1954 in literature

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.
 * 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.
 * 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.
 * 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.
 * 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.

Fiction

 * Kingsley Amis – Lucky Jim
 * 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
 * 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
 * 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
 * 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)
 * 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)

Awards

 * Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Ronald Welch, Knight Crusader
 * 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
 * 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