This page gives a chronological list of years in literature (descending order), with notable publications listed with their respective years. The time covered in individual years covers Renaissance, Baroque and Modern literature, while Medieval literature is resolved by century.

See Table of years in literature for an overview of all "year in literature" pages.

21st century

2000s

• 2008 in literature - Duma Key - Stephen King;
• 2007 in literature - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - J.K. Rowling;
• 2006 in literature - Daniel Handler, The End, 13th and final book in A Series of Unfortunate Events; Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion
• 2005 in literature - Haunted - Chuck Palahniuk; Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - J.K. Rowling
• 2004 in literature - Free Culture - Lawrence Lessig
• 2003 in literature - The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown; Hegemony or Survival - Noam Chomsky; Roman Triptych (Meditation) - John Paul II
• 2002 in literature - Atonement - Ian McEwan; Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World - Margaret MacMillan
• 2001 in literature - Seabiscuit: An American Legend – Laura Hillenbrand; Life of Pi - Yann Martel
• 2000 in literature - No Logo - Naomi Klein

20th century

1990s

• 1999 in literature - Chocolat - Joanne Harris; Disgrace - J M Coetzee
• 1998 in literature - Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - J.K. Rowling
• 1997 in literature - Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone - J. K. Rowling; Underworld - Don DeLillo
• 1996 in literature - Angela's Ashes - Frank McCourt; Left Behind - Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins; The Nightmare Factory - Thomas Ligotti
• 1995 in literature - The Celestine Prophecy - James Redfield; Blindness - José Saramago
• 1994 in literature - The Stone Diaries - Carol Shields
• 1993 in literature - The Christmas Box – Richard Paul Evans; Trainspotting - Irvine Welsh
• 1992 in literature - The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje; The Black Echo - Michael Connelly
• 1991 in literature - The Firm - John Grisham; Such a Long Journey - Rohinton Mistry
• 1990 in literature - Jurassic Park - Michael Crichton; Vertigo - W.G. Sebald

1980s

• 1989 in literature - Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro; The Joy Luck Club - Amy Tan; Songs of a Dead Dreamer - Thomas Ligotti
• 1988 in literature - Oscar and Lucinda - Peter Carey; The Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie, Curriculum - Grazyna Miller
• 1987 in literature - Beloved - Toni Morrison
• 1986 in literature - Extinction - Thomas Bernhard
• 1985 in literature - The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood; Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel García Márquez
• 1984 in literature - White Noise - Don DeLillo; The Unbearable Lightness of Being - Milan Kundera
• 1983 in literature - On Wings of Eagles - Ken Follett; Ancient Evenings - Norman Mailer; Shame - Salman Rushdie
• 1982 in literature - The Color Purple - Alice Walker
• 1981 in literature - The Blue Bicycle - Régine Deforges; Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
• 1980 in literature - Smiley's People - John le Carré; Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose) - Umberto Eco

1970s

• 1979 in literature - Sophie's Choice - William Styron; The Executioner's Song - Norman Mailer; Kane and Abel - Jeffrey Archer; A Bend in the River - V.S. Naipaul, Heatherley -Flora Thompson
• 1978 in literature - The World According to Garp - John Irving; The Stand - Stephen King
• 1977 in literature - The Sea, the Sea - Iris Murdoch; Song of Soloman - Toni Morrison; The Shining - Stephen King
• 1976 in literature - Interview with the Vampire - Anne Rice; The Final Days - Bob Woodward & Carl Bernstein; Triton - Samuel R. Delany
• 1975 in literature - The Book of Sand - Jorge Luis Borges
• 1974 in literature - All the President's Men - Carl Bernstein & Bob Woodward; Carrie - Stephen King; Jaws - Peter Benchley
• 1973 in literature - Burr - Gore Vidal; Gravity's Rainbow - Thomas Pynchon
• 1972 in literature - Jonathan Livingston Seagull - Richard Bach
• 1971 in literature - The End of Summer - Rosamunde Pilcher
• 1970 in literature - Deliverance - James Dickey; Blue Movie - Terry Southern

