List of years in literature
Encyclopedia
This page gives a chronological list of years in literature (descending order), with notable publications listed with their respective years and a small selection of notable events. The time covered in individual years covers Renaissance
Renaissance literature
Renaissance Literature refers to the period in European literature that began in Italy during the 14th century and spread around Europe through the 17th century...

, Baroque and Modern literature
History of modern literature
The history of literature in the Modern period in Europe begins with the Age of Enlightenment and the conclusion of the Baroque period in the 18th century, succeeding the Renaissance and Early Modern periods....

, while Medieval literature
Medieval literature
Medieval literature is a broad subject, encompassing essentially all written works available in Europe and beyond during the Middle Ages . The literature of this time was composed of religious writings as well as secular works...

 is resolved by century.

See Table of years in literature
Table of years in literature
The table of years in literature is a tabular display of all years in literature for overview and quick navigation to any year.-2000s in literature:2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015...

 for an overview of all "year in literature" pages.

2010s

  • 2011 in literature
    2011 in literature
    The year 2011 will involve some significant events and new books.-Events:*Tomas Tranströmer wins the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature.*Jennifer Egan wins the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her novel A Visit From the Goon Squad.-Literature:*T.C...

    - The Tiger's Wife
    The Tiger's Wife
    The Tiger's Wife is the first novel by Téa Obreht, a Belgrade-born novelist of Bosniak/Slovene origin who currently lives in the United States.-Story:...

    - Téa Obreht
    Téa Obreht
    Téa Obreht is an American novelist of Bosniak/Slovene descent, born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, now Serbia...

    ;
  • 2010 in literature
    2010 in literature
    The year 2010 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*February - The Wheeler Centre, Australia's "literary hub", officially opened.*April 3 - First release of the Apple iPad, electronic book reading device....

    - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest
    The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest
    The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest is the third and final novel in the best-selling "Millennium series"by Swedish writer Stieg Larsson.The novel is the sequel to The Girl Who Played with Fire....

    - Stieg Larsson
    Stieg Larsson
    Karl Stig-Erland Larsson , who wrote professionally as Stieg Larsson, was a Swedish journalist and writer, born in Skelleftehamn outside Skellefteå. He is best known for writing the "Millennium series" of crime novels, which were published posthumously...

    ; Death of Erich Segal
    Erich Segal
    Erich Wolf Segal was an American author, screenwriter, and educator. He was best-known for writing the novel Love Story , a best-seller, and writing the motion picture of the same name, which was a major hit....

    , Louis Auchincloss
    Louis Auchincloss
    Louis Stanton Auchincloss was an American lawyer, novelist, historian, and essayist. He is best known as a prolific novelist who parlayed his firsthand knowledge into dozens of finely wrought books exploring the private lives of America's East Coast patrician class...

    , J.D. Salinger, José Saramago
    José Saramago
    José de Sousa Saramago, GColSE was a Nobel-laureate Portuguese novelist, poet, playwright and journalist. His works, some of which can be seen as allegories, commonly present subversive perspectives on historic events, emphasizing the human factor. Harold Bloom has described Saramago as "a...


2000s

  • 2009 in literature
    2009 in literature
    The year 2009 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*8 October - Romanian-born German novelist Herta Müller wins the 2009 Nobel Prize in Literature....

    - The Girl Who Played With Fire
    The Girl Who Played with Fire
    The Girl Who Played with Fire is the second novel in the best-selling "Millennium series" by Swedish writer Stieg Larsson. It was published posthumously in Swedish in 2006 and in English in January 2009....

    - Stieg Larsson
    Stieg Larsson
    Karl Stig-Erland Larsson , who wrote professionally as Stieg Larsson, was a Swedish journalist and writer, born in Skelleftehamn outside Skellefteå. He is best known for writing the "Millennium series" of crime novels, which were published posthumously...

    ; First Family
    First Family
    A First Family is an unofficial title for the family of the head of state or head of government of a country .A First Family usually consists of:*The head of state or head of government*The First Lady or First Gentleman...

    - David Baldacci
    David Baldacci
    David Baldacci is a bestselling American novelist.-Biography:Baldacci received a B.A. from Virginia Commonwealth University and a law degree from the University of Virginia. As a student, Baldacci wrote short stories in his spare time, and later practiced law for nine years near Washington, D.C....

    ; Death of - John Updike
    John Updike
    John Hoyer Updike was an American novelist, poet, short story writer, art critic, and literary critic....

    , Philip José Farmer
    Philip José Farmer
    Philip José Farmer was an American author, principally known for his award-winning science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories....

    , J.G. Ballard, Frank McCourt
    Frank McCourt
    Francis "Frank" McCourt was an Irish-American teacher and Pulitzer Prize–winning writer, best known as the author of Angela’s Ashes, an award-winning, tragicomic memoir of the misery and squalor of his childhood....

    , Budd Schulberg
    Budd Schulberg
    Budd Schulberg was an American screenwriter, television producer, novelist and sports writer. He was known for his 1941 novel, What Makes Sammy Run?, his 1947 novel The Harder They Fall, his 1954 Academy-award-winning screenplay for On the Waterfront, and his 1957 screenplay for A Face in the...

  • 2008 in literature
    2008 in literature
    The year 2008 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 1 - In the 2008 New Year Honours, Hanif Kureishi , Jenny Uglow , Peter Vansittart and Debjani Chatterjee are all rewarded for "services to literature".*June 15 - Gore Vidal, asked in a New York Times...

    - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
    The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
    The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is an award-winning crime novel by Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson. It is the first book in the trilogy known as the "Millennium series"....

    - Stieg Larsson
    Stieg Larsson
    Karl Stig-Erland Larsson , who wrote professionally as Stieg Larsson, was a Swedish journalist and writer, born in Skelleftehamn outside Skellefteå. He is best known for writing the "Millennium series" of crime novels, which were published posthumously...

    ; Duma Key
    Duma Key
    Duma Key is a horror novel by American novelist Stephen King published in 2008. The book reached #1 on the New York Times Bestseller List. It is King's first novel to be set in Florida or Minnesota.-Plot:...

    - Stephen King
    Stephen King
    Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...

    ; The White Tiger
    The White Tiger
    The White Tiger is the debut novel by Indian author Aravind Adiga. It was first published in 2008 and won the Man Booker Prize in the same year. The novel provides a darkly comical view of modern day life in India through the narration of its protagonist Balram Halwai...

    - Aravind Adiga
    Aravind Adiga
    Aravind Adiga is an Indian writer and journalist. His debut novel, The White Tiger, won the 2008 Man Booker Prize.-Early life and education:...

    ; Death of Michael Crichton
    Michael Crichton
    John Michael Crichton , best known as Michael Crichton, was an American best-selling author, producer, director, and screenwriter, best known for his work in the science fiction, medical fiction, and thriller genres. His books have sold over 200 million copies worldwide, and many have been adapted...

    , Alain Robbe-Grillet
    Alain Robbe-Grillet
    Alain Robbe-Grillet , was a French writer and filmmaker. He was, along with Nathalie Sarraute, Michel Butor and Claude Simon, one of the figures most associated with the Nouveau Roman trend. Alain Robbe-Grillet was elected a member of the Académie française on March 25, 2004, succeeding Maurice...

    , Margaret Truman
    Margaret Truman
    Mary Margaret Truman Daniel , also known as Margaret Truman or Margaret Daniel, was an American singer who later became a successful writer. The only child of US President Harry S...

    , David Foster Wallace
    David Foster Wallace
    David Foster Wallace was an American author of novels, essays, and short stories, and a professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California...

    , Arthur C. Clarke
    Arthur C. Clarke
    Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, FRAS was a British science fiction author, inventor, and futurist, famous for his short stories and novels, among them 2001: A Space Odyssey, and as a host and commentator in the British television series Mysterious World. For many years, Robert A. Heinlein,...

    , Studs Terkel
    Studs Terkel
    Louis "Studs" Terkel was an American author, historian, actor, and broadcaster. He received the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction in 1985 for The Good War, and is best remembered for his oral histories of common Americans, and for hosting a long-running radio show in Chicago.-Early...

    , Robert Giroux
    Robert Giroux
    Robert Giroux was an influential American book editor and publisher. Starting his editing career with Harcourt, Brace & Co., he was hired away to work for Roger W. Straus, Jr. at Farrar & Straus in 1955, where he became a partner and, eventually, its chairman...

  • 2007 in literature
    2007 in literature
    The year 2007 in literature involves some significant new books.-Events:*November 19 - First Kindle e-book reader released.*December 11 - Terry Pratchett informs fans on-line that he has been diagnosed with a rare form of Alzheimer's disease.-Literature:...

    - Death of Norman Mailer
    Norman Mailer
    Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S...

    , Kurt Vonnegut
    Kurt Vonnegut
    Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was a 20th century American writer. His works such as Cat's Cradle , Slaughterhouse-Five and Breakfast of Champions blend satire, gallows humor and science fiction. He was known for his humanist beliefs and was honorary president of the American Humanist Association.-Early...

    ; Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (final book in the Harry Potter series
    Harry Potter
    Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter and his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...

    ) - J. K. Rowling
    J. K. Rowling
    Joanne "Jo" Rowling, OBE , better known as J. K. Rowling, is the British author of the Harry Potter fantasy series...

  • 2006 in literature
    2006 in literature
    The year 2006 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Literature:*Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - Half of a Yellow Sun*Chris Adrian - The Children's Hospital *Martin Amis - House of Meetings...

    - The God Delusion
    The God Delusion
    The God Delusion is a 2006 bestselling non-fiction book by British biologist Richard Dawkins, professorial fellow of New College, Oxford, and inaugural holder of the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford.In The God Delusion, Dawkins contends that...

    - Richard Dawkins
    Richard Dawkins
    Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...

    ; Death of Peter Benchley
    Peter Benchley
    Peter Bradford Benchley was an American author, best known for his novel Jaws and its subsequent film adaptation, the latter co-written by Benchley and directed by Steven Spielberg...

    , Betty Friedan
    Betty Friedan
    Betty Friedan was an American writer, activist, and feminist.A leading figure in the Women's Movement in the United States, her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often credited with sparking the "second wave" of American feminism in the twentieth century...

    , Muriel Spark
    Muriel Spark
    Dame Muriel Spark, DBE was an award-winning Scottish novelist. In 2008 The Times newspaper named Spark in its list of "the 50 greatest British writers since 1945".-Early life:...

    , Mickey Spillane
    Mickey Spillane
    Frank Morrison Spillane , better known as Mickey Spillane, was an American author of crime novels, many featuring his signature detective character, Mike Hammer. More than 225 million copies of his books have sold internationally...

    , Wendy Wasserstein
    Wendy Wasserstein
    Wendy Wasserstein was an American playwright and an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University...

  • 2005 in literature
    2005 in literature
    The year 2005 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*February 25 - Canada Reads selects Rockbound by Frank Parker Day as the novel to be read across the nation....

    - Death of Arthur Miller
    Arthur Miller
    Arthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...

    , John Fowles
    John Fowles
    John Robert Fowles was an English novelist and essayist. In 2008, The Times newspaper named Fowles among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".-Birth and family:...

    , Elizabeth Janeway
    Elizabeth Janeway
    Elizabeth Janeway was an American author and critic.Born Elizabeth Ames Hall in Brooklyn, New York, her naval architect father and homemaker mother fell on hard times during the Depression, leading her to end her Swarthmore College education and help support the family by creating bargain basement...

    ; Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro
    Kazuo Ishiguro
    Kazuo Ishiguro OBE or ; born 8 November 1954) is a Japanese–English novelist. He was born in Nagasaki, Japan, and his family moved to England in 1960. Ishiguro obtained his Bachelor's degree from University of Kent in 1978 and his Master's from the University of East Anglia's creative writing...

    ; Haunted - Chuck Palahniuk
    Chuck Palahniuk
    Charles Michael "Chuck" Palahniuk is an American transgressional fiction novelist and freelance journalist. He is best known for the award-winning novel Fight Club, which was later made into a film directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, and Helena Bonham Carter...

  • 2004 in literature
    2004 in literature
    The year 2004 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Canada Reads selects Guy Vanderhaeghe's The Last Crossing to be read across the nation....

    - Death of Stieg Larsson
    Stieg Larsson
    Karl Stig-Erland Larsson , who wrote professionally as Stieg Larsson, was a Swedish journalist and writer, born in Skelleftehamn outside Skellefteå. He is best known for writing the "Millennium series" of crime novels, which were published posthumously...

    , Françoise Sagan
    Françoise Sagan
    Françoise Sagan – real name Françoise Quoirez – was a French playwright, novelist, and screenwriter. Hailed as "a charming little monster" by François Mauriac on the front page of Le Figaro, Sagan was known for works with strong romantic themes involving wealthy and disillusioned bourgeois...

     Hubert Selby Jr., Susan Sontag
    Susan Sontag
    Susan Sontag was an American author, literary theorist, feminist and political activist whose works include On Photography and Against Interpretation.-Life:...

    ; The Plot Against America
    The Plot Against America
    The Plot Against America is a novel by Philip Roth published in 2004. It is an alternate history in which Franklin Delano Roosevelt is defeated in the presidential election of 1940 by Charles Lindbergh.-Plot introduction:...

    - Philip Roth
    Philip Roth
    Philip Milton Roth is an American novelist. He gained fame with the 1959 novella Goodbye, Columbus, an irreverent and humorous portrait of Jewish-American life that earned him a National Book Award...

    ; Free Culture
    Free Culture (book)
    Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity is a book by law professor Lawrence Lessig that was released on the Internet under the Creative Commons Attribution/Non-commercial license on March 25, 2004."There has never been a...

    - Lawrence Lessig
    Lawrence Lessig
    Lawrence "Larry" Lessig is an American academic and political activist. He is best known as a proponent of reduced legal restrictions on copyright, trademark, and radio frequency spectrum, particularly in technology applications, and he has called for state-based activism to promote substantive...

  • 2003 in literature
    2003 in literature
    The year 2003 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Peter Ackroyd - The Clerkenwell Tales*Atsuko Asano - No...

    - The Da Vinci Code
    The Da Vinci Code
    The Da Vinci Code is a 2003 mystery-detective novel written by Dan Brown. It follows symbologist Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu as they investigate a murder in Paris's Louvre Museum and discover a battle between the Priory of Sion and Opus Dei over the possibility of Jesus having been married to...

    - Dan Brown
    Dan Brown
    Dan Brown is an American author of thriller fiction, best known for the 2003 bestselling novel, The Da Vinci Code. Brown's novels, which are treasure hunts set in a 24-hour time period, feature the recurring themes of cryptography, keys, symbols, codes, and conspiracy theories...

    ; Hegemony or Survival
    Hegemony or Survival
    Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance is a book by Noam Chomsky published November 2003. It is a macroscopic view of United States foreign policy from World War II to the post-Iraq War reconstruction...

    - Noam Chomsky
    Noam Chomsky
    Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...

    ; Roman Triptych
    Roman Triptych
    "Roman Triptych: Meditations" is a poem by Pope John Paul II, published in the in March 2003 by Libreria Editrice Vaticana, with the presentation of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger...

     (Meditation)
    - John Paul II; Death of Howard Fast
    Howard Fast
    Howard Melvin Fast was an American novelist and television writer. Fast also wrote under the pen names E. V. Cunningham and Walter Ericson.-Early life:Fast was born in New York City...

  • 2002 in literature
    2002 in literature
    The year 2002 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*March 16: Authorities in Saudi Arabia arrested and jailed poet Abdul Mohsen Musalam and fired a newspaper editor following the publication of Musalam's poem The Corrupt on Earth that criticized the state's Islamic...

    - Atonement
    Atonement (novel)
    Atonement is a 2001 novel by British author Ian McEwan.On a fateful day, a young girl makes a terrible mistake that has life-changing effects for many people...

    - Ian McEwan
    Ian McEwan
    Ian Russell McEwan CBE, FRSA, FRSL is a British novelist and screenwriter, and one of Britain's most highly regarded writers. In 2008, The Times named him among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945"....

    ; Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World - Margaret MacMillan
    Margaret MacMillan
    Margaret Olwen MacMillan, OC is a historian and professor at the University of Oxford, where she is Warden of St. Antony's College. She is former provost of Trinity College and professor of history at the University of Toronto and previously, at Ryerson University...

    ; Death of Chaim Potok
    Chaim Potok
    Chaim Potok was an American Jewish author and rabbi. Potok is most famous for his first book The Chosen, a 1967 novel which was listed on The New York Times’ best seller list for 39 weeks and sold more than 3,400,000 copies.-Biography :Herman Harold Potok was born in The Bronx, New York City, to...

  • 2001 in literature
    2001 in literature
    The year 2001 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The film version of J. R. R. Tolkien's classic book, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, is released to movie theaters...

    - Seabiscuit: An American Legend
    Seabiscuit
    Seabiscuit was a champion Thoroughbred racehorse in the United States. From an inauspicious start, Seabiscuit became an unlikely champion and a symbol of hope to many Americans during the Great Depression...

    Laura Hillenbrand
    Laura Hillenbrand
    Laura Hillenbrand is an American author of books and magazine articles.Born in Fairfax, Virginia, Hillenbrand spent much of her childhood riding bareback "screaming over the hills" of her father's Sharpsburg, Maryland, farm. A favorite of hers was Come On Seabiscuit, a 1963 kiddie book. "I read...

    ; Life of Pi
    Life of Pi
    Life of Pi is a fantasy adventure novel by Yann Martel published in 2001. The protagonist, Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, an Indian boy from Pondicherry, explores issues of spirituality and practicality from an early age...

    - Yann Martel
    Yann Martel
    Yann Martel is a Canadian author best known for the Man Booker Prize-winning novel Life of Pi.-Early life:Martel was born in Salamanca, Spain where his father was posted as a diplomat for the Canadian government. He was raised in Costa Rica, France, Mexico, and Canada...

    ; The Corrections
    The Corrections
    The Corrections is a 2001 novel by American author Jonathan Franzen. It revolves around the troubles of an elderly Midwestern couple and their three adult children, tracing their lives from the mid-twentieth century to "one last Christmas" together near the turn of the millennium...

    - Jonathan Franzen
    Jonathan Franzen
    Jonathan Franzen is an American novelist and essayist. His third novel, The Corrections , a sprawling, satirical family drama, drew widespread critical acclaim, earned Franzen a National Book Award, and was a finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction...

    ; Death of Ken Kesey
    Ken Kesey
    Kenneth Elton "Ken" Kesey was an American author, best known for his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , and as a counter-cultural figure who considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. "I was too young to be a beatnik, and too old to be a...

    , Robert Ludlum
    Robert Ludlum
    Robert Ludlum was an American author of 23 thriller novels. The number of his books in print is estimated between 290–500 million copies. They have been published in 33 languages and 40 countries. Ludlum also published books under the pseudonyms Jonathan Ryder and Michael Shepherd.-Life and...

  • 2000 in literature
    2000 in literature
    The year 2000 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* February 13 - Final original Peanuts comic strip is published...

    - The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
    The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
    The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is a 2000 novel by American author Michael Chabon that won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2001. The novel follows the lives of two Jewish cousins before, during, and after World War II. They are a Czech artist named Joe Kavalier and a Brooklyn-born...

    - Michael Chabon
    Michael Chabon
    Michael Chabon born May 24, 1963) is an American author and "one of the most celebrated writers of his generation", according to The Virginia Quarterly Review....

    ; No Logo
    No Logo
    No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies is a book by Canadian author Naomi Klein. First published by Knopf Canada in January 2000, shortly after the 1999 WTO Ministerial Conference protests in Seattle had generated media attention around such issues, it became one of the most influential books...

    - Naomi Klein
    Naomi Klein
    Naomi Klein is a Canadian author and social activist known for her political analyses and criticism of corporate globalization.-Family:...

    , Death of Charles M. Schulz
    Charles M. Schulz
    Charles Monroe "Sparky" Schulz was an American cartoonist, whose comic strip Peanuts proved one of the most popular and influential in the history of the medium, and is still widely reprinted on a daily basis.-Early life and education:Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Schulz grew up in Saint Paul...


1990s

  • 1999 in literature
    1999 in literature
    The year 1999 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*June 19 - Stephen King is hit by a Dodge van while taking a walk. He spends the next three weeks hospitalized...

    - Chocolat
    Chocolat
    Chocolat is a 1999 novel by Joanne Harris. It tells the story of Vianne Rocher, a young mother, who arrives at a fictional insular French village of Lansquenet-sous-Tannes with her six-year-old daughter, Anouk...

    - Joanne Harris
    Joanne Harris
    Joanne Michèle Sylvie Harris is a British author.Biography=Born to a French mother and an English father in her grandparents' sweet shop, her family life was filled with food and folklore. Her great-grandmother had an odd reputation and enjoyed letting the gullible think she was a witch and healer...

    ; Disgrace - J M Coetzee
    John Maxwell Coetzee
    John Maxwell Coetzee ; is an author and academic from South Africa. He is now an Australian citizen and lives in Adelaide, South Australia...

    ; Death of Iris Murdoch
    Iris Murdoch
    Dame Iris Murdoch DBE was an Irish-born British author and philosopher, best known for her novels about political and social questions of good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious...

    , Joseph Heller
    Joseph Heller
    Joseph Heller was a US satirical novelist, short story writer, and playwright. His best known work is Catch-22, a novel about US servicemen during World War II...

    , Mario Puzo
    Mario Puzo
    Mario Gianluigi Puzo was an American author and screenwriter, known for his novels about the Mafia, including The Godfather , which he later co-adapted into a film by Francis Ford Coppola...

    , John F. Kennedy Jr.
  • 1998 in literature
    1998 in literature
    The year 1998 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*March 5 - Tennessee Williams' 1938 play, Not About Nightingales, receives its stage première....

    - Death of Carlos Castaneda
    Carlos Castaneda
    Carlos Castaneda was a Peruvian-born American anthropologist and author....

    , Octavio Paz
    Octavio Paz
    Octavio Paz Lozano was a Mexican writer, poet, and diplomat, and the winner of the 1990 Nobel Prize for Literature.-Early life and writings:...

    , Lawrence Sanders
    Lawrence Sanders
    Lawrence Sanders was an American novelist and short story writer.Lawrence Sanders was born in Brooklyn in New York City. After public school he attended Wabash College, where he obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree. He then returned to New York and worked at Macy's Department Store...

    , Benjamin Spock
    Benjamin Spock
    Benjamin McLane Spock was an American pediatrician whose book Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, is one of the biggest best-sellers of all time. Its message to mothers is that "you know more than you think you do."Spock was the first pediatrician to study psychoanalysis to try to understand...

    ; Blood Work
    Blood Work (novel)
    Blood Work is a novel written by Michael Connelly which marks the first appearance of Terry McCaleb. The book was used as the basis for the 2002 movie of the same name, starring Clint Eastwood...

    - Michael Connelly
    Michael Connelly
    Michael Connelly is an American author of detective novels and other crime fiction, notably those featuring LAPD Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch and criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller. His books, which have been translated into 36 languages, have garnered him many awards...

  • 1997 in literature
    1997 in literature
    The year 1997 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Tom Clancy signs a book deal with Pearson Custom Publishing and Penguin Putnam Inc. , giving him US$50 million for the world-English rights to two new books . A second agreement gives him another US$25 million for a...

    - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
    Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
    Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is the first novel in the Harry Potter series written by J. K. Rowling and featuring Harry Potter, a young wizard...

    - J. K. Rowling
    J. K. Rowling
    Joanne "Jo" Rowling, OBE , better known as J. K. Rowling, is the British author of the Harry Potter fantasy series...

    ; Underworld
    Underworld (DeLillo novel)
    Underworld is a postmodern novel published in 1997 by Don DeLillo. It was nominated for the National Book Award, was a best-seller, and is one of DeLillo's better-known novels....

    - Don DeLillo
    Don DeLillo
    Don DeLillo is an American author, playwright, and occasional essayist whose work paints a detailed portrait of American life in the late 20th and early 21st centuries...

    ; Death of William S. Burroughs
    William S. Burroughs
    William Seward Burroughs II was an American novelist, poet, essayist and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th...

    , James Dickey
    James Dickey
    James Lafayette Dickey was an American poet and novelist. He was appointed the eighteenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1966.-Early years:...

    , James A. Michener
    James A. Michener
    James Albert Michener was an American author of more than 40 titles, the majority of which were sweeping sagas, covering the lives of many generations in particular geographic locales and incorporating historical facts into the stories...

  • 1996 in literature
    1996 in literature
    The year 1996 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, is removed from an advanced placement English reading list in Lindale, Texas because it "conflicted with the values of the community."* In the United Kingdom, the first...

    - Death of Erma Bombeck
    Erma Bombeck
    Erma Louise Bombeck was an American humorist who achieved great popularity for her newspaper column that described suburban home life from the mid-1960s until the late 1990s...

    , Marguerite Duras
    Marguerite Duras
    Marguerite Donnadieu, better known as Marguerite Duras was a French writer and film director.-Background:...

     Timothy Leary
    Timothy Leary
    Timothy Francis Leary was an American psychologist and writer, known for his advocacy of psychedelic drugs. During a time when drugs like LSD and psilocybin were legal, Leary conducted experiments at Harvard University under the Harvard Psilocybin Project, resulting in the Concord Prison...

    , Carl Sagan
    Carl Sagan
    Carl Edward Sagan was an American astronomer, astrophysicist, cosmologist, author, science popularizer and science communicator in astronomy and natural sciences. He published more than 600 scientific papers and articles and was author, co-author or editor of more than 20 books...

    ; Infinite Jest
    Infinite Jest
    Infinite Jest is a 1996 novel by David Foster Wallace. The lengthy and complex work takes place in a semi-parodic future version of North America, and touches on tennis, substance addiction and recovery programs, depression, child abuse, family relationships, advertising and popular entertainment,...

    - David Foster Wallace
    David Foster Wallace
    David Foster Wallace was an American author of novels, essays, and short stories, and a professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California...

    ; Angela's Ashes
    Angela's Ashes
    Angela's Ashes is a 1996 memoir by the Irish-American author Frank McCourt. The memoir consists of various anecdotes and stories of Frank McCourt's impoverished childhood and early adulthood in Brooklyn, New York and Limerick, Ireland, as well as McCourt's struggles with poverty, his father's...

    - Frank McCourt; Left Behind
    Left Behind
    Left Behind is a series of 16 best-selling novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, dealing with Christian dispensationalist End Times: pretribulation, premillennial, Christian eschatological viewpoint of the end of the world. The primary conflict of the series is the members of the Tribulation...

    - Tim Lahaye
    Tim LaHaye
    Timothy F. LaHaye is an American evangelical Christian minister, author, and speaker. He is best known for the Left Behind series of apocalyptic fiction, which he co-wrote with Jerry B. Jenkins. He has written over 50 books, both fiction and non-fiction.-Early life:LaHaye was born in Detroit,...

    , Jerry B. Jenkins
    Jerry B. Jenkins
    Jerry Bruce Jenkins is an American novelist and biographer. He is best known as co-author of the Left Behind series of books with Tim LaHaye, Jenkins has written over 150 books, including romance novels, mysteries, and children's adventures, as well as non-fiction...

    ; Fight Club
    Fight Club (novel)
    Fight Club is a 1996 novel by Chuck Palahniuk. It follows the experiences of an unnamed protagonist struggling with insomnia. Inspired by his doctor's exasperated remark that insomnia is not suffering, he finds relief by impersonating a seriously ill person in several support groups...

    - Chuck Palahniuk
    Chuck Palahniuk
    Charles Michael "Chuck" Palahniuk is an American transgressional fiction novelist and freelance journalist. He is best known for the award-winning novel Fight Club, which was later made into a film directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, and Helena Bonham Carter...

  • 1995 in literature
    1995 in literature
    The year 1995 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Dylan Thomas Centre in Swansea is opened by Jimmy Carter....

    - The Celestine Prophecy
    The Celestine Prophecy
    The Celestine Prophecy is a 1993 novel by James Redfield that discusses various psychological and spiritual ideas which are rooted in many ancient Eastern Traditions and New Age spirituality. The main character of the novel undertakes a journey to find and understand a series of nine spiritual...

    - James Redfield
    James Redfield
    James Redfield is an American author, lecturer, screenwriter and film producer. He is notable for his novel The Celestine Prophecy .-Biography:...

    ; Blindness
    Blindness (novel)
    Blindness is a novel by Portuguese author José Saramago. It was originally published in Portuguese and then translated into English. It is one of his most famous novels, along with The Gospel According to Jesus Christ and Baltasar and Blimunda....

    - José Saramago
    José Saramago
    José de Sousa Saramago, GColSE was a Nobel-laureate Portuguese novelist, poet, playwright and journalist. His works, some of which can be seen as allegories, commonly present subversive perspectives on historic events, emphasizing the human factor. Harold Bloom has described Saramago as "a...

  • 1994 in literature
    1994 in literature
    The year 1994 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Kevin J. Anderson - Champions of the Force, Dark Apprentice and Jedi Search*Reed Arvin - The Wind in the Wheat*Greg Bear - Songs of Earth and Power...

    - The Stone Diaries
    The Stone Diaries
    The Stone Diaries is a 1993 award-winning novel by Carol Shields.It is the fictional autobiography about the life of Daisy Goodwill Flett, a seemingly ordinary woman whose life is marked by death and loss from the beginning, when her mother dies during childbirth...

    - Carol Shields
    Carol Shields
    Carol Ann Shields, CC, OM, FRSC, MA was an American-born Canadian author. She is best known for her 1993 novel The Stone Diaries, which won the U.S. Pulitzer Prize for Fiction as well as the Governor General's Award in Canada.-Biography:Shields was born in Oak Park, Illinois...

    ; Death of James Clavell
    James Clavell
    James Clavell, born Charles Edmund DuMaresq Clavell was an Australian-born, British novelist, screenwriter, director and World War II veteran and prisoner of war...

    , Ralph Ellison
    Ralph Ellison
    Ralph Waldo Ellison was an American novelist, literary critic, scholar and writer. He was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Ellison is best known for his novel Invisible Man, which won the National Book Award in 1953...

    , Eugène Ionesco
    Eugène Ionesco
    Eugène Ionesco was a Romanian and French playwright and dramatist, and one of the foremost playwrights of the Theatre of the Absurd...

  • 1993 in literature
    1993 in literature
    The year 1993 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Professor Stephen Hawking's book, A Brief History of Time, becomes the longest running book on the bestseller list of The Sunday Times....

    - Death of Kōbō Abe
    Kobo Abe
    , pseudonym of was a Japanese writer, playwright, photographer and inventor. Abe has been often compared to Franz Kafka and Alberto Moravia for his surreal, often nightmarish explorations of individuals in contemporary society and his modernist sensibilities....

    , Anthony Burgess
    Anthony Burgess
    John Burgess Wilson  – who published under the pen name Anthony Burgess – was an English author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. The dystopian satire A Clockwork Orange is Burgess's most famous novel, though he dismissed it as one of his lesser works...

    , William Golding
    William Golding
    Sir William Gerald Golding was a British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Literature laureate, best known for his novel Lord of the Flies...

    , William L. Shirer
    William L. Shirer
    William Lawrence Shirer was an American journalist, war correspondent, and historian, who wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, a history of Nazi Germany read and cited in scholarly works for more than 50 years...

    ; The Christmas Box
    The Christmas Box
    The Christmas Box is an American novel written by Richard Paul Evans and self-published in 1993. A Christmas story purportedly written for his children, the book was advertised locally by Evans, who was working at the time as an advertising executive. He placed the book in Utah stores and it...

    Richard Paul Evans
    Richard Paul Evans
    Richard Paul Evans is an American author.-Biography:Evans graduated from Cottonwood High School in Salt Lake City. He graduated with a B.A. degree from the University of Utah in 1984. While working as an advertising executive he wrote a Christmas story for his children...

    ; Trainspotting
    Trainspotting (novel)
    Trainspotting is the first novel by Scottish writer Irvine Welsh. It is written in the form of short chapters narrated in the first person by various residents of Leith, Edinburgh, who either use heroin, are friends of the core group of heroin users, or engage in destructive activities that are...

    - Irvine Welsh
    Irvine Welsh
    Irvine Welsh is a contemporary Scottish novelist, best known for his novel Trainspotting. His work is characterised by raw Scottish dialect, and brutal depiction of the realities of Edinburgh life...

  • 1992 in literature
    1992 in literature
    The year 1992 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Ben Aaronovitch - Transit*Julia Álvarez - How the García Girls Lost Their Accents*Paul Auster - Leviathan*Iain Banks - The Crow Road...

    - The English Patient
    The English Patient
    The English Patient is a 1992 novel by Sri Lankan-Canadian novelist Michael Ondaatje. The story deals with the gradually revealed histories of a critically burned English accented Hungarian man, his Canadian nurse, a Canadian-Italian thief, and an Indian sapper in the British Army as they live out...

    - Michael Ondaatje
    Michael Ondaatje
    Philip Michael Ondaatje , OC, is a Sri Lankan-born Canadian novelist and poet of Burgher origin. He is perhaps best known for his Booker Prize-winning novel, The English Patient, which was adapted into an Academy-Award-winning film.-Life and work:...

    ; All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
    Cormac McCarthy
    Cormac McCarthy is an American novelist and playwright. He has written ten novels, spanning the Southern Gothic, Western, and modernist genres. He received the Pulitzer Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction for The Road...

    ; The Black Echo
    The Black Echo
    The Black Echo is the 1992 debut novel by American crime author Michael Connelly. This is the first of Connelly's Bosch series. The book won the Mystery Writer's of America Edgar Award in 1992....

    - Michael Connelly
    Michael Connelly
    Michael Connelly is an American author of detective novels and other crime fiction, notably those featuring LAPD Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch and criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller. His books, which have been translated into 36 languages, have garnered him many awards...

  • 1991 in literature
    1991 in literature
    The year 1991 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Douglas Coupland publishes the novel Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, popularizing the term Generation X as the name of the generation....

    - Such a Long Journey
    Such a Long Journey (novel)
    Such a Long Journey is a 1991 novel by Rohinton Mistry. It was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won several other awards. In 2010 the book made headlines when it was withdrawn from the University of Mumbai's English syllabus after complaints from the family of the Hindu nationalist politician...

    - Rohinton Mistry
    Rohinton Mistry
    Rohinton Mistry is an Indian-born Canadian writer in English. Residing in Brampton, Ontario, Canada, Mistry is of Indian origin, originally from Mumbai, Zoroastrian and belongs to the Parsi community. Mistry is a Neustadt International Prize for Literature laureate .-Biography:Rohinton Mistry was...

    ; Parliament of Whores
    Parliament of Whores
    Parliament of Whores is an international best-selling political humor book by P. J. O'Rourke published by Atlantic Monthly Press in 1991. Subtitled "A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire US Government", Parliament is a scathing critique of the American system of governance from a right...

    - P.J. O'Rourke; Death of Isaac Bashevis Singer
    Isaac Bashevis Singer
    Isaac Bashevis Singer – July 24, 1991) was a Polish Jewish American author noted for his short stories. He was one of the leading figures in the Yiddish literary movement, and received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978...

  • 1990 in literature
    1990 in literature
    The year 1990 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*J. K. Rowling gets the idea for Harry Potter while on a train ride from Manchester to London. She says "I was staring out the window, and the idea for Harry just came. He appeared in my mind's eye, very fully formed...

    - Vertigo
    Vertigo (book)
    Vertigo is a book by German author W. G. Sebald. The book functions along with Sebald's subsequent critically successful works The Emigrants and The Rings of Saturn as a trilogy...

    - W.G. Sebald; The Hebrew Goddess
    The Hebrew Goddess
    The Hebrew Goddess is a 1967 book by Jewish historian and anthropologist Raphael Patai. In this book, Patai argues that the Jewish religion historically had elements of polytheism, especially the worship of goddesses and a cult of the mother goddess...

    - Raphael Patai
    Raphael Patai
    Raphael Patai , born Ervin György Patai, was a Hungarian-Jewish ethnographer, historian, Orientalist and anthropologist.-Family background:...

    ; Death of Malcolm Forbes
    Malcolm Forbes
    Malcolm Stevenson Forbes was publisher of Forbes magazine, founded by his father B. C. Forbes and today run by his son Steve Forbes.-Life and career:...

    , Walker Percy
    Walker Percy
    Walker Percy was an American Southern author whose interests included philosophy and semiotics. Percy is best known for his philosophical novels set in and around New Orleans, Louisiana, the first of which, The Moviegoer, won the National Book Award for Fiction in 1962...

    , Alberto Moravia
    Alberto Moravia
    Alberto Moravia, born Alberto Pincherle was an Italian novelist and journalist. His novels explored matters of modern sexuality, social alienation, and existentialism....

    , Anya Seton
    Anya Seton
    Anya Seton was the pen name of Ann Seton, an American author of historical romances.-Biography:...

    , Roald Dahl
    Roald Dahl
    Roald Dahl was a British novelist, short story writer, fighter pilot and screenwriter.Born in Wales to Norwegian parents, he served in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, in which he became a flying ace and intelligence agent, rising to the rank of Wing Commander...


1980s

  • 1989 in literature
    1989 in literature
    The year 1989 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* February 24 - Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini places a US$3 million bounty for the death of The Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie.-Literature:...

    - Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
    Kazuo Ishiguro
    Kazuo Ishiguro OBE or ; born 8 November 1954) is a Japanese–English novelist. He was born in Nagasaki, Japan, and his family moved to England in 1960. Ishiguro obtained his Bachelor's degree from University of Kent in 1978 and his Master's from the University of East Anglia's creative writing...

    ; The Joy Luck Club
    The Joy Luck Club
    The Joy Luck Club is a best-selling novel written by Amy Tan. It focuses on four Chinese American immigrant families in San Francisco, California who start a club known as "the Joy Luck Club," playing the Chinese game of mahjong for money while feasting on a variety of foods...

    - Amy Tan
    Amy Tan
    Amy Tan is an American writer whose works explore mother-daughter relationships. Her most well-known work is The Joy Luck Club, which has been translated into 35 languages...

  • 1988 in literature
    1988 in literature
    The year 1988 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Margaret Atwood - Cat's Eye*J.G. Ballard - Memories of the Space Age*Iain M...

    - Oscar and Lucinda
    Oscar and Lucinda
    Oscar and Lucinda is a novel by Peter Carey which won the 1988 Booker Prize, the 1989 Miles Franklin Award, and was shortlisted for The Best of the Booker.-Plot introduction:...

    - Peter Carey; The Satanic Verses
    The Satanic Verses (novel)
    The Satanic Verses is Salman Rushdie's fourth novel, first published in 1988 and inspired in part by the life of Prophet Muhammad. As with his previous books, Rushdie used magical realism and relied on contemporary events and people to create his characters...

    - Salman Rushdie, Curriculum
    Curriculum
    See also Syllabus.In formal education, a curriculum is the set of courses, and their content, offered at a school or university. As an idea, curriculum stems from the Latin word for race course, referring to the course of deeds and experiences through which children grow to become mature adults...

    - Grazyna Miller
    Grazyna Miller
    Grażyna Miller was a poet, born in Poland.She lived in Italy, where she wrote poems and translates publications from Polish into Italian. She was also a literary critic whose work was published by the most prestigious Italian press media...

    , Noam Chomsky
    Noam Chomsky
    Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...

    , Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media
  • 1987 in literature
    1987 in literature
    The year 1987 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Tom Wolfe was paid $5 million for the film rights to his novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities, the most ever earned by an author, at the time.-Fiction:...

    - Beloved
    Beloved (novel)
    Beloved is a novel by the American writer Toni Morrison, published in 1987. Set in 1873 just after the American Civil War , it is based on the story of the African-American slave, Margaret Garner, who escaped slavery in 1856 in Kentucky by fleeing to Ohio, a free state...

    - Toni Morrison
    Toni Morrison
    Toni Morrison is a Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, editor, and professor. Her novels are known for their epic themes, vivid dialogue, and richly detailed characters. Among her best known novels are The Bluest Eye, Song of Solomon and Beloved...

    ; The Bonfire of the Vanities
    The Bonfire of the Vanities
    The Bonfire of the Vanities is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The story is a drama about ambition, racism, social class, politics, and greed in 1980s New York City and centers on four main characters: WASP bond trader Sherman McCoy, Jewish assistant district attorney Larry Kramer, British expatriate...

    - Tom Wolfe
    Tom Wolfe
    Thomas Kennerly "Tom" Wolfe, Jr. is a best-selling American author and journalist. He is one of the founders of the New Journalism movement of the 1960s and 1970s.-Early life and education:...

    ; Patriot Games
    Patriot Games
    Patriot Games is a novel by Tom Clancy. It is chronologically the first book focusing on CIA analyst Jack Ryan, the main character in almost all of Clancy's novels. It is the indirect sequel to Without Remorse...

    - Tom Clancy
    Tom Clancy
    Thomas Leo "Tom" Clancy, Jr. is an American author, best known for his technically detailed espionage, military science, and techno thriller storylines set during and in the aftermath of the Cold War, along with video games on which he did not work, but which bear his name for licensing and...

  • 1986 in literature
    1986 in literature
    The year 1986 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Michael Grade. Controller of BBC One, axes plans to televise Ian Curteis's The Falklands Play.-New books:*Kingsley Amis - The Old Devils...

    - Extinction
    Extinction
    In biology and ecology, extinction is the end of an organism or of a group of organisms , normally a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point...

    - Thomas Bernhard
    Thomas Bernhard
    Thomas Bernhard was an Austrian novelist, playwright and poet. Bernhard, whose body of work has been called "the most significant literary achievement since World War II," is widely considered to be one of the most important German-speaking authors of the postwar era.- Life :Thomas Bernhard was...

    ; The Bourne Supremacy
    The Bourne Supremacy
    The Bourne Supremacy is the second Jason Bourne novel written by Robert Ludlum, first published in 1986. It was the sequel to Ludlum's bestseller The Bourne Identity and precedes Ludlum's final Bourne novel, The Bourne Ultimatum ....

    - Robert Ludlum
    Robert Ludlum
    Robert Ludlum was an American author of 23 thriller novels. The number of his books in print is estimated between 290–500 million copies. They have been published in 33 languages and 40 countries. Ludlum also published books under the pseudonyms Jonathan Ryder and Michael Shepherd.-Life and...

  • 1985 in literature
    1985 in literature
    The year 1985 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Isaac Asimov - Robots and Empire*Margaret Atwood - The Handmaid's Tale*Jean M. Auel - The Mammoth Hunters*Iain Banks - Walking on Glass...

    - The Handmaid's Tale
    The Handmaid's Tale
    The Handmaid's Tale is a dystopian novel, a work of science fiction or speculative fiction, written by Canadian author Margaret Atwood and first published by McClelland and Stewart in 1985...

    - Margaret Atwood
    Margaret Atwood
    Margaret Eleanor Atwood, is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, and environmental activist. She is among the most-honoured authors of fiction in recent history; she is a winner of the Arthur C...

    ; Love in the Time of Cholera
    Love in the Time of Cholera
    Love in the Time of Cholera is a novel by Nobel Prize winning Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez first published in the Spanish language during 1985. Alfred A. Knopf published the English translation during 1988...

    - Gabriel García Márquez
    Gabriel García Márquez
    Gabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez is a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo throughout Latin America. He is considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in...

  • 1984 in literature
    1984 in literature
    The year 1984 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The book Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is widely read....

    - White Noise
    White Noise (novel)
    White Noise, the eighth novel by Don DeLillo, is an example of postmodern literature. Widely considered his "breakout" work, the book won the National Book Award in 1985 and brought him to the attention of a much larger audience. Time included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels...

    - Don DeLillo
    Don DeLillo
    Don DeLillo is an American author, playwright, and occasional essayist whose work paints a detailed portrait of American life in the late 20th and early 21st centuries...

    ; The Unbearable Lightness of Being
    The Unbearable Lightness of Being
    The Unbearable Lightness of Being , written by Milan Kundera, is a philosophical novel about two men, two women, a dog and their lives in the Prague Spring of the Czechoslovak Communist period in 1968. Although written in 1982, the novel was not published until two years later, in France...

    - Milan Kundera
    Milan Kundera
    Milan Kundera , born 1 April 1929, is a writer of Czech origin who has lived in exile in France since 1975, where he became a naturalized citizen in 1981. He is best known as the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, and The Joke. Kundera has written in...

  • 1983 in literature
    1983 in literature
    The year 1983 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Ironweed by William Kennedy is published.*Salvage for the Saint by Peter Bloxsom and John Kruse is published. This is the final book in a series of novels, novellas and short stories featuring the Leslie Charteris...

    - On Wings of Eagles
    On Wings of Eagles
    On Wings of Eagles is a 1983 thriller novel written by British author Ken Follett. Set against the background of the Iranian revolution, it tells the story of the rescue of Paul Chiapparone and Bill Gaylord from prison in Tehran by a team of Electronic Data Systems executives led by retired Col....

    - Ken Follett
    Ken Follett
    Ken Follett is a Welsh author of thrillers and historical novels. He has sold more than 100 million copies of his works. Four of his books have reached the number 1 ranking on the New York Times best-seller list: The Key to Rebecca, Lie Down with Lions, Triple, and World Without End.-Early...

    ; Ancient Evenings
    Ancient Evenings
    Ancient Evenings is a novel by American author Norman Mailer. It deals with the lives of two protagonists, one young, one old, in a very alien Ancient Egypt marked by journeys by the dead, reincarnation, and violent and hyper-sexual gods and mortals in a complex combination of historical fiction,...

    - Norman Mailer
    Norman Mailer
    Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S...

    ; Shame
    Shame
    Shame is, variously, an affect, emotion, cognition, state, or condition. The roots of the word shame are thought to derive from an older word meaning to cover; as such, covering oneself, literally or figuratively, is a natural expression of shame....

    - Salman Rushdie
  • 1982 in literature
    1982 in literature
    The year 1982 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*La Bicyclette Bleue by Régine Deforges becomes France's best selling novel ever.-New books:...

    - The Color Purple
    The Color Purple
    The Color Purple is an acclaimed 1982 epistolary novel by American author Alice Walker. It received the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction...

    - Alice Walker
    Alice Walker
    Alice Malsenior Walker is an American author, poet, and activist. She has written both fiction and essays about race and gender...

    ; La casa de los espíritus (The House of the Spirits
    The House of the Spirits
    The House of the Spirits is the debut novel by Isabel Allende. Initially, the novel was rejected by several Spanish-language publishers, but became an instant best seller when published in Barcelona in 1982. The novel was critically acclaimed around the world, and catapulted Allende to literary...

    ) - Isabel Allende
    Isabel Allende
    Isabel Allende Llona is a Chilean writer with American citizenship. Allende, whose works sometimes contain aspects of the "magic realist" tradition, is famous for novels such as The House of the Spirits and City of the Beasts , which have been commercially successful...

  • 1981 in literature
    1981 in literature
    The year 1981 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction given for the first time...

    - The Blue Bicycle - Régine Deforges
    Régine Deforges
    Régine Deforges is a French author, editor, director, and playwright.Born in Montmorillon, Vienne, she is sometimes called the "High Priestess of French erotic literature." Deforges was the first woman to own and operate a publishing house in France...

    ; Midnight's Children
    Midnight's Children
    Midnight's Children is a 1981 book by Salman Rushdie about India's transition from British colonialism to independence and the partition of India. It is considered an example of postcolonial literature and magical realism...

    - Salman Rushdie; Red Dragon - Thomas Harris
    Thomas Harris
    Thomas Harris is an American author and screenwriter, best known for a series of suspense novels about his most famous character, Hannibal Lecter...

  • 1980 in literature
    1980 in literature
    The year 1980 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Marguerite Yourcenar becomes the first woman to be elected to the Académie française....

