2003 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 2003.

Events

*February 12 – An invitation from the First Lady of the United States, Laura Bush, for some poets to attend a conference at the White House is postponed when one of them, Sam Hamill, organizes a "Poets Against the War" group for poetry readings across the United States on the same date.
*February 15 – Anti-war protests occur in London. They are later used as the setting for Ian McEwan's 2005 novel ''Saturday''.
*March – The University of Mosul library is damaged and looted during the Iraq War, but many volumes are removed for protection by staff.
*April 14 – The Iraq National Library and Archive is burned down during the Battle of Baghdad.
*April – Nicholas Hytner succeeds Sir Trevor Nunn as artistic director of London's Royal National Theatre.
* November 7 – UNESCO places among the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity ''wayang kulit'', a shadow puppet theatre and best known of the Indonesian wayang.

New books

Fiction

*Peter Ackroyd – '' The Clerkenwell Tales''
* Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – '' Purple Hibiscus''
* Mitch Albom – '' The Five People You Meet in Heaven''
* Monica Ali – ''Brick Lane''
*Martin Amis – '' Yellow Dog''
*Margaret Atwood – '' Oryx and Crake''
*Paul Auster – '' Oracle Night''
* Max Barry – '' Jennifer Government''
* Greg Bear – '' Darwin's Children''
*Frédéric Beigbeder – '' Windows on the World''
* Hilari Bell – '' Fall of a Kingdom''
* Thomas Berger – ''Best Friends''
*Giles Blunt – ''The Delicate Storm''
* Frank Brennan – '' Tampering with Asylum''
* Dan Brown – '' The Da Vinci Code''
*Angus Peter Campbell – ''An Oidhche Mus Do Sheol Sinn''
*Lars Saabye Christensen – '' Maskeblomstfamilien''
*Paulo Coelho – '' Eleven Minutes''
* J. M. Coetzee – ''Elizabeth Costello''
* Deborah Joy Corey – ''The Skating Pond''
*Bernard Cornwell
**'' Sharpe's Havoc''
**''Sharpe's Christmas''
**''Heretic''
* Douglas Coupland – '' Hey Nostradamus!''
*Robert Crais – '' The Last Detective''
* Julie E. Czerneda – '' Space, Inc.''
*Jeffery Deaver – '' Twisted''
* Don DeLillo – '' Cosmopolis''
*Cory Doctorow
**''A Place So Foreign and Eight More''
**''Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom''
*Gerard Donovan – '' Schopenhauer's Telescope''
*Fernanda Eberstadt – ''The Furies''
* Rodrigo Fresán – ''Jardines de Kensington''
* Cornelia Funke – '' Inkheart''
* Anna Gavalda – ''I Wish Someone Were Waiting for Me Somewhere'' (translation)
*William Gibson – '' Pattern Recognition''
*Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen – '' Gettysburg: A Novel of the Civil War''
*Jean-Christophe Grangé – ''L'Empire des loups''
* John Grisham – '' The King of Torts''
* Margaret Peterson Haddix – '' Among the Barons''
*Mark Haddon – ''The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time''
*Pete Hamill – ''Forever''
*Joanne Harris – ''Holy Fools''
* Victor Heck – ''The Asylum''
**''Vol 2 – The Violent Ward''
**''Vol 3 – The Quiet Ward''
* Jennifer Haigh – '' Mrs. Kimble''
* Zoë Heller – '' Notes on a Scandal''
*Khaled Hosseini – '' The Kite Runner''
* Michel Houellebecq – ''Lanzarote''
* Alan Judd – '' The Kaiser's Last Kiss''
* N. M. Kelby – ''Theater of the Stars: A Novel of Physics and Memory''
*Thomas Keneally – '' The Tyrant's Novel''
*Greg Keyes – '' The Final Prophecy''
*Stephen King – '' Wolves of the Calla''
*Dean R. Koontz – ''The Face''
* Jhumpa Lahiri – '' The Namesake''
* Dennis Lehane – '' Shutter Island''
*Jonathan Lethem – '' The Fortress of Solitude''
*James Luceno – ''The Unifying Force''
* Steve Martini – ''The Arraignment''
*Magnus Mills – '' The Scheme for Full Employment''
* Paul Murray – '' An Evening of Long Goodbyes''
*Julie Myerson – ''Something Might Happen''
*Andrew Neiderman – '' The Baby Squad''
* Audrey Niffenegger – ''The Time Traveler's Wife''
*Garth Nix – ''Mister Monday''
*Chuck Palahniuk – ''Diary''
*Christopher Paolini – ''Eragon''
*Carolyn Parkhurst – '' The Dogs of Babel''
*Per Petterson – '' Out Stealing Horses (Ut og stjæle hester)''
*DBC Pierre – ''Vernon God Little''
*Terry Pratchett
**'' Monstrous Regiment''
**''The Wee Free Men''
*Jean Raspail – ''Les Royaumes de Borée''
*Matthew Reilly – ''Scarecrow''
* Nina Revoyr – ''Southland''
*Tom Robbins – ''Villa Incognito''
* J. Jill Robinson – ''Residual Desire''
*Nick Sagan – '' Idlewild''
* Matthew Sharpe – ''The Sleeping Father''
*Michael Slade – ''Bed of Nails''
*Wilbur Smith – '' Blue Horizon''
*Olen Steinhauer – ''The Bridge of Sighs''
*Neal Stephenson – '' Quicksilver'' (Vol. I of the Baroque Cycle)
*Matthew Stover – ''Shatterpoint''
*Anthony Swofford – '' Jarhead''
*Miguel Sousa Tavares – ''Equador''
*Adam Thirlwell – ''Politics''
*Akira Toriyama (鳥山 明) – ''Toccio the Angel (Tenshi no Tocchio)''
*Sergio Troncoso – ''The Nature of Truth''
*Andrew Vachss – The Getaway Man''
*Mario Vargas Llosa – ''The Way to Paradise (El paraíso en la otra esquina)''
*Jo Walton – '' Tooth and Claw''
*Irvine Welsh – '' Porno''
*Tobias Wolff – '' Old School''
*Roger Zelazny – ''Manna from Heaven'' (short stories)

