1983 in literature

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This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1983.

EventsEdit

April – The Russian samizdat poet Irina Ratushinskaya is sentenced to imprisonment in a labor camp for dissident activity. While there she continues to write poetry clandestinely.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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June 2 – The Francophone Senegalese poet and politician Léopold Sédar Senghor becomes the first black African writer elected as a member of the Académie française.
July – Barbara Cartland, who reaches the age of 82, writes 23 romantic novels this year.
November – Bruce Bethke's short story "Cyberpunk", written in 1980, is published in Amazing Stories magazine in the United States, giving a name to the science fiction subgenre of cyberpunk.
unknown date – Salvage for the Saint by Peter Bloxsom and John Kruse is published, as the final book in a series of novels, novellas and short stories featuring the Leslie Charteris creation "The Saint", which started in 1928. (An attempt to revive the series in 1997 is unsuccessful.)

New booksEdit

FictionEdit

Nelson Algren (posthumous) – The Devil's Stocking
Isaac Asimov – The Robots of Dawn
Greg Bear – The Wind from a Burning Woman
Samuel Beckett – Worstward Ho<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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Thomas Bernhard – The Loser (Der Untergeher)
Jorge Luis Borges – Shakespeare's Memory (La memoria de Shakespeare, short stories)
Marion Zimmer Bradley – The Mists of Avalon
Morley Callaghan – A Time for Judas
Raymond Carver – Cathedral
J. M. Coetzee – Life and Times of Michael K
Jackie Collins – Hollywood Wives
Basil Copper – The House of the Wolf
Bernard Cornwell
- Sharpe's Sword
- Sharpe's Enemy
Bernard and Judy Cornwell (as Susannah Kells) – A Crowning Glory
György Dalos – 1985
L. Sprague de Camp
- The Reluctant King
- The Unbeheaded King
Jim Dodge – Fup
Stephen R. Donaldson – White Gold Wielder: Book Three of The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant
Nora Ephron – Heartburn
Ken Follett – On Wings of Eagles
Ernest J. Gaines – A Gathering of Old Men
John Gardner – Icebreaker
Mark Helprin – Winter's Tale
Susan Hill – The Woman in Black
Elizabeth Jolley – Woman in a Lamp Shade
Ernst Jünger – Aladdin's Problem
William Kennedy – Ironweed
Stephen King
- Christine
- Pet Sematary
Dean R. Koontz – Phantoms
Louis L'Amour – The Lonesome Gods
Derek Lambert – The Judas Code
John le Carré – The Little Drummer Girl<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Mary Mackey – The Last Warrior Queen
Norman Mailer – Ancient Evenings
James A. Michener – Poland
R. K. Narayan – A Tiger for Malgudi
Robert B. Parker – The Widening Gyre
Ellis Peters
- The Sanctuary Sparrow
- The Devil's Novice
Tim Powers – The Anubis Gates
Terry Pratchett – The Colour of Magic
Salman Rushdie – Shame
Joanna Russ – The Zanzibar Cat
Danielle Steel – Changes
Peter Straub – Floating Dragon
Walter Tevis – The Queen's Gambit
Gore Vidal – Duluth
Evangeline Walton – The Sword Is Forged
Fay Weldon – The Life and Loves of a She-Devil
A. N. Wilson – Scandal
Robert Anton Wilson – Prometheus Rising
Christa Wolf – Cassandra (Kassandra)
Roger Zelazny – Unicorn Variations (stories and essays)

Children and young peopleEdit

Chris Van Allsburg – The Wreck of the Zephyr
Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (with Willi Glasauer) – Beauty and the Beast
Roald Dahl – The Witches
Lynley Dodd – Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy (first of the Hairy Maclary and Friends series)
Mem Fox – Possum Magic
Dick King-Smith – The Sheep-Pig (also as Babe, the Gallant Pig)
Harold Lamb (with George Barr and Alicia Austin) - The Sea of the Ravens
Jean Giono (with Willi Glasauer) – The Man Who Planted Trees
Julian F. Thompson - The Grounding of Group 6

DramaEdit

Samuel Beckett – Nacht und Träume (television play, first broadcast)
Ray Cooney – Run for Your Wife
David Mamet – Glengarry Glen Ross
Tom Murphy – The Gigli Concert
Christina Reid – Tea in a China Cup
Larry Shue – The Foreigner
Neil Simon – Brighton Beach Memoirs
Botho Strauß – The Park (Der Park)

PoetryEdit

Paul Durcan – Jumping the Train Tracks with Angela
Grace Nichols – I is a long-memoried woman

Non-fictionEdit

Benedict Anderson – Imagined Communities
Pascal Bruckner – The Tears of the White Man
L. Sprague de Camp – The Fringe of the Unknown
L. Sprague de Camp, Catherine Crook de Camp and Jane Whittington Griffin – Dark Valley Destiny
Tom Dardis – Harold Lloyd: The Man on the Clock
Joan Didion – Salvador
Terry Eagleton – Literary Theory: An Introduction
Anthony Grey – The Prime Minister Was a Spy
Susan Oliver – Odyssey: A Daring Transatlantic Journey
Renée Richards – Second Serve: The Renée Richards Story
Colin Thubron – Among the Russians
A. N. Wilson – The Life of John Milton: A Biography

BirthsEdit

November 17 – Christopher Paolini, American fantasy novelist<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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December 6 – Jason Reynolds, African American children's novelist and poet<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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unknown date – Sarah Howe, Hong Kong-born poet writing in English<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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DeathsEdit

January 5 – Chapman Grant, American historian and publisher (born 1887)
January 18 – Colin Watson, English crime fiction writer (born 1920)
February 14 – Brita von Horn, Swedish theater director, dramatist and novelist (born 1886)
February 18 – Robert Payne, English author, poet and biographer (born 1911)
February 25 – Tennessee Williams (Thomas Lanier Williams III), American playwright (born 1911)
March 3 – Hergé (Georges Prosper Remi), Belgian comics creator (born 1907)
March 15 – Dame Rebecca West, British writer (born 1892)
April 12 – Desmond Bagley, English novelist (complications from stroke, born 1923))
May 4 – Shūji Terayama (寺山修司), Japanese poet, dramatist, and film director (cirrhosis, born 1935)
May 21 – Amal Abul-Qassem Donqol, Egyptian poet (born 1940)
May 26 – Jack Hilton, British writer (born 1900)
June 19 – Vilmundur Gylfason, Icelandic historian, poet and politician (suicide, born 1948)
June 27 – Alden Nowlan, Canadian poet, novelist and playwright (born 1933)
July 27 – Gladys Mitchell, English crime fiction writer (born 1901)
August 12 – Mikey Smith, Jamaican dub poet (stoned to death; born 1954)
August 18 – Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, German-born British art historian (born 1902)
September 15 – Beverley Nichols, English writer and playwright (born 1898)
September 16 – Roy Andries De Groot, English-born American food writer (born 1910)
November 30 – Richard Llewellyn, British novelist (heart attack, born 1906)
December 5 – John Robinson, English religious writer and bishop (born 1919)
December 13 – Mary Renault, British novelist (born 1905)
December 27 – Wilson Starbuck, American playwright and author (born 1897)