1772 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1772.

Events

• March – Gottfried August Bürger obtains a magistracy and is reconciled with his family.
• May 7 – The Stadsschouwburg theatre in Amsterdam is destroyed by fire.
• June
• At Marseilles, the Marquis de Sade 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.
• Charles Burney tours Europe, researching for his History of Music.
• September 12 – The Göttinger Hainbund of German poets is formed at a midnight ritual in an oaken grove.
• November 10 – The wife of poet Pedro Correia Garção obtains an order for his release from prison, the very day of his death.
• November 28 – Publication of the Bible in the Manx language is completed.
• unknown dates
• Thomas Paine produces his first published work, a political article entitled Case of the Officers of Excise.
• Hannah More arrives in London.
• An Armenian language press is set up in Chennai, India.

New books

Fiction

• Elizabeth Bonhôte – The Rambles of Mr Frankly, Published by his Sister
• Jacques Cazotte – Le Diable Amoureux
• Robert Fergusson – The Daft Days
• Sarah Scott – The Test of Filial Duty
• David Williams – Letter to David Garrick

Drama

• György Bessenyei – Ágis tragédiája
• Richard Cumberland – The Fashionable Lover
• Samuel Foote – The Nabob
• Vicente Garcia de la Huerta – Raquel
• David Garrick – The Irish Widow
• Gotthold Lessing – Emilia Galotti
• Louis-Sébastien Mercier
• Le faux ami (The False Friend)
• Jean Hennuyer, évêque de Lisieux (written)
• Arthur Murphy – The Grecian Daughter

Poetry

• Mark Akenside – Poems
• Thomas Chatterton – The Execution of Sir Charles Bawdin
• William Jones – Poems, Consisting Chiefly of Translations from the Asiatick Languages
• William Kenrick – Love in the Suds
• William Mason – The English Garden
• Christopher Smart – Hymns, for the Amusement of Children
• George Alexander Stevens – Songs

Non-fiction

• Alphabetum grandonico-malabaricum sive samscrudonicum (with a preface by Giovanni Cristofano Amaduzzi)
• The Encyclopédie in 28 volumes by Diderot, d'Alembert, and many others
• Moses Browne – The Excellency of the Knowledge of Jesus Christ
• José Cadalso – Los eruditos a la violeta
• William Chambers – A Dissertation on Oriental Gardening
• Junius (possibly Philip Francis) – Junius: Stat Nominis Umbra
• Francis Grose – The Antiquities of England and Wales
• Johann Gottfried Herder – Abhandlung über den Ursprung der Sprache (Treatise on the Origin of Language)
• Richard Hurd – An Introduction to the Study of Prophecies...
• Carsten Niebuhr – Beschreibung von Arabien
• Joseph Priestley – The History and Present State of Discoveries Relating to Vision, Light, and Colours
• Francis Stoughton Sullivan (died 1766) – An Historical Treatise on the Feudal Law, and the Constitution and Laws of England
• Catherine Talbot – Essays on Various Subjects
• Wilhelm Abraham Teller – Wörterbuch des Neuen Testamentes zur Erklärung der christlichen Lehre (Dictionary of the New Testament for the Explanation of Christian Doctrine)

Births

• January 15 – James Ballantyne, Scottish editor and publisher (died 1833)
• March 10 – Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel, German poet, literary critic, philosopher and philologist (died 1829)
• April 11 – Manuel José Quintana, Spanish poet (died 1857)
• May 2 – Novalis (Georg Philipp Friedrich Freiherr von Hardenberg), German poet and philosopher (died 1801)
• August 29 – Sarah Burney, English novelist (died 1844)
• September 27 – Sándor Kisfaludy, Hungarian poet (died 1844)
• October 21 – Samuel Taylor Coleridge, English poet (died 1834)
• November 17 – Marc-Antoine Madeleine Désaugiers, French dramatist (died 1827)
• November 28 – Johann Gottfried Jakob Hermann, German classical commentator and philologist (died 1848)
• December 6
• John Carr, English travel writer and lawyer (died 1832)
• Henry Cary, Gibraltar-born Irish author, editor and translator (died 1844)
• unknown date – Maria Riddell, West Indies-born poet, naturalist and travel writer resident in Scotland (died 1808)
• probable – Charlotte Dacre, English Gothic novelist (died 1825)

Deaths

• March 26 – Charles Pinot Duclos, French novelist and encyclopedist (born 1704)
• March 29 – Emanuel Swedenborg, Swedish philosopher (born 1688)
• May 22 – Durastante Natalucci, Italian historian (born 1687)
• June – Thomas Whately, English politician and writer (born 1726)
• June 18 – Johann Ulrich von Cramer, German philosopher (born 1706)
• October 7 – John Woolman, American abolitionist author (smallpox, born 1720)
• October 10 – William Wilkie, Scottish poet (ague, born 1721)
• November 10 – Pedro Correia Garção, Portuguese poet (born 1724)
• unknown dates
• Thomas Hawkins, English editor and cleric (born 1729)
• Margareta Momma, Swedish editor and writer (born 1702)

References