1997 in literature

Last updated November 21, 2025

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1997.

Events

February 20 – Allen Ginsberg makes a final public appearance at the NYU Poetry Slam.^[1] He continues to write through his final illness, his last poem being "Things I'll Not Do (Nostalgias)" written on March 30.^[2]
May 27 – Shakespeare's Globe in London, a reconstruction of the Elizabethan Globe Theatre, opens with a production of Shakespeare's Henry V .
June 3 – The supposed climax of Max Beerbohm's 1916 short story Enoch Soames occurs at the old British Museum Reading Room in London.
June 26 – J. K. Rowling's first Harry Potter novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone , is published in London by Bloomsbury Publishing, in an edition of 500 copies.
July 13 – The release occurs in Ireland of the film of Patrick McCabe's 1992 novel The Butcher Boy . The author plays Jimmy The Skite, the town drunk.
September 1 – The Adventures of Captain Underpants , the first in Dav Pilkey's series of children's novels, is published by Scholastic in the United States.
October – The online literary magazine Jacket is founded.
November 24 – The new British Library building in London designed by Colin St John Wilson opens to readers.
December 30 – The memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou is removed from the ninth-grade English curriculum in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, for portraying "white people as being horrible, nasty, stupid people".^[3]

Uncertain dates

Tom Clancy signs a deal with Pearson Custom Publishing and Penguin Putnam Inc. giving him US $50 million for the world English rights to two new books. A second agreement pays another $25 million for a four-year book/multimedia deal, and a third, with Berkley Books for 24 paperbacks to tie in with an ABC television miniseries for $22 million.
Janet Dailey admits to plagiarism of the novels of the fellow American bestselling romance writer Nora Roberts.^[4]^[5]

New books

Births

February 12 – Alexander Nikolov, Bulgarian poet
June 22 – Aqiil Gopee, Mauritian writer and poet
November 28 – Franz Mherryon Robles, Filipino novelist and aphorist

Deaths

January 19 – James Dickey, American poet and novelist (born 1923)^[14]
February 3 – Bohumil Hrabal, Czech novelist (born 1914)
February 18 – Emily Hahn, American journalist and author (born 1905)
March 21 - Wilbert Awdry, British Anglican reverend and author (born 1911)
April 5 – Allen Ginsberg, American poet (liver cancer, born 1926)^[1]
May 9 – Rina Lasnier, Canadian poet (born 1915)
May 23 – Alison Adburgham, English social historian and journalist (born 1912)
June 8 – George Turner, Australian novelist and critic (born 1916)
June 11 – Susanna Roth, Swiss bohemist and literary translator (born 1950)
July 26 – Joseph Henry Reason, American librarian (born 1905)^[15]
August 2 – William S. Burroughs, American novelist (born 1914 ^[16]
August 16 – Gerard McLarnon, Irish actor and playwright (born 1915)
August 27 – Johannes Edfelt, Swedish poet, translator and critic (born 1904)
October 14 – Harold Robbins, American novelist (born 1916)
October 16 – James A. Michener, American novelist and historian (born 1907)
November 6 – Leon Forrest, African American novelist and essayist (cancer, born 1937)^[17]
November 30 – Kathy Acker, American novelist and poet (breast cancer, born 1947)^[18]
December 14 – Owen Barfield, British philosopher, author and poet (born 1898)

Awards

Australia

The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Eva Sallis, Hiam
C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry: Les Murray, Subhuman Redneck Poems
Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Anthony Lawrence, The Viewfinder
Mary Gilmore Prize: Morgan Yasbincek, Night Reversing
Miles Franklin Award: David Foster, The Glade Within the Grove

Canada

Bronwen Wallace Memorial Award: Rachel Rose
Giller Prize for Canadian Fiction: Mordecai Richler, Barney's Version
See 1997 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.
Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction: Anne Mullens, Timely Death ^[19]

France

Prix Goncourt: Patrick Rambaud, La Bataille
Prix Décembre: Lydie Salvayre, La Compagnie des spectres
Prix Médicis International: T. Coraghessan Boyle, America
Prix Médicis French: Les Sept Noms du peintre – Philippe Le Guillou

Spain

Premio Miguel de Cervantes: Guillermo Cabrera Infante

United Kingdom

Booker Prize: Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things
Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Tim Bowler, River Boy
James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Andrew Miller, Ingenious Pain
James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: R. F. Foster, William Butler Yeats: A Life, Volume 1 – The Apprentice Mage 1965-1914
Cholmondeley Award: Alison Brackenbury, Gillian Clarke, Tony Curtis, Anne Stevenson
Eric Gregory Award: Matthew Clegg, Sarah Corbett, Polly Clark, Tim Kendall, Graham Nelson, Matthew Welton
Orange Prize for Fiction: Anne Michaels, Fugitive Pieces
Whitbread Best Book Award: Ted Hughes, Tales from Ovid

United States

Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Richard Blanco, City of a Hundred Fires
Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry: Fred Chappell
American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal in Poetry, John Ashbery
Compton Crook Award: Richard Garfinkle, Celestial Matters
Hugo Award: Kim Stanley Robinson, Blue Mars
Nebula Award: Vonda McIntyre, The Moon and the Sun
Newbery Medal for children's literature: E. L. Konigsburg, The View from Saturday
Pulitzer Prize for Drama: no award given
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Steven Millhauser – Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Lisel Mueller: Alive Together: New and Selected Poems
Wallace Stevens Award: Anthony Hecht
Whiting Awards:

Fiction: Josip Novakovich (fiction/nonfiction), Melanie Rae Thon

Nonfiction: Jo Ann Beard, Suketu Mehta (fiction/nonfiction), Ellen Meloy

Plays: Erik Ehn

Poetry: Connie Deanovich, Forrest Gander, Jody Gladding, Mark Turpin

Elsewhere

Notes

Hahn, Daniel (2015). The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature (2nd ed.). Oxford. University Press. ISBN 9780198715542.

