– Tennessee Williams' 1938 play Not About Nightingales receives its stage première in London, in a collaboration between the Royal National Theatre of Great Britain and Corin and Vanessa Redgrave's Moving Theatre.^[1]

March 5

Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom

– Alice McDermott wins the National Book Award with her novel Charming Billy.

November 18

December – title is revived in the United States.^[3]

The Strand Magazine

– Adama (first volume in Atyaf al-Aziqah al-Mahjurah (Phantoms of the Deserted Alley) trilogy)

Turki al-Hamad

– The Book of Saladin

Tariq Ali

Aaron Allston

Iron Fist

– I Sweep the Sun off Rooftops (أكنس الشمس عن السطوح)

Hanan al-Shaykh

– Heavy Water and Other Stories (most stories previously published)

Martin Amis

– Master Georgie

Beryl Bainbridge

– Inversions

Iain M. Banks

– Romanzo russo. Fiutando i futuri supplizi (translated 2010 as The Anonymous Novel. Sensing the Future Torments)

Alessandro Barbero

– England, England

Julian Barnes

Greg Bear

Dinosaur Summer

– The Facts of Death

Raymond Benson

and Roger Zelazny – Psychoshop

Alfred Bester

– Flowers from the Moon and Other Lunacies

Robert Bloch

– The Savage Detectives (Los Detectives Salvajes)

Roberto Bolaño

– Contos malvados

Xurxo Borrazás

– Armadillo

William Boyd

– Yo-Yo Boing!

Giannina Braschi

– Autobiography of Red (verse novel)

Anne Carson

– Muhammad

Driss Chraïbi

– All Through the Night

Mary Higgins Clark

– Rainbow Six

Tom Clancy

– Veronika Decides to Die

Paulo Coelho

– Blood Work

Michael Connelly

– Sharpe's Triumph

Bernard Cornwell

– Point of Origin

Patricia Cornwell

– Girlfriend in a Coma

Douglas Coupland

– Rebel Dawn

Ann C. Crispin

– The Hours

Michael Cunningham

– Plum Island

Nelson DeMille

August Derleth

The Final Adventures of Solar Pons

– The Kin

Peter Dickinson

– Return to Hawk's Hill

Allan W. Eckert

– Glamorama

Bret Easton Ellis

– The Last King of Scotland

Giles Foden

– Hellfire

Diana Gabaldon

– Smoke and Mirrors (mainly reprints)

Neil Gaiman

– A Midwinter's Tale

Andrew Greeley

– The Street Lawyer

John Grisham

– Komm, süßer Tod (Come, Sweet Death)^[4]

Wolf Haas

- Among the Hidden

Margaret Peterson Haddix

(哈金) – Waiting

Ha Jin

– Kiss of the Fur Queen

Tomson Highway

– About a Boy

Nick Hornby

– Atomised (Les Particules élémentaires)

Michel Houellebecq

– Gniazdo światów (Nest of Worlds)

Marek S. Huberath

– A Widow for One Year

John Irving

K. W. Jeter

The Mandalorian Armor

– The Colony of Unrequited Dreams

Wayne Johnston

– Bag of Bones

Stephen King

– The Poisonwood Bible^[5]

Barbara Kingsolver

– Seize the Night

Dean R. Koontz

Joe R. Lansdale

Rumble Tumble

– Bleu-Blanc-Rouge

Alain Mabanckou

– Breakfast on Pluto

Patrick McCabe

– Amsterdam

Ian McEwan

– African Exploits

Roy MacLaren

– Pure Drivel

Steve Martin

– Greater Than Angels

Carol Matas

– King Rat

China Miéville

– The Love of a Good Woman

Alice Munro

(村上春樹) – The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (ねじまき鳥クロニクル, Nejimakidori Kuronikuru)

Haruki Murakami

– All Souls' Day (Allerzielen)

Cees Nooteboom

– Mitz: The Marmoset of Bloomsbury

Sigrid Nunez

– Tomcat in Love

Tim O'Brien

– My Name Is Red (Benim Adım Kırmızı)

Orhan Pamuk

– Election

Tom Perrotta

Terry Pratchett

Carpe Jugulum

– Godavari

Fahmida Riaz

– The Bay of Love and Sorrows

David Adams Richards

– Crónica de invisibles

José Luis Rodríguez Pittí

– I Married a Communist

Philip Roth

– Ensam i världen (Alone in the World)

Margit Sandemo

– Shrink (also Primal Scream)

Michael Slade

– The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency

Alexander McCall Smith

– I, Jedi

Michael Stackpole

Danielle Steel

The Long Road Home

– The Martyring

Thomas Sullivan

– Safe House

Andrew Vachss

– To Say Nothing of the Dog

Connie Willis

– Dream Children

A. N. Wilson

– A Man in Full

Tom Wolfe

– Vision of the Future

Timothy Zahn

– Amanda Gorman, American poet and activist

March 7

– Mohammed El-Kurd, Palestinian writer and poet

May 15

– Chloe Gong, Chinese-born New Zealand author

December 16

unknown dates

K-Ming Chang

– Frank Muir, English comedy writer and broadcaster (born 1920)

January 2

– John Wells, English satirist (born 1936)

January 11

– Monica Edwards, English children's novelist (born 1912)

January 18

– John Forbes, Australian poet (heart attack, born 1950)

January 23

– Geoffrey Trease, English children's historical novelist (born 1909)

January 27

– Lawrence Sanders, American novelist and short story writer (born 1920)

February 7

– Martha Gellhorn, American journalist (suicide, born 1908)

February 15

– Ernst Jünger, German novelist and war memoirist (born 1895)

February 17

– Dr. Benjamin Spock, American pediatrician and writer on child care (born 1903)

March 15

– Francis Durbridge, English playwright (born 1912)

April 11

– Octavio Paz, Mexican poet and Nobel Prize laureate (born 1914)

April 19

April 27

Anne Desclos

– Nat Perrin, American comedy writer (born 1905)

May 9

— Willy Corsari, Dutch author of detective fiction (born 1897)^[13]

May 11

June 10

Joan Adeney Easdale

– Dame Catherine Cookson, English novelist (born 1906)

June 11

– Martin Seymour-Smith, English biographer (born 1928)

July 1

– Johnny Speight, English comedy writer (born 1920)

July 5

– Ian Wallace (John Wallace Pritchard), American science fiction author (born 1912)

July 9

– Miroslav Holub, Czech poet (born 1923)

July 14

July 23

John Hopkins

– Dorothy West, American novelist and short story writer (born 1907)

August 16

– Grace Paley, American writer (born 1922)

August 22

– Eric Malling, Canadian journalist (born 1946)

September 28

– Iain Crichton Smith, Scottish writer (born 1928)^[15]

October 15

– Eric Ambler, English spy novelist (born 1909)

October 22

– Ted Hughes, English poet and Poet Laureate (born 1930)^[16]

October 28

– Bob Kane (Robert Kahn), American comics artist and writer (born 1915)

November 3

– Rumer Godden, English novelist (born 1907)^[17]

November 8

– Alexandru Talex, Romanian journalist, critic and biographer (born 1909)

November 17

– William Gaddis, American novelist (born 1922)

December 16

: José Saramago

Nobel Prize for Literature

: Luca Ronconi

Europe Theatre Prize

: Antonio Candido