Are you not sure yet what you want to be reading this year? Do you know what the books are you mustn’t miss? Luckily, The Guardian has rounded those up for us! (full article here)
You can find all the books they propose in their article. Here below, I have taken over their list of important dates you cannot miss.
January
1 Centenary of the birth of The Catcher in the Rye author JD Salinger.
7 Winners of Costa category awards announced.
11 Release of the biopic Colette, starring Keira Knightley.
12 50th anniversary of the publication of Philip Roth’s Portnoy’s Complaint.
14 TS Eliot prize for poetry awarded.
29 Costa prize-giving with book of the year revealed. Germaine Greer turns 80.
February
8 Bicentenary of the birth of John Ruskin in 1819.
Release of James Baldwin adaptation If Beale Street Could Talk, by Moonlight writer/director Barry Jenkins.
20 20th anniversary of death of Blasted playwright Sarah Kane, aged 28.
March
1 Release of Chaos Walking, based on Patrick Ness’s Guardian award winner The Knife of Letting Go. Tom Holland and Daisy Ridley star.
12 London Book Fair, until 14th.
April
5 Release of The Sisters Brothers, starring John C Reilly and Joaquin Phoenix, based on Patrick deWitt’s Booker-shortlisted novel. And of Pet Sematary, the second film version of Stephen King’s horror tale.
21 Bicentenary of the start of Keats’s “great year”, including most of his Odes.
22 Fifty years since Booker prize first awarded in 1969, to PH Newby.
23 300th anniversary of the publication of Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, often called the first novel in English.
May
6 Centenary of the death of L Frank Baum, author of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
16 International Dylan Thomas prize winner announced
20 Rathbones Folio prize awarded.
21 Man Booker international prize awarded.
23 Hay festival opens, until 2 June.
31 Bicentenary of birth of Walt Whitman.
June
5 Women’s prize for fiction winner announced.
23 Bicentenary of publication of Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book, including “Rip Van Winkle”.
July
15 Centenary of the birth of Iris Murdoch.
31 Centenary of Primo Levi’s birth.
August
1 Bicentenary of birth of Herman Melville, best known for Moby‑Dick.
3 75th anniversary of 1944 Education Act gaining royal assent.
9 Kenneth Branagh-directed film Artemis Fowl, based on Eoin Colfer’s 2001 YA fantasy novel.
10 Edinburgh international book festival, until 26th.
16 Bicentenary of the Peterloo massacre, which inspired a Shelley poem and led to the founding of the Manchester Guardian newspaper.
25 75th anniversary of the liberation of Paris.
September
27 Release of Joe Wright’s film of AJ Finn’s bestselling thriller The Woman in the Window, starring Amy Adams.
October
4 Cheltenham literature festival, until 15th.
11 Film adaptation of Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch, starring Ansel Elgort and scripted by British screenwriter Peter Straughan.
14 Man Booker prize ceremony.
22 100 years since birth of Doris Lessing, winner of Nobel prize in 2007.
November
Centenary of JM Keynes’s The Economic Consequences of the Peace.
10 Quatercentenary of René Descartes’ famous night of three dreams in 1619, revealing the shape of his new philosophy.
22 Bicentenary of the birth of George Eliot. 150 years since birth of André Gide.
December
One hundred and fifty years since the publication of War and Peace.
20 Film of Cats, directed by Tom Hooper and reworking the TS Eliot-based musical.
26 Release of The Call of the Wild, based on Jack London’s tale of a dog.
Happy reading,
Loes M.