2005 in literature

The year 2005 in literature involved some significant events and new books.

Events

• February 25 - Canada Reads selects Rockbound by Frank Parker Day as the novel to be read across the nation.
• 400th anniversary of Cervantes' publication of the first part of Don Quixote.

New prose fiction books

• Tariq Ali - A Sultan in Palermo
• Rajaa Alsanea - Banat al-Riyadh
• Avi - Never Mind
• John Banville - The Sea
• Sebastian Barry - A Long Long Way
• Nelson Bond - Other Worlds Than Ours
• Dionne Brand, What We All Long For
• Orson Scott Card - Magic Street and Shadow of the Giant
• Rita Chowdhury - Deo Langkhui
• Wendy Coakley-Thompson - What You Won't Do for Love
• Eoin Colfer - Artemis Fowl: The Opal Deception
• Bernard Cornwell - The Pale Horseman
• Colin Cotterill - Thirty-Three Teeth
• Robert Crais - The Forgotten Man
• Michael Cunningham - Specimen Days
• Lindsey Davis - See Delphi and Die
• Abha Dawesar - Babyji
• L. Sprague de Camp - Years in the Making: the Time-Travel Stories of L. Sprague de Camp
• Troy Denning - The Joiner King, The Swarm War and The Unseen Queen
• Bret Easton Ellis - Lunar Park
• Alicia Erian - Towelhead
• Sebastian Faulks - Human Traces
• Amanda Filipacchi - Love Creeps
• Nicci French - Catch Me When I Fall
• Gayleen Froese - Touch
• David Gibbins - Atlantis
• Joanne Harris - Gentlemen & Players
• Carl Hiaasen - Flush
• Charlie Higson - SilverFin
• John Irving - Until I Find You
• Kazuo Ishiguro - Never Let Me Go
• Uzodinma Iweala - Beasts of No Nation
• Raymond Khoury - The Last Templar
• Stephen King - The Colorado Kid
• Dean Koontz - Velocity
• Stieg Larsson - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
• Marina Lewycka - A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian
• James Luceno - Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader and Labyrinth of Evil
• Stephenie Meyer - Twilight
• Ian McEwan - Saturday
• Gregory Maguire - Son of a Witch
• Gabriel Garcia Marquez - Memories of My Melancholy Whores
• David Michaels - Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Operation Barracuda
• Robert Muchamore - Maximum Security (novel) and The Killing (novel)
• Péter Nádas - Parallel Stories
• Chuck Palahniuk - Haunted
• Christopher Paolini - Eldest
• Robert B. Parker - School Days
• Ruth Rendell - End in Tears
• J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• Salman Rushdie - Shalimar the Clown
• Darren Shan - Lord Loss (first of The Demonata series)
• Michael Slade - Swastika
• Lemony Snicket - The Penultimate Peril
• David Southwell - Secrets and Lies
• Olen Steinhauer - 36 Yalta Boulevard
• Matthew Stover - Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
• Thomas Sullivan - Second Soul
• Jean-François Susbielle - La Morsure du dragon
• Rupert Thomson - Divided Kingdom
• Harry Turtledove, editor - The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp
• Andrew Vachss - Two Trains Running
• Michal Viewegh - Lekce tvůrčího psaní
• David Weber - At All Costs
• Samantha Weinberg - The Moneypenny Diaries: Guardian Angel
• Garth Nix - Drowned Wednesday
• Kirby Wright - Punahou Blues
• Catherynne M. Valente - Yume No Hon: The Book of Dreams

New drama

• Catherine Filloux - Lemkin's House
• Oleg Kagan - The Black Hat
• Carlos Lacamara - Nowhere on the Border
• The Los Angeles Theatre Ensemble - Wounded
• Vern Thiessen - Shakespeare's Will
• Vincent Woods - A Cry from Heaven

