This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1936.

• January 8 – Jewish booksellers throughout Nazi Germany are deprived of their Reich Publications Chamber membership cards, without which no one can sell books.^[2]
• May – The Greek poet and Communist activist Yiannis Ritsos is inspired to write his poem Epitaphios by a photograph of a dead protester at a massive tobacco workers' demonstration in Thessaloniki. It is published soon after. In August, the right-wing dictatorship of Ioannis Metaxas comes to power in Greece and copies are burned publicly at the foot of the Acropolis in Athens.^[3]
• May 16–17 – About 30 left-wing writers of the Second Polish Republic gather at the Lviv Anti-Fascist Congress of Cultural Workers.
• August 3 – George Heywood Hill establishes the Heywood Hill bookshop in London's Mayfair.
• August 18 – The 38-year-old Spanish dramatist, Federico García Lorca, is arrested by Francoist militia during the White Terror and never seen alive again. His brother-in-law, Manuel Fernández-Montesinos, the leftist mayor of Granada, is shot on the same day.^[4][5] Lorca's play The House of Bernarda Alba (La casa de Bernarda Alba), completed on June 19, will not be performed until 1945.
• November 6 – After United States publication in 1934, the U.K. authorities decide they will not prosecute or seize copies of James Joyce's 1922 novel Ulysses.^[6]
• November 23 – Life magazine begins to appear as a weekly news magazine in the United States, under the management of Henry Luce.
• unknown dates
  • The New Theatre, Sydney, in Australia, attempts to stage Clifford Odets' anti-Nazi drama Till the Day I Die; the German Consul General in the country complains to the Commonwealth Government and the play is banned; but the theatre stages the play in private premises.^[7]
  • The first lighthearted crime novel by Scottish-born university teacher of English literature J. I. M. Stewart, writing as Michael Innes, is published: Death at the President's Lodging, set in Oxford. It introduces his long-running character Detective Inspector John Appleby of Scotland Yard.^[8]
  • The Carnegie Medal for excellence in children's literature is inaugurated by the Library Association in the United Kingdom. The first winner is Arthur Ransome for Pigeon Post.^[9]

• January 5 – Florence King, American writer (died 2016)
• January 10 – Stephen E. Ambrose, American historian (died 2002)
• January 28 – Ismail Kadare, Albanian novelist and poet
• February 12 – Shawkat Ali, Bangladeshi writer (died 2018)
• February 18 – Jean M. Auel, American historical novelist
• March 1 – Jean-René Huguenin, French novelist and literary critic (died in 1962)
• March 7 – Georges Perec, French novelist, filmmaker and essayist (died 1982)
• March 28 – Peter Mayer, English-born publisher (died 2018)
• March 31 – Marge Piercy, American poet and activist
• April 30 – Viktor Likhonosov, Soviet Russian writer and editor
• May 10 – Anthea Bell, English translator (died 2018)
• May 23 – Ian Kennedy Martin, English scriptwriter and novelist
• May 27 – Ivo Brešan, Croatian playwright, novelist, screenwriter and satirist (died 2016)
• June 3
  • Duff Hart-Davis, English biographer and journalist
  • Larry McMurtry, American novelist, essayist and screenwriter (died 2021)
• June 9 – Nell Dunn, English playwright and author
• June 18 – Dick Wimmer, American novelist (died 2011)
• June 23 – Richard Bach, American novelist and non-fiction writer
• June 24 – J. H. Prynne, English poet
• June 29 – David Rudkin, English playwright
• July 5 – Valerie Flint, English medieval historian (died 2009)
• July 6 – Abidullah Ghazi, Indian-American author, educator and poet
• July 22 – Tom Robbins, American novelist
• August 8 – Jan Pieńkowski, Polish-born British children's writer and illustrator (died 2022)
• August 24 – A. S. Byatt, English novelist (died 2023)
• September 1 – Roderick Thorp, American novelist (died 1999)
• September 2 – Károly Krajczár, Hungarian Slovene teacher, writer and collector (died 2018)
• September 20 – Andrew Davies, Welsh novelist and screenwriter
• September 26 – Victor Watson, English children's writer and academic
• October 1 – Kailayar Sellanainar Sivakumaran, Sri Lankan writer, art and literary critic, journalist and radio and TV personality
• October 5 – Václav Havel, Czech dramatist and first president of Czech Republic (died 2011)
• November 4 – C. K. Williams, American poet (died 2015)
• November 17 – John Wells, English satirical writer and actor (died 1998)
• November 18 – Suzette Haden Elgin, American science fiction writer (died 2015)^[13]
• November 20 – Don DeLillo, American novelist
• November 25 – William McIlvanney, Scottish novelist, short story writer and poet (died 2015)
• November 27 – Dahlia Ravikovitch, Israeli poet (died 2005)
• December 1 – Ma Văn Kháng, Vietnamese writer
• December 2 – Hebe Uhart, Argentine writer (died 2018)
• December 5
  • James Lee Burke, American writer
  • Lewis Nkosi, Zulu writer (died 2010)
• December 11 – Ingvar Moe, Norwegian poet, novelist and children's writer (died 1993)
• December 17 – Frank Martinus Arion, Curaçaoan novelist and poet (died 2015)

