Events

• Douglas Adams begins writing for BBC radio.
• V. S. Naipaul declines the offer of a CBE.
• Christopher Tolkien, with Guy Gavriel Kay, completes and publishes his father's work, The Silmarillion.
• Philosophy and Literature, an academic journal that explores the connections between literary and philosophical studies by presenting ideas on the aesthetics of literature, critical theory, and the philosophical interpretation of literature, is founded.

New books

• Richard Adams -The Plague Dogs
• Jorge Amado - Tieta do Agreste
• Jay Anson - The Amityville Horror
• Margaret Atwood - Dancing Girls
• Richard Bach - Illusions
• Richard Bachman - Rage
• Gerd Brantenberg - Egalia's Daughters or The Daughters of Egalia
• Terry Brooks - The Sword of Shannara
• J. M. Coetzee - In the Heart of the Country
• Robert Coover - The Public Burning
• Basil Copper - And Afterward, the Dark
• L. Sprague de Camp
  • The Hostage of Zir
  • The Queen of Zamba
• L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter - Conan of Aquilonia
• Philip K. Dick - A Scanner Darkly
• Joan Didion - A Book of Common Prayer
• Buchi Emecheta - The Slave Girl
• Timothy Findley - The Wars
• John Fowles - Daniel Martin
• Marilyn French - The Women's Room
• Pauline Gedge - Child of the Morning
• Mark Helprin - Refiner's Fire
• Erica Jong - How to Save Your Own Life
• Stephen King - The Shining
• John le Carré - The Honourable Schoolboy
• Robert Ludlum - The Chancellor Manuscript
• Brian Lumley - The Horror at Oakdeene and Others
• Colleen McCullough - The Thorn Birds
• Larry McMurtry - Terms of Endearment
• Ruth Manning-Sanders - A Book of Enchantments and Curses
• Toni Morrison - Song of Solomon
• Iris Murdoch - The Sea, the Sea
• Patrick O'Brian - The Mauritius Command
• Ruth Rendell - A Judgement in Stone
• Alun Richards - Ennal's Point
• Harold Robbins - Dreams Die First
• Paul Mark Scott - Staying On
• Erich Segal - Oliver's Story
• Irwin Shaw - Beggarman, Thief
• M. P. Shiel - Prince Zaleski and Cummings King Monk
• Sidney Sheldon - Bloodline
• Elizabeth Smart - A Bonus
• Craig Thomas - Firefox
• J. R. R. Tolkien - The Silmarillion
• Melvin Van Peebles - The True American, A Folk Fable
• Christopher Wood -James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me

New drama

• Heiner Müller - Die Hamletmaschine
• Dennis Potter - Brimstone and Treacle

Poetry

• Frank Belknap Long - In Mayan Splendor

Non-fiction

• Robert Coles – Eskimos, Indians, Chicanos, vol 4 of Children of Crisis
• Robert Coles – The Privileged Ones: The Well-off and the Rich in America, vol 5 of Children of Crisis
• Patrick Leigh Fermor – A Time Of Gifts
• Jim Fixx – The Complete Book of Running
• Bharati Mukherjee & Clark Blaise –Days and Nights in Calcutta
• E. F. Schumacher – A Guide for the Perplexed
• Everett M. Skehan – Rocky Marciano. Biography of A First Son
• Peter Ustinov - Dear Me

Births

• date unknown - Jonathan Safran Foer

Deaths

• January 14 - Anaïs Nin, novelist and diarist
• February 27 - John Dickson Carr, crime novelist
• April 7 - Jim Thompson, pulp fiction author
• April 11 - Jacques Prévert, poet
• May 9 - James Jones, American novelist (b. 1921)
• July 2 - Vladimir Nabokov, Russian/American novelist
• September 4 - E. F. Schumacher, Small is Beautiful author
• September 12 - Robert Lowell, poet
• October 27 - James M. Cain, novelist, newspaperman
• November 10 - Dennis Wheatley, occult novelist
• November 30 - Terence Rattigan, dramatist
• December 22 - Frank Thiess, German writer

Awards

• Nobel Prize in Literature: Vicente Aleixandre

Canada

• 1977 Governor General's Awards

France

• Prix Goncourt: Didier Decoin, John l'enfer
• Prix Médicis French: Michel Butel, L'Autre Amour
• Prix Médicis International: Héctor Bianciotti, Le Traité des saisons - Argentina

United Kingdom

• Booker Prize: Paul Mark Scott, Staying On
• Eric Gregory Award: Tony Flynn, Michael Vince, David Cooke, Douglas Marshall, Melissa Murray
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: John le Carré, The Honourable Schoolboy
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: George Painter, Chateaubriand: Volume 1 - The Longed-For Tempests
• Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry: Norman Nicholson
• Whitbread Best Book Award: Beryl Bainbridge, Injury Time

United States

• American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for the Novel, Saul Bellow
• Nebula Award: Frederik Pohl, Gateway
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Mildred D. Taylor, Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
• Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science: Gerard K. O'Neill, The High Frontier: Human Colonies in Space
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Michael Cristofer, The Shadow Box
• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: no award given
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: James Merrill, Divine Comedies
• Pulitzer Prize for History: David M. Potter: The Impending Crisis, 1841-186 (Completed and edited by Don E. Fehrenbacher).

Rest of the World

• Premio Nadal: José Asenjo Sedano, Conversación sobre la guerra
• Viareggio Prize: Davide Lajolo, Veder l'erba dalla parte delle radici