1960s

• 1969 in literature - The Godfather - Mario Puzo; Portnoy's Complaint - Philip Roth; Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut; Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle - Vladimir Nabokov
• 1968 in literature - The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test - Tom Wolfe; Airport - Arthur Hailey; Belle du Seigneur - Albert Cohen
• 1967 in literature - Wild Season - Allan W. Eckert; Cien años de soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude) - Gabriel García Márquez; Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited - Vladimir Nabokov
• 1966 in literature - The Master and Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov; The Crying of Lot 49 - Thomas Pynchon; Wide Sargasso Sea - Jean Rhys; In Cold Blood - Truman Capote; Beautiful Losers - Leonard Cohen; Last Picture Show - Larry McMurtry
• 1965 in literature - The Autobiography of Malcolm X - Alex Haley, Herzog - Saul Bellow; An American Dream - Norman Mailer; The Magus - John Fowles; Little Trulsa - Ester Ringnér-Lundgren
• 1964 in literature - Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man - Marshall McLuhan, Little Big Man - Thomas Berger; Flowers for Hitler - Leonard Cohen; Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
• 1963 in literature - Planet of the Apes (La Planete des Singes) - Pierre Boulle; V - Thomas Pynchon; The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath; Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut
• 1962 in literature - One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey; Pale Fire - Vladimir Nabokov; One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; The Golden Notebook - Doris Lessing; Labyrinths - Jorge Luis Borges
• 1961 in literature - Catch-22 - Joseph Heller; Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein; A House for Mr. Biswas - V. S. Naipaul
• 1960 in literature - The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich - William L. Shirer; To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee

1950s

• 1959 in literature - The Last of the Just - André Schwarz-Bart; The Magic Christian - Terry Southern; In the Labyrinth - Alain Robbe-Grillet; The Tin Drum - Günter Grass; Billiards at Half-past Nine - Heinrich Boll; Naked Lunch - William S. Burroughs
• 1958 in literature - Exodus - Leon Uris; Candy - Terry Southern; The Grass - Claude Simon; The Guide - R. K. Narayan
• 1957 in literature - On the Road - Jack Kerouac; Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand; Pnin - Vladimir Nabokov; Voss - Patrick White
• 1956 in literature - Peyton Place - Grace Metalious; The Visit - Friedrich Dürrenmatt
• 1955 in literature - Tunnel in the Sky – Robert A. Heinlein; Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov; The Return of the King - J. R. R. Tolkien
• 1954 in literature - Lord of the Flies - William Golding; The Fellowship of the Ring - J. R. R. Tolkien; The Two Towers - J. R. R. Tolkien Diaries of a Dying Man William Soutar
• 1953 in literature - Casino Royale - Ian Fleming - First James Bond novel; The Adventures of Augie March - Saul Bellow, Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451, Battle Cry - Leon Uris
• 1952 in literature - Waiting for Godot - Samuel Beckett; Charlotte's Web - E. B. White; The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway
• 1951 in literature - The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger; Memoirs of Hadrian - Marguerite Yourcenar
• 1950 in literature - The Martian Chronicles - Ray Bradbury; The Bald Soprano - Eugène Ionesco; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis

1940s

• 1949 in literature - George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman
• 1948 in literature - Norman Mailer's The Naked and the Dead and Graham Greene's The Heart of the Matter Still Giles the Stream Flora Thompson
• 1947 in literature - The Diary of a Young Girl - Anne Frank
• 1946 in literature - The Iceman Cometh - Eugene O'Neill
• 1945 in literature - Cannery Row - John Steinbeck; A History of Western Philosophy And Its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present Day - Bertrand Russell; Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is sentenced to eight years in a labour camp for criticism of Stalin. Lark Rise to Candleford - Flora Thompson
• 1944 in literature - No Exit - Jean-Paul Sartre; Our Lady of the Flowers - Jean Genet; A Bell for Adano – John Hersey
• 1943 in literature - Anti-Semite and Jew - Jean-Paul Sartre; The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand; T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets published together for the first time; Das Glasperlenspiel (The Glass Bead Game) - Hermann Hesse
• 1942 in literature - The Myth of Sisyphus (Le Mythe de Sisyphe), and The Stranger - Albert Camus; Mythology - Edith Hamilton
• 1941 in literature - Death of James Joyce, Virginia Woolf; Between the Acts - Virginia Woolf
• 1940 in literature - Native Son - Richard Wright; For Whom the Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway; The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers; Darkness at Noon - Arthur Koestler

