Literary Hit Parade: 1930-1939
1930
Nobel Prize for Literature
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951), American
Appointed English Poet Laureate
John Masefield (1930-1967)
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction Laughing Boy, Oliver La Farge
Poetry Selected Poems, Conrad Aiken
Drama The Green Pastures, Marc Connelly, Opened at Mansfield Theatre, NY (all-black cast)
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. Cimarron, Edna Ferber 2. Exile, Warwick Deeping
Nonfiction 1. The Story of San Michele, Axel Munthe 2. The Strange Death of President Harding, Gaston B. Means & May Dixon Thacker
Other Notable Literary Events
Ash Wednesday, T. S. Eliot; The 42nd Parallel, 1st in U. S. A. trilogy, John Dos Passos; Poems, Early poetry collection by W. H. Auden; The Maltese Falcon, Dashiell Hammett; The Virgin and the Gipsy, D. H. Lawrence; Love Among the Haystacks, and Other Pieces (short stories) D. H. Lawrence; Nettles, The Triumph of the Machine, and Love Poems and Others (poems), D. H. Lawrence; Murder at the Vicarage (1st appearance of Jane Marple), Agatha Christie; Cakes and Ale, Somerset Maugham; Strong Poison (introducing Harriet Vane and Lord Peter Wimsey), Dorothy Sayers; 1066 and All That, comic version of English history, W. B. Sellar and R. Yeatman; Not Without Laughter (novel), Langston Hughes; East Wind, West Wind (1st novel), Pearl Buck; Whoroscope (poetry), Samuel Beckett; Fire for the Night (poetry), Babette Deutsch; Flowering Judas (short stories), Katherine Anne Porter; The Bridge (long poem), Hart Crane; Seven Types of Ambiguity (criticism), William Empson; Private Lives (comedy), Noel Coward; Elizabeth the Queen, Maxwell Anderson’s 1st blank verse play, opened at Guild Theatre, NY; Waterloo Bridge (play of wartime love), Robert Sherwood; Once in a Lifetime (comedy), Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, opened in NY.; Alison’s House, Susan Glaspell drama, opened at Eva LeGalliene’s Civic Repertory Theatre, NY.; The Last Mile, a tragedy by John Wexley, opened at Sam H. Harris Theatre , NY.; Green Grow the Lilacs, play by Lynn Riggs, basis for Oklahoma
Died
Arthur Conan Doyle, British writer (Creator of Sherlock Holmes) (b. 1859)
D. H. Lawrence (David Herbert), British writer (b. 1885)
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Soviet poet and playwright (b. 1893)
Jeppe Aakjaer, Danish poet and novelist (b. 1866)
Tayama Katai, Japanese novelist (b. 1871)
Raul Brandao, Portuguese novelist and playwright (b. 1867)
1931
Nobel Prize for Literature
Erik Axel Karlfeldt (1864-1931), Swedish (posthumously given)
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction Years of Grace, Margaret Ayer Barnes
Poetry Collected Poems, Robert Frost
Drama Alison’s House, Susan Glaspell
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. The Good Earth, Pearl S. Buck 2. Shadows on the Rock, Willa Cather 4. Grand Hotel, Vicki Baum 6. The Road Back, Erich Maria Remarque 8. Back Street, Fannie Hurst
Nonfiction 1. Education of a Princess, Grand Duchess Marie 2. The Story of San Michele, Axel Munthe
Other Notable Literary Events
Sanctuary, William Faulkner; Spektorsky (poetry), Boris Pasternak; Les Journees de Sodome, First publication (1931-1935) Marquis de Sade; From Feathers to Iron, C. Day Lewis; The Glass Key (mystery novel), Dashiell Hammett; Back Street, Fannie Hurst; Guests of the Nation, Frank O’Connor; Plagued by the Nightingale (novel), Kay Boyle; Yehuda (novel), Meyer Levin; God Without Thunder: An Unorthodox Defense of Orthodoxy (essays), John Crowe Ransom; Axel’s Castle (criticism), Edmund Wilson; Group Treatre organized by Harold Clurman, Lee Strasberg, and Cheryl Crawford (1931-1941); 1st production was The House of Connelly by Paul Green; Mourning Becomes Electra, Eugene O’Neill’s trilogy (Homecoming, The Hunted, and The Haunted), opened at the Guild Theatre, NY.; The