1950 in literature explained
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1950.
Events
- January 19 – Isaac Asimov's first full-length novel, Pebble in the Sky, is published in the United States by Doubleday.[1]
- January 26 – For the film noir Gun Crazy, released on this day in the United States, co-writer Dalton Trumbo is billed as Millard Kaufman, due to the former's inclusion on the Hollywood blacklist. This year Trumbo serves 11 months in prison for Contempt of Congress, in the federal penitentiary in Ashland, Kentucky.
- February – Jack Kerouac has his first novel, The Town and the City, published in the United States.
- April 8 – J. D. Salinger's wartime short story "For Esmé — with Love and Squalor" is published in The New Yorker.
- May 11 – Eugène Ionesco's first play, The Bald Soprano is first performed, in Paris.
- September 10 – George Bernard Shaw is taken to hospital after fracturing a hip falling out of a tree he was pruning.[2] He is released from hospital a few weeks later after a successful operation, but suffers kidney failure and dies at his home, Shaw's Corner (Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire, England), aged 94.
- October – Galaxy Science Fiction magazine launches in the United States.
- October 2 – The daily comic strip Peanuts, by Charles M. Schulz, makes its debut in nine United States newspapers.
- October 16 – C. S. Lewis's children's portal allegorical fantasy novel The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, illustrated by Pauline Baynes, is published by Geoffrey Bles in London, first of the seven-book The Chronicles of Narnia.[3]
- December 20 – Poet T. S. Eliot expresses concerns about "the television habit" in a letter to The Times (London).[4]
- unknown dates
New books
Fiction
Children and young people
Drama
Poetry
Non-fiction
Births
- January 5 – Valentina Tăzlăuanu, Moldovan essayist, journalist and theatre critic (died 2020)
- January 17 – Luis López Nieves, Puerto Rican writer
- January 19 – Will Weaver, American author
- January 20 – Edward Hirsch, American poet
- January 22 – Paul Bew, Irish historian and academic
- January 24 – Benjamin Urrutia, Ecuadorian author and scholar
- January 25 – Gloria Naylor, African-American novelist and academic (died 2016)
- February 11 – Mauri Kunnas, Finnish children's author
- February 20 – Jean-Paul Dubois, French novelist and journalist
- February 26
-
- March 17 – Peter Robinson, British-born Canadian novelist (died 2022)
- March 19 – Kirsten Boie, German children's writer
- March 23 – Ahdaf Soueif, Egyptian novelist
- April 20 – Steve Erickson, American novelist
- May 1 – Aldino Muianga, Mozambican physician and writer
- May 27 – Alex Gray, Scottish crime writer
- June 21 – Anne Carson, Canadian poet and scholar
- June 25 – Barbara Gowdy, Canadian novelist
- July 3 – Zhang Kangkang (张抗抗), Chinese writer
- July 22 – Susan Eloise Hinton, American novelist
- August 9 – Nicole Tourneur, French novelist (died 2011)
- August 26 – Carl Deuker, American author
- September 7 – Peggy Noonan, American columnist, political writer
- September 16 – Henry Louis Gates, American literary critic
- September 20 – James Blaylock, American fantasy author
- September 28 – Christina Hoff Sommers, American author and philosopher[10]
- October 10 – Nora Roberts, American novelist
- October 12 – Edward Bloor, American novelist
- October 15 – Teresa Amy, Uruguayan poet and translator (died 2017)
- October 17 – David Adams Richards, Canadian author
- October 18 – Wendy Wasserstein, American playwright (died 2006)
- October 27 – Fran Lebowitz, American writer
- November 3 – Massimo Mongai, Italian author
- November 4 – Charles Frazier, American novelist
- December 18 – Leonard Maltin, American film critic and historian
- December 20 – Sheenagh Pugh, English-born poet and novelist
- December 30 – Timothy Mo, Hong Kong British novelist
- unknown dates
Deaths
- January 5 – Basil Williams, English historian (born 1867)
- January 8 – Joseph Schumpeter, Austrian/American political economist (born 1883)
- January 21 – George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair), English novelist (tuberculosis, born 1903)[12]
- February 7 – D. K. Broster, English historical novelist (born 1877)
- February 13 – Rafael Sabatini, Italian-born English-language novelist (born 1875)