1930s

• 1939 in literature - Finnegans Wake - James Joyce; The Day of the Locust - Nathanael West; The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck; How Green Was My Valley - Richard Llewellyn; The Big Sleep - Raymond Chandler, Lark Rise - Flora Thompson
• 1938 in literature - Tropic of Capricorn - Henry Miller; La Nausée - Jean-Paul Sartre; The Sword in the Stone - T. H. White
• 1937 in literature - Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck; Journal d'un Curé de Campagne (Diary of a Country Priest) - Georges Bernanos
• 1936 in literature - Gone with the Wind - Margaret Mitchell; Jamaica Inn - Daphne du Maurier; First issue of Life magazine
• 1935 in literature - Little House on the Prairie - Laura Ingalls Wilder; Penguin Books publishes the first paperback
• 1934 in literature - Tropic of Cancer - Henry Miller; Lust for Life - Irving Stone; I, Claudius - Robert Graves; The Thin Man - Dashiell Hammett; Goodbye, Mr. Chips - James Hilton; Tender Is the Night - F. Scott Fitzgerald; Supernatural Horror in Literature - H. P. Lovecraft -year completed (1925-34); The Postman Always Rings Twice - James M. Cain
• 1933 in literature - The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas - Gertrude Stein; Lost Horizon - James Hilton; Testament of Youth - Vera Brittain; La Condition Humaine (Man's Fate) - André Malraux
• 1932 in literature - Brave New World - Aldous Huxley; Voyage au Bout de la Nuit (Journey to the End of the Night) - Louis-Ferdinand Céline; Journey to the East - Hermann Hesse
• 1931 in literature - The Good Earth - Pearl S. Buck; first Maigret novel by Georges Simenon
• 1930 in literature - The Maltese Falcon - Dashiell Hammett; Luigi Pirandello's The Man With the Flower in His Mouth becomes the first broadcast television drama

1920s

• 1929 in literature - Berlin Alexanderplatz - Alfred Döblin; A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway; All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque; Goodbye to All That - Robert Graves; The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner
• 1928 in literature - Lady Chatterley's Lover - D. H. Lawrence; The Threepenny Opera - Bertholt Brecht; All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque
• 1927 in literature - Elmer Gantry - Sinclair Lewis; Envy - Yuri Olesha; The Snake Pit - Sigrid Undset; To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf; The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle; In Search of Lost Time (final installment) - Marcel Proust
• 1926 in literature - Winnie-the-Pooh - A. A. Milne; The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway; Sean O'Casey's play, The Plough and the Stars
• 1925 in literature - The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald; Mrs. Dalloway - Virginia Woolf; Der Prozeß (The Trial) - Franz Kafka
• 1924 in literature - Death of Franz Kafka; Billy Budd, Foretopman - Herman Melville; A Passage to India - E. M. Forster; Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain) - Thomas Mann
• 1923 in literature - The Prophet - Kahlil Gibran; Lord Peter Wimsey makes his first appearance in print.
• 1922 in literature - Ulysses - James Joyce; The Waste Land - T. S. Eliot; Siddhartha - Hermann Hesse; Marcel Proust dies - In Search of Lost Time completed; The Worm Ouroboros - E. R. Eddison
• 1921 in literature - Karel Čapek's play, R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots)
• 1920 in literature - This Side of Paradise - F. Scott Fitzgerald; Main Street - Sinclair Lewis; The Age of Innocence - Edith Wharton; Women in Love - D. H. Lawrence

1910s

• 1919 in literature - The Moon and Sixpence - W. Somerset Maugham
• 1918 in literature - The Magnificent Ambersons - Booth Tarkington; Eminent Victorians - Lytton Strachey
• 1917 in literature - Prufrock and Other Observations - T. S. Eliot; Moon Child - Aleister Crowley Completed
• 1916 in literature - Relativity - Albert Einstein; A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man - James Joyce
• 1915 in literature - The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka
• 1914 in literature - Ambrose Bierce vanishes in Mexico; Arcadian Adventures With the Idle Rich - Stephen Leacock
• 1913 in literature - The Return of Tarzan - Edgar Rice Burroughs; Alcools - Guillaume Apollinaire, Petersburg - Andrei Bely; Sons and Lovers - D. H. Lawrence; Pygmalion - George Bernard Shaw
• 1912 in literature - Tarzan of the Apes - Edgar Rice Burroughs; Death in Venice - Thomas Mann; The Lost World - Arthur Conan Doyle
• 1911 in literature - Ethan Frome - Edith Wharton; The Phantom of the Opera - Gaston Leroux; The Devil's Dictionary - Ambrose Bierce; 11th edition of Encyclopædia Britannica published
• 1910 in literature - Howards End - E. M. Forster; The Sorcerer's Apprentice - Hanns Heinz Ewers