Circle of Chalk, English version of Chinese play (ca. 1300), opened in London; The Barretts of Wimpole Street opened at Empire Theatre, NY.; Reunion in Vienna, play by Robert Sherwood, opened at Martin Beck Theatre, NY.; Of Thee I Sing, musical (book by George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind, lyrics by Ira Gershwin, music by George Gershwin), opened at Music Box Theatre, NY.; Fear, play—originally banned—by Alexander Afinogenov, opened at the State Dramatical Theatre, Leningrad, and the Moscow Art Theatre; Cavalcade, Noel Coward; Counsellor-at-Law (play), Elmer Rice, opened at Plymouth Theatre, NY; The Ermine (play), Jean Anouilh; The Left Bank, by Elmer Rice opened at Little Theatre, NY; Oedipus play Andre Gide
Died
Arnold Bennett, British writer (b. 1867)
Vachel Lindsay, American poet (b. 1879)
Ole Edvert Rolvaag, Norwegian-American writer (b. 1876)
Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese writer and artist (b. 1883)
Frank Harris (James Thomas Harris), Irish-American writer and editor (b. 1856)
Arthur Schnitzler, Austrian playwright (b. 1862)
David Belasco, American playwright, producer, and novelist (b. 1859)
Hjalmar Frederik Bergman, Swedish playwright and novelist (1883)
Tor Hedberg, Swedish playwright (b. 1862)
1932
Nobel Prize for Literature
John Galsworthy, (1867-1933) English
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction The Good Earth, Pearl Buck
Poetry The Flowering Stone, George Dillon
Drama Of Thee I Sing, George S. Kaufman, Morrie Ryskind, and Ira Gershwin
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. The Good Earth, Pearl S. Buck 2. The Fountain, Charles Morgan 3. Sons, Pearl S. Buck 5. The Sheltered Life, Ellen Glasgow 7. Mary’s Neck, Booth Tarkington 8. Magnificent Obsession, Lloyd C. Douglas 10. Three Loves, A. J. Cronin
Nonfiction 1. The Epic of America, James Truslow Adams 2. Only Yesterday, Frederick Lewis Allen 9. The Story of My Life, Clarence Darrow
Other Notable Literary Events
Brave New World, Aldous Huxley; Light in August, William Faulkner; Tobacco Road, Erskine Caldwell; 1919 (2nd in the U.S.A. triology), John Dos Passos; The Thin Man, Dashiell Hammett; Young Lonigan (1st of 3 Studs Lonigan novels), James Farrell; Jules Romains began his 27-novel series Men of Good Will (1932-1946); Mutiny on the Bounty, Charles Nordhoff and Norman Hall; Last Poems, D. H. Lawrence; Limits and Renewals (stories and poems), Rudyard Kipling; Midsummer Night Madness and Other Stories, Sean O’Faolain; Beyond Desire (novel), Sherwood Anderson; Rip Tide, William Rose Benet; Scrutiny, journal edited by F. R. Leavis (1932-1953); Dinner at Eight, play by George S. Kaufman and Edna Ferber, opened at Music Box Theatre, NY; Twentieth Century, Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur play, opened at Broadhurst Theatre, NY; Dangerous Corner (play), J. B. Priestley
Died
Charles W. Chesnutt, American author (b. 1858)
Hart Crane (Harold Hart Crane), American poet (b. 1899)
Giles Lytton Strachy, British writer (b. 1880)
Augusta, Lady Gregory, Irish Playwright (b. 1852)
Eugene Brieuz, French playwright (b. 1858)
Henri Gheon, French playwright (b. 1875)
1933
Nobel Prize for Literature
Ivan Gasse Bunin (1870-1953), French (Born in Russia)
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction The Store, T. S. Stribling
Poetry Conquistador, Archibald MacLeish
Drama Both Your Houses, Maxwell Anderson
History The Significance of Sections in American History, Frederick J. Turner
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. Anthony Adverse, Hervey Allen 2. As the Earth Turns, Gladys Hasty Carroll 3. Ann Vickers, Sinclair Lewis
Nonfiction 1. Life Begins at Forty, W. B. Pitkin
Other Notable Literary Events