References

1 2 Hampton, Wilborn (April 6, 1997). "Allen Ginsberg, Master Poet Of Beat Generation, Dies at 70". New York Times. Archived from the original on March 11, 2008. Retrieved April 14, 2008.
↑ Ginsberg, Allen. Collected Poems 1947–1997. pp. 1160–61.
↑ "Harry Potter, 'Huckleberry Finn' among controversial". Banned books. CNN. Archived from the original on 2004-08-05.
↑ Wilson, Jeff (1997-07-30). "Romance novelist Janet Dailey apologizes for plagiarism". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette .
↑ Standora, Leo (1997-08-27). "Romance Writer Janet Dailey Sued". New York Daily News . Archived from the original on 2009-08-01. Retrieved 2008-11-18.
↑ The Worlds of Carol Shields. University of Ottawa Press. 2014. p. 113. ISBN 9780776621869.
↑ Hahn 2015, p. 14
↑ Hahn 2015, p.106
↑ "His Dark Materials". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 11 January 2022.
↑ Hahn 2015, pp. 264-265
↑ Hahn 2015, p. 631
↑ Kevin Warwick (1997). March of the Machines: Why the New Race of Robots Will Rule the World. Century. ISBN 978-0-7126-7756-1.
↑ "L'empire des rois khmers". livreshebdo.fr (in French). 1997. Retrieved 14 April 2022.
↑ Davison, Peter (August 1, 1998). "The Burden of James Dickey". The Atlantic.
↑ Owens, Irene (January 2003). "Reason, Joseph Henry". In Donald G. Davis (ed.). Dictionary of American Library Biography: Second supplement. Libraries Unlimited. pp. 182–186. ISBN 978-1-56308-868-1.
↑ 2003 Penguin Modern Classics edition of Junky.
↑ Onishi, Norimitsu. "Leon Forrest, 60, a Novelist Who Explored Black History", The New York Times, November 10, 1997.
↑ Kathy Acker and Transnationalism, ed. Polina Mackay and Kathryn Nicol (Cambridge Scholars, 2009)
↑ Faculty of Arts, 1997, Edna Staebler Award Archived 2014-06-06 at Archive-It , Wilfrid Laurier University, Previous winners, Anne Mullens, Retrieved 11/17/2012

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[NYTObit-1] 1 2 Hampton, Wilborn (April 6, 1997). "Allen Ginsberg, Master Poet Of Beat Generation, Dies at 70". New York Times. Archived from the original on March 11, 2008. Retrieved April 14, 2008.

[2] Ginsberg, Allen. Collected Poems 1947–1997. pp. 1160–61.

[3] "Harry Potter, 'Huckleberry Finn' among controversial". Banned books. CNN. Archived from the original on 2004-08-05.

[4] Wilson, Jeff (1997-07-30). "Romance novelist Janet Dailey apologizes for plagiarism". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette .

[5] Standora, Leo (1997-08-27). "Romance Writer Janet Dailey Sued". New York Daily News . Archived from the original on 2009-08-01. Retrieved 2008-11-18.

[6] The Worlds of Carol Shields. University of Ottawa Press. 2014. p. 113. ISBN 9780776621869.

[7] Hahn 2015, p. 14

[8] Hahn 2015, p.106

[9] "His Dark Materials". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 11 January 2022.

[10] Hahn 2015, pp. 264-265

[11] Hahn 2015, p. 631

[12] Kevin Warwick (1997). March of the Machines: Why the New Race of Robots Will Rule the World. Century. ISBN 978-0-7126-7756-1.

[13] "L'empire des rois khmers". livreshebdo.fr (in French). 1997. Retrieved 14 April 2022.

[14] Davison, Peter (August 1, 1998). "The Burden of James Dickey". The Atlantic.

[15] Owens, Irene (January 2003). "Reason, Joseph Henry". In Donald G. Davis (ed.). Dictionary of American Library Biography: Second supplement. Libraries Unlimited. pp. 182–186. ISBN 978-1-56308-868-1.

[16] 2003 Penguin Modern Classics edition of Junky.

[17] Onishi, Norimitsu. "Leon Forrest, 60, a Novelist Who Explored Black History", The New York Times, November 10, 1997.

[18] Kathy Acker and Transnationalism, ed. Polina Mackay and Kathryn Nicol (Cambridge Scholars, 2009)

[19] Faculty of Arts, 1997, Edna Staebler Award Archived 2014-06-06 at Archive-It , Wilfrid Laurier University, Previous winners, Anne Mullens, Retrieved 11/17/2012

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