1900s

• 1909 in literature - The Road to Oz - L.Frank Baum; The Song of Songs - Hermann Sudermann
• 1908 in literature - Anne of Green Gables - Lucy Maud Montgomery; L'île des Pingouins (Penguin Island) - Anatole France; The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
• 1907 in literature - The City of Pleasure - Arnold Bennett; The Listener and Other Stories - Algernon Blackwood
• 1906 in literature - The Jungle - Upton Sinclair; The House of Souls - Arthur Machen; Time and the Gods - Lord Dunsany
• [[1905 in literature - White Fang - Jack London; The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
• 1904 in literature - Nostromo - Joseph Conrad; Ghost Stories of Antiquity - M. R. James
• 1903 in literature - The Souls of Black Folk - W. E. B. DuBois; The Ambassadors - Henry James; Jewel of the Seven Stars - Bram Stoker
• 1902 in literature - The Immoralist - André Gide; The Wings of the Dove - Henry James
• 1901 in literature - Death of Queen Victoria; - Buddenbrooks - Thomas Mann; The Purple Cloud - M. P. Shiel
• 1900 in literature - The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - L.Frank Baum; Lord Jim - Joseph Conrad; Sister Carrie - Theodore Dreiser; The Flame of Life - Gabriele d'Annunzio

19th century

1890s

• 1899 in literature - The School and Society - John Dewey; The Awakening - Kate Chopin; Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad; The Yellow Wallpaper - Charlotte Perkins Gilman;
• 1898 in literature - Paris - Emile Zola; The War of the Worlds - H. G. Wells; The Turn of the Screw - Henry James
• 1897 in literature - Captains Courageous - Rudyard Kipling; Dracula - Bram Stoker; Divagations -Stéphane Mallarmé; the Beetle - Richard Marsh; The Invisible Man - H. G. Wells
• 1896 in literature - The Island of Doctor Moreau - H. G. Wells; The Well at the World's End - William Morris; Shapes in the Fire - M.P. Shiel
• 1895 in literature - The Time Machine - H. G. Wells; Almayer's Folly - Joseph Conrad; Pharaoh - Bolesław Prus; Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy; The Three Impostors - Arthur Machen
• 1894 in literature - The Jungle Books - Rudyard Kipling; The Prisoner of Zenda - Anthony Hope ; Pan - Knut Hamsun; The Great God Pan - Arthur Machen; Studies of Death: Romantic Tales - Stanislaus Eric Stenbock
• 1893 in literature - The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde; The New Woman - Bolesław Prus
• 1892 in literature - Children of the Ghetto - Israel Zangwill; Gunga Din - Rudyard Kipling
• 1891 in literature - Diary of a Pilgrimage - Jerome K. Jerome; Tess of the d'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
• 1890 in literature - Hedda Gabler - Henrik Ibsen; Hunger - Knut Hamsun; An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge - Ambrose Bierce

1880s

• 1889 in literature - Thus Spoke Zarathustra - Friedrich Nietzsche; The Doll - Bolesław Prus; The Child of Pleasure - Gabriele d'Annunzio
• 1888 in literature - The Man Who Would Be King - Rudyard Kipling; Confessions of a Young Man - George A. Moore
• 1887 in literature - She - Henry Rider Haggard; Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle; Thelma - Marie Corelli
• 1886 in literature - L'Œuvre (The Masterpiece) - Emile Zola; Little Lord Fauntleroy - Frances Hodgson Burnett; Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson; The Outpost - Bolesław Prus
• 1885 in literature - King Solomon's Mines - Henry Rider Haggard; Marius the Epicurean - Walter Pater; Lord Alfred Tennyson completes Idylls of the King; Germinal - Émile Zola; George A. Moore - The Mummer's Wife; The Mikado - Gilbert and Sullivan
• 1884 in literature - Miss Bretherton - Mary Augusta Ward; The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
• 1883 in literature - Une Vie - Guy de Maupassant; Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson; The Adventures of Pinocchio - Carlo Collodi
• 1882 in literature - The Prince and the Pauper - Mark Twain; The Naval War of 1812 - Theodore Roosevelt
• 1881 in literature - The Portrait of a Lady - Henry James; The Black Robe - Wilkie Collins
• 1880 in literature - Workers in the Dawn - George Gissing; Nana - Émile Zola; The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodor Dostoevsky

1870s

• 1879 in literature - The Red Room - August Strindberg; A Doll's House - Henrik Ibsen
• 1878 in literature - H.M.S. Pinafore - Gilbert and Sullivan
• 1877 in literature - Under the Lilacs - Louisa May Alcott; Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy; L'Assommoir - Emile Zola
• 1876 in literature - The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - Mark Twain; The Shadow of the Sword - Robert Buchanan
• 1875 in literature - The Way We Live Now - Anthony Trollope
• 1874 in literature - Les Diaboliques - Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly; Far from the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
• 1873 in literature - Around the World in 80 Days - Jules Verne; The Poison Tree - Bankim Chatterjee
• 1872 in literature - The Birth of Tragedy - Friedrich Nietzsche
• 1871 in literature - Middlemarch - George Eliot; Through the Looking Glass - Lewis Carroll
• 1870 in literature - Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne; Venus in Furs - Leopold von Sacher-Masoch

