The Calendar of Literary Facts contains more than 6,500 events in literary history.
1950 Literary Facts
William Demby publishes Beetlecreek
S. E. Hinton is born
L. Ron Hubbard publishes Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health
Gwendolyn Brooks receives Pulitzer Prize in poetry
Heinrich Boell publishes Wanderer, kommst du nach Spa (Traveller, If You Come to Spa)
James Boswell’s Boswell’s London Journal, 1762-1763 is published
Ray Bradbury publishes The Martian Chronicles
Ralph J. Bunche receives Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating the 1949 armistice between Arab and Israeli states
C. S. Lewis publishes The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (first in the “Chronicles of Narnia” series)
Paer Lagerkvist publishes Barabbas
Kenneth Millar publishes The Drowning Pool
Carl Sandburg publishes Complete Poems
Sidney Sheldon’s Annie Get Your Gun is produced
Doris Lessing publishes The Grass Is Singing
Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy conducts hearings intended to detect communist penetration of American government and academia; for his recklessness, he is censured by the U.S. Senate in 1954
South African opponents of apartheid are banned from attending schools, universities, and public meetings
Theater of the Absurd flourishes in Western drama
Chinese forces invade and occupy Tibet
A. B. Guthrie Jr. receives the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for The Way West
Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, and Joshua Logan receive the Pulitzer Prize in drama for South Pacific
Gwendolyn Brooks receives the Pulitzer Prize in poetry for Annie Allen
Bertrand Russell receives the Nobel Prize for Literature
S. Y. Agnon publishes Edo ve-Enam (Two Tales: Betrothes [and] Edo and Enam)
Conrad Richter publishes The Town
Lionel Trilling publishes his first essay collection, The Liberal Imagination: Essays on Literature and Society
Ray A. Young Bear is born
Damon Knight publishes two of his best-known stories, “To Serve Man” and “Not with a Bang”
Ernest Poole dies
George Orwell dies
Explore: Animal Farm, 1984, Shooting an Elephant, George Orwell
A jury finds Alger Hiss, accused by Whittaker Chambers of spying for the Soviets, guilty of perjury
Gloria Naylor is born
Explore: The Women of Brewster Place, Mama Day, Gloria Naylor, Linden Hills
Irving Bacheller dies
Edgar Lee Masters dies
Explore: Spoon River Anthology, Edgar Lee Masters, Butch Weldy
Edgar Rice Burroughs dies
Explore: Tarzan of the Apes, At the Earth's Core, Edgar Rice Burroughs
Julia Alvarez is born
Explore: In the Time of the Butterflies, Something to Declare, Julia Alvarez
Carolyn Forche is born
Explore: The Garden Shukkei-en, Carolyn Forché, What is the theme of Carolyn Forché's poem "Museum of Stones"?
William Rose Benét dies
John Gould Fletcher dies
David Adams Richards is born
Eileen Goudge is born
Black Elk dies
Explore: Black Elk Speaks
David Bradley Jr. is born
Henry Louis Gates Jr. is born
Explore: The Signifying Monkey, Colored People
Ralph J. Bunche, a black American, wins the Nobel Peace Prize
Wendy Wasserstein is born
Explore: The Heidi Chronicles, Wendy Wasserstein
Edna St. Vincent Millay dies
Explore: Wild Swans, An Ancient Gesture, Edna St. Vincent Millay
Bernard Shaw dies
Explore: Arms and the Man, George Bernard Shaw, Candida
Johannes V. Jensen dies
Explore: The Long Journey