This article contains information about the literary events and publications of1978.

• March 8 –Douglas Adams'comic science fiction seriesThe Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy originates as aradio comedy broadcast on the U.K.BBC Radio 4.
• March –Philip Larkin ends his relationships with Maeve Brennan and Betty Mackereth.^[1]
• April –James Blaylock's first published story, "The Ape-Box Affair", appears inUnearth magazine, pioneeringsteampunk fiction.^[2]
• August 1 –Barbara Pym is a guest onDesert Island Discs.^[3]
• October – TheBookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year, a humorous award given annually to books with unusual titles, is launched at theFrankfurt Book Fair. The first winner isProceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice.^[4]
• November 15 –Harold Pinter's playBetrayal, inspired by a seven-year clandestine extramarital affair withBBC Television presenterJoan Bakewell, opens at theNational Theatre in London, directed byPeter Hall and featuringPenelope Wilton and her husband at this time,Daniel Massey, withMichael Gambon.^[5]
• December 15 – TheBerlin State Library's newHaus Potsdamer Straße is opened inWest Berlin'sKulturforum.^[6]
• unknown date –Antonia White's 1933 novelFrost in May becomes the first inVirago Press's Modern Classics series of reissues of books by neglected women authors, published in the UK.^[7]

• Etel Adnan –Sitt Marie Rose
• Srikrishna Alanahalli –Parasangada Gendethimma
• Kingsley Amis –Jake's Thing
• Martin Amis –Success
• Jessica Anderson –Tirra Lirra by the River
• Aharon Appelfeld –Badenheim 1939 (באדנהיים עיר נופש,Badenhaim `ir nofesh)
• Richard Bach –Illusions
• Beryl Bainbridge –Young Adolf
• Thomas Berger –Arthur Rex: A Legendary Novel
• Thomas Bernhard –Yes (Ja)
• Adolfo Bioy Casares –The Hero of Women (El héroe de las mujeres)
• William Peter Blatty –The Ninth Configuration
• Judy Blume –Wifey
• Charles Bukowski –Women
• Anthony Burgess –1985
• Taylor Caldwell –Bright Flows the River
• Chantal Chawaf –Rougeâtre
• John Cheever –The Stories of John Cheever
• C. J. Cherryh –Well of Shiuan
• Brian Cleeve –Judith
• Mary Elizabeth Counselman –Half in Shadow
• L. Sprague de Camp
  • The Best of L. Sprague de Camp
  • The Great Fetish
  • Conan the Swordsman (withLin Carter andBjörn Nyberg)
• Samuel R. Delany &Howard Chaykin –Empire: A Visual Novel
• Don DeLillo –Running Dog
• Nelson DeMille –By the Rivers of Babylon
• Phyllis Eisenstein –Born to Exile
• J. G. Farrell –The Singapore Grip
• Howard Fast –Second Generation
• Ken Follett –Eye of the Needle
• Alan Dean Foster –Splinter of the Mind's Eye
• Ernest J. Gaines –In My Father's House
• Jane Gardam –God on the Rocks
• Maurice Gee –Plumb (first in trilogy)
• Graham Greene –The Human Factor
• Donald Hamilton –The Silencers
• Harry Harrison –The Stainless Steel Rat Wants You
• Roy Heath –The Murderer
• James Herbert –The Spear
• William Hjortsberg –Falling Angel
• Timothy Mo –The Monkey King
• John Irving –The World According to Garp
• Marshall Jevons –Murder at the Margin
• James Jones –Whistle
• Ismail Kadare –The Three-Arched Bridge (Ura Me Tri Harqe)
• M. M. Kaye –The Far Pavilions
• Stephen King
  • The Stand
  • Night Shift (collection of short stories including "Children of the Corn")
• Christopher Koch –The Year of Living Dangerously
• Larry Kramer –Faggots
• Judith Krantz –Scruples
• Jaan Kross –The Czar's Madman (Keisri hull)
• Derek Lambert –The Saint Peter's Plot
• Camara Laye –Le Maître de la parole – Kouma Lafôlô Kouma (The Guardian of the Word)
• Ursula K. Le Guin –The Eye of the Heron
• Madeleine L'Engle –A Swiftly Tilting Planet
• Robert Ludlum –The Holcroft Covenant
• John D. MacDonald –The Empty Copper Sea
• David Malouf –An Imaginary Life
• Dambudzo Marechera –The House of Hunger
• Ngaio Marsh –Grave Mistake
• Richard Matheson –What Dreams May Come
• Ian McEwan –The Cement Garden
• James A. Michener –Chesapeake
• Patrick Modiano –Rue des boutiques obscures (translated asMissing Person)
• Alice Munro –Who Do You Think You Are? (The Beggar Maid: Stories of Flo and Rose in U.S.)
• Larry Niven –The Magic Goes Away
• Tim O'Brien –Going After Cacciato
• Andrew J. Offutt –Conan and the Sorcerer
• John L. Parker Jr. –Once a Runner
• Robert B. Parker –The Judas Goat
• Elizabeth Peters –Street of the Five Moons
• William Luther Pierce –The Turner Diaries
• Belva Plain –Evergreen
• Mario Puzo –Fools Die
• Mary Renault –The Praise Singer
• Ruth Rendell –A Sleeping Life
• Hubert Selby Jr. –Requiem for a Dream
• Jaswant Singh Kanwal –Lahoo Di Lo (Dawn of the Blood)
• Whitley Strieber –The Wolfen
• Thomas Sullivan –Diapason
• Julian Symons –The Blackheath Poisonings
• John Updike –The Coup
• Gore Vidal –Kalki
• Martin Walser –Runaway Horse
• William Wharton –Birdy
• Herman Wouk –War and Remembrance
• Richard Yates –A Good School
• Frank Yerby –Hail the Conquering Hero
• Roger Zelazny –The Courts of Chaos