1860s

• 1869 in literature - War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy; L'Education Sentimentale - Gustav Flaubert; The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoevsky; Les Chants de Maldoror - Comte de Lautréamont
• 1868 in literature - Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
• 1867 in literature - Cometh Up as a Flower - Rhoda Broughton
• 1866 in literature - Surry of Eagle's-Nest - John Esten Cooke; Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky; Poems and Ballads - Algernon Charles Swinburne
• 1865 in literature - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll; Our Mutual Friend - Charles Dickens; From the Earth to the Moon - Jules Verne
• 1864 in literature - Journey to the Center of the Earth - Jules Verne; Renee Mauperin - Edmond de Goncourt
• 1863 in literature - Capitan Fracassa - Theophile Gautier
• 1862 in literature - Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
• 1861 in literature - Silas Marner - George Eliot; Framley Parsonage - Anthony Trollope; Great Expectations - Charles Dickens; East Lynne - Mrs Henry Wood
• 1860 in literature - Max Havelaar - Multatuli; The Mill on the Floss - George Eliot

1850s

• 1859 in literature - A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
• 1858 in literature - A House of Gentlefolk - Ivan Turgenev
• 1857 in literature - Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert; Little Dorritt - Charles Dickens; Les Fleurs du mal - Charles Baudelaire
• 1856 in literature - The Daisy Chain - Charlotte Mary Yonge; Aurora Leigh - Elizabeth Barrett Browning
• 1855 in literature - Westward Ho! - Charles Kingsley
• 1854 in literature - The Newcomers - William Makepeace Thackeray
• 1853 in literature - Bleak House is the first English novel to feature a detective
• 1852 in literature - Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe
• 1851 in literature - Moby-Dick - Herman Melville
• 1850 in literature - The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne; Household Words edited by Charles Dickens begins publication

1840s

• 1849 in literature - David Copperfield - Charles Dickens; The Oregon Trail - Francis Parkman
• 1848 in literature - The Tenant of Wildfell Hall - Anne Brontë; Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackery; Eureka - Edgar Allan Poe -Completed
• 1847 in literature - The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Alexandre Dumas, père; Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë; Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë; Evangeline - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
• 1846 in literature - Cousin Bette - Honoré de Balzac; The Children of the Night - Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
• 1845 in literature - The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas, père; Twenty Years After - Alexandre Dumas, père; La Reine Margot - Alexandre Dumas, père; Stages on Life's Way - Søren Kierkegaard
• 1844 in literature - The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas, père; Les Paysans - Honoré de Balzac
• 1843 in literature - A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens; Windsor Castle - William Harrison Ainsworth; Either/Or - Søren Kierkegaard; The Ugly Duckling - Hans Christian Andersen
• 1842 in literature - Dead Souls - Nikolai Gogol
• 1841 in literature - The Deerslayer - James Fenimore Cooper; The Bronze Horseman - Alexander Pushkin
• 1840 in literature - Two Years Before the Mast - Richard Henry Dana, Jr.; Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque - Edgar Allan Poe; The Arabian Nights; - Edward William Lane publishes an English version

1830s

• 1839 in literature - The Voyage of the Beagle - Charles Darwin; Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens; Nicholas Nickleby - Charles Dickens; The Charterhouse of Parma - Stendhal
• 1838 in literature - Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens; The Birds of America - John James Audubon
• 1837 in literature - Live and Let Live - Catharine Maria Sedgwick; The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club - Charles Dickens
• 1836 in literature - Poems - Oliver Wendell Holmes; Gaspard de la nuit - Aloysius Bertrand
• 1835 in literature - Souvenirs - Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun; Le Père Goriot - Honoré de Balzac
• 1834 in literature - Sartor Resartus - Thomas Carlyle
• 1833 in literature - Gamiani - Alfred de Musset; Eugene Onegin - Aleksandr Pushkin; Eugénie Grandet - Honoré de Balzac
• 1832 in literature - Valentine - George Sand; Faust Part Two - Goethe
• 1831 in literature - The Young Duke - Benjamin Disraeli; Notre-Dame de Paris - Victor Hugo
• 1830 in literature - The Red and the Black - Stendhal

