1968 - Literature

Literature

Nonfiction: Toward a Rational Society by German philosopher and sociologist Jürgen Habermas, 39, who has a Kantian dedication to reason, ethics, and moral philosophy. A member of the "Frankfurt School" who has studied under Paul Adorno, Habermas will be condemned by some as a "Luddite"; Four Essays on Liberty by Sir Isaiah Berlin (he was knighted in 1957); Liberalism: Ancient and Modern by Leo Strauss; Soul on Ice by Arkansas-born Black Panther leader (Leroy) Eldridge Cleaver, 33, who wrote it in prison while serving 9 years for drug dealing and rape. The Panthers have run a free-lunch program at Oakland, Calif., and worked to help inner-city blacks help themselves, but Cleaver's faction has favored overthrowing the U.S. government by force and replacing it with a black socialist regime. Cleaver flees to Cuba in November to avoid going to prison for parole violations and begins a 7-year exile; Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima and Revolutionary Immortality: Mao Tse-Tung and the Chinese Revolution by Robert Jay Lifton; Chemical and Biological Warfare by Chicago-born journalist Seymour M. Hersh, 31; Slouching Towards Bethlehem (essays) by Sacramento-born California journalist-novelist Joan Didion, 33; Disobedience and History by Howard Zinn; Can We Win in Vietnam? by Herman Kahn; Les Nègres Blancs d'Amerique (White Niggers of America) by Quebec separatist Pierre Vallières, 30, who says, "To be a nigger in America is to be not a man but someone's slave." He calls upon Québcois to take up arms and use gasoline bombs in their campaign for independence, but critics say that being a black in the United States is incomparably more burdensome than being a French-Canadian; The Naked Civil Servant by English writer-raconteur-actor Quentin Crisp (originally Denis Pratt), 59, is an account of his openly homosexual life in London; Crisis Now by James M. Gavin, who criticizes the U.S. Army for over-reliance on nuclear weapons and other advanced hardware at the expense of conventional forces; The Whole Earth Catalog by Menlo Park, Calif., Truck Store operator Stewart Brand, 29; The Politics of Ecstasy by marijuana advocate Timothy Leary, who urges his readers to "turn on and drop out"; The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge by Peruvian- (or Brazilian-) born California anthropologist Carlos Castaneda, 42 (or 36—he is secretive about his life), who has explored the jimson weed and peyote drug culture of Sonora, Mexico, where belief in the supernatural is widespread. Castaneda's book becomes an international bestseller, although doubts will be raised as to whether the Yaqui Indian shaman Juan Matus ever existed outside the author's fantasies. Castaneda will write nine other books and be credited not only with reviving interest in Indian and Southwest cultures but also with helping to usher in the "New Age" sensibility.

British diplomat-author-critic Sir Harold Nicolson dies of a heart attack in Kent May 1 at age 81; lecturer-journalist Randolph (Frederick Edward Spencer) Churchill at his country home in Stour June 6 at age 57, having completed two volumes of a projected five-volume biography of his late father, the prime minister; psychologist Edwin G. Boring dies at Cambridge, Mass., July 1 at age 81; historian Crane Brinton at Cambridge, Mass., September 7 at age 70; author Thomas Merton (Father M. Louis) while attending an ecumenical conference of Catholic and Buddhist monks at Bangkok December 9 at age 53 when he is accidentally electrocuted in his bathtub by an electric fan.

Fiction: The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Richmond, Va.-born novelist Tom Wolfe (Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr.), 37, whose term "radical chic" becomes a national catch phrase; The Armies of the Night: History as a Novel, The Novel as History by Norman Mailer; Welcome to the Monkey House (stories) by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.; Couples by John Updike; First Circle (V kruge pyervom) and Cancer Ward (Rakovy korpus) by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; Enderby by Anthony Burgess; The Military Philosophers by Anthony Powell; Expensive People by Joyce Carol Oates; My Michael by Israeli novelist Amos Oz, 29; Over Against the Woods (Muol ha-ye'arot) (stories) by Jerusalem-born Israeli writer A. (Abraham) B. Yehoshua, 31; Myra Breckenridge by Gore Vidal; Cocksure by Mordecai Richler; The Universal Baseball Association, J. Harry Waugh, Prop. by Robert Coover; Dance of the Happy Shades (stories) by Canadian writer Alice Munro (née Laidlaw), 37; Tigers Are Better Looking (stories) by Jean Rhys; Star Quest by Pennsylvania-born novelist Dean R. (Ray) Koontz, 23; Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy; Red Sky at Morning by Chicago-born, New Orleans-raised Santa Fe novelist Richard Bradford (son of Roark Bradford), 36; Airport by Arthur Hailey; The Salzburg Connection by Helen MacInnes.