Children and young people

* David Almond – ''The Fire-Eaters''
*Atsuko Asano – ''No. 6 (あさの あつこ)''
*Cressida Cowell – ''How to Train Your Dragon'' (first in the eponymous series of 16 books)
*Madonna - ''The English Roses''
* Elizabeth Laird – ''The Garbage King''
*Jim Murphy – '' An American Plague: the true and terrifying story of the yellow fever epidemic of 1793''
*Jenny Nimmo – '' Charlie Bone and the Time Twister''
*Tyne O'Connell – ''Pulling Princes''
*Philip Reeve – '' Predator's Gold''
*J. K. Rowling – ''Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix''
*Lemony Snicket – ''The Slippery Slope''
*Dugald Steer (with Helen Ward, Wayne Anderson, etc.) – '' Dragonology: The Complete Book of Dragons''
*Mo Willems - '' Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!'' (first in a series of 8 books)
*Ann Turnbull – ''No Shame, No Fear''
* Kay Winters (with Barry Moser) – ''Voices of Ancient Egypt''
*Yang Hongying (楊紅櫻) – ''Four Troublemakers'' (四个调皮蛋, first in the ''Mo's Mischief'' – ''淘气包马小跳'' – series of 8 books)
*Peter H. Reynolds - '' The Dot''

Drama

*Jordi Galceran – ''El mètode Grönholm (The Grönholm method)''
*Richard Greenberg – ''The Violet Hour''
* David Hare – '' The Permanent Way''
*Kwame Kwei-Armah – ''Elmina's Kitchen''
*Lynn Nottage – ''Intimate Apparel''
*Mark O'Rowe – ''Crestfall''
*Abhi Subedi – '' Agniko Katha''

