1989 in Australian literature

This article presents a list of the historical events and publications of Australian literature during 1989.

Events

 * Peter Carey won the Miles Franklin Award for Oscar and Lucinda

Novels

 * Jessica Anderson — Taking Shelter
 * Mena Calthorpe — The Plain of Ala
 * Bryce Courtenay — The Power of One
 * Tom Flood — Oceana Fine
 * Peter Goldsworthy — Maestro
 * Elizabeth Jolley — My Father's Moon
 * Tom Keneally — Towards Asmara
 * Amy Witting — I for Isobel

Short story anthologies

 * Liam Davison — The Shipwreck Party
 * Brian Matthews — Quickening and Other Stories

Crime and mystery

 * Kerry Greenwood — Cocaine Blues, the first in the Phryne Fisher series.
 * Jennifer Rowe — Murder by the Book

Science fiction and fantasy

 * Judith Clarke — The Boy on the Lake : Stories
 * Rosaleen Love — The Total Devotion Machine and Other Stories

Children's and young adult fiction

 * Graeme Base — The Eleventh Hour
 * Morris Gleitzman — Two Weeks with the Queen

Poetry

 * Robert Adamson — The Clean Dark
 * Dorothy Hewett — A Tremendous World in Her Head: Selected Poems
 * Dorothy Porter — Driving Too Fast
 * Peter Porter — Possible Worlds
 * Peter Skrzynecki — "Night Swim"

Drama

 * Nick Enright — Daylight Saving
 * Jenny Kemp — Call of the Wild
 * Peta Murray
 * Spitting Chips
 * Wallflowering
 * David Williamson — Top Silk

Non-fiction

 * Jill Ker Conway — The Road from Coorain
 * Adam Shoemaker — Black Words, White Page: Aboriginal Literature 1929-1988
 * Elisabeth Wynhausen — Manly Girls

Awards and honours

 * Mary Durack, for "service to the community and literature"
 * Les Murray (poet), for "service to Australian literature"
 * Thomas Shapcott, for "service to Australian literature and to arts administration"
 * Gwen Harwood, for "service to literature, particularly as a poet and librettist"
 * Max Harris (poet), for "service to literature"
 * Clement Semmler, for "service to Australian literature"
 * John Morrison (writer), for "service to literature"

Births
A list, ordered by date of birth (and, if the date is either unspecified or repeated, ordered alphabetically by surname) of births in 1989 of Australian literary figures, authors of written works or literature-related individuals follows, including year of death.
 * 2 June — Will Kostakis, author and journalist

Deaths
A list, ordered by date of death (and, if the date is either unspecified or repeated, ordered alphabetically by surname) of deaths in 1989 of Australian literary figures, authors of written works or literature-related individuals follows, including year of birth.
 * 3 June – Connie Christie, children's writer/illustrator, photographer and commercial artist (born 1908 in England)
 * 16 August – Donald Friend, artist and diarist (born 1914)