1970 in literature

The year 1970 in literature involved some significant events and new books.

Events

 * Deliverance by American poet James Dickey published. In 2001, the book would be named as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century by the editorial board of the American Modern Library.
 * The Royal Shakespeare Company premieres its revolutionary production of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, directed by Peter Brook, at Stratford-upon-Avon, England.

New books

 * Richard Bach - Jonathan Livingston Seagull
 * Nina Bawden - The Birds on the Trees
 * Pierre Berton - The National Dream
 * Judy Blume - Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret
 * Jim Bouton - Ball Four
 * Wallace Breem - Eagle in the Snow
 * Jimmy Breslin - The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight
 * Taylor Caldwell - Great Lion of God
 * John Dickson Carr - The Ghosts' High Noon
 * Agatha Christie - Passenger to Frankfurt
 * Roald Dahl - Fantastic Mr Fox
 * Robertson Davies - Fifth Business
 * L. Sprague de Camp
 * The Reluctant Shaman and Other Fantastic Tales
 * Warlocks and Warriors (ed.)
 * Samuel R. Delany - The Fall of the Towers (Trilogy)
 * James Dickey - Deliverance
 * José Donoso - The Obscene Bird of Night (El obsceno pájaro de la noche)
 * Lawrence Durrell - Nunquam
 * J. G. Farrell - Troubles
 * Shirley Hazzard - The Bay of Noon
 * Anne Hébert - Kamouraska
 * Ernest Hemingway - Islands in the Stream
 * Susan Hill - I'm the King of the Castle
 * Pamela Hansford Johnson - The Honours Board
 * Anna Kavan - Julia and the Bazooka
 * Jaan Kross - Between Three Plagues (part 1)
 * Ira Levin - This Perfect Day
 * H.P. Lovecraft - The Horror in the Museum and Other Revisions
 * John D. MacDonald - The Long Lavender Look
 * Eric Malpass - Oh My Darling Daughter
 * Ruth Manning-Sanders - A Book of Devils and Demons
 * Yukio Mishima - The Decay of the Angel last book in The Sea of Fertility series
 * Brian Moore - Fergus
 * Toni Morrison - The Bluest Eye
 * Larry Niven - Ringworld
 * John Jay Osborn, Jr. - The Paper Chase
 * Robert W. Peterson - Only the Ball was White
 * Mary Renault - Fire from Heaven
 * Kurban Said - Ali and Nino
 * Erich Segal - Love Story
 * Sidney Sheldon - The Naked Face
 * Clark Ashton Smith - Other Dimensions
 * Muriel Spark - The Driver's Seat
 * Mary Stewart - The Crystal Cave
 * Leon Uris - QB VII
 * Jack Vance - The Pnume
 * E.B. White - The Trumpet Of The Swan
 * Patrick White - The Vivisector
 * Roger Zelazny - Nine Princes in Amber

New drama

 * Dario Fo - Accidental Death of an Anarchist
 * Anthony Shaffer - Sleuth

Poetry

 * L. Sprague deCamp - Demons and Dinosaurs

Non-fiction

 * Dee Brown - ''Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
 * Henri Charrière - Papillon
 * Edward De Bono - Lateral Thinking: creativity step by step
 * August Derleth - Thirty Years of Arkham House, 1939-1969: A History and Bibliography
 * Germaine Greer - The Female Eunuch
 * Helene Hanff - 84 Charing Cross Road
 * Arthur Janov - The Primal Scream
 * Mahathir bin Mohamad - The Malay Dilemma
 * Kate Millet - Sexual Politics
 * Nancy Mitford - Frederick the Great
 * Albert Speer - Inside the Third Reich
 * Alvin Toffler - Future Shock

Births

 * September 10 - Phaswane Mpe, novelist, (d. 2004)
 * September 16 - Nick Sagan, novelist and screenwriter
 * September 24 - Gemma Moraleja Paz, poet and novelist
 * October 27  - Jonathan Stroud, fantasy writer
 * unknown date - Alex Garland, novelist
 * unknown date - Chris Adrian, novelist
 * unknown date - Nathan Englander, author

Deaths

 * January 10 - Charles Olson, poet
 * January 29 - B. H. Liddell Hart, military historian
 * February 2 - Bertrand Russell, philosopher
 * March 11 - Erle Stanley Gardner, Perry Mason author
 * March 29 - Vera Brittain, novelist and poet
 * April 11 - John O'Hara, novelist
 * May 12 - Nelly Sachs, poet and dramatist
 * June 3 - Adrian Conan Doyle, son and literary executor of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
 * June 7 - E. M. Forster, novelist
 * June 16 - Elsa Triolet, novelist
 * July 15 - Eric Berne, psychiatrist and author
 * September 1 - François Mauriac, novelist
 * September 28 - John Dos Passos, novelist
 * November 25 - Yukio Mishima, Japanese author and rightist political activist (suicide)

Awards

 * Nobel Prize for Literature: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Canada

 * See 1970 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

France

 * Prix Goncourt: Michel Tournier, Le Roi des Aulnes
 * Prix Médicis French: Camille Bourniquel, Sélinonte ou la Chambre impériale
 * Prix Médicis International: Luigi Malerba, Saut de la mort

United Kingdom

 * Booker Prize: Bernice Rubens, The Elected Member
 * Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Leon Garfield and Edward Blishen, The God Beneath the Sea
 * Cholmondeley Award: Kathleen Raine, Douglas Livingstone, Edward Brathwaite
 * Eric Gregory Award: Helen Frye, Paul Mills, John Mole, Brian Morse, Alan Perry, Richard Tibbitts
 * James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Lily Powell, The Bird of Paradise
 * James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Jasper Ridley, Lord Palmerston
 * Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: Roy Fuller

United States

 * Hugo Award: Ursula K. Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness
 * Nebula Award: Larry Niven, Ringworld
 * Newbery Medal for children's literature: William H. Armstrong, Sounder
 * Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Charles Gordone, No Place To Be Somebody
 * Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Jean Stafford, Collected Stories
 * Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Richard Howard, Untitled Subjects

Elsewhere

 * Premio Nadal: Jesús Fernández Santos, Libro de las memorias de las cosas
 * Viareggio Prize: Nello Saito, Dentro e fuori