    - Smiley's People
    Smiley's People
    Smiley's People is a spy novel by John le Carré, published in 1979. Featuring British master-spy George Smiley, it is the third and final novel of the "Karla Trilogy", following Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and The Honourable Schoolboy...

    - John le Carré
    John le Carré
    David John Moore Cornwell , who writes under the name John le Carré, is an author of espionage novels. During the 1950s and the 1960s, Cornwell worked for MI5 and MI6, and began writing novels under the pseudonym "John le Carré"...

    ; Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose
    The Name of the Rose
    The Name of the Rose is the first novel by Italian author Umberto Eco. It is a historical murder mystery set in an Italian monastery in the year 1327, an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...

    )
    - Umberto Eco
    Umberto Eco
    Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist, best known for his novel The Name of the Rose , an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...

    ; Thy Neighbor's Wife
    Thy Neighbor's Wife
    Thy Neighbor's Wife is a non-fiction book by Gay Talese, published in 1981 and updated in 2009.The book is an exploration of early-1950s sexuality in America, with notable discussion of the free love subculture...

    - Gay Talese
    Gay Talese
    Gay Talese is an American author. He wrote for The New York Times in the early 1960s and helped to define literary journalism...


1970s

  • 1979 in literature
    1979 in literature
    The year 1979 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy*V.C...

    - Sophie's Choice
    Sophie's Choice (novel)
    Sophie's Choice is a novel by William Styron published in 1979. It concerns a young American Southerner, an aspiring writer, who befriends the Jewish Nathan Landau and his beautiful lover Sophie, a Polish survivor of the Nazi concentration camps...

    - William Styron
    William Styron
    William Clark Styron, Jr. was an American novelist and essayist who won major literary awards for his work.For much of his career, Styron was best known for his novels, which included...

    ; The Executioner's Song
    The Executioner's Song
    The Executioner's Song is a 1980 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Norman Mailer that depicts the events surrounding the execution of Gary Gilmore by the state of Utah for murder. The title of the book may be a play on "The Lord High Executioner's Song" from Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado...

    - Norman Mailer
    Norman Mailer
    Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S...

    ; Kane and Abel
    Kane and Abel (novel)
    Kane and Abel is a 1979 novel by British author Jeffrey Archer. The title and story is a play on the Biblical brothers, Cain and Abel.Released in the United Kingdom in 1979 and in the United States in February 1980, the book was an international success. It reached No...

    - Jeffrey Archer; A Bend in the River
    A Bend in the River
    A Bend in the River is a 1979 novel by Nobel laureate V. S. Naipaul.In 1998, the Modern Library ranked A Bend in the River #83 on its list of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century...

    - V.S. Naipaul, Heatherley -Flora Thompson
    Flora Thompson
    Flora Jane Thompson was an English novelist and poet famous for her semi-autobiographical trilogy about the English countryside, Lark Rise to Candleford.-Early life and family:...

    *
  • 1978 in literature
    1978 in literature
    The year 1978 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year, a humorous award given annually to books with unusual titles is created. The first winner was Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude...

    - The World According to Garp
    The World According to Garp
    The World According to Garp is John Irving's fourth novel. Published in 1978, the book was a bestseller for several years.A movie adaptation of the novel starring Robin Williams was released in 1982, with a screenplay written by Steve Tesich....

    - John Irving
    John Irving
    John Winslow Irving is an American novelist and Academy Award-winning screenwriter.Irving achieved critical and popular acclaim after the international success of The World According to Garp in 1978...

    ; The Stand
    The Stand
    The Stand is a post-apocalyptic horror/fantasy novel by American author Stephen King. It demonstrates the scenario in his earlier short story, Night Surf...

    - Stephen King
    Stephen King
    Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...

  • 1977 in literature
    1977 in literature
    The year 1977 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Douglas Adams begins writing for BBC radio.*V. S. Naipaul declines the offer of a CBE....

    - The Sea, the Sea
    The Sea, the Sea
    The Sea, the Sea is the 19th novel by Iris Murdoch. It won the Booker Prize in 1978.-Plot summary:The Sea, the Sea is a tale of the strange obsessions that haunt a self-satisfied playwright and director as he begins to write his memoirs...

    - Iris Murdoch
    Iris Murdoch
    Dame Iris Murdoch DBE was an Irish-born British author and philosopher, best known for her novels about political and social questions of good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious...

    ; Song of Solomon (novel)
    Song of Solomon (novel)
    Song of Solomon is a 1977 novel by American author Toni Morrison. It follows the life of Macon "Milkman" Dead III, an African-American male living in Michigan, from birth to adulthood....

    - Toni Morrison
    Toni Morrison
    Toni Morrison is a Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, editor, and professor. Her novels are known for their epic themes, vivid dialogue, and richly detailed characters. Among her best known novels are The Bluest Eye, Song of Solomon and Beloved...

    ; The Shining
    The Shining (novel)
    The Shining is a 1977 horror novel by American author Stephen King. The title was inspired by the John Lennon song "Instant Karma!", which contained the line "We all shine on…". It was King's third published novel, and first hardback bestseller, and the success of the book firmly established King...

    - Stephen King
    Stephen King
    Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...

  • 1976 in literature
    1976 in literature
    The year 1976 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Saul Bellow won both the Nobel Prize for Literature and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.-New books:*Kingsley Amis – The Alteration...

    - Interview with the Vampire
    Interview with the Vampire
    Interview with the Vampire is a vampire novel by Anne Rice written in 1973 and published in 1976. It was the first novel to feature the enigmatic vampire Lestat, and was followed by several sequels, collectively known as The Vampire Chronicles...

    - Anne Rice
    Anne Rice
    Anne Rice is a best-selling Southern American author of metaphysical gothic fiction, Christian literature and erotica from New Orleans, Louisiana. Her books have sold nearly 100 million copies, making her one of the most widely read authors in modern history...

    ; The Final Days
    The Final Days
    The Final Days is a 1976 non-fiction book written by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. A follow up to their book All the President's Men, The Final Days concerns itself with the final months of the Richard Nixon presidency....

    - Bob Woodward
    Bob Woodward
    Robert Upshur Woodward is an American investigative journalist and non-fiction author. He has worked for The Washington Post since 1971 as a reporter, and is currently an associate editor of the Post....

     & Carl Bernstein
    Carl Bernstein
    Carl Bernstein is an American investigative journalist who, at The Washington Post, teamed up with Bob Woodward; the two did the majority of the most important news reporting on the Watergate scandal. These scandals led to numerous government investigations, the indictment of a vast number of...

    ; Triton
    Triton (novel)
    Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia is a science fiction novel by Samuel R. Delany. It was nominated for the 1976 Nebula Award for Best Novel, and was shortlisted for a retrospective James Tiptree, Jr. Award in 1995...

    - Samuel R. Delany
    Samuel R. Delany
    Samuel Ray Delany, Jr., also known as "Chip" is an American author, professor and literary critic. His work includes a number of novels, many in the science fiction genre, as well as memoir, criticism, and essays on sexuality and society.His science fiction novels include Babel-17, The Einstein...

    ; Roots: The Saga of an American Family
    Roots: The Saga of an American Family
    Roots: The Saga of an American Family is a novel written by Alex Haley and first published in 1976. It tells the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African, captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery in the United States, and follows his life and the lives of his descendants in the U.S....

    - Alex Haley
    Alex Haley
    Alexander Murray Palmer Haley was an African-American writer. He is best known as the author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family and the coauthor of The Autobiography of Malcolm X.-Early life:...

  • 1975 in literature
    1975 in literature
    The year 1975 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* August 12 — with the 20-year time limit stipulated by Thomas Mann at his death having expired, sealed packets containing 32 of the author's notebooks were opened in Zurich, Switzerland.* Writing under the...

    - Shōgun
    Shogun (novel)
    Shōgun is a 1975 novel by James Clavell. It is the first novel of the author's Asian Saga. A major bestseller, by 1990 the book had sold 15 million copies worldwide...

    - James Clavell
    James Clavell
    James Clavell, born Charles Edmund DuMaresq Clavell was an Australian-born, British novelist, screenwriter, director and World War II veteran and prisoner of war...

    ; Salem's Lot - Stephen King
    Stephen King
    Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...

    ; The Book of Sand
    The Book of Sand (book)
    The Book of Sand is a short story collection by Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges, published in 1975. According to the author's opinion, the collection, written in his last days , is his best book, an opinion not shared by most critics, who prefer his other works such as Ficciones.Referring to...

    - Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

    ; Dhalgren
    Dhalgren
    Dhalgren is a science fiction novel by Samuel R. Delany. The story begins with a cryptic passage:to wound the autumnal city.So howled out for the world to give him a name.The in-dark answered with wind....

    - Samuel R. Delany
    Samuel R. Delany
    Samuel Ray Delany, Jr., also known as "Chip" is an American author, professor and literary critic. His work includes a number of novels, many in the science fiction genre, as well as memoir, criticism, and essays on sexuality and society.His science fiction novels include Babel-17, The Einstein...

    ; Ragtime
    Ragtime (novel)
    Ragtime is a 1975 novel by E. L. Doctorow. This work of historical fiction is primarily set in the New York City area from about 1900 until the United States entry into World War I in 1917...

    - E. L. Doctorow
    E. L. Doctorow
    Edgar Lawrence Doctorow is an American author.- Biography :Edgar Lawrence Doctorow was born in the Bronx, New York City, the son of second-generation Americans of Russian Jewish descent...

  • 1974 in literature
    1974 in literature
    The year 1974 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics is founded by Allen Ginsberg and Anne Waldman.-New books:*Richard Adams - Shardik*Kingsley Amis - Ending Up...

    - All the President's Men
    All the President's Men
    All the President's Men is a 1974 non-fiction book by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, two of the journalists investigating the first Watergate break-in and ensuing scandal for The Washington Post. The book chronicles the investigative reporting of Woodward and Bernstein from Woodward's initial...

    - Carl Bernstein
    Carl Bernstein
    Carl Bernstein is an American investigative journalist who, at The Washington Post, teamed up with Bob Woodward; the two did the majority of the most important news reporting on the Watergate scandal. These scandals led to numerous government investigations, the indictment of a vast number of...

     & Bob Woodward
    Bob Woodward
    Robert Upshur Woodward is an American investigative journalist and non-fiction author. He has worked for The Washington Post since 1971 as a reporter, and is currently an associate editor of the Post....

    ; Carrie
    Carrie (novel)
    Carrie is American author Stephen King's first published novel, released in 1974. It revolves around the eponymous Carrie, a shy high-school girl, who uses her newly discovered telekinetic powers to exact revenge on those who tease her...

    - Stephen King
    Stephen King
    Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...

    ; Jaws
    Jaws (novel)
    Jaws is a 1974 novel by Peter Benchley. It tells the story of a great white shark that preys upon a small resort town, and the voyage of three men to kill it....

    - Peter Benchley
    Peter Benchley
    Peter Bradford Benchley was an American author, best known for his novel Jaws and its subsequent film adaptation, the latter co-written by Benchley and directed by Steven Spielberg...

    ; Fear of Flying
    Fear of Flying (novel)
    Fear of Flying is a 1973 novel by Erica Jong, which became famously controversial for its attitudes towards female sexuality, and figured in the development of second-wave feminism....

    - Erica Jong
    Erica Jong
    Erica Jong is an American author and teacher best known for her fiction and poetry.-Career:A 1963 graduate of Barnard College, and with an M.A...

  • 1973 in literature
    1973 in literature
    The year 1973 in literature involved several significant events and the writing of many notable books.-Events:*September 25 - The funeral of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda becomes a focus for protests against the new government of Augusto Pinochet...

    - Burr
    Burr (novel)
    Burr , by Gore Vidal, is a historical novel challenging the traditional iconography of United States history via narrative and a fictional memoir of Aaron Burr. Burr was variously the third US vice president, a US Army officer in and combat veteran of the Revolutionary War, a lawyer and a U.S....

    - Gore Vidal
    Gore Vidal
    Gore Vidal is an American author, playwright, essayist, screenwriter, and political activist. His third novel, The City and the Pillar , outraged mainstream critics as one of the first major American novels to feature unambiguous homosexuality...

    ; Gravity's Rainbow
    Gravity's Rainbow
    Gravity's Rainbow is a postmodern novel written by Thomas Pynchon and first published on February 28, 1973.The narrative is set primarily in Europe at the end of World War II and centers on the design, production and dispatch of V-2 rockets by the German military, and, in particular, the quest...

    - Thomas Pynchon
    Thomas Pynchon
    Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...

  • 1972 in literature
    1972 in literature
    The year 1972 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Fiction:*Richard Adams - Watership Down*Jorge Amado - Teresa Batista Cansada da Guerra *Martin Amis - The Rachel Papers...

    - Jonathan Livingston Seagull
    Jonathan Livingston Seagull
    Jonathan Livingston Seagull, written by Richard Bach, is a fable in novella form about a seagull learning about life and flight, and a homily about self-perfection...

    - Richard Bach
    Richard Bach
    Richard David Bach is an American writer. He is widely known as the author of the hugely popular 1970s best-sellers Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah, and others. His books espouse his philosophy that our apparent physical limits and mortality are merely...

    ; Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
    Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (novel)
    Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream is an autobiographical novel by Hunter S. Thompson, illustrated by Ralph Steadman. The book is a roman à clef, rooted in autobiographical incidents. The story follows its protagonist, Raoul Duke, and his attorney, Dr...

    - Hunter S. Thompson
    Hunter S. Thompson
    Hunter Stockton Thompson was an American journalist and author who wrote The Rum Diary , Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 .He is credited as the creator of Gonzo journalism, a style of reporting where reporters involve themselves in the action to...

    ; The Stepford Wives
    The Stepford Wives
    The Stepford Wives is a 1972 satirical thriller novel by Ira Levin. The story concerns Joanna Eberhart, a photographer and young mother who begins to suspect that the frighteningly submissive housewives in her new idyllic Connecticut neighborhood may be robots created by their husbands.Two films of...

    - Ira Levin
    Ira Levin
    Ira Levin was an American author, dramatist and songwriter.-Professional life:Levin attended Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa...

  • 1971 in literature
    1971 in literature
    The year 1971 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Destiny Waltz by Gerda Charles wins the UK's first Whitbread Novel of the Year Award.-New books:*Hiroshi Aramata - Teito Monogatari...

    - A Separate Reality
    A Separate Reality
    is an allegedly non-fictional book written by anthropologist/author Carlos Castaneda in 1971 concerning the events that took place during an apprenticeship he claimed to have served with a self-proclaimed Yaqui Indian Sorcerer, Don Juan Matus, between 1968 and 1971...

    : Further Conversations with Don Juan
    - Carlos Castaneda
    Carlos Castaneda
    Carlos Castaneda was a Peruvian-born American anthropologist and author....

    ; The Happy Hooker: My Own Story - Xaviera Hollander; The End of Summer
    The End of Summer
    is a 1961 film directed by Yasujirō Ozu. It was entered into the 12th Berlin International Film Festival. The film was his penultimate film; only An Autumn Afternoon followed it....

    - Rosamunde Pilcher
    Rosamunde Pilcher
    Rosamunde Pilcher OBE is a British author of romance novels and mainstream women's fiction. Early in her career she was also published under the pen name Jane Fraser. Pilcher retired from writing in 2000.-Early years:...

  • 1970 in literature
    1970 in literature
    The year 1970 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Deliverance by American poet James Dickey published...

    - Deliverance
    Deliverance
    Deliverance is a 1972 American thriller film produced and directed by John Boorman. Principal cast members include Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ronny Cox and Ned Beatty in his film debut. The film is based on a 1970 novel of the same name by American author James Dickey, who has a small role in the...

    - James Dickey
    James Dickey
    James Lafayette Dickey was an American poet and novelist. He was appointed the eighteenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1966.-Early years:...

    ; Blue Movie
    Blue Movie
    Blue Movie , a.k.a. Fuck, is a film by Andy Warhol starring Viva and Louis Waldon.Warhol describes the film, "in October '68 I shot a movie of Viva having sex with Louis Waldon...

    - Terry Southern
    Terry Southern
    Terry Southern was an American author, essayist, screenwriter and university lecturer, noted for his distinctive satirical style...

    ; Ball Four
    Ball Four
    Ball Four is a book written by former Major League Baseball pitcher Jim Bouton in . The book is a diary of Bouton's 1969 season, spent with the Seattle Pilots and then the Houston Astros following a late-season trade. In it Bouton also recounts much of his baseball career, spent mainly with the...

    - Jim Bouton
    Jim Bouton
    James Alan "Jim" Bouton is a former American Major League Baseball pitcher. He is also the author of the controversial baseball book Ball Four, which was a combination diary of his season and memoir of his years with the New York Yankees, Seattle Pilots, and Houston Astros.-Amateur and college...

    ; The Bluest Eye
    The Bluest Eye
    The Bluest Eye is a 1970 novel by American author Toni Morrison. It is Morrison's first novel, written while Morrison was teaching at Howard University and was raising her two sons on her own. The story is about a year in the life of a young black girl in Lorain, Ohio, named Pecola...

    - Toni Morrison
    Toni Morrison
    Toni Morrison is a Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, editor, and professor. Her novels are known for their epic themes, vivid dialogue, and richly detailed characters. Among her best known novels are The Bluest Eye, Song of Solomon and Beloved...


1960s

  • 1969 in literature
    1969 in literature
    The year 1969 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The first Booker Prize is awarded.* "Penelope Ashe", author of the bestselling novel Naked Came the Stranger, is found to be several people who each took a turn writing a chapter of what they described as "junk" in...

    - Death of Jack Kerouac
    Jack Kerouac
    Jean-Louis "Jack" Lebris de Kerouac was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic...

    ; The Godfather
    The Godfather
    The Godfather is a 1972 American epic crime film directed by Francis Ford Coppola, based on the 1969 novel by Mario Puzo. With a screenplay by Puzo, Coppola and an uncredited Robert Towne, the film stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard...

    - Mario Puzo
    Mario Puzo
    Mario Gianluigi Puzo was an American author and screenwriter, known for his novels about the Mafia, including The Godfather , which he later co-adapted into a film by Francis Ford Coppola...

    ; Portnoy's Complaint
    Portnoy's Complaint
    Portnoy's Complaint is the American novel that turned its author Philip Roth into a major celebrity, sparking a storm of controversy over its explicit and candid treatment of sexuality, including detailed depictions of masturbation using various props including a piece of liver...

    - Philip Roth
    Philip Roth
    Philip Milton Roth is an American novelist. He gained fame with the 1959 novella Goodbye, Columbus, an irreverent and humorous portrait of Jewish-American life that earned him a National Book Award...

    ; Slaughterhouse-Five
    Slaughterhouse-Five
    Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death is a satirical novel by Kurt Vonnegut about World War II experiences and journeys through time of a soldier called Billy Pilgrim...

    - Kurt Vonnegut
    Kurt Vonnegut
    Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was a 20th century American writer. His works such as Cat's Cradle , Slaughterhouse-Five and Breakfast of Champions blend satire, gallows humor and science fiction. He was known for his humanist beliefs and was honorary president of the American Humanist Association.-Early...

    ; Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle
    Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle
    Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle is a novel by Vladimir Nabokov published in 1969.Ada began to materialize in 1959, when Nabokov was flirting with two projects: "The Texture of Time" and "Letters from Terra." In 1965, he began to see a link between the two ideas, finally composing a unified novel...

    - Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...

    ; I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings
    I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
    I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is the 1969 autobiography about the early years of African-American writer and poet Maya Angelou. The first in a six-volume series, it is a coming-of-age story that illustrates how strength of character and a love of literature can help overcome racism and trauma...

    - Maya Angelou
    Maya Angelou
    Maya Angelou is an American author and poet who has been called "America's most visible black female autobiographer" by scholar Joanne M. Braxton. She is best known for her series of six autobiographical volumes, which focus on her childhood and early adult experiences. The first and most highly...

  • 1968 in literature
    1968 in literature
    The year 1968 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Dean R. Koontz's first novel, Star Quest is published....

    - Death of John Steinbeck
    John Steinbeck
    John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...

    , Edna Ferber
    Edna Ferber
    Edna Ferber was an American novelist, short story writer and playwright. Her novels were especially popular and included the Pulitzer Prize-winning So Big , Show Boat , and Giant .-Early years:Ferber was born August 15, 1885, in Kalamazoo, Michigan,...

    , Upton Sinclair
    Upton Sinclair
    Upton Beall Sinclair Jr. , was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle . It exposed conditions in the U.S...

    ; The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
    The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
    The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is a work of literary journalism by Tom Wolfe, published in 1968. Using techniques from the genre of hysterical realism and pioneering new journalism, the "nonfiction novel" tells the story of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters...

    - Tom Wolfe
    Tom Wolfe
    Thomas Kennerly "Tom" Wolfe, Jr. is a best-selling American author and journalist. He is one of the founders of the New Journalism movement of the 1960s and 1970s.-Early life and education:...

    ; Airport - Arthur Hailey
    Arthur Hailey
    Arthur Hailey was a British/Canadian novelist.- Biography :Born in Luton, Bedfordshire, England, Hailey served in the Royal Air Force from the start of World War II during 1939 until 1947, when he went to live in Canada. Hailey's last novel, Detective , is a mystery told from the perspective of a...

    ; Belle du Seigneur - Albert Cohen
    Albert Cohen
    Albert Cohen was a Greek-born Romaniote Jewish Swiss novelist who wrote in French. He worked as a civil servant for various international organizations, such as the International Labour Organization...

     The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge
    The Teachings of Don Juan
    The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge was published by the University of California Press in 1968 as a work of anthropology. It was written by Carlos Castaneda and submitted as his master’s thesis in the school of anthropology...

    - Carlos Castaneda
    Carlos Castaneda
    Carlos Castaneda was a Peruvian-born American anthropologist and author....

  • 1967 in literature
    1967 in literature
    The year 1967 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Influential science fiction anthology Dangerous Visions published.*Cecil Day-Lewis is selected as the new Poet Laureate of the UK.-New books:...

    - Wild Season
    Wild Season
    Wild Season is a 1967 South African drama film directed by Emil Nofal and starring Gert Van den Bergh, Marie Du Toit and Antony Thomas. A family operating a trawler off the South African coast, suffer a personal tragedy....

    - Allan W. Eckert
    Allan W. Eckert
    Allan W. Eckert was an American historian, historical novelist, and naturalist.-Biography:Eckert was born in Buffalo, New York and raised in the Chicago, Illinois area, but had been a long-time resident of Bellefontaine, Ohio, near where he attended university...

    ; Cien años de soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude
    One Hundred Years of Solitude
    One Hundred Years of Solitude , by Gabriel García Márquez, is a novel which tells the multi-generational story of the Buendía family, whose patriarch, José Arcadio Buendía, founds the town of Macondo, the metaphoric Colombia...

    )
    - Gabriel García Márquez
    Gabriel García Márquez
    Gabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez is a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo throughout Latin America. He is considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in...

    ; Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited - Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...

    ; The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects
    The Medium is the Massage
    The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects is a book co-created by media analyst Marshall McLuhan and graphic designer Quentin Fiore, and coordinated by Jerome Agel...

    - Marshall McLuhan
    Marshall McLuhan
    Herbert Marshall McLuhan, CC was a Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar—a professor of English literature, a literary critic, a rhetorician, and a communication theorist...

     and Quentin Fiore
    Quentin Fiore
    Quentin Fiore is a graphic designer, who has worked mostly in books.Having taken art lessons from renowned artists George Grosz and Hans Hofmann, Fiore later studied at the "New Bauhaus" in Chicago....

    ; The Death of a President
    The Death of a President
    The Death of a President, November 20–November 25, 1963 is historian William Manchester's 1967 account of the assassination of John F. Kennedy...

    - William Manchester
    William Manchester
    William Raymond Manchester was an American author, biographer, and historian from Springfield, Massachusetts, USA, notable as the bestselling author of 18 books that have been translated into over 20 languages...

    ; Nicholas and Alexandra
    Nicholas and Alexandra (book)
    Nicholas and Alexandra: An Intimate Account of the Last of the Romanovs and the Fall of Imperial Russia is a 1967 biography of the last royal family of Russia by historian Robert K. Massie...

    - Robert K. Massie
    Robert K. Massie
    Robert Kinloch Massie III is an American historian, author, Pulitzer Prize recipient. He has devoted much of his career to studying the House of Romanov, Russia's royal family from 1613-1917.-Biography:...

  • 1966 in literature
    1966 in literature
    The year 1966 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*February 14 - Dissident writers Yuli Daniel and Andrei Sinyavsky are sentenced to hard labour for "anti-Soviet activity"....

    - The Master and Margarita
    The Master and Margarita
    The Master and Margarita is a novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, woven around the premise of a visit by the Devil to the fervently atheistic Soviet Union. Many critics consider the book to be one of the greatest novels of the 20th century, and one of the foremost Soviet satires, directed against a...

    - Mikhail Bulgakov
    Mikhail Bulgakov
    Mikhaíl Afanásyevich Bulgákov was a Soviet Russian writer and playwright active in the first half of the 20th century. He is best known for his novel The Master and Margarita, which The Times of London has called one of the masterpieces of the 20th century.-Biography:Mikhail Bulgakov was born on...

    ; The Crying of Lot 49
    The Crying of Lot 49
    The Crying of Lot 49 is a novel by Thomas Pynchon, first published in 1966. The shortest of Pynchon's novels, it is about a woman, Oedipa Maas, possibly unearthing the centuries-old conflict between two mail distribution companies, Thurn und Taxis and the Trystero...

    - Thomas Pynchon
    Thomas Pynchon
    Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...

    ; Wide Sargasso Sea
    Wide Sargasso Sea
    Wide Sargasso Sea is a 1966 postcolonial parallel novel by Dominica-born author Jean Rhys. Since her previous work, Good Morning, Midnight, was published in 1939, Rhys had lived in obscurity. Wide Sargasso Sea put Rhys into the limelight once more, and became her most successful novel.The novel...

    - Jean Rhys
    Jean Rhys
    Jean Rhys , born Ella Gwendolen Rees Williams, was a mid 20th-century novelist from Dominica. Educated from the age of 16 in Great Britain, she is best known for her novel Wide Sargasso Sea , written as a "prequel" to Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre.-Early life:Rhys was born in Roseau, Dominica...

    ; In Cold Blood
    In Cold Blood (book)
    In Cold Blood is a 1966 book by American author Truman Capote detailing the brutal 1959 murders of Herbert Clutter, a successful farmer from Holcomb, Kansas, his wife and two of their four children. Two older daughters no longer lived at the farm and were not there at the time of the murders...

    - Truman Capote
    Truman Capote
    Truman Streckfus Persons , known as Truman Capote , was an American author, many of whose short stories, novels, plays, and nonfiction are recognized literary classics, including the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's and the true crime novel In Cold Blood , which he labeled a "nonfiction novel." At...

    ; Beautiful Losers - Leonard Cohen
    Leonard Cohen
    Leonard Norman Cohen, is a Canadian singer-songwriter, musician, poet and novelist. Cohen published his first book of poetry in Montreal in 1956 and his first novel in 1963. His work often explores religion, isolation, sexuality and interpersonal relationships...

    ; Last Picture Show - Larry McMurtry
    Larry McMurtry
    Larry Jeff McMurtry is an American novelist, essayist, bookseller and screenwriter whose work is predominantly set in either the old West or in contemporary Texas...

  • 1965 in literature
    1965 in literature
    The year 1965 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Lloyd Alexander - The Black Cauldron*J. G. Ballard - The Drought*Ray Bradbury - The Vintage Bradbury*John Brunner...

    - Death of W. Somerset Maugham
    W. Somerset Maugham
    William Somerset Maugham , CH was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and, reputedly, the highest paid author during the 1930s.-Childhood and education:...

    , T.S. Eliot; The Autobiography of Malcolm X
    The Autobiography of Malcolm X
    The Autobiography of Malcolm X was published in 1965, the result of a collaboration between Malcolm X and journalist Alex Haley. Haley coauthored the autobiography based on a series of in-depth interviews he conducted between 1963 and Malcolm X's 1965 assassination...

    - Alex Haley
    Alex Haley
    Alexander Murray Palmer Haley was an African-American writer. He is best known as the author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family and the coauthor of The Autobiography of Malcolm X.-Early life:...

    , Herzog
    Herzog (novel)
    Herzog is a 1964 novel by Saul Bellow. Letters from the protagonist constitute much of the text.Herzog won the 1965 National Book Award for Fiction and the The Prix International...

    - Saul Bellow
    Saul Bellow
    Saul Bellow was a Canadian-born Jewish American writer. For his literary contributions, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the National Medal of Arts...

    ; An American Dream
    An American Dream
    An American Dream is Norman Mailer's fourth novel, published by Dial Press. Mailer wrote it in serialized form for Esquire, consciously attempting to resurrect the methodology used by Charles Dickens and other earlier novelists, with Mailer writing each chapter against monthly deadlines...

    - Norman Mailer
    Norman Mailer
    Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S...

    ; The Magus
    The Magus (novel)
    The Magus is the first novel written by British author John Fowles. It tells the story of Nicholas Urfe, a teacher on a small Greek island...

    - John Fowles
    John Fowles
    John Robert Fowles was an English novelist and essayist. In 2008, The Times newspaper named Fowles among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".-Birth and family:...

    ; Little Trulsa - Ester Ringnér-Lundgren
    Ester Ringnér-Lundgren
    Ester Ringnér-Lundgren was a Swedish writer who wrote books for children and youth. A few of her books were published in Great Britain....

  • 1964 in literature
    1964 in literature
    The year 1964 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Jean-Paul Sartre becomes head of the Organization to Defend Iranian Political Prisoners....

    - Death of Ian Fleming
    Ian Fleming
    Ian Lancaster Fleming was a British author, journalist and Naval Intelligence Officer.Fleming is best known for creating the fictional British spy James Bond and for a series of twelve novels and nine short stories about the character, one of the biggest-selling series of fictional books of...

    ; Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man - Marshall McLuhan
    Marshall McLuhan
    Herbert Marshall McLuhan, CC was a Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar—a professor of English literature, a literary critic, a rhetorician, and a communication theorist...

    , Little Big Man
    Little Big Man
    Little Big Man is a 1970 American Western film directed by Arthur Penn and based on the 1964 comic novel by Thomas Berger. It is a picaresque comedy about a Caucasian boy raised by the Cheyenne nation during the 19th century...

    - Thomas Berger
    Thomas Berger (US novelist)
    -Biography:Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Berger was in Europe with the United States Army and then studied at the University of Cincinnati, and at Columbia University. He worked as a librarian and a journalist before publishing his first novel, Crazy in Berlin, in 1958. Berger may be best known for...

    ; Flowers for Hitler
    Flowers for Hitler
    Flowers for Hitler is Canadian poet Leonard Cohen's third collection of poetry, first published in 1964 by McClelland and Stewart. Like other artworks regarding Adolf Hitler as a subject, it was somewhat controversial in its day...

    - Leonard Cohen
    Leonard Cohen
    Leonard Norman Cohen, is a Canadian singer-songwriter, musician, poet and novelist. Cohen published his first book of poetry in Montreal in 1956 and his first novel in 1963. His work often explores religion, isolation, sexuality and interpersonal relationships...

    ; Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
    Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
    Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a 1964 children's book by British author Roald Dahl. The story features the adventures of young Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory of the eccentric chocolatier, Willy Wonka....

    - Roald Dahl
    Roald Dahl
    Roald Dahl was a British novelist, short story writer, fighter pilot and screenwriter.Born in Wales to Norwegian parents, he served in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, in which he became a flying ace and intelligence agent, rising to the rank of Wing Commander...

    ; Last Exit to Brooklyn
    Last Exit to Brooklyn
    Last Exit to Brooklyn is a 1964 novel by American author Hubert Selby, Jr. The novel has become a cult classic because of its harsh, uncompromising look at lower class Brooklyn in the 1950s and for its brusque, everyman style of prose....

    - Hubert Selby Jr.
  • 1963 in literature
    1963 in literature
    The year 1963 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*First United States printing of John Cleland's 1749 novel, Fanny Hill . The book is banned for obscenity, triggering a court case by its publisher.*Leslie Charteris publishes his final collection of stories...

    - Death of Aldous Huxley
    Aldous Huxley
    Aldous Leonard Huxley was an English writer and one of the most prominent members of the famous Huxley family. Best known for his novels including Brave New World and a wide-ranging output of essays, Huxley also edited the magazine Oxford Poetry, and published short stories, poetry, travel...

    , Robert Frost
    Robert Frost
    Robert Lee Frost was an American poet. He is highly regarded for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American colloquial speech. His work frequently employed settings from rural life in New England in the early twentieth century, using them to examine complex social and...

    , Clifford Odets
    Clifford Odets
    Clifford Odets was an American playwright, screenwriter, socialist, and social protester.-Early life:Odets was born in Philadelphia to Romanian- and Russian-Jewish immigrant parents, Louis Odets and Esther Geisinger, and raised in Philadelphia and the Bronx, New York. He dropped out of high...

    , Sylvia Plath
    Sylvia Plath
    Sylvia Plath was an American poet, novelist and short story writer. Born in Massachusetts, she studied at Smith College and Newnham College, Cambridge before receiving acclaim as a professional poet and writer...

    , William Carlos Williams
    William Carlos Williams
    William Carlos Williams was an American poet closely associated with modernism and Imagism. He was also a pediatrician and general practitioner of medicine, having graduated from the University of Pennsylvania...

    , C.S. Lewis; Planet of the Apes (La Planete des Singes) - Pierre Boulle
    Pierre Boulle
    Pierre Boulle was a French novelist largely known for two famous works, The Bridge over the River Kwai and Planet of the Apes .-Biography:...

    ; V.
    V.
    V. is the debut novel of Thomas Pynchon, published in 1963. It describes the exploits of a discharged U.S. Navy sailor named Benny Profane, his reconnection in New York with a group of pseudo-bohemian artists and hangers-on known as the Whole Sick Crew, and the quest of an aging traveller named...

    - Thomas Pynchon
    Thomas Pynchon
    Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...

    ; The Bell Jar
    The Bell Jar
    The Bell Jar is American writer and poet Sylvia Plath's only novel, which was originally published under the pseudonym "Victoria Lucas" in 1963. The novel is semi-autobiographical with the names of places and people changed...

    - Sylvia Plath
    Sylvia Plath
    Sylvia Plath was an American poet, novelist and short story writer. Born in Massachusetts, she studied at Smith College and Newnham College, Cambridge before receiving acclaim as a professional poet and writer...

    ; Cat's Cradle
    Cat's Cradle
    Cat's Cradle is the fourth novel by American writer Kurt Vonnegut, first published in 1963. It explores issues of science, technology, and religion, satirizing the arms race and many other targets along the way...

    - Kurt Vonnegut
    Kurt Vonnegut
    Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was a 20th century American writer. His works such as Cat's Cradle , Slaughterhouse-Five and Breakfast of Champions blend satire, gallows humor and science fiction. He was known for his humanist beliefs and was honorary president of the American Humanist Association.-Early...

  • 1962 in literature
    1962 in literature
    The year 1962 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 7 - In an article in the New York Times Book Review, Gore Vidal calls Evelyn Waugh "our time's first satirist."...

    - Death of Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature...

    , William Faulkner
    William Faulkner
    William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...

    , E.E. Cummings; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
    One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (novel)
    One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a novel written by Ken Kesey. Set in an Oregon asylum, the narrative serves as a study of the institutional process and the human mind, as well as a critique of Behaviorism and a celebration of humanistic principles. Written in 1959, the novel was adapted into a...

    - Ken Kesey
    Ken Kesey
    Kenneth Elton "Ken" Kesey was an American author, best known for his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , and as a counter-cultural figure who considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. "I was too young to be a beatnik, and too old to be a...

    ; Pale Fire
    Pale Fire
    Pale Fire is a novel by Vladimir Nabokov. The novel is presented as a 999-line poem titled "Pale Fire", written by the fictional John Shade, with a foreword and lengthy commentary by a neighbor and academic colleague of the poet. Together these elements form a narrative in which both authors are...

    - Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...

    ; One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
    One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
    One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is a novel written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, first published in November 1962 in the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir . The story is set in a Soviet labor camp in the 1950s, and describes a single day of an ordinary prisoner, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov...

    - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
    Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
    Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was aRussian and Soviet novelist, dramatist, and historian. Through his often-suppressed writings, he helped to raise global awareness of the Gulag, the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system – particularly in The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of...

    ; The Golden Notebook
    The Golden Notebook
    The Golden Notebook is a 1962 novel by Doris Lessing. This book, as well as the couple that followed it, enters the realm of what Margaret Drabble in The Oxford Companion to English Literature has called Lessing's "inner space fiction", her work that explores mental and societal breakdown...

    - Doris Lessing
    Doris Lessing
    Doris May Lessing CH is a British writer. Her novels include The Grass is Singing, The Golden Notebook, and five novels collectively known as Canopus in Argos....

    ; Labyrinths
    Labyrinths
    Labyrinths is an English-language collection of short stories and essays by Jorge Luis Borges.It includes "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius", "The Garden of Forking Paths", and "The Library of Babel", three of Borges' most famous stories. Many of the stories are from the collections Ficciones and El...

    - Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

  • 1961 in literature
    1961 in literature
    The year 1961 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*First English production of Bertolt Brecht's The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui*Michael Halliday publishes his seminal paper on the systemic functional grammar model....

    - Death of Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...

    ; Catch-22
    Catch-22
    Catch-22 is a satirical, historical novel by the American author Joseph Heller. He began writing it in 1953, and the novel was first published in 1961. It is set during World War II in 1943 and is frequently cited as one of the great literary works of the twentieth century...

    - Joseph Heller
    Joseph Heller
    Joseph Heller was a US satirical novelist, short story writer, and playwright. His best known work is Catch-22, a novel about US servicemen during World War II...

    ; Stranger in a Strange Land
    Stranger in a Strange Land
    Stranger in a Strange Land is a 1961 science fiction novel by American author Robert A. Heinlein. It tells the story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human who comes to Earth in early adulthood after being born on the planet Mars and raised by Martians. The novel explores his interaction with—and...

    - Robert A. Heinlein
    Robert A. Heinlein
    Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...

    ; A House for Mr. Biswas - V. S. Naipaul
    V. S. Naipaul
    Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad "V. S." Naipaul, TC is a Nobel prize-winning Indo-Trinidadian-British writer who is known for his novels focusing on the legacy of the British Empire's colonialism...

    ; Revolutionary Road
    Revolutionary Road
    Revolutionary Road, the first novel of author Richard Yates, was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1962 along with Catch-22 and The Moviegoer. When it was published by Atlantic-Little, Brown in 1961, it received critical acclaim, and the New York Times reviewed it as "beautifully crafted.....

    - Richard Yates
    Richard Yates (novelist)
    Richard Yates was an American novelist and short story writer, known for his exploration of mid-20th century life.-Life:...

    ;
  • 1960 in literature
    1960 in literature
    The year 1960 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*November 2 – Penguin Books is found not guilty of obscenity in the Lady Chatterley's Lover case in the United Kingdom....

    - Death of Albert Camus
    Albert Camus
    Albert Camus was a French author, journalist, and key philosopher of the 20th century. In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.Camus was awarded the 1957...

    , Boris Pasternak
    Boris Pasternak
    Boris Leonidovich Pasternak was a Russian language poet, novelist, and literary translator. In his native Russia, Pasternak's anthology My Sister Life, is one of the most influential collections ever published in the Russian language...

    , Nevil Shute
    Nevil Shute
    Nevil Shute Norway was a popular British-Australian novelist and a successful aeronautical engineer. He used his full name in his engineering career, and 'Nevil Shute' as his pen name, in order to protect his engineering career from any potential negative publicity in connection with his novels.-...

    , Richard Wright
    Richard Wright (author)
    Richard Nathaniel Wright was an African-American author of sometimes controversial novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African-Americans during the late 19th to mid 20th centuries...

    ; The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
    The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
    The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is a 1960 non-fiction book by William L. Shirer chronicling the general history of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945...

    - William L. Shirer
    William L. Shirer
    William Lawrence Shirer was an American journalist, war correspondent, and historian, who wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, a history of Nazi Germany read and cited in scholarly works for more than 50 years...

    ; To Kill a Mockingbird
    To Kill a Mockingbird
    To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was instantly successful, winning the Pulitzer Prize, and has become a classic of modern American literature...

    - Harper Lee
    Harper Lee
    Nelle Harper Lee is an American author known for her 1960 Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird, which deals with the issues of racism that were observed by the author as a child in her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama...


1950s

  • 1959 in literature
    1959 in literature
    The year 1959 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*April 30 - Theatrical première of Bertolt Brecht's Saint Joan of the Stockyards, originally performed on radio in 1932....

    - The Last of the Just
    The Last of the Just
    The Last of the Just is a post-war novel by André Schwarz-Bart originally published in French in 1959. It was published in an English translation by Stephen Becker in 1960. It was Schwarz-Bart's first book and won the Prix de Goncourt, France's highest literary prize...

    - André Schwarz-Bart
    Andre Schwarz-Bart
    André Schwarz-Bart was a French novelist of Polish-Jewish origins....

    ; The Magic Christian
    The Magic Christian (novel)
    The Magic Christian is a 1959 comic novel by American author Terry Southern. In 1969 the novel was made into a film starring Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr, by director Joseph McGrath, also titled The Magic Christian...

    - Terry Southern
    Terry Southern
    Terry Southern was an American author, essayist, screenwriter and university lecturer, noted for his distinctive satirical style...

    ; In the Labyrinth
    In the Labyrinth (novel)
    -Summary:Based on months of taped conversation with its real-life protagonist, In the Labyrinth is the fictionalized memoir of Hungarian-born, German businessman Josef Pallehner who, due to bureaucratic inertia and his own guilty conscience, gets lost for six years in a maze of eastern...

    - Alain Robbe-Grillet
    Alain Robbe-Grillet
    Alain Robbe-Grillet , was a French writer and filmmaker. He was, along with Nathalie Sarraute, Michel Butor and Claude Simon, one of the figures most associated with the Nouveau Roman trend. Alain Robbe-Grillet was elected a member of the Académie française on March 25, 2004, succeeding Maurice...

    ; The Tin Drum
    The Tin Drum
    The Tin Drum is a 1959 novel by Günter Grass. The novel is the first book of Grass's .- Plot summary :The story revolves around the life of Oskar Matzerath, as narrated by himself when confined in a mental hospital during the years 1952-1954...

    - Günter Grass
    Günter Grass
    Günter Wilhelm Grass is a Nobel Prize-winning German author, poet, playwright, sculptor and artist.He was born in the Free City of Danzig...

    ; Billiards at Half-past Nine
    Billiards at Half-past Nine
    Billiards at Half-past Nine is a novel written in 1959 by German author Heinrich Böll. The entirety of the narrative takes place on the day of September 6, 1958 but the story stretches back through the use of flashbacks and the retelling of memories of the characters...

    - Heinrich Böll
    Heinrich Böll
    Heinrich Theodor Böll was one of Germany's foremost post-World War II writers. Böll was awarded the Georg Büchner Prize in 1967 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1972.- Biography :...

    ; Naked Lunch
    Naked Lunch
    Naked Lunch is a novel by William S. Burroughs originally published in 1959. The book is structured as a series of loosely-connected vignettes. Burroughs stated that the chapters are intended to be read in any order...

    - William S. Burroughs
    William S. Burroughs
    William Seward Burroughs II was an American novelist, poet, essayist and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th...

    ; Death of Raymond Chandler
    Raymond Chandler
    Raymond Thornton Chandler was an American novelist and screenwriter.In 1932, at age forty-five, Raymond Chandler decided to become a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Depression. His first short story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in...

  • 1958 in literature
    1958 in literature
    The year 1958 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*August 18 - Vladimir Nabokov's controversial novel Lolita is published in United States.*First volume of The Civil War by Shelby Foote is published....

    - Exodus
    Exodus (novel)
    Exodus by American novelist Leon Uris is about the founding of the State of Israel. Published in 1958, it is based on the name of the 1947 immigration ship Exodus....

    - Leon Uris
    Leon Uris
    Leon Marcus Uris was an American novelist, known for his historical fiction and the deep research that went into his novels. His two bestselling books were Exodus, published in 1958, and Trinity, in 1976.-Life:...

    ; Candy
    Candy (novel)
    Candy is a 1958 novel written by Maxwell Kenton in collaboration with Mason Hoffenberg published by Olympia Press. It was later published in North America by Putnam under the authors' own names...

    - Terry Southern
    Terry Southern
    Terry Southern was an American author, essayist, screenwriter and university lecturer, noted for his distinctive satirical style...

    ; The Dharma Bums
    The Dharma Bums
    The Dharma Bums is a 1958 novel by Beat Generation author Jack Kerouac. The semi-fictional accounts in the novel are based upon events that occurred years after the events of On the Road...

    - Jack Kerouac
    Jack Kerouac
    Jean-Louis "Jack" Lebris de Kerouac was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic...

    ; The Grass - Claude Simon
    Claude Simon
    Claude Simon was a French novelist and the 1985 Nobel Laureate in Literature. He was born in Antananarivo, Madagascar, and died in Paris, France....

    ; The Guide
    The Guide
    The Guide is a 1958 novel written in English by the Indian author R. K. Narayan. Like most of his works the novel is based in Malgudi, the fictional town in South India...

    - R. K. Narayan
    R. K. Narayan
    R. K. Narayan , shortened from Rasipuram Krishnaswami Iyer Narayanaswami Tamil: ) , Madras Presidency, British India. His father was a school headmaster, and Narayan did some of his studies at his father's school...

    ; Things Fall Apart
    Things Fall Apart
    Things Fall Apartis a 1958 English language novel by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe. It is a staple book in schools throughout Africa and widely read and studied in English-speaking countries around the world. It is seen as the archetypal modern African novel in English, and one of the first African...

    - Chinua Achebe
    Chinua Achebe
    Albert Chinụalụmọgụ Achebe popularly known as Chinua Achebe is a Nigerian novelist, poet, professor, and critic...

  • 1957 in literature
    1957 in literature
    The year 1957 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Lawrence Durrell publishes the first volume of The Alexandria Quartet. The final of the four volumes will be published in 1960....

    - On the Road
    On the Road
    On the Road is a novel by American writer Jack Kerouac, written in April 1951, and published by Viking Press in 1957. It is a largely autobiographical work that was based on the spontaneous road trips of Kerouac and his friends across mid-century America. It is often considered a defining work of...

    - Jack Kerouac
    Jack Kerouac
    Jean-Louis "Jack" Lebris de Kerouac was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic...

    ; Atlas Shrugged
    Atlas Shrugged
    Atlas Shrugged is a novel by Ayn Rand, first published in 1957 in the United States. Rand's fourth and last novel, it was also her longest, and the one she considered to be her magnum opus in the realm of fiction writing...

    - Ayn Rand
    Ayn Rand
    Ayn Rand was a Russian-American novelist, philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter. She is known for her two best-selling novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism....

    ; Pnin
    Pnin
    Pnin is Vladimir Nabokov's 13th novel and his fourth written in English; it was published in 1957.-Plot summary:The book's eponymous protagonist, Timofey Pavlovich Pnin, is a Russian-born professor living in the United States...

    - Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...

    ; Voss
    Voss (novel)
    Voss is the fifth published novel of Patrick White. It is based upon the life of the nineteenth-century Prussian explorer and naturalist Ludwig Leichhardt who disappeared whilst on an expedition into the Australian outback.-Plot summary:...

    - Patrick White
    Patrick White
    Patrick Victor Martindale White , an Australian author, is widely regarded as an important English-language novelist of the 20th century. From 1935 until his death, he published 12 novels, two short-story collections and eight plays.White's fiction employs humour, florid prose, shifting narrative...