The Shape of Things to Come (science fiction novel), H. G. Wells; Lost Horizon, James Hilton; The Case of the Velvet Claws (1st in series of Perry Mason mystery novels), Earle Stanley Gardner; The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, Gertrude Stein; God’s Little Acre, Erskine Caldwell; Down and Out in Paris and London (essays), George Orwell; Anthony Adverse, Hervey Allen; Miss Lonelyhearts, Nathanael West; Frescoes for Mr. Rockefeller’s City (poems),Archibald MacLeish; Banana Bottom, Claude McKay; Give Your Heart to the Hawks, and Other Poems, Robinson Jeffers; Poems, Stephen Spender; After Such Pleasures (short stories), Dorothy Parker; South Moon Under (novel), Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings; Design for Living, Noel Coward; Ah, Wilderness! Eugene O’Neill opened at Guild Theatre, NY; Tobacco Road, play based on Caldwell novel, by Jack Kirkland, Masque Theatre, NY; Mary of Scotland, Maxwell Anderson, opened at Alvin Theatre, NY; Blood Wedding, Frederico Garcia Lorca; The Dance of Death (play), W. H. Auden; Intermezzo (play), Jean Giraudoux
Died
John Galsworthy, British writer (b.1867)
Constantine Peter Cavafy, Greek poet (b. 1863)
George Moore, Irish novelist, playwright, poet, and critic (b. 1852)
Ring (Ringgold Wilmer) Lardner, American writer (b. 1885)
Anthony Hope Hawkins, English writer (b. 1863)
Sara Teasdale, American poet (b. 1884)
George Moore, Irish novelist and playwright (b. 1852)
Langdon Elwyn Mitchell, American poet and playwright (b. 1862)
Paul Kester, American playwright (b. 1870)
1934
Nobel Prize for Literature
Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936) Italian
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction Lamb in His Bosom, Caroline Miller
Poetry Collected Verse, Robert Hillyer
Drama Men in White, Sidney Kingsley (Opened in Group Theatre production in NY)
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. Anthony Adverse, Hervey Allen 2. Lamb in His Bosom, Caroline Miller 3. So Red the Rose, Stark Young 4. Good-Bye, Mr. Chips, James Hilton 110. Seven Gothic Tales, Isak Dinesen
Nonfiction 1. While Rome Burns, Alexander Woollcott 2. Life Begins at Forty, Walter B. Pitkin
Other Notable Literary Events
Tender Is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald; The Postman Always Rings Twice (first novel) by James M. Cain; Burmese Days (novel), George Orwell; I, Claudius, Robert Graves; Seven Gothic Tales (short stories), Isak Dinesen; Eighteen Poems, Dylan Thomas; Murder on the Orient Express, Agatha Christie; Goodbye, Mr. Chips, James Hilton; Men Against the Sea and Pitcairn’s Island, Charles Nordhoff and Norman Hall; Fer-de-Lance, 1st mystery novel by Rex Stout (introducing Nero Wolfe); The Young Manhood of Studs Lonigan (2nd of 3 Studs Lonigan novels), James Farrell; Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller; Appointment in Samarra, John O’Hara; An Exile’s Return (essays) Malcolm Cowley; Every Day Is Saturday (stories and poems), E. B. White; Lust for Life (fictional biography of painter Vincent Van Gogh), Irving Stone; Experiments in Autobiography H. G. Wells; Jonah’s Gourd Vine (novel), Zora Neale Hurston; Joseph and His Brothers (four-part novel, 1934-1942), Thomas Mann; More Pricks Than Kicks, Samuel Beckett; An Ordinary Life, Karel Capek; Voyage in the Dark, Jean Rhys; The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze (short stories), William Saroyan; The Children’s Hour, Lillian Hellman’s 1st play; The Farmer Takes a Wife, Frank B. Elser and Marc Connelly; Days without End, Eugene O’Neill; Merrily We Roll Along, George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart; Valley Forge, Maxwell Anderson opened at Guild Theatre, NY; The Infernal Machine, Jean Cocteau; Une Femme Libre, Armand Salacroou; Yerma, Frederico Garcia Lorca; Skutarevski, Leonid Maximovich Leonov; Thunderstorm, Wan Chia-pao; Within the Gates, Sean O’Casey
Died
Andrei Bely, Russian writer (b. 1880)
Hayim Nachman Bialik, Russian-Jewish poet (b. 1873)
Mary Austin, American writer (b. 1868)
