2003 year of literature
◄◄ | ◄ | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | Literature year 2003  | 2004  | 2005  | 2006  | 2007  | ►  | ►► 
Overview of the literary years 
Further events
Events
- September 9 : Barnes & Noble , the largest American bookseller , announces it will no longer sell downloadable e-books
- November 24th : The Wikisource project starts under the temporary domain sources.wikipedia.org as a free online project for the collection and edition of texts that are either free of copyright ( public domain ) or are under a free license . Like its sister project Wikipedia , Wikisource is operated by the Wikimedia Foundation and uses MediaWiki as its software . The project was given its own domain name wikisource.org shortly after it was set up .
Literary prizes
- Oliver Henkel , Imperial Day
 
- Robert J. Sawyer , Hominids , The Neanderthal Parallax , Category: Best Novel
- Neil Gaiman, Coraline , Coraline - Trapped Behind the Mirror , Category: Best Short Novel
- Michael Swanwick , Slow Life , Category: Best Story
- Geoffrey A. Landis , Falling Onto Mars , Category: Best Short Story
 
- Michael Marrak , Imagon , Category: Best Novel
- Erik Simon , Game Over, Said the Swamp , Category: Best Short Story / Narrative
- China Miéville , Die Falter / Der Weber , Category: Best Foreign Work
- Eva Bauche-Eppers , Category: Best Translator
- Hans-Peter Neumann for the large illustrated bibliography of science fiction in the GDR , special price
 
- Kim Stanley Robinson , The Years of Rice and Salt , Category: Best SF Novel
- China Miéville , The Scar , 2-part: The Scar and Leviathan , Category: Best Fantasy Novel
- Neil Gaiman, Coraline , Coraline - Trapped Behind the Mirror , Category: Best Young Adult Novel
- Alexander C. Irvine , A Scattering of Jades , Category: Best First Novel
- China Miéville, The Tain , Spiegelhaut , Category: Best Short Novel
- Ursula K. Le Guin , The Wild Girls , Category: Best Story
- Neil Gaiman, October in the Chair , Category: Best Short Story
- Ted Chiang , Stories of Your Life and Others , Category: Best Collection
- Gardner Dozois , The Year's Best Science Fiction: Nineteenth Annual Collection , Category: Best Anthology
 
- Elizabeth Moon , The Speed of Dark , The Speed of Dark , Category: Best Novel
- Neil Gaiman , Coraline , Coraline - Trapped Behind the Mirror , Category: Best Short Novel
- Jeffrey Ford , The Empire of Ice Cream , Category: Best Story
- Karen Joy Fowler , What I Didn't See , Category: Best Short Story
- Fran Walsh & Philippa Boyens & Stephen Sinclair & Peter Jackson , The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers , The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers , Category: Best Screenplay
 
