1947 in literature

• January – The English actor-manager Geoffrey Kendal arrives in British India with his touring repertory theatre company "Shakespeareana." It will perform Shakespeare in towns and villages there for several decades.[1]
• January 29 – Arthur Miller's play All My Sons opens at the Coronet Theater in New York, directed by Elia Kazan and starring Ed Begley, as the writer's first Broadway success.
• February 17 – On the death of Montserrat-born British fantasy fiction writer M. P. Shiel aged 81 in Chichester, his supposed title to the Kingdom of Redonda passes to the London poet John Gawsworth.
• March – Landfall, a literary magazine, is founded by Charles Brasch and first published by Caxton Press (New Zealand). It will become the country's longest-established literary journal.
• April
  • The opening night of the Swiss dramatist Friedrich Dürrenmatt's first play, Es steht geschrieben (It Is Written), is held in the Schauspielhaus Zürich, provoking fights among the audience.
  • The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls at the Qumran Caves becomes public.
• April 6 – The 1st Tony Awards for excellence in live American theater are awarded at the Waldorf Astoria New York.
• May/June – The English novelist T. H. White buys a house in Saint Anne, Alderney in the Channel Islands, where he will spend the rest of his life.
• June – Publication begins of Vice Versa magazine in Los Angeles, the first known periodical for lesbians, edited by 'Lisa Ben'.
• June 24 – Kenneth Arnold claims to have seen nine flying saucers near Mount Rainier, Washington, starting a wave of enthusiasm in science fiction writers and scientists.
• June 25 – Most of The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank is first published as Het Achterhuis: Dagboekbrieven 14 juni 1942 – 1 augustus 1944 ("The Annex: Diary Notes from 14 June 1942 – 1 August 1944") in Amsterdam, two years after its writer's death in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.
• August 24 – The first Edinburgh Festival of the Arts opens in Scotland.[2]
• September – The German literary association Group 47 forms.
• September 12 – The American novelist John Dos Passos is involved in an automobile accident that kills his wife and costs him the sight in one eye.
• November – Muriel Spark becomes editor of Poetry Review in London from this month's issue.
• November 24 – Dalton Trumbo refuses to testify before the McCarthyite House Un-American Activities Committee. Ring Lardner, Jr. attends, but refuses to answer questions. The United States House of Representatives votes 346–17 to approve citations of Contempt of Congress against all the "Hollywood Ten" screenwriters and directors who refuse to cooperate with the Committee over allegations of communist influences in the movie business. The ten are blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studios the following day.[3]
• December 23 – Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire opens at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on Broadway in New York City, directed by Elia Kazan. It stars Jessica Tandy and Marlon Brando in his first major stage rôle.

Uncertain dates

• Woody Guthrie completes his novel House of Earth. It will not be published until 2013.
• Jack Kerouac makes the journey he will later chronicle in his book On the Road.
• Séamus Ó Néill's novel Tonn Tuile is the first book from the Irish language publisher Sáirséal agus Dill in Dublin.
• Dorothy Parker divorces Alan Campbell for the first time.
• Pramoedya Ananta Toer begins two years' imprisonment by the Dutch authorities in Jakarta for supporting the Indonesian National Revolution. While in prison he begins his first major novel, Perburuan (The Fugitive, 1950).