1820s

• 1829 in literature - The Misfortunes of Elphin - Thomas Love Peacock
• 1828 in literature - The Birds of America - John James Audubon
• 1827 in literature - Book of Songs (poetry) - Heinrich Heine
• 1826 in literature - The Last of the Mohicans - James Fenimore Cooper; Cinq-Mars - Alfred de Vigny
• 1825 in literature - The Betrothed - Alessandro Manzoni
• 1824 in literature - Our Village - Mary Russell Mitford
• 1823 in literature - The Pioneers - James Fenimore Cooper; Posthumous Poems - Percy Bysshe Shelley
• 1822 in literature - Trilby - Charles Nodier
• 1821 in literature - Confessions of an English Opium Eater - Thomas De Quincey
• 1820 in literature - Méditations Poétiques - Lamartine

1810s

• 1819 in literature - Ivanhoe - Sir Walter Scott; The Sketch Book - Washington Irving; Ode to a Nightingale - John Keats
• 1818 in literature - Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
• 1817 in literature - Rob Roy - Sir Walter Scott; Ormond and Harrington - Maria Edgeworth
• 1816 in literature - Adolphe - Benjamin Constant; Emma - Jane Austen; The Sandman - E.T.A. Hoffman
• 1815 in literature - The Pastor's Fireside - Jane Porter
• 1814 in literature - The Wanderer - Fanny Burney; Mansfield Park - Jane Austen
• 1813 in literature - The Swiss Family Robinson - Johann David Wyss; Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
• 1812 in literature - The Milesian Chief - Charles Robert Maturin; Children's and Household Tales - The Brothers Grimm
• 1811 in literature - Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
• 1810 in literature - The Houses of Osma and Almeria - Regina Maria Roche

1800s

• 1809 in literature - The Martyrs - François-René de Chateaubriand
• 1808 in literature - Faust (Part One) - Goethe
• 1807 in literature - Tales from Shakespeare - Charles Lamb & Mary Lamb
• 1806 in literature - The Earthquake in Chile - Heinrich von Kleist
• 1805 in literature - The Wonder of the Village - Mary Meeke; Manuscript Found in Saragossa - Count Jan Nepomucen Potocki
• 1804 in literature - Jerusalem (poetry) - William Blake
• 1803 in literature - St. Clair of the Isles - Elisabeth Helme
• 1802 in literature - Delphine - Anne Louise Germaine de Stael
• 1801 in literature - The Wizard and the Sword - Henry Summersett
• 1800 in literature - Hymns to the Night - Novalis

18th century

1790s

• 1799 in literature - Arthur Mervyn - Charles Brockden Brown
• 1798 in literature - Lyrical Ballads - Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth; The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
• 1797 in literature - l'Histoire de Juliette - Marquis de Sade; Kubla Khan - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
• 1796 in literature - Camilla - Fanny Burney
• 1795 in literature - Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship (to 1796) - Goethe; The Mysteries of Udolpho - Ann Radcliffe
• 1794 in literature - The Age of Reason - Thomas Paine
• 1793 in literature - Songs of Experience - William Blake
• 1792 in literature - A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Mary Wollstonecraft
• 1791 in literature - Justine - Marquis de Sade; The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - James Boswell; Dream of the Red Chamber - Cao Xueqin
• 1790 in literature - Reflections on the Revolution in France - Edmund Burke; Tam O'Shanter - Robert Burns

1780s

• 1789 in literature - Songs of Innocence - William Blake
• 1788 in literature - Memoirs - Saint-Simon
• 1787 in literature - Don Carlos - Friedrich Schiller
• 1786 in literature - Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect - Robert Burns
• 1785 in literature - 120 Days of Sodom - Marquis de Sade; Anton Reiser (to 1790) - Karl Philipp Moritz
• 1784 in literature - Barham Downs - Robert Bage
• 1783 in literature - Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics - Immanuel Kant
• 1782 in literature - The Robbers - Friedrich Schiller Les Liaisons Dangereuses - Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
• 1781 in literature - A Critique of Pure Reason - Immanuel Kant
• 1780 in literature -

1770s

• 1779 in literature - Nathan the Wise - Gotthold Lessing; Fables and Parables - Ignacy Krasicki
• 1778 in literature - Evelina - Fanny Burney
• 1777 in literature -
• 1776 in literature - Common Sense - Thomas Paine
• 1775 in literature - The Rivals - Richard Sheridan
• 1774 in literature - The Sorrows of Young Werther - Goethe
• 1773 in literature - Der Messias (from 1749) - Klopstock; Jaques le fataliste - Denis Diderot
• 1772 in literature -
• 1771 in literature - Jacques the Fatalist (to 1773) - Diderot
• 1770 in literature -