Poetry

* Lavinia Greenlaw – ''Minsk''
*Pope John Paul II – '' Roman Triptych. Meditations''
* Dean Kalimniou – '' Kipos Esokleistos''

Non–fiction

*''Banglapedia – National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh''
*Neal Bascomb – '' Higher: A Historic Race to the Sky and the Making of a City''
* Patricia Brown – ''A League Of My Own: Memoir of a Pitcher for the All-American Girls''
* Andrea Curtis – '' Into the Blue''
*Gerina Dunwich – ''Dunwich's Guide to Gemstone Sorcery''
*Marc Ferro – '' Le Livre noir du colonialisme''
*John Fowles – ''The Journals – Volume 1''
*Anna Funder – '' Stasiland''
*Mattias Gardell – ''Gods of the Blood''
* A. C. Grayling – ''What Is Good?: The Search for the Best Way to Live''
* Erik Larson – '' The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America''
* Bethany McLean – ''The Smartest Guys in the Room''
* Don Miller – ''Blue Like Jazz''
*Michael Moore – '' Dude, Where's My Country?''
*Azar Nafisi – ''Reading Lolita in Tehran''
*Alanna Nash – ''The Colonel: The Extraordinary Story of Colonel Tom Parker and Elvis Presley''
*Daniel Okrent – '' Great Fortune: The Epic of Rockefeller Center''
*Chuck Palahniuk – '' Fugitives and Refugees: A Walk in Portland, Oregon''
*Rudy Ruiz – ''¡ADELANTE!: una guía personal del éxito para usted y su familia'' (a guide for success for immigrants)
*Jane Smiley – ''Charles Dickens''
*Clark Ashton Smith – '' Selected Letters of Clark Ashton Smith''
*David Starkey – ''Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII''
*Lynne McTaggart – ''The Field: The Quest for the Secret Force of the Universe''
*Amy Tan – '' The Opposite of Fate: A Book of Musings''
*Lynne Truss – ''Eats, Shoots & Leaves''
*Penny Wolfson – ''Moonrise''

Deaths

*January 5 – Jean Kerr, American author and playwright (born 1923)
*January 21 – Paul Haines, American-born Canadian poet and songwriter (born 1933)
*February 16 – Aleksandar Tišma, Serbian novelist (born 1924)
*February 26 – Quentin Keynes, English explorer, writer and filmmaker (born 1921)
*March 11 – Brian Cleeve, English-born Irish writer and broadcaster (born 1921)
*March 12 – Howard Fast, American novelist (born 1914)
*March 14 – Lucian Boz, Romanian and Australian literary critic (born 1908)
*April 3 – Michael Kelly, American journalist (born 1957)
*April 7 – Cecile de Brunhoff, French children's writer (born 1903)
*June 21
**George Axelrod, American dramatist and screenwriter (born 1922)
**Leon Uris, American novelist (born 1924)
*July 6 – Kathleen Raine, English poet, scholar, and translator (born 1908)
*July 10 – Winston Graham, English novelist (born 1908)
*July 14 – Éva Janikovszky, Hungarian novelist and children's writer (born 1926)
*July 15 – Roberto Bolaño, Chilean-born fiction writer (born 1953)
*July 16 – Carol Shields, American-born Canadian novelist (breast cancer; born 1935)
*September 3 – Alan Dugan, American poet (born 1923)
*September 24 – Derek Prince, English biblical scholar, author and radio presenter (born 1915)
*September 25 – Edward Said, Palestinian-American literary critic (born 1935)
* November 9 – Alan Davidson, Northern Irish historian and food writer (born 1924)
*December 3 – Sita Ram Goel, Indian historian, publisher and author (born 1921)
*December 11 – Ahmadou Kourouma, Ivorian writer (born 1927)
*December 12 – Fadwa Toukan, Palestinian poet (born 1917)

