November 16

In literary history

• 1849A Russian court sentenced Dostoevsky to death for reading a banned letter aloud to a literary circle. Five weeks later he was led to the firing squad and pardoned at the last moment; the Tsar had signed the reprieve the previous day.

Writers born on November 16

• José Saramago (1922),
• Chinua Achebe (1930)

The Daily Canon for November 16

Blindness by José Saramago (1995).