1972 in literature

The year 1972 in literature involved some significant events and new books.

New prose fiction

• Richard Adams - Watership Down
• Jorge Amado - Teresa Batista Cansada da Guerra (Tereza Batista: Home from the Wars)
• Martin Amis - The Rachel Papers
• Isaac Asimov - The Gods Themselves
• Italo Calvino - Invisible Cities
• Taylor Caldwell - Captains and the Kings
• John Dickson Carr - The Hungry Goblin: A Victorian Detective Novel
• Angela Carter - The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman
• Agatha Christie - Elephants Can Remember
• Brian Cleeve - Tread Softly in this Place
• Roald Dahl - Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator
• Robertson Davies - The Manticore
• R. F. Delderfield - To Serve Them All My Days
• Frederick Forsyth - The Odessa File
• Günter Grass - Aus dem Tagebuch einer Schnecke - (From the Diary of a Snail)
• Graham Greene - The Honorary Consul
• Peter Handke - A Sorrow Beyond Dreams
• James Herriot - All Creatures Great and Small
• Georgette Heyer - Lady of Quality
• George V. Higgins - The Friends of Eddie Coyle
• P. D. James - An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
• Dan Jenkins - Semi-Tough
• Thomas Keneally - The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith
• Oe Kenzaburo - The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away
• Carl Jacobi - Disclosures in Scarlet
• Ira Levin - The Stepford Wives
• Frank Belknap Long - The Rim of the Unknown
• Robert Ludlum - The Osterman Weekend
• John D. MacDonald - The Scarlet Ruse
• David McCullough - The Great Bridge
• Barry N. Malzberg - Beyond Apollo
• Vladimir Nabokov - Transparent Things
• Chaim Potok - My Name is Asher Lev
• Mary Renault - The Persian Boy
• Tom Sharpe - Indecent Exposure
• Arkady and Boris Strugatsky - Roadside Picnic
• Paul Theroux - Saint Jack
• Hunter S. Thompson - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
• Irving Wallace - The Word

Non-fiction

• Jacob Bronowski - The Ascent of Man
• L. Sprague de Camp - Great Cities of the Ancient World
• L. Sprague de Camp and Catherine Crook de Camp - Darwin and His Great Discovery'
• Carlos Castaneda - Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan
• Nena and George O'Neill - Open Marriage: A New Life Style for Couples^[1]
• Frances Yates - The Rosicrucian Enlightenment.
• John Howard Yoder - The Politics of Jesus

Drama

• Alan Ayckbourn - Absurd Person Singular
• Vijay Tendulkar - Ghashiram Kotwal
• Vijay Tendulkar - Sakharam Binder

Births

• January 1 - Maile Meloy
• February 11 - Noboru Yamaguchi
• September 6 - China Miéville

Deaths

• February 15 - Edgar Snow, journalist
• March 4 - Richard Church, poet and novelist^[2]
• March 9 - Violet Trefusis, English writer and lover of Vita Sackville-West
• March 11 - Fredric Brown, science fiction and mystery author
• April 10 - Laurence Manning, science fiction author
• May 22 - Cecil Day-Lewis, Poet Laureate
• June 24 - R. F. Delderfield, novelist and historian
• August 22 - Ernestine Hill, travel writer
• September 21 - Henry de Montherlant, essayist
• September 27 - S. R. Ranganathan, influential librarian
• November 1 - Ezra Pound, poet
• December 10 - Mark Van Doren, poet
• December 13 - L. P. Hartley, novelist
• December 23 - Abraham Joshua Heschel, theologian

Awards

• Nobel Prize for Literature: Heinrich Böll

Canada

• See 1972 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

France

• Prix Goncourt: Jean Carrière, L'Epervier de Maheux
• Prix Médicis French: Maurice Clavel, Le Tiers des étoiles

United Kingdom

• Booker Prize: John Berger, G.
• Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Richard Adams, Watership Down
• Cholmondeley Award: Molly Holden, Tom Raworth, Patricia Whittaker
• Eric Gregory Award: Tony Curtis, Richard Burns, Brian Oxley, Andrew Greig, Robin Lee, Paul Muldoon
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: John Berger, G
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Quentin Bell, Virginia Woolf

United States

• American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for the novel, Eudora Welty
• Hugo Award: Philip José Farmer, To Your Scattered Bodies Go
• Nebula Award: Isaac Asimov, The Gods Themselves
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Robert C. O'Brien, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Not awarded
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Wallace Stegner - Angle of Repose
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: James Wright, Collected Poems

Elsewhere

• Premio Nadal: José María Carrascal, Grrovy
• Viareggio Prize: Romano Bilenchi, Il bottone di Stalingrado

Other events

This section is empty. You can help by adding to it.

References