  • 1956 in literature
    1956 in literature
    The year 1956 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Writing under the pseudonym of Emile Ajar, author Romain Gary becomes the only person ever to win the Prix Goncourt twice.*Iris Murdoch marries John Bayley....

    - Peyton Place
    Peyton Place (novel)
    Peyton Place is a 1956 novel by Grace Metalious. It sold 60,000 copies within the first ten days of its release and remained on the New York Times best seller list for 59 weeks. It was adapted as both a 1957 film and a 1964–69 television series....

    - Grace Metalious; The Visit
    The Visit
    The Visit is a 1956 tragicomic play by Swiss dramatist Friedrich Dürrenmatt.-Plot summary:...

    - Friedrich Dürrenmatt
    Friedrich Dürrenmatt
    Friedrich Dürrenmatt was a Swiss author and dramatist. He was a proponent of epic theatre whose plays reflected the recent experiences of World War II. The politically active author's work included avant-garde dramas, philosophically deep crime novels, and often macabre satire...

    ; Long Day's Journey into Night
    Long Day's Journey Into Night
    Long Day's Journey Into Night is a 1956 drama in four acts written by American playwright Eugene O'Neill. The play is widely considered to be his masterwork...

    - Eugene O'Neill
    Eugene O'Neill
    Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into American drama techniques of realism earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish...

  • 1955 in literature
    1955 in literature
    The year 1955 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*28 May - Philip Larkin makes a train journey from Hull to London which inspires his poem The Whitsun Weddings....

    - Tunnel in the Sky
    Tunnel in the Sky
    Tunnel in the Sky is a science fiction book written by Robert A. Heinlein and published in 1955 by Scribner's as one of the Heinlein juveniles. The story describes a group of students sent on a survival test to an uninhabited planet...

    Robert A. Heinlein
    Robert A. Heinlein
    Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...

    ; Lolita
    Lolita
    Lolita is a novel by Vladimir Nabokov, first written in English and published in 1955 in Paris and 1958 in New York, and later translated by the author into Russian...

    Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Nabokov
    Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...

    ; The Return of the King
    The Return of the King
    The Return of the King is the third and final volume of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, following The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers.-Title:...

    - J. R. R. Tolkien
    J. R. R. Tolkien
    John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...

  • 1954 in literature
    1954 in literature
    The year 1954 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Jack Kerouac reads Dwight Goddard's A Buddhist Bible, which will influence him greatly.*John Updike graduates from Harvard with a thesis on George Herbert....

    - Lord of the Flies - William Golding
    William Golding
    Sir William Gerald Golding was a British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Literature laureate, best known for his novel Lord of the Flies...

    ; The Fellowship of the Ring
    The Fellowship of the Ring
    The Fellowship of the Ring is the first of three volumes of the epic novel The Lord of the Rings by the English author J. R. R. Tolkien. It takes place in the fictional universe Middle-earth. It was originally published on July 29, 1954 in the United Kingdom...

    - J. R. R. Tolkien
    J. R. R. Tolkien
    John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...

    ; The Two Towers
    The Two Towers
    The Two Towers is the second volume of J. R. R. Tolkien's high fantasy novel The Lord of the Rings. It is preceded by The Fellowship of the Ring and followed by The Return of the King.-Title:...

    - J. R. R. Tolkien
    J. R. R. Tolkien
    John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...

    ; The Doors of Perception
    The Doors of Perception
    The Doors of Perception is a 1954 book by Aldous Huxley detailing his experiences when taking mescaline. The book takes the form of Huxley’s recollection of a mescaline trip which took place over the course of an afternoon, and takes its title from William Blake's poem The Marriage of Heaven and Hell...

    - Aldous Huxley
    Aldous Huxley
    Aldous Leonard Huxley was an English writer and one of the most prominent members of the famous Huxley family. Best known for his novels including Brave New World and a wide-ranging output of essays, Huxley also edited the magazine Oxford Poetry, and published short stories, poetry, travel...

    ; Diaries of a Dying Man William Soutar
    William Soutar
    William Soutar was a Scottish poet, born 1898. He served in the navy in World War I, and afterwards studied at the University of Edinburgh, where he encountered the work of Hugh MacDiarmid. This led to a radical alteration in his work, and he became a leading poet of the Scottish Literary...

  • 1953 in literature
    1953 in literature
    The year 1953 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* January 22 - The Crucible, a drama by Arthur Miller, opens on Broadway....

    - Casino Royale
    Casino Royale (novel)
    Casino Royale is Ian Fleming's first James Bond novel. It paved the way for a further eleven novels by Fleming himself, in addition to two short story collections, followed by many "continuation" Bond novels by other authors....

    - Ian Fleming
    Ian Fleming
    Ian Lancaster Fleming was a British author, journalist and Naval Intelligence Officer.Fleming is best known for creating the fictional British spy James Bond and for a series of twelve novels and nine short stories about the character, one of the biggest-selling series of fictional books of...

     - First James Bond
    James Bond
    James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...

     novel; The Adventures of Augie March
    The Adventures of Augie March
    The Adventures of Augie March is a novel by Saul Bellow.It centers on the eponymous character who grows up during the Great Depression...

    - Saul Bellow
    Saul Bellow
    Saul Bellow was a Canadian-born Jewish American writer. For his literary contributions, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the National Medal of Arts...

    , Ray Bradbury
    Ray Bradbury
    Ray Douglas Bradbury is an American fantasy, horror, science fiction, and mystery writer. Best known for his dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 and for the science fiction stories gathered together as The Martian Chronicles and The Illustrated Man , Bradbury is one of the most celebrated among 20th...

     Fahrenheit 451
    Fahrenheit 451
    Fahrenheit 451 is a 1953 dystopian novel by Ray Bradbury. The novel presents a future American society where reading is outlawed and firemen start fires to burn books...

    , Battle Cry
    Battle Cry
    Battle Cry is a novel by American writer Leon Uris, published in 1953. Many of the events in the book are based on Uris's own World War II experience with the 6th Marine Regiment....

    - Leon Uris
    Leon Uris
    Leon Marcus Uris was an American novelist, known for his historical fiction and the deep research that went into his novels. His two bestselling books were Exodus, published in 1958, and Trinity, in 1976.-Life:...

  • 1952 in literature
    1952 in literature
    The year 1952, in literature involved some significant events and new literary publications.-Events:*J. L. Carr takes over as headmaster of Highfields Primary School, Kettering, which will eventually furnish the subject matter for his novel, The Harpole Report.*November 25 - Agatha Christie's play...

    - Waiting for Godot
    Waiting for Godot
    Waiting for Godot is an absurdist play by Samuel Beckett, in which two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, wait endlessly and in vain for someone named Godot to arrive. Godot's absence, as well as numerous other aspects of the play, have led to many different interpretations since the play's...

    - Samuel Beckett
    Samuel Beckett
    Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director, and poet. He wrote both in English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black comedy and gallows humour.Beckett is widely regarded as among the most...

    ; Charlotte's Web
    Charlotte's Web
    Charlotte's Web is an award-winning children's novel by acclaimed American author E. B. White, about a pig named Wilbur who is saved from being slaughtered by an intelligent spider named Charlotte. The book was first published in 1952, with illustrations by Garth Williams.The novel tells the story...

    - E. B. White
    E. B. White
    Elwyn Brooks White , usually known as E. B. White, was an American writer. A long-time contributor to The New Yorker magazine, he also wrote many famous books for both adults and children, such as the popular Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little, and co-authored a widely used writing guide, The...

    ; The Old Man and the Sea
    The Old Man and the Sea
    The Old Man and the Sea is a novel written by American author Ernest Hemingway in 1951 in Cuba, and published in 1952. It was the last major work of fiction to be produced by Hemingway and published in his lifetime. One of his most famous works, it centers upon Santiago, an aging fisherman who...

    - Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...

    ; Wise Blood
    Wise Blood
    Wise Blood is the first novel by American author Flannery O'Connor, published in 1952. The novel was assembled from several disparate stories first published in Mademoiselle, Sewanee Review, and Partisan Review...

    - Flannery O'Connor
    Flannery O'Connor
    Mary Flannery O'Connor was an American novelist, short-story writer and essayist. An important voice in American literature, O'Connor wrote two novels and 32 short stories, as well as a number of reviews and commentaries...

  • 1951 in literature
    1951 in literature
    The year 1951 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*E. E. Cummings and Rachel Carson are awarded Guggenheim Fellowships.*Flannery O'Connor is diagnosed with lupus....

    - The Catcher in the Rye
    The Catcher in the Rye
    The Catcher in the Rye is a 1951 novel by J. D. Salinger. Originally published for adults, it has since become popular with adolescent readers for its themes of teenage confusion, angst, alienation, language, and rebellion. It has been translated into almost all of the world's major...

    - J.D. Salinger; Memoirs of Hadrian
    Memoirs of Hadrian
    Memoirs of Hadrian is a novel by the French writer Marguerite Yourcenar about the life and death of Roman Emperor Hadrian. The book was first published in France in French in 1951 as Mémoires d'Hadrien, and was an immediate success, meeting with enormous critical acclaim...

    - Marguerite Yourcenar
    Marguerite Yourcenar
    Marguerite Yourcenar was a Belgian-born French novelist and essayist. Winner of the Prix Femina and the Erasmus Prize, she was the first woman elected to the Académie française, in 1980, and the seventeenth person to occupy Seat 3.-Biography:Yourcenar was born Marguerite Antoinette Jeanne Marie...

  • 1950 in literature
    1950 in literature
    The year 1950 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Kazuo Shimada wins the "Mystery Writer Of Japan" award for his book Shakai-bu Kisha .*Jack Kerouac has his first novel published....

    - The Martian Chronicles
    The Martian Chronicles
    The Martian Chronicles is a 1950 science fiction short story collection by Ray Bradbury that chronicles the colonization of Mars by humans fleeing from a troubled and eventually atomically devastated Earth, and the conflict between aboriginal Martians and the new colonists...

    - Ray Bradbury
    Ray Bradbury
    Ray Douglas Bradbury is an American fantasy, horror, science fiction, and mystery writer. Best known for his dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 and for the science fiction stories gathered together as The Martian Chronicles and The Illustrated Man , Bradbury is one of the most celebrated among 20th...

    ; The Bald Soprano
    The Bald Soprano
    La Cantatrice Chauve — translated from French as The Bald Soprano or The Bald Prima Donna — is the first play written by Franco-Romanian playwright Eugène Ionesco. Nicolas Bataille directed the premiere on May 11, 1950 at the Théâtre des Noctambules, Paris...

    - Eugène Ionesco
    Eugène Ionesco
    Eugène Ionesco was a Romanian and French playwright and dramatist, and one of the foremost playwrights of the Theatre of the Absurd...

    ; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
    The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
    The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a fantasy novel for children by C. S. Lewis. Published in 1950 and set circa 1940, it is the first-published book of The Chronicles of Narnia and is the best known book of the series. Although it was written and published first, it is second in the series'...

    - C. S. Lewis
    C. S. Lewis
    Clive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland...


1940s

  • 1949 in literature
    1949 in literature
    The year 1949 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Arthur C. Clarke becomes Assistant Editor of Science Abstracts.*Bertrand Russell receives the Order of Merit....

    - George Orwell
    George Orwell
    Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...

    's Nineteen Eighty-Four
    Nineteen Eighty-Four
    Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is a dystopian novel about Oceania, a society ruled by the oligarchical dictatorship of the Party...

    and Arthur Miller
    Arthur Miller
    Arthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...

    's Death of a Salesman
    Death of a Salesman
    Death of a Salesman is a 1949 play written by American playwright Arthur Miller. It was the recipient of the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and Tony Award for Best Play. Premiered at the Morosco Theatre in February 1949, the original production ran for a total of 742 performances.-Plot :Willy Loman...

  • 1948 in literature
    1948 in literature
    The year 1948 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The Pulitzer Prize for the Novel is renamed the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction....

    - Norman Mailer
    Norman Mailer
    Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S...

    's The Naked and the Dead
    The Naked and the Dead
    The Naked and the Dead is a 1948 novel by Norman Mailer. It was based on his experiences with the 112th Cavalry Regiment during the Philippines Campaign in World War II...

    and Graham Greene
    Graham Greene
    Henry Graham Greene, OM, CH was an English author, playwright and literary critic. His works explore the ambivalent moral and political issues of the modern world...

    's The Heart of the Matter
    The Heart of the Matter
    The Heart of the Matter , a novel by the English author Graham Greene, won the 1948 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. During World War II, Greene worked for the Secret Intelligence Service in Sierra Leone, the setting for his novel...

    Still Glides the Stream Flora Thompson
    Flora Thompson
    Flora Jane Thompson was an English novelist and poet famous for her semi-autobiographical trilogy about the English countryside, Lark Rise to Candleford.-Early life and family:...

  • 1947 in literature
    1947 in literature
    The year 1947 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Diary of Anne Frank is published for the first time.*Jack Kerouac makes the journey which he will later chronicle in his book On the Road....

    - The Diary of a Young Girl
    The Diary of a Young Girl
    The Diary of a Young Girl is a book of the writings from the Dutch language diary kept by Anne Frank while she was in hiding for two years with her family during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. The family was apprehended in 1944 and Anne Frank ultimately died of typhus in the Bergen-Belsen...

    - Anne Frank
    Anne Frank
    Annelies Marie "Anne" Frank is one of the most renowned and most discussed Jewish victims of the Holocaust. Acknowledged for the quality of her writing, her diary has become one of the world's most widely read books, and has been the basis for several plays and films.Born in the city of Frankfurt...

  • 1946 in literature
    1946 in literature
    The year 1946 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*November 7 - Walker Percy marries Mary Bernice Townsend.*Launch in the United Kingdom of Penguin Classics under the editorship of E. V...

    - The Iceman Cometh
    The Iceman Cometh
    The Iceman Cometh is a play written by American playwright Eugene O'Neill in 1939. First published in 1940 the play premiered on Broadway at the Martin Beck Theatre on 9 October 1946, directed by Eddie Dowling where it ran for 136 performances to close on 15 March 1947.-Characters:* Night Hawk-...

    - Eugene O'Neill
    Eugene O'Neill
    Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into American drama techniques of realism earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish...

    ; Zorba the Greek
    Zorba the Greek (novel)
    Zorba the Greek is a novel written by the Greek author Nikos Kazantzakis, first published in 1946. It is the tale of a young Greek intellectual who ventures to escape his bookish life with the aid of the boisterous and mysterious Alexis Zorba...

    - Nikos Kazantzakis
    Nikos Kazantzakis
    Nikos Kazantzakis was a Greek writer and philosopher, celebrated for his novel Zorba the Greek, considered his magnum opus...

  • 1945 in literature
    1945 in literature
    The year 1945 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*November 1 - The magazine Ebony is published for the first time.*Noel Coward's short play, Still Life, is adapted to become the film, Brief Encounter....

    - Cannery Row
    Cannery Row (novel)
    Cannery Row is an English language novel by American author John Steinbeck. It was published in 1945. A film version was released in 1982. A stage version was produced in 1995....

    - John Steinbeck
    John Steinbeck
    John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...

    ; A History of Western Philosophy And Its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present Day
    History of Western Philosophy (Russell)
    A History of Western Philosophy by the philosopher Bertrand Russell is a conspectus of Western philosophy from the pre-Socratic philosophers to the early 20th century. Although criticised for its over-generalization and its omissions, particularly from the post-Cartesian period, it was a popular...

    - Bertrand Russell
    Bertrand Russell
    Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRS was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic. At various points in his life he considered himself a liberal, a socialist, and a pacifist, but he also admitted that he had never been any of these things...

    ; Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
    Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
    Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was aRussian and Soviet novelist, dramatist, and historian. Through his often-suppressed writings, he helped to raise global awareness of the Gulag, the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system – particularly in The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of...

     is sentenced to eight years in a labour camp for criticism of Stalin. Lark Rise to Candleford
    Lark Rise to Candleford
    Lark Rise to Candleford is a trilogy of semi-autobiographical novels about the countryside of north-east Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, England, at the end of the 19th century. They were written by Flora Thompson and first published together in 1945...

    - Flora Thompson
    Flora Thompson
    Flora Jane Thompson was an English novelist and poet famous for her semi-autobiographical trilogy about the English countryside, Lark Rise to Candleford.-Early life and family:...

    ; Animal Farm
    Animal Farm
    Animal Farm is an allegorical novella by George Orwell published in England on 17 August 1945. According to Orwell, the book reflects events leading up to and during the Stalin era before World War II...

    - George Orwell
    George Orwell
    Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...

  • 1944 in literature
    1944 in literature
    The year 1944 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Samuel Hopkins Adams – Canal Town*Jorge Amado – Terras do Sem Fim *Saul Bellow – Dangling Man*Jorge Luis Borges – Fictions...

    - No Exit
    No Exit
    No Exit is a 1944 existentialist French play by Jean-Paul Sartre. The original French title is Huis Clos, the French equivalent of the legal term in camera, referring to a private discussion behind closed doors; English translations have also been performed under the titles In Camera, No Way Out...

    - Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary...

    ; Our Lady of the Flowers
    Our Lady of the Flowers
    Our Lady of the Flowers is the debut novel of French writer Jean Genet, first published in 1943. The free-flowing, poetic novel is a largely autobiographical account of a man's journey through the Parisian underworld...

    - Jean Genet
    Jean Genet
    Jean Genet was a prominent and controversial French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. Early in his life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but later took to writing...

    ; A Bell for Adano
    A Bell for Adano
    A Bell for Adano is a film directed by Henry King starring John Hodiak and Gene Tierney. The film was adapted from the novel A Bell for Adano by John Hersey, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1945. In his 1945 review of the film, Bosley Crowther wrote, "... this easily vulnerable picture, which came...

    John Hersey
    John Hersey
    John Richard Hersey was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American writer and journalist considered one of the earliest practitioners of the so-called New Journalism, in which storytelling devices of the novel are fused with non-fiction reportage...

  • 1943 in literature
    1943 in literature
    The year 1943 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*George Orwell resigns from the BBC to become literary editor of Tribune.*Isaac Bashevis Singer becomes a naturalized citizen of the United States....

    - Anti-Semite and Jew
    Anti-Semite and Jew
    Anti-Semite and Jew is an essay about antisemitism written by Jean-Paul Sartre shortly after the liberation of Paris from German occupation in 1944...

    - Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary...

    ; The Fountainhead
    The Fountainhead
    The Fountainhead is a 1943 novel by Ayn Rand. It was Rand's first major literary success and brought her fame and financial success. More than 6.5 million copies of the book have been sold worldwide....

    - Ayn Rand
    Ayn Rand
    Ayn Rand was a Russian-American novelist, philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter. She is known for her two best-selling novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism....

    ; T. S. Eliot
    T. S. Eliot
    Thomas Stearns "T. S." Eliot OM was a playwright, literary critic, and arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century. Although he was born an American he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39.The poem that made his...

    's Four Quartets
    Four Quartets
    Four Quartets is a set of four poems written by T. S. Eliot that were published individually over a six-year period. The first poem, "Burnt Norton", was written and published with a collection of his early works following the production of Eliot's play Murder in the Cathedral...

    published together for the first time; Das Glasperlenspiel (The Glass Bead Game
    The Glass Bead Game
    The Glass Bead Game is the last full-length novel and magnum opus of the German author Hermann Hesse. Begun in 1931 and published in Switzerland in 1943, after being rejected for publication in Germany, the book was mentioned in Hesse's citation for the 1946 Nobel Prize for Literature."Glass Bead...

    )
    - Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature...

  • 1942 in literature
    1942 in literature
    The year 1942 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*André Gide leaves France to live in Tunis.*Robertson Davies becomes editor of the Peterborough Examiner.*Thomas Mann emigrates to California....

    - The Myth of Sisyphus
    The Myth of Sisyphus
    The Myth of Sisyphus is a philosophical essay by Albert Camus. It comprises about 120 pages and was published originally in 1942 in French as Le Mythe de Sisyphe; the English translation by Justin O'Brien followed in 1955....

     (Le Mythe de Sisyphe)
    , and The Stranger
    The Stranger (novel)
    The Stranger or The Outsider is a novel by Albert Camus published in 1942. Its theme and outlook are often cited as examples of existentialism, though Camus did not consider himself an existentialist; in fact, its content explores various philosophical schools of thought, including absurdism, as...

    - Albert Camus
    Albert Camus
    Albert Camus was a French author, journalist, and key philosopher of the 20th century. In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.Camus was awarded the 1957...

    ; Mythology
    Mythology
    The term mythology can refer either to the study of myths, or to a body or collection of myths. As examples, comparative mythology is the study of connections between myths from different cultures, whereas Greek mythology is the body of myths from ancient Greece...

    - Edith Hamilton
    Edith Hamilton
    Edith Hamilton was an American educator and author who was "recognized as the greatest woman Classicist". She was sixty-two years old when The Greek Way, her first book, was published in 1930...

  • 1941 in literature
    1941 in literature
    The year 1941 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Frank Herbert marries Flora Parkinson.*F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished work, The Last Tycoon, is edited and published by Edmund Wilson.-New books:...

    - Death of James Joyce
    James Joyce
    James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...

    , Virginia Woolf
    Virginia Woolf
    Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....

    ; Between the Acts
    Between the Acts
    Between the Acts is the final novel by Virginia Woolf, published in 1941 shortly after her suicide. This is a book laden with hidden meaning and allusion. It describes the mounting, performance, and audience of a festival play in a small English village just before the outbreak of the Second World...

    - Virginia Woolf
    Virginia Woolf
    Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....

  • 1940 in literature
    1940 in literature
    The year 1940 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Aldous Huxley is a screenwriter for the movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice.*Jean-Paul Sartre is taken prisoner by the Germans....

    - Native Son
    Native Son
    Native Son is a novel by American author Richard Wright. The novel tells the story of 20-year-old Bigger Thomas, an African American living in utter poverty. Bigger lived in Chicago's South Side ghetto in the 1930s...

    - Richard Wright
    Richard Wright (author)
    Richard Nathaniel Wright was an African-American author of sometimes controversial novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African-Americans during the late 19th to mid 20th centuries...

    ; For Whom the Bell Tolls
    For Whom the Bell Tolls
    For Whom the Bell Tolls is a novel by Ernest Hemingway published in 1940. It tells the story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades attached to a republican guerrilla unit during the Spanish Civil War. As an expert in the use of explosives, he is assigned to blow up a...

    - Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...

    ; The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
    The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
    The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter is the debut 1940 novel by American author Carson McCullers. Written in Charlotte, North Carolina, in houses on Central Avenue and East Boulevard, it is about a deaf man named John Singer and the people he encounters in a 1930s mill town in the US state of Georgia...

    - Carson McCullers
    Carson McCullers
    Carson McCullers was an American writer. She wrote novels, short stories, and two plays, as well as essays and some poetry. Her first novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter explores the spiritual isolation of misfits and outcasts of the South...

    ; Darkness at Noon
    Darkness at Noon
    Darkness at Noon is a novel by the Hungarian-born British novelist Arthur Koestler, first published in 1940...

    - Arthur Koestler
    Arthur Koestler
    Arthur Koestler CBE was a Hungarian author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest and, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria...


1930s

  • 1939 in literature
    1939 in literature
    The year 1939 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*December 25 - A Christmas Carol is read before a radio audience for the first time....

    - Finnegans Wake
    Finnegans Wake
    Finnegans Wake is a novel by Irish author James Joyce, significant for its experimental style and resulting reputation as one of the most difficult works of fiction in the English language. Written in Paris over a period of seventeen years, and published in 1939, two years before the author's...

    - James Joyce
    James Joyce
    James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...

    ; The Day of the Locust
    The Day of the Locust
    The Day of the Locust is a 1939 novel by American author Nathanael West, set in Hollywood, California during the Great Depression, its overarching themes deal with the alienation and desperation of a broad group of odd individuals who exist at the fringes of the Hollywood movie industry.In 1998,...

    - Nathanael West
    Nathanael West
    Nathanael West was a US author, screenwriter and satirist.- Early life :...

    ; The Grapes of Wrath
    The Grapes of Wrath
    The Grapes of Wrath is a novel published in 1939 and written by John Steinbeck, who was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1940 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962....

    - John Steinbeck
    John Steinbeck
    John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...

    ; How Green Was My Valley
    How Green Was My Valley
    How Green Was My Valley is a 1939 novel by Richard Llewellyn, telling the story through narration of the main character, of his Welsh family and the mining community in which they live. The author had claimed to have based the book on his own knowledge of the Gilfach Goch area, but this was proven...

    - Richard Llewellyn
    Richard Llewellyn
    Richard Dafydd Vivian Llewellyn Lloyd , better known by his pen name Richard Llewellyn, was a Welsh novelist.Llewellyn Richard Dafydd Vivian Llewellyn Lloyd (8 December 1906 – 30 November 1983), better known by his pen name Richard Llewellyn, was a Welsh novelist.Llewellyn Richard Dafydd...

    ; The Big Sleep
    The Big Sleep
    The Big Sleep is a hardboiled crime novel by Raymond Chandler, the first in his acclaimed series about detective Philip Marlowe. The work has been adapted twice into film, once in 1946 and again in 1978...

    - Raymond Chandler
    Raymond Chandler
    Raymond Thornton Chandler was an American novelist and screenwriter.In 1932, at age forty-five, Raymond Chandler decided to become a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Depression. His first short story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in...

    , Lark Rise - Flora Thompson
    Flora Thompson
    Flora Jane Thompson was an English novelist and poet famous for her semi-autobiographical trilogy about the English countryside, Lark Rise to Candleford.-Early life and family:...

  • 1938 in literature
    1938 in literature
    The year 1938 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The trilogy, U.S.A. by John Dos Passos, is published containing his three novels The 42nd Parallel , 1919 , and The Big Money ....

    - Tropic of Capricorn
    Tropic of Capricorn (novel)
    Tropic of Capricorn is a semi-autobiographical novel by Henry Miller, first published in Paris in 1938. The novel was subsequently banned in the United States until a 1961 Justice Department ruling declared that its contents were not obscene. It is a sequel to Miller's 1934 work, the Tropic of...

    - Henry Miller
    Henry Miller
    Henry Valentine Miller was an American novelist and painter. He was known for breaking with existing literary forms and developing a new sort of 'novel' that is a mixture of novel, autobiography, social criticism, philosophical reflection, surrealist free association, and mysticism, one that is...

    ; La Nausée - Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary...

    ; The Sword in the Stone
    The Sword in the Stone
    The Sword in the Stone is a novel by T. H. White, published in 1939, initially a stand-alone work but now the first part of a tetralogy The Once and Future King. A fantasy of the boyhood of King Arthur, it is a sui generis work which combines elements of legend, history, fantasy and comedy...

    - T. H. White
    T. H. White
    Terence Hanbury White was an English author best known for his sequence of Arthurian novels, The Once and Future King, first published together in 1958.-Biography:...

    ; Alamut
    Alamut (1938 novel)
    Alamut is a novel by Vladimir Bartol, first published in 1938 in Slovenian, dealing with the story of Hassan-i Sabbah and the Hashshashin, and named after their Alamut fortress....

    - Vladimir Bartol
    Vladimir Bartol
    Vladimir Bartol was a Slovene writer, most famous for his novel Alamut. Alamut was published in 1938 and translated into numerous languages, becoming the most popular work of Slovene literature around the world.-Biography:Bartol was born on February 24, 1903 in San Giovanni , a suburb of the...

  • 1937 in literature
    1937 in literature
    The year 1937 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 9 - The first issue of Look magazine goes on sale in the United States.*Thomas Quinn Curtiss meets Klaus Mann.-New books:*Eric Ambler - Uncommon Danger...

    - Of Mice and Men
    Of Mice and Men
    Of Mice and Men is a novella written by Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck. Published in 1937, it tells the tragic story of George Milton and Lennie Small, two displaced migrant ranch workers during the Great Depression in California, USA....

    - John Steinbeck
    John Steinbeck
    John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...

    ; Journal d'un Curé de Campagne (Diary of a Country Priest
    Diary of a Country Priest
    Diary of a Country Priest is a 1951 French film directed by Robert Bresson, and starring Claude Laydu. It was closely based on the novel of the same name by Georges Bernanos. Published in 1937, the novel received the Grand prix du roman de l'Académie française...

    )
    - Georges Bernanos
    Georges Bernanos
    Georges Bernanos was a French author, and a soldier in World War I. Of Roman Catholic and monarchist leanings, he was a violent adversary to bourgeois thought and to what he identified as defeatism leading to France's defeat in 1940.-Biography:Bernanos was born at Paris, into a family of...

  • 1936 in literature
    1936 in literature
    The year 1936 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Life magazine is first published.* The Carnegie Medal for excellence in children's literature is established in the UK.-New books:...

    - Absalom, Absalom!
    Absalom, Absalom!
    Absalom, Absalom! is a Southern Gothic novel by the American author William Faulkner, first published in 1936. It is a story about three families of the American South, taking place before, during, and after the Civil War, with the focus of the story on the life of Thomas Sutpen.-Plot...

    - William Faulkner
    William Faulkner
    William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...

    ; Gone with the Wind
    Gone with the Wind
    The slaves depicted in Gone with the Wind are primarily loyal house servants, such as Mammy, Pork and Uncle Peter, and these slaves stay on with their masters even after the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 sets them free...

    - Margaret Mitchell
    Margaret Mitchell
    Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell was an American author and journalist. Mitchell won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937 for her epic American Civil War era novel, Gone with the Wind, which was the only novel by Mitchell published during her lifetime.-Family:Margaret Mitchell was born in Atlanta,...

    ; Jamaica Inn
    Jamaica Inn (novel)
    Jamaica Inn is a novel by the English writer Daphne du Maurier, first published in 1936. It was later made into a film, also called Jamaica Inn, by Alfred Hitchcock...

    - Daphne du Maurier
    Daphne du Maurier
    Dame Daphne du Maurier, Lady Browning DBE was a British author and playwright.Many of her works have been adapted into films, including the novels Rebecca and Jamaica Inn and the short stories "The Birds" and "Don't Look Now". The first three were directed by Alfred Hitchcock.Her elder sister was...

    ; First issue of Life magazine
  • 1935 in literature
    1935 in literature
    The year 1935 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* June 15 - W. H. Auden enters a marriage of convenience with Erika Mann.* July 30 - Allen Lane founds Penguin Books to publish the first mass market paperbacks in Britain....

    - Little House on the Prairie
    Little House on the Prairie (novel)
    Little House on the Prairie is a children's novel by Laura Ingalls Wilder and was published in 1935. This book is the third of the series of books known as the Little House series....

    - Laura Ingalls Wilder
    Laura Ingalls Wilder
    Laura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder was an American author who wrote the Little House series of books based on her childhood in a pioneer family...

    ; Penguin Books
    Penguin Books
    Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...

     publishes the first paperback
  • 1934 in literature
    1934 in literature
    The year 1934 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The first Flash Gordon comic strip is published.*Boris Pasternak and Korney Chukovsky are among those present at the first Congress of the Soviet Union of Writers....

    - Tropic of Cancer
    Tropic of Cancer (novel)
    Tropic of Cancer is a novel by Henry Miller which has been described as "notorious for its candid sexuality" and as responsible for the "free speech that we now take for granted in literature." It was first published in 1934 by the Obelisk Press in Paris, France, but this edition was banned in the...

    - Henry Miller
    Henry Miller
    Henry Valentine Miller was an American novelist and painter. He was known for breaking with existing literary forms and developing a new sort of 'novel' that is a mixture of novel, autobiography, social criticism, philosophical reflection, surrealist free association, and mysticism, one that is...

    ; Lust for Life
    Lust for Life (novel)
    Lust for Life is a biographical novel written by Irving Stone and is based on the life of the famous Dutch painter, Vincent van Gogh and his hardships....

    - Irving Stone
    Irving Stone
    Irving Stone was an American writer known for his biographical novels of famous historical personalities, including Lust for Life, a biographical novel about the life of Vincent van Gogh, and The Agony and the Ecstasy, a biographical novel about Michelangelo.-Biography:In...

    ; I, Claudius
    I, Claudius
    I, Claudius is a novel by English writer Robert Graves, written in the form of an autobiography of the Roman Emperor Claudius. As such, it includes history of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and Roman Empire, from Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC to Caligula's assassination in AD 41...

    - Robert Graves
    Robert Graves
    Robert von Ranke Graves 24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985 was an English poet, translator and novelist. During his long life he produced more than 140 works...

    ; The Thin Man
    The Thin Man
    The Thin Man is a detective novel by Dashiell Hammett, originally published in Redbook. Although he never wrote a sequel, the book became the basis for a successful six-part film series which also began in 1934 with The Thin Man and starred William Powell and Myrna Loy...

    - Dashiell Hammett
    Dashiell Hammett
    Samuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories, and political activist. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade , Nick and Nora Charles , and the Continental Op .In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on...

    ; Goodbye, Mr. Chips
    Goodbye, Mr. Chips
    Goodbye, Mr. Chips is a novel by James Hilton, published in the United States in June 1934 by Little, Brown and Company and in the United Kingdom in October of that same year by Hodder & Stoughton...

    - James Hilton
    James Hilton
    James Hilton was an English novelist who wrote several best-sellers, including Lost Horizon and Goodbye, Mr. Chips.-Biography:...

    ; Tender Is the Night
    Tender is the Night
    Tender Is the Night is a novel by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. It was his fourth and final completed novel, and was first published in Scribner's Magazine between January-April, 1934 in four issues...

    - F. Scott Fitzgerald
    F. Scott Fitzgerald
    Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigm writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost...

    ; Supernatural Horror in Literature - H. P. Lovecraft
    H. P. Lovecraft
    Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....

     -year completed (1925–34); The Postman Always Rings Twice
    The Postman Always Rings Twice
    The Postman Always Rings Twice is a 1934 crime novel by James M. Cain.The novel was quite successful and notorious upon publication, and is regarded as one of the more important crime novels of the 20th century...

    - James M. Cain
    James M. Cain
    James Mallahan Cain was an American author and journalist. Although Cain himself vehemently opposed labeling, he is usually associated with the hardboiled school of American crime fiction and seen as one of the creators of the roman noir...

  • 1933 in literature
    1933 in literature
    The year 1933 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* February 17 - The magazine Newsweek is published for the first time.* James Joyce's Ulysses is allowed into United States.-New books:...

    - The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas
    The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas
    The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas is a 1933 book by Gertrude Stein, written in the guise of an autobiography authored by Alice B. Toklas, who was her lover.-Summary:-Before I came to Paris:...

    - Gertrude Stein
    Gertrude Stein
    Gertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...

    ; Lost Horizon
    Lost Horizon (novel)
    Lost Horizon is a 1933 novel by English writer James Hilton. It is best remembered as the origin of Shangri-La, a fictional utopian lamasery high in the mountains of Tibet.-Overview:...

    - James Hilton
    James Hilton
    James Hilton was an English novelist who wrote several best-sellers, including Lost Horizon and Goodbye, Mr. Chips.-Biography:...

    ; Testament of Youth
    Testament of Youth
    Testament of Youth is the first installment, covering 1900–1925, in the memoir of Vera Brittain . It was published in 1933. Brittain's memoir continues with Testament of Experience, published in 1957, and encompassing the years 1925–1950...

    - Vera Brittain
    Vera Brittain
    Vera Mary Brittain was a British writer, feminist and pacifist, best remembered as the author of the best-selling 1933 memoir Testament of Youth, recounting her experiences during World War I and the beginning of her journey towards pacifism.-Life:Born in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Brittain was the...

    ; La Condition Humaine (Man's Fate
    Man's Fate
    Man's Fate is a 1933 novel written by André Malraux about the failed communist insurrection in Shanghai in 1927, and the existential quandaries facing a diverse group of people associated with the revolution...

    )
    - André Malraux
    André Malraux
    André Malraux DSO was a French adventurer, award-winning author, and statesman. Having traveled extensively in Indochina and China, Malraux was noted especially for his novel entitled La Condition Humaine , which won the Prix Goncourt...

  • 1932 in literature
    1932 in literature
    The year 1932 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*E. V. Knox replaces Sir Owen Seaman as editor of Punch magazine.*Samuel Beckett's first novel, Dream of Fair to Middling Women, is rejected by several publishers....

    - Brave New World
    Brave New World
    Brave New World is Aldous Huxley's fifth novel, written in 1931 and published in 1932. Set in London of AD 2540 , the novel anticipates developments in reproductive technology and sleep-learning that combine to change society. The future society is an embodiment of the ideals that form the basis of...

    - Aldous Huxley
    Aldous Huxley
    Aldous Leonard Huxley was an English writer and one of the most prominent members of the famous Huxley family. Best known for his novels including Brave New World and a wide-ranging output of essays, Huxley also edited the magazine Oxford Poetry, and published short stories, poetry, travel...

    ; Voyage au Bout de la Nuit (Journey to the End of the Night
    Journey to the End of the Night
    Journey to the End of Night is the first novel of Louis-Ferdinand Céline. This semi-autobiographical work describes antihero Ferdinand Bardamu....

    )
    - Louis-Ferdinand Céline
    Louis-Ferdinand Céline
    Louis-Ferdinand Céline was the pen name of French writer and physician Louis-Ferdinand Destouches . Céline was chosen after his grandmother's first name. He is considered one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century, developing a new style of writing that modernized both French and...

    ; Journey to the East
    Journey to the East
    Journey to the East is a short novel by German author Hermann Hesse. It was first published in German in 1932 as "Die Morgenlandfahrt". This novel came directly after his biggest international success, Narcissus and Goldmund.-Plot summary:...

    - Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature...

  • 1931 in literature
    1931 in literature
    The year 1931 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Cherokee playwright Lynn Riggs' play Green Grow the Lilacs premiers. It would later be adapted by Rodgers and Hammerstein as Oklahoma!....

    - The Good Earth
    The Good Earth
    The Good Earth is a novel by Pearl S. Buck published in 1931 and awarded the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1932. The best selling novel in the United States in both 1931 and 1932, it was an influential factor in Buck winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938...

    - Pearl S. Buck
    Pearl S. Buck
    Pearl Sydenstricker Buck also known by her Chinese name Sai Zhenzhu , was an American writer who spent most of her time until 1934 in China. Her novel The Good Earth was the best-selling fiction book in the U.S. in 1931 and 1932, and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1932...

    ; first Maigret
    Maigret
    Jules Maigret, Maigret to most people, including his wife, is a fictional police detective, actually a commissaire or commissioner of the Paris "Brigade Criminelle" , created by writer Georges Simenon.Seventy-five novels and twenty-eight short stories about Maigret were published between 1931 and...

     novel by Georges Simenon
    Georges Simenon
    Georges Joseph Christian Simenon was a Belgian writer. A prolific author who published nearly 200 novels and numerous short works, Simenon is best known for the creation of the fictional detective Maigret.-Early life and education:...

  • 1930 in literature
    1930 in literature
    The year 1930 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 6 - The first literary character licensing agreement is signed by A. A. Milne, granting Stephen Slesinger U.S...

    - As I Lay Dying - William Faulkner
    William Faulkner
    William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...

    ; The Maltese Falcon - Dashiell Hammett
    Dashiell Hammett
    Samuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories, and political activist. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade , Nick and Nora Charles , and the Continental Op .In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on...

    ; Luigi Pirandello
    Luigi Pirandello
    Luigi Pirandello was an Italian dramatist, novelist, and short story writer awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934, for his "bold and brilliant renovation of the drama and the stage." Pirandello's works include novels, hundreds of short stories, and about 40 plays, some of which are written...

    's The Man With the Flower in His Mouth
    The Man With The Flower In His Mouth
    The Man With the Flower in His Mouth is a play by the Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello. It is particularly noteworthy for becoming, in 1930, the first piece of television drama ever to be produced in Britain, when a version was screened by the British Broadcasting Corporation as part of their...

    becomes the first broadcast television drama

1920s

  • 1929 in literature
    1929 in literature
    The year 1929 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Candide by Voltaire is declared obscene by the United States Customs and seized in 1930....

    - Berlin Alexanderplatz
    Berlin Alexanderplatz
    Berlin Alexanderplatz is a novel by Alfred Döblin, published in 1929. The story concerns a small-time criminal, Franz Biberkopf, fresh from prison, who is drawn into the underworld. When his criminal mentor murders the prostitute whom Biberkopf has been relying on as an anchor, he realizes that...

    - Alfred Döblin
    Alfred Döblin
    Alfred Döblin was a German expressionist novelist, best known for the novel Berlin Alexanderplatz .- 1878–1918:...

    ; A Farewell to Arms
    A Farewell to Arms
    A Farewell to Arms is a semi-autobiographical novel written by Ernest Hemingway concerning events during the Italian campaigns during the First World War. The book, which was first published in 1929, is a first-person account of American Frederic Henry, serving as a Lieutenant in the ambulance...

    - Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...

    ; All Quiet on the Western Front
    All Quiet on the Western Front
    All Quiet on the Western Front is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, a German veteran of World War I. The book describes the German soldiers' extreme physical and mental stress during the war, and the detachment from civilian life felt by many of these soldiers upon returning home from the front.The...

    - Erich Maria Remarque
    Erich Maria Remarque
    Erich Maria Remarque was a German author, best known for his novel All Quiet on the Western Front.-Life and work:...

    ; Goodbye to All That
    Goodbye to All That
    Good-Bye to All That, an autobiography by Robert Graves, first appeared in 1929, when the author was thirty-four. "It was my bitter leave-taking of England," he wrote in a prologue to the revised second edition of 1957, "where I had recently broken a good many conventions"...

    - Robert Graves
    Robert Graves
    Robert von Ranke Graves 24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985 was an English poet, translator and novelist. During his long life he produced more than 140 works...

    ; The Sound and the Fury
    The Sound and the Fury
    The Sound and the Fury is a novel written by the American author William Faulkner. It employs a number of narrative styles, including the technique known as stream of consciousness, pioneered by 20th century European novelists such as James Joyce and Virginia Woolf. Published in 1929, The Sound and...

    - William Faulkner
    William Faulkner
    William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...

  • 1928 in literature
    1928 in literature
    The year 1928 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Ford Madox Ford publishes Last Post. It is the final book of a four-volume work titled Parade's End published between 1924 and 1928....

    - Lady Chatterley's Lover
    Lady Chatterley's Lover
    Lady Chatterley's Lover is a novel by D. H. Lawrence, first published in 1928. The first edition was printed privately in Florence, Italy with assistance from Pino Orioli; it could not be published openly in the United Kingdom until 1960...

    - D. H. Lawrence
    D. H. Lawrence
    David Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...

    ; The Threepenny Opera
    The Threepenny Opera
    The Threepenny Opera is a musical by German dramatist Bertolt Brecht and composer Kurt Weill, in collaboration with translator Elisabeth Hauptmann and set designer Caspar Neher. It was adapted from an 18th-century English ballad opera, John Gay's The Beggar's Opera, and offers a Marxist critique...

    - Bertholt Brecht; All Quiet on the Western Front
    All Quiet on the Western Front
    All Quiet on the Western Front is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, a German veteran of World War I. The book describes the German soldiers' extreme physical and mental stress during the war, and the detachment from civilian life felt by many of these soldiers upon returning home from the front.The...

    - Erich Maria Remarque
    Erich Maria Remarque
    Erich Maria Remarque was a German author, best known for his novel All Quiet on the Western Front.-Life and work:...

  • 1927 in literature
    1927 in literature
    The year 1927 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Random House, book publishers, is founded in New York City by Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer.-New books:*James Boyd - Marching On...

    - Elmer Gantry
    Elmer Gantry
    Elmer Gantry is a satirical novel written by Sinclair Lewis in 1926 and published by Harcourt in March 1927.-Background:Lewis did research for the novel by observing the work of various preachers in Kansas City in his so-called "Sunday School" meetings on Wednesdays. He first worked with William L...

    - Sinclair Lewis
    Sinclair Lewis
    Harry Sinclair Lewis was an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of...

    ; Envy
    Envy (novel)
    Envy is a landmark novel published in 1927 by the Russian novelist Yuri Olesha and acclaimed by Vladimir Nabokov as the greatest novel produced in the Soviet Union...

    - Yuri Olesha; The Snake Pit
    The Snake Pit
    The Snake Pit is a 1948 American drama film directed by Anatole Litvak. The film tells the story of a woman who finds herself in an insane asylum and cannot remember how she got there, and stars Olivia de Havilland, Mark Stevens, Leo Genn, Celeste Holm, Beulah Bondi, and Lee Patrick.The film was...

    - Sigrid Undset
    Sigrid Undset
    Sigrid Undset was a Norwegian novelist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1928.-Biography:Undset was born in Kalundborg, Denmark, but her family moved to Norway when she was two years old. In 1924, she converted to Catholicism and became a lay Dominican...

    ; To the Lighthouse
    To the Lighthouse
    To the Lighthouse is a novel by Virginia Woolf. A novel set on the Ramsays and their visits to the Isle of Skye in Scotland between 1910 and 1920, it skilfully manipulates temporal and psychological elements....

    - Virginia Woolf
    Virginia Woolf
    Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....

    ; The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes
    The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes
    The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes is the final collection of Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. Originally published in 1927, it contains stories published between 1921 and 1927....

    - Arthur Conan Doyle
    Arthur Conan Doyle
    Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...

    ; In Search of Lost Time
    In Search of Lost Time
    In Search of Lost Time or Remembrance of Things Past is a novel in seven volumes by Marcel Proust. His most prominent work, it is popularly known for its considerable length and the notion of involuntary memory, the most famous example being the "episode of the madeleine." The novel is widely...

    (final installment) - Marcel Proust
    Marcel Proust
    Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...

    ; Steppenwolf
    Steppenwolf (novel)
    Steppenwolf is the tenth novel by German-Swiss author Hermann Hesse. Originally published in Germany in 1927, it was first translated into English in 1929. Combining autobiographical and psychoanalytic elements, the novel was named after the lonesome wolf of the steppes...

    - Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature...

    ;
  • 1926 in literature
    1926 in literature
    The year 1926 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Bread Loaf Writers' Conference is founded in Middlebury, Vermont....

    - Winnie-the-Pooh
    Winnie-the-Pooh
    Winnie-the-Pooh, also called Pooh Bear, is a fictional anthropomorphic bear created by A. A. Milne. The first collection of stories about the character was the book Winnie-the-Pooh , and this was followed by The House at Pooh Corner...

    - A. A. Milne
    A. A. Milne
    Alan Alexander Milne was an English author, best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh and for various children's poems. Milne was a noted writer, primarily as a playwright, before the huge success of Pooh overshadowed all his previous work.-Biography:A. A...

    ; The Sun Also Rises
    The Sun Also Rises
    The Sun Also Rises is a 1926 novel written by American author Ernest Hemingway about a group of American and British expatriates who travel from Paris to the Festival of San Fermín in Pamplona to watch the running of the bulls and the bullfights. An early and enduring modernist novel, it received...

    - Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Hemingway
    Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...

    ; Sean O'Casey
    Seán O'Casey
    Seán O'Casey was an Irish dramatist and memoirist. A committed socialist, he was the first Irish playwright of note to write about the Dublin working classes.- Early life:...

    's play, The Plough and the Stars
  • 1925 in literature
    1925 in literature
    The year 1925 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* April: F Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway meet in the Dingo Bar on rue Delambre, in the Montparnasse Quarter of Paris, France shortly after the publication of Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and shortly before...

    - Death of Sergey Esenin; The Great Gatsby
    The Great Gatsby
    The Great Gatsby is a novel by the American author F. Scott Fitzgerald. First published in1925, it is set on Long Island's North Shore and in New York City from spring to autumn of 1922....

    - F. Scott Fitzgerald
    F. Scott Fitzgerald
    Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigm writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost...