The Booker Prize established by Britain's Publishers Association and the Booker food company rewards literary merit, publicizes little-known authors, and will increase sales of novels. Emulating the prix Goncourt established in France 65 years ago, the Booker will become Britain's most coveted literary award.

Salt Lake City-born writer Neal Cassady dies of alcohol and drugs beside a Mexican railroad track at San Miguel de Allende February 4 at age 41, having written long, spontaneous letters that inspired William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and other members of the Beat Generation; novelist Fannie Hurst dies at New York February 23 at age 78; Edwin O'Connor of a cerebral hemorrhage at Boston March 23 at age 49; Damon Runyon Jr. in a leap from a bridge at Washington, D.C., April 14 at age 50; novelist-playwright Edna Ferber dies at New York April 16 at age 82; Allan Seeger of cancer at Ann Arbor, Mich., May 10 at age 62; Dorothy Dodds Baker at Terra Bella, Calif., June 17 at age 61; Charles Jackson commits suicide at New York September 21 at age 65; mystery writer Cornell Woolrich dies at New York September 25 age 64; Conrad Richter of a heart ailment at Pottsville, Pa., October 30 at age 78; Rose Wilder Lane at her Danbury, Conn., home October 30 at age 80; novelist-politician Upton Sinclair at Bound Brook, N.J., November 25 age 90; John Steinbeck of a heart ailment at New York December 20 at age 66; Czech novelist Max Brod of a heart attack at Tel Aviv December 20 at age 84; James Kennaway at London December 21 at age 40 from injuries sustained in a motorcar accident.

Poetry: "August 1968" by W. H. Auden has been inspired by the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia; Of Being Numerous by George Oppen; White Haired Lover by Karl Shapiro; Bending the Bow by Oakland, Calif.-born poet Robert (Edward) Duncan, 49; Shall We Gather at the River by James Wright; The Speed of Darkness by Muriel Rukeyser; Windmill Country, The Hidden Journey, and Late Night Bulletin by Dorothy Hewett; His Toy, His Dream, His Rest by John Berryman; A Day for Anne Frank by Newark, N.J.-born poet C. K. (Charles Kenneth) Williams, 31; The World Saved by Little Children (Il mondo salvato dai ragazzini) by Elsa Morante; Firstborn by New York-born poet Louise (Elisabeth) Glück, 25; Black Judgement by Nikki Giovanni includes her poem "Nikki Rosa."

Poet-essayist Gunnar Ekelöf dies at Sigtuna, Sweden, March 16 at age 60; Arnulf Overland at Oslo March 25 at age 77 (after his liberation from a German concentration camp in 1945 the Norwegian government expressed its gratitude by giving him the old home of poet Hernik Wergeland); poet-art critic Herbert Read dies near Malton, England, June 10 at age 74; Salvatore Quasimodo of a brain hemorrhage at Naples June 14 at age 60.

Juvenile: Corduroy by California author-illustrator Don Freeman, 60; Tikki Tikki Tembo by Cleveland-born author Arlene Mosel (née Tichy), 47, illustrations by Blair Lent; CDB! and Roland the Minstrel Pig by New Yorker magazine cartoonist-author William Steig, now 60; Lagalag, the Wanderer by Carol Fenner.

Author-illustrator Virginia Lee Burton dies following lung cancer surgery at Boston October 15 at age 59; Enid Blyton at Hampstead, London, November 28 at age 71.