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.

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
 * 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
 * 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
 * Ruth Park – The Muddle-Headed Wombat on a Rainy Day
 * Gary Paulsen – Mr. Tucket (first in Mr. Tucket series)
 * Bill Peet – Fly Homer Fly
 * 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
 * Peter Geach – God and the Soul
 * 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
 * Kate Millett – Sexual Politics
 * 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 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
 * Adrian Goldsworthy, Welsh military historian and novelist
 * 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