    ; The Painted Veil
    The Painted Veil (novel)
    The Painted Veil is a 1925 novel by British author W. Somerset Maugham. The title is taken from Percy Bysshe Shelley's sonnet which begins "Lift not the painted veil which those who live / Call Life"....

    - W.Somerset Maugham
    W. Somerset Maugham
    William Somerset Maugham , CH was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and, reputedly, the highest paid author during the 1930s.-Childhood and education:...

    ; Mrs. Dalloway - Virginia Woolf
    Virginia Woolf
    Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....

    ; Der Prozeß (The Trial
    The Trial
    The Trial is a novel by Franz Kafka, first published in 1925. One of Kafka's best-known works, it tells the story of a man arrested and prosecuted by a remote, inaccessible authority, with the nature of his crime revealed neither to him nor the reader.Like Kafka's other novels, The Trial was never...

    )
    - Franz Kafka
    Franz Kafka
    Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...

  • 1924 in literature
    1924 in literature
    The year 1924 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Ford Madox Ford publishes the first book of a four-volume work titled Parade's End published between 1924 and 1928.-New books:*Michael Arlen - The Green Hat...

    - Death of Franz Kafka
    Franz Kafka
    Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...

    ; Billy Budd, Foretopman
    Billy Budd
    Billy Budd is a short novel by Herman Melville.Billy Budd can also refer to:*Billy Budd , a 1962 film produced, directed, and co-written by Peter Ustinov, based on Melville's novel...

    - Herman Melville
    Herman Melville
    Herman 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....

    ; A Passage to India
    A Passage to India
    A Passage to India is a novel by E. M. Forster set against the backdrop of the British Raj and the Indian independence movement in the 1920s. It was selected as one of the 100 great works of English literature by the Modern Library and won the 1924 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. Time...

    - E. M. Forster
    E. M. Forster
    Edward Morgan Forster OM, CH was an English novelist, short story writer, essayist and librettist. He is known best for his ironic and well-plotted novels examining class difference and hypocrisy in early 20th-century British society...

    ; Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain
    The Magic Mountain
    The Magic Mountain is a novel by Thomas Mann, first published in November 1924. It is widely considered to be one of the most influential works of 20th century German literature....

    )
    - Thomas Mann
    Thomas Mann
    Thomas Mann was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate, known for his series of highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas, noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectual...

  • 1923 in literature
    1923 in literature
    The year 1923 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Fictional detective Lord Peter Wimsey makes his first appearance in print....

    - The Prophet
    The Prophet (book)
    The Prophet is a book of 26 poetic essays written in English by the Lebanese artist, philosopher and writer Kahlil Gibran. It was originally published in 1923 by Alfred A. Knopf. It is Gibran's best known work...

    - Kahlil Gibran; Lord Peter Wimsey
    Lord Peter Wimsey
    Lord Peter Death Bredon Wimsey is a bon vivant amateur sleuth in a series of detective novels and short stories by Dorothy L. Sayers, in which he solves mysteries; usually, but not always, murders...

     makes his first appearance in print.
  • 1922 in literature
    1922 in literature
    The year 1922 in literature involved some significant events and new books.Under the current U.S. copyright law, all works published before January 1, 1923 with a proper copyright notice entered the public domain no later than 75 years from the date of the copyright...

    - Ulysses
    Ulysses (novel)
    Ulysses is a novel by the Irish author James Joyce. It was first serialised in parts in the American journal The Little Review from March 1918 to December 1920, and then published in its entirety by Sylvia Beach on 2 February 1922, in Paris. One of the most important works of Modernist literature,...

    - James Joyce
    James Joyce
    James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...

    ; The Waste Land
    The Waste Land
    The Waste Land[A] is a 434-line[B] modernist poem by T. S. Eliot published in 1922. It has been called "one of the most important poems of the 20th century." Despite the poem's obscurity—its shifts between satire and prophecy, its abrupt and unannounced changes of speaker, location and time, its...

    - T. S. Eliot
    T. S. Eliot
    Thomas Stearns "T. S." Eliot OM was a playwright, literary critic, and arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century. Although he was born an American he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39.The poem that made his...

    ; Siddhartha
    Siddhartha (novel)
    Siddhartha is a novel by Hermann Hesse that deals with the spiritual journey of an Indian man named Siddhartha during the time of the Buddha.The book, Hesse's ninth novel , was written in German, in a simple, powerful, and lyrical style. It was published in the U.S. in 1951 and became influential...

    - Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse
    Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature...

    ; Marcel Proust
    Marcel Proust
    Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...

     dies - In Search of Lost Time
    In Search of Lost Time
    In Search of Lost Time or Remembrance of Things Past is a novel in seven volumes by Marcel Proust. His most prominent work, it is popularly known for its considerable length and the notion of involuntary memory, the most famous example being the "episode of the madeleine." The novel is widely...

    completed; The Worm Ouroboros - E. R. Eddison
  • 1921 in literature
    1921 in literature
    The year 1921 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Edgar Rice Burroughs – Tarzan the Terrible*James Branch Cabell – Figures of Earth*Hall Caine – The Master of Man*Willa Cather – Alexander's Bridge...

    - Karel Čapek
    Karel Capek
    Karel Čapek was Czech writer of the 20th century.-Biography:Born in 1890 in the Bohemian mountain village of Malé Svatoňovice to an overbearing, emotional mother and a distant yet adored father, Čapek was the youngest of three siblings...

    's play, R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots)
    R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots)
    R.U.R. is a 1920 science fiction play in the Czech language by Karel Čapek. R.U.R. stands for Rossum's Universal Robots, an English phrase used as the subtitle in the Czech original. It premiered in 1921 and introduced the word "robot" to the English language and to science fiction as a whole.The...

  • 1920 in literature
    1920 in literature
    The year 1920 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Agatha Christie publishes her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, introducing the long-running character detective, Hercule Poirot....

    - This Side of Paradise
    This Side of Paradise
    This Side of Paradise is the debut novel of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Published in 1920, and taking its title from a line of the Rupert Brooke poem Tiare Tahiti, the book examines the lives and morality of post-World War I youth. Its protagonist, Amory Blaine, is an attractive Princeton University...

    - F. Scott Fitzgerald
    F. Scott Fitzgerald
    Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigm writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost...

    ; Main Street
    Main Street (novel)
    - Plot summary :Carol Milford is a liberal, free-spirited young woman, reared in the metropolis of Saint Paul, Minnesota. She marries Will Kennicott, a doctor, who is a small-town boy at heart....

    - Sinclair Lewis
    Sinclair Lewis
    Harry Sinclair Lewis was an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of...

    ; The Age of Innocence
    The Age of Innocence
    The Age of Innocence is a novel by Edith Wharton published in 1920, which won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize. The story is set in upper-class New York City in the 1870s. In 1920, The Age of Innocence was serialized in four parts in the Pictorial Review magazine, and later released by D...

    - Edith Wharton
    Edith Wharton
    Edith Wharton , was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, short story writer, and designer.- Early life and marriage:...

    ; Women in Love
    Women in Love
    Women in Love is a novel by British author D. H. Lawrence published in 1920. It is a sequel to his earlier novel The Rainbow , and follows the continuing loves and lives of the Brangwen sisters, Gudrun and Ursula. Gudrun Brangwen, an artist, pursues a destructive relationship with Gerald Crich, an...

    - D. H. Lawrence
    D. H. Lawrence
    David Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...


1910s

  • 1919 in literature
    1919 in literature
    The year 1919 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Winifred Holtby and Vera Brittain return to Somerville College, Oxford, to complete their education following war service.*Two paintings by E. E...

    - The Moon and Sixpence
    The Moon and Sixpence
    The Moon and Sixpence is a novel by W. Somerset Maugham, told in episodic form by the first-person narrator as a series of glimpses into the mind and soul of the central character, Charles Strickland, a middle-aged English stockbroker who abandons his wife and children abruptly to pursue his desire...

    - W. Somerset Maugham
    W. Somerset Maugham
    William Somerset Maugham , CH was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and, reputedly, the highest paid author during the 1930s.-Childhood and education:...

  • 1918 in literature
    1918 in literature
    The year 1918 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The 2nd annual Pulitzer Prizes are awarded.* Author Hall Caine made a KBE.*Robert Graves marries Nancy Nicholson...

    - The Magnificent Ambersons
    The Magnificent Ambersons
    The Magnificent Ambersons is a 1918 novel by Booth Tarkington which won the 1919 Pulitzer Prize for novel. It was the second novel in his Growth trilogy, which included The Turmoil and The Midlander . In 1925 the novel was first adapted for film under the title Pampered Youth...

    - Booth Tarkington
    Booth Tarkington
    Booth Tarkington was an American novelist and dramatist best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning novels The Magnificent Ambersons and Alice Adams...

    ; Eminent Victorians
    Eminent Victorians
    Eminent Victorians is a book by Lytton Strachey , first published in 1918 and consisting of biographies of four leading figures from the Victorian era. Its fame rests on the irreverence and wit Strachey brought to bear on three men and a woman who had till then been regarded as heroes and heroine...

    - Lytton Strachey
    Lytton Strachey
    Giles Lytton Strachey was a British writer and critic. He is best known for establishing a new form of biography in which psychological insight and sympathy are combined with irreverence and wit...

  • 1917 in literature
    1917 in literature
    The year 1917 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* January - Francis Picabia produces the first issue of the Dada periodical 391 in Barcelona....

    - The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock - T. S. Eliot
    T. S. Eliot
    Thomas Stearns "T. S." Eliot OM was a playwright, literary critic, and arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century. Although he was born an American he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39.The poem that made his...

    ; Moonchild - Aleister Crowley
    Aleister Crowley
    Aleister Crowley , born Edward Alexander Crowley, and also known as both Frater Perdurabo and The Great Beast, was an influential English occultist, astrologer, mystic and ceremonial magician, responsible for founding the religious philosophy of Thelema. He was also successful in various other...

     Completed
  • 1916 in literature
    1916 in literature
    The year 1916 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The Journal of Negro History is founded by Carter Godwin Woodson, the father of "Black History" and "Negro History Week."...

    - Relativity
    General relativity
    General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

    - Albert Einstein
    Albert Einstein
    Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...

    ; A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
    A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
    A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is a semi-autobiographical novel by James Joyce, first serialised in the magazine The Egoist from 1914 to 1915, and published first in book format in 1916 by B. W. Huebsch, New York. The first English edition was published by the Egoist Press in February 1917...

    - James Joyce
    James Joyce
    James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...

  • 1915 in literature
    1915 in literature
    The year 1915 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* May 3 - In Flanders Fields is written by Canadian poet John McCrae....

    - The Metamorphosis
    The Metamorphosis
    The Metamorphosis is a novella by Franz Kafka, first published in 1915. It is often cited as one of the seminal works of short fiction of the 20th century and is widely studied in colleges and universities across the western world...

    - Franz Kafka
    Franz Kafka
    Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...

  • 1914 in literature
    1914 in literature
    The year 1914 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The literature of World War I makes its first appearance.*November 7 - The first issue of The New Republic magazine is published....

    - Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...

     vanishes in Mexico; Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich
    Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich
    Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich is a work of humorous fiction by Stephen Leacock first published in 1914. It is the follow-up to his 1912 classic Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town...

    - Stephen Leacock
    Stephen Leacock
    Stephen Butler Leacock, FRSC was an English-born Canadian teacher, political scientist, writer, and humorist...

  • 1913 in literature
    1913 in literature
    The year 1913 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Husayn Haykal publishes the first modern Egyptian novel Zaynab.-New books:* Alain-Fournier — Le Grand Meaulnes* L...

    - The Return of Tarzan
    The Return of Tarzan
    The Return of Tarzan is a novel written by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the second in his series of books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published in the pulp magazine New Story Magazine in the issues for June through December 1913; the first book edition was published in 1915 by A. C....

    - Edgar Rice Burroughs
    Edgar Rice Burroughs
    Edgar Rice Burroughs was an American author, best known for his creation of the jungle hero Tarzan and the heroic Mars adventurer John Carter, although he produced works in many genres.-Biography:...

    ; Alcools
    Alcools
    Alcools is a collection of poems by the French author Guillaume Apollinaire.- External links :* Alcools * Alcools...

    - Guillaume Apollinaire
    Guillaume Apollinaire
    Wilhelm Albert Włodzimierz Apolinary Kostrowicki, known as Guillaume Apollinaire was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist, and art critic born in Italy to a Polish mother....

    , Petersburg
    Petersburg (novel)
    Petersburg or St. Petersburg is the title of Andrei Bely's masterpiece, a Symbolist work that foreshadows Joyce's Modernist ambitions. For various reasons the novel never received much attention and was not translated into English until 1959 by John Cournos, over 45 years after it was written,...

    - Andrei Bely
    Andrei Bely
    Andrei Bely was the pseudonym of Boris Nikolaevich Bugaev , a Russian novelist, poet, theorist, and literary critic. His novel Petersburg was regarded by Vladimir Nabokov as one of the four greatest novels of the 20th century.-Biography:...

    ; Sons and Lovers
    Sons and Lovers
    Sons and Lovers is a 1913 novel by the English writer D. H. Lawrence. The Modern Library placed it ninth on their list of the 100 best novels of the 20th century.-Plot introduction and history:...

    - D. H. Lawrence
    D. H. Lawrence
    David Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...

    ; Pygmalion
    Pygmalion (play)
    Pygmalion: A Romance in Five Acts is a play by Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw. Professor of phonetics Henry Higgins makes a bet that he can train a bedraggled Cockney flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, to pass for a duchess at an ambassador's garden party by teaching her to assume a veneer of...

    - George Bernard Shaw
    George Bernard Shaw
    George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...

  • 1912 in literature
    1912 in literature
    The year 1912 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Virginia Stephen marries Leonard Woolf.*Frieda von Richthofen meets D. H. Lawrence.-New books:*Mary Antin - The Promised Land*L...

    - Tarzan of the Apes
    Tarzan of the Apes
    Tarzan of the Apes is a novel written by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the first in a series of books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published in the pulp magazine All-Story Magazine in October, 1912; the first book edition was published in 1914. The character was so popular that Burroughs...

    - Edgar Rice Burroughs
    Edgar Rice Burroughs
    Edgar Rice Burroughs was an American author, best known for his creation of the jungle hero Tarzan and the heroic Mars adventurer John Carter, although he produced works in many genres.-Biography:...

    ; Death in Venice
    Death in Venice
    The novella Death in Venice was written by the German author Thomas Mann, and was first published in 1913 as Der Tod in Venedig. The plot of the work presents a great writer suffering writer's block who visits Venice and is liberated and uplifted, then increasingly obsessed, by the sight of a...

    - Thomas Mann
    Thomas Mann
    Thomas Mann was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate, known for his series of highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas, noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectual...

    ; The Lost World - Arthur Conan Doyle
    Arthur Conan Doyle
    Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...

  • 1911 in literature
    1911 in literature
    The year 1911 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*George Moore publishes the first of his three-volume Hail and Farewell .*Gallimard publishing house founded in Paris by Gaston Gallimard...

    - Ethan Frome
    Ethan Frome
    Ethan Frome is a novel published in 1911 by the Pulitzer Prize-winning American author Edith Wharton. It is set in the fictitious town of Starkfield, Massachusetts, New England, United States...

    - Edith Wharton
    Edith Wharton
    Edith Wharton , was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, short story writer, and designer.- Early life and marriage:...

    ; The Phantom of the Opera
    The Phantom of the Opera
    Le Fantôme de l'Opéra is a novel by French writer Gaston Leroux. It was first published as a serialisation in "Le Gaulois" from September 23, 1909 to January 8, 1910...

    - Gaston Leroux
    Gaston Leroux
    Gaston Louis Alfred Leroux was a French journalist and author of detective fiction.In the English-speaking world, he is best known for writing the novel The Phantom of the Opera , which has been made into several film and stage productions of the same name, notably the 1925 film starring Lon...

    ; The Devil's Dictionary
    The Devil's Dictionary
    The Devil's Dictionary is a satirical "reference" book written by Ambrose Bierce. The book offers reinterpretations of terms in the English language, lampooning cant and political doublespeak, as well as other aspects of human foolishness and frailty. It was originally published in 1906 as The...

    - Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...

    ; 11th edition of Encyclopædia Britannica
    Encyclopædia Britannica
    The Encyclopædia Britannica , published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia that is available in print, as a DVD, and on the Internet. It is written and continuously updated by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 expert...

    published
  • 1910 in literature
    1910 in literature
    The year 1910 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*April - Halley's comet reappears , and Mark Twain dies on April 21, 1910, the day following the comet's perihelion. In his biography, Twain had written, "I came in with Halley's comet in 1835. It's coming again...

    - Howards End
    Howards End
    Howards End is a novel by E. M. Forster, first published in 1910, which tells a story of class struggle in turn-of-the-century England. The main theme is the difficulties, troubles, and also the benefits of relationships between members of different social classes...

    - E. M. Forster
    E. M. Forster
    Edward Morgan Forster OM, CH was an English novelist, short story writer, essayist and librettist. He is known best for his ironic and well-plotted novels examining class difference and hypocrisy in early 20th-century British society...

    ; The Sorcerer's Apprentice
    The Sorcerer's Apprentice
    The Sorcerer's Apprentice is the English name of a poem by Goethe, Der Zauberlehrling, written in 1797. The poem is a ballad in fourteen stanzas.-Story:...

    - Hanns Heinz Ewers
    Hanns Heinz Ewers
    Hanns Heinz Ewers was a German actor, poet, philosopher, and writer of short stories and novels. While he wrote on a wide range of subjects, he is now known mainly for his works of horror, particularly his trilogy of novels about the adventures of Frank Braun, a character modeled on himself...


1900s

  • 1909 in literature
    1909 in literature
    The year 1909 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*L. Frank Baum - The Road to Oz** - Aunt Jane's Nieces at Work *André Billy - La Derive*René Boylesve - La Jeune Fille bien élevée...

    - The Road to Oz
    The Road to Oz
    The Road to Oz: In Which Is Related How Dorothy Gale of Kansas, The Shaggy Man, Button Bright, and Polychrome the Rainbow's Daughter Met on an Enchanted Road and Followed it All the Way to the Marvelous Land of Oz. is the fifth of L. Frank Baum's Land of Oz books...

    - L.Frank Baum; The Song of Songs - Hermann Sudermann
    Hermann Sudermann
    Hermann Sudermann was a German dramatist and novelist.- Early career :He was born at Matzicken, a village just to the east of Heydekrug in the Province of Prussia , close to the Russian frontier...

  • 1908 in literature
    1908 in literature
    The year 1908 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Afawarq Gabra Iyasus - Libb Wolled Tārīk , the first novel in Amharic*Leonid Andreyev - The Seven Who Were Hanged...

    - Anne of Green Gables
    Anne of Green Gables
    Anne of Green Gables is a bestselling novel by Canadian author Lucy Maud Montgomery published in 1908. Set in 1878, it was written as fiction for readers of all ages, but in recent decades has been considered a children's book...

    - Lucy Maud Montgomery
    Lucy Maud Montgomery
    Lucy Maud Montgomery OBE , called "Maud" by family and friends and publicly known as L.M. Montgomery, was a Canadian author best known for a series of novels beginning with Anne of Green Gables, published in 1908. Anne of Green Gables was an immediate success...

    ; L'île des Pingouins (Penguin Island) - Anatole France
    Anatole France
    Anatole France , born François-Anatole Thibault, , was a French poet, journalist, and novelist. He was born in Paris, and died in Saint-Cyr-sur-Loire. He was a successful novelist, with several best-sellers. Ironic and skeptical, he was considered in his day the ideal French man of letters...

    ; The Wind in the Willows
    The Wind in the Willows
    The Wind in the Willows is a classic of children's literature by Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. Alternately slow moving and fast paced, it focuses on four anthropomorphised animal characters in a pastoral version of England...

    - Kenneth Grahame
    Kenneth Grahame
    Kenneth Grahame was a Scottish writer, most famous for The Wind in the Willows , one of the classics of children's literature. He also wrote The Reluctant Dragon; both books were later adapted into Disney films....

  • 1907 in literature
    1907 in literature
    The year 1907 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* June 26 - Mark Twain receives an honorary doctorate of laws degree from Oxford University.*James Joyce meets Ettore Schmitz for the first time....

    - The City of Pleasure
    The City of Pleasure
    The City of Pleasure is Ezzat el Kamhawi's first Novel, and Second book after It Happened in the land of Dust and Mud , it was first released by the General Organization for Cultural Centers in 1997, Second Edition by el-Ain publishing in 2009....

    - Arnold Bennett
    Arnold Bennett
    - Early life :Bennett was born in a modest house in Hanley in the Potteries district of Staffordshire. Hanley is one of a conurbation of six towns which joined together at the beginning of the twentieth century as Stoke-on-Trent. Enoch Bennett, his father, qualified as a solicitor in 1876, and the...

    ; The Listener and Other Stories - Algernon Blackwood
    Algernon Blackwood
    Algernon Henry Blackwood, CBE was an English short story writer and novelist, one of the most prolific writers of ghost stories in the history of the genre. He was also a journalist and a broadcasting narrator. S. T...

  • 1906 in literature
    1906 in literature
    The year 1906 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* December 24 - Reginald Fessenden transmits the first radio program, a poetry reading, a violin solo, and a speech, broadcasts....

    - The Jungle
    The Jungle
    The Jungle is a 1906 novel written by journalist Upton Sinclair. Sinclair wrote the novel with the intention of portraying the life of the immigrant in the United States, but readers were more concerned with the large portion of the book pertaining to the corruption of the American meatpacking...

    - Upton Sinclair
    Upton Sinclair
    Upton Beall Sinclair Jr. , was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle . It exposed conditions in the U.S...

    ; The House of Souls - Arthur Machen
    Arthur Machen
    Arthur Machen was a Welsh author and mystic of the 1890s and early 20th century. He is best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy, and horror fiction. His novella The Great God Pan has garnered a reputation as a classic of horror...

    ; Time and the Gods - Lord Dunsany;
  • 1905 in literature
    1905 in literature
    The year 1905 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*L. Frank Baum's Animal Fairy Tales are published in The Delineator magazine from January to September....

    - White Fang
    White Fang
    White Fang is a novel by American author Jack London. First serialized in Outing magazine, it was published in 1906. The story takes place in Yukon Territory, Canada, during the Klondike Gold Rush at the end of the 19th-century, and details a wild wolfdog's journey to domestication...

    - Jack London
    Jack London
    John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...

    ; The Return of Sherlock Holmes
    The Return of Sherlock Holmes
    The Return of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of 13 Sherlock Holmes stories, originally published in 1903-1904, by Arthur Conan Doyle.-History:...

    - Arthur Conan Doyle
    Arthur Conan Doyle
    Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...

  • 1904 in literature
    1904 in literature
    The year 1904 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* January - Mark Twain begins dictating his autobiography.* 16 June - "Bloomsday": the day on which the action of James Joyce's novel Ulysses takes place in Dublin....

    - The Sea-Wolf
    The Sea-Wolf
    The Sea-Wolf is a 1904 psychological adventure novel by American novelist Jack London about a literary critic, survivor of an ocean collision who comes under the dominance of Wolf Larsen, the powerful and amoral sea captain who rescues him...

    - Jack London
    Jack London
    John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...

    ; Nostromo
    Nostromo
    Nostromo is a 1904 novel by Polish-born British novelist Joseph Conrad, set in the fictitious South American republic of "Costaguana." It was originally published serially in two volumes of T.P.'s Weekly....

    - Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...

    ; Green Mansions
    Green Mansions
    Green Mansions: A Romance of the Tropical Forest is an exotic romance by William Henry Hudson about a traveller to the Guyana jungle of southeastern Venezuela and his encounter with a forest dwelling girl named Rima.-Plot summary:...

    - William Henry Hudson
    William Henry Hudson
    William Henry Hudson was an author, naturalist, and ornithologist.- Life and work :Hudson was born in the Quilmes, a borough of the greater Buenos Aires, in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, son of settlers of U.S. origin...

    ; The Golden Bowl
    The Golden Bowl
    The Golden Bowl is a 1904 novel by Henry James. Set in England, this complex, intense study of marriage and adultery completes what some critics have called the "major phase" of James' career...

    - Henry James
    Henry James
    Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

    ; Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
    Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
    Ghost Stories of an Antiquary is the title of M. R. James' first collection of ghost stories, published in 1904...

    - M. R. James
    M. R. James
    Montague Rhodes James, OM, MA, , who used the publication name M. R. James, was an English mediaeval scholar and provost of King's College, Cambridge and of Eton College . He is best remembered for his ghost stories, which are regarded as among the best in the genre...

  • 1903 in literature
    1903 in literature
    The year 1903 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* October 24 - Mark Twain moves to Florence.* The first Goncourt Prize for French literature is awarded to John Antoine Nau....

    - The Call of the Wild
    The Call of the Wild
    The Call of the Wild is a novel by American writer Jack London. The plot concerns a previously domesticated dog named Buck, whose primordial instincts return after a series of events leads to his serving as a sled dog in the Yukon during the 19th-century Klondike Gold Rush, in which sled dogs...

    - Jack London
    Jack London
    John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...

    ;The Souls of Black Folk
    The Souls of Black Folk
    The Souls of Black Folk is a classic work of American literature by W. E. B. Du Bois. It is a seminal work in the history of sociology, and a cornerstone of African-American literary history....

    - W. E. B. Du Bois; The Ambassadors
    The Ambassadors
    The Ambassadors is a 1903 novel by Henry James, originally published as a serial in the North American Review . This dark comedy, one of the masterpieces of James's final period, follows the trip of protagonist Lewis Lambert Strether to Europe in pursuit of Chad, his widowed fiancée's supposedly...

    - Henry James
    Henry James
    Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

    ; The Jewel of Seven Stars
    The Jewel of Seven Stars
    The Jewel of Seven Stars is a horror novel by Bram Stoker, first published in 1903. The story is about an archaeologist's plot to revive Queen Tera, an ancient Egyptian mummy.-Second edition:...

    - Bram Stoker
    Bram Stoker
    Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...

  • 1902 in literature
    1902 in literature
    The year 1902 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* April - Mark Twain purchases a home in Terrytown, New York.* June 4 - Mark Twain receives an honorary doctorate of literature degree from the University of Missouri....

    - The Immoralist
    The Immoralist
    The Immoralist is a novel by André Gide, published in France in 1902. When it was first published, it was considered shocking. What some see as a story of dereliction, others see as a tale of introspection and self-discovery.-Plot:...

    - André Gide
    André Gide
    André Paul Guillaume Gide was a French author and winner of the Nobel Prize in literature in 1947. Gide's career ranged from its beginnings in the symbolist movement, to the advent of anticolonialism between the two World Wars.Known for his fiction as well as his autobiographical works, Gide...

    ; The Wings of the Dove
    The Wings of the Dove
    The Wings of the Dove is a 1902 novel by Henry James. This novel tells the story of Milly Theale, an American heiress stricken with a serious disease, and her impact on the people around her...

    - Henry James
    Henry James
    Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

    ; The Hound of the Baskervilles
    The Hound of the Baskervilles
    The Hound of the Baskervilles is the third of four crime novels by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serialised in The Strand Magazine from August 1901 to April 1902, it is set largely on Dartmoor in Devon in England's West Country and tells the story of an...

    - Arthur Conan Doyle
    Arthur Conan Doyle
    Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...

    ; The Tale of Peter Rabbit
    The Tale of Peter Rabbit
    The Tale of Peter Rabbit is a children's book written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter that follows mischievous and disobedient young Peter Rabbit as he is chased about the garden of Mr. McGregor. He escapes and returns home to his mother who puts him to bed after dosing him with camomile tea...

    - Beatrix Potter
    Beatrix Potter
    Helen Beatrix Potter was an English author, illustrator, natural scientist and conservationist best known for her imaginative children’s books featuring animals such as those in The Tale of Peter Rabbit which celebrated the British landscape and country life.Born into a privileged Unitarian...

  • 1901 in literature
    1901 in literature
    The year 1901 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* First Nobel Prize for Literature awarded, to French poet Sully Prudhomme; many are outraged when Leo Tolstoy does not win...

    - Death of Queen Victoria; - Buddenbrooks
    Buddenbrooks
    Buddenbrooks was Thomas Mann's first novel, published in 1901 when he was twenty-six years old. The publication of the 2nd edition in 1903 confirmed that Buddenbrooks was a major literary success in Germany....

    - Thomas Mann
    Thomas Mann
    Thomas Mann was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate, known for his series of highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas, noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectual...

    ; The Purple Cloud
    The Purple Cloud
    The Purple Cloud is a "last man" novel by the British writer M. P. Shiel. It was published in 1901. H. P. Lovecraft later praised the novel as exemplary weird fiction, "delivered with a skill and artistry falling little short of actual majesty." Frank Belknap Long deemed it "the most unutterably...

    - M. P. Shiel
    M. P. Shiel
    Matthew Phipps Shiel was a prolific British writer of West Indian descent. His legal surname remained "Shiell" though he adopted the shorter version as a de facto pen name....

  • 1900 in literature
    1900 in literature
    The year 1900 in literature involved some significant new books and publications, as well as the deaths of several highly prominent writers, including among them the late Irish poet Oscar Wilde and the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche....

    - The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
    The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
    The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is a children's novel written by L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. Originally published by the George M. Hill Company in Chicago on May 17, 1900, it has since been reprinted numerous times, most often under the name The Wizard of Oz, which is the name of...

    - L.Frank Baum; Lord Jim
    Lord Jim
    Lord Jim is a novel by Joseph Conrad originally published as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine from October 1899 to November 1900.An early and primary event is Jim's abandonment of a ship in distress on which he is serving as a mate...

    - Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...

    ; Sister Carrie
    Sister Carrie
    Sister Carrie is a novel by Theodore Dreiser about a young country girl who moves to the big city where she starts realizing her own American Dream by first becoming a mistress to men that she perceives as superior and later as a famous actress...

    - Theodore Dreiser
    Theodore Dreiser
    Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser was an American novelist and journalist of the naturalist school. His novels often featured main characters who succeeded at their objectives despite a lack of a firm moral code, and literary situations that more closely resemble studies of nature than tales of...

    ; The Flame of Life - Gabriele d'Annunzio
    Gabriele D'Annunzio
    Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...


1890s

  • 1899 in literature
    1899 in literature
    The year 1899 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Edgar Rice Burroughs begins working in his father's business.*Rainer Maria Rilke travels to Moscow to meet Leo Tolstoy....

    - The School and Society - John Dewey
    John Dewey
    John Dewey was an American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. Dewey was an important early developer of the philosophy of pragmatism and one of the founders of functional psychology...

    ; The Awakening
    The Awakening (novel)
    The Awakening is a novel by Kate Chopin, first published in 1899 . Set in New Orleans and the Southern Louisiana coast at the end of the nineteenth century, the plot centers around Edna Pontellier and her struggle to reconcile her increasingly unorthodox views on femininity and motherhood with the...

    - Kate Chopin
    Kate Chopin
    Kate Chopin, born Katherine O'Flaherty , was an American author of short stories and novels. She is now considered by some to have been a forerunner of feminist authors of the 20th century....

    ; Heart of Darkness
    Heart of Darkness
    Heart of Darkness is a novella written by Joseph Conrad. Before its 1903 publication, it appeared as a three-part series in Blackwood's Magazine. It was classified by the Modern Library website editors as one of the "100 best novels" and part of the Western canon.The story centres on Charles...

    - Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...

    ; The Yellow Wallpaper
    The Yellow Wallpaper
    "The Yellow Wallpaper" is a short story by the American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman, first published in January 1892 in The New England Magazine. It is regarded as an important early work of American feminist literature, illustrating attitudes in the nineteenth century toward women's physical...

    - Charlotte Perkins Gilman
    Charlotte Perkins Gilman
    Charlotte Perkins Gilman was a prominent American sociologist, novelist, writer of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction, and a lecturer for social reform...

  • 1898 in literature
    1898 in literature
    The year 1898 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Elizabeth von Arnim - Elizabeth and Her German Garden*F. W. Bain - A Digit of the Moon*L...

    - Paris - Emile Zola
    Émile Zola
    Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...

    ; The War of the Worlds
    The War of the Worlds
    The War of the Worlds is an 1898 science fiction novel written by H. G. Wells.The War of the Worlds may also refer to:- Radio broadcasts :* The War of the Worlds , the 1938 radio broadcast by Orson Welles...

    - H. G. Wells
    H. G. Wells
    Herbert George Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books and rules for war games...

    ; The Turn of the Screw
    The Turn of the Screw
    The Turn of the Screw is a novella written by Henry James. Originally published in 1898, it is ostensibly a ghost story.Due to its ambiguous content, it became a favourite text of academics who subscribe to New Criticism. The novella has had differing interpretations, often mutually exclusive...

    - Henry James
    Henry James
    Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

  • 1897 in literature
    1897 in literature
    The year 1897 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* January 2 - Newspapers in London, England erroneously report the death of Mark Twain. It is believed that the rumors began when Twain's cousin had become ill...

    - Captains Courageous
    Captains Courageous
    Captains Courageous is an 1897 novel, by Rudyard Kipling, that follows the adventures of fifteen-year-old Harvey Cheyne Jr., the arrogant and spoiled son of a railroad tycoon...

    - Rudyard Kipling
    Rudyard Kipling
    Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...

    ; Dracula
    Dracula
    Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...

    - Bram Stoker
    Bram Stoker
    Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...

    ; Divagations - Stéphane Mallarmé
    Stéphane Mallarmé
    Stéphane Mallarmé , whose real name was Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his work anticipated and inspired several revolutionary artistic schools of the early 20th century, such as Dadaism, Surrealism, and Futurism.-Biography:Stéphane...

    ; The Beetle - Richard Marsh
    Richard Marsh (author)
    Richard Marsh was the pseudonym of the British author born Richard Bernard Heldmann. He is best known for his supernatural thriller The Beetle: A Mystery, which was published in the same year as Bram Stoker's Dracula and was initially even more popular...

    ; The Invisible Man
    The Invisible Man
    The Invisible Man is a science fiction novella by H.G. Wells published in 1897. Wells' novel was originally serialised in Pearson's Weekly in 1897, and published as a novel the same year...

    - H. G. Wells
    H. G. Wells
    Herbert George Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books and rules for war games...

  • 1896 in literature
    1896 in literature
    The year 1896 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* Final volume of Theodore Roosevelt's The Winning of the West....

    - The Island of Doctor Moreau
    The Island of Doctor Moreau
    The Island of Doctor Moreau is an 1896 science fiction novel written by H. G. Wells. It is told from the point of view of a man named Edward Prendick who is shipwrecked, rescued by a passing boat, and then left at the ship's destination by the crew along with the ship's cargo of exotic animals...

    - H. G. Wells
    H. G. Wells
    Herbert George Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books and rules for war games...

    ; The Well at the World's End
    The Well at the World's End
    The Well at the World's End is a fantasy novel by the British artist, poet, and author William Morris. It was first published in 1896 and has been reprinted a number of times since, most notably in two parts as the twentieth and twenty-first volumes of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series in August...

    - William Morris
    William Morris
    William Morris 24 March 18343 October 1896 was an English textile designer, artist, writer, and socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement...

    ; Shapes in the Fire - M.P. Shiel
  • 1895 in literature
    1895 in literature
    The year 1895 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* Carlyle's House in Chelsea opens to the public.* Robert Frost marries Elinor Miriam White.* Ernest Thayer recites his poem, Casey at the Bat, at a Harvard class reunion....

    - The Time Machine
    The Time Machine
    The Time Machine is a science fiction novella by H. G. Wells, published in 1895 for the first time and later adapted into at least two feature films of the same name, as well as two television versions, and a large number of comic book adaptations. It indirectly inspired many more works of fiction...

    - H. G. Wells
    H. G. Wells
    Herbert George Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books and rules for war games...

    ; Almayer's Folly
    Almayer's Folly
    Almayer's Folly, published in 1895, is Joseph Conrad's first novel. Set in the late 19th century, it centers on the life of the Dutch trader Kaspar Almayer in the Borneo jungle and his relationship to his half-caste daughter Nina.-Plot:...

    - Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad
    Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...

    ; Pharaoh
    Pharaoh (novel)
    Pharaoh is the fourth and last major novel by the Polish writer Bolesław Prus . Composed over a year's time in 1894–95, it was the sole historical novel by an author who had earlier disapproved of historical novels on the ground that they inevitably distort history.Pharaoh has been described...

    - Bolesław Prus; Jude the Obscure
    Jude the Obscure
    Jude the Obscure, the last of Thomas Hardy's novels, began as a magazine serial and was first published in book form in 1895. The book was burned publicly by William Walsham How, Bishop of Wakefield, in that same year. Its hero, Jude Fawley, is a working-class young man who dreams of becoming a...

    - Thomas Hardy
    Thomas Hardy
    Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...

    ; The Three Impostors - Arthur Machen
    Arthur Machen
    Arthur Machen was a Welsh author and mystic of the 1890s and early 20th century. He is best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy, and horror fiction. His novella The Great God Pan has garnered a reputation as a classic of horror...

  • 1894 in literature
    1894 in literature
    The year 1894 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Robert Frost sells his first poem, "My Butterfly", to The New York Independent for fifteen dollars.*Hermann Hesse begins his apprenticeship at a factory in Calw....

    - The Jungle Books - Rudyard Kipling
    Rudyard Kipling
    Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...

    ; The Prisoner of Zenda
    The Prisoner of Zenda
    The Prisoner of Zenda is an adventure novel by Anthony Hope, published in 1894. The king of the fictional country of Ruritania is drugged on the eve of his coronation and thus unable to attend his own coronation. Political forces are such that in order for the king to retain his crown his...

    - Anthony Hope
    Anthony Hope
    Sir Anthony Hope Hawkins, better known as Anthony Hope , was an English novelist and playwright. Although he was a prolific writer, especially of adventure novels, he is remembered best for only two books: The Prisoner of Zenda and its sequel Rupert of Hentzau...

    ; Pan
    Pan (novel)
    Pan is a 1894 novel by the Norwegian author Knut Hamsun. Written while he lived in Paris, France, and in Kristiansand, Norway, Hamsun was directly influenced by the works of Fyodor Dostoevsky...

    - Knut Hamsun
    Knut Hamsun
    Knut Hamsun was a Norwegian author, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920. He was praised by King Haakon VII of Norway as Norway's soul....

    ; The Great God Pan - Arthur Machen
    Arthur Machen
    Arthur Machen was a Welsh author and mystic of the 1890s and early 20th century. He is best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy, and horror fiction. His novella The Great God Pan has garnered a reputation as a classic of horror...

    ; Studies of Death: Romantic Tales - Stanislaus Eric Stenbock
  • 1893 in literature
    1893 in literature
    The year 1893 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*André Gide begins his travels in North Africa.*Jerome K. Jerome founds the magazine To-Day.-New books:*Byron A...

    - The New Woman
    The New Woman (novel)
    The New Woman is the third of four major novels by the Polish writer Bolesław Prus. It was composed, and appeared in newspaper serialization, in 1890-93, and dealt with societal questions involving feminism.-History:...

    - Bolesław Prus
  • 1892 in literature
    1892 in literature
    The year 1892 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Shadows Uplifted by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper becomes the second novel by an African-American woman published in the United States-New books:...

    - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
    The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
    The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of twelve stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, featuring his famous detective and illustrated by Sidney Paget....

    - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; Children of the Ghetto - Israel Zangwill
    Israel Zangwill
    Israel Zangwill was a British humorist and writer.-Biography:Zangwill was born in London on January 21, 1864 in a family of Jewish immigrants from Czarist Russia, to Moses Zangwill from what is now Latvia and Ellen Hannah Marks Zangwill from what is now Poland. He dedicated his life to championing...

    ; Gunga Din
    Gunga Din
    -Background:The poem is a rhyming narrative from the point of view of a British soldier, about a native water-bearer who saves the soldier's life but dies himself. The last line suggests a deep-down unease of conscience about the prevailing views of natural hierarchies, both in the depicted...

    - Rudyard Kipling
    Rudyard Kipling
    Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...


  • 1891 in literature
    1891 in literature
    The year 1891 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Guy de Maupassant is officially diagnosed as insane.*Tristan Bernard has his first work published in La Revue Blanche....

    - Tales of Soldiers and Civilians
    Tales of Soldiers and Civilians
    Tales of Soldiers and Civilians is a collection of short stories written by Ambrose Bierce. Published in 1891, the 26 stories detail the lives of soldiers and civilians during the American Civil War...

    - Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...

    ; Diary of a Pilgrimage
    Diary of a Pilgrimage
    Diary of a Pilgrimage is a novel by Jerome K. Jerome published in 1891. It tells of a trip undertaken by Jerome and his friend "B" to see the Oberammergau Passion Play in Germany.-Itinerary:...

    - Jerome K. Jerome
    Jerome K. Jerome
    Jerome Klapka Jerome was an English writer and humorist, best known for the humorous travelogue Three Men in a Boat.Jerome was born in Caldmore, Walsall, England, and was brought up in poverty in London...

    ; Tess of the d'Urbervilles
    Tess of the d'Urbervilles
    Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented, also known as Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman, Tess of the d'Urbervilles or just Tess, is a novel by Thomas Hardy, first published in 1891. It initially appeared in a censored and serialised version, published by the British...

    - Thomas Hardy
    Thomas Hardy
    Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...

    ; "The Picture of Dorian Gray
    The Picture of Dorian Gray
    The Picture of Dorian Gray is the only published novel by Oscar Wilde, appearing as the lead story in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine on 20 June 1890, printed as the July 1890 issue of this magazine...

    "- Oscar Wilde
    Oscar Wilde
    Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...

  • 1890 in literature
    1890 in literature
    The year 1890 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* Bram Stoker begins work on Dracula.*Arthur Morrison joins the staff of the Evening Globe newspaper.-New books:*Rolf Boldrewood - The Squatter's Dream...

    - Hedda Gabler
    Hedda Gabler
    Hedda Gabler is a play first published in 1890 by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. The play premiered in 1891 in Germany to negative reviews, but has subsequently gained recognition as a classic of realism, nineteenth century theatre, and world drama...

    - Henrik Ibsen
    Henrik Ibsen
    Henrik Ibsen was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of prose drama" and is one of the founders of Modernism in the theatre...

    ; Hunger
    Hunger (novel)
    Hunger is a novel by the Norwegian author Knut Hamsun and was published in its final form in 1890. Parts of it had been published anonymously in the Danish magazine Ny Jord in 1888. The novel has been hailed as the literary opening of the 20th century and an outstanding example of modern,...

    - Knut Hamsun
    Knut Hamsun
    Knut Hamsun was a Norwegian author, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920. He was praised by King Haakon VII of Norway as Norway's soul....

    ; An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
    An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
    "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" is a short story by Ambrose Bierce. It was originally published in 1890, and first collected in Bierce's 1891 book Tales of Soldiers and Civilians...

    - Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Bierce
    Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...

    ;

1880s

  • 1889 in literature
    1889 in literature
    The year 1889 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Theodore Roosevelt publishes the first of four volumes of The Winning of the West, with three more by 1896.-New books:*Gabriele D'Annunzio - Il piacere...

    - Thus Spoke Zarathustra
    Thus Spoke Zarathustra
    Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None is a philosophical novel by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, composed in four parts between 1883 and 1885...

    - Friedrich Nietzsche
    Friedrich Nietzsche
    Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a 19th-century German philosopher, poet, composer and classical philologist...

    ; The Doll
    The Doll (novel)
    The Doll is the second of four major novels by the Polish writer Bolesław Prus. It was composed for periodical serialization in 1887-89 and appeared in book form in 1890....

    - Bolesław Prus; The Child of Pleasure - Gabriele d'Annunzio
    Gabriele D'Annunzio
    Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...

  • 1888 in literature
    1888 in literature
    The year 1888 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Grant Allen - The Devil's Die**The White Man's Foot*Edward Bellamy - Looking Backward*Rolf Boldrewood - Robbery Under Arms...

    - The Man Who Would Be King
    The Man Who Would Be King
    For the 1975 film based on this story, see The Man Who Would Be King "The Man Who Would Be King" is a short story by Rudyard Kipling. It is about two British adventurers in British India who become kings of Kafiristan, a remote part of Afghanistan...

    - Rudyard Kipling
    Rudyard Kipling
    Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...

  • 1887 in literature
    1887 in literature
    The year 1887 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Futabatei Shimei writes The Drifting Cloud, the first modern novel in Japan.-New books:*Mary Elizabeth Braddon - Cut by the County*Hall Caine - The Deemster...

    - She
    She (novel)
    She, subtitled A History of Adventure, is a novel by Henry Rider Haggard, first serialized in The Graphic magazine from October 1886 to January 1887. She is one of the classics of imaginative literature, and with over 83 million copies sold in 44 different languages, one of the best-selling books...

    - Henry Rider Haggard; Sherlock Holmes
    Sherlock Holmes
    Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...

    - Arthur Conan Doyle
    Arthur Conan Doyle
    Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...

    ; Thelma - Marie Corelli
    Marie Corelli
    Marie Corelli was a British novelist. She enjoyed a period of great literary success from the publication of her first novel in 1886 until World War I. Corelli's novels sold more copies than the combined sales of popular contemporaries, including Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G...

  • 1886 in literature
    1886 in literature
    The year 1886 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* MLN: Modern Language Notes, an academic journal founded with the intention of introducing European literary criticism into American scholarship, is founded at the Johns Hopkins University.-Books:*Louisa May Alcott - Jo's...

    - L'Œuvre
    L'Œuvre
    L'œuvre is the fourteenth novel in the Rougon-Macquart series by Émile Zola. It was first serialized in the periodical Gil Blas beginning in December 1885 before being published in novel form by Charpentier in 1886....

     (The Masterpiece)
    - Emile Zola
    Émile Zola
    Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...

    ; Little Lord Fauntleroy
    Little Lord Fauntleroy
    Little Lord Fauntleroy is the first children's novel written by English playwright and author Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was originally published as a serial in the St. Nicholas Magazine between November 1885 and October 1886, then as a book by Scribner's in 1886...

    - Frances Hodgson Burnett
    Frances Hodgson Burnett
    Frances Eliza Hodgson Burnett was an English playwright and author. She is best known for her children's stories, in particular The Secret Garden , A Little Princess, and Little Lord Fauntleroy.Born Frances Eliza Hodgson, she lived in Cheetham Hill, Manchester...

    ; Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson
    Robert Louis Stevenson
    Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....

    ; The Outpost
    The Outpost (novel)
    The Outpost was the first of four major novels by the Polish writer Bolesław Prus. The author sought to bring attention to the plight of rural Poland, which had to contend with poverty, ignorance, neglect on the part of the country's upper crust, and colonization by German settlers backed by Otto...

    - Bolesław Prus; The Bostonians
    The Bostonians
    The Bostonians is a novel by Henry James, first published as a serial in The Century Magazine in 1885–1886 and then as a book in 1886. This bittersweet tragicomedy centers on an odd triangle of characters: Basil Ransom, a political conservative from Mississippi; Olive Chancellor, Ransom's cousin...

    - Henry James
    Henry James
    Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

  • 1885 in literature
    1885 in literature
    The year 1885 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*February 18 - Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is published for the first time*May 19 - Revised Version Old Testament published.*Thomas Hardy moves to Max Gate....

    - King Solomon's Mines
    King Solomon's Mines
    King Solomon's Mines is a popular novel by the Victorian adventure writer and fabulist Sir H. Rider Haggard. It tells of a search of an unexplored region of Africa by a group of adventurers led by Allan Quatermain for the missing brother of one of the party...

    - Henry Rider Haggard; Marius the Epicurean
    Marius the Epicurean
    Marius the Epicurean: his sensations and ideas is an historical and philosophical novel by Walter Pater , written between 1881 and 1884, published in 1885 and set in A.D. 161-177, in the Rome of the Antonines...