Arthur Wing Pinero, English playwright and actor (b.1855)
Augustus Thomas, American playwright (b. 1857)
1935
Nobel Prize for Literature
No Award Given
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction Now in November, Josephine W. Johnson
Poetry Bright Ambush, Audrey Wurdemann
Drama The Old Maid, Zoe Akins (Opened at Empire Theatre, NY)
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. Green Light, Lloyd C. Douglas 2. Vein of Iron, Ellen Glasgow 3. Of Time and the River, Thomas Wolfe 8. Lost Horizon, James Hilton 9. Come and Get It, Edna Ferber
Nonfiction 1.North to the Orient, Anne Morrow Lindbergh 2. While Rome Burns, Alexander Woollcott 3. Life with Father, Clarence Day 5. Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T. E. Lawrence 9. R. E. Lee, Douglas Southall Freeman
Other Notable Literary Events
Le Temps du mepris (Days of Wrath), Andre Malraux; Butterfield 8, John O’Hara; The Stars Look Down, A. J. Cronin; Tortilla Flat, John Steinbeck; The African Queen, C. S. Forster; Little House on the Prairie (autobiographical novel), Laura Ingalls Wilder; The Last Puritan: A Memoir in the Form of a Novel, George Santayana; Of Time and the River, Thomas Wolfe; From Death to Morning (Short stories), Thomas Wolfe; Come and Get It, Edna Ferber; The Last of Mr. Norris, Christopher Isherwood; King Coffin, Conrad Aiken; End of a Chapter (trilogy of novels further developing characters in The Forsyte Saga), John Galsworthy; It Can’t Happen Here, Sinclair Lewis; Golden Apples, Margarie Kinnan Rawlings; Heaven’s My Destination, Thornton Wilder; The Middle-Aged Man on the Flying Trapeze, James Thurber; Strictly from Hunger, S. J. Perelman; Judgment Day (3rd of 3 Studs Lonigan novels), James Farrell; Poems, Louis MacNiece; Mistaken Ambitions, Alberto Moravia; Echo’s Bones (poetry), Samuel Beckett; Solstice, and Other Poems, Robinson Jeffers; The House in Paris, Elizabeth Bowen; La Serpente de Oro (The Golden Serpent) (novel), Ciro Alegria; The Making of Americans (novel), Gertrude Stein; A House Divided, Pearl Buck; Penguin paperbacks introduced in Britain by publisher Allen Lane; Beginning of the American Federal Arts, Theatre, and Writers Projects (1935-1943), American Works Progress Administration (WPA) programs; Porgy and Bess (folk opera), book & lyrics by Dubose Heyward & Ira Gershwin, music by George Gershwin, opened in NY; The Petrified Forest, Robert Sherwood, Broadhurst Theatre, NY; Winterset (verse play, inspired by Sacco-Vanzetti Case) Maxwell Anderson, opened at Martin Beck Theatre, NY; Awake and Sing, 1st play by Clifford Odets, 1st produced by the Group Theatre, opened in NY, dir. Harold Clurman; Dead End (play), Sidney Kingsley opened at Belasco Theatre, NY; Mulatto, Langston Hughes opened at Vanderbilt Theatre, NY; Murder in the Cathedral (verse play), T. S. Eliot opened in London; Night Must Fall, Emlyn Williams (who starred as the murderer in his own play); Boy Meets Girl, Sam Spewack, opened at Cort Theatre, NY; Three Men on a Horse, John Cecil Holm opened at Playhouse, NY; Night of January 16 (play), Ayn Rand, opened at Ambassador Theatre, NY; A Tiger at the Gates (play), Jean Giraudoux; Panic, (verse play), Archibald MacLeish; Doña Rosita la Slotera (play), Frederico Garcia Lorca; Hamlet in Wittenberg (play), Gerhart Hauptmann; Mottke the Thief (play), Sholem Asch; American National Theatre and Academy (ANTA) founded
Died
Andy Adams, American fiction writer (b. 1859)
Edwin Arlington Robinson, American poet (b. 1869)
George William Russell (pen name A. E.), Irish poet, painter, and journalist (b. 1867)
Henri Barbusse, French journalist, novelist, and poet (b. 1873)
Agha Hashr, Indian playwright and poet (b. 1876)
Will (William Penn Adair) Rogers, American humorist (b. 1879)
1936
Nobel Prize for Literature
Eugene O’Neill (1888-1953), American
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction Honey in the Horn, Harold L. Davis
