1975 in literature

The year 1975 in literature involved some significant events and new books.

Events

 * August 12 &mdash; with the 20-year time limit stipulated by Thomas Mann at his death having expired, sealed packets containing 32 of the author's notebooks were opened in Zurich, Switzerland.
 * Writing under the pseudonym of "Emile Ajar", author Romain Gary becomes the only person to ever win the Prix Goncourt twice.
 * Hearing Secret Harmonies, the twelfth and final novel of the A Dance to the Music of Time duodecalogy by Anthony Powell is published.
 * Milan Kundera emigrated to France.
 * Petrarca-Preis was founded by Hubert Burda.

Fiction

 * Edward Abbey - The Monkey Wrench Gang
 * Martin Amis - Dead Babies
 * Natalie Babbitt -  Tuck Everlasting
 * Donald Barthelme - The Dead Father
 * Saul Bellow - Humboldt's Gift
 * Thomas Berger - Sneaky People
 * Timothy L. Bottoms - Mr. Schutzer
 * Jorge Luis Borges - The Book of Sand
 * Malcolm Bradbury - The History Man
 * Morley Callaghan - A Fine and Private Place
 * Agatha Christie - Curtain
 * James Clavell - Shōgun
 * Susan Cooper - The Grey King
 * Michael Crichton - The Great Train Robbery
 * A. J. Cronin - The Minstrel Boy
 * Roald Dahl - Danny, the Champion of the World
 * Robertson Davies - World of Wonders
 * L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt - The Compleat Enchanter
 * Samuel R. Delany - Dhalgren
 * August Derleth - Harrigan's File
 * E. L. Doctorow - Ragtime
 * William Gaddis - J R
 * Gabriel García Márquez - El Otoño del Patriarca (The Autumn of the Patriarch)
 * Romain Gary as Emile Ajar - La vie devant soi
 * Arthur Hailey - The Moneychangers
 * Thomas Harris - Black Sunday
 * Georgette Heyer - My Lord John
 * Jack Higgins - The Eagle Has Landed
 * Ruth Prawer Jhabvala - Heat and Dust
 * Stephen King - 'Salem's Lot
 * J. Sheridan LeFanu - The Purcell Papers
 * David Lodge - Changing Places
 * Robert Ludlum - The Road to Gandolfo
 * John D. MacDonald - The Dreadful Lemon Sky
 * Bharati Mukherjee - Wife
 * Gary Myers - The House of the Worm
 * V.S. Naipaul - Guerillas
 * Tim O'Brien - Northern Lights
 * Gerald W. Page, editor - Nameless Places
 * Robert B. Parker - Mortal Stakes
 * Elizabeth Peters - Crocodile on the Sandbank (the first in the Amelia Peabody series)
 * Anthony Powell - Hearing Secret Harmonies
 * James Purdy - In A Shallow Grave
 * Judith Rossner - Looking for Mister Goodbar
 * Nawal El Saadawi - Woman at Point Zero
 * Paul Scott - A Division of the Spoils
 * Anya Seton - Smouldering Fires
 * Tom Sharpe - Blott on the Landscape
 * Bob Shea and Robert Anton Wilson - The Illuminatus! Trilogy (individual editions)
 * M. P. Shiel - Xélucha and Others
 * Rex Stout - A Family Affair
 * Glendon Swarthout - The Shootist
 * Joseph Wambaugh - The Choirboys
 * Jack Vance - Showboat World
 * Roger Zelazny - Sign of the Unicorn

Poetry

 * Lin Carter - Dreams from R'lyeh
 * Leslie Norris - Mountains, Polecats, Pheasants and other Elegies

Non-fiction

 * Philip Agee - Inside the Company: CIA Diary
 * Kingsley Amis - Rudyard Kipling and His World
 * Jacob Bronowski - The Ascent of Man
 * L. Sprague de Camp
 * Blond Barbarians and Noble Savages
 * Lovecraft: a Biography
 * The Miscast Barbarian: a Biography of Robert E. Howard
 * Paul Fussell - The Great War and Modern Memory
 * Frank Belknap Long - Howard Phillips Lovecraft: Dreamer on the Nitghtside
 * Philip Roth - Reading Myself and Others
 * Paul Theroux - The Great Railway Bazaar

Births

 * January 13 - Daniel Kehlmann, novelist
 * October 27 - Zadie Smith, novelist

Deaths

 * January 15 - Sydney Goodsir Smith, poet, dramatist and novelist
 * February 14 - Sir P. G. Wodehouse (b.1881), English comic novelist - creator of Jeeves and Wooster
 * February 14 - Julian Huxley, biologist and author, brother of Aldous Huxley
 * March 13 - Ivo Andrić (b.1892), Serbo-Croatian novelist - winner, 1961 Nobel Prize for Literature
 * June 8 - Murray Leinster, science fiction writer
 * September 20 - Saint-John Perse, poet - winner, 1960 Nobel Prize for Literature
 * October 5 - Constance Malleson, actress and writer
 * October 22 - Arnold J. Toynbee, historian
 * November 13 - R. C. Sherriff, dramatist
 * November 19 - Elizabeth Taylor, novelist
 * November 23 - Francis Webb, poet
 * November 27 - Ross McWhirter, joint author of the Guinness Book of Records
 * December 4 - Hannah Arendt, philosopher
 * December 7 - Thornton Wilder, novelist and dramatist
 * date unknown - Janko Glazer, (b.1893) - poet
 * date unknown - Vojko Gorjan, (b.1949) - poet

Awards

 * Nobel Prize for Literature: Eugenio Montale

Canada

 * See 1975 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

France

 * Prix Goncourt: Romain Gary as Emile Ajar - La vie devant soi
 * Prix Médicis French: Jacques Almira, Le Voyage à Naucratis
 * Prix Médicis International: Steven Millhauser, La Vie trop brève d'Edwin Mulhouse - United States

Spain

 * Premio Nadal: Francisco Umbral, Las ninfas

United Kingdom

 * Booker Prize: Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Heat and Dust
 * Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Robert Westall, The Machine Gunners
 * Cholmondeley Award: Jenny Joseph, Norman MacCaig, John Ormond
 * Duff Cooper Prize: - Seamus Heaney, North
 * Eric Gregory Award: John Birtwhistle, Duncan Bush, Val Warner, Philip Holmes, Peter Cash, Alasdair Paterson
 * James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Brian Moore, The Great Victorian Collection
 * James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Karl Miller, Cockburn's Millennium

United States

 * American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Belles Lettres: Kenneth Burke
 * Nebula Award: Joe Haldeman, The Forever War
 * Newbery Medal for children's literature: Virginia Hamilton, M. C. Higgins, the Great
 * Newdigate prize: Andrew Motion
 * Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Edward Albee, Seascape
 * Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Michael Shaara - The Killer Angels
 * Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Gary Snyder - Turtle Island

Elsewhere

 * Viareggio Prize: Paolo Volponi, Il sipario ducale