Non-fiction

• Joan Didion - The Year of Magical Thinking
• Tony Judt - Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945
• Jung Chang & Jon Halliday - Mao: The Unknown Story
• Jared Diamond - Collapse
• John Grogan - Marley & Me
• Alexander Masters - Stuart: A Life Backwards
• Azadeh Moaveni - Lipstick Jihad
• Peter C. Newman - The Secret Mulroney Tapes: Unguarded Confessions of a Prime Minister
• Masamune Shirow - Ghost in the Shell 2: Man/Machine Interface
• James B. Stewart - DisneyWar
• Từ điển Bách khoa toàn thư Việt Nam (encyclopedia)
• Binod Bihari Verma - Vedmurti Taponishth SriRam Sharma Acharya Biography of Shriram Sharma Acharya
• Theodore Dalrymple - Our Culture, What's Left of It: The Mandarins and the Masses

Poetry

Deaths

• January 7 - Pierre Daninos, French novelist (born 1913)
• January 14 - Charlotte MacLeod, American mystery writer (born 1922)
• January 15
  • Elizabeth Janeway, American feminist author (born 1913)
  • Walter Ernsting, German science fiction author (born 1920)
• January 19 - K. Sello Duiker, South African novelist (born 1974) (suicide)
• January 21 - Theun de Vries, Dutch writer and poet (born 1907)
• January 24 - Vladimir Savchenko, Ukrainian science fiction writer (born 1933)
• January 25 - Max Velthuijs, Dutch writer and illustrator
• January 29 - Ephraim Kishon, Israeli satirist, dramatist, and screenwriter (born 1924)
• February 10 - Arthur Miller, American playwright (born 1915)
• February 11 - Jack L. Chalker, American science fiction writer (born 1944)
• February 20 - Hunter S. Thompson, American writer, creator of Gonzo journalism (born 1937)
• February 21 - Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Cuban novelist (born 1929)
• February 25 - Phoebe Hesketh, British poet (born 1909)
• March 7 - Willis Hall, English playwright (born 1929)
• March 8 - Anna Haycraft, English novelist (born 1932)
• March 17 - Andre Norton, American science fiction writer (born 1912)
• March 22 - Anthony Creighton, English playwright (born 1922)
• March 30 - Robert Creeley, American poet (born 1926)
• April 5 - Saul Bellow, Canadian writer (born 1915)
• April 7 - Yvonne Vera, Zimbabwean novelist (born 1964) (meningitis)
• April 26 - Augusto Roa Bastos, Paraguayan novelist (born 1917)
• May 7 - Tristan Egolf, American novelist (born 1971) (suicide)
• June 9 - Hovis Presley, English poet (born 1960) (heart attack)
• June 14 - Norman Levine, Canadian short story writer (born 1923)
• June 16 - Enrique Laguerre, Puerto Rican novelist (born 1905)
• June 20 - Larry Collins, American novelist (born 1929)
• June 22 - William Donaldson, English satirist (born 1935)
• June 27 - Shelby Foote, American novelist (born 1916)
• June 28 - Philip Hobsbaum, Scottish poet and critic (born 1932)
• June 30 - Christopher Fry, English dramatist (born 1907)
• July 6
  • Claude Simon, French Nobel laureate in literature (born 1913)
  • Evan Hunter, American novelist (born 1926)
• July 7 - Gustaf Sobin, American poet (born 1935)
• July 17 - Gavin Lambert, English novelist and biographer (born 1924)
• July 19 - Edward Bunker, American crime writer (born 1933)
• August 9 - Judith Rossner, American novelist (born 1935)
• August 21 - Dahlia Ravikovitch, Israeli poet (born 1936)
• August 29 - Sybil Marshall, English novelist (born 1913)
• September 3 - R. S. R. Fitter, English nature writer (born 1913)
• September 26 - Helen Cresswell, English children's writer (born 1934)
• September 27
  • Mary Lee Settle, American novelist (born 1918)
  • Ronald Pearsall, English writer (born 1927)
• October 2 - August Wilson, American playwright (born 1945)
• October 17 - Ba Jin, Chinese novelist (born 1904)
• November 1 - Michael Thwaites, Australian poet (born 1915)
• November 2 - Gordon A. Craig, Scottish historian
• November 3 - Robert Waller, English poet, (born 1913)
• November 4 - Michael G. Coney, Canadian science-fiction writer (born 1932)
• November 5 - John Fowles, English writer (born 1926)
• November 26 - Stan Berenstain, American children's writer and illustrator (born 1923)
• December 1 - Mary Hayley Bell, dramatist
• December 2 - Christine Pullein-Thompson, English novelist (born 1925)
• December 9 - Robert Sheckley, American short story writer (born 1928)
• December 15 - Julián Marías, Spanish philosopher and author (born 1914)
• December 16 - Kenneth Bulmer, English novelist and short story writer (born 1921)