Poetry Strange Holiness, Robert P. T. Coffin
Drama Idiot’s Delight (anti-War comedy), Robert Sherwood (opened at Shubert Theatre, NY)
The Governor General’s Literary Award (Fiction)
Think of the Earth, Bertram Brooker
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell 2. The Last Puritan, George Santayana 4. Drums Along the Mohawk, Walter D. Edmonds 5. It Can’t Happen Here, Sinclair Lewis 6. White Banners, Lloyd C. Douglas 10. Eyeless in Gaza, Aldous Huxley
Nonfiction 1. Man the Unknown, Alexis Carrel 2. Wake up and Live!, Dorothea Brande
Other Notable Literary Events
The People, Yes (narative poem), Carl Sandburg; Absalom, Absalom!, William Faulkner; Eyeless in Gaza, Aldous Huxley; The Four Quartets (four-part poetic work, begun with Burnt Norton), T. S. Eliot; In Dubious Battle, John Steinbeck; Double Indemnity, James M. Cain; The Big Money (3rd novel of U.S.A. trilogy), John Dos Passos; Jamaica Inn, Daphne du Maurier; Black Thunder, Arna Bontemps; Not So Deep a Well (poems), Dorothy Parker; The Hangman (anti-Nazi novel), Par Lagerkvist; Twenty-Five Poems, Dylan Thomas; Bones of Contention (short stories), Frank O’Connor; Novel on Yellow Paper, Stevie Smith; Revaluation (criticism of English poetry), F. R. Leavis; My Ten Years in a Quandary (essays), Robert Benchley; We, the Living, Ayn Rand; Life, the magazine, began publication in the United States; Stage Door, Edna Ferber-George S. Kaufman (opened at Music Box Theatre, NY); An Actor Prepares, Constantin Stanislavsky; Orson Welles directed an all-black Macbeth for the Federal Theatre Project; Ascent of F-6 and The Dog Beneath the Skin, W. H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood; The House of Bernardo Alba (play), Frederico Garcia Lorca; Wingless Victory, Maxwell Anderson (opened in NY); The Women (comedy), Clare Boothe (Luce) opened at Ethel Barrymore Theatre, NY; Brother Rat, John Monks, Jr., and Fred Finklehoffe opened in NY with Eddie Albert; End of Summer, S. N. Behrman opened at Guild Theatre, NY; French without Tears, Terrence Rattigan; Johnny Johnson, anti-war play, Paul Green (with music by Kurt Weill), opened in NY
Died
(Joseph) Rudyard Kipling, English writer (b. 1865)
Federico Garcia Lorca, Spanish poet and playwright (b. 1899) (Murdered by Spanish fascists)
Maxim Gorky (Aleksei Maximovich Peshkov), Russian writer (b.1868)
A. E. Housman, English poet and classical scholar (b. 1859)
Miguel de Unamuno, Spanish writer and philosopher (b. 1864)
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton, British writer (b. 1874)
Mary Johnston, American author (b. 1870)
Luigi Pirandello, Italian playwright (b. 1867)
1937
Nobel Prize for Literature
Roger Martin du Gard, (1881-1958) French
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
Poetry A Further Range, Robert Frost
Drama You Can’t Take It with You, Moss Hart-George S. Kaufman
Literary History The Flowering of New England, Van Wyck Brooks
The Governor General’s Literary Award (Fiction)
The Dark Weaver, Laura G. Salverson
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell 2. Northwest Passage, Kenneth Roberts 3. The Citadel, A. J. Cronin 8. Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck 9. The Rains Came, Louis Bromfield
Nonfiction 1. How to Win Friends and Influence People, Dale Carnegie 2. An American Doctor’s Odyssey, Voctor Heiser 8. Life with Mother, Clarence Day 10. The Flowering of New England, Van Wyck Brooks
Other Notable Literary Events
Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck; Of Mice and Men (dramatization of his novel by John Steinbeck) opened at Music Box Theatre, NY; Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston; Three Comrades, (anti-fascist novel), Erich Maria Remarque; The Years, Virginia Woolf; Out of Africa (autobiographical work), Isak Dinesen; The Citadel, A. J. Cronin; The Hobbit (fantasy novel), J. R. R. Tolkien; Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter, Frederico Garcia Lorca; And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, 1st Children’s book by Dr. Seuss (Theodore Geisel); “The Devil and Daniel Webster” (short story), Stephen Vincent Benet; The Sea of Grass (1st novel), Conrad Richter; The Rains Came, Louis Bromfield; Northwest Passage, Kenneth Roberts; Bread and Wine, Ignazio Silone; A Good Time Was Had by All, Stevie Smith; Famine, Liam O’Flaherty; Out of the Picture, Louis MacNiece; The Sleeping Fury, Louise Bogan; Serenade, James M. Cain; World Light (1937-1940) (four-volume novel), Haldor Laxness; Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional Language, Eric Partridge; The Playwrights’ Company was founded by Maxwell Anderson, S. N. Behrman, Sudney Howard, Elmer Rice, and Robert E. Sherwood; High Tor (play), Maxwell Anderson opened at Martin Beck Theatre, NY; Golden Boy, Clifford Odets opened at Belasco Theatre, NY; Susan and Godm (play) Rachel Crothers opened at Plymouth Theatre, NY; The Star Wagon, Maxwell Anderson (opened at Empire Theatre, NY); Room Service, John Murray and Allen Boretz (opened at Cort Theatre, NY); Having Wonderful Time, Arthur Kober opened at Lyceum Theatre, NY; Yes, My Darling Daughter, Mark Reed opened at Playhouse, NY; The Fall of the City, Archibald MacLeish; The White Scourge, anti-fascist, Karel Capek; Hamlet, with Laurence Olivier, directed by Tyrone Guthrie; Amphitryon 38, S. N. Behrman; Julius Caesar with Orson Welles, Joseph Cotton, and Martin Gabel
Died
Don Marquis, American journalist and humorist (b. 1878)
Edith Wharton, American writer (b. 1862)
James M(atthew) Barrie, Scottish playwright and novelist (b. 1860)
William Gillette, American actor and playwright (b. 1855), famous for starring role in his adaptation of Sherlock Holmes
James Drinkwater, English poet and playwright (b. 1882)
1938
Nobel Prize for Literature
Pearl S. Buck, (1892-1973) American
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction The Late George Apley, J. P. Marquand
Poetry Cold Morning Sky, Marya Zaturenska
Drama Our Town, Thornton Wilder
The Governor General’s Literary Award (Fiction)
Swiss Sonata, Gwethalyn Graham
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. The Yearling, Majorie Kinnan Rawlings 2. The Citadel, A. J. Cronin 4. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier 9. The Mortal Storm, Phyllis Bottome
Nonfiction 1. The Importance of Living, Lin Yutang 2. With Malice Toward Some, Margaret Halsey
Died
James Weldon Johnson, American writer & lyricist (b. 1871)
Capek, Czech writer (b. 1890)
Mary Hallock Foote, American novelist (b. 1847)
Thomas Wolfe, American writer (b. 1900)
1939
Nobel Prize for Literature
Frans E. Sillanpaa, (1888-1964) Finnish
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction The Yearling, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
Poetry Selected Poems, John Gould Fletcher
Drama Abe Lincoln in Illinois, Robert E. Sherwood
History A History of American Magazines, Frank Luther Mott
The Governor General’s Literary Award (Fiction)
The Champlain Road, Franklin D. McDowell
Best Sellers
Fiction 1. The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck 2. All This, and Heaven Too, Rachel Field
Nonfiction 1. Days of Our Years, Pierre van Paassen 2. Reaching for the Stars, Nora Waln 7. Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler
Other Notable Literary Events
Finnegans Wake, James Joyce; Tropic of Capricorn, Henry Miller; The Web and the Rock, Thomas Wolfe; Pale Horse, Pale Rider, Katherine Anne Porter; Poetical Works, Edward Taylor (first published)
Died
Ethel M. Dell, British novelist (b. 1881)
Ford Madox Ford (Ford Madox Hueffer), British writer, editor, & critic
Zane Grey, American author of over 50 Western novels (b. 1872)
Sidney Coe Howard, American playwright (b. 1891)
Ernst Toller, German playwright (b. 1893)
William Butler Yeats, Irish poet & dramatist (b. 1865)