• Janet and Allan Ahlberg –Each Peach, Pear, Plum (approximate year)
• Raymond Briggs –The Snowman
• Roald Dahl –The Enormous Crocodile
• Rumer Godden –A Kindle of Kittens
• Gwen Grant –Private – Keep Out
• Roger Hargreaves –Timbuctoo (first twelve of a series of 25 books)
• David Larkin (withBrian Froud andAlan Lee) –Faeries
• Bill Peet –Eli
• Lidia Postma –De Heksentuin (The Witch's Garden), in the Netherlands
• David Rees –The Exeter Blitz
• Seymour Reit (with Roberto Innocenti)
  • All Kinds of Planes
  • All Kinds of Ships
  • All Kinds of Trains
  • Sails, Rails, and Wings
• Louis Sachar –Sideways Stories from Wayside School (first in theWayside School series of six books)
• Rosemary Sutcliff –Song for a Dark Queen
• Arnold Wesker –Fatlips: A Story for Children
• Arnulf Zitelmann (withWilli Glasauer) –Kleiner Weg (Small Trail)

• Miguel M. Abrahão –O Chifrudo
• Douglas Adams –The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (radio play)
• Brian Clark –Whose Life Is It Anyway?
• Max Frisch –Tryptichon: Drei szenische Bilder (Triptych)
• David Hare –Plenty
• Arthur Kopit –Wings
• Ira Levin –Deathtrap
• Mary O'Malley –Once a Catholic
• Heiner Müller –Germania Death in Berlin (first performance)
• Harold Pinter –Betrayal
• Sam Shepard –Buried Child
• Martin Sherman –Bent
• Victoria Wood –Talent

• Maya Angelou –And Still I Rise
• Robert Minhinnick –A Thread in the Maze
• Luis Alberto Spinetta –Guitarra Negra (Black Guitar)
• John Tripp –Collected Poems

• Hannah Arendt (died 1975) –The Life of the Mind
• Gisela Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg –Tabu Homosexualität
• Roger Caron –Go-Boy! Memories of a Life Behind Bars
• Lord David Cecil –A Portrait of Jane Austen
• Charlotte Chandler –Hello, I Must Be Going!
• Beth Chatto –The Dry Garden
• Christina Crawford –Mommie Dearest
• Gerald Durrell –The Garden of the Gods
• Don E. Fehrenbacher –The Dred Scott Case: Its Significance in American Law and Politics
• John Gall –Systemantics
• H. R. Haldeman –The Ends of Power
• Mollie Katzen –Moosewood Cookbook
• Mary Midgley –Beast and Man: The Roots of Human Nature
• New York International Bible Society –Holy Bible,New International Version (translated into modernAmerican English)
• Richard Nixon –The Memoirs of Richard Nixon
• M. Scott Peck –The Road Less Travelled
• David Rorvik –In his Image: The Cloning of a Man^[8]
• Edward Said –Orientalism

