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.
 * Arthur Machen's wife Amy dies after a long illness, an event that has a devastating effect on him.
 * The Irish Literary Theatre is founded by William Butler Yeats, Augusta, Lady Gregory, George Moore and Edward Martyn

New books

 * Anna Adolph - Arqtiq
 * Machado de Assis - Dom Casmurro
 * L. Frank Baum - Father Goose: His Book
 * René Bazin - La terre qui meurt
 * René Boylesve - Demoiselle Cloque
 * Mary Elizabeth Braddon - His Darling Sin
 * Rhoda Broughton - The Game and the Candle
 * Charles Waddell Chesnutt - The Conjure Woman
 * Mary Cholmondeley - Red Pottage
 * Kate Chopin - The Awakening
 * Ralph Connor - The Sky Pilot
 * Joseph Conrad - Heart of Darkness
 * Stephen Crane - The Monster and Other Stories
 * Margaret Deland - Old Chester Tales
 * Géza Gárdonyi - Eclipse of the Crescent Moon
 * Maxim Gorky - Foma Gordyeeff
 * G. A. Henty - The Golden Canon
 * Henry James - The Awkward Age
 * Octave Mirbeau - The Torture Garden
 * Arthur Morrison - To London Town
 * Frank Norris
 * Blix
 * McTeague
 * Leo Tolstoy - Resurrection
 * Émile Zola - Fécondité
 * George Paston - A Writer of Books

New drama

 * Anton Chekhov - Uncle Vanya
 * Leon Kobrin - Minna or, The Ruined Family from Downtown

Poetry

 * Stéphane Mallarmé - Poésies (posthumously published)

Non-fiction

 * Qasim Amin - The Liberation of Women.
 * Edward Bernstein - Evolutionary Socialism.
 * Percy Dearmer - The Parson's Handbook.
 * John Dewey - The School and Society.
 * Elbert Hubbard - A Message to Garcia.

Births

 * January 17 - Nevil Shute, novelist (d. 1960)
 * February 23 - Erich Kästner, children's author (d. 1974)
 * March 25 - Jacques Audiberti (d. 1965)
 * April 22 - Vladimir Nabokov, novelist  (d. 1977)
 * May 8 - Friedrich Hayek, social scientist (d. 1992)
 * July 21
 * Ernest Hemingway, novelist (d. 1961)
 * Hart Crane, poet (d. 1932)
 * August 9 - P. L. Travers, Mary Poppins author (d. 1996)
 * August 24 - Jorge Luis Borges (d. 1986)
 * August 27 - C. S. Forester, adventure novelist (d. 1966)
 * December 16 - Noel Coward, playwright (d. 1973)
 * December 18 - Peter Wessel Zapffe, philosopher (d. 1990)

Deaths

 * February 10 - Archibald Lampman, poet
 * March 16 - Alexander Balloch Grosart, literary editor
 * May 1 - Ludwig Büchner, philosopher
 * May 16 - Francisque Sarcey, journalist and theatre critic
 * June 7 - Augustin Daly, dramatist and theatre manager
 * June 30 - E. D. E. N. Southworth, novelist
 * July 18 - Horatio Alger, Jr.
 * August 29 - Catharine Parr Traill, English-born author of "Canadiana"
 * October 25 - Grant Allen, author
 * November 13 - Arthur Giry, historian
 * December 22 - Dwight L. Moody, preacher and publisher
 * date unknown
 * Anna Swanwick, feminist writer
 * Vendela Hebbe, journalist, writer, novelist.