Books reviewed in chronological order - 1940-1949

The Modern Novel home page » Books reviewed in chronological order » 1940-1949

1940

  • Miklos Bánffy: Darabokra szaggattatol (They Were Divided)
  • Karin Boye: Kallocain (Kallocain)
  • Kay Boyle: The Crazy Hunter - Three Short Novels (The Crazy Hunter; The Bridegroom's Body; Big Fiddle)
  • Dino Buzzati: Il deserto dei Tartari (The Tartar Steppe)
  • Willa Cather: Sapphira and the Slave Girl
  • William Faulkner: The Hamlet
  • Graham Greene: The Power and the Glory (US: The Labyrinthine Ways)
  • Neil Gunn: Second Sight
  • James Hanley: Our Time Is Gone
  • Ernest Hemingway: For Whom the Bell Tolls
  • Carson McCullers: The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
  • Carson McCullers: Reflections in a Golden Eye
  • Christina Stead: The Man Who Loved Children
  • Richard Wright: Native Son

    • 1941

  • F. Scott Fitzgerald: The Last Tycoon
  • Béla Illés: Kárpáti Rapszódia (Carpathian Rhapsody)
  • Wyndham Lewis: The Vulgar Streak
  • Andrew Lytle: At the Moon's Inn
  • Vladimir Nabokov: The Real Life of Sebastian Knight
  • Flann O'Brien: An Béal Bocht (The Poor Mouth)
  • Elio Vittorini: Conversazione in Sicilia (Conversation in Sicily; In Sicily; Tears and Wine)
  • Patrick White: The Living and the Dead
  • Virginia Woolf: Between the Acts

    • 1942

  • Albert Camus: L'Etranger (UK: The Outsider; US: The Stranger)
  • Camilo José Cela: La familia de Pascual Duarte (Pascual Duarte's Family, US: The Family of Pascual Duarte)
  • William Faulkner: Go Down, Moses, and Other Stories (later title: Go Down, Moses)
  • Milán Füst: A feleségem története (The Story of My Wife)
  • Neil Gunn: Young Art and Old Hector
  • Ion Sadoveanu: Sfârşit de veac în Bucureşti [Fin-de-siècle in Bucharest]
  • Frank Waters: The Man Who Killed the Deer
  • Evelyn Waugh: Put Out More Flags
  • Eudora Welty: Robber Bridegroom
  • Austin Tappan Wright: Islandia

    • 1943

  • Jorge Amado: São Jorge dos Ilhéus (The Golden Harvest)
  • Jorge Amado: Terras do Sem-Fim (The Violent Land)
  • Georges Bernanos: Monsieur Ouine (The Open Mind; Monsieur Ouine)
  • Simone de Beauvoir: L'invitée (She Came to Stay)
  • Graham Greene: The Ministry of Fear
  • Neil Gunn: The Serpent (US: Man Goes Alone)
  • James Hanley: No Directions
  • Halldór Laxness: Íslandsklukkan (Iceland's Bell)
  • Thomas Mann: Joseph, der Ernährer (Joseph the Provider)
  • Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: Le petit prince (The Little Prince)

    • 1944

  • Saul Bellow: Dangling Man
  • Louis-Ferdinand Céline: Guignol's Band (Guignol's Band)
  • Caroline Gordon: The Women on the Porch
  • Neil Gunn: The Green Isle of the Great Deep
  • L P Hartley: The Shrimp and the Anemone
  • Curzio Malaparte: Kaputt (Kaputt; later: Kaputt goes Europe!)

    • 1945

  • Ivo Andrić: Na Drini ćuprija (The Bridge on the Drina)
  • Ivo Andrić: Travnička hronika (Bosnian Story; Bosnian Chronicle; The Days of the Consuls)
  • Ivo Andrić: Gospođjica (The Woman from Sarajevo)
  • Mukhtar Auezov: Абай жолы (Abai)
  • Hermann Broch: Der Tod des Vergil (The Death of Virgil)
  • Henry Green: Loving
  • Neil Gunn: The Key of the Chest
  • Christopher Isherwood: Prater Violet
  • Carlo Levi: Cristo si è fermato a Eboli (Christ Stopped at Eboli)
  • Carmen Laforet: Nada (Nada; Andrea)
  • George Orwell: Animal Farm
  • Jean-Paul Sartre: L'Age de raison (The Age of Reason)
  • Jean-Paul Sartre: Le Sursis (The Reprieve)
  • Tarjei Vesaas: Huset i mørkret (The House in the Dark)
  • Evelyn Waugh: Brideshead Revisited