1760s

• 1769 in literature - The History of Emily Montague - Frances Brooke
• 1768 in literature - Poems - Thomas Gray
• 1767 in literature - Minna von Barnhelm - Gotthold Lessing
• 1766 in literature - The Vicar of Wakefield - Oliver Goldsmith
• 1765 in literature - Beginning of the Sturm und Drang movement
• 1764 in literature - The Castle of Otranto - Horace Walpole
• 1763 in literature - James Boswell is introduced to Samuel Johnson
• 1762 in literature - Emile: or, On Education - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
• 1761 in literature - Julie, ou la nouvelle Héloïse - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
• 1760 in literature - Tristram Shandy (to 1770) - Laurence Sterne

1750s

• 1759 in literature - Candide - Voltaire
• 1758 in literature - Voltaire buys his estate at Ferney
• 1757 in literature - Pierre-Augustin Caron changes his surname to Beaumarchais
• 1756 in literature - Gilbert White becomes curate of Selborne, Hampshire
• 1755 in literature - Letter to Lord Chesterfield - Samuel Johnson
• 1754 in literature - The History of Great Britain (to 1762) - David Hume
• 1753 in literature - The History of Sir Charles Grandison - Samuel Richardson
• 1752 in literature - Birth of Fanny Burney
• 1751 in literature - Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard - Thomas Gray
• 1750 in literature - Rambler essays (to 1752) - Samuel Johnson

1740s

• 1749 in literature - The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling - Henry Fielding
• 1748 in literature - Fanny Hill - John Cleland; An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding - David Hume
• 1747 in literature - Clarissa (to 1748) - Samuel Richardson
• 1746 in literature - Voltaire is elected to the French Academy
• 1745 in literature - Death of Jonathan Swift
• 1744 in literature - The Female Spectator is launched by Eliza Haywood
• 1743 in literature - The Life of Jonathan Wild the Great - Henry Fielding
• 1742 in literature - Joseph Andrews - Henry Fielding
• 1741 in literature - Shamela - Henry Fielding
• 1740 in literature - Institutions de physique – Émilie du Châtelet

1730s

• 1739 in literature - A Treatise of Human Nature (to 1740) - David Hume
• 1738 in literature - Leonidas - Richard Glover
• 1737 in literature -
• 1736 in literature -
• 1735 in literature -
• 1734 in literature -
• 1733 in literature -
• 1732 in literature - Essay on Man (to 1744) - Alexander Pope
• 1731 in literature - Insel Felsenburg (to 1743) - Johann Schnabel
• 1730 in literature -

1720s

• 1729 in literature - Death of William Congreve
• 1728 in literature - Alexander Pope, The Dunciad
• 1727 in literature - Eliza Haywood, Philidore and Placentia
• 1726 in literature - Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels
• 1725 in literature - Birth of Giacomo Casanova
• 1724 in literature - Voltaire, Henriade
• 1723 in literature - Births of Richard Price and Adam Smith; deaths of Susannah Centlivre and Marianna Alcoforado
• 1722 in literature - Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders
• 1721 in literature - Montesquieu, Persian Letters
• 1720 in literature - Daniel Defoe, Memoirs of a Cavalier

1710s

• 1719 in literature - Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
• 1718 in literature
• 1717 in literature
• 1716 in literature
• 1715 in literature - Nicholas Rowe becomes Poet Laureate of Great Britain
• 1714 in literature - Bernard de Mandeville, The Fable of the Bees
• 1713 in literature - Birth of Laurence Sterne
• 1712 in literature - Alexander Pope, The Rape of the Lock
• 1711 in literature - The Spectator is founded by Addison and Steele
• 1710 in literature - Colley Cibber becomes manager of Drury Lane

1700s

• 1709 in literature
• 1708 in literature
• 1707 in literature
• 1706 in literature
• 1705 in literature - Nouveaux essais sur l'entendement humain ("New Essays on Human Understanding") - Gottfried Leibniz
• 1704 in literature - A Tale of a Tub - Jonathan Swift
• 1703 in literature - The Storm - Daniel Defoe (released 1704)
• 1702 in literature
• 1701 in literature
• 1700 in literature

17th century literature

1690s

• 1699 in literature
• 1698 in literature
• 1697 in literature
• 1696 in literature
• 1695 in literature
• 1694 in literature
• 1693 in literature
• 1692 in literature
• 1691 in literature - Athalie - Jean Racine
• 1690 in literature

1680s

• 1689 in literature
• 1688 in literature - Aphra Behn, Oroonoko
• 1687 in literature - Isaac Newton, Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica
• 1686 in literature
• 1685 in literature
• 1684 in literature
• 1683 in literature
• 1682 in literature
• 1681 in literature
• 1680 in literature

