1990 in literature

Last updated September 15, 2025

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1990.

Events

March – Anton Chekhov's play Three Sisters opens at the Gate Theatre in Dublin with locally born Sinéad, Sorcha and Niamh Cusack in the title rôles and their father Cyril Cusack as Dr. Chebutykin.^[1]
March 20 – Stephen Blumberg is arrested for stealing more than 23,600 books in North America.
May 24 – Alicia Girón García is the first woman to become director of the Biblioteca Nacional de España.
c. June – J. K. Rowling has the idea for Harry Potter while on a train from Manchester to London: "I was staring out the window, and the idea for Harry just came. He appeared in my mind's eye, very fully formed. The basic idea was for a boy who didn't know what he was." She begins writing Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone , which will be completed in 1995 and published in 1997.
October – Nicci Gerrard marries Sean French in the London Borough of Hackney, to make up a writing team known as Nicci French.
Uncertain date – Austrian writer Ernest Bornemann is awarded the first Magnus Hirschfeld Medal for sexual research.

New books

Births

March 29 – Kiran Millwood Hargrave, English poet, playwright and novelist
July 27 - Victoria Aveyard, American young-adult novelist
Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, Senegalese francophone fiction writer

Deaths

January 24 – Leon Kalustian, Romanian journalist, essayist and memoirist (born 1908)
February 27 – Alexandru Rosetti, Romanian linguist, editor and memoirist (burns, born 1895)
March 12 – Rosamond Lehmann, English novelist (born 1901)
May 4 – John Ormond, Welsh poet (born 1923)
May 10 – Walker Percy, American novelist (born 1916)
May 25 – Lucy M. Boston, English children's novelist (born 1892)
July 15 – Zaim Topčić, Yugoslav and Bosnian writer (born 1920)
July 22 – Manuel Puig, Argentine novelist (heart attack, born 1932)^[2]
August 1 – Michael Glenny, British translator of Russian literature into English (born 1927)
August 17 – Roderick Cook, English playwright (born 1932)
August 25 – Morley Callaghan, Canadian novelist, playwright and broadcasting personality (born 1903)
September 8 – Denys Watkins-Pitchford, English children's writer (born 1905)
September 26 – Alberto Moravia, Italian novelist and journalist (born 1907)
September 27 – Ion Biberi, Romanian social scientist, novelist, and essayist (born 1904)
September 30 – Patrick White, Australian novelist (born 1912)
October 23 – Louis Althusser, French Marxist philosopher (heart attack, born 1918)^[3]
November 7 – Lawrence Durrell, English novelist, dramatist, and travel writer (born 1912)
November 8 – Anya Seton, American genre novelist (born 1904)^[4]
November 23 – Roald Dahl, Welsh-born children's author (myelodysplastic syndrome, born 1916)^[5]
November 24 – Dodie Smith, English novelist and dramatist (born 1899)
December 1 – Irma Chilton, Welsh children's writer in Welsh and English (born 1930)
December 7 – Reinaldo Arenas, Cuban poet, novelist, and playwright (suicide, born 1943)^[6]
December 11 – David Turner, English dramatist (born 1927)
December 14 – Friedrich Dürrenmatt, Swiss dramatist (congestive heart failure, born 1921)^[7]
December 16 - Stanley Green, American theatre and film historian and writer (born 1923)^[8]
December 20 – Andrea Dunbar, English playwright (born 1961)
December 24 – Gwyn Williams, Welsh poet and novelist (born 1904)

Uncertain date

Clare Hoskyns-Abrahall, English biographer and children's writer (born 1900)

Awards

Australia

The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Gillian Mears, The Mint Lawn
C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry: Robert Adamson, The Clean Dark
Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Robert Adamson, The Clean Dark
Mary Gilmore Prize: Kristopher Rassemussen, In the Name of the Father
Miles Franklin Award: Tom Flood, Oceana Fine

Canada

See 1990 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

France

Prix Goncourt: Jean Rouaud, Les Champs d'honneur^[9]
Prix Décembre: François Maspero, Les Passagers du Roissy–Express
Prix Médicis French: Les Quartiers d'hiver – Jean-Noël Pancrazi
Prix Médicis International: Amitav Ghosh, Les Feux du Bengale

