1909 in literature

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The year 1909 in literature involved some significant new books.

Events

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New books

• L. Frank Baum - The Road to Oz
  • - Aunt Jane's Nieces at Work (as "Edith Van Dyne")
• André Billy - La Derive
• René Boylesve - La Jeune Fille bien élevée
• Hall Caine - The White Prophet
• Gilbert Cannan - Peter Homunculus
• Ion Luca Caragiale - Kir Ianulea
• Herbert Croly - The Promise of American Life
• Charles Hoy Fort - The Outcast Manufacturers
• Anatole France - Balthazar
• Jacques Futrelle - Elusive Isabel
• John Galsworthy - Fraternity
• Jack London - Martin Eden
• John Masefield - Multitude and Solitude
• Silas Weir Mitchell - The Red City
• Lucy Maud Montgomery - Anne of Avonlea
• Baroness Orczy -The Nest of the Sparrowhawk
  • - The Old Man In the Corner
• Gertrude Stein - Three Lives
• Gene Stratton-Porter - A Girl of the Limberlost
• Hermann Sudermann - The Song of Songs
• Robert Walser &- Jakob von Gunten
• Mary Augusta Ward - Daphne
• H.G. Wells - Ann Veronica
  • - Tono-Bungay

New drama

• John Galsworthy - Strife
• Ferenc Molnár - Liliom
• George Bernard Shaw - The Shewing-up Of Blanco Posnet

Poetry

• Guillaume Apollinaire — L'Enchanteur Pourrissant
• François Mauriac — Les Mains Jointes (Clasped Hands)
• John Millington Synge — Poems and Translations

Non-fiction

• Henry James - Italian Hours
• William James - A Pluralistic Universe
• Charlotte Fell Smith - John Dee: 1527-1608

Births

• January 29 - Phoebe Hesketh, British poet (died 2005)
• February 24 - August Derleth, anthologist (died 1971)
• February 15 - Miep Gies, Anne Frank friend, biographer
• March 22 - Gabrielle Roy, French Canadian author (died 1983)
• March 28 - Nelson Algren, novelist (died 1981)
• March 31 - Robert Brasillach, French author (died 1945)
• April 8 - John Fante, novelist (died 1983)
• May 1 - Yiannis Ritsos, Greek poet (died 1990)
• May 5 - Miklós Radnóti, a Hungarian poet (died 1944)
• May 9 - Robert Garioch, poet (died 1981)
• June 6 - Sir Isaiah Berlin, philosopher (died 1997)
• June 19 - Osamu Dazai, Japanese author (died 1948)
• June 28 - Eric Ambler, novelist (died 1998)
• July 1 – Juan Carlos Onetti, Uruguayan writer (died 1994)
• July 17 - G. P. Wells, son and co-author of H. G. Wells (died 1985)
• July 28 - Malcolm Lowry, British novelist (died 1957)
• July 30 - C. Northcote Parkinson, British historian and author (died 1993)
• August 3 - Walter Van Tilburg Clark, novelist (died 1971)
• August 19 - Jerzy Andrzejewski, Polish author (died 1983)
• November 26 - Eugène Ionesco, Romanian and French playwright (died 1994)

Deaths

• January 14 - Arthur William à Beckett, journalist (born 1844)
• February 11 - Russell Sturgis, art critic (born 1836)
• March 24 - John Millington Synge, dramatist and poet (born 1871)
• March 27 (probable) - John Davidson, poet (born 1857)
• April 9 - Francis Marion Crawford, novelist (born 1854)
• April 9 - Paschal Grousset, journalist and science fiction writer (born 1844)
• April 12 - Algernon Charles Swinburne, British poet (born 1837)
• April 26 - Marcus Dods, theologian (born 1834)
• May 18 - George Meredith, novelist and poet (born 1828)
• June 11 - Jacob Gordin, dramatist (born 1853)
• July 8 - Albert Craig, "The Surrey Poet", cricket writer (born 1850)
• August 21 - George Cabot Lodge, poet (born 1873)
• August 23 - Liu E, novelist (born 1857)
• October 24 - Henry Charles Lea, historian (born 1825)
• December 14 - Frederick Greenwood, journalist (born 1830)
• date unknown
  • H. L. Fischer, translator (born 1822)

Awards

• Nobel Prize for Literature: Selma Lagerlöf
• Newdigate prize: Frank Ashton-Gwatkin