Awards

*Nobel Prize for Literature: J. M. Coetzee

Australia

*The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Nicholas Angel, ''Drown Them in the Sea''
*C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry: Emma Lew, ''Anything the Landlord Touches''
* Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Jill Jones, ''Screens Jets Heaven''
*Miles Franklin Award: Alex Miller, '' Journey to the Stone Country''

Canada

*Giller Prize: M. G. Vassanji – ''The In-Between World of Vikram Lall''
*See 2003 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of the winners of those awards.
*Griffin Poetry Prize: Margaret Avison, ''Concrete and Wild Carrot'' and Paul Muldoon, ''Moy sand and gravel''
*Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction: Alison Watt (writer), Alison Watt, ''The Last Island''

Sweden

*Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award: Maurice Sendak and Christine Nöstlinger

United Kingdom

*Man Booker Prize, Booker Prize: DBC Pierre, ''Vernon God Little''
*Caine Prize for African Writing: Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor, "Weight of Whispers"
*Carnegie Medal (literary award), Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Jennifer Donnelly, ''A Gathering Light''
*Cholmondeley Award: Ciarán Carson, Michael Donaghy, Lavinia Greenlaw, Jackie Kay
*David Cohen Prize: Beryl Bainbridge, Thom Gunn
*Eric Gregory Award: Jen Hadfield, Zoë Brigley, Paul Batchelor, Olivia Cole (poet), Olivia Cole, Sasha Dugdale, Anna Woodford
*James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Janet Browne, ''Charles Darwin: Volume 2 – The Power of Place''
*James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Andrew O'Hagan, ''Personality''
*Orange Prize for Fiction: Valerie Martin, ''Property (book), Property''
*Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: U. A. Fanthorpe
*2003 Whitbread Awards, Whitbread Book of The Year Award: Mark Haddon, ''The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: A Novel''

United States

*Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: David Shumate, ''High Water Mark''
*American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medals#Poetry, American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal in Poetry: W. S. Merwin
*Bernard F. Connors Prize for Poetry: Julie Sheehan, "Brown-headed Cow Birds"
*Bollingen Prize for Poetry: Adrienne Rich
*Brittingham Prize in Poetry: Brian Teare, ''The Room Where I Was Born''
*Compton Crook Award: Patricia Bray, ''Devlin's Luck''
*Frost Medal: Lawrence Ferlinghetti
*Hugo Award: Robert J. Sawyer, ''Hominids (novel), Hominids''
*Lambda Literary Awards: Multiple categories; see 2003 Lambda Literary Awards
*National Book Award for Fiction: Shirley Hazzard, ''The Great Fire (Hazzard novel), The Great Fire''
*National Book Critics Circle Award: Edward P. Jones, ''The Known World''
*Newbery Medal for children's literature: Edward Irving Wortis, Avi, ''Crispin: The Cross of Lead''Hahn 2015, p. 658
*PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction: Sabina Murray, ''The Caprices''
*Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Jeffrey Eugenides, ''Middlesex (novel), Middlesex''
*Wallace Stevens Award: Richard Wilbur
*Whiting Awards:
:Fiction: Courtney Angela Brkic (fiction/nonfiction), Alexander Chee, Agymah Kamau, Ann Pancake, Lewis Robinson, Jess Row
:Nonfiction: Christopher Cokinos, Trudy Dittmar
:Plays: Sarah Ruhl
:Poetry: Major Jackson

Other

*Camões Prize: Rubem Fonseca
*International Dublin Literary Award: Orhan Pamuk ''My Name is Red''
*Premio Nadal: Andrés Trapiello, ''Los amigos del crimen perfecto''
*SAARC Literary Award: Tissa Abeysekara, Laxman Gaikwad

See also

*2003 in comics
*2003 in Australian literature

Notes

*

References

{{Year in literature article categories

2003 books,
2003, Literature
Years of the 21st century in literature