List of years in literature

This page gives a chronological list of years in literature (descending order), with notable publications listed with their respective years and a small selection of notable events. 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.

History of Literature

Bronze Age literature

Sumerian Egyptian Akkadian

Classical literatures

Chinese Greek Hebrew Latin Pahlavi Pali Prakrit Sanskrit Syriac Tamil

Early Medieval literature

Matter of Rome Matter of France Matter of Britain Byzantine literature Kannada literature Persian literature

Medieval literature

Old English Middle English Arabic Byzantine Dutch French German Indian Old Irish Italian Japanese Kannada Nepal Bhasa Norse Persian Telugu Welsh

Early Modern literature

Renaissance literature Baroque literature

Modern literature

18th century 19th century 20th century 21st century

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21st century

Main article: 21st century in literature

See also: Modern Library 100 Best Novels

2010s

• 2011 in literature - The Tiger's Wife - Téa Obreht;
• 2010 in literature - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest - Stieg Larsson; Death of Erich Segal, Louis Auchincloss, J.D. Salinger, José Saramago

2000s

• 2009 in literature - The Girl Who Played With Fire - Stieg Larsson; First Family - David Baldacci; Death of - John Updike, Philip José Farmer, J.G. Ballard, Frank McCourt, Budd Schulberg
• 2008 in literature - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo - Stieg Larsson; Duma Key - Stephen King; The White Tiger - Aravind Adiga; Death of Michael Crichton, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Margaret Truman, David Foster Wallace, Arthur C. Clarke, Studs Terkel, Robert Giroux
• 2007 in literature - Death of Norman Mailer, Kurt Vonnegut; Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (final book in the Harry Potter series) - J. K. Rowling
• 2006 in literature - The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins; Death of Peter Benchley, Betty Friedan, Muriel Spark, Mickey Spillane, Wendy Wasserstein
• 2005 in literature - Death of Arthur Miller, John Fowles, Elizabeth Janeway; Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro; Haunted - Chuck Palahniuk
• 2004 in literature - Death of Stieg Larsson, Françoise Sagan Hubert Selby Jr., Susan Sontag; The Plot Against America - Philip Roth; Free Culture - Lawrence Lessig
• 2003 in literature - The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown; Hegemony or Survival - Noam Chomsky; Roman Triptych (Meditation) - John Paul II; Death of Howard Fast
• 2002 in literature - Atonement - Ian McEwan; Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World - Margaret MacMillan; Death of Chaim Potok
• 2001 in literature - Seabiscuit: An American Legend – Laura Hillenbrand; Life of Pi - Yann Martel; The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen; Death of Ken Kesey, Robert Ludlum
• 2000 in literature - The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Michael Chabon; No Logo - Naomi Klein, Death of Charles M. Schulz

20th century

Main article: 20th century in literature

1990s

• 1999 in literature - Chocolat - Joanne Harris; Disgrace - J M Coetzee; Death of Iris Murdoch, Joseph Heller, Mario Puzo, John F. Kennedy Jr.
• 1998 in literature - Death of Carlos Castaneda, Octavio Paz, Lawrence Sanders, Benjamin Spock; Blood Work - Michael Connelly
• 1997 in literature - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - J. K. Rowling; Underworld - Don DeLillo; Death of William S. Burroughs, James Dickey, James A. Michener
• 1996 in literature - Death of Erma Bombeck, Marguerite Duras Timothy Leary, Carl Sagan; Infinite Jest - David Foster Wallace; Angela's Ashes - Frank McCourt; Left Behind - Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins; Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk
• 1995 in literature - The Celestine Prophecy - James Redfield; Blindness - José Saramago
• 1994 in literature - The Stone Diaries - Carol Shields; Death of James Clavell, Ralph Ellison, Eugène Ionesco
• 1993 in literature - Death of Kōbō Abe, Anthony Burgess, William Golding, William L. Shirer; The Christmas Box – Richard Paul Evans; Trainspotting - Irvine Welsh
• 1992 in literature - The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje; All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy; The Black Echo - Michael Connelly
• 1991 in literature - Such a Long Journey - Rohinton Mistry; Parliament of Whores- P.J. O'Rourke; Death of Isaac Bashevis Singer
• 1990 in literature - Vertigo - W.G. Sebald; The Hebrew Goddess - Raphael Patai; Death of Malcolm Forbes, Walker Percy, Alberto Moravia, Anya Seton, Roald Dahl