- Richard Morgan , Altered Carbon , The Immortality Program
 
- Alex Wedding Prize : FK Waechter
- Booker Prize : DBC Pierre
- Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award : Edgar Pangborn
- Danuta Gleed Literary Award : Lee Henderson , The Broken Record Technique
- Erich Fried Prize : Robert Schindel : Robert Menasse
- Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize : Carol Shields , Unless
- Peace Prize of the German Book Trade : Susan Sontag , American author
- Georg Büchner Prize : Alexander Kluge (1932)
- Giller Prize : MG Vassanji : The In-Between World of Vikram Lall
- see Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners
- Hubert Burda Prize for Young Poetry from Eastern Europe: Constantin Virgil Bănescu , Kateřina Rudčenková and István Vörös
- Ingeborg Bachmann Prize : Inka Parei
- Johann Gottfried Seume Literature Prize : Wolfgang Büscher , Berlin - Moscow. A journey on foot
- Matt Cohen Prize : Audrey Thomas
- National Book Award : Polly Horvath , The Canning Season
- Newbery Medal for Children's Literature : Avi, Crispin: The Cross of Lead
- Oldenburg Children's and Youth Book Prize : Jens Thiele and Mirijam Günter
- Austrian State Prize for European Literature : Cees Nooteboom
- Prix Goncourt : Jacques-Pierre Amette Paul Clément , La Maîtresse de Brecht
- Pulitzer Prize , Non Fiction: Samantha Power , A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide
- Whitbread Book of the Year Award : Mark Haddon for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: A Novel (German Supergute Tage or Die weird World of Christopher Boone )
New releases
Fiction
- Using the example of my brother - Uwe Timm
- The consul - Christian v. Ditfurth
- Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
- Drop City - TC Boyle
- Thirst - Michael Kumpfmüller
- Eleven minutes - Paulo Coelho
- Esra - Maxim Biller
- Owl moon - Hilde Kähler-Timm
- Eternal life - Wolf Haas
- Exponential drift - Andreas Eschbach
- The time traveler's wife - Audrey Niffenegger
- A woman, an apartment, a novel - Wilhelm Genazino
- Lost and found office - Siegfried Lenz
- Gertrud - Einar Schleef
- Grandfather and the Wolves - Per Olov Enquist
- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - Joanne K. Rowling
- The King's Heart - Viola Alvarez
- Guardian of the Dragon - Carole Wilkinson
- Me and Kaminski - Daniel Kehlmann
- No angel so pure - Michael Connelly
- Kingdom of Fear - Hunter S. Thompson
- The little gem - Patrick Modiano
- Little Free Men - Terry Pratchett
- The little friend - Donna Tartt
- Queen of the South - Arturo Pérez-Reverte
- Campfire - Julia Franck
- Teachers' room - Markus Orths
- Canvas - Feridun Zaimoglu
- The last of its kind - Andreas Eschbach
- Declaration of love - Michael Lentz
- Love lasts three years - Frédéric Beigbeder
- Seas - Alban Nikolai Herbst
- The master - Tess Gerritsen
- After the quake - Haruki Murakami
- Night of the Oracle - Paul Auster
- The orange girl - Jostein Gaarder
- Oryx and Crake - Margaret Atwood
- Private matter - Horst Ehmke
- The Avenger - Frederick Forsyth
- Revolutions - Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio
- Rumo & The Miracles in the Dark - Walter Moers
- Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
- The shadow of the wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafón
- Snow in the Ardennes - Jürgen Becker
- Shutter Island - Dennis Lehane
- The Settlers of Catan - Rebecca Gablé
- Upstream - Margaret Elphinstone
- A day like a life - Nicholas Sparks
- The Warrior's Dance - Michael Blake
- Mortal Sin - Tess Gerritsen
- The unfinished - Reinhard Jirgl
- The Guardian - Dean Koontz
- The return - Wolfgang Hohlbein
- Wolf Moon - Stephen King
- The Broken Sky - Andrea Camilleri
drama
- Casino Leger - Günter Senkel and Feridun Zaimoglu
- Yes. Do it. Now. - Günter Senkel and Feridun Zaimoglu
- The sexual neuroses of our parents - Lukas Bärfuss
- Burns - Wajdi Mouawad
Non-fiction
- Book of memories - edited by Wolfgang Scheffler and Diana Schulle
- Responsibility and Judgment - Hannah Arendt (posthumous)
- A Short History of Nearly Everything - Bill Bryson
Picture book
Travel report
Died
- February 16 : Aleksandar Tišma , Serbian writer (* 1924)
- March 12 : Howard Fast , American writer (* 1914)
- April 20 : Maurice Gleize , French resistance fighter and poet (* 1907)
- April 23 : Herbert Riehl-Heyse , German journalist and author (* 1940)
- May 20 : Walter Höllerer , German professor of German studies and influential writer of the early Federal Republic (* 1922)
- May 25 : Sloan Wilson , American writer (* 1920)
- June 21 : Leon Uris , American writer (* 1924)
- July 4th : Armin Mohler , Swiss writer and journalist (* 1920)
- July 16 : Carol Shields , Canadian writer and poet (* 1935)
- July 24th : Heinz Knobloch , German writer (* 1926)
- August 15 : Gerhard Mauz , German journalist (* 1925)
- August 28 : Peter Hacks , German writer and playwright (* 1928)
- September 1 : Rainer Malkowski , German poet (* 1939)
- September 21 : Robert H. Lochner , American translator (* 1918)
- September 25 : Josef Guggenmos , German children's book author (* 1922)
- September 25 : George Plimpton , American writer (* 1927)
- October 7 : Eleanor Lambert , American fashion journalist (* 1903)
- October 18 : Manuel Vázquez Montalbán , Spanish writer (* 1939)
- November 2 : Marianne Wintersteiner , German writer (* 1920)
- November 11th : Miquel Martí i Pol , Catalan poet (* 1929)
- November 15 : Mohamed Choukri , Moroccan writer (* 1935)
- December 10 : Günter Seuren , German writer (* 1932)
- December 22nd : Doris Shadbolt , Canadian art historian and writer (* 1918)