    - Walter Pater
    Walter Pater
    Walter Horatio Pater was an English essayist, critic of art and literature, and writer of fiction.-Early life:...

    ; Alfred, Lord Tennyson completes Idylls of the King
    Idylls of the King
    Idylls of the King, published between 1856 and 1885, is a cycle of twelve narrative poems by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson which retells the legend of King Arthur, his knights, his love for Guinevere and her tragic betrayal of him, and the rise and fall of Arthur's kingdom...

    ; Germinal - Émile Zola
    Émile Zola
    Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...

    ; George A. Moore - The Mummer's Wife; The Mikado
    The Mikado
    The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert, their ninth of fourteen operatic collaborations...

    - Gilbert and Sullivan
    Gilbert and Sullivan
    Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...

  • 1884 in literature
    1884 in literature
    The year 1884 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Edwin Abbott Abbott - Flatland*Henry Brooks Adams - Esther*Aluísio de Azevedo - Casa de Pensão*Richard Doddridge Blackmore - Tommy Upmore...

    - Miss Bretherton - Mary Augusta Ward
    Mary Augusta Ward
    Mary Augusta Ward née Arnold; , was a British novelist who wrote under her married name as Mrs Humphry Ward.- Early life:...

    ; The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
    Mark Twain
    Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...

  • 1883 in literature
    1883 in literature
    The year 1883 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Mary Elizabeth Braddon - Phantom Fortune*Rhoda Broughton - Belinda*Wilkie Collins - Heart and Science*Jonas Lie - Familien paa Gilje ...

    - Une Vie - Guy de Maupassant
    Guy de Maupassant
    Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was a popular 19th-century French writer, considered one of the fathers of the modern short story and one of the form's finest exponents....

    ; Treasure Island
    Treasure Island
    Treasure Island is an adventure novel by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, narrating a tale of "pirates and buried gold". First published as a book on May 23, 1883, it was originally serialized in the children's magazine Young Folks between 1881–82 under the title Treasure Island; or, the...

    - Robert Louis Stevenson
    Robert Louis Stevenson
    Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....

    ; The Adventures of Pinocchio - Carlo Collodi
    Carlo Collodi
    Carlo Lorenzini , better known by the pen name Carlo Collodi, was an Italian children's writer known for the world-renowned fairy tale novel, The Adventures of Pinocchio.-Biography:...

  • 1882 in literature
    1882 in literature
    The year 1882 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*F. Anstey - Vice Versa*Walter Besant - The Revolt of Man*Bankim Chatterjee - Anandmath*Richard Doddridge Blackmore -Christowell*Wilkie Collins - After Dark...

    - The Prince and the Pauper
    The Prince and the Pauper
    The Prince and the Pauper is an English-language novel by American author Mark Twain. It was first published in 1881 in Canada before its 1882 publication in the United States. The book represents Twain's first attempt at historical fiction...

    - Mark Twain
    Mark Twain
    Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...

    ; The Naval War of 1812 - Theodore Roosevelt
    Theodore Roosevelt
    Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...

  • 1881 in literature
    1881 in literature
    The year 1881 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* March 4 - A Study in Scarlet, the first Sherlock Holmes story, begins.* The first of the three-volume History of Woman Suffrage, was published by Susan B...

    - The Portrait of a Lady
    The Portrait of a Lady
    The Portrait of a Lady is a novel by Henry James, first published as a serial in The Atlantic Monthly and Macmillan's Magazine in 1880–81 and then as a book in 1881...

    - Henry James
    Henry James
    Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

    ; The Black Robe
    The Black Robe
    The Black Robe is an 1881 epistolary novel by famed English writer, Wilkie Collins. The book relates the misadventures of Lewis Romayne, and is also noted for a perceived anti-Catholic bias.-Plot summary:...

    - Wilkie Collins
    Wilkie Collins
    William Wilkie Collins was an English novelist, playwright, and author of short stories. He was very popular during the Victorian era and wrote 30 novels, more than 60 short stories, 14 plays, and over 100 non-fiction pieces...

  • 1880 in literature
    1880 in literature
    The year 1880 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Henry Adams - Democracy: An American Novel *Rhoda Broughton - Second Thoughts*Wilkie Collins - Jezebel's Daughter...

    - Ben-Hur
    Ben-Hur (novel)
    Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ is a novel by Lew Wallace published on November 12, 1880 by Harper & Brothers. Considered "the most influential Christian book of the nineteenth century", it was the best-selling American novel from the time of its publication, superseding Harriet Beecher Stowe's...

    - Lew Wallace
    Lew Wallace
    Lewis "Lew" Wallace was an American lawyer, Union general in the American Civil War, territorial governor and statesman, politician and author...

    ; Workers in the Dawn - George Gissing
    George Gissing
    George Robert Gissing was an English novelist who published twenty-three novels between 1880 and 1903. From his early naturalistic works, he developed into one of the most accomplished realists of the late-Victorian era.-Early life:...

    ; Nana
    Nana (novel)
    Nana is a novel by the French naturalist author Émile Zola. Completed in 1880, Nana is the ninth installment in the 20-volume Les Rougon-Macquart series, the object of which was to tell "The Natural and Social History of a Family under the Second Empire", the subtitle of the series.-Origins:A year...

    - Émile Zola
    Émile Zola
    Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...

    ; The Brothers Karamazov
    The Brothers Karamazov
    The Brothers Karamazov is the final novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Dostoyevsky spent nearly two years writing The Brothers Karamazov, which was published as a serial in The Russian Messenger and completed in November 1880...

    - Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky was a Russian writer of novels, short stories and essays. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov....


1870s

  • 1879 in literature
    1879 in literature
    The year 1879 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* The Rabelais Club is founded in London, holding a literary dinner once every two months...

    - The Red Room
    The Red Room (Strindberg)
    The Red Room is a Swedish novel by August Strindberg that was first published in 1879. A satire of Stockholm society, it has frequently been described as the first modern Swedish novel. While receiving mixed reviews in Sweden, it was acclaimed in Denmark, where Strindberg was hailed as a genius. ...

    - August Strindberg
    August Strindberg
    Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist and painter. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg's career spanned four decades, during which time he wrote over 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography,...

    ; A Doll's House
    A Doll's House
    A Doll's House is a three-act play in prose by the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. It premièred at the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen, Denmark, on 21 December 1879, having been published earlier that month....

    - Henrik Ibsen
    Henrik Ibsen
    Henrik Ibsen was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of prose drama" and is one of the founders of Modernism in the theatre...

  • 1878 in literature
    1878 in literature
    The year 1878 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*January 28 - The Yale News becomes the first daily college newspaper in the United States.*Guy de Maupassant becomes an employee of the Ministry of Public Instruction....

    - H.M.S. Pinafore
    H.M.S. Pinafore
    H.M.S. Pinafore; or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It opened at the Opera Comique in London, England, on 25 May 1878 and ran for 571 performances, which was the second-longest run of any musical...

    - Gilbert and Sullivan
    Gilbert and Sullivan
    Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...

  • 1877 in literature
    1877 in literature
    The year 1877 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Louisa May Alcott - Under the Lilacs*R M Ballantyne -The Settler and the Savage*Ambrose Bierce - The Dance of Death...

    - Under the Lilacs
    Under the Lilacs
    Under the Lilacs is a children fiction novel by Louisa May Alcott, first published in 1878. The story is about two girls , Miss Celia, a circus runaway and his dog .- Plot :...

    - Louisa May Alcott
    Louisa May Alcott
    Louisa May Alcott was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel Little Women and its sequels Little Men and Jo's Boys. Little Women was set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House in Concord, Massachusetts, and published in 1868...

    ; Anna Karenina
    Anna Karenina
    Anna Karenina is a novel by the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, published in serial installments from 1873 to 1877 in the periodical The Russian Messenger...

    - Leo Tolstoy
    Leo Tolstoy
    Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist...

    ; L'Assommoir
    L'Assommoir
    L'Assommoir is the seventh novel in Émile Zola's twenty-volume series Les Rougon-Macquart. Usually considered one of Zola's masterpieces, the novel—a harsh and uncompromising study of alcoholism and poverty in the working-class districts of Paris—was a huge commercial success and established...

    - Emile Zola
    Émile Zola
    Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...

    ; Black Beauty
    Black Beauty
    Black Beauty is an 1877 novel by English author Anna Sewell. It was composed in the last years of her life, during which she remained in her house as an invalid. The novel became an immediate bestseller, with Sewell dying just five months after its publication, long enough to see her first and only...

    - Anna Sewell
    Anna Sewell
    Anna 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...

    ; Povídky malostranské ("Tales of the Little Quarter") - Jan Neruda
    Jan Neruda
    Jan Nepomuk Neruda was a Czech journalist, writer and poet, one of the most prominent representatives of Czech Realism and a member of "the May school".-Early life:...

    ;

  • 1876 in literature
    1876 in literature
    The year 1876 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*William Harrison Ainsworth**Chetwynd Calverley**The Leaguer of Lathom*Louisa May Alcott - Rose in Bloom*Machado de Assis - Helena*Rhoda Broughton - Joan...

    - The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
    The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
    The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain is an 1876 novel about a young boy growing up along the Mississippi River. The story is set in the Town of "St...

    - Mark Twain
    Mark Twain
    Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...

    ; The Shadow of the Sword - Robert Buchanan
    Robert Williams Buchanan
    Robert Williams Buchanan was a Scottish poet, novelist and dramatist.- Early life and education :He was the son of Robert Buchanan , Owenite lecturer and journalist, and was born at Caverswall, Staffordshire, England...

    ; The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs
    The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs
    The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs is an epic poem by William Morris, telling the tragic story of the Norse hero Sigmund, his son Sigurd and Sigurd's wife Gudrun...

    - William Morris
    William Morris
    William Morris 24 March 18343 October 1896 was an English textile designer, artist, writer, and socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement...

  • 1875 in literature
    1875 in literature
    The year 1875 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*October 1 - American poet and short story writer Edgar Allan Poe is reburied in Westminster Hall and Burying Ground with a larger memorial marker. Some controversy arose years later as to whether the correct body was exhumed.*...

    - The Way We Live Now
    The Way We Live Now
    The Way We Live Now is a satirical novel published in London in 1875 by Anthony Trollope, after a popular serialisation. In 1872 Trollope returned to England from abroad and was appalled by the greed which was loose in the land. His scolding rebuke was his longest novel.Containing over a hundred...

    - Anthony Trollope
    Anthony Trollope
    Anthony Trollope was one of the most successful, prolific and respected English novelists of the Victorian era. Some of his best-loved works, collectively known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire, revolve around the imaginary county of Barsetshire...

    ; Beauchamp's Career
    Beauchamp's Career
    Beauchamp's Career is a novel by George Meredith which portrays life and love in upper-class Radical circles and satirises the Conservative establishment. Meredith himself was inclined to think it his best novel, and the character Renée de Croisnel was his favourite of his creations...

    - George Meredith
    George Meredith
    George Meredith, OM was an English novelist and poet of the Victorian era.- Life :Meredith was born in Portsmouth, England, a son and grandson of naval outfitters. His mother died when he was five. At the age of 14 he was sent to a Moravian School in Neuwied, Germany, where he remained for two...

  • 1874 in literature
    1874 in literature
    The year 1874 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Arthur William à Beckett joins the staff of Punch.*Johan Nicolai Madvig loses his sight, forcing him to give up most of his research and writing....

    - Les Diaboliques
    Les Diaboliques (book)
    Les Diaboliques, is a collection of short stories written by Barbey d'Aurevilly and published in France in 1874. Each story features a woman who commits an act of violence, or revenge, or some other crime. It is considered d'Aurevilly's masterpiece.D'Aurevilly, due to the boredom induced by...

    - Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly
    Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly
    Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly was a French novelist and short story writer. He specialised in mystery tales that explored hidden motivation and hinted at evil without being explicitly concerned with anything supernatural...

    ; Far from the Madding Crowd
    Far from the Madding Crowd
    Far from the Madding Crowd is Thomas Hardy's fourth novel and his first major literary success. It originally appeared anonymously as a monthly serial in Cornhill Magazine, where it gained a wide readership. Critical notices were plentiful and mostly positive...

    - Thomas Hardy
    Thomas Hardy
    Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...

  • 1873 in literature
    1873 in literature
    The year 1873 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*3 March - The U.S. Congress enacts the Comstock Law, making it illegal to send any "obscene, lewd, or lascivious" books through the mail....

    - Around the World in 80 Days - Jules Verne
    Jules Verne
    Jules Gabriel Verne was a French author who pioneered the science fiction genre. He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea , A Journey to the Center of the Earth , and Around the World in Eighty Days...

    ; The Poison Tree - Bankim Chatterjee; Red Cotton Night-Cap Country
    Red Cotton Night-Cap Country
    Red Cotton Night-Cap Country, or Turf and Towers is a poem in blank verse by Robert Browning. It tells a story of sexual intrigue, religious obsession and violent death in contemporary Paris and Normandy, closely based on the true story of the death, supposedly by suicide, of the jewellery heir...

    - Robert Browning
    Robert Browning
    Robert Browning was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets.-Early years:...

  • 1872 in literature
    1872 in literature
    The year 1872 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Paul Verlaine abandons his family to go to London with Arthur Rimbaud....

    - The Birth of Tragedy
    The Birth of Tragedy
    The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music is a 19th-century work of dramatic theory by the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. It was reissued in 1886 as The Birth of Tragedy, Or: Hellenism and Pessimism ...

    - Friedrich Nietzsche
    Friedrich Nietzsche
    Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a 19th-century German philosopher, poet, composer and classical philologist...

  • 1871 in literature
    1871 in literature
    The year 1871 involved saw some significant events relevant to literature.-New books:*Louisa May Alcott - Little Men*Mary Elizabeth Braddon - Fenton's Quest*Edward George Bulwer-Lytton - The Coming Race...

    - Middlemarch
    Middlemarch
    Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life is a novel by George Eliot, the pen name of Mary Anne Evans, later Marian Evans. It is her seventh novel, begun in 1869 and then put aside during the final illness of Thornton Lewes, the son of her companion George Henry Lewes...

    - George Eliot
    George Eliot
    Mary Anne Evans , better known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, journalist and translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era...

    ; Through the Looking-Glass
    Through the Looking-Glass
    Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There is a work of literature by Lewis Carroll . It is the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland...

    - Lewis Carroll
    Lewis Carroll
    Charles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...

  • 1870 in literature
    1870 in literature
    The year 1870 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Thomas Bailey Aldrich - The Story of a Bad Boy*Thomas Archer - The Terrible Sights of London*Rhoda Broughton - Red as a rose is she...

    - Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
    Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
    Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea is a classic science fiction novel by French writer Jules Verne published in 1870. It tells the story of Captain Nemo and his submarine Nautilus as seen from the perspective of Professor Pierre Aronnax...

    - Jules Verne
    Jules Verne
    Jules Gabriel Verne was a French author who pioneered the science fiction genre. He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea , A Journey to the Center of the Earth , and Around the World in Eighty Days...

    ; Venus in Furs
    Venus in Furs
    Venus in Furs is a novella by Austrian author Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the best known of his works. The novel was part of an epic series that Sacher-Masoch envisioned called Legacy of Cain. Venus in Furs was part of Love, the first volume of the series...

    - Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
    Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
    Leopold Ritter von Sacher-Masoch was an Austrian writer and journalist, who gained renown for his romantic stories of Galician life. The term masochism is derived from his name....

    ; Lothair
    Lothair (novel)
    Lothair was the first novel written by Benjamin Disraeli after his first term as Prime Minister. It deals with the comparative merits of the Catholic and Anglican churches as heirs of Judaism, and with the topical question of Italian unification...

    - Benjamin Disraeli

1860s

  • 1869 in literature
    1869 in literature
    The year 1869 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Macmillan Publishing opens first American office in New York City headed by George Edward Brett-New books:*Louisa May Alcott - Good Wives...

    - War and Peace
    War and Peace
    War and Peace is a novel by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy, first published in 1869. The work is epic in scale and is regarded as one of the most important works of world literature...

    - Leo Tolstoy
    Leo Tolstoy
    Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist...

    ; L'Education Sentimentale - Gustave Flaubert
    Gustave Flaubert
    Gustave Flaubert was a French writer who is counted among the greatest Western novelists. He is known especially for his first published novel, Madame Bovary , and for his scrupulous devotion to his art and style.-Early life and education:Flaubert was born on December 12, 1821, in Rouen,...

    ; Les Chants de Maldoror
    Les Chants de Maldoror
    Les Chants de Maldoror is a poetic novel consisting of six cantos. It was written between 1868 and 1869 by the Comte de Lautréamont, the pseudonym of Isidore Lucien Ducasse...

    - Comte de Lautréamont
    Comte de Lautréamont
    Comte de Lautréamont was the pseudonym of Isidore Lucien Ducasse , an Uruguayan-born French poet....

    ; Lorna Doone
    Lorna Doone
    Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor is a novel by Richard Doddridge Blackmore. It is a romance based on a group of historical characters and set in the late 17th century in Devon and Somerset, particularly around the East Lyn Valley area of Exmoor....

    - R. D. Blackmore
    R. D. Blackmore
    Richard Doddridge Blackmore , referred to most commonly as R. D. Blackmore, was one of the most famous English novelists of the second half of the nineteenth century. Over the course of his career, Blackmore achieved a close following around the world...

    ; The Idiot
    The Idiot (novel)
    The Idiot is a novel written by 19th century Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It was first published serially in The Russian Messenger between 1868 and 1869. The Idiot is ranked beside some of Dostoyevsky's other works as one of the most brilliant literary achievements of the "Golden Age" of...

    - Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky was a Russian writer of novels, short stories and essays. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov....

  • 1868 in literature
    1868 in literature
    The year 1868 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*First edition of the World Almanac is published.*Emile Zola defends his criticized first novel against charges of pornography and corruption of morals....

    - Little Women
    Little Women
    Little Women is a novel by American author Louisa May Alcott . The book was written and set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts. It was published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869...

    - Louisa May Alcott
    Louisa May Alcott
    Louisa May Alcott was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel Little Women and its sequels Little Men and Jo's Boys. Little Women was set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House in Concord, Massachusetts, and published in 1868...

    ; The Luck of Roaring Camp
    The Luck of Roaring Camp
    "The Luck of Roaring Camp" is a short story by American author Bret Harte. It was first published in the August 1868 issue of the Overland Monthly and helped push Harte to international prominence....

    - Bret Harte
    Bret Harte
    Francis Bret Harte was an American author and poet, best remembered for his accounts of pioneering life in California.- Life and career :...

    ; The Moonstone
    The Moonstone
    The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins is a 19th-century British epistolary novel, generally considered the first detective novel in the English language. The story was originally serialized in Charles Dickens' magazine All the Year Round. The Moonstone and The Woman in White are considered Wilkie...

    - Wilkie Collins
    Wilkie Collins
    William Wilkie Collins was an English novelist, playwright, and author of short stories. He was very popular during the Victorian era and wrote 30 novels, more than 60 short stories, 14 plays, and over 100 non-fiction pieces...

  • 1867 in literature
    1867 in literature
    The year 1867 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* Three new American periodicals for children — Oliver Optic's Magazine, Frank Leslie's Boys' and Girls' Weekly, and the Riverside Magazine for Young People — all begin publishing.-New books:*Mary Elizabeth Braddon...

    - The Gambler
    The Gambler (novel)
    The Gambler is a short novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky about a young tutor in the employment of a formerly wealthy Russian general. The novella reflects Dostoyevsky's own addiction to roulette, which was in more ways than one the inspiration for the book: Dostoyevsky completed the novella under a...

    - Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky was a Russian writer of novels, short stories and essays. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov....

  • 1866 in literature
    1866 in literature
    The year 1866 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Ludwig Anzengruber returns to Vienna after working as a travelling actor.*Luigi Capuana becomes theatre critic for Italian newspaper The Nation....

    - Crime and Punishment
    Crime and Punishment
    Crime and Punishment is a novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It was first published in the literary journal The Russian Messenger in twelve monthly installments during 1866. It was later published in a single volume. This is the second of Dostoyevsky's full-length novels following his...

    - Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Dostoevsky
    Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky was a Russian writer of novels, short stories and essays. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov....

    ; Poems and Ballads - Algernon Charles Swinburne
    Algernon Charles Swinburne
    Algernon Charles Swinburne was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He invented the roundel form, wrote several novels, and contributed to the famous Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica...

  • 1865 in literature
    1865 in literature
    The year 1865 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* June 9 - Charles Dickens is involved in the Staplehurst rail crash....

    - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
    Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
    Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is an 1865 novel written by English author Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll. It tells of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar, anthropomorphic creatures...

    - Lewis Carroll
    Lewis Carroll
    Charles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...

    ; Our Mutual Friend
    Our Mutual Friend
    Our Mutual Friend is the last novel completed by Charles Dickens and is one of his most sophisticated works, combining psychological insight with social analysis. It centres on, in the words of critic J. Hillis Miller, "money, money, money, and what money can make of life" but is also about human...

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; From the Earth to the Moon
    From the Earth to the Moon
    From the Earth to the Moon is a humorous science fantasy novel by Jules Verne and is one of the earliest entries in that genre. It tells the story of the president of a post-American Civil War gun club in Baltimore, his rival, a Philadelphia maker of armor, and a Frenchman, who build an enormous...

    - Jules Verne
    Jules Verne
    Jules Gabriel Verne was a French author who pioneered the science fiction genre. He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea , A Journey to the Center of the Earth , and Around the World in Eighty Days...

  • 1864 in literature
    1864 in literature
    The year 1864 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Ambrose Bierce is wounded at the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain.*Charles Baudelaire leaves Paris for Belgium in the hope of resolving his financial difficulties....

    - Journey to the Center of the Earth
    Journey to the Center of the Earth
    A Journey to the Center of the Earth is a classic 1864 science fiction novel by Jules Verne. The story involves a German professor who believes there are volcanic tubes going toward the center of the Earth...

    - Jules Verne
    Jules Verne
    Jules Gabriel Verne was a French author who pioneered the science fiction genre. He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea , A Journey to the Center of the Earth , and Around the World in Eighty Days...

    ; Notes from Underground
    Notes from Underground
    Notes from Underground is an 1864 short novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Notes is considered by many to be the first existentialist novel...

    - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
  • 1863 in literature
    1863 in literature
    The year 1863 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*First reunions of the Romanian Junimea literary society, a group which was to exercise a major influence on Romanian culture until the 1910s.-New books:*Mary Elizabeth Braddon...

    - Capitan Fracassa - Théophile Gautier
    Théophile Gautier
    Pierre Jules Théophile Gautier was a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist, art critic and literary critic....

  • 1862 in literature
    1862 in literature
    The year 1862 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*February - Ambrose Bierce joins the staff of General William Badcock Hazen....

    - Les Misérables
    Les Misérables
    Les Misérables , translated variously from the French as The Miserable Ones, The Wretched, The Poor Ones, The Wretched Poor, or The Victims), is an 1862 French novel by author Victor Hugo and is widely considered one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century...

    - Victor Hugo
    Victor Hugo
    Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....

    ; Fathers and Sons
    Fathers and Sons
    Fathers and Sons is an 1862 novel by Ivan Turgenev, his best known work. The title of this work in Russian is Отцы и дети , which literally means "Fathers and Children"; the work is often translated to Fathers and Sons in English for reasons of euphony.- Historical context and notes :The fathers...

    - Ivan Turgenev
    Ivan Turgenev
    Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev was a Russian novelist, short story writer, and playwright. His first major publication, a short story collection entitled A Sportsman's Sketches, is a milestone of Russian Realism, and his novel Fathers and Sons is regarded as one of the major works of 19th-century...

  • 1861 in literature
    1861 in literature
    The year 1861 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*October 20 - Poet and dramatist Apollo Korzeniowski is arrested for his political activities and placed in the infamous Tenth Pavilion of the Warsaw Citadel....

    - Silas Marner
    Silas Marner
    Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe is a dramatic novel by George Eliot. Her third novel, it was first published in 1861. An outwardly simple tale of a reclusive weaver, in its strong realism it represents one of Eliot's most sophisticated treatments of her attitude to religion.-Plot summary:The...

    - George Eliot
    George Eliot
    Mary Anne Evans , better known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, journalist and translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era...

    ; Framley Parsonage
    Framley Parsonage
    Framley Parsonage is the fourth novel in Anthony Trollope's series known as the "Chronicles of Barsetshire". It was first published in serial form in the Cornhill Magazine in 1860.-Synopsis:...

    - Anthony Trollope
    Anthony Trollope
    Anthony Trollope was one of the most successful, prolific and respected English novelists of the Victorian era. Some of his best-loved works, collectively known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire, revolve around the imaginary county of Barsetshire...

    ; Great Expectations
    Great Expectations
    Great Expectations is a novel by Charles Dickens. It was first published in serial form in the publication All the Year Round from 1 December 1860 to August 1861. It has been adapted for stage and screen over 250 times....

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; East Lynne
    East Lynne
    East Lynne is an English sensation novel of 1861 by Ellen Wood. East Lynne was a Victorian bestseller. It is remembered chiefly for its elaborate and implausible plot, centering on infidelity and double identities...

    - Mrs Henry Wood
  • 1860 in literature
    1860 in literature
    The year 1860 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*January - First issue of the Cornhill Magazine*June 9 ****- Malaeska: The Indian Wife of the White Hunter becomes the first dime novel to be published....

    - Max Havelaar
    Max Havelaar
    Max Havelaar: Or the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company is a culturally and socially significant 1860 novel by Multatuli which was to play a key role in shaping and modifying Dutch colonial policy in the Dutch East Indies in the nineteenth and early twentieth century...

    - Multatuli
    Multatuli
    Eduard Douwes Dekker , better known by his pen name Multatuli , was a Dutch writer famous for his satirical novel, Max Havelaar , which denounced the abuses of colonialism in the Dutch East Indies .-Biography:Dekker was born in Amsterdam...

    ; The Mill on the Floss
    The Mill on the Floss
    The Mill on the Floss is a novel by George Eliot , first published in three volumes in 1860 by William Blackwood. The first American edition was by Thomas Y...

    - George Eliot
    George Eliot
    Mary Anne Evans , better known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, journalist and translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era...


1850s

  • 1859 in literature
    1859 in literature
    The year 1859 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*George Eliot's novel Adam Bede is accused of being the "vile outpourings of a lewd woman's mind" in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and was consequently withdrawn from libraries.*30 April - Charles Dickens's...

    - A Tale of Two Cities
    A Tale of Two Cities
    A Tale of Two Cities is a novel by Charles Dickens, set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution. With well over 200 million copies sold, it ranks among the most famous works in the history of fictional literature....

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; The Ordeal of Richard Feverel
    The Ordeal of Richard Feverel
    The Ordeal of Richard Feverel: A History of Father and Son is the earliest full-length novel by George Meredith; its subject is the inability of systems of education to control human passions...

    - George Meredith
    George Meredith
    George Meredith, OM was an English novelist and poet of the Victorian era.- Life :Meredith was born in Portsmouth, England, a son and grandson of naval outfitters. His mother died when he was five. At the age of 14 he was sent to a Moravian School in Neuwied, Germany, where he remained for two...

    ; Oblomov
    Oblomov
    Oblomov is the best known novel by Russian writer Ivan Goncharov, first published in 1859. Oblomov is also the central character of the novel, often seen as the ultimate incarnation of the superfluous man, a symbolic character in 19th-century Russian literature...

    - Ivan Goncharov
    Ivan Goncharov
    Ivan Alexandrovich Goncharov was a Russian novelist best known as the author of Oblomov .- Biography :Ivan Goncharov was born in Simbirsk ; his father was a wealthy grain merchant and respected official who was elected mayor of Simbirsk several times...

    ; On the Origin of Species - Charles Darwin
    Charles Darwin
    Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...

  • 1858 in literature
    1858 in literature
    The year 1858 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Henrik Ibsen marries and becomes creative director of Oslo's National Theater.*Charles Baudelaire's study on Théophile Gautier is published in Revue contemporaine....

    - A House of Gentlefolk - Ivan Turgenev
    Ivan Turgenev
    Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev was a Russian novelist, short story writer, and playwright. His first major publication, a short story collection entitled A Sportsman's Sketches, is a milestone of Russian Realism, and his novel Fathers and Sons is regarded as one of the major works of 19th-century...

  • 1857 in literature
    1857 in literature
    The year 1857 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Jules Verne marries Honorine de Viane Morel.*The illustrated weekly, Über Land and Meer, is founded by Friedrich Wilhelm Hackländer and Edmund von Zoller....

    - Madame Bovary
    Madame Bovary
    Madame Bovary is Gustave Flaubert's first published novel and is considered his masterpiece. The story focuses on a doctor's wife, Emma Bovary, who has adulterous affairs and lives beyond her means in order to escape the banalities and emptiness of provincial life...

    - Gustave Flaubert
    Gustave Flaubert
    Gustave Flaubert was a French writer who is counted among the greatest Western novelists. He is known especially for his first published novel, Madame Bovary , and for his scrupulous devotion to his art and style.-Early life and education:Flaubert was born on December 12, 1821, in Rouen,...

    ; Little Dorritt - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; Les Fleurs du mal
    Les Fleurs du mal
    Les Fleurs du mal is a volume of French poetry by Charles Baudelaire. First published in 1857 , it was important in the symbolist and modernist movements...

    - Charles Baudelaire
    Charles Baudelaire
    Charles Baudelaire was a French poet who produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. His most famous work, Les Fleurs du mal expresses the changing nature of beauty in modern, industrializing Paris during the nineteenth century...

    ; The Virginians
    The Virginians
    The Virginians: A Tale of the Last Century is a historical novel by William Makepeace Thackeray which forms a sequel to his Henry Esmond and is also loosely linked to Pendennis. It tells the story of Henry Esmond's twin grandsons, George and Henry Warrington...

    - William Makepeace Thackeray
    William Makepeace Thackeray
    William Makepeace Thackeray was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society.-Biography:...

    ; Tom Brown's Schooldays
    Tom Brown's Schooldays
    Tom Brown's Schooldays is a novel by Thomas Hughes. The story is set at Rugby School, a public school for boys, in the 1830s; Hughes attended Rugby School from 1834 to 1842...

    - Thomas Hughes
    Thomas Hughes
    Thomas Hughes was an English lawyer and author. He is most famous for his novel Tom Brown's Schooldays , a semi-autobiographical work set at Rugby School, which Hughes had attended. It had a lesser-known sequel, Tom Brown at Oxford .- Biography :Hughes was the second son of John Hughes, editor of...

    ; The Hasheesh Eater
    The Hasheesh Eater
    The Hasheesh Eater is an autobiographical book by Fitz Hugh Ludlow describing the author's altered states of consciousness and philosophical flights of fancy while he was using a cannabis extract....

    - Fitz Hugh Ludlow
    Fitz Hugh Ludlow
    Fitz Hugh Ludlow, sometimes seen as “Fitzhugh Ludlow,” was an American author, journalist, and explorer; best-known for his autobiographical book The Hasheesh Eater ....

  • 1856 in literature
    1856 in literature
    The year 1856 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Arthur Schopenhauer adds a chapter on "The Metaphysics of Sexual Love" to the third edition of his The World as Will and Representation....

    - The Daisy Chain - Charlotte Mary Yonge
    Charlotte Mary Yonge
    Charlotte Mary Yonge , was an English novelist, known for her huge output, now mostly out of print.- Life :Charlotte Mary Yonge was born in Otterbourne, Hampshire, England, on 11 August 1823 to William Yonge and Fanny Yonge, née Bargus. She was educated at home by her father, studying Latin, Greek,...

    ; Aurora Leigh
    Aurora Leigh
    Aurora Leigh is an eponymous epic novel/poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The poem is written in blank verse and encompasses nine books . It is a first person narration, from the point of view of Aurora; its other heroine, Marian Erle, is an abused self-taught child of itinerant parents...

    - Elizabeth Barrett Browning
    Elizabeth Barrett Browning
    Elizabeth Barrett Browning was one of the most prominent poets of the Victorian era. Her poetry was widely popular in both England and the United States during her lifetime. A collection of her last poems was published by her husband, Robert Browning, shortly after her death.-Early life:Members...

    ; Lilies In December
    Lilies In December
    Lilies In December is the sole novel and debut work of 19th Century Literature author and playwright Agustus Montrose. He was inspired by travels to Ireland during the Great Famine. It is widely recognized as one of the best psychological realism novels of the era. It has been praised for its...

    - Agustus Montrose
    Agustus Montrose
    Agustus Horatio Montrose was an English novelist and playwright operating in the northeast of London in the mid to late 19th century. He is especially notable for one novel and several plays, although he wrote 22 known pieces and there is a possibility that more were created unknown to the...

  • 1855 in literature
    1855 in literature
    The year 1855 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* July 4 - In Brooklyn, New York, Walt Whitman's first edition of his book of poems titled Leaves of Grass is published....

    - The Grandmother
    The Grandmother
    The Grandmother is a novel written by Czech writer Božena Němcová in 1855. It is her most popular work and is regarded as a classic piece of Czech literature. This most frequently read book of the Czech nation was published more than 300 times in the Czech language alone and translated into 21...

    - Božena Němcová
    Božena Nemcová
    Božena Němcová was a Czech writer of the final phase of the Czech National Revival movement.-Biography:...

    ; Westward Ho!
    Westward Ho!
    Westward Ho! is a seaside village near Bideford in Devon, England. The A39 road provides access from the towns of Barnstaple, Bideford and Bude...

    - Charles Kingsley
    Charles Kingsley
    Charles Kingsley was an English priest of the Church of England, university professor, historian and novelist, particularly associated with the West Country and northeast Hampshire.-Life and character:...

  • 1854 in literature
    1854 in literature
    The year 1854 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* The Polyglotta Africana, an early classification of African languages based on field work under freed slaves in Freetown, Sierra Leone, is published by Sigismund Wilhelm Koelle....

    - Walden
    Walden
    Walden is an American book written by noted Transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau...

    - Henry David Thoreau
    Henry David Thoreau
    Henry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist...

    ; The Newcomes
    The Newcomes
    The Newcomes is an novel by William Makepeace Thackeray, first published in 1855.-Publication:The Newcomes was published serially over about two years, as Thackeray himself says in one of the novel's final chapters...

    - William Makepeace Thackeray
    William Makepeace Thackeray
    William Makepeace Thackeray was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society.-Biography:...

  • 1853 in literature
    1853 in literature
    The year 1853 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Charles Dickens writes Bleak House, the first English novel to feature a detective.*William Wells Brown becomes the first African American novelist to be published.-New books:...

    - Bleak House
    Bleak House
    Bleak House is the ninth novel by Charles Dickens, published in twenty monthly installments between March 1852 and September 1853. It is held to be one of Dickens's finest novels, containing one of the most vast, complex and engaging arrays of minor characters and sub-plots in his entire canon...

    by Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

     is the first English novel to feature a detective; The Heir of Redclyffe
    The Heir of Redclyffe
    The Heir of Redclyffe was the first of Charlotte M. Yonge's bestselling romantic novels. Its religious tone derives from the High Church background of her family and from her friendship with a leading figure in the Oxford Movement, John Keble, who closely supervised the writing of the book. The...

    - Charlotte Mary Yonge
    Charlotte Mary Yonge
    Charlotte Mary Yonge , was an English novelist, known for her huge output, now mostly out of print.- Life :Charlotte Mary Yonge was born in Otterbourne, Hampshire, England, on 11 August 1823 to William Yonge and Fanny Yonge, née Bargus. She was educated at home by her father, studying Latin, Greek,...

    ; The Scholar Gipsy
    The Scholar Gipsy
    "The Scholar Gipsy" is a poem by Matthew Arnold, based on a 17th century Oxford story found in Joseph Glanvill's The Vanity of Dogmatizing...

    - Matthew Arnold
    Matthew Arnold
    Matthew Arnold was a British poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, literary professor, and William Delafield Arnold, novelist and colonial administrator...

    ; Bartleby, the Scrivener - Herman Melville
    Herman Melville
    Herman 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....

  • 1852 in literature
    1852 in literature
    The year 1852 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Manuel Antônio de Almeida - Memoirs of a Police Sergeant*Wilkie Collins - Basil: A Story of Modern Life...

    - Uncle Tom's Cabin
    Uncle Tom's Cabin
    Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. Published in 1852, the novel "helped lay the groundwork for the Civil War", according to Will Kaufman....

    - Harriet Beecher Stowe
    Harriet Beecher Stowe
    Harriet Beecher Stowe was an American abolitionist and author. Her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin was a depiction of life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the United States and United Kingdom...

  • 1851 in literature
    1851 in literature
    The year 1851 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*January 1 - The Georgian theatre company gives its first performance, under the direction of Giorgi Eristavi....

    - Moby-Dick
    Moby-Dick
    Moby-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,...

    - Herman Melville
    Herman Melville
    Herman 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....

    ; Lavengro
    Lavengro
    Lavengro: The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Priest is a work by George Borrow, falling somewhere between the genres of memoir and novel, which has long been considered a classic of 19th century English literature. According to the author lav-engro is a Romany word meaning "word master". The historian...

    - George Borrow
    George Borrow
    George Henry Borrow was an English author who wrote novels and travelogues based on his own experiences around Europe. Over the course of his wanderings, he developed a close affinity with the Romani people of Europe. They figure prominently in his work...

    ; The House of the Seven Gables
    The House of the Seven Gables
    The House of the Seven Gables is a 1668 colonial mansion in Salem, Massachusetts, USA. The house is now a non-profit museum, with an admission fee charged for tours, as well as an active settlement house with programs for children...

    - Nathaniel Hawthorne
    Nathaniel Hawthorne
    Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer.Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in 1804 in the city of Salem, Massachusetts to Nathaniel Hathorne and the former Elizabeth Clarke Manning. His ancestors include John Hathorne, a judge during the Salem Witch Trials...

  • 1850 in literature
    1850 in literature
    The year 1850 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Alfred Lord Tennyson named Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, succeeding William Wordsworth.*Periodical Household Words begins publication...

    - The Scarlet Letter
    The Scarlet Letter
    The Scarlet Letter is an 1850 romantic work of fiction in a historical setting, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is considered to be his magnum opus. Set in 17th-century Puritan Boston during the years 1642 to 1649, it tells the story of Hester Prynne, who conceives a daughter through an...

    - Nathaniel Hawthorne
    Nathaniel Hawthorne
    Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer.Nathaniel Hawthorne was born in 1804 in the city of Salem, Massachusetts to Nathaniel Hathorne and the former Elizabeth Clarke Manning. His ancestors include John Hathorne, a judge during the Salem Witch Trials...

    ; David Copperfield
    David Copperfield (novel)
    The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery , commonly referred to as David Copperfield, is the eighth novel by Charles Dickens, first published as a novel in 1850. Like most of his works, it originally appeared in serial...

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    , Household Words
    Household Words
    Household Words was an English weekly magazine edited by Charles Dickens in the 1850s which took its name from the line from Shakespeare "Familiar in his mouth as household words" — Henry V.-History:...

    edited by Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

     begins publication; Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day
    Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day
    Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day, a Poem is, despite the title, often treated as two poems by Robert Browning, rather than as one poem in two parts. It was the first new work published by Robert Browning after his marriage to Elizabeth Barrett Browning and their departure for Italy, and is widely...

    - Robert Browning
    Robert Browning
    Robert Browning was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets.-Early years:...


1840s

  • 1849 in literature
    1849 in literature
    The year 1849 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*La Tribune des Peuples, a pan-European romantic nationalist periodical, is published between March and November by Adam Mickiewicz.*Who's Who is published for the first time....

    - David Copperfield
    David Copperfield (novel)
    The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery , commonly referred to as David Copperfield, is the eighth novel by Charles Dickens, first published as a novel in 1850. Like most of his works, it originally appeared in serial...

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    , published as a serial in installments; The Oregon Trail - Francis Parkman
    Francis Parkman
    Francis Parkman was an American historian, best known as author of The Oregon Trail: Sketches of Prairie and Rocky-Mountain Life and his monumental seven-volume France and England in North America. These works are still valued as history and especially as literature, although the biases of his...

  • 1848 in literature
    1848 in literature
    The year 1848 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*R M Ballantyne -Life in the Wilds of North America*Anne Brontë - The Tenant of Wildfell Hall*Edward George Bulwer-Lytton - Harold...

    - The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
    The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
    The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is the second and final novel by English author Anne Brontë, published in 1848 under the pseudonym Acton Bell...

    - Anne Brontë
    Anne Brontë
    Anne 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...

    ; Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackery; Eureka - Edgar Allan Poe
    Edgar Allan Poe
    Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...

     -Completed
  • 1847 in literature
    1847 in literature
    The year 1847 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Honoré de Balzac - Le Cousin Pons*Anne Brontë - Agnes Grey*Charlotte Brontë - Jane Eyre*Emily Brontë - Wuthering Heights*Catherine Gore - Castles in The Air...

    - The Vicomte de Bragelonne
    The Vicomte de Bragelonne
    The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later is a novel by Alexandre Dumas. It is the third and last of the d'Artagnan Romances, following The Three Musketeers and Twenty Years After. It appeared first in serial form between 1847 and 1850...

    - Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...

    ; Wuthering Heights
    Wuthering Heights
    Wuthering Heights is a novel by Emily Brontë published in 1847. It was her only novel and written between December 1845 and July 1846. It remained unpublished until July 1847 and was not printed until December after the success of her sister Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane Eyre...

    - Emily Brontë
    Emily Brontë
    Emily Jane Brontë 30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English novelist and poet, best remembered for her only novel, Wuthering Heights, now considered a classic of English literature. Emily was the third eldest of the four surviving Brontë siblings, between the youngest Anne and her brother...

    ; Jane Eyre
    Jane Eyre
    Jane Eyre is a novel by English writer Charlotte Brontë. It was published in London, England, in 1847 by Smith, Elder & Co. with the title Jane Eyre. An Autobiography under the pen name "Currer Bell." The first American edition was released the following year by Harper & Brothers of New York...

    - Charlotte Brontë
    Charlotte Brontë
    Charlotte Brontë was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood, whose novels are English literature standards...

    ; Evangeline
    Evangeline
    Evangeline, A Tale of Acadie, is an epic poem published in 1847 by the American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The poem follows an Acadian girl named Evangeline and her search for her lost love Gabriel, set during the time of the Expulsion of the Acadians.The idea for the poem came from...

    - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an American poet and educator whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline...

    ; Tancred
    Tancred (novel)
    Tancred; or, The New Crusade is a novel by Benjamin Disraeli, first published by Henry Colburn in three volumes. Together with Coningsby and Sybil it forms a sequence sometimes called the Young England trilogy...

    - Benjamin Disraeli
  • 1846 in literature
    1846 in literature
    The year 1846 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*First publication of the Daily News, edited by Charles Dickens....

    - Cousin Bette - Honoré de Balzac
    Honoré de Balzac
    Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. His magnum opus was a sequence of short stories and novels collectively entitled La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of French life in the years after the 1815 fall of Napoleon....

  • 1845 in literature
    1845 in literature
    The year 1845 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*April 24 - Alfred de Musset and Honoré de Balzac are awarded the Légion d'honneur.* Robert Browning begins his correspondence with his future wife, Elizabeth Barrett....

    - The Count of Monte Cristo
    The Count of Monte Cristo
    The Count of Monte Cristo is an adventure novel by Alexandre Dumas. It is often considered to be, along with The Three Musketeers, Dumas's most popular work. He completed the work in 1844...

    - Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...

    ; Twenty Years After
    Twenty Years After
    Twenty Years After is a novel by Alexandre Dumas, père, first serialized from January to August, 1845. A book of the D'Artagnan Romances, it is a sequel to The Three Musketeers and precedes The Vicomte de Bragelonne .The novel follows events in France during La Fronde, during the childhood reign...

    - Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...

    ; La Reine Margot - Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...

    ; Stages on Life's Way
    Stages on Life's Way
    Stages on Life's Way is a philosophical work by Søren Kierkegaard written in 1845. The book was written as a continuation of Kierkegaard's masterpiece Either/Or...

    - Søren Kierkegaard
    Søren Kierkegaard
    Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish Christian philosopher, theologian and religious author. He was a critic of idealist intellectuals and philosophers of his time, such as Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel...

  • 1844 in literature
    1844 in literature
    The year 1844 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* The first volumes of the Patrologia Latina, a 217 volume collection of works in Latin, are published in Paris by Jacques Paul Migne...

    - The Three Musketeers
    The Three Musketeers
    The Three Musketeers is a novel by Alexandre Dumas, first serialized in March–July 1844. Set in the 17th century, it recounts the adventures of a young man named d'Artagnan after he leaves home to travel to Paris, to join the Musketeers of the Guard...

    - Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, père
    Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...

  • 1843 in literature
    1843 in literature
    The year 1843 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*William Harrison Ainsworth - Windsor Castle*Edward George Bulwer-Lytton - The Last of the Barons*James Fenimore Cooper - Le Mouchoir; an Autobiographical Romance...

    - A Christmas Carol
    A Christmas Carol
    A Christmas Carol is a novella by English author Charles Dickens first published by Chapman & Hall on 17 December 1843. The story tells of sour and stingy Ebenezer Scrooge's ideological, ethical, and emotional transformation after the supernatural visits of Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of...

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; Windsor Castle
    Windsor Castle (novel)
    Windsor Castle is a novel by William Harrison Ainsworth serially published in 1842. It is a historical romance with gothic elements that depicts Henry VIII's pursuit of Anne Boleyn...

    - William Harrison Ainsworth
    William Harrison Ainsworth
    William Harrison Ainsworth was an English historical novelist born in Manchester. He trained as a lawyer, but the legal profession held no attraction for him. While completing his legal studies in London he met the publisher John Ebers, at that time manager of the King's Theatre, Haymarket...

    ; Either/Or
    Either/Or
    Published in two volumes in 1843, Either/Or is an influential book written by the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, exploring the aesthetic and ethical "phases" or "stages" of existence....

    - Søren Kierkegaard
    Søren Kierkegaard
    Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish Christian philosopher, theologian and religious author. He was a critic of idealist intellectuals and philosophers of his time, such as Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel...

    ; Repetition (Kierkegaard)
    Repetition (Kierkegaard)
    Kierkegaard said "Seneca has said that when a person has reached his thirtieth year he ought to know his constitution so well that he can be his own physician; I likewise believe that when a person has reached a certain age he ought to be able to be his own pastor...

    - Søren Kierkegaard
    Søren Kierkegaard
    Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish Christian philosopher, theologian and religious author. He was a critic of idealist intellectuals and philosophers of his time, such as Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel...

    ; The Ugly Duckling
    The Ugly Duckling
    "The Ugly Duckling" is a literary fairy tale by Danish poet and author Hans Christian Andersen . The story tells of a homely little bird born in a barnyard who suffers abuse from his neighbors until, much to his delight , he matures into a beautiful swan, the most beautiful bird of all...

    - Hans Christian Andersen
    Hans Christian Andersen
    Hans Christian Andersen was a Danish author, fairy tale writer, and poet noted for his children's stories. These include "The Steadfast Tin Soldier," "The Snow Queen," "The Little Mermaid," "Thumbelina," "The Little Match Girl," and "The Ugly Duckling."...

  • 1842 in literature
    1842 in literature
    The year 1842 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Fanny Burney's diary and letters are posthumously published.*The Book of Abraham is published in two installments in the Times and Seasons....

    - Dead Souls
    Dead Souls
    Dead Souls is a novel by Nikolai Gogol, first published in 1842, and widely regarded as an exemplar of 19th-century Russian literature. Gogol himself saw it as an "epic poem in prose", and within the book as a "novel in verse". Despite supposedly completing the trilogy's second part, Gogol...

    - Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol was a Ukrainian-born Russian dramatist and novelist.Considered by his contemporaries one of the preeminent figures of the natural school of Russian literary realism, later critics have found in Gogol's work a fundamentally romantic sensibility, with strains of Surrealism...

  • 1841 in literature
    1841 in literature
    The year 1841 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Horace Greeley begins publication of the New York Tribune.*Punch magazine is founded in London.-New books:*William Harrison Ainsworth - Old St...

    - The Deerslayer - James Fenimore Cooper
    James Fenimore Cooper
    James 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...

    ; Demon
    Demon (poem)
    Demon is a poem by Mikhail Lermontov, written in several versions in the years 1829 to 1839. It is considered a masterpiece of European Romantic poetry....

    - Mikhail Lermontov
    Mikhail Lermontov
    Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov , a Russian Romantic writer, poet and painter, sometimes called "the poet of the Caucasus", became the most important Russian poet after Alexander Pushkin's death in 1837. Lermontov is considered the supreme poet of Russian literature alongside Pushkin and the greatest...

  • 1840 in literature
    1840 in literature
    The year 1840 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Novelist Fritz Reuter is freed from the fortress of Dömitz after two years' imprisonment on a charge of high treason....

    - A Hero of Our Time
    A Hero of Our Time
    A Hero of Our Time is a novel by Mikhail Lermontov, written in 1839 and revised in 1841. It is an example of the superfluous man novel, noted for its compelling Byronic hero Pechorin and for the beautiful descriptions of the Caucasus...

    - Mikhail Lermontov
    Mikhail Lermontov
    Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov , a Russian Romantic writer, poet and painter, sometimes called "the poet of the Caucasus", became the most important Russian poet after Alexander Pushkin's death in 1837. Lermontov is considered the supreme poet of Russian literature alongside Pushkin and the greatest...

    ; Two Years Before the Mast
    Two Years Before the Mast
    Two Years Before the Mast is a book by the American author Richard Henry Dana, Jr., published in 1840, having been written after a two-year sea voyage starting in 1834. A film adaptation under the same name was released in 1946.- Background :...

    - Richard Henry Dana, Jr.
    Richard Henry Dana, Jr.
    Richard Henry Dana Jr. was an American lawyer and politician from Massachusetts, a descendant of an eminent colonial family who gained renown as the author of the American classic, the memoir Two Years Before the Mast...

    ; Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque
    Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque
    Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque is a collection of previously published short stories by Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1840.-Publication:It was published by the Philadelphia firm Lea & Blanchard and released in two volumes...

    - Edgar Allan Poe
    Edgar Allan Poe
    Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...

    ; The Arabian Nights - Edward William Lane
    Edward William Lane
    Edward William Lane was a British Orientalist, translator and lexicographer....

     publishes an English version

1830s

  • 1839 in literature
    1839 in literature
    The year 1839 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Washington Irving begins contributing regularly to The Knickerbocker, and will publish thirty new pieces in the magazine — including "The Creole Village," in which he will coin the phrase "the almighty dollar" — through March...

    - The Voyage of the Beagle
    The Voyage of the Beagle
    The Voyage of the Beagle is a title commonly given to the book written by Charles Darwin and published in 1839 as his Journal and Remarks, bringing him considerable fame and respect...

    - Charles Darwin
    Charles Darwin
    Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...

    ; Nicholas Nickleby - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; The Charterhouse of Parma
    The Charterhouse of Parma
    The Charterhouse of Parma is a novel published in 1839 by Stendhal.-Plot summary:The Charterhouse of Parma tells the story of the young Italian nobleman Fabrice del Dongo and his adventures from his birth in 1798 to his death...

    - Stendhal
    Stendhal
    Marie-Henri Beyle , better known by his pen name Stendhal, was a 19th-century French writer. Known for his acute analysis of his characters' psychology, he is considered one of the earliest and foremost practitioners of realism in his two novels Le Rouge et le Noir and La Chartreuse de Parme...

  • 1838 in literature
    1838 in literature
    The year 1838 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* George Palmer Putnam and John Wiley form the book publishing and retail firm of Wiley & Putnam in New York City. It is the forerunner of G. P...

    - Oliver Twist
    Oliver Twist
    Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress is the second novel by English author Charles Dickens, published by Richard Bentley in 1838. The story is about an orphan Oliver Twist, who endures a miserable existence in a workhouse and then is placed with an undertaker. He escapes and travels to...

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; The Birds of America
    Birds of America (book)
    The Birds of America is a book by naturalist and painter John James Audubon, containing illustrations of a wide variety of birds of the United States. It was first published as a series of sections between 1827 and 1838, in Edinburgh and London....

    - John James Audubon
    John James Audubon
    John James Audubon was a French-American ornithologist, naturalist, and painter. He was notable for his expansive studies to document all types of American birds and for his detailed illustrations that depicted the birds in their natural habitats...

  • 1837 in literature
    1837 in literature
    The year 1837 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* The Little, Brown and Company publishing house opens its doors.* First publication of the The United States Magazine and Democratic Review.-New books:...

    - The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club
    The Pickwick Papers
    The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club is the first novel by Charles Dickens. After the publication, the widow of the illustrator Robert Seymour claimed that the idea for the novel was originally her husband's; however, in his preface to the 1867 edition, Dickens strenuously denied any...

    - Charles Dickens
    Charles Dickens
    Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

    ; Death of the Poet
    Death of the Poet
    "Death of the Poet" is an 1837 poem by Mikhail Lermontov, written in reaction to the death of Alexander Pushkin.Pushkin was mortally wounded in a duel on January 27, 1837, and died on the 29th...

    - Mikhail Lermontov
    Mikhail Lermontov
    Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov , a Russian Romantic writer, poet and painter, sometimes called "the poet of the Caucasus", became the most important Russian poet after Alexander Pushkin's death in 1837. Lermontov is considered the supreme poet of Russian literature alongside Pushkin and the greatest...

  • 1836 in literature
    1836 in literature
    The year 1836 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk, or, The Hidden Secrets of a Nun's Life in a Convent Exposed *Hans Christian Andersen - The Little Mermaid...

    - Máj
    Máj
    Máj is a romantic poem by Karel Hynek Mácha in four cantos. It was fiercely criticized when first published, but since then has gained the status of one of the most prominent works of Czech literature; the poem now is memorized by schoolchildren and continuously in print.-Setting:According to the...

    - Karel Hynek Mácha
    Karel Hynek Mácha
    Karel Hynek Mácha was a Czech romantic poet.- Biography :Mácha grew up in Prague, the son of a foreman at a mill. He learned Latin and German in school...

    ; The Captain's Daughter
    The Captain's Daughter
    The Captain's Daughter is a historical novel by the Russian writer Alexander Pushkin. It was first published in 1836 in the fourth issue of the literary journal Sovremennik. The novel is a romanticized account of Pugachev's Rebellion in 1773-1774....

     - Alexander Pushkin; The Government Inspector and The Nose - Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol was a Ukrainian-born Russian dramatist and novelist.Considered by his contemporaries one of the preeminent figures of the natural school of Russian literary realism, later critics have found in Gogol's work a fundamentally romantic sensibility, with strains of Surrealism...

  • 1835 in literature
    1835 in literature
    The year 1835 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* Alexis de Tocqueville publishes the first volume of Democracy in America....

    -
    Le Père Goriot
    Le Père Goriot
    Le Père Goriot is an 1835 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac , included in the Scènes de la vie Parisienne section of his novel sequence La Comédie humaine...

    - Honoré de Balzac
    Honoré de Balzac
    Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. His magnum opus was a sequence of short stories and novels collectively entitled La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of French life in the years after the 1815 fall of Napoleon....

    ;
    Taras Bulba
    Taras Bulba
    Taras Bulba is a romanticized historical novel by Nikolai Gogol. It tells the story of an old Zaporozhian Cossack, Taras Bulba, and his two sons, Andriy and Ostap. Taras’ sons studied at the Kiev Academy and return home...

    - Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol was a Ukrainian-born Russian dramatist and novelist.Considered by his contemporaries one of the preeminent figures of the natural school of Russian literary realism, later critics have found in Gogol's work a fundamentally romantic sensibility, with strains of Surrealism...

  • 1834 in literature
    1834 in literature
    The year 1834 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*William Harrison Ainsworth -Rookwood*Carl Jonas Love Almquist - Drottningens juvelsmycke*Honoré de Balzac - Le père Goriot...

    -
    Sartor Resartus
    Sartor Resartus
    Thomas Carlyle's major work, Sartor Resartus , first published as a serial in 1833-34, purported to be a commentary on the thought and early life of a German philosopher called Diogenes Teufelsdröckh , author of a tome entitled "Clothes: their Origin and Influence" , but was actually a poioumenon...

    - Thomas Carlyle
    Thomas Carlyle
    Thomas Carlyle was a Scottish satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher during the Victorian era.He called economics "the dismal science", wrote articles for the Edinburgh Encyclopedia, and became a controversial social commentator.Coming from a strict Calvinist family, Carlyle was...

    ; The Queen of Spades
    The Queen of Spades (story)
    "The Queen of Spades" is a short story by Alexander Pushkin about human avarice. Pushkin wrote the story in autumn 1833 in Boldino and it was first published in the literary magazine Biblioteka dlya chteniya in March 1834...

     - Alexander Pushkin
  • 1833 in literature
    1833 in literature
    The year 1833 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Alphonse de Lamartine is elected a député of France.*Parley's Magazine, an American periodical for young readers, publishes its first issue.-New Books:*Honoré de Balzac...

    -
    Gamiani
    Gamiani
    Gamiani, or Two Nights of Excess , is a French erotic novel first published in 1833. Its authorship is anonymous, but it is believed to have been written by Alfred de Musset and the lesbian eponymous heroine a portrait of his lover, George Sand...

    - Alfred de Musset
    Alfred de Musset
    Alfred Louis Charles de Musset-Pathay was a French dramatist, poet, and novelist.Along with his poetry, he is known for writing La Confession d'un enfant du siècle from 1836.-Biography:Musset was born on 11 December 1810 in Paris...

    ;
    Eugene Onegin
    Eugene Onegin
    Eugene Onegin is a novel in verse written by Alexander Pushkin.It is a classic of Russian literature, and its eponymous protagonist has served as the model for a number of Russian literary heroes . It was published in serial form between 1825 and 1832...

    - Aleksandr Pushkin
    Aleksandr Pushkin
    Alexander 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....

    ;
    Eugénie Grandet
    Eugénie Grandet
    Eugénie Grandet is an 1833 novel by Honoré de Balzac about miserliness, and how it is bequeathed from the father to the daughter, Eugénie, through her unsatisfying love attachment with her cousin. As is usual with Balzac, all the characters in the novel are fully realized...

    - Honoré de Balzac
    Honoré de Balzac
    Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. His magnum opus was a sequence of short stories and novels collectively entitled La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of French life in the years after the 1815 fall of Napoleon....

  • 1832 in literature
    1832 in literature
    The year 1832 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The Houghton Mifflin publishing house founded in Boston, Massachusetts* Publishers begin the use of a paper jacket to wrap book covers...

    -
    Eugene Onegin
    Eugene Onegin
    Eugene Onegin is a novel in verse written by Alexander Pushkin.It is a classic of Russian literature, and its eponymous protagonist has served as the model for a number of Russian literary heroes . It was published in serial form between 1825 and 1832...

    - Alexander Pushkin; Faust
    Faust
    Faust is the protagonist of a classic German legend; a highly successful scholar, but also dissatisfied with his life, and so makes a deal with the devil, exchanging his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures. Faust's tale is the basis for many literary, artistic, cinematic, and musical...

    Part Two - Goethe; Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka
    Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka
    Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka is a collection of short stories by Nikolai Gogol, written from 1831-1832. They appeared in various magazines and were published in book form when Gogol, who had spent his life in Ukraine up to the age of nineteen, was twenty two. He put his early impressions and...

    - Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Gogol
    Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol was a Ukrainian-born Russian dramatist and novelist.Considered by his contemporaries one of the preeminent figures of the natural school of Russian literary realism, later critics have found in Gogol's work a fundamentally romantic sensibility, with strains of Surrealism...

  • 1831 in literature
    1831 in literature
    The year 1831 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* January 15 - Victor Hugo completed his novel Notre-Dame de Paris, known in English as The Hunchback of Notre Dame....

    -
    Notre-Dame de Paris - Victor Hugo
    Victor Hugo
    Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....

  • 1830 in literature
    1830 in literature
    The year 1830 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Amos Bronson Alcott marries Abby May.*Edgar Allan Poe takes up an appointment at the United States Military Academy, West Point....

    -
    The Red and the Black
    The Red and the Black
    Le Rouge et le Noir , 1830, by Stendhal, is a historical psychological novel in two volumes, chronicling a provincial young man’s attempts to socially rise beyond his plebeian upbringing with a combination of talent and hard work, deception and hypocrisy — yet who ultimately allows his passions to...

    - Stendhal
    Stendhal
    Marie-Henri Beyle , better known by his pen name Stendhal, was a 19th-century French writer. Known for his acute analysis of his characters' psychology, he is considered one of the earliest and foremost practitioners of realism in his two novels Le Rouge et le Noir and La Chartreuse de Parme...


1820s

  • 1829 in literature
    1829 in literature
    The year 1829 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:*Edward George Bulwer-Lytton - Devereux*Honoré de Balzac - Les Chouans*Catherine Gore - Romances of Real Life...

    -
    The Misfortunes of Elphin
    The Misfortunes of Elphin
    The Misfortunes of Elphin is the fifth novel by Thomas Love Peacock, published in 1829. It is set in a somewhat historically-fanciful Arthurian Britain which incorporates many Welsh legends, but avoids all supernatural and mystical elements. Seithenyn appears as a major character.-External links:*...

    - Thomas Love Peacock
    Thomas Love Peacock
    Thomas Love Peacock was an English satirist and author.Peacock was a close friend of Percy Bysshe Shelley and they influenced each other's work...

  • 1828 in literature
    1828 in literature
    The year 1828 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The first volume of John James Audubon's 10-volume The Birds of America is published....

    -
    The Birds of America
    Birds of America (book)
    The Birds of America is a book by naturalist and painter John James Audubon, containing illustrations of a wide variety of birds of the United States. It was first published as a series of sections between 1827 and 1838, in Edinburgh and London....

    - John James Audubon
    John James Audubon
    John James Audubon was a French-American ornithologist, naturalist, and painter. He was notable for his expansive studies to document all types of American birds and for his detailed illustrations that depicted the birds in their natural habitats...

  • 1827 in literature
    1827 in literature
    The year 1827 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Samuel G. Goodrich publishes the first of the "Peter Parley" juvenile novels that would continue until 1860....

    -
    Book of Songs (poetry) - Heinrich Heine
    Heinrich Heine
    Christian Johann Heinrich Heine was one of the most significant German poets of the 19th century. He was also a journalist, essayist, and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of Lieder by composers such as Robert Schumann...

  • 1826 in literature
    1826 in literature
    The year 1826 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The Juvenile Miscellany, an American magazine for children, begins publishing in Boston...

    -
    The Last of the Mohicans
    The Last of the Mohicans
    The Last of the Mohicans: A Narrative of 1757 is a historical novel by James Fenimore Cooper, first published in February 1826. It is the second book of the Leatherstocking Tales pentalogy and the best known...

    - James Fenimore Cooper
    James Fenimore Cooper
    James 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...

    ;
    Cinq-Mars - Alfred de Vigny
    Alfred de Vigny
    Alfred Victor de Vigny was a French poet, playwright, and novelist.-Life:Alfred de Vigny was born in Loches into an aristocratic family...

  • 1825 in literature
    1825 in literature
    The year 1825 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Henri Boulard dies, leaving behind one of the greatest book collections in history, with a library containing more than half a million books.-Fiction:...

    -
    Boris Godunov - Alexander Pushkin; The Betrothed - Alessandro Manzoni
    Alessandro Manzoni
    Alessandro Francesco Tommaso Manzoni was an Italian poet and novelist.He is famous for the novel The Betrothed , generally ranked among the masterpieces of world literature...

  • 1824 in literature
    1824 in literature
    The year 1824 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Julia Beckwith Hart becomes the first Canadian female writer to be published....

    - Our Village
    Our Village
    Our Village is a collection of about 100 literary sketches of rural life written by Mary Russell Mitford , and originally published during the 1820s and 1830s. The series first appeared in The Lady's Magazine. The full title is: Our Village: Sketches of Rural Character and Scenery...

    - Mary Russell Mitford
    Mary Russell Mitford
    Mary Russell Mitford , was an English author and dramatist. She was born at Alresford, Hampshire. Her place in English literature is as the author of Our Village...

  • 1823 in literature
    1823 in literature
    The year 1823 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Clement Clarke Moore's poem, A Visit from St. Nicholas introduces the character named "Santa Claus"....

    - The Pioneers - James Fenimore Cooper
    James Fenimore Cooper
    James 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...

    ; Woe from Wit
    Woe from Wit
    Woe from Wit is Alexander Griboyedov's comedy in verse, satirizing the society of post-Napoleonic Moscow, or, as a high official in the play styled it, "a pasquinade on Moscow."The play, written in 1823 in the countryside and in Tiflis, was not passed by the censorship for the stage, and...

    - Alexander Griboyedov; The Fountain of Bakhchisaray
    The Fountain of Bakhchisaray
    For Boris Asafyev's ballet of the same name, see The Fountain of Bakhchisarai The Fountain of Bakhchisaray is a poem by Alexander Pushkin, written 1821-1823....

     - Alexander Pushkin
  • 1822 in literature
    1822 in literature
    The year 1822 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Thursday-evening class" begins*Percy Bysshe Shelley dies-New books:*Hans Christian Andersen - Ghost at Palnatoke's Grave...

    -
    The Vision of Judgment
    The Vision of Judgment
    The Vision of Judgment is a satirical poem in ottava rima by Lord Byron, which depicts a dispute in Heaven over the fate of George III's soul. It was written in response to the Poet Laureate Robert Southey's A Vision of Judgement , which had imagined the soul of king George triumphantly entering...

    - Lord Byron
  • 1821 in literature
    1821 in literature
    The year 1821 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* In the first known obscenity case in the United States, a Massachusetts court outlawed the John Cleland novel, Fanny Hill ...

    -
    Confessions of an English Opium Eater - Thomas De Quincey
    Thomas de Quincey
    Thomas Penson de Quincey was an English esssayist, best known for his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater .-Child and student:...

  • 1820 in literature
    1820 in literature
    The year 1820 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Robert Chambers's publishing company publishes The Songs of Robert Burns....

    -
    Ruslan and Ludmila - Alexander Pushkin

1810s

  • 1819 in literature
    1819 in literature
    The year 1819 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* In England, Richard Carlile is convicted of blasphemy and sent to prison for publishing The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine ....

    -
    Ivanhoe
    Ivanhoe
    Ivanhoe is a historical fiction novel by Sir Walter Scott in 1819, and set in 12th-century England. Ivanhoe is sometimes credited for increasing interest in Romanticism and Medievalism; John Henry Newman claimed Scott "had first turned men's minds in the direction of the middle ages," while...

    - Sir Walter Scott; The Sketch Book - Washington Irving
    Washington Irving
    Washington Irving was an American author, essayist, biographer and historian of the early 19th century. He was best known for his short stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle", both of which appear in his book The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. His historical works...

    ;
    Ode to a Nightingale
    Ode to a Nightingale
    "Ode to a Nightingale" is a poem by John Keats written in May 1819 in either the garden of the Spaniards Inn, Hampstead, or, as according to Keats' friend Charles Armitage Brown, under a plum tree in the garden of Keats House, Hampstead, London. According to Brown, a nightingale had built its nest...

    - John Keats
    John Keats
    John 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...

  • 1818 in literature
    1818 in literature
    The year 1818 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Lord Byron begins writing Don Juan.* Series of lectures on poetry, drama, philosophy - Samuel Taylor Coleridge.-New books:*Jane Austen - Persuasion...

    -
    Frankenstein
    Frankenstein
    Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel about a failed experiment that produced a monster, written by Mary Shelley, with inserts of poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first...

    - Mary Shelley
    Mary Shelley
    Mary Shelley was a British novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer, best known for her Gothic novel Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus . She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley...

    ;
    Julian and Maddalo
    Julian and Maddalo
    "Julian and Maddalo: A Conversation" is a poem in 617 lines of enjambed heroic couplets by Percy Bysshe Shelley. It was written in the autumn of 1818 at a villa called I Capuccini, in Este, near Venice, which had been lent to Shelley by his friend Lord Byron, and it was given its final revision...

    - Percy Bysshe Shelley
    Percy Bysshe Shelley
    Percy 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...

  • 1817 in literature
    1817 in literature
    The year 1817 in literature involved some significant new books, including Sir Walter Scott's Rob Roy, Lord Byron's Manfred, Hegel's Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences, and the death of Jane Austen mid-year.-New books:...

    -
    Rob Roy
    Rob Roy (novel)
    Rob Roy is a historical novel by Walter Scott. It is narrated by Frank Osbaldistone, the son of an English merchant who travels first to the North of England, and subsequently to the Scottish Highlands to collect a debt stolen from his father. On the way he encounters the larger-than-life title...

    - Sir Walter Scott; Ormond and Harrington - Maria Edgeworth
    Maria Edgeworth
    Maria Edgeworth was a prolific Anglo-Irish writer of adults' and children's literature. She was one of the first realist writers in children's literature and was a significant figure in the evolution of the novel in Europe...

  • 1816 in literature
    1816 in literature
    The year 1816 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:* July - Lord Byron, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Polidori, gathered at the Villa Diodati by Lake Geneva in a rainy Switzerland in this 'Year Without a Summer', tell each other tales...

    -
    Adolphe
    Adolphe
    Adolphe is a classic French novel by Benjamin Constant, first published in 1816. It tells the story of an alienated young man, Adolphe, who falls in love with an older woman, Ellénore, the Polish mistress of the Comte de P***. Their illicit relationship serves to isolate them from their friends and...

    - Benjamin Constant
    Benjamin Constant
    Henri-Benjamin Constant de Rebecque was a Swiss-born French nobleman, thinker, writer and politician.-Biography:...

    ;
    Emma
    Emma
    Emma, by Jane Austen, is a novel about the perils of misconstrued romance. The novel was first published in December 1815. As in her other novels, Austen explores the concerns and difficulties of genteel women living in Georgian-Regency England; she also creates a lively 'comedy of manners' among...

    - Jane Austen
    Jane Austen
    Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...

    ;
    The Sandman - E.T.A. Hoffman
  • 1815 in literature
    1815 in literature
    The year 1815 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The Brothers Grimm complete the writing of Grimms' Fairy Tales.* First publication of the North American Review.-New books:*John Agg - A Month at Brussels...

    -
    The Pastor's Fireside - Jane Porter
    Jane Porter
    Jane Porter was a Scottish historical novelist and dramatist.-Life and work:Jane Porter was an avid reader. Said to rise at four in the morning in order to read and write, she read the whole of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene while still a child...

  • 1814 in literature
    1814 in literature
    The year 1814 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* In England, a revolutionary steam-powered press prints the Times newspaper at a rate of 1100 copies per hour.-New books:*Jane Austen — Mansfield Park...

    -
    The Wanderer - Fanny Burney
    Fanny Burney
    Frances Burney , also known as Fanny Burney and, after her marriage, as Madame d’Arblay, was an English novelist, diarist and playwright. She was born in Lynn Regis, now King’s Lynn, England, on 13 June 1752, to musical historian Dr Charles Burney and Mrs Esther Sleepe Burney...

    ;
    Mansfield Park
    Mansfield Park (novel)
    Mansfield Park is a novel by Jane Austen, written at Chawton Cottage between 1812 and 1814. It was published in July 1814 by Thomas Egerton, who published Jane Austen's two earlier novels, Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice...

    - Jane Austen
    Jane Austen
    Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...

  • 1813 in literature
    1813 in literature
    The year 1813 in literature involved some significant new books, including Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, Robert Southey with Life of Nelson, Arthur Schopenhauer's Sufficient Reason, and Shelley's Queen Mab.-Events:...

    -
    The Swiss Family Robinson
    The Swiss Family Robinson
    -History:Written by Swiss pastor Johann David Wyss and edited by his son Johann Rudolf Wyss, the novel was intended to teach his four sons about family values, good husbandry, the uses of the natural world and self-reliance...

    - Johann David Wyss
    Johann David Wyss
    Johann David Wyss is best remembered for his book The Swiss Family Robinson. It is said that he was inspired by Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, but wanted to write a story from which his own children would learn, as the father in the story taught important lessons to his children...

    ;
    Pride and Prejudice
    Pride and Prejudice
    Pride and Prejudice is a novel by Jane Austen, first published in 1813. The story follows the main character Elizabeth Bennet as she deals with issues of manners, upbringing, morality, education and marriage in the society of the landed gentry of early 19th-century England...

    - Jane Austen
    Jane Austen
    Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...

  • 1812 in literature
    1812 in literature
    The year 1812 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Series of lectures on drama and Shakespeare - Samuel Taylor Coleridge* Washington Irving begins editing Analectic magazine....

    -
    The Milesian Chief - Charles Robert Maturin; Children's and Household Tales - The Brothers Grimm
  • 1811 in literature
    1811 in literature
    The year 1811 in literature involved some significant new books, including Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility.-New books:*Jane Austen - Sense and Sensibility*Amelia Beauclerc - Eva of Cambria*Mary Brunton - Self-Control...

    -
    Sense and Sensibility
    Sense and Sensibility
    Sense and Sensibility, published in 1811, is a British romance novel by Jane Austen, her first published work under the pseudonym, "A Lady." Jane Austen is considered a pioneer of the romance genre of novels, and for the realism portrayed in her novels, is one the most widely read writers in...

    - Jane Austen
    Jane Austen
    Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...

  • 1810 in literature
    1810 in literature
    The year 1810 in literature involved some significant new books.-New books:*Catherine Cuthbertson - The Forest of Montalbano*Peter Middleton Darling - The Romance of the Highlands...

    -
    The Houses of Osma and Almeria - Regina Maria Roche
    Regina Maria Roche
    Regina Maria Roche is considered today to be a minor Gothic novelist who wrote very much in the shadow of Ann Radcliffe. She was, however, a best seller in her own time...


1800s

  • 1809 in literature
    1809 in literature
    The year 1809 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Samuel Taylor Coleridge founds The Friend .*On February 24, the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane is destroyed by fire....

    -
    The Martyrs - François-René de Chateaubriand
    François-René de Chateaubriand
    François-René, vicomte de Chateaubriand was a French writer, politician, diplomat and historian. He is considered the founder of Romanticism in French literature.-Early life and exile:...

    ; Death of Thomas Paine
    Thomas Paine
    Thomas "Tom" Paine was an English author, pamphleteer, radical, inventor, intellectual, revolutionary, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States...

  • 1808 in literature
    1808 in literature
    The year 1808 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Opening of the Théâtre St. Philippe, New Orleans.*The first Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, established in 1732, is destroyed by fire. Rebuilding begins in December....

    -
    Faust
    Faust
    Faust is the protagonist of a classic German legend; a highly successful scholar, but also dissatisfied with his life, and so makes a deal with the devil, exchanging his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures. Faust's tale is the basis for many literary, artistic, cinematic, and musical...

    (Part One) - Goethe
  • 1807 in literature
    1807 in literature
    The year 1807 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*June 24 - The Tout-Paris assists in the first production of the Panorama de Momus, a vaudeville by Marc-Antoine Désaugiers....

    -
    Tales from Shakespeare
    Tales from Shakespeare
    Tales from Shakespeare was an English children's book written by Charles Lamb with his sister Mary Lamb in 1807. It was illustrated by Arthur Rackham in 1899 and 1909....

    - Charles Lamb & Mary Lamb
    Mary Lamb
    Mary Ann Lamb , was an English writer, the sister and collaborator of Charles Lamb.-Biography:She was born on 3 December 1764. In 1796, Mary, who had suffered a breakdown from the strain of caring for her family, killed her mother with a kitchen knife, and from then on had to be kept under constant...

  • 1806 in literature
    1806 in literature
    -New books:*Harriet Butler - Vensenshon*Catherine Cuthbertson - Santo Sebastiano*Charlotte Dacre - Zofloya*Maria Edgeworth - Leonora*Sophia Frances - Vivonio*William Herbert -The Spanish Outlaw...

    -
    The Earthquake in Chile
    The Earthquake in Chile
    The Earthquake in Chile , is a novella written by Heinrich von Kleist . The novella's central characters are two lovers, caught up in the chaos of the 1647 Santiago earthquake in Chile.-Synopsis:...

    - Heinrich von Kleist
    Heinrich von Kleist
    Bernd Heinrich Wilhelm von Kleist was a poet, dramatist, novelist and short story writer. The Kleist Prize, a prestigious prize for German literature, is named after him.- Life :...

  • 1805 in literature
    1805 in literature
    The year 1805 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Samuel Taylor Coleridge appointed Acting Public Secretary in Malta.*Jacob Grimm is invited to Paris as an assistant to Friedrich Karl von Savigny.-New books:...

    -
    The Wonder of the Village - Mary Meeke
    Mary Meeke
    Mary Meeke was a prolific author of around 30 novels published by the Minerva Press during the early 19th century, and is believed to have died in October 1816....

    ;
    Manuscript Found in Saragossa - Count Jan Nepomucen Potocki
  • 1804 in literature
    1804 in literature
    The year 1804 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*John Keats' father dies from a fractured skull after falling from his horse.*Samuel Taylor Coleridge re-locates to Malta....

    -
    Jerusalem (poetry) - William Blake
    William Blake
    William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...

  • 1803 in literature
    1803 in literature
    The year 1803 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Novelist Mary Butt marries Captain Henry Sherwood, acquiring the surname by which she will become best known.-New books:...

    -
    St. Clair of the Isles - Elisabeth Helme
  • 1802 in literature
    1802 in literature
    The year 1802 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* 4 October - William Wordsworth marries Mary Hutchinson....

    -
    Delphine - Anne Louise Germaine de Stael
    Anne Louise Germaine de Staël
    Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein , commonly known as Madame de Staël, was a French-speaking Swiss author living in Paris and abroad. She influenced literary tastes in Europe at the turn of the 19th century.- Childhood :...

  • 1801 in literature
    1801 in literature
    The year 1801 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*In recognition of the English attack on Copenhagen, Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger produces his first dramatic sketch.-New books:*Mary Charlton – The Pirate of Naples...

    -
    The Wizard and the Sword - Henry Summersett
  • 1800 in literature
    1800 in literature
    The year 1800 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The United States creates the Library of Congress.* January 10 – The Serampore Mission and Press is established in Serampore India by Baptist missionaries Joshua Marshman and William Ward...

    -
    Hymns to the Night - Novalis
    Novalis
    Novalis was the pseudonym of Georg Philipp Friedrich Freiherr von Hardenberg , an author and philosopher of early German Romanticism.-Biography:...


1790s

  • 1799 in literature
    1799 in literature
    -Events:* Charles Lamb becomes guardian of his sister, Mary Lamb, on the death of their father.* New edition of Edward Young's Night Thoughts, illustrated by Thomas Stothard.-New books:*Charles Brockden Brown**Arthur Mervyn**Edgar Huntly...

    -
    Arthur Mervyn
    Arthur Mervyn
    Arthur Mervyn is a novel written by Charles Brockden Brown and published in 1799. It was one of Brown's more popular novels, and is in many ways representative of Brown's dark, gothic style and subject matter.-Meeting Mervyn:...

    - Charles Brockden Brown
    Charles Brockden Brown
    Charles Brockden Brown , an American novelist, historian, and editor of the Early National period, is generally regarded by scholars as the most ambitious and accomplished US novelist before James Fenimore Cooper...

  • 1798 in literature
    1798 in literature
    -New books:*Charles Brockden Brown**Alcuin: a Dialogue**Wieland: or, The Transformation; an American Tale*Emily Clark - Ianthé, or the Flower of Caernarvon*William Godwin - Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman...

    -
    Lyrical Ballads
    Lyrical Ballads
    Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems is a collection of poems by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, first published in 1798 and generally considered to have marked the beginning of the English Romantic movement in literature...

    - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...

     and William Wordsworth
    William Wordsworth
    William Wordsworth was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads....

    ;
    The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
    The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
    The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is the longest major poem by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, written in 1797–98 and was published in 1798 in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads. Modern editions use a later revised version printed in 1817 that featured a gloss...

    - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...

  • 1797 in literature
    1797 in literature
    -Events:* Walter Scott marries Charlotte Carpenter.* Jane Austen finishes a draft of Pride and Prejudice.-New books:*Hannah Webster Foster - The Coquette, or the History of Eliza Wharton *Friedrich Hölderlin - Hyperion, volume 1...

    -
    l'Histoire de Juliette
    L'Histoire de Juliette
    Juliette is a novel written by the Marquis de Sade and published 1797–1801, accompanying Sade's Nouvelle Justine. While Justine, Juliette's sister, was a virtuous woman who consequently encountered nothing but despair and abuse, Juliette is an amoral nymphomaniac who ends up successful and...

    - Marquis de Sade
    Marquis de Sade
    Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...

    ;
    Kubla Khan
    Kubla Khan
    Kubla Khan is a poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, completed in 1797 and published in Christabel, Kubla Khan, and the Pains of Sleep in 1816...

    - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...

  • 1796 in literature
    1796 in literature
    -Events:*Samuel Taylor Coleridge publishes his periodical The Watchman*Samuel Ireland publishes a collection of Shakespearean forgeries in his Miscellaneous Papers and Legal Instruments Under the Hand and Seal of William Shakespeare. Amid a growing controversy, Edmond Malone exposes the forgeries...

    -
    Camilla
    Camilla (Burney novel)
    Camilla, subtitled A Picture of Youth, is a novel by Frances Burney, first published in 1796. Camilla deals with the matrimonial concerns of a group of young people: Camilla Tyrold and her sisters, the sweet tempered Lavinia and the deformed, but extremely kind, Eugenia, and their cousin, the...

    - Fanny Burney
    Fanny Burney
    Frances Burney , also known as Fanny Burney and, after her marriage, as Madame d’Arblay, was an English novelist, diarist and playwright. She was born in Lynn Regis, now King’s Lynn, England, on 13 June 1752, to musical historian Dr Charles Burney and Mrs Esther Sleepe Burney...

  • 1795 in literature
    1795 in literature
    -Events:*Samuel Taylor Coleridge gives a series of lectures on politics and religion.*Charles Lamb spends six weeks in a mental asylum.*William Henry Ireland first displays his Shakespearean forgeries to the public...

    -
    Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship
    Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship
    Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship is the second novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, published in 1795-96. While his first novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther, featured a hero driven to suicide by despair, the eponymous hero of this novel undergoes a journey of self-realization...

    (to 1796) - Goethe; The Mysteries of Udolpho
    The Mysteries of Udolpho
    The Mysteries of Udolpho, by Ann Radcliffe, was published in four volumes on 8 May 1794 by G. G. and J. Robinson of London. The firm paid her £500 for the manuscript. The contract is housed at the University of Virginia Library. Her fourth and most popular novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho follows...

    - Ann Radcliffe
    Ann Radcliffe
    Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...

  • 1794 in literature
    1794 in literature
    See also: 1793 in literature, other events of 1794, 1795 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* The rebuilt Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, designed by Henry Holland, opens on March 12.* Robert Southey's first collection of poetry is published....

    -
    The Age of Reason
    The Age of Reason
    The Age of Reason; Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology is a deistic pamphlet, written by eighteenth-century British radical and American revolutionary Thomas Paine, that criticizes institutionalized religion and challenges the legitimacy of the Bible, the central sacred text of...

    - Thomas Paine
    Thomas Paine
    Thomas "Tom" Paine was an English author, pamphleteer, radical, inventor, intellectual, revolutionary, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States...

  • 1793 in literature
    1793 in literature
    -Events:*William Wordsworth tours Wales and western England, writing some of his best-known poems.-New books:*Charlotte Turner Smith**The Old Manor House**The Emigrants*Johann Heinrich Daniel Zschokke - Abällino, der grosse Bandit-New drama:...

    -
    Songs of Experience - William Blake
    William Blake
    William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...

  • 1792 in literature
    1792 in literature
    -New books:*Hugh Henry Brackenridge - Modern Chivalry: containing the Adventures of Captain John Farrago and Teague O'Regan, His servant*Johann Baptist Durach - Philippine Welserin*Susannah Gunning - Anecdotes of the Delborough Family...

    -
    A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
    A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
    A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects , written by the 18th-century British feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, is one of the earliest works of feminist philosophy. In it, Wollstonecraft responds to those educational and political theorists of the 18th...

    - Mary Wollstonecraft
    Mary Wollstonecraft
    Mary Wollstonecraft was an eighteenth-century British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. During her brief career, she wrote novels, treatises, a travel narrative, a history of the French Revolution, a conduct book, and a children's book...

  • 1791 in literature
    1791 in literature
    -Events:*Chinese writer and publisher Gao E and his partner Cheng Weiyan claim to have discovered Cao Xueqin's lost novel Dream of the Red Chamber* Samuel Taylor Coleridge begins his course at Jesus College, Cambridge.-New books:...

    -
    Justine - Marquis de Sade
    Marquis de Sade
    Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...

    ;
    The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - James Boswell
    James Boswell
    James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck was a lawyer, diarist, and author born in Edinburgh, Scotland; he is best known for the biography he wrote of one of his contemporaries, the English literary figure Samuel Johnson....

    ;
    Dream of the Red Chamber
    Dream of the Red Chamber
    Dream of the Red Chamber , composed by Cao Xueqin, is one of China's Four Great Classical Novels. It was composed in the middle of the 18th century during the Qing Dynasty. It is considered to be a masterpiece of Chinese vernacular literature and is generally acknowledged to be a pinnacle of...

    - Cao Xueqin
    Cao Xueqin
    Cao Xueqin was a Qing Dynasty Chinese writer, best known as the author of Dream of the Red Chamber, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature...

  • 1790 in literature
    1790 in literature
    The year 1790 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*June 9 - The Philadelphia Spelling Book by John Barry becomes the first book to be copyrighted in the United States....

    -
    Reflections on the Revolution in France
    Reflections on the Revolution in France
    Reflections on the Revolution in France , by Edmund Burke, is one of the best-known intellectual attacks against the French Revolution...

    - Edmund Burke
    Edmund Burke
    Edmund Burke PC was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party....

    ;
    Tam O'Shanter
    Tam o' Shanter (Burns poem)
    "Tam o' Shanter" is a poem written by the Scottish poet Robert Burns in 1790. Many consider it to be one of the best examples of the narrative poem in modern European literature....

    - Robert Burns
    Robert Burns
    Robert Burns was a Scottish poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide...


1780s

  • 1789 in literature
    1789 in literature
    -Events:* Friedrich Schiller is appointed professor of history and philosophy at Jena.* The Children's Magazine, the first American periodical for children, is published in Hartford, Connecticut...

    -
    Songs of Innocence - William Blake
    William Blake
    William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...

  • 1788 in literature
    1788 in literature
    -Events:*Ann Ward marries William Radcliffe, gaining the surname under which she will become known as a writer of Gothic novels.*Joseph Johnson and Thomas Christie found the Analytical Review.-New books:...

    -
    Memoirs - Saint-Simon
    Louis de Rouvroy, duc de Saint-Simon
    Louis de Rouvroy commonly known as Saint-Simon was a French soldier, diplomatist and writer of memoirs, was born in Paris...

  • 1787 in literature
    1787 in literature
    -New books:*Elizabeth Bonhôte - Olivia, or, The Deserted Bride*Johann Jakob Wilhelm Heinse - Ardinghello and die glückseligen Inseln*Elizabeth Helme - Louisa; or the Cottage on the Moor*Bernardin de Saint-Pierre - Paul et Virginie...

    -
    Don Carlos
    Don Carlos
    Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French language libretto by Camille du Locle and Joseph Méry, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller...

    - Friedrich Schiller
    Friedrich Schiller
    Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller was a German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright. During the last seventeen years of his life , Schiller struck up a productive, if complicated, friendship with already famous and influential Johann Wolfgang von Goethe...

  • 1786 in literature
    1786 in literature
    -Events:*January 19 - Franziska Stading plays the female lead in Gustav Vasa at the Royal Swedish Opera.* The Story of the Learned Pig, a satire based on the idea that the learned pig was the reincarnation of Romulus, Brutus, the Duke of Marborough and wrote William Shakespeare's plays.-New...

    -
    Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect - Robert Burns
    Robert Burns
    Robert Burns was a Scottish poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide...

  • 1785 in literature
    1785 in literature
    -Events:* January 1 - First publication of the Daily Universal Register * Thomas Warton becomes Poet Laureate* The first steam powered cotton spinner was made by Matthew Bolton and James Watt....

    -
    120 Days of Sodom
    120 Days of Sodom
    The 120 Days of Sodom, or the School of Libertinism is a novel by the French writer and nobleman Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade, written in 1785...

    - Marquis de Sade
    Marquis de Sade
    Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...

    ;
    Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals
    Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals
    The Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals , also known as Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals or Grounding of the Metaphysics of Morals, is Immanuel Kant's first contribution to moral philosophy. It argues for an a priori basis for morality...

    - Immanuel Kant
    Immanuel Kant
    Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....

    ,
    Anton Reiser (to 1790) - Karl Philipp Moritz
    Karl Philipp Moritz
    Karl Philipp Moritz was a German author, editor and essayist of the Sturm und Drang, late enlightenment, and classicist periods, influencing early German Romanticism as well...

    ;
    The Task
    The Task (poem)
    The Task: A Poem, in Six Books is a poem in 6000 lines of blank verse by William Cowper, usually seen as his supreme achievement. Its six books are called "The Sofa", "The Timepiece", "The Garden", "The Winter Evening", "The Winter Morning Walk" and "The Winter Walk at Noon"...

    - William Cowper
    William Cowper
    William Cowper was an English poet and hymnodist. One of the most popular poets of his time, Cowper changed the direction of 18th century nature poetry by writing of everyday life and scenes of the English countryside. In many ways, he was one of the forerunners of Romantic poetry...

  • 1784 in literature
    1784 in literature
    -Events:* The founding of the Methodist Church by John Wesley* Gottlieb Jakob Planck becomes professor of theology at Göttingen-New books:* Thomas Astle - The Origin and Progress of Writing* George Berkeley - Works...

    -
    Barham Downs - Robert Bage
    Robert Bage (novelist)
    Robert Bage was an English businessman and novelist.Born in Darley Abbey, near Derby, Bage was the son of a paper-maker and was himself a papier. For a time he lived in Elford, Staffordshire...

    ; Death of - Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson , often referred to as Dr. Johnson, was an English author who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer...

     and Denis Diderot
    Denis Diderot
    Denis Diderot was a French philosopher, art critic, and writer. He was a prominent person during the Enlightenment and is best known for serving as co-founder and chief editor of and contributor to the Encyclopédie....

  • 1783 in literature
    1783 in literature
    -Events:*Friedrich Schiller leaves Stuttgart for Weimar to avoid persecution.*William Cobbett arrives in London.*August von Kotzebue is appointed to the high court of appeal in Reval.-New books:* Thomas Day - The History of Standford and Merton...

    -
    Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics
    Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics
    Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics That Will Be Able to Present Itself as a Science is one of the shorter works by the German philosopher Immanuel Kant...

    - Immanuel Kant
    Immanuel Kant
    Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....

  • 1782 in literature
    1782 in literature
    -Events:* Charles Dibdin becomes joint manager of the Royal Circus, afterwards known as the Surrey Theatre.* William Blake first meets his patron, John Flaxman.* The Siku Quanshu is completed, the largest literary compilation in China's history...

    -
    The Robbers - Friedrich Schiller
    Friedrich Schiller
    Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller was a German poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright. During the last seventeen years of his life , Schiller struck up a productive, if complicated, friendship with already famous and influential Johann Wolfgang von Goethe...

     
    Les Liaisons Dangereuses
    Les Liaisons dangereuses
    Les Liaisons dangereuses is a French epistolary novel by Choderlos de Laclos, first published in four volumes by Durand Neveu from March 23, 1782....

    - Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
    Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
    Pierre Ambroise François Choderlos de Laclos was a French novelist, official and army general, best known for writing the epistolary novel Les Liaisons dangereuses ....

  • 1781 in literature
    1781 in literature
    -Events:* Friedrich Schiller arrested after the first performance of his play, The Robbers-New books:* Anna Barbauld - Hymns in Prose for Children* Robert Bage - Mount Henneth* Christoph Friedrich Bretzner - Belmont und Constanze...

    -
    A Critique of Pure Reason - Immanuel Kant
    Immanuel Kant
    Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....

  • 1780 in literature
    1780 in literature
    The year 1780 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Karl von Marinelli becomes head of the Schultz theatre company of Baden.*Richard Brinsley Sheridan is elected to Parliament-New books:...

    -
    Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever
    Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever
    Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever is a multi-volume series of books on metaphysics by eighteenth-century British polymath Joseph Priestley....

    - Joseph Priestley
    Joseph Priestley
    Joseph Priestley, FRS was an 18th-century English theologian, Dissenting clergyman, natural philosopher, chemist, educator, and political theorist who published over 150 works...


1770s

  • 1779 in literature
    1779 in literature
    -Events:* William Blake enrols at the Royal Academy*April 6 - Premiėre of Iphigenie auf Tauris by Johann Wolfgang Goethe.-New books:* Richard Graves - Columella* Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi - Woldemar...

    -
    Nathan the Wise - Gotthold Lessing; Fables and Parables
    Fables and Parables
    Fables and Parables , by Ignacy Krasicki , is a work in a long international tradition of fable-writing that reaches back to antiquity. They have been described as being, "[l]ike LaFontaine's [fables],.....

    - Ignacy Krasicki
    Ignacy Krasicki
    Ignacy Krasicki , from 1766 Prince-Bishop of Warmia and from 1795 Archbishop of Gniezno , was Poland's leading Enlightenment poet , a critic of the clergy, Poland's La Fontaine, author of the first Polish novel, playwright, journalist, encyclopedist, and translator from French and...

  • 1778 in literature
    1778 in literature
    See also: 1777 in literature, other events of 1778, 1779 in literature, list of years in literature.-New books:* Fanny Burney - Evelina* Pierre-Louis Ginguené - Satire des Satires* Clara Reeve - The Old English Baron-New drama:...

    -
    Evelina
    Evelina
    Evelina or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World is a novel written by English author Frances Burney and first published in 1778...

    - Fanny Burney
    Fanny Burney
    Frances Burney , also known as Fanny Burney and, after her marriage, as Madame d’Arblay, was an English novelist, diarist and playwright. She was born in Lynn Regis, now King’s Lynn, England, on 13 June 1752, to musical historian Dr Charles Burney and Mrs Esther Sleepe Burney...

    ; death of Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

     (b. 1694)
  • 1777 in literature
    1777 in literature
    -Events:* Fanny Burney is introduced to Samuel Johnson by her father* Robert Lowth becomes Bishop of London* First appearance of James Boswell's The Hypochondriak in the London Magazine-New books:* Frances Brooke - The Excursion...

    -
    The School for Scandal
    The School for Scandal
    The School for Scandal is a play written by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. It was first performed in London at Drury Lane Theatre on May 8, 1777.The prologue, written by David Garrick, commends the play, its subject, and its author to the audience...

    - Richard Brinsley Sheridan
    Richard Brinsley Sheridan
    Richard Brinsley Butler Sheridan was an Irish-born playwright and poet and long-term owner of the London Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. For thirty-two years he was also a Whig Member of the British House of Commons for Stafford , Westminster and Ilchester...

  • 1776 in literature
    1776 in literature
    -Events:* The United States issues its Declaration of Independence on July 4.-New books:* Elizabeth Griffith - The Story of Lady Juliana Harley* Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi - Edward Allwill's Briefsammlung* Ignacy Krasicki - The Adventures of Mr...