• January 14 – Richard Laymon, American suspense novelist (died 2001)
• February 3 – Paul Auster, American novelist
• February 9 – Eamon Duffy, Irish church historian and academic
• April 3 – Srikrishna Alanahalli, Indian novelist and poet (died 1989)
• April 18 – Kathy Acker (Karen Lehmann), American novelist and poet (died 1997)
• April 12 – Tom Clancy, American novelist (died 2013)
• April 24 – Astrid Roemer, Suriname-born Dutch novelist, poet and playwright
• April 28 – Humayun Azad, Bangladeshi author, poet, scholar and linguist (died 2004)
• May 10 – Thomas Tessier, American writer of horror novels and short stories
• May 12 – Catherine Yronwode, American author and illustrator
• May 27 – Felix Dennis, English publisher and poet (died 2014)[7]
• June 5 – David Hare, English playwright
• June 19 – Salman Rushdie, Indian novelist writing in English
• June 22 – Octavia E. Butler, American science fiction writer (died 2006)
• July 2 – Jürg Amann, Swiss dramatist (died 2013)
• July 18 – Dermot Healy, Irish novelist and poet (died 2014)
• July 23 – Gardner Dozois, American science fiction author and editor (died 2018)
• August 14 - Danielle Steel, American romance novelist
• August 23 – Willy Russell, English dramatist
• September 8 – Marianne Wiggins, American novelist
• September 21 – Stephen King, American novelist
• October 14 – Tomás de Mattos, Uruguayan writer and librarian (died 2016)
• October 19 – Giorgio Cavazzano, Italian comics artist and illustrator
• November 6 – Michelle Magorian, English children's author
• December 26 – Jean Echenoz, French novelist

Uncertain dates

• Jaume Cabré, Catalan Spanish novelist and screenwriter
• Shahid Nadeem, Pakistani playwright
• Borka Pavićević, Montenegrin drama writer and columnist

• February 1 – J. D. Beresford, English short-story writer (born 1873)
• February 5 – Hans Fallada, German novelist (born 1893)
• February 11 – E. M. Hull, English romance novelist (born 1880)
• February 15 – Margaret Marshall Saunders, Canadian author (born 1861)
• March 12 – Winston Churchill, American novelist (born 1871)
• March 13 – Angela Brazil, English school-story writer for girls (born 1868)
• April 24 – Willa Cather, American novelist (born 1873)
• April 30 – Anna Wickham (Edith Alice Mary Harper), English poet (suicide, born 1883) [8]
• May 21
  • Flora Thompson, English semi-autobiographical novelist (born 1876)
  • E. C. Vivian (Charles Henry Cannell), English genre novelist (born 1882)
• June 6 – James Agate, English author and critic (born 1877)
• June 17 – Maxwell Perkins, American literary editor (born 1884)
• August 5 – Herbert Asquith, English poet and novelist (born 1881)
• September 25 – Afevork Ghevre Jesus, Ethiopian author writing in Amharic (born 1868)
• September 26 – Hugh Lofting, English-born children's writer (born 1886)
• September 15 – Richard Le Gallienne, English writer and poet (born 1866)
• October 13
  • William Le Queux, English-born French novelist and writer (born 1864)
  • Sidney Webb, English political economist (born 1859)
• November 12 – Baroness Orczy (Emma Orczy), Hungarian novelist writing in English (born 1865)
• November 14 – Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes, Anglo-French novelist and biographer writing in English (born 1868)
• December 7 – Tristan Bernard, French playwright and novelist (born 1866)
• December 15 – Arthur Machen, Welsh journalist, novelist and short-story writer (born 1863)
• December 30 – Alfred North Whitehead, English mathematician and philosopher (born 1861)

• Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Walter de la Mare, Collected Stories for Children
• Frost Medal: Gustav Davidson
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: L. P. Hartley, Eustace and Hilda
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Rev. C. C. E. Raven, English Naturalists from Neckham to Ray
• Knight Bachelor: Ralph Richardson
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Carolyn Sherwin Bailey, Miss Hickory
• Nobel Prize for literature: André Gide[9]
• Premio Nadal: Miguel Delibes, La sombra del ciprés es alargada
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: no award given
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Robert Lowell: Lord Weary's Castle
• Pulitzer Prize for the Novel: Robert Penn Warren – All the King's Men

• August 14/15 – Partition of India, the background to a number of novels including
  • John Masters – Bhowani Junction (1954)
  • Salman Rushdie – Midnight's Children (1981)
  • Paul Scott – A Division of the Spoils (1975)
• The following novels are also set during this year in the places shown
  • J. P. Donleavy – The Ginger Man (1955) (Dublin)
  • Philip Kerr – A German Requiem (1991) (Berlin and Vienna)
  • Amos Oz – Panther in the Basement (1998) (Palestine)