1820 in literature
Encyclopedia
The year 1820 in literature involved some significant events.
Events
- Robert Chambers's publishing company publishes The Songs of Robert Burns.
- November 20 - An 80-ton sperm whaleSperm WhaleThe sperm whale, Physeter macrocephalus, is a marine mammal species, order Cetacea, a toothed whale having the largest brain of any animal. The name comes from the milky-white waxy substance, spermaceti, found in the animal's head. The sperm whale is the only living member of genus Physeter...
attacks the Essex (a whalingWhalingWhaling is the hunting of whales mainly for meat and oil. Its earliest forms date to at least 3000 BC. Various coastal communities have long histories of sustenance whaling and harvesting beached whales...
ship from Nantucket, MassachusettsNantucket, MassachusettsNantucket is an island south of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, in the United States. Together with the small islands of Tuckernuck and Muskeget, it constitutes the town of Nantucket, Massachusetts, and the coterminous Nantucket County, which are consolidated. Part of the town is designated the Nantucket...
) 2,000 miles from the western coast of South AmericaSouth AmericaSouth America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
(Herman MelvilleHerman MelvilleHerman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....
's 1851 novel Moby-DickMoby-DickMoby-Dick; or, The Whale, was written by American author Herman Melville and first published in 1851. It is considered by some to be a Great American Novel and a treasure of world literature. The story tells the adventures of wandering sailor Ishmael, and his voyage on the whaleship Pequod,...
was in part inspired by this story).
New books
- James Fenimore CooperJames Fenimore CooperJames Fenimore Cooper was a prolific and popular American writer of the early 19th century. He is best remembered as a novelist who wrote numerous sea-stories and the historical novels known as the Leatherstocking Tales, featuring frontiersman Natty Bumppo...
- PrecautionPrecaution (novel)Precaution is the first novel written by American author James Fenimore Cooper. It was written in imitation of contemporary English domestic novels like those of Jane Austen and Amelia Opie, and it did not meet with contemporary success. Cooper went on to have great success with works such as The... - Thomas Gaspey - Forty Years Ago
- Robert HuishRobert HuishRobert Huish was a prolific, but generally poorly regarded, English author of history books, novels, and miscellaneous other works.-Life:...
- Castle of Nielo - Francis LathomFrancis LathomFrancis Lathom was a British gothic novelist and playwright.-Biography:Francis Lathom was born on the 14 July of 1774, either in Rotterdam, Holland, where his father, Henry, conducted business for the East India Company and returning to England around 1777, settling near Norwich, or he was born in...
- Italian Mysteries - Charles MaturinCharles MaturinCharles Robert Maturin, also known as C.R. Maturin was an Irish Protestant clergyman and a writer of gothic plays and novels.-Biography:...
- Melmoth the WandererMelmoth the WandererMelmoth the Wanderer is a gothic novel published in 1820, written by Charles Robert Maturin .- Synopsis :... - Regina Marie Roche - The Munster Cottage Boy
- Sir Walter ScottWalter ScottSir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet was a Scottish historical novelist, playwright, and poet, popular throughout much of the world during his time....
- The AbbotThe AbbotThe Abbot is a historical novel by Sir Walter Scott. A sequel to The Monastery, it is one of Scott's Tales from Benedictine Sources and is set in the time of Mary, Queen of Scots...
- The MonasteryThe MonasteryThe Monastery: a Romance is a historical novel by Sir Walter Scott. Along with The Abbot, it is one of Scott's Tales from Benedictine Sources and is set in the time of Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Elizabethan period.-Plot introduction:...
- The Abbot
- Louisa StanhopeLouisa StanhopeLouisa Sidney Stanhope was an English novelist of the early 19th century. She wrote mainly historical and Gothic romances.-Novels:*Montbrasil Abbey: or, Maternal Trials...
- The Crusaders - Rosalia St. Clair - The Highland Castle, and the Lowland Cottage
- Sarah Wilkinson - The Spectre of Lanmere Abbey
New drama
- William Thomas MoncrieffWilliam Thomas MoncrieffWilliam Thomas Moncrieff was an English dramatist.-Biography:He was born in London, the son of a Strand tradesman named Thomas. The name Moncrieff he assumed for theatrical purposes...
- The Lear of Private Life - Percy Bysshe ShelleyPercy Bysshe ShelleyPercy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...
- Prometheus Unbound
Poetry
- Robert BurnsRobert BurnsRobert Burns was a Scottish poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide...
- The Songs of Robert Burns - John ClareJohn ClareJohn Clare was an English poet, born the son of a farm labourer who came to be known for his celebratory representations of the English countryside and his lamentation of its disruption. His poetry underwent a major re-evaluation in the late 20th century and he is often now considered to be among...
- Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery - John KeatsJohn KeatsJohn Keats was an English Romantic poet. Along with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley, he was one of the key figures in the second generation of the Romantic movement, despite the fact that his work had been in publication for only four years before his death.Although his poems were not...
- The Eve of St. AgnesThe Eve of St. Agnes"The Eve of St. Agnes" is a long poem by John Keats, written in 1819 and published in 1820. It is widely considered to be amongst his finest poems and was influential in 19th century literature. The poem is in Spenserian stanzas....