    -
    Common Sense
    Common sense
    Common sense is defined by Merriam-Webster as, "sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts." Thus, "common sense" equates to the knowledge and experience which most people already have, or which the person using the term believes that they do or should have...

    - Thomas Paine
    Thomas Paine
    Thomas "Tom" Paine was an English author, pamphleteer, radical, inventor, intellectual, revolutionary, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States...

  • 1775 in literature
    1775 in literature
    -Events:* October 19 - Samuel Johnson, Henry Thrale and Hester Thrale, visiting Paris, dine with King Louis XVI of France and Queen Marie Antoinette.-New books:* Hester Chapone - Miscellanies...

    -
    The Rivals
    The Rivals
    The Rivals, a play by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, is a comedy of manners in five acts. It was first performed on 17 January 1775.- Production :...

    - Richard Sheridan
  • 1774 in literature
    1774 in literature
    -Events:* The First Continental Congress in America.* Joseph Priestley refines oxygen.* Johann Gottlob Schneider becomes secretary to Richard François Philippe Brunck.-New books:* Jeremy Bentham - The White Bull* Henry Brooke - Juliet Grenville...

    -
    The Sorrows of Young Werther
    The Sorrows of Young Werther
    The Sorrows of Young Werther is an epistolary and loosely autobiographical novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, first published in 1774; a revised edition of the novel was published in 1787...

    - Goethe
  • 1773 in literature
    1773 in literature
    See also: 1772 in literature, other events of 1773, 1774 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*Richard Brinsley Sheridan marries Elizabeth Linley.*Samuel Johnson and James Boswell tour the Western Isles of Scotland-New books:...

    -
    Der Messias (from 1749) - Klopstock
    Klopstock
    Klopstock * Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock , a German poet** 9344 Klopstock , a Main-belt Asteroid discovered on 1991 by F. Borngen...

    ;
    Jaques le fataliste - Denis Diderot
    Denis Diderot
    Denis Diderot was a French philosopher, art critic, and writer. He was a prominent person during the Enlightenment and is best known for serving as co-founder and chief editor of and contributor to the Encyclopédie....

  • 1772 in literature
    1772 in literature
    See also: 1771 in literature, other events of 1772, 1773 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*May 7 - The Stadsschouwburg theatre in Amsterdam is destroyed by fire....

    - the Marquis de Sade
    Marquis de Sade
    Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...

     embarks on an orgy, as a result of which he is convicted
    in absentia of sodomy and poisoning and receives a death sentence; he escapes.
  • 1771 in literature
    1771 in literature
    See also: 1770 in literature, other events of 1771, 1772 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*April 9 - Pedro Correia Garção is arrested and committed to prison by Sebastião de Melo, Marquis of Pombal....

    -
    Jacques the Fatalist (to 1773) - Diderot
  • 1770 in literature
    1770 in literature
    The year 1770 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* John Armstrong - Miscellanies* James Beattie -An Essay on the Nature and Immutability of Truth...

    -
    Épître à l'Auteur du Livre des Trois Imposteurs
    Épître à l'Auteur du Livre des Trois Imposteurs
    Épître à l'Auteur du Livre des Trois Imposteurs is an epistle in verse form written by Voltaire and published in 1770 . It is a letter to the anonymous writers and publishers of The Treatise of the Three Impostors...

    - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...


1760s

  • 1769 in literature
    1769 in literature
    See also: 1768 in literature, other events of 1769, 1770 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* February–April - John Wilkes is expelled from the Parliament of Great Britain three times....

    -
    The History of Emily Montague - Frances Brooke
    Frances Brooke
    Frances Moore Brooke was an English novelist, essayist, playwright and translator.-Biography:Brooke was born in, Claypole, Lincolnshire, the daughter of a clergyman. By the late 1740s, she had moved to London, where she embarked on her career as a poet and playwright...

  • 1768 in literature
    1768 in literature
    See also: 1767 in literature, other events of 1768, 1769 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*John Wilkes returns from exile in France and is elected to Parliament.*May 10 - John Wilkes is imprisoned for attacking King George III in print....

    -
    Poems - Thomas Gray
    Thomas Gray
    Thomas Gray was a poet, letter-writer, classical scholar and professor at Cambridge University.-Early life and education:...

  • 1767 in literature
    1767 in literature
    See also: 1766 in literature, other events of 1767, 1768 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* The tax on tea and paper is imposed on the American colonies, leading to the Boston Tea Party.* New Testament translated into Manx....

    -
    Minna von Barnhelm
    Minna von Barnhelm
    Minna von Barnhelm or the Soldiers' Happiness is a lustspiel or comedy by the German author Gotthold Ephraim Lessing...

    - Gotthold Lessing
  • 1766 in literature
    1766 in literature
    See also: 1765 in literature, other events of 1766, 1767 in literature, list of years in literature.-New books:* Henry Brooke - The Fool of Quality*Genuine Memoirs of the Celebrated Miss Maria Brown...

    -
    The Vicar of Wakefield
    The Vicar of Wakefield
    The Vicar of Wakefield is a novel by Irish author Oliver Goldsmith. It was written in 1761 and 1762, and published in 1766, and was one of the most popular and widely read 18th-century novels among Victorians...

    - Oliver Goldsmith
    Oliver Goldsmith
    Oliver Goldsmith was an Irish writer, poet and physician known for his novel The Vicar of Wakefield , his pastoral poem The Deserted Village , and his plays The Good-Natur'd Man and She Stoops to Conquer...

  • 1765 in literature
    1765 in literature
    -Events:* Beginning of Sturm und Drang movement in German literature.* Arthur Murphy introduces Hester Thrale and her husband to Samuel Johnson.*Denis Diderot completes Encyclopédie.-New books:* Henry Brooke - The Fool of Quality...

    - Beginning of the Sturm und Drang
    Sturm und Drang
    Sturm und Drang is a proto-Romantic movement in German literature and music taking place from the late 1760s through the early 1780s, in which individual subjectivity and, in particular, extremes of emotion were given free expression in reaction to the perceived constraints of rationalism...

     movement
  • 1764 in literature
    1764 in literature
    See also: 1763 in literature, other events of 1764, 1765 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* January 19 - John Wilkes is expelled from the British House of Commons for seditious libel for his article criticising King George III in The North Briton.* October 15 - While visiting...

    -
    The Castle of Otranto
    The Castle of Otranto
    The Castle of Otranto is a 1764 novel by Horace Walpole. It is generally regarded as the first gothic novel, initiating a literary genre which would become extremely popular in the later 18th century and early 19th century...

    - Horace Walpole
  • 1763 in literature
    1763 in literature
    See also: 1762 in literature, other events of 1763, 1764 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* John Wilkes was arrested for his writings in The North Briton...

    - James Boswell
    James Boswell
    James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck was a lawyer, diarist, and author born in Edinburgh, Scotland; he is best known for the biography he wrote of one of his contemporaries, the English literary figure Samuel Johnson....

     is introduced to Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson , often referred to as Dr. Johnson, was an English author who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer...

  • 1762 in literature
    1762 in literature
    See also: 1761 in literature, other events of 1762, 1763 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* Founding of the Sorbonne library.* Académie française produces new edition of its dictionary of the French language...

    -
    Emile: or, On Education
    Emile: Or, On Education
    Émile, or On Education is a treatise on the nature of education and on the nature of man written by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who considered it to be the “best and most important of all my writings”. Due to a section of the book entitled “Profession of Faith of the Savoyard Vicar,” Émile was be...

    - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
    Jean-Jacques Rousseau
    Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of 18th-century Romanticism. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological and educational thought.His novel Émile: or, On Education is a treatise...

  • 1761 in literature
    1761 in literature
    See also: 1760 in literature, other events of 1761, 1762 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* On the death of Johann Matthias Gesner, the chair of rhetoric at the University of Göttingen is refused by both Johann August Ernesti and by David Ruhnken...

    -
    Julie, ou la nouvelle Héloïse
    Julie, ou la nouvelle Héloïse
    Julie, or the New Héloïse is an epistolary novel by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, published in 1761 by Marc-Michel Rey in . The original edition was entitled Lettres de deux amans habitans d'une petite ville au pied des Alpes .The novel’s subtitle points to the history of Héloïse d’Argenteuil and Pierre...

    - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
    Jean-Jacques Rousseau
    Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of 18th-century Romanticism. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological and educational thought.His novel Émile: or, On Education is a treatise...

  • 1760 in literature
    1760 in literature
    The year 1760 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*James Beattie becomes a professor at the University of Aberdeen.*Fanny Burney and her family move to London....

    -
    Tristram Shandy (to 1770) - Laurence Sterne
    Laurence Sterne
    Laurence Sterne was an Irish novelist and an Anglican clergyman. He is best known for his novels The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, and A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy; but he also published many sermons, wrote memoirs, and was involved in local politics...


1750s

  • 1759 in literature
    1759 in literature
    See also: 1758 in literature, other events of 1759, 1760 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* Denis Diderot's Encyclopédie is formally suppressed by the French government....

    -
    Candide
    Candide
    Candide, ou l'Optimisme is a French satire first published in 1759 by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment. The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled Candide: or, All for the Best ; Candide: or, The Optimist ; and Candide: or, Optimism...

    - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

  • 1758 in literature
    1758 in literature
    See also: 1757 in literature, other events of 1758, 1759 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* Voltaire buys estate at Ferney.* Annual Register founded by Edmund Burke and Robert Dodsley....

    - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

     buys his estate at Ferney
  • 1757 in literature
    1757 in literature
    See also: 1756 in literature, other events of 1757, 1758 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*May 6 - Christopher Smart is admitted to St...

    - Pierre-Augustin Caron changes his surname to Beaumarchais
    Pierre Beaumarchais
    Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais was a French playwright, watchmaker, inventor, musician, diplomat, fugitive, spy, publisher, arms dealer, satirist, financier, and revolutionary ....

  • 1756 in literature
    1756 in literature
    See also: 1755 in literature, other events of 1756, 1757 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* The beginning of the Seven Years' War.* The Black Hole of Calcutta incident inspires renewed British efforts in India....

    - Gilbert White
    Gilbert White
    Gilbert White FRS was a pioneering English naturalist and ornithologist.-Life:White was born in his grandfather's vicarage at Selborne in Hampshire. He was educated at the Holy Ghost School and by a private tutor in Basingstoke before going to Oriel College, Oxford...

     becomes curate of Selborne
    Selborne
    Selborne is a village in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is south of Alton. It will be just within the extreme northern boundary of the proposed South Downs National Park, which is due to take effect in mid-2010....

    , Hampshire
    Hampshire
    Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...

  • 1755 in literature
    1755 in literature
    See also: 1754 in literature, other events of 1755, 1756 in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* Fort Duquesne, the French defeat the English.* Samuel Johnson publishes his dictionary of the English language....

    -
    Letter to Lord Chesterfield - Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson , often referred to as Dr. Johnson, was an English author who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer...

  • 1754 in literature
    1754 in literature
    -New books:* Anonymous - Critical Remarks on Sir Charles Grandison, Clarissa and Pamela* Thomas Birch - Memoirs of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth* Charles Bonnet - Essai de psychologie* John Gilbert Cooper - Letters Concerning Taste...

    -
    The History of Great Britain
    The History of Great Britain
    The History of Great Britain is the name sometimes given to David Hume's The History of England. According to the British Library, "The History of Great Britain" refers to the last two volumes of The History of England....

    (to 1762) - David Hume
    David Hume
    David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...

  • 1753 in literature
    1753 in literature
    The year 1753 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The earliest existing diary by a woman is written in 1753 by Mercy Seccombe, who had emigrated from Harvard, Massachusetts to Nova Scotia, Canada; her diary ends there....

    -
    The History of Sir Charles Grandison
    The History of Sir Charles Grandison
    The History of Sir Charles Grandison, commonly called Sir Charles Grandison, is an epistolary novel by Samuel Richardson first published in February 1753. The book was a response to Henry Fielding's The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, which parodied the morals presented in Richardson's previous...

    - Samuel Richardson
    Samuel Richardson
    Samuel Richardson was an 18th-century English writer and printer. He is best known for his three epistolary novels: Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded , Clarissa: Or the History of a Young Lady and The History of Sir Charles Grandison...

  • 1752 in literature
    1752 in literature
    The year 1752 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* John Hill and Henry Fielding begin the Paper War of 1752-1753.* Tobias Smollett quarrels with Henry Fielding, accusing him of plagiarism.-New Books:...

    - Birth of Fanny Burney
    Fanny Burney
    Frances Burney , also known as Fanny Burney and, after her marriage, as Madame d’Arblay, was an English novelist, diarist and playwright. She was born in Lynn Regis, now King’s Lynn, England, on 13 June 1752, to musical historian Dr Charles Burney and Mrs Esther Sleepe Burney...

  • 1751 in literature
    1751 in literature
    The year 1751 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Robert Clive conquers Arcot for the English Raj.* Death of Frederick Lewis, "Prince Frederick," the Prince of Wales and heir apparent....

    -
    Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard
    Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard
    Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard is a poem by Thomas Gray, completed in 1750 and first published in 1751. The poem’s origins are unknown, but it was partly inspired by Gray’s thoughts following the death of the poet Richard West in 1742. Originally titled Stanza's Wrote in a Country...

    - Thomas Gray
    Thomas Gray
    Thomas Gray was a poet, letter-writer, classical scholar and professor at Cambridge University.-Early life and education:...

  • 1750 in literature
    1750 in literature
    The year 1750 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Tobias Smollett travels in France, collecting material for The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle....

    -
    Rambler essays (to 1752) - Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson
    Samuel Johnson , often referred to as Dr. Johnson, was an English author who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer...


1740s

  • 1749 in literature
    1749 in literature
    The year 1749 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* Joseph Ames - Typographical Antiquities* George Berkeley - A Word to the Wise* John Brown - On Liberty...

    -
    The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
    The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
    The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, often known simply as Tom Jones, is a comic novel by the English playwright and novelist Henry Fielding. First published on 28 February 1749, Tom Jones is among the earliest English prose works describable as a novel...

    - Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humour and satirical prowess, and as the author of the novel Tom Jones....

  • 1748 in literature
    1748 in literature
    The year 1748 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* While in debtor's prison in London, John Cleland writes Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, also known as Fanny Hill, considered the first modern "erotic novel" by some.* Euler’s fifth paper on nautical topics, E137,...

    -
    Fanny Hill
    Fanny Hill
    Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure is an erotic novel by John Cleland first published in England in 1748...

    - John Cleland
    John Cleland
    John Cleland was an English novelist most famous and infamous as the author of Fanny Hill: or, the Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure....

    ;
    An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
    An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
    An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding is a book by the Scottish empiricist philosopher David Hume, published in 1748. It was a revision of an earlier effort, Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature, published anonymously in London in 1739–40...

    - David Hume
    David Hume
    David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...

  • 1747 in literature
    1747 in literature
    The year 1747 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Samuel Johnson begins work on his dictionary of the English language* David Garrick becomes one of the managers of Drury Lane Theatre-New books:...

    -
    Clarissa
    Clarissa
    Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady is an epistolary novel by Samuel Richardson, published in 1748. It tells the tragic story of a heroine whose quest for virtue is continually thwarted by her family, and is the longest real novelA completed work that has been released by a publisher in...

    (to 1748) - Samuel Richardson
    Samuel Richardson
    Samuel Richardson was an 18th-century English writer and printer. He is best known for his three epistolary novels: Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded , Clarissa: Or the History of a Young Lady and The History of Sir Charles Grandison...

  • 1746 in literature
    1746 in literature
    The year 1746 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Voltaire is elected to the French Academy.* The oldest manuscript of Jean de Joinville's Life of Saint Louis is rediscovered in Brussels....

    - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

     is elected to the French Academy
  • 1745 in literature
    1745 in literature
    The year 1745 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The London theatres stage competing productions of Shakespeare's King John in response to the Jacobite invasion of Bonnie Prince Charlie...

    - Death of Jonathan Swift
    Jonathan Swift
    Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...

  • 1744 in literature
    1744 in literature
    The year 1744 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*May 29 - Alexander Pope is received into the Roman Catholic faith, a day before his death.*Samuel Foote makes his debut as an actor....

    -
    The Female Spectator is launched by Eliza Haywood
    Eliza Haywood
    Eliza Haywood , born Elizabeth Fowler, was an English writer, actress and publisher. Since the 1980s, Eliza Haywood’s literary works have been gaining in recognition and interest...

  • 1743 in literature
    1743 in literature
    The year 1743 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* William Rufus Chetwood - The Twins...

    -
    The Life of Jonathan Wild the Great - Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humour and satirical prowess, and as the author of the novel Tom Jones....

  • 1742 in literature
    1742 in literature
    The year 1742 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* December 2 - The Pennsylvania Journal first appears in print in the United States.* The Stockholm Gazette begins publication....

    -
    Joseph Andrews
    Joseph Andrews
    Joseph Andrews, or The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and of his Friend Mr. Abraham Adams, was the first published full-length novel of the English author and magistrate Henry Fielding, and indeed among the first novels in the English language...

    - Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humour and satirical prowess, and as the author of the novel Tom Jones....

  • 1741 in literature
    1741 in literature
    The year 1741 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*David Garrick packs theatres with his performance as Shakespeare's Richard III.* The American Magazine begins publication by Andrew Bedford.-New books:...

    -
    Shamela - Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding
    Henry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humour and satirical prowess, and as the author of the novel Tom Jones....

  • 1740 in literature
    1740 in literature
    The year 1740 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*John Cleland returns to Britain from government service in India.* Accession of Frederick the Great in Prussia.* Beginning of the War of the Austrian Succession....

    -
    Institutions de physiqueÉmilie du Châtelet
    Émilie du Châtelet
    -Early life:Du Châtelet was born on 17 December 1706 in Paris, the only daughter of six children. Three brothers lived to adulthood: René-Alexandre , Charles-Auguste , and Elisabeth-Théodore . Her eldest brother, René-Alexandre, died in 1720, and the next brother, Charles-Auguste, died in 1731...


1730s

  • 1739 in literature
    1739 in literature
    The year 1739 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* War between the United Kingdom and Spain begins.* Celebrity hanging of Dick Turpin.* Handel's Saul performed....

    -
    A Treatise of Human Nature
    A Treatise of Human Nature
    A Treatise of Human Nature is a book by Scottish philosopher David Hume, first published in 1739–1740.The full title of the Treatise is 'A Treatise of Human Nature: Being an Attempt to introduce the experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects'. It contains the following sections:* Book 1:...

    (to 1740) - David Hume
    David Hume
    David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...

  • 1738 in literature
    1738 in literature
    The year 1738 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Robert Blair marries Isabella Law.* Beginning of the mental decline of Jonathan Swift.* Laurence Sterne is ordained....

    -
    Leonidas - Richard Glover
    Richard Glover (Poet)
    Richard Glover was an English poet and politician.-Life:The son of Richard Glover, a Hamburg merchant, was born in London. He was educated at Cheam in Surrey....

  • 1737 in literature
    1737 in literature
    The year 1737 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*June 21 - The Theatrical Licensing Act is passed, introducing censorship to the London stage. Plays now require approval before production...

    - Birth of Thomas Paine
    Thomas Paine
    Thomas "Tom" Paine was an English author, pamphleteer, radical, inventor, intellectual, revolutionary, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States...

    , free thinker
    Freethought
    Freethought is a philosophical viewpoint that holds that opinions should be formed on the basis of science, logic, and reason, and should not be influenced by authority, tradition, or other dogmas...

     and revolutionary (died 1809)
  • 1736 in literature
    1736 in literature
    The year 1736 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* Anonymous - The Life of Marianne The year 1736 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* Anonymous - The Life of Marianne The year 1736 in literature involved some significant...

    -
  • 1735 in literature
    1735 in literature
    The year 1735 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Samuel Johnson marries Elizabeth "Tetty" Porter, twenty years his senior....

    - At the end of the trial of John Peter Zenger
    John Peter Zenger
    John Peter Zenger was a German-American printer, publisher, editor, and journalist in New York City. He was a defendant in a landmark legal case in American jurisprudence that determined that truth was a defense against charges of libel and "laid the foundation for American press freedom."-...

     for seditious libel in the
    New York Weekly Journal, he is found not guilty by the jury determining that truth was a defense against charges of libel..

  • 1734 in literature
    1734 in literature
    The year 1734 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Manoel da Assumpcam begins writing his grammar of the Bengali language....

    - Copies of Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

    's
    Lettres philosophiques sur les Anglais are burned, and a warrant is issued for the author's arrest.
  • 1733 in literature
    1733 in literature
    The year 1733 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Antoine François Prévost arrives in London, where he will edit Le Pour et centre....

    -
    Letters Concerning the English Nation
    Letters on the English
    Lettres philosophiques or ) is a series of essays written by Voltaire based on his experiences living in England between 1722 and 1734. It was published in both French and English in 1734...

    - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

  • 1732 in literature
    1732 in literature
    The year 1732 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* The first edition of Poor Richard's Almanac, by Benjamin Franklin, is published....

    -
    Essay on Man (to 1744) - Alexander Pope
    Alexander Pope
    Alexander Pope was an 18th-century English poet, best known for his satirical verse and for his translation of Homer. He is the third-most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, after Shakespeare and Tennyson...

  • 1731 in literature
    1731 in literature
    The year 1731 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* Anonymous - The Life of Mr. Cleveland, Natural Son of Oliver Cromwell* Corporate authorship - The Gentleman's Magazine...

    -
    Insel Felsenburg (to 1743) - Johann Gottfried Schnabel
    Johann Gottfried Schnabel
    Johann Gottfried Schnabel was a German writer best known for his novel Insel Felsenburg. He published his works under the pen name Gisander....

  • 1730 in literature
    1730 in literature
    The year 1730 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Voltaire's Brutus is finally staged.* Colley Cibber becomes Poet Laureate of Great Britain.* Metastasio settles in Vienna....

    -
    Le Jeu de l'Amour et du Hasard
    Le Jeu de l'Amour et du Hasard
    The Game of Love and Chance is a three-act romantic comedy by French playwright Marivaux. The Game of Love and Chance was first performed 23 January 1730 by the Comédie Italienne. In this play, a young woman is visited by her betrothed, whom she does not know. To get a better idea of the type of...

    - Pierre de Marivaux
    Pierre de Marivaux
    Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux , commonly referred to as Marivaux, was a French novelist and dramatist....


1720s

  • 1729 in literature
    1729 in literature
    The year 1729 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Johann Sebastian Bach's St. Matthew Passion was performed for the first time....

    - Death of William Congreve
    William Congreve
    William Congreve was an English playwright and poet.-Early life:Congreve was born in Bardsey, West Yorkshire, England . His parents were William Congreve and his wife, Mary ; a sister was buried in London in 1672...

  • 1728 in literature
    1728 in literature
    The year 1728 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*The Universal Spectator and Weekly Journal is founded by Daniel Defoe and Henry Baker*Jonathan Swift and Thomas Sheridan launch The Intelligencer ....

    - Alexander Pope
    Alexander Pope
    Alexander Pope was an 18th-century English poet, best known for his satirical verse and for his translation of Homer. He is the third-most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, after Shakespeare and Tennyson...

    ,
    The Dunciad
    The Dunciad
    The Dunciad is a landmark literary satire by Alexander Pope published in three different versions at different times. The first version was published in 1728 anonymously. The second version, the Dunciad Variorum was published anonymously in 1729. The New Dunciad, in four books and with a...

  • 1727 in literature
    1727 in literature
    The year 1727 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Richard Savage is arrested for the murder of James Sinclair in a drunken quarrel...

    - Eliza Haywood
    Eliza Haywood
    Eliza Haywood , born Elizabeth Fowler, was an English writer, actress and publisher. Since the 1980s, Eliza Haywood’s literary works have been gaining in recognition and interest...

    ,
    Philidore and Placentia
  • 1726 in literature
    1726 in literature
    The year 1726 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Voltaire arrives for a 3 year stay in England.* Lavinia Fenton makes her debut as Monimia in Thomas Otway's The Orphan at the Haymarket Theatre....

    - Jonathan Swift
    Jonathan Swift
    Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...

    ,
    Gulliver's Travels
    Gulliver's Travels
    Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships, better known simply as Gulliver's Travels , is a novel by Anglo-Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan Swift that is both a satire on human nature and a parody of...

  • 1725 in literature
    1725 in literature
    The year 1725 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Émilie de Breteuil marries Marquis Florent-Claude du Chastellet....

    - Birth of Giacomo Casanova
    Giacomo Casanova
    Giacomo Girolamo Casanova de Seingalt was an Italian adventurer and author from the Republic of Venice. His autobiography, Histoire de ma vie , is regarded as one of the most authentic sources of the customs and norms of European social life during the 18th century...

  • 1724 in literature
    1724 in literature
    The year 1724 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* Anonymous - A Narrative of All the Robberies, Escapes, &c. of John Sheppard The year 1724 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-New books:* Anonymous - A Narrative of All the Robberies,...

    - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

    ,
    La Henriade
  • 1723 in literature
    1723 in literature
    The year 1723 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Voltaire contracts smallpox.* The book collection of Samuel Pepys is transferred to the Pepys Library at Magdalene College, Cambridge.-New books:...

    - Births of Richard Price
    Richard Price
    Richard Price was a British moral philosopher and preacher in the tradition of English Dissenters, and a political pamphleteer, active in radical, republican, and liberal causes such as the American Revolution. He fostered connections between a large number of people, including writers of the...

     and Adam Smith
    Adam Smith
    Adam Smith was a Scottish social philosopher and a pioneer of political economy. One of the key figures of the Scottish Enlightenment, Smith is the author of The Theory of Moral Sentiments and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations...

    ; deaths of Susannah Centlivre and Marianna Alcoforado
    Marianna Alcoforado
    Sóror Mariana Alcoforado , was a Portuguese nun, living in the convent of the Poor Ladies in Beja, Portugal....

  • 1722 in literature
    1722 in literature
    The year 1722 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Voltaire and Jean-Baptiste Rousseau meet and quarrel at Brussels.* Ten-year-old Jean-Jacques Rousseau is abandoned by his father, Isaac....

    - Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...

    ,
    Moll Flanders
    Moll Flanders
    The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders is a novel written by Daniel Defoe in 1722, after his work as a journalist and pamphleteer. By 1722, Defoe had become a recognised novelist, with the success of Robinson Crusoe in 1719...

  • 1721 in literature
    1721 in literature
    The year 1721 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Around this time , inoculation for smallpox began in England....

    - Montesquieu,
    Persian Letters
    Persian Letters
    Persian Letters is a literary work by Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu, recounting the experiences of two Persian noblemen, Usbek and Rica, who are traveling through France.-Plot summary:...

  • 1720 in literature
    1720 in literature
    The year 1720 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*October - The South Sea Bubble began to burst. Its collapse will affect the fortunes of many writers and occupy many works of literature....

    - Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...

    ,
    Memoirs of a Cavalier
    Memoirs of a Cavalier
    Memoirs of a Cavalier is a work of historical fiction by Daniel Defoe, set during the Thirty Years' War and the English Civil Wars. The full title, which bore no date, was:-External links:...


1710s

  • 1719 in literature
    1719 in literature
    The year 1719 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Nicholas Rowe's widow receives a pension from King George I in recognition of her husband's translation of Lucan's Pharsalia....

    -
    Robinson Crusoe
    Robinson Crusoe
    Robinson Crusoe is a novel by Daniel Defoe that was first published in 1719. Epistolary, confessional, and didactic in form, the book is a fictional autobiography of the title character—a castaway who spends 28 years on a remote tropical island near Trinidad, encountering cannibals, captives, and...

    - Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...

  • 1718 in literature
    1718 in literature
    The year 1718 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*November 1 - Lady Mary Wortley Montagu writes the last of her Turkish Letters, addressed to Alexander Pope....

    -
    Oedipe - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

    's first play
  • 1717 in literature
    1717 in literature
    The year 1717 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Voltaire is sentenced to eleven months in the Bastille and is banished from Paris for criticizing the Duc D'Orléans...

  • 1716 in literature
    1716 in literature
    The year 1716 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Anne Lefèvre, Madame Dacier, meets Antoine Houdar de la Motte in person.*Voltaire is exiled to Tulle.*Poet John Byrom returns to England to teach his own system of shorthand....

  • 1715 in literature
    1715 in literature
    The year 1715 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Nicholas Rowe becomes Poet Laureate of Great Britain.* Peter the Great takes lessons in maritime affairs from Hermann Boerhaave, before departing for Holland....

    - Nicholas Rowe
    Nicholas Rowe (dramatist)
    Nicholas Rowe , English dramatist, poet and miscellaneous writer, was appointed Poet Laureate in 1715.-Life:...

     becomes Poet Laureate
    Poet Laureate
    A poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...

     of Great Britain
  • 1714 in literature
    1714 in literature
    The year 1714 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Sir Samuel Garth, poet and royal physician, is knighted by King George I of Great Britain...

    - Bernard de Mandeville
    Bernard de Mandeville
    Bernard Mandeville, or Bernard de Mandeville , was a philosopher, political economist and satirist. Born in the Netherlands, he lived most of his life in England and used English for most of his published works...

    ,
    The Fable of the Bees
    The Fable of the Bees
    The Fable of The Bees: or, Private Vices, Public Benefits is a book by Bernard Mandeville, consisting of the poem The Grumbling Hive: or, Knaves turn’d Honest and prose discussion of it. The poem was published in 1705 and the book first appeared in 1714...

  • 1713 in literature
    1713 in literature
    The year 1713 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Scriblerus Club is formed in London by Jonathan Swift, Alexander Pope, John Gay, Thomas Parnell, Robert Harley, Henry St...

    - Birth of Laurence Sterne
    Laurence Sterne
    Laurence Sterne was an Irish novelist and an Anglican clergyman. He is best known for his novels The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, and A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy; but he also published many sermons, wrote memoirs, and was involved in local politics...

  • 1712 in literature
    1712 in literature
    The year 1712 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Lady Mary Pierrepont elopes with Edward Wortley Montagu.* Fire destroys William Bowyer's printing press.* Henry St...

    - Alexander Pope
    Alexander Pope
    Alexander Pope was an 18th-century English poet, best known for his satirical verse and for his translation of Homer. He is the third-most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, after Shakespeare and Tennyson...

    ,
    The Rape of the Lock
    The Rape of the Lock
    The Rape of the Lock is a mock-heroic narrative poem written by Alexander Pope, first published anonymously in Lintot's Miscellany in May 1712 in two cantos , but then revised, expanded and reissued under Pope's name on March 2, 1714, in a much-expanded 5-canto version...

  • 1711 in literature
    1711 in literature
    The year 1711 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*The Spectator founded by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele.*After defeat at the Battle of Stănileşti, Dimitrie Cantemir flees to Russia and begins writing his most important works....

    -
    The Spectator
    The Spectator (1711)
    The Spectator was a daily publication of 1711–12, founded by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele in England after they met at Charterhouse School. Eustace Budgell, a cousin of Addison's, also contributed to the publication. Each 'paper', or 'number', was approximately 2,500 words long, and the...

    is founded by Addison
    Joseph Addison
    Joseph Addison was an English essayist, poet, playwright and politician. He was a man of letters, eldest son of Lancelot Addison...

     and Steele
    Richard Steele
    Sir Richard Steele was an Irish writer and politician, remembered as co-founder, with his friend Joseph Addison, of the magazine The Spectator....

  • 1710 in literature
    1710 in literature
    The year 1710 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*After Thomas Betterton's death in April, the great Shakespearean roles he had dominated for a generation were divided up among fellow actors Barton Booth, Robert Wilks, and John Mills...

    - Colley Cibber
    Colley Cibber
    Colley Cibber was an English actor-manager, playwright and Poet Laureate. His colourful memoir Apology for the Life of Colley Cibber describes his life in a personal, anecdotal and even rambling style...

     becomes manager of Drury Lane
    Theatre Royal, Drury Lane
    The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane is a West End theatre in Covent Garden, in the City of Westminster, a borough of London. The building faces Catherine Street and backs onto Drury Lane. The building standing today is the most recent in a line of four theatres at the same location dating back to 1663,...


1700s

  • 1709 in literature
    1709 in literature
    The year 1709 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 2 - Alexander Selkirk, the original Robinson Crusoe, is rescued and returns to civilisation.*April 12 - The Tatler is founded by Richard Steele....

    -
    Ode à Sainte-Geneviève - Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

    's first published work
  • 1708 in literature
    1708 in literature
    The year 1708 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The Battle of Oudenarde* Joseph Trapp becomes Oxford Professor of Poetry.* Edward Lhuyd becomes a Fellow of the Royal Society.-New books:...

  • 1707 in literature
    1707 in literature
    The year 1707 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Thanks to the efforts of Daniel Defoe, John Arbuthnot, and Anne's ministry, the Act of Union between England and Scotland takes place....

  • 1706 in literature
    1706 in literature
    The year 1706 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Daniel Defoe is sent to Edinburgh as a government agent.* Philosopher Samuel Clarke attacks the views of Henry Dodwell on the immortality of the soul....

  • 1705 in literature
    1705 in literature
    The year 1705 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*William Somervile inherits his father's estate, where his participation in field sports will furnish the material for much of his poetry....

    - Nouveaux essais sur l'entendement humain ("New Essays on Human Understanding") - Gottfried Leibniz
    Gottfried Leibniz
    Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was a German philosopher and mathematician. He wrote in different languages, primarily in Latin , French and German ....

  • 1704 in literature
    1704 in literature
    The year 1704 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Battle of Blenheim* The capture of Gibraltar during the War of the Spanish Succession by British and Dutch troops, allies of Archduke Charles, the Austrian pretender to the Spanish Crown.* Architect and dramatist, Sir John...

    - A Tale of a Tub
    A Tale of a Tub
    A Tale of a Tub was the first major work written by Jonathan Swift, composed between 1694 and 1697 and published in 1704. It is arguably his most difficult satire, and perhaps his most masterly...

     - Jonathan Swift
    Jonathan Swift
    Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...

  • 1703 in literature
    1703 in literature
    The year 1703 in literature involved some significant events.-New books:* Bernard de Mandeville - Some Fables After the Easie and Familiar Method of Monsieur de la Fontaine* Benjamin Whichcote - Moral and Religious Aphorisms-New drama:...

    -
    The Storm - Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe
    Daniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...

     (released 1704)
  • 1702 in literature
    1702 in literature
    The year 1702 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* March 11 - First publication of the Daily Courant, The year 1702 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* March 11 - First publication of the Daily Courant, The year 1702 in literature involved some significant...

  • 1701 in literature
    1701 in literature
    The year 1701 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The beginning of the War of the Spanish Succession, which would continue and have frequent discussion in literature, until 1713....

  • 1700 in literature
    1700 in literature
    The year 1700 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* May 5 - Within a few days of John Dryden's death , his last written work, The Secular Masque, is performed as part of Vanbrugh's version of The Pilgrim....


1690s

  • 1699 in literature
    1699 in literature
    The year 1699 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Jonathan Swift is out of work after the death of his employer, Sir William Temple.*Joseph Addison receives a pension of £300 to enable him to travel abroad.-New books:...

    -Death of Jean Racine
    Jean Racine
    Jean Racine , baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine , was a French dramatist, one of the "Big Three" of 17th-century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition...

  • 1698 in literature
    1698 in literature
    The year 1698 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge is formed.* The latest edition of the Bay Psalm Book is the first to include music....

  • 1697 in literature
    1697 in literature
    The year 1697 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* George Farquhar arrives in London from Dublin.* Thomas Corneille publishes his translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses into the French language....

  • 1696 in literature
    1696 in literature
    The year 1696 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Vincenzo da Filicaja becomes governor of Volterra.*The Kit-Kat Club is founded in London....

  • 1695 in literature
    1695 in literature
    The year 1695 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Antoine Lemaistre and his brother Louis Isaac Lemaistre complete their translation of the Bible into the French language ....

  • 1694 in literature
    1694 in literature
    The year 1694 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Jonathan Swift is ordained a clergyman.*The death of Queen Mary II of England prompts numerous elegies.-New books:* Edmund Arwaker - An Epistle to Monsieur Boileau...

    - Feb 20th, birth of Voltaire
    Voltaire
    François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

  • 1693 in literature
    1693 in literature
    The year 1693 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* July 29 - Anthony Wood is condemned in the vice-chancellor's court for certain libels against Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon; he is fined, banished from the university until he recants, and the offending pages are burned.*...

  • 1692 in literature
    1692 in literature
    The year 1692 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Nahum Tate becomes Poet Laureate.*Thomas Rymer is made Historiographer Royal, and mounts a major effort to preserve and publish historical documents....

  • 1691 in literature
    1691 in literature
    The year 1691 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The first of eight volumes of Letters Writ by a Turkish Spy Who Lived Five and Forty Years Undiscover'd at Paris is published; subsequent volumes are issued through 1694...

    - Athalie
    Athalie
    Athalie is the final tragedy of Jean Racine, and has been described as the masterpiece of 'one of the greatest literary artists known' and the 'ripest work' of Racine's genius...

    - Jean Racine
    Jean Racine
    Jean Racine , baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine , was a French dramatist, one of the "Big Three" of 17th-century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition...

  • 1690 in literature
    1690 in literature
    The year 1690 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*December 10 - Playwright Henry Nevil Payne is tortured for his role in the "Montgomery Plot" to restore James II to the throne — the last time a political prisoner is subjected to torture in Britain.* Colley Cibber becomes...


1680s

  • 1689 in literature
    1689 in literature
    The year 1689 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Jonathan Swift becomes secretary to Sir William Temple.-New books:*Sir Richard Cox - Hibernia Anglicana*John Locke - An Essay Concerning Human Understanding...

  • 1688 in literature
    1688 in literature
    The year 1688 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*John Locke has the first abstract of his seminal Essay concerning Human Understanding appear in Leclerc's Bibliotheque universelle...

    - Aphra Behn
    Aphra Behn
    Aphra Behn was a prolific dramatist of the English Restoration and was one of the first English professional female writers. Her writing contributed to the amatory fiction genre of British literature.-Early life:...

    ,
    Oroonoko
    Oroonoko
    Oroonoko is a short work of prose fiction by Aphra Behn , published in 1688, concerning the love of its hero, an enslaved African in Surinam in the 1660s, and the author's own experiences in the new South American colony....

  • 1687 in literature
    1687 in literature
    The year 1687 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* A Latin edition of the works of Confucius is published in Paris, the first translation of his works into any Western language...

    - Isaac Newton
    Isaac Newton
    Sir Isaac Newton PRS was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, who has been "considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived."...

    ,
    Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica
    Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica
    Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Latin for "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy", often referred to as simply the Principia, is a work in three books by Sir Isaac Newton, first published 5 July 1687. Newton also published two further editions, in 1713 and 1726...

    ; John Dryden
    John Dryden
    John Dryden was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden.Walter Scott called him "Glorious John." He was made Poet...

     
    The Hind and the Panther
    The Hind and the Panther
    The Hind and the Panther: A Poem, in Three Parts is an allegory in heroic couplets by John Dryden. At some 2600 lines it is much the longest of Dryden's poems, translations excepted, and perhaps the most controversial...

  • 1686 in literature
    1686 in literature
    The year 1686 in literature involved some significant events.-New books:*John Bunyan - A Book for Boys and Girls, or, Country Rhymes for Children...

  • 1685 in literature
    1685 in literature
    The year 1685 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Antoine Furetière is expelled from the French Academy.* in London, the year sees one of the major theatrical flops of the Restoration era: Albion and Albanius — an allegorical drama in praise of Charles II, with text by...

  • 1684 in literature
    1684 in literature
    The year 1684 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* John Banks' historical play The Island Queens, or the Death of Mary Queen of Scotland is banned from the stage; it is produced as The Albion Queens twenty years later ....

  • 1683 in literature
    1683 in literature
    The year 1683 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*John Locke flees to the Netherlands, under suspicion of involvement in the Rye House Plot.*The Protestant Academy of Saumur is repressed by King Louis XIV of France....

  • 1682 in literature
    1682 in literature
    The year 1682 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* In London, the King's Company and the Duke's Company join to form the United Company.-New books:*John Bunyan - The Holy War...

  • 1681 in literature
    1681 in literature
    The year 1681 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Birth of Abigail Williams, much later a central character in Arthur Miller's play, The Crucible.-New books:*Robert Knox - An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon...

  • 1680 in literature
    1680 in literature
    The year 1680 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The spring/summer production of Nathaniel Lee's Theodosius at Dorset Garden features Henry Purcell's earliest theatre music....


1670s

  • 1679 in literature
    1679 in literature
    This article lists some of the most significant events of the year 1679 in literature.-Events:*John Locke returns to England from France.*Étienne Baluze becomes almoner to King Louis XIV of France....

  • 1678 in literature
    1678 in literature
    The year 1678 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Thomas Otway, escaping from an unhappy love affair, obtains a commission in the army.*Printer Joseph Moxon becomes the first tradesman to be elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society....

    -
    The Pilgrim's Progress
    The Pilgrim's Progress
    The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to That Which Is to Come is a Christian allegory written by John Bunyan and published in February, 1678. It is regarded as one of the most significant works of religious English literature, has been translated into more than 200 languages, and has never been...

    - John Bunyan
    John Bunyan
    John Bunyan was an English Christian writer and preacher, famous for writing The Pilgrim's Progress. Though he was a Reformed Baptist, in the Church of England he is remembered with a Lesser Festival on 30 August, and on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church on 29 August.-Life:In 1628,...

  • 1677 in literature
    1677 in literature
    The year 1677 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Roger Morrice begins his Entring Book.* Francis North's A Philosophical Essay of Music published....

    -
    Phèdre
    Phèdre
    Phèdre is a dramatic tragedy in five acts written in alexandrine verse by Jean Racine, first performed in 1677.-Composition and premiere:...

    - Jean Racine
    Jean Racine
    Jean Racine , baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine , was a French dramatist, one of the "Big Three" of 17th-century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition...

  • 1676 in literature
    1676 in literature
    The year 1676 in literature involved some significant events.-New books:*Robert Barclay - Theses Theologiae*Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of Orrery - English-Adventures by a Person of Honor...

  • 1675 in literature
    1675 in literature
    The year 1675 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*November 11 - Gottfried Leibniz's notebooks record a breakthrough in his work on calculus.-New books:...

  • 1674 in literature
    1674 in literature
    The year 1674 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Isaac de Benserade is elected to the French Academy, along with Pierre Daniel Huet.* Thomas Ken and Izaak Walton visit Rome together.* The new Theatre Royal, Drury Lane opens in March...

    Nouveaux contes - Jean de la Fontaine
    Jean de La Fontaine
    Jean de La Fontaine was the most famous French fabulist and one of the most widely read French poets of the 17th century. He is known above all for his Fables, which provided a model for subsequent fabulists across Europe and numerous alternative versions in France, and in French regional...

  • 1673 in literature
    1673 in literature
    The year 1673 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*With the death of Sir Henry Herbert, Thomas Killigrew is appointed Master of the Revels...

    - Death of Molière
    Molière
    Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...

     (b. 1622), D'Artagnan
    D'Artagnan
    Charles Ogier de Batz de Castelmore, Comte d'Artagnan served Louis XIV as captain of the Musketeers of the Guard and died at the Siege of Maastricht in the Franco-Dutch War. A fictionalized account of his life by Gatien de Courtilz de Sandras formed the basis for the d'Artagnan Romances of...

    , soldier, inspiration for Dumas' character
  • 1672 in literature
    1672 in literature
    The year 1672 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* In London, the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane is destroyed by fire. The King's Company moves into the theatre at Lincoln's Inn Fields, which their rivals the Duke's Company left the previous year.* During the 1672–73 theatre...

    -
    Les Femmes Savantes
    Les Femmes Savantes
    Les Femmes savantes is a play by Molière in five acts, written in verse. A satire on academic pretention, female education, and préciosité , it was one of his most popular comedies...

    - Molière
    Molière
    Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...

  • 1671 in literature
    1671 in literature
    The year 1671 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Nell Gwyn retires from the stage.*On November 9, the Duke's Company open their new venue, the Dorset Garden Theatre.-New books:...

    -
    Samson Agonistes
    Samson Agonistes
    Samson Agonistes is a tragic closet drama by John Milton. It appeared with the publication of Milton's Paradise Regain'd in 1671, as the title page of that volume states: "Paradise Regained / A Poem / In IV Books / To Which Is Added / Samson Agonistes"...

    - John Milton
    John Milton
    John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...


  • 1670 in literature
    1670 in literature
    The year 1670 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The philosophical arguments of John Locke inspire the formation of the Board of Trade in London ....

    -
    Le Bourgeois gentilhomme
    Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme
    Le Bourgeois gentilhomme is a five-act comédie-ballet—a play intermingled with music, dance and singing—by Molière, first presented on 14 October 1670 before the court of Louis XIV at the Château of Chambord by Molière's troupe of actors...

    - Molière
    Molière
    Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...


1660s

  • 1669 in literature
    1669 in literature
    The year 1669 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Samuel Pepys stops keeping his diary on May 31.* The final section of Parthenissa, the prose romance by Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of Orrery, is published...

    - Jean Racine
    Jean Racine
    Jean Racine , baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine , was a French dramatist, one of the "Big Three" of 17th-century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition...

    's
    Britannicus
  • 1668 in literature
    1668 in literature
    The year 1668 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Izaak Walton's Compleat Angler goes into its fourth edition.*John Dryden signs a contract to produce three plays a year for the King’s Company.-New books:...

    - Birth of Alain-René Lesage
    Alain-René Lesage
    Alain-René Lesage was a French novelist and playwright. Lesage is best known for his comic novel The Devil upon Two Sticks , his comedy Turcaret , and his picaresque novel Gil Blas .-Youth and education:Claude Lesage, the father of the novelist, held the united...

  • 1667 in literature
    1667 in literature
    -Events:* The Roman Catholic Church places the works of René Descartes on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum.* Molière's play, Tartuffe, is banned.* Edmund Castell is imprisoned for debt....

    - John Milton
    John Milton
    John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

    's
    Paradise Lost
    Paradise Lost
    Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse...

  • 1666 in literature
    1666 in literature
    The year 1666 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*2 September - Samuel Pepys begins recording details of the Great Fire of London in his diary.*Aphra Behn goes to Antwerp to work as a government spy.-New books:...

    - Gottfried Leibniz
    Gottfried Leibniz
    Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was a German philosopher and mathematician. He wrote in different languages, primarily in Latin , French and German ....

    's
    De Arte Combinatoria ('On the Art of Combination')
  • 1665 in literature
    1665 in literature
    The year 1665 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*November 7 - The London Gazette is published for the first time.* Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society begins publication....

    -
    Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
    Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
    The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society is a scientific journal published by the Royal Society of London. It was established in 1665, making it the first journal in the world exclusively devoted to science, and it has remained in continuous publication ever since, making it the world's...

    begins publication
  • 1664 in literature
    1664 in literature
    The year 1664 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Sir William Davenant's "dramatic opera" Macbeth, adapted from Shakespeare's play, premiers on November 5....

    - Molière's
    Tartuffe
    Tartuffe
    Tartuffe is a comedy by Molière. It is one of his most famous plays.-History:Molière wrote Tartuffe in 1664...

  • 1663 in literature
    1663 in literature
    The year 1663 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February - The Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres is founded in Paris....

  • 1662 in literature
    1662 in literature
    The year 1662 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*September 29 - Samuel Pepys sees the King's Company production of A Midsummer Night's Dream...

    - Molière
    Molière
    Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...

    's
    L'école des femmes
  • 1661 in literature
    1661 in literature
    The year 1661 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* The Book of Kells is presented to Trinity College, Dublin.* Controversial author James Harrington is arrested on a charge of conspiracy....