United Kingdom

Booker Prize: A. S. Byatt, Possession: A Romance
Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Gillian Cross, Wolf
Cholmondeley Award: Kingsley Amis, Elaine Feinstein, Michael O'Neill
Eric Gregory Award: Nicholas Drake, Maggie Hannan, William Park, Jonathan Davidson, Lavinia Greenlaw, Don Paterson, John Wells
James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: William Boyd, Brazzaville Beach
James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Claire Tomalin, The Invisible Woman: The Story of Nelly Ternan and Charles Dickens
Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: Sorley Maclean
Whitbread Best Book Award: Nicholas Mosley, Hopeful Monsters
The Sunday Express Book of the Year: J. M. Coetzee, Age of Iron

United States

Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Debra Allbery, Walking Distance
Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry: W. S. Merwin
Bernard F. Connors Prize for Poetry: Christopher Logue, Kings
Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry: James Merrill, The Inner Room
Caldecott Award: Ed Young, Lon Po Po: A Red–Riding Hood Story from China
Compton Crook Award: Josepha Sherman, The Shining Falcon
Frost Medal: Denise Levertov / James Laughlin
Hugo Award for Best Novel: Dan Simmons for Hyperion
National Book Award for Fiction: Charles Johnson for Middle Passage
Nebula Award: Ursula K. Le Guin, Tehanu: The Last Book of Earthsea
Newbery Medal for children's literature: Lois Lowry, Number the Stars
Pulitzer Prize for Drama: August Wilson, The Piano Lesson
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Oscar Hijuelos for The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love ^[10]
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Charles Simic: The World Doesn't End
Whiting Awards:

Fiction: Yannick Murphy, Lawrence Naumoff, Mark Richard, Christopher Tilghman, Stephen Wright

Nonfiction: Harriet Ritvo, Amy Wilentz

Plays: Tony Kushner

Poetry: Emily Hiestand, Dennis Nurkse

Elsewhere

Premio Nadal, Juan José Millás, La soledad era esto

References

↑ Wolf, Matt (27 May 1990). "Theater: Novel Casting for 'Three Sisters' – Three Sisters". The New York Times . Retrieved 2012-06-16.
↑ Levine, Suzanne Jill (2000). Manuel Puig and the Spider Woman: His Life and Fictions. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 978-0-374-28190-8. p. 377.
↑ Lewis, William (2005). Louis Althusser and the Traditions of French Marxism. Lexington Books.
↑ Moser, Margaret (29 September 2006). "Love in the Time of 'Green Darkness'". Austin Chronicle . Retrieved 8 July 2013.
↑ "Deaths England and Wales 1984–2006". Findmypast.com. Archived from the original on 4 November 2015. Retrieved 28 January 2011.
↑ Soto, Francisco (1998). Reinaldo Arenas . Twayne's World Author Series. Twayne. ISBN 9780805745542.
↑ Liukkonen, Petri. "Friedrich Dürrenmatt". Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi). Finland: Kuusankoski Public Library. Archived from the original on 1 February 2014.
↑ Morga, Paula; Westover, Jonas (2002). "Green, Stanley". Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.A2283026.
↑ Jean Rouaud (22 May 2019). Les Champs d'honneur. Flammarion. ISBN 978-2-08-149181-6.
↑ Elizabeth A. Brennan; Elizabeth C. Clarage (1999). Who's who of Pulitzer Prize Winners. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 245. ISBN 978-1-57356-111-2.

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[1] Wolf, Matt (27 May 1990). "Theater: Novel Casting for 'Three Sisters' – Three Sisters". The New York Times . Retrieved 2012-06-16.

[2] Levine, Suzanne Jill (2000). Manuel Puig and the Spider Woman: His Life and Fictions. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 978-0-374-28190-8. p. 377.

[3] Lewis, William (2005). Louis Althusser and the Traditions of French Marxism. Lexington Books.

[4] Moser, Margaret (29 September 2006). "Love in the Time of 'Green Darkness'". Austin Chronicle . Retrieved 8 July 2013.

[5] "Deaths England and Wales 1984–2006". Findmypast.com. Archived from the original on 4 November 2015. Retrieved 28 January 2011.

[6] Soto, Francisco (1998). Reinaldo Arenas . Twayne's World Author Series. Twayne. ISBN 9780805745542.

[7] Liukkonen, Petri. "Friedrich Dürrenmatt". Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi). Finland: Kuusankoski Public Library. Archived from the original on 1 February 2014.

[8] Morga, Paula; Westover, Jonas (2002). "Green, Stanley". Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.A2283026.

[9] Jean Rouaud (22 May 2019). Les Champs d'honneur. Flammarion. ISBN 978-2-08-149181-6.

[10] Elizabeth A. Brennan; Elizabeth C. Clarage (1999). Who's who of Pulitzer Prize Winners. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 245. ISBN 978-1-57356-111-2.

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1990 in literature

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