 7 – Eric Linklater, Welsh-born Scottish novelist and travel writer
• November 26 – Cyril Connolly, English critic and writer
• November 28 – David Jones, English artist and poet
• December 14 – Walter Lippmann, American writer

• Buddhadeb Bosu, Bengali poet and writer
• Sheila Stuart, Scottish author and children's writer

  Awards

• Nobel Prize for Literature: Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson

  Canada

• See 1974 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

  France

• Prix Goncourt: Pascal Lainé, La Dentellière
• Prix Médicis French: Porporino ou les Mystèrs de Naples
• Prix Médicis International: Julio Cortázar, Libro de Manuel

  United Kingdom

• Booker Prize: Nadine Gordimer, The Conservationist and Stanley Middleton, Holiday.
• Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Mollie Hunter, The Stronghold
• Cholmondeley Award: D.J. Enright, Vernon Scannell, Alasdair Maclean
• Eric Gregory Award: Duncan Forbes, Roger Garfitt, Robin Hamilton, Frank Ormsby, Penelope Shuttle
• Newdigate prize: Alan Hollinghurst
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Lawrence Durrell, Monsieur, or the Prince of Darkness
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: John Wain, Samuel Johnson
• Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: Ted Hughes

  United States

• Frost Medal: John Hall Wheelock
• Hugo Award: Arthur C. Clarke, Rendezvous with Rama
• Nebula Award: Ursula K. Le Guin, The Dispossessed
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Paula Fox, The Slave Dancer
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: no award given
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: no award given
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Robert Lowell, The Dolphin

  Elsewhere

• Miles Franklin Award: Ronald McKie, The Mango Tree
• Premio Nadal: Luis Gasulla, Culminación de Montoya
• Viareggio Prize: Clotilde Marghieri, Amati enigmi

  In literature

• James Graham's play This House
• Christopher Hampton's play Treats
• Neamat Imam's novel The Black Coat
• Stephen King's novella Apt Pupil and novels Roadwork and The Shining
• Camilla Läckberg's novel The Angel Maker's Wife
• Maaza Mengiste's novel Beneath the Lion's Gaze
• Stewart O'Nan's novel Snow Angels
• David Adams Richards' novel The Bay of Love and Sorrows
• Shauna Seliy's novel When We Get There