• February 1 –Arno Camenisch, Swiss writer
• April 4 -Robison Wells, American novelist
• July 23 –Lauren Groff, American novelist and short story writer
• October 24 –Kei Miller, Jamaican-born poet and fiction writer
• November 2 -Ally Condie, American young-adult and middle grade novelist
• unknown dates
  • Filippo Bologna, Italian novelist and screenwriter
  • David Llewellyn, Welsh screenwriter
  • Samanta Schweblin, Argentine fiction writer
  • Rachel Trezise, Welsh novelist and short story writer^[9]

• January 12 –Robert Harbin, South African-born author of books on magic (born1908)
• March 1 –Paul Scott, English novelist, playwright and poet (born1920)
• March 24 –Leigh Brackett, American science fiction writer (born1915)
• April 14 –F. R. Leavis, English academic literary critic (born1895)
• May 1 –Sylvia Townsend Warner, English poet and novelist (born1893)
• May 12 –Louis Zukofsky, American modernist poet (born1904)
• June 11 –Carola Oman, English historical novelist, biographer and children's writer (born1897)
• June 18 –Walter C. Alvarez, American medical author (born1884)
• August 11 –Berta Ruck, Indian-born Welshromantic novelist (born1878)^[10]
• August 28 –Robert Shaw, English-born actor, novelist and playwright (born1927)
• September 3 –Basil Willey, English academic literary critic (died1897)
• September 9 –Hugh MacDiarmid (pen name of Christopher Murray Grieve), Scottish poet, journalist and essayist (born1892)
• September 11 –Georgi Markov, Bulgarian dissident writer, broadcaster, playwright (born1929)
• September 15 –Edmund Crispin (Robert Bruce Montgomery), English crime writer and composer (born1921)
• September 28 –Pope John Paul I (Albino Luciani), Italian author ofIllustrissimi (born1912)
• November 5 –N. Crevedia, Romanian poet, novelist and journalist (born1902)
• November 11 –Helena Boguszewska, Polish writer, columnist and a social activist (born1883)
• November 15 –Margaret Mead, American cultural anthropologist and author (born1901)^[11]
• December 15 –Ionel Gherea, Romanian philosopher, essayist and novelist (born1895)

• Nobel Prize for Literature:Isaac Bashevis Singer^[12]
• Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year is first awarded. The winner isProceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice.

• See1978 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

• Prix Goncourt:Patrick Modiano,Rue des boutiques obscures
• Prix Médicis French:Georges Perec,La Vie mode d'emploi
• Prix Médicis International:Aleksandr Zinovyev,L'Avenir radieux –Russia

• Miguel de Cervantes Prize:Dámaso Alonso

• Booker Prize:Iris Murdoch,The Sea, The Sea
• Carnegie Medal forchildren's literature:David Rees,The Exeter Blitz
• Cholmondeley Award:Christopher Hope,Leslie Norris,Peter Reading,D.M. Thomas,R.S. Thomas
• Eric Gregory Award:Ciarán Carson, Peter Denman,Christopher Reid, Paul Wilkins, Martyn A. Ford, James Sutherland-Smith
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction:Maurice Gee,Plumb
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography:Robert Gittings,The Older Hardy

• American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Fiction,Peter Taylor
• Nebula Award:Vonda McIntyre,Dreamsnake
• Newbery Medal forchildren's literature:Katherine Paterson,Bridge to Terabithia
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama:Donald L. Coburn,The Gin Game
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction:James Alan McPherson,Elbow Room
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry:Howard Nemerov,Collected Poems

• Friedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels:Astrid Lindgren
• Miles Franklin Award:Jessica Anderson,Tirra Lirra by the River
• Premio Nadal: Germán Sánchez Espeso,Narciso
• Viareggio Prize: Antonio Altomonte,Dopo il presidente

• 1978 in literature
• Years of the 20th century in literature

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