See also: 1937 in literature, other events of 1938, 1939 in literature, list of years in literature.

Events

A very good year in books:

• The trilogy, U.S.A. by John Dos Passos, is published containing his three novels The 42nd Parallel (1930), 1919 (1932), and The Big Money (1936).
• Scoop by Evelyn Waugh is published.
• The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen is published.
• Jorge Luis Borges is injured in an accident and develops blood poisoning in December. While recovering next year he will write the first short story in his later characteristic style.
• Samuel Beckett's first completed novel Murphy is published.

New books

• Aunt Sara's Wooden God - Mercedes Gilbert
• Being Geniuses Together, 1920-1930 – Robert McAlmon
• Beyond The River - George Hamlin Ross
• The Bridge in The Jungle - B. Traven
• Brighton Rock - Graham Greene
• Count Belisarius - Robert Graves
• The Death of the Heart - Elizabeth Bowen
• Dynasty of Death - Taylor Caldwell
• Epitaph for A Spy - Eric Ambler
• Gas Light - Patrick Hamilton
• Homage to Catalonia - George Orwell
• Hope of Heaven - John O'Hara
• Invitation To A Beheading - Vladimir Nabokov
• Lassie Come-Home - Eric Knight
• Nausea (La Nausée) - Jean-Paul Sartre
• Out of Africa - Isak Dinesen
• Out of the Silent Planet - C. S. Lewis
• Rebecca - Daphne du Maurier
• Scoop - Evelyn Waugh
• Thieves' Carnival (Le bal des voleurs) - Jean Anouilh
• U.S.A. trilogy - John Dos Passos
• The White Stag - Kate Seredy
• The Yearling - Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
• Anthem - Ayn Rand

Births

• February 12 - Judy Blume, author
• April 29 - Larry Niven, author

Deaths

• June 26 - James Weldon Johnson

Awards

• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Kate Seredy, The White Stag
• Nobel Prize for literature: Pearl S. Buck
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Thornton Wilder, Our Town
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Marya Zaturenska: Cold Morning Sky
• Pulitzer Prize for the Novel: John Phillips Marquand - The Late George Apley