    • 1946

  • Miguel Ángel Asturias: El Señor Presidente (The President; El Señor Presidente)
  • Isabel Bolton: Do I Wake or Sleep
  • Marta Brunet: Humo hacia el sur [Smoke Towards the South]
  • Stella Gibbons: Westwood
  • Neil Gunn: The Drinking Well
  • L P Hartley: The Sixth Heaven
  • Emyr Humphreys: The Little Kingdom
  • Nikos Kazantzakis: Βιος και Πολιτεία του Αλέξη Ζορμπά (Zorba the Greek)
  • Gianna Manzini: Lettera all'editore (Game Plan for a Novel)
  • Carson McCullers: The Member of the Wedding
  • Liam O'Flaherty: Land
  • Mervyn Peake: Titus Groan
  • Eudora Welty: Delta Wedding

    • 1947

  • Anna Banti: Artemisia (Artemisia)
  • Saul Bellow: The Victim
  • John Horne Burns: The Gallery
  • Italo Calvino: Il sentiero dei nidi di ragno (The Path to the Nest of Spiders)
  • Albert Camus: La Peste (The Plague)
  • Osamu Dazai: 斜陽 (Japan: The Declining Sun, US: The Setting Sun)
  • L P Hartley: Eustace and Hilda
  • Malcolm Lowry: Under the Volcano
  • Andrew Lytle: A Name for Evil
  • Julian Maclaren-Ross: Of Love and Hunger
  • Naguib Mahfouz: زقاق المدق (Midaq Alley)
  • Thomas Mann: Doktor Faustus (Doctor Faustus)
  • Alberto Moravia: La romana (The Woman of Rome)
  • Vladimir Nabokov: Bend Sinister
  • Cesare Pavese: Il compagno (The Comrade)
  • Vasco Pratolini: Cronaca familiare (Two Brothers; Family Chronicle)
  • Vasco Pratolini: Cronache di poveri amanti (A Tale of Poor Lovers)
  • Rogelio Sinán: Plenilunio [Full Moon]
  • Agustín Yáñez: Al filo del agua (The Edge of the Storm)

    • 1948

  • Jerzy Andrzejewski: Popiół i diament (Ashes and Diamonds)
  • Elizabeth Bowen: The Heat of the Day
  • Jocelyn Brooke: The Military Orchid
  • Osamu Dazai: 人間失格 (No Longer Human)
  • G V Desani: All About H. Hatterr
  • William Faulkner: Intruder in the Dust
  • Graham Greene: The Heart of the Matter
  • Neil Gunn: The Shadow
  • Neil Gunn: The Silver Bough
  • Aldous Huxley: Ape and Essence
  • Norman Mailer: The Naked and the Dead
  • Leopoldo Marechal: Adán Buenosayres
  • Achdiat Mihardja: Atheis (Atheis)
  • Elsa Morante: Menzogna e sortilegio (House of Liars)
  • Pa Chin: 寒夜 (Cold Nights)
  • Ernesto Sabato: El túnel (The Outsider; The Tunnel)
  • Nathalie Sarraute: Portrait d'un inconnu (Portrait of a Man Unknown)
  • Elio Vittorini: Il garofano rosso (The Red Carnation)
  • Evelyn Waugh: The Loved One
  • Patrick White: The Aunt's Story

    • 1949

  • Nelson Algren: The Man with the Golden Arm
  • Miguel Ángel Asturias: Hombres de maíz (Men of Maize)
  • Isabel Bolton: The Christmas Tree
  • Paul Bowles: The Sheltering Sky
  • Jocelyn Brooke: A Mine of Serpents
  • Alejo Carpentier: El reino de este mundo (The Kingdom of this World)
  • Alba de Céspedes: Dalla parte di lei (The Best of Husbands)
  • Neil Gunn: The Lost Chart
  • John Hawkes: The Cannibal
  • Naguib Mahfouz: بداية ونهاية (The Beginning and the End)
  • Curzio Malaparte: La Pelle (The Skin)
  • George Orwell: Nineteen Eighty-Four
  • Jean-Paul Sartre: La mort dans l'âme (UK: Iron in the Soul; US: Troubled Sleep)

    • Other links

  • Publishers Weekly list of bestselling novels in the United States in the 1940s
  • he Books of the Century: 1940-1949
  • Modern Literature Time Chart (1940 - 1949)