- February 24 – Irving Bacheller, American journalist and novelist (born 1859)
- March 5 – Edgar Lee Masters, American poet (born 1868)
- March 11 – Heinrich Mann, German novelist (born 1871)
- March 19 – Edgar Rice Burroughs, American author (born 1875)
- March 22 – Emmanuel Mounier, French philosopher, journalist and theologian (born 1905)
- circa March 30 – Henric Streitman, Romanian essayist and journalist (born 1870)[13]
- April 1 – F. O. Matthiessen, American historian and literary critic (born 1902)
- April 4 – Cuthbert Whitaker, English yearbook editor (born 1873)[14]
- April 8 – Albert Ehrenstein, Austrian Expressionist poet (born 1886)
- April 27 – H. Bonciu, Romanian novelist, poet and translator (cancer, born 1893)
- May 6 – Agnes Smedley, American journalist and writer (born 1892)
- May 8 – Cezaro Rossetti, Scottish-born Esperanto writer (born 1901)
- May 10 – Belle da Costa Greene, American librarian (born 1883)[15]
- May 11 – Alfred O. Andersson, English-born American journalist and newspaper publisher (born 1874)
- June 4 – George Cecil Ives, German-born English poet, writer and reformer (born 1867)
- June 14 – Katharine Glasier, English writer and socialist (born 1867)
- July 7 – Guy Gilpatric, American short story writer (suicide, born 1896)
- August 27 – Cesare Pavese, Italian poet and novelist (born 1908)
- September 6 – Olaf Stapledon, English philosopher and science fiction writer (heart attack, born 1886)
- September 18 – Henrik Rytter, Norwegian dramatist, lyricist and translator (born 1887)
- October 9 – Nicolai Hartmann, German-Latvian philosopher (born 1882)
- October 19 – Edna St. Vincent Millay, American poet (heart attack, born 1892)
- October 31 – Herbert Kelly, English religious writer and cleric (born 1860)
- November 2 – George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist, critic and activist (born 1856)
- November 25 – Johannes V. Jensen, Danish author (born 1873)
- December 28 – Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky, Soviet short-story writer (born 1887)
- December 31 – Xavier Villaurrutia, Mexican poet and dramatist (born 1903)
- unknown dates
Awards
Marguerite de Angeli, The Door in the Wall
John Bayley
Bertrand Russell
Elena Quiroga, Viento del norte
Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, Joshua Logan, South Pacific
A. B. Guthrie Jr., The Way West
Gwendolyn Brooks, Annie Allen (first African American winner)
Notes and References
- Book: Isaac Asimov . Pebble in the Sky . 1957 . Bantam Books.
- Web site: George Bernard Shaw treated in Luton after tree fall . https://archive.today/20130420111312/http://www.dunstabletoday.co.uk/community/nostalgia/george-bernard-shaw-treated-in-luton-after-tree-fall-1-3686051 . dead . April 20, 2013 . Dunstable Today . 2012-03-31 . 2013-04-11 .
- Web site: Lucy Barfield: The Real Lucy of Narnia. Into the Wardrobe . 27 May 2006 . 2010-10-04.
- Book: Asa Briggs. The History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom: Volume V: Competition. 23 March 1995. OUP Oxford. 978-0-19-215964-9. 57.
- Book: Andrej Kodjak . Alexander Solzhenitsyn . 1978 . Twayne Publishers . 978-0-8057-6320-1 . 11–18.
- Book: Graham, Malcolm . On foot from Broad Street . Oxford Preservation Trust . 2014 . 978-0-9576797-1-9 . 18.
- Book: Richard Hawking . At The Field's Edge: Adrian Bell and the English Countryside. 22 April 2019 . Crowood . 978-0-7198-2907-9 . 211.
- Book: S. T. Joshi. John Dickson Carr: A Critical Study. 1990. Popular Press. 978-0-87972-477-1. 182.
- Book: Kynaston, David . David Kynaston . Austerity Britain 1945–1951 . London . Bloomsbury . 2007 . 978-0-7475-7985-4.
- Book: Rosenstand, Nina. The Moral of the Story: An Introduction to Ethics. November 20, 2003. McGraw-Hill. 9780767429108. Google Books.
- Book: Michelle Kazensky . The Writers Directory 2008 . June 2007 . Thomson Gale . 978-1-55862-600-3 . 1670.
- News: George Orwell, Author, 46, Dead. British Writer, Acclaimed for His '1984' and 'Animal Farm,' is Victim of Tuberculosis. Two Novels Popular Here, Distaste for Imperialism . . 22 January 1950.
- News: H. St. Streitman, jurnalist-pensionar. Adevărul. 1950-03-31. 2.
- Book: The Illustrated London News. April 1960. Illustrated London News & Sketch Limited. 570.
- Web site: Belle da Costa Greene American librarian and bibliographer . Encyclopedia Britannica . 13 July 2020 . en.