Awards

• Nobel Prize in Literature: Harold Pinter

Australia

• The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Andrew T. O'Connor, Tuvalu
• C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry: M. T. C. Cronin, <More Or Less Than>1-100
• Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Samuel Wagan Watson, Smoke Encrypted Whispers
• Miles Franklin Award: Andrew McGahan, The White Earth

Canada

• Governor General's Award for English language fiction: David Gilmour, A Perfect Night to Go to China
• Griffin Poetry Prize: Roo Borson, Short Journey Upriver Towards Oishida and Charles Simic, Selected Poems: 1963-2003
• Hugo Award for Best Novel: Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
• Scotiabank Giller Prize: David Bergen, The Time in Between

United Kingdom

• Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Mal Peet, Tamar
• Cholmondeley Award: Jane Duran, Christopher Logue, M.R. Peacocke, Neil Rollinson
• Commonwealth Writers Prize: Andrea Levy, Small Island
• Dagger of Daggers: John le Carré, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1963)
• Eric Gregory Award: Melanie Challenger, Carolyn Jess, Luke Kennard, Jaim Smith
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Sue Prideaux, Edvard Munch: Behind the Scream
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Ian McEwan, Saturday
• Man Booker International Prize: Ismail Kadare
• Man Booker Prize: John Banville, The Sea
• Samuel Johnson Prize: Jonathan Coe, Like A Fiery Elephant: The Story of BS Johnson
• Orange Prize for Fiction: Lionel Shriver, We Need to Talk About Kevin
• Somerset Maugham Award: Justin Hill, Passing Under Heaven; Maggie O'Farrell, The Distance Between Us
• Whitbread Book of the Year Award: Hilary Spurling, Matisse the Master: The Conquest of Colour 1909-1954

United States

• Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry: B.H. Fairchild
• Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Rick Hilles, Brother Salvage: Poems
• Arthur Rense Prize: Daniel Hoffman
• Bollingen Prize for Poetry: Jay Wright
• Brittingham Prize in Poetry: Susanna Childress, Jagged with Love
• Compton Crook Award: Tamara Siler Jones, Ghosts in the Snow
• Frost Medal: Marie Ponsot
• Hugo Award: Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
• National Book Award for Poetry: W.S. Merwin, Migration: New and Selected Poems
• Newbery Medal: Cynthia Kadohata, Kira-Kira
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: John Patrick Shanley, Doubt: A Parable
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Marilynne Robinson, Gilead
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Ted Kooser, Delights & Shadows
• Wallace Stevens Award: Gerald Stern
• Whiting Writers' Awards:

Fiction: Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, Nell Freudenberger, Seth Kantner, John Keene (fiction/poetry)

Plays: Rinne Groff

Poetry: Thomas Sayers Ellis, Ilya Kaminsky, John Keene (fiction/poetry), Dana Levin, Spencer Reece, Tracy K. Smith

• Wordcraft Writer of the Year Award for Poetry: Allison Hedge Coke, Off-Season City Pipe

Elsewhere

• International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award: Edward P. Jones - The Known World
• Commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres: Patti Smith

See also

• List of years in literature
• Literature
• Poetry
• List of literary awards
• List of poetry awards
• 2005 in Australian literature