  • 1660 in literature
    1660 in literature
    The year 1660 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* January 1 - Samuel Pepys starts his diary.* February - John Rhodes reopens the old Cockpit Theatre in London, forms a company of young actors and begins to stage plays...

    - Samuel Pepys
    Samuel Pepys
    Samuel Pepys FRS, MP, JP, was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament who is now most famous for the diary he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man...

     opens his diary

1650s

  • 1659 in literature
    1659 in literature
    The year 1659 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Andrew Marvell becomes a member of Parliament.* Méric Casaubon edits John Dee's journal of angel magic.-New books:*Richard Baxter - The Holy Commonwealth...

  • 1658 in literature
    1658 in literature
    The year 1658 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Molière arrives in Paris to act at the Louvre.* Edward Phillips continues the Chronicle of the Kings of England from the Time of the Romans' Government unto the Death of King James to this date.-New books:* Sir Thomas Browne -...

  • 1657 in literature
    1657 in literature
    The year 1657 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Prohibition of young male actors in Japan.* Madame de la Fayette becomes friends with Madame de Sévigné.-New books:*François Hédelin, abbé d'Aubignac - Pratique du théâtre...

  • 1656 in literature
    1656 in literature
    The year 1656 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*September - performance of The Siege of Rhodes, Part I by Sir William Davenant, the "first English opera"* November 12 - John Milton marries Katherine Woodcock....

  • 1655 in literature
    1655 in literature
    The year 1655 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*May - Jeremy Taylor is imprisoned for four months at Chepstow Castle.*August 6 - The Blackfriars Theatre is demolished....

  • 1654 in literature
    1654 in literature
    The year 1654 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Lady Dorothy Osborne plays the lead role in a country-house staging of Sir William Berkeley's tragicomedy The Lost Lady. While the London theatres remain closed, amateur theatricals continue at private houses in England...

  • 1653 in literature
    1653 in literature
    The year 1653 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* James Shirley's masque Cupid and Death is performed on March 26.* Pierre Corneille retires from the theatre for six years.* John Evelyn buys Sayes Court, Deptford....

  • 1652 in literature
    1652 in literature
    The year 1652 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* John Milton loses the last of his eyesight during the year. His wife Mary dies on May 5.-New books:*Anonymous - Eliza's Babes, or the Virgin's Offering...

  • 1651 in literature
    1651 in literature
    The year 1651 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*August 22 - Execution of Protestant preacher, Christopher Love, whose sermons were later published.-New books:...

  • 1650 in literature
    1650 in literature
    The year 1650 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Blaise Pascal's poor health forces him to retire from the study of mathematics....

    Death of René Descartes
    René Descartes
    René Descartes ; was a French philosopher and writer who spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. He has been dubbed the 'Father of Modern Philosophy', and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings, which are studied closely to this day...

    , philosopher (born 1596)

1640s

  • 1649 in literature
    1649 in literature
    The year 1649 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - Local authorities raid the four remaining London theatres to suppress clandestine play-acting...

  • 1648 in literature
    1648 in literature
    The year 1648 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Richard Lovelace, Royalist poet, is imprisoned for opposition to Parliament.* René Descartes meets Frans Burman, resulting in the Conversation with Burman....

  • 1647 in literature
    1647 in literature
    The year 1647 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* Thomas Hobbes becomes tutor to the future Charles II of England.* Plagiarist Robert Baron publishes his Deorum Dona, a masque, and Gripus and Hegio, a pastoral, which draw heavily on the poems of Edmund Waller and John Webster's...

  • 1646 in literature
    1646 in literature
    The year 1646 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*March 24 - The King's Men petition Parliament for three and a half years' back pay; this is despite the London theatres officially remaining closed through the middle 1640s...

  • 1645 in literature
    1645 in literature
    The year 1645 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* With the London theatres closed by the Puritan regime during the English Civil War, closet drama grows in prominence. Henry Burkhead's Cola's Fury, or Lirenda's Misery is published in 1645...

  • 1644 in literature
    1644 in literature
    The year 1644 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*April 15 - The second Globe Theatre is demolished by the Puritan government to make room for new housing....

  • 1643 in literature
    1643 in literature
    The year 1643 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Having had his philosophy condemned by the University of Utrecht, René Descartes begins his long correspondence with Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia....

  • 1642 in literature
    1642 in literature
    The year 1642 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*May - John Milton marries Marie Powell.*September 2 - The theatres in London are closed by the Puritan government; the "lascivious mirth and levity" of stage plays are to "cease and be forborn" for the next eighteen years, during...

  • 1641 in literature
    1641 in literature
    The year 1641 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Pierre Corneille marries Marie de Lampérière.*Sir William Davenant is convicted of high treason.*Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon becomes an advisor to King Charles I of England....

  • 1640 in literature
    1640 in literature
    The year 1640 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 21 - Salmacida Spolia, a masque written by Sir William Davenant and designed by Inigo Jones, is performed at Whitehall Palace — the final royal masque of the Caroline era.*March 17 - Henry Burnell's play Landgartha...

    - René Descartes
    René Descartes
    René Descartes ; was a French philosopher and writer who spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. He has been dubbed the 'Father of Modern Philosophy', and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings, which are studied closely to this day...

     completes Meditations on First Philosophy
    Meditations on First Philosophy
    Meditations on First Philosophy is a philosophical treatise written by René Descartes and first published in 1641 . The French translation was published in 1647 as Méditations Metaphysiques...

    : "I think therefore I am"

1630s

  • 1639 in literature
    1639 in literature
    The year 1639 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*May 21 - The King's Men act John Fletcher's The Mad Lover.*Blaise Pascal's family move to Rouen.*François de La Mothe-Le-Vayer is elected to the Académie Française....

    - Birth of Jean Racine
    Jean Racine
    Jean Racine , baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine , was a French dramatist, one of the "Big Three" of 17th-century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition...

  • 1638 in literature
    1638 in literature
    The year 1638 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 6 - Luminalia, a masque written by Sir William Davenant and designed by Inigo Jones, is staged at the English Court....

  • 1637 in literature
    1637 in literature
    The year 1637 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 24 - Hamlet is performed before King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria at Hampton Court Palace....

  • 1636 in literature
    1636 in literature
    The year 1636 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 31 - The King's Men perform Shakespeare's Julius Caesar at St. James's Palace.*February - James Shirley's The Duke's Mistress is performed at St...

    - the Annals of the Four Masters
    Annals of the Four Masters
    The Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland or the Annals of the Four Masters are a chronicle of medieval Irish history...

     are completed
  • 1635 in literature
    1635 in literature
    The year 1635 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 22 - In Paris, the Académie française is founded.*May 6 - The King's Men perform Othello at the Blackfriars Theatre.*Birth of René Descartes' daughter, Francine....

  • 1634 in literature
    1634 in literature
    The year 1634 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - The King's Men perform Cymbeline at the court of King Charles I of England.*January 22 - The King's Men perform Davenant's The Wits at the Blackfriars Theatre....

  • 1633 in literature
    1633 in literature
    The year 1633 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*On May 21, Ben Jonson's masque The King's Entertainment at Welbeck is performed....

  • 1632 in literature
    1632 in literature
    The year 1632 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*On February 14, Tempe Restored, a masque written by Aurelian Townshend and designed by Inigo Jones, is performed at Whitehall Palace....

  • 1631 in literature
    1631 in literature
    The year 1631 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 9 - Love's Triumph Through Callipolis, a masque written by Ben Jonson and designed by Inigo Jones, is staged at Whitehall Palace....

  • 1630 in literature
    1630 in literature
    The year 1630 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:* English literature, drama, and education lose a major patron and benefactor when William Herbert, 3rd Earl of Pembroke and Lord Chamberlain of England, dies on April 10.-New books:...


1620s

  • 1629 in literature
    1629 in literature
    The year 1629 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*April 6 - Tommaso Campanella is released from custody in Rome, and gains the confidence of Pope Urban IV....

  • 1628 in literature
    1628 in literature
    The year 1628 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Ben Jonson is appointed city chronologer of London.*Ten-year-old Abraham Cowley produces his Tragicall History of Piramus and Thisbe....

  • 1627 in literature
    1627 in literature
    The year 1627 in literature involved some significant events.-New books:*Jean-Pierre Camus - Hyacinthe*George Hakewill - An Apologie or Declaration of the Power and Providence of God*Marin Mersenne - Traité de l'harmonie universelle...

  • 1626 in literature
    1626 in literature
    The year 1626 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Izaak Walton marries Rachel Floud.*John Beaumont is made a baronet.-New books:*Francis Bacon - The New Atlantis*Robert Fludd - Philosophia Sacra...

  • 1625 in literature
    1625 in literature
    The year 1625 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - The King's Men act Henry IV, Part 1 at Whitehall Palace....

  • 1624 in literature
    1624 in literature
    The year 1624 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*The King's Men perform The Winter's Tale at Whitehall Palace on January 18...

  • 1623 in literature
    1623 in literature
    The year 1623 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 2 - The King's Men perform Twelfth Night at Court on Candlemas....

  • 1622 in literature
    1622 in literature
    The year 1622 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 28 - Loiola, a Latin comedy mocking the Jesuits, is acted at Cambridge; the performance is repeated before King James I on March 12.*March 12 - Teresa of Ávila The year 1622 in literature involved some significant...

    - Birth of Molière
    Molière
    Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...

     (d. 1673)
  • 1621 in literature
    1621 in literature
    The year 1621 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*August 26 - Barten Holyday's allegorical play Technogamia, originally produced at Christ Church, Oxford in 1618, is staged before King James at Woodstock Palace...

  • 1620 in literature
    1620 in literature
    The year 1620 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*The Book of Psalmes: Englished both in Prose and Metre with Annotations by Henry Ainsworth is the only book brought to New England by the pilgrim settlers....

    - Novum Organum
    Novum Organum
    The Novum Organum, full original title Novum Organum Scientiarum, is a philosophical work by Francis Bacon, written in Latin and published in 1620. The title translates as new instrument, i.e. new instrument of science. This is a reference to Aristotle's work Organon, which was his treatise on...

    Francis Bacon
    Francis Bacon
    Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Albans, KC was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist, author and pioneer of the scientific method. He served both as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England...


1610s

  • 1619 in literature
    1619 in literature
    The year 1619 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Richard Burbage dies in March; his place as the star of the King's Men is filled by Joseph Taylor.*René Descartes has a dream that helps him develop his ideas on analytical geometry....

  • 1618 in literature
    1618 in literature
    The year 1618 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Sir Francis Bacon is appointed Lord Chancellor by King James I of England.*Ben Jonson sets out to walk to Scotland....

  • 1617 in literature
    1617 in literature
    The year 1617 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*March 4 - Shrovetide riot of the London apprentices damages the Cockpit Theatre...

  • 1616 in literature
    1616 in literature
    The year 1616 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Nicolaus Copernicus' De revolutionibus is placed on the Index of Forbidden Books by the Roman Catholic Church....

    - Death of William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

    , genius, dramatist and poet (b. 1564), Miguel de Cervantes
    Miguel de Cervantes
    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was a Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright. His magnum opus, Don Quixote, considered the first modern novel, is a classic of Western literature, and is regarded amongst the best works of fiction ever written...

    , Spanish writer (b.1547)
  • 1615 in literature
    1615 in literature
    The year 1615 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 6 - Mercury Vindicated from the Alchemists, a masque written by Ben Jonson and designed by Inigo Jones, is performed at Whitehall Palace....

    -
    Don Quixote de la Mancha (Part 2) - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
  • 1614 in literature
    1614 in literature
    The year 1614 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Sir Francis Bacon's dual role as MP and attorney-general is objected to by Parliament.*Izaak Walton owns an ironmonger's shop in Fleet Street, London.*Lope de Vega becomes a priest....

  • 1613 in literature
    1613 in literature
    The year 1613 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*English poet Francis Quarles becomes cupbearer to Princess Elizabeth....

    -
    Henry VIII
    Henry VIII of England
    Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...

     - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

  • 1612 in literature
    1612 in literature
    The year 1612 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 6 - Ben Jonson's masque Love Restored is performed.*January 12 - The King's Men and Queen Anne's Men unite for the first of two Court performances in January, with Thomas Heywood's The Silver Age*January 13 - The King's...

  • 1611 in literature
    1611 in literature
    The year 1611 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - Oberon, the Faery Prince, a masque written by Ben Jonson and designed by Inigo Jones, is performed at Whitehall Palace....

    - The Tempest
    The Tempest
    The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

  • 1610 in literature
    1610 in literature
    The year 1610 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Thomas Bodley makes an agreement with the Stationers' Company of London to put a copy of every book registered with them into his new Bodleian.-New books:...


1600s

  • 1609 in literature
    1609 in literature
    The year 1609 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - the Children of the Blackfriars perform Middleton's A Trick to Catch the Old One at Court....

  • 1608 in literature
    1608 in literature
    The year 1608 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 10 - Ben Jonson's The Masque of Beauty is performed by Queen Anne and her retinue at the Banqueting House, Whitehall, a sequel to The Masque of Blackness....

  • 1607 in literature
    1607 in literature
    The year 1607 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 2 - The King's Men perform Barnes's The Devil's Charter at Court.*June 5 - John Hall marries Susanna, daughter of William Shakespeare....

  • 1606 in literature
    1606 in literature
    The year 1606 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*May 27 - The English Parliament passes An Act to Restrain Abuses of Players, which tightens the censorship controls on public theatre performances, most notably on the question of profane oaths.*December 26 - Shakespeare's King...

  • 1605 in literature
    1605 in literature
    The year 1605 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - The Queen's Revels Children perform George Chapman's All Fools at Court....

    - King Lear
    King Lear
    King Lear is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The title character descends into madness after foolishly disposing of his estate between two of his three daughters based on their flattery, bringing tragic consequences for all. The play is based on the legend of Leir of Britain, a mythological...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

    ; Don Quixote de la Mancha (Part 1) Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
  • 1604 in literature
    1604 in literature
    The year 1604 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Isaac Casaubon becomes sub-librarian of the royal library in Paris.*Construction of the Red Bull Theatre in London....

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     - Hamlet
    Hamlet
    The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, or more simply Hamlet, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601...

  • 1603 in literature
    1603 in literature
    The year 1603 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*Ben Jonson and Thomas Dekker collaborate on a pageant to welcome the new king James I of England.*Thomas Middleton gets married.*Chronicler Richard Baker, is knighted by James I....

    -
    Measure for Measure
    Measure for Measure
    Measure for Measure is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604. It was classified as comedy, but its mood defies those expectations. As a result and for a variety of reasons, some critics have labelled it as one of Shakespeare's problem plays...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

  • 1602 in literature
    1602 in literature
    The year 1602 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 2 - The King's Men perform Twelfth Night at the Middle Temple.*May 4 - Richard Hakluyt is installed as prebendary of Westminster....

  • 1601 in literature
    1601 in literature
    The year 1601 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*February 7 - The Lord Chamberlain's Men stage a performance of Shakespeare's Richard II at the Globe Theatre. The performance is specially commissioned by the plotters in the Earl of Essex's rebellion of the following day...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     -
    Twelfth Night
  • 1600 in literature
    1600 in literature
    The year 1600 in literature involved some significant events.-Events:*January 1 - The Admiral's Men perform Dekker's The Shoemaker's Holiday at Court....

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     - Henry IV, Part 2
    Henry IV, Part 2
    Henry IV, Part 2 is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed written between 1596 and 1599. It is the third part of a tetralogy, preceded by Richard II and Henry IV, Part 1 and succeeded by Henry V.-Sources:...

    , The Merchant of Venice
    The Merchant of Venice
    The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...

    , Henry V
    Henry V (play)
    Henry V is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to be written in approximately 1599. Its full titles are The Cronicle History of Henry the Fifth and The Life of Henry the Fifth...

    , A Midsummer Night's Dream
    A Midsummer Night's Dream
    A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play that was written by William Shakespeare. It is believed to have been written between 1590 and 1596. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta...

    , and Much Ado About Nothing
    Much Ado About Nothing
    Much Ado About Nothing is a comedy written by William Shakespeare about two pairs of lovers, Benedick and Beatrice, and Claudio and Hero....

    published

1590s

  • 1599 in literature
    1599 in literature
    -Events:* Undated - Opening of the Globe Theatre.*June 4 - Middleton's Microcynicon and Marston's Scourge of Villainy are publicly burned, as ecclesiastical authorities crack down on the craze for satire of the past year. The Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury tighten their...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     - Henry V
    Henry V (play)
    Henry V is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to be written in approximately 1599. Its full titles are The Cronicle History of Henry the Fifth and The Life of Henry the Fifth...

    ,

Julius Caesar
Julius Caesar (play)
The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, also known simply as Julius Caesar, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1599. It portrays the 44 BC conspiracy against...

  • 1598 in literature
    1598 in literature
    -Events:*September 22 - Ben Jonson is charged with manslaughter, after killing actor Gabriel Spenser in a duel.*October - Edmund Spenser's castle at Kilcolman, near Doneraile in North Cork, is burned down by the native Irish forces of Aodh Ó Néill...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     - Henry IV, Part 1
    Henry IV, Part 1
    Henry IV, Part 1 is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written no later than 1597. It is the second play in Shakespeare's tetralogy dealing with the successive reigns of Richard II, Henry IV , and Henry V...

    and Love's Labor's Lost published
  • 1597 in literature
    1597 in literature
    -Events:*February - Pembroke's Men contract with Francis Langley to play the next year at his new Swan Theatre. Their season goes disastrously wrong in July, when they stage the scandalous play The Isle of Dogs, which provokes the authorities to close all of the London theatres for the remainder of...

    - Francis Bacon
    Francis Bacon
    Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Albans, KC was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist, author and pioneer of the scientific method. He served both as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England...

     Essays
    Essays (Francis Bacon)
    Essayes: Religious Meditations. Places of Perswasion and Disswasion. Seene and Allowed was the first published book by the philosopher, statesman and jurist Francis Bacon. The Essays are written in a wide range of styles, from the plain and unadorned to the epigrammatic...

  • 1596 in literature
    1596 in literature
    -Events:*The first complete edition of The Faerie Queene in six books is published.*James Burbage buys the disused Blackfriars Theatre from Sir William More for £600; yet he is prevented from using it for theatrical productions by the opposition of wealthy and influential neighbors.* Lord Hunsdon...

    - Edmund Spenser
    Edmund Spenser
    Edmund Spenser was an English poet best known for The Faerie Queene, an epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty and Elizabeth I. He is recognised as one of the premier craftsmen of Modern English verse in its infancy, and one of the greatest poets in the English...

     - The Faerie Queene
    The Faerie Queene
    The Faerie Queene is an incomplete English epic poem by Edmund Spenser. The first half was published in 1590, and a second installment was published in 1596. The Faerie Queene is notable for its form: it was the first work written in Spenserian stanza and is one of the longest poems in the English...

    , Books 4-6

  • 1595 in literature
    1595 in literature
    -Events:*Lope de Vega leaves the service of the Duke of Alba and returns to Madrid.* December 9 - Shakespeare's Richard II is possibly acted at a private performance at the Canon Row house of Sir Edward Hoby; Sir Robert Cecil attends.-New books:...

    - William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     - Richard II
    Richard II (play)
    King Richard the Second is a history play by William Shakespeare believed to be written in approximately 1595. It is based on the life of King Richard II of England and is the first part of a tetralogy, referred to by some scholars as the Henriad, followed by three plays concerning Richard's...

    , Romeo and Juliet
    Romeo and Juliet
    Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...

  • 1594 in literature
    1594 in literature
    -Events:*The London theatres re-open in the spring, after two years of general inactivity due to the bubonic plague epidemic of 1592–94. Many of the actors who used to be Lord Strange's Men form a new organization, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, under the patronage of Henry Carey, 1st Baron...

    - The Unfortunate Traveller
    The Unfortunate Traveller
    The Unfortunate Traveller: or, the Life of Jack Wilton by Thomas Nashe is a picaresque novel set during the reign of Henry VIII of England....

    , Thomas Nashe
    Thomas Nashe
    Thomas Nashe was an English Elizabethan pamphleteer, playwright, poet and satirist. He was the son of the minister William Nashe and his wife Margaret .-Early life:...

  • 1593 in literature
    1593 in literature
    -Events:*The London theatres remain closed for almost the entire year, due to the outbreak of bubonic plague that began the previous year. In the summer, Edward Alleyn and other actors tour the towns and countryside beyond the city...

    - Death of Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. As the foremost Elizabethan tragedian, next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his mysterious death.A warrant was issued for Marlowe's arrest on 18 May...

    , dramatist and poet (born 1564)
  • 1592 in literature
    1592 in literature
    -Events:*Ulysses Redux, a Latin play by William Gager, is staged by the students of Christ Church, Oxford on February 5. Two days later, on February 7, the students revive Gager's 1583 Latin play Rivales...

  • 1591 in literature
    1591 in literature
    -Events:*In the spring of the year, a dispute with James Burbage impels the Admiral's Men to leave The Theatre and move to Philip Henslowe's Rose Theatre.*Summer - Sir Walter Raleigh secretly marries Elizabeth Throckmorton....

  • 1590 in literature
    1590 in literature
    -Events:*The Children of Paul's perform at Court twice in the first week of January; one of the plays they acted may have been John Lyly's Midas. Later in the year, however, they are banned from performing because of the involvement of their chief script-writer, Lyly, in the Marprelate...

    - Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. As the foremost Elizabethan tragedian, next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his mysterious death.A warrant was issued for Marlowe's arrest on 18 May...

     - Tamburlaine
    Tamburlaine (play)
    Tamburlaine the Great is the name of a play in two parts by Christopher Marlowe. It is loosely based on the life of the Central Asian emperor, Timur 'the lame'...

    (both parts published); Edmund Spenser
    Edmund Spenser
    Edmund Spenser was an English poet best known for The Faerie Queene, an epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty and Elizabeth I. He is recognised as one of the premier craftsmen of Modern English verse in its infancy, and one of the greatest poets in the English...

     - The Faerie Queene
    The Faerie Queene
    The Faerie Queene is an incomplete English epic poem by Edmund Spenser. The first half was published in 1590, and a second installment was published in 1596. The Faerie Queene is notable for its form: it was the first work written in Spenserian stanza and is one of the longest poems in the English...

    , Books 1-3; Sir Philip Sidney
    Philip Sidney
    Sir Philip Sidney was an English poet, courtier and soldier, and is remembered as one of the most prominent figures of the Elizabethan Age...

     - Arcadia
    Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia
    The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia, also known simply as the Arcadia or the Old Arcadia, is a long prose work by Sir Philip Sidney written towards the end of the sixteenth century, and later published in several versions. It is Sidney's most ambitious literary work, by far, and as significant in...

  • unknown year in 1590s - Journey to the West
    Journey to the West
    Journey to the West is one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature. It was written by Wu Cheng'en in the 16th century. In English-speaking countries, the tale is also often known simply as Monkey. This was one title used for a popular, abridged translation by Arthur Waley...

    , Wu Cheng'en
    Wu Cheng'en
    Wu Cheng'en , courtesy name Ruzhong , pen name "Sheyang Hermit," was a Chinese novelist and poet of the Ming Dynasty, best known for being the attributed author of one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, Journey to the West.-Biography:Wu was born in Lianshui, in Jiangsu...


1580s

  • 1589 in literature
    1589 in literature
    -Events:*The Children of Paul's perform twice at the English royal court during the first two weeks of January.-New books:*"Jane Anger" - Protection for Women*Giovanni Botero - Della ragione di Stato ...

    - The Passionate Shepherd to His Love
    The Passionate Shepherd to His Love
    "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love" is a poem written by the English poet Christopher Marlowe and published in 1599 . In addition to being one of the most well-known love poems in the English language, it is considered one of the earliest examples of the pastoral style of British poetry in the...

    - Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. As the foremost Elizabethan tragedian, next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his mysterious death.A warrant was issued for Marlowe's arrest on 18 May...

  • 1588 in literature
    1588 in literature
    -Events:*January 1 - The Children of Paul's perform at the court of Queen Elizabeth I of England, probably acting Lyly's Gallathea.*February 2 - The Children of Paul's return to the English court, probably with Lyly's Endymion....

    - The Battle of Alcazar (date first performed) - George Peele
    George Peele
    George Peele , was an English dramatist.-Life:Peele was christened on 25 July 1556. His father, who appears to have belonged to a Devonshire family, was clerk of Christ's Hospital, and wrote two treatises on bookkeeping...

  • 1587 in literature
    1587 in literature
    -Events:*The Rose theatre is built by Philip Henslowe in Southwark.*Torquato Tasso travels to Rome to stay with Scipione Gonzaga, Patriarch of Jerusalem.-New books:*George Gifford - A discourse of the subtill practises of deuilles by witches and sorcerers...

    - A discourse of the subtill practises of deuilles by witches and sorcerers - George Gifford
    George Gifford
    George Gifford was a Puritan preacher at Maldon, Essex.-Life:Gifford was born in Dry Drayton, near Cambridge and attended Christ's College, Cambridge, graduating BA in 1570 and MA in 1573. He afterwards lived at Maldon, but was discharged from the priesthood for refusing to subscribe to Archbishop...

  • 1586 in literature
    1586 in literature
    -New books:*John Knox - Historie of the Reformatioun of Religioun within the Realms of Scotland*John Lyly - Pappe with an hatchet, alias a figge for my Godsonne*Jerónimo Osório - De rebus Emmanuelis...

    - Historie of the Reformatioun of Religioun within the Realms of Scotland - John Knox
    John Knox
    John Knox was a Scottish clergyman and a leader of the Protestant Reformation who brought reformation to the church in Scotland. He was educated at the University of St Andrews or possibly the University of Glasgow and was ordained to the Catholic priesthood in 1536...

  • 1585 in literature - La Galatea
    La Galatea
    La Galatea was Miguel de Cervantes’ first book, published in 1585.Under the guise of pastoral characters, it is an examination of love and contains many allusions to contemporary literary figures....

    - Miguel de Cervantes
    Miguel de Cervantes
    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was a Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright. His magnum opus, Don Quixote, considered the first modern novel, is a classic of Western literature, and is regarded amongst the best works of fiction ever written...

  • 1584 in literature
    1584 in literature
    -Events:*Master Thomas Giles takes charge of the Children of Paul's; this is the start of a close association with the works of John Lyly.-New books:*A Booke of Cookry*Giordano Bruno - La Cena de le Ceneri ...

    - Campaspe
    Campaspe (play)
    Campaspe is an Elizabethan era stage play, a comedy by John Lyly. Widely considered Lyly's earliest drama, Campaspe was an influence and a precedent for much that followed in English Renaissance drama.-Performance and publication:...

    , Sapho and Phao
    Sapho and Phao
    Sapho and Phao is an Elizabethan era stage play, a comedy written by John Lyly. One of Lyly's earliest dramas, it was likely the first that the playwright devoted to the allegorical idealization of Queen Elizabeth I that became the predominating feature of Lyly's dramatic canon.-Performance and...

    - John Lyly
    John Lyly
    John Lyly was an English writer, best known for his books Euphues,The Anatomy of Wit and Euphues and His England. Lyly's linguistic style, originating in his first books, is known as Euphuism.-Biography:John Lyly was born in Kent, England, in 1553/1554...

  • 1583 in literature
    1583 in literature
    -Events:*June 11 - Rivales, another Latin play by Gager, is acted by the students of Christ Church, Oxford. Rivales, criticized for its "filth," was never printed and does not survive; but was revived for two performances in 1592, one before Queen Elizabeth I of England.*June 12 - Dido, a play in...

    - The Anatomy of Abuses - Philip Stubbes
  • 1582 in literature
    1582 in literature
    -Events:*Meleager, a Latin play on the mythological figure by "Gulielmus Gagerus" , is performed by students at Christ Church, Oxford in February.-New books:*George Buchanan - Rerum Scoticarum Historia...

    - Divers Voyages - Richard Hakluyt
    Richard Hakluyt
    Richard Hakluyt was an English writer. He is principally remembered for his efforts in promoting and supporting the settlement of North America by the English through his works, notably Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America and The Principal Navigations, Voiages, Traffiques and...

  • 1581 in literature
    1581 in literature
    -Events:*Stationer Thomas Marsh publishes Seneca's Tragedies in English, a collected edition of ten dramas written by Seneca the Younger , translated by Jasper Heywood, John Studley, Alexander Neville, Thomas Newton, and Thomas Nuce...

    - Second Book of Discipline
  • 1580 in literature
    1580 in literature
    -Events:*Thomas Legge's Latin play about Richard III, Richardus Tertius, is acted by students at St John's College, Cambridge during March.-New books:*Book of Concord*Jean Bodin - De la demonomanie des sorciers*John Lyly - Euphues and his England...

    - Os Lusíadas
    Os Lusíadas
    Os Lusíadas , usually translated as The Lusiads, is a Portuguese epic poem by Luís Vaz de Camões ....

    - Luís Vaz de Camões

1570s

  • 1579 in literature
    1579 in literature
    -Events:*Bible of Kralice is published - the first translation of the Bible into the Czech language.-New books:*Stephen Gosson - The Schoole of Abuse*Martin de Hoyarçabal - Les voyages aventureux du Capitaine Martin de Hoyarsal, habitant du çubiburu...

  • 1578 in literature
    1578 in literature
    -Events:*Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga is sent on a mission to Zaragoza by King Philip II of Spain.-New books:*Diogo de Paiva de Andrada - Defensio Tridentinae Fidei...

  • 1577 in literature
    1577 in literature
    -Events:*December 4 - San Juan de la Cruz is imprisoned at Toledo. During his imprisonment he composes his Spiritual Canticle.-New books:*Richard Eden - The History of Travayle in the West and East Indies*Thomas Hill - The Gardener's Labyrinth...

  • 1576 in literature
    1576 in literature
    -Events:*James Burbage builds The Theatre, the first permanent public playhouse in London, ushering in the great age of Elizabethan drama.-New books:*Jean Boudin - Six livres de la République*George Pettie - A Petite Palace of Pettie His Pleasure...

  • 1575 in literature
    1575 in literature
    -Events:*Sir Philip Sidney meets Penelope Devereaux, the inspiration for his Astrophel and Stella.*The first primer in the Estonian language is published.*First printed version of Don Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, originally published in 1335....

  • 1574 in literature
    1574 in literature
    -Events:*Creation of the original Exercicio quotidiano .-New books:*Jean-Antoine de Baïf - Etrenes de poezie Franzoeze an vers mezures*Matthias Flacius et al...

  • 1573 in literature
    1573 in literature
    -New books:*George Gascoigne - A Hundred Sundry Flowers Bound Up in One Small Poesy... -New drama:*Anonymous - New Custom *George Gascoigne**Jocasta**Supposes...

  • 1572 in literature
  • 1571 in literature
    1571 in literature
    -Events:*Michel de Montaigne retires from public life and isolates himself in the tower of the Château de Montaigne.-New books:*François de Belleforest - La Pyrénée...

  • 1570 in literature
    1570 in literature
    -New books:*Roger Ascham - The Scholemaster *Abraham Ortelius - Theatrum Orbis Terrarum -Births:*October 4 - Péter Pázmány, philosopher and theologian...

    Abraham Ortelius
    Abraham Ortelius
    thumb|250px|Abraham Ortelius by [[Peter Paul Rubens]]Abraham Ortelius thumb|250px|Abraham Ortelius by [[Peter Paul Rubens]]Abraham Ortelius (Abraham Ortels) thumb|250px|Abraham Ortelius by [[Peter Paul Rubens]]Abraham Ortelius (Abraham Ortels) (April 14, 1527 – June 28,exile in England to take...

     - Theatrum Orbis Terrarum
    Theatrum Orbis Terrarum
    Theatrum Orbis Terrarum is considered to be the first true modern atlas. Written by Abraham Ortelius and originally printed on May 20, 1570, in Antwerp, it consisted of a collection of uniform map sheets and sustaining text bound to form a book for which copper printing plates were specifically...

    (the first modern atlas)

1560s

  • 1569 in literature
    1569 in literature
    -Events:*Publication of the first complete Spanish translation of the Bible, Reina-Valera -New books:*Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga - La Araucana, part 1*Magdeburg Centuries, vol...

    La Araucana
    La Araucana
    La Araucana is an epic poem in Spanish about the Spanish conquest of Chile, by Alonso de Ercilla; it is also known in English as The Araucaniad...

    , part 1 - Joan Perez de Lazarraga
    Joan Perez de Lazarraga
    Joan Perez de Lazarraga, Lord of Larrea Tower was a Basque writer, who was born and died in Larrea, Álava.Lazarraga, the lord of Larrea, and a member of a family originating in Oñati. As a writer, he was one of the few Renaissance authors writing in Basque...

  • 1568 in literature
    1568 in literature
    -New books:*Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki - De optimo senatore*Petar Hektorović - Ribanje i ribarsko prigovaranje ...

    - Giorgio Vasari
    Giorgio Vasari
    Giorgio Vasari was an Italian painter, writer, historian, and architect, who is famous today for his biographies of Italian artists, considered the ideological foundation of art-historical writing.-Biography:...

     - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects
    Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects
    The Lives of the Most Excellent Italian Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, from Cimabue to Our Times, or Le Vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e architettori da Cimabue insino a' tempi nostri, as it was originally known in Italian, is a series of artist biographies written by 16th century...

    ; Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki - De optimo senatore
    De optimo senatore
    De optimo senatore was a book by Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki published in Venice in 1568, republished in Basel , and then translated into English and published in 1598 and in 1607....

  • 1567 in literature
    1567 in literature
    -Events:*October 14 - António Ferreira becomes Desembargador da Casa do Civel and leaves Coimbra for Lisbon.-New books:*Joan Perez de Lazarraga - Silbero, Silbia, Doristeo, and Sirena *Magdeburg Centuries, vols X-XI...

    - William Salesbury
    William Salesbury
    William Salesbury also Salusbury was the leading Welsh scholar of the Renaissance and the principal translator of the 1567 Welsh New Testament.Salesbury was born in about 1520 in the parish of Llansannan, Conwy...

     - New Testament
    New Testament
    The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....

     (first Welsh language version); Magdeburg Centuries
    Magdeburg Centuries
    The Magdeburg Centuries is an ecclesiastical history, divided into thirteen centuries, covering thirteen hundred years, ending in 1298; it was first published from 1559 to 1574. It was compiled by several Lutheran scholars in Magdeburg, known as the Centuriators of Magdeburg. The chief of the...

  • 1566 in literature
    1566 in literature
    -Events:*At a performance of Richard Edwardes' play, Palamon and Arcite, at Oxford, in the presence of Queen Elizabeth I of England, the stage collapses causing three deaths. The show goes on.-New books:*Magdeburg Centuries, volume IX...

    - William Painter
    William Painter
    William Painter was an English author and translator.William Painter was a native of Kent. He matriculated at St John's College, Cambridge, in 1554. In 1561 he became clerk of the ordnance in the Tower of London, a position in which he appears to have amassed a fortune out of the public funds...

     - The Palace of Pleasure
    The Palace of Pleasure
    The Palace of Pleasure is a poem by James Henry Leigh Hunt published in his 1801 collection Juvenilia. Written before he was even sixteen, the work was part of a long tradition of poets imitating Spenser...

  • 1565 in literature
    1565 in literature
    -Events:*Torquato Tasso enters the service of Cardinal Luigi d'Este at Ferrara.*Poet and missionary José de Anchieta co-founds Rio de Janeiro.-New books:*Pierre Pithou - Adversariorum subsectorum lib...

    - Bernardino Telesio
    Bernardino Telesio
    Bernardino Telesio was an Italian philosopher and natural scientist.While his natural theories were later disproven, his emphasis on observation made him the "first of the moderns" who eventually developed thescientific method.-Biography:...

     - De natura juxta propria principia
  • 1564 in literature
    1564 in literature
    -Events:*Ivan Fyodorov prints the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles, the first printed work in the Russian language that can be dated.-New books:*John Dee - Monas Hieroglyphica*Magdeburg Centuries, volumes VII and VIII...

    – Birth of William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare
    William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

     dramatist and poet (d.1616); Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe
    Christopher Marlowe was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. As the foremost Elizabethan tragedian, next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his mysterious death.A warrant was issued for Marlowe's arrest on 18 May...

    , dramatist and poet (d. 1593)
  • 1563 in literature
    1563 in literature
    -Events:*August - Michel de Montaigne writes a long letter to his father, describing the death of his friend Étienne de La Boétie.-New books:*John Foxe - Foxe's Book of Martyrs.*Richard Grafton - Abridgement of the Chronicles of England....

    Foxe's Book of Martyrs
    Foxe's Book of Martyrs
    The Book of Martyrs, by John Foxe, more accurately Acts and Monuments, is an account from a Protestant point of view of Christian church history and martyrology...

    - John Foxe
    John Foxe
    John Foxe was an English historian and martyrologist, the author of what is popularly known as Foxe's Book of Martyrs, , an account of Christian martyrs throughout Western history but emphasizing the sufferings of English Protestants and proto-Protestants from the fourteenth century through the...

  • 1562 in literature
    1562 in literature
    -New books:*Magdeburg Centuries, volumes V and VI*Melchior Cano - De Locis theologicis *Petrus Ramus - Grammaire française*Richard Smyth - De Missa Sacrificio...

    – Arthur Brooke - The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet
    The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet
    The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet is a narrative poem, first published in 1562 by Arthur Brooke, who is reported to have translated it from an Italian novella by Matteo Bandello...


  • 1561 in literature
    1561 in literature
    -New books:*Gabriele Fallopius - Observationes anatomicae*Sir Thomas Hoby - The Book of the Courtier *Julius Caesar Scaliger -Poetices...

    - John Calvin
    John Calvin
    John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530...

     - Institutes of the Christian Religion
    Institutes of the Christian Religion
    The Institutes of the Christian Religion is John Calvin's seminal work on Protestant systematic theology...

  • 1560 in literature
    1560 in literature
    -Births:*January 3 - John Bois, Bible translator *October 10 - Jacobus Arminius, theologian *December 3 - Jan Gruter, critic and scholar *date unknown - Constantino Cajetan, ecclesiastical historian -Deaths:...

    Geneva Bible
    Geneva Bible
    The Geneva Bible is one of the most historically significant translations of the Bible into the English language, preceding the King James translation by 51 years. It was the primary Bible of the 16th century Protestant movement and was the Bible used by William Shakespeare, Oliver Cromwell, John...

     (first full edition)

  • 1550s in literature – The Elizabethan
    Elizabeth I of England
    Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...

     version of the Book of Common Prayer
    Book of Common Prayer
    The Book of Common Prayer is the short title of a number of related prayer books used in the Anglican Communion, as well as by the Continuing Anglican, "Anglican realignment" and other Anglican churches. The original book, published in 1549 , in the reign of Edward VI, was a product of the English...

     of the Church of England
    Church of England
    The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...

    , which remained in use until the mid-17th century and was the first English Prayer Book in America.

  • 1547 in literature – Birth of Miguel de Cervantes
    Miguel de Cervantes
    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was a Spanish novelist, poet, and playwright. His magnum opus, Don Quixote, considered the first modern novel, is a classic of Western literature, and is regarded amongst the best works of fiction ever written...

     (d.1616)

  • 1540s in literature – Nicolaus Copernicus
    Nicolaus Copernicus
    Nicolaus Copernicus was a Renaissance astronomer and the first person to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe....

     - De revolutionibus orbium coelestium
    De revolutionibus orbium coelestium
    De revolutionibus orbium coelestium is the seminal work on the heliocentric theory of the Renaissance astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus...

    (On the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres)
  • 1530s in literature – Niccolò Machiavelli
    Niccolò Machiavelli
    Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli was an Italian historian, philosopher, humanist, and writer based in Florence during the Renaissance. He is one of the main founders of modern political science. He was a diplomat, political philosopher, playwright, and a civil servant of the Florentine Republic...

     - The Prince
    The Prince
    The Prince is a political treatise by the Italian diplomat, historian and political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. From correspondence a version appears to have been distributed in 1513, using a Latin title, De Principatibus . But the printed version was not published until 1532, five years after...

    ; François Rabelais
    François Rabelais
    François Rabelais was a major French Renaissance writer, doctor, Renaissance humanist, monk and Greek scholar. He has historically been regarded as a writer of fantasy, satire, the grotesque, bawdy jokes and songs...

     - Pantagruel
    Gargantua and Pantagruel
    The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel is a connected series of five novels written in the 16th century by François Rabelais. It is the story of two giants, a father and his son and their adventures, written in an amusing, extravagant, satirical vein...

    ; Luther Bible
    Luther Bible
    The Luther Bible is a German Bible translation by Martin Luther, first printed with both testaments in 1534. This translation became a force in shaping the Modern High German language. The project absorbed Luther's later years. The new translation was very widely disseminated thanks to the printing...

    translation by Martin Luther
    Martin Luther
    Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...

  • 1520s in literature – Baltissare Castiglione - The Book of the Courtier
    The Book of the Courtier
    The Book of the Courtier is a courtesy book. It was written by Baldassare Castiglione over the course of many years, beginning in 1508, and published in 1528 by the Aldine Press just before his death...

  • 1510s in literature – Thomas More
    Thomas More
    Sir Thomas More , also known by Catholics as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist. He was an important councillor to Henry VIII of England and, for three years toward the end of his life, Lord Chancellor...

     - Utopia
  • 1500s in literature – Marko Marulić
    Marko Marulic
    Marko Marulić |Split]], 18 August 1450 – Split, 5 January 1524) was a Croatian national poet and Christian humanist, known as the Crown of the Croatian Medieval Age and the father of the Croatian Renaissance. He signed his works as Marko Marulić Splićanin , Marko Pečenić, Marcus Marulus ...

     - Judita
    Judita
    Judita is one of the most important Croatian literary works, an epic poem written by the "father of Croatian literature" Marko Marulić in 1501.-Editions:...

    ; Erasmus - In Praise of Folly

Middle Ages

  • 15th century in literature
    15th century in literature
    See also: 15th century in poetry, 14th century in literature, other events of the 15th century, 16th century in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:* 1403 - The Yongle Encyclopedia is commissioned in China....

     – Johann Gutenberg prints the Vulgate
    Vulgate
    The Vulgate is a late 4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. It was largely the work of St. Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of the old Latin translations...

     Bible
    Bible
    The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

    ; – Sir Thomas Malory
    Thomas Malory
    Sir Thomas Malory was an English writer, the author or compiler of Le Morte d'Arthur. The antiquary John Leland as well as John Bale believed him to be Welsh, but most modern scholars, beginning with G. L...

     – Le Morte d'Arthur
    Le Morte d'Arthur
    Le Morte d'Arthur is a compilation by Sir Thomas Malory of Romance tales about the legendary King Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, and the Knights of the Round Table...

    ;
  • 14th century in literature
    14th century in literature
    See also: 14th century in poetry, 13th century in literature, other events of the 14th century, 15th century in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*c.1330 - Production of the Macclesfield Psalter.*1331 - Production of the Nuremberg Mahzor....

     – The Divine Comedy
    The Divine Comedy
    The Divine Comedy is an epic poem written by Dante Alighieri between 1308 and his death in 1321. It is widely considered the preeminent work of Italian literature, and is seen as one of the greatest works of world literature...

    Dante Alighieri
    Dante Alighieri
    Durante degli Alighieri, mononymously referred to as Dante , was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia ...

    ; The Decameron
    The Decameron
    The Decameron, also called Prince Galehaut is a 14th-century medieval allegory by Giovanni Boccaccio, told as a frame story encompassing 100 tales by ten young people....

    Giovanni Boccaccio
    Giovanni Boccaccio
    Giovanni Boccaccio was an Italian author and poet, a friend, student, and correspondent of Petrarch, an important Renaissance humanist and the author of a number of notable works including the Decameron, On Famous Women, and his poetry in the Italian vernacular...

    ; Canterbury TalesGeoffrey Chaucer
    Geoffrey Chaucer
    Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...

  • 13th century in literature
    13th century in literature
    See also: 13th century in poetry, 12th century in literature, other events of the 13th century, 14th century in literature, list of years in literature.-Events:*1211 - Hélinand of Froidmont begins compiling his Chronicon....

     – Theologus Autodidactus
    Theologus Autodidactus
    Al-Risalah al-Kamiliyyah fil Siera al-Nabawiyyah , also known as Risālat Fād il ibn Nātiq , was the first theological novel, written by Ibn al-Nafis and later translated in the West as Theologus Autodidactus...

    , Gesta Romanorum
    Gesta Romanorum
    Gesta Romanorum, a Latin collection of anecdotes and tales, was probably compiled about the end of the 13th century or the beginning of the 14th...

    – Ibn al-Nafis; The Travels of Marco Polo
    The Travels of Marco Polo
    Books of the Marvels of the World or Description of the World , also nicknamed Il Milione or Oriente Poliano and commonly called The Travels of Marco Polo, is a 13th-century travelogue written down by Rustichello da Pisa from stories told by Marco Polo, describing the...

    Marco Polo
    Marco Polo
    Marco Polo was a Venetian merchant traveler from the Venetian Republic whose travels are recorded in Il Milione, a book which did much to introduce Europeans to Central Asia and China. He learned about trading whilst his father and uncle, Niccolò and Maffeo, travelled through Asia and apparently...

  • 12th century in literature
    12th century in literature
    See also: 12th century in poetry, 11th century in literature, 13th century in literature, list of years in literature.----The 12th century saw an increase in the production of Latin texts and a proliferation of literate clerics from the multiplying cathedral schools...

     – Hayy ibn Yaqdhan
    Hayy ibn Yaqdhan
    Ḥayy ibn Yaqẓān is an Arabic philosophical novel and allegorical tale written by Ibn Tufail in the early 12th century.- Translations :* from Wikisource* English translations of Hayy bin Yaqzan...

    Ibn Tufail
    Ibn Tufail
    Ibn Tufail was an Andalusian Muslim polymath: an Arabic writer, novelist, Islamic philosopher, Islamic theologian, physician, vizier,...

  • 11th century in literature
    11th century in literature
    See also: 11th century in poetry, 10th century in literature, 12th century in literature, list of years in literature.-New books:*1000 - Al-Tasrif, by Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi...

     – The Tale of Genji
    The Tale of Genji
    is a classic work of Japanese literature attributed to the Japanese noblewoman Murasaki Shikibu in the early 11th century, around the peak of the Heian period. It is sometimes called the world's first novel, the first modern novel, the first psychological novel or the first novel still to be...

    Murasaki Shikibu
    Murasaki Shikibu
    Murasaki Shikibu was a Japanese novelist, poet and lady-in-waiting at the Imperial court during the Heian period. She is best known as the author of The Tale of Genji, written in Japanese between about 1000 and 1012...

  • 10th century in literature
    10th century in literature
    See also: 10th century in poetry, Early Medieval literature, 11th century in literature, list of years in literature.-New books:*Beowulf *Anglo-Saxon Chronicle...

     – One Thousand and One Nights
  • 6th to 9th centuries in literature
    Early Medieval literature
    See also: Ancient literature, 10th century in literature, list of years in literature.This is a list of literature dating to the 6th to 9th centuries...

     – Book of Kells
    Book of Kells
    The Book of Kells is an illuminated manuscript Gospel book in Latin, containing the four Gospels of the New Testament together with various prefatory texts and tables. It was created by Celtic monks ca. 800 or slightly earlier...

    ; The Pillow Book
    The Pillow Book
    is a book of observations and musings recorded by Sei Shōnagon during her time as court lady to Empress Consort Teishi during the 990s and early 11th century in Heian Japan. The book was completed in the year 1002....

    Sei Shōnagon
    Sei Shonagon
    Sei Shōnagon , was a Japanese author and a court lady who served the Empress Teishi around the year 1000 during the middle Heian period. She is best known as the author of The Pillow Book .-Name:...

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