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.
 * November 14 - Herman Melville's novel Moby-Dick is published in full, in a single volume, for the first time.

New books

 * Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly - Une Vieille Maltresse
 * George Henry Borrow - Lavengro
 * Elizabeth Gaskell - Cranford
 * Nathaniel Hawthorne - The House of the Seven Gables
 * Gottfried Keller - Der Grüne Heinrich
 * Sheridan Le Fanu - The Watcher
 * Herman Melville - Moby-Dick
 * John Ruskin - The King of the Golden River
 * Francisco de Paula Mellado - Enciclopedia moderna

Poetry

 * Heinrich Heine - Romanzero
 * Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - The Golden Legend
 * Matthew Arnold - Dover Beach - written not published

Non-fiction

 * John Ruskin - The Stones of Venice, vol 1

Births

 * February 8 - Kate Chopin, American writer
 * June 11 - Mary Augusta Ward, author (+ 1920)
 * 21 February - Ernst von Hesse-Wartegg, Austrian writer and traveller

Deaths

 * February 1 - Mary Shelley, author
 * February 23 - Joanna Baillie, Scottish poet, dramatist
 * May 23 - Richard Lalor Sheil, dramatist and journalist
 * August 10 - Heinrich Paulus, theologian
 * September 14 - James Fenimore Cooper, writer
 * October 12 - Augusta Leigh, half-sister and lover of Lord Byron
 * December 19 - Henry Luttrell, poet
 * date unknown - Abigail Mott, writer