• January 4 – James Churchward, British writer (born 1851)
• January 5 – Ramón del Valle-Inclán, Spanish dramatist and novelist (born 1866)
• January 17 – Mateiu Caragiale, Romanian novelist and poet (stroke, born 1885)
• January 18 – Rudyard Kipling, English writer and Nobel laureate (born 1865)
• February 7 – Elizabeth Robins Pennell, American biographer and critic based in London (born 1855)
• February 8 – Rahel Sanzara, German dancer, actress and novelist (cancer, born 1894)
• February 23 – Lidia Veselitskaya (V. Mikulich), Russian novelist, memoirist and translator (born 1857)
• March 1 – Mikhail Kuzmin, Russian poet, musician and novelist (born 1872)
• March 9 – A. de Herz, Romanian playwright and journalist (hemoptysis, born 1887)
• March 16 – Marguerite Durand, French actress and journalist (born 1864)
• April 30 – A. E. Housman, English poet (born 1859)
• June 11 – Robert E. Howard, American fantasy writer (suicide, born 1906)
• June 12:
  • M. R. James, English ghost story writer and scholar (born 1862)
  • Karl Kraus, Austrian writer and journalist (born 1874)
• June 14 – G. K. Chesterton, English novelist, poet and Catholic apologist (born 1874)
• June 18 – Maxim Gorky, Russian dramatist (born 1868)
• July 25 – Donald Maxwell, English travel writer and illustrator (born 1877)
• July 26 – F. J. Harvey Darton English children's literature historian and publisher (born 1878)
• August 8 – Mourning Dove, Native American writer (born 1884)
• August 15 – Grazia Deledda, Sardinian-born novelist and Nobel laureate (born 1871)
• August 19 – Federico García Lorca, Spanish dramatist and poet (shot, born 1898)
• August 26 – Juliette Adam, French author (born 1836)^[14]
• October 5 – J. Slauerhoff, Dutch poet and novelist (born 1898)
• October 9 – Harriette A. Keyser, American industrial reformer (born 1841)
• November 12 – Stefan Grabiński, Polish horror writer (born 1887)
• December – Emma Sheridan Fry, American actor, playwright, and drama teacher (born 1864)
• December 10 – Luigi Pirandello, Italian dramatist and novelist (born 1867)
• December 24 – Frances Garnet Wolseley, 2nd Viscountess Wolseley, English horticulturist and garden writer (born 1872)
• December 27 – Kristína Royová, Slovak novelist, religious writer and poet (born 1860)
• December 28 – John Cornford, English poet (killed in action, born 1915)^[15]
• December 31 – Miguel de Unamuno, Spanish novelist, poet and scholar (born 1864)
• date unknown – Bertha M. Wilson, American playwright, critic and actress (born 1874)

• Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Arthur Ransome, Pigeon Post
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Winifred Holtby, South Riding
• James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Edward Sackville West, A Flame in Sunlight: The Life and Work of Thomas de Quincey
• Newbery Medal for children's literature: Carol Ryrie Brink, Caddie Woodlawn
• Nobel Prize in literature: Eugene Gladstone O'Neill
• Prix Goncourt: Maxence Van Der Meersch, L'Empreinte de Dieu^[16]
• Pulitzer Prize for Drama: Robert E. Sherwood, Idiot's Delight
• Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Robert P. Tristram Coffin, Strange Holiness
• Pulitzer Prize for the Novel: Harold L. Davis, Honey in the Horn