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

 * Eugenia de Acton - The Nuns of the Desert
 * Hosea Ballou - A Treatise on Atonement
 * Sophie Ristaud Cottin - The Saracen
 * Charlotte Dacre - Confessions of the Nun of St. Omer
 * Robert Charles Dallas - The Morlands
 * Denis Diderot - Rameau's Nephew
 * Maria Edgeworth - The Modern Griselda
 * Elizabeth Helme:
 * The Chronicles of Christabelle de Mowbray
 * The Pilgrims of the Cross
 * William Henry Ireland:
 * The Confessions of William Henry Ireland
 * Gondez the Monk
 * Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool - Treatise on the Coins of the Realm
 * Ellis Cornelia Knight - Description of Latium or La Campagna di Roma
 * Matthew Gregory Lewis - The Bravo of Venice
 * Mary Meeke - The Wonder of the Village
 * Anna Maria Porter - A Sailor's Friendship, and A Soldier's Love
 * Catherine Selden - Villa Nova
 * Richard Sickelmore – Rashleigh Abbey
 * Mercy Otis Warren - History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution
 * William Frederick Williams - The Witcheries of Craig Isaf
 * Sophia Woodfall - The Child of the Abbey
 * R. P. M. Yorke - My Master's Secret
 * Mary Julia Young - The Witches of Glenshiel

New drama

 * Alexandre-Vincent Pineux Duval - Le Menuisier de Livonie
 * Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger - Hakon Jarl

Poetry

 * Ivan Pnin - God
 * Sir Walter Scott - The Lay of the Last Minstrel
 * Sir Martin Archer Shee - Rhymes on Art
 * Robert Southey - Madoc

Births

 * February 4 - William Harrison Ainsworth, novelist (+  1882)
 * April 2 - Hans Christian Andersen, writer (+ 1875)
 * July 29 - Alexis de Tocqueville, writer  (+  1859)
 * August 29 - Frederick Maurice, theologian and novelist
 * September 19 - John Stevens Cabot Abbott, historian
 * December 23 - Joseph Smith, Jr., founder and prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Deaths

 * March 29 - Jean Elliot, Scottish poet
 * May 9 - Friedrich Schiller, German playwright
 * May 25 - William Paley, philosopher
 * June 18 - Arthur Murphy, who wrote as "Charles Ranger"
 * July 27 - Brian Merriman, Irish language poet
 * August 3 - Christopher Anstey, poet
 * September 3 - Johann Martin Abele, publisher
 * date unknown - Anna Hammar-Rosén, publisher (b. 1735)