1670s

• 1679 in literature
• 1678 in literature - The Pilgrim's Progress - John Bunyan
• 1677 in literature - Phèdre - Jean Racine
• 1676 in literature
• 1675 in literature
• 1674 in literature Nouveaux contes - Jean de la Fontaine
• 1673 in literature
• 1672 in literature - Les Femmes Savantes - Molière
• 1671 in literature
• 1670 in literature - Le Bourgeois gentilhomme - Molière

1660s

• 1669 in literature - Jean Racine's Britannicus
• 1668 in literature - Birth of Alain-René Lesage
• 1667 in literature - John Milton's Paradise Lost
• 1666 in literature - Gottfried Leibniz's De Arte Combinatoria ('On the Art of Combination')
• 1665 in literature - Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society begins publication
• 1664 in literature - Molière's Tartuffe
• 1663 in literature
• 1662 in literature - Molière's L'école des femmes
• 1661 in literature
• 1660 in literature - Samuel Pepys opens his diary

1650s

• 1659 in literature
• 1658 in literature
• 1657 in literature
• 1656 in literature
• 1655 in literature
• 1654 in literature
• 1653 in literature
• 1652 in literature
• 1651 in literature
• 1650 in literature

1640s

• 1649 in literature
• 1648 in literature
• 1647 in literature
• 1646 in literature
• 1645 in literature
• 1644 in literature
• 1643 in literature
• 1642 in literature
• 1641 in literature
• 1640 in literature Rene Descartes completes Meditations on First Philosophy: "I think therefore I am"

1630s

• 1639 in literature
• 1638 in literature
• 1637 in literature
• 1636 in literature
• 1635 in literature
• 1634 in literature
• 1633 in literature
• 1632 in literature
• 1631 in literature
• 1630 in literature

1620s

• 1629 in literature
• 1628 in literature
• 1627 in literature
• 1626 in literature
• 1625 in literature
• 1624 in literature
• 1623 in literature
• 1622 in literature
• 1621 in literature
• 1620 in literature – Novum Organum – Francis Bacon

1610s

• 1619 in literature
• 1618 in literature
• 1617 in literature
• 1616 in literature
• 1615 in literature - Don Quixote de la Mancha (Part 2) - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
• 1614 in literature
• 1613 in literature - ''Henry VIII - William Shakespeare
• 1612 in literature
• 1611 in literature - The Tempest - William Shakespeare
• 1610 in literature

1600s

• 1609 in literature
• 1608 in literature
• 1607 in literature
• 1606 in literature
• 1605 in literature - King Lear - William Shakespeare; Don Quixote de la Mancha (Part 1) Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
• 1604 in literature
• 1603 in literature - Measure for Measure - William Shakespeare
• 1602 in literature
• 1601 in literature
• 1600 in literature

16th century

1590s

• 1599 in literature
• 1598 in literature
• 1597 in literature
• 1596 in literature
• 1595 in literature
• 1594 in literature - The Unfortunate Traveller, Thomas Nashe
• 1593 in literature
• 1592 in literature
• 1591 in literature
• 1590 in literature
• unknown year in 1590s - Journey to the West, Wu Cheng'en

1580s

• 1589 in literature Christopher Marlowe - The Passionate Shepherd to His Love
• 1588 in literature George Peele - The Battle of Alcazar (date first performed)
• 1587 in literature George Gifford - A discourse of the subtill practises of deuilles by witches and sorcerers
• 1586 in literature John Knox - Historie of the Reformatioun of Religioun within the Realms of Scotland
• 1585 in literature Miguel de Cervantes - La Galatea
• 1584 in literature John Lyly - Campaspe, Sapho and Phao
• 1583 in literature Philip Stubbes - The Anatomy of Abuses
• 1582 in literature Richard Hakluyt - Divers Voyages
• 1581 in literature Second Book of Discipline
• 1580 in literature Luís Vaz de Camões - Os Lusíadas
• 1570s in literature
• 1560s in literature
• 1550s in literature
• 1540s in literature
• 1530s in literature
• 1520s in literature
• 1510s in literature
• 1500s in literature

Middle Ages

• 15th century in literature
• 14th century in literature - Dante Alighieri - The Divine Comedy (1321); Giovanni Boccaccio - The Decameron (1353); - Geoffrey Chaucer Canterbury Tales (1390)
• 13th century in literature - Gesta Romanorum; Marco Polo: The Travels of Marco Polo
• 12th century in literature
• 11th century in literature - Murasaki Shikibu: The Tale of Genji
• 10th century in literature
• 6th to 9th centuries in literature - Book of Kells; Sei Shōnagon: The Pillow Book

External links

• Literature Timeline An interactive timeline of major literary events, books and authors.