; Lamia and Other PoemsLamia and Other Poems"Lamia" is a narrative poem written by English poet John Keats.Believing himself a failure as a poet, Keats asked for his tombstone to read "Here lies one whose name was writ in water"... - Alphonse de LamartineAlphonse de LamartineAlphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine was a French writer, poet and politician who was instrumental in the foundation of the Second Republic.-Career:...
- Méditations poétiques - Aleksandr PushkinAleksandr PushkinAlexander Sergeyevich Pushkin was a Russian author of the Romantic era who is considered by many to be the greatest Russian poet and the founder of modern Russian literature....
- Ruslan and LudmilaRuslan and LyudmilaRuslan and Lyudmila is an opera in five acts composed by Mikhail Glinka between 1837 and 1842. The opera is based on the 1820 poem of the same name by Alexander Pushkin. The Russian libretto was written by Valerian Shirkov, Nestor Kukolnik and N. A. Markevich, among others... - Percy Bysshe ShelleyPercy Bysshe ShelleyPercy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...
- To a SkylarkTo a SkylarkPercy Bysshe Shelley completed the poem "To a Skylark" in late June, 1820, and forwarded it to London to be included among the verse accompanying Prometheus Unbound published by Charles and James Collier in London....
Non-fiction
- Thomas BrownThomas Brown (philosopher)Thomas Brown FRSE was a Scottish metaphysician.He was born at Kirkmabreck, Kirkcudbright, where his father Rev. Samuel Brown was parish clergyman. He was a wide reader and an eager student...
- Lectures on the Philosophy of the Human Mind - Georg Wilhelm Friedrich HegelGeorg Wilhelm Friedrich HegelGeorg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher, one of the creators of German Idealism. His historicist and idealist account of reality as a whole revolutionized European philosophy and was an important precursor to Continental philosophy and Marxism.Hegel developed a comprehensive...
- Elements of the Philosophy of RightElements of the Philosophy of RightGeorg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's Elements of the Philosophy of Right was published in 1820, though the book's original title page dates it to 1821... - John George Hoffman - Pow-Wows; or, Long Lost FriendPow-Wows; or, Long Lost FriendPow-Wows; or, Long Lost Friend is a book by John George Hohman published in 1820. Hohman was a Pennsylvania Dutch healer; the book is a collection of home- and folk-remedies, as well as spells and talismans...
- Charles Lamb - Essays of EliaEssays of EliaEssays of Elia is a collection of essays written by Charles Lamb; it was first published in book form in 1823, with a second volume, Last Essays of Elia, issued in 1833 by the publisher Edward Moxon....
- Thomas MalthusThomas MalthusThe Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus FRS was an English scholar, influential in political economy and demography. Malthus popularized the economic theory of rent....
- Principles of Political EconomyPrinciples of Political Economy (Malthus)Principles of Political Economy was a successful book by Thomas Malthus . The last chapter of the book was devoted to rebutting Say's law, and argued that the economy could stagnate with a lack of "effectual demand". In other words, wages if less than the total costs of production cannot purchase... - Charles Mills -History of the Crusades for the Recovery and Possession of the Holy Land
- Robert SoutheyRobert SoutheyRobert Southey was an English poet of the Romantic school, one of the so-called "Lake Poets", and Poet Laureate for 30 years from 1813 to his death in 1843...
- Life of WesleyJohn WesleyJohn Wesley was a Church of England cleric and Christian theologian. Wesley is largely credited, along with his brother Charles Wesley, as founding the Methodist movement which began when he took to open-air preaching in a similar manner to George Whitefield...
Births
- January 17 - Anne BrontëAnne BrontëAnne Brontë was a British novelist and poet, the youngest member of the Brontë literary family.The daughter of a poor Irish clergyman in the Church of England, Anne Brontë lived most of her life with her family at the parish of Haworth on the Yorkshire moors. For a couple of years she went to a...
, author (+ 1849) - March 30 - Anna SewellAnna SewellAnna Sewell was an English novelist, best known as the author of the classic novel Black Beauty.-Biography:Anna Mary Sewell was born in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, England into a devoutly Quaker family...
, author (+ 1878) - April 26 - Alice CaryAlice CaryAlice Cary was an American poet, and the sister of fellow poet Phoebe Cary .-Biography:Alice Cary was born on April 26, 1820, in Mount Healthy, Ohio near Cincinnati. Her parents lived on a farm bought by Robert Cary in 1813 in what is now North College Hill, Ohio. He called the Clovernook Farm...
, American poet and short-story writer - November 23 - Afanasy FetAfanasy FetAfanasy Afanasyevich Fet , was a Russian poet regarded as one of the finest lyricists in Russian literature.-Origins:...
, Russian poet, essayist and short-story writer (+ 1892) - November 28 - Friedrich EngelsFriedrich EngelsFriedrich Engels was a German industrialist, social scientist, author, political theorist, philosopher, and father of Marxist theory, alongside Karl Marx. In 1845 he published The Condition of the Working Class in England, based on personal observations and research...
, socialist writer (+ 1895)