1980s

• 1989 in literature - Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro; The Joy Luck Club - Amy Tan
• 1988 in literature - Oscar and Lucinda - Peter Carey; The Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie, Curriculum - Grazyna Miller, Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media
• 1987 in literature - Beloved - Toni Morrison; The Bonfire of the Vanities - Tom Wolfe; Patriot Games - Tom Clancy
• 1986 in literature - Extinction - Thomas Bernhard; The Bourne Supremacy - Robert Ludlum
• 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; La casa de los espíritus (The House of the Spirits) - Isabel Allende
• 1981 in literature - The Blue Bicycle - Régine Deforges; Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie; Red Dragon - Thomas Harris; Little Miss - Roger Hargreaves
• 1980 in literature - Smiley's People - John le Carré; Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose) - Umberto Eco; Thy Neighbor's Wife - Gay Talese; The Paper Bag Princess - Robert Munsch

1970s

Main article: 1970s in literature

• 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 Solomon (novel) - 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; Roots: The Saga of an American Family - Alex Haley; Arthur's Nose - Marc Brown (first Arthur book)
• 1975 in literature - Shōgun - James Clavell; Salem's Lot - Stephen King; The Book of Sand - Jorge Luis Borges; Dhalgren - Samuel R. Delany; Ragtime - E. L. Doctorow
• 1974 in literature - All the President's Men - Carl Bernstein & Bob Woodward; Carrie - Stephen King; Jaws - Peter Benchley; Fear of Flying - Erica Jong
• 1973 in literature - Burr - Gore Vidal; Gravity's Rainbow - Thomas Pynchon
• 1972 in literature - Jonathan Livingston Seagull - Richard Bach; Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S. Thompson; The Stepford Wives - Ira Levin
• 1971 in literature - A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan - Carlos Castaneda; The Happy Hooker: My Own Story - Xaviera Hollander; The End of Summer - Rosamunde Pilcher; Mr. Men - Roger Hargreaves
• 1970 in literature - Deliverance - James Dickey; Blue Movie - Terry Southern; Ball Four - Jim Bouton; The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison

1960s

• 1969 in literature - Death of Jack Kerouac; The Godfather - Mario Puzo; Portnoy's Complaint - Philip Roth; Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut; Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle - Vladimir Nabokov; I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings - Maya Angelou
• 1968 in literature - Death of John Steinbeck, Edna Ferber, Upton Sinclair; The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test - Tom Wolfe; Airport - Arthur Hailey; Belle du Seigneur - Albert Cohen The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge - Carlos Castaneda
• 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; The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects - Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore; The Death of a President - William Manchester; Nicholas and Alexandra - Robert K. Massie
• 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 - Death of W. Somerset Maugham, T.S. Eliot; 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 - Death of Ian Fleming; 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; Last Exit to Brooklyn - Hubert Selby Jr.
• 1963 in literature - Death of Aldous Huxley, Robert Frost, Clifford Odets, Sylvia Plath, William Carlos Williams, C.S. Lewis; 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 - Death of Hermann Hesse, William Faulkner, E.E. Cummings; 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 - Death of Ernest Hemingway; Catch-22 - Joseph Heller; Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert A. Heinlein; A House for Mr. Biswas - V. S. Naipaul; Revolutionary Road - Richard Yates;
• 1960 in literature - Death of Albert Camus, Boris Pasternak, Nevil Shute, Richard Wright; 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 Böll; Naked Lunch - William S. Burroughs; Death of Raymond Chandler
• 1958 in literature - Exodus - Leon Uris; Candy - Terry Southern; The Dharma Bums - Jack Kerouac; The Grass - Claude Simon; The Guide - R. K. Narayan; Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
• 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; Long Day's Journey into Night - Eugene O'Neill
• 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; The Doors of Perception - Aldous Huxley; 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; Wise Blood - Flannery O'Connor
• 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 Glides the Stream Flora Thompson
• 1947 in literature - The Diary of a Young Girl - Anne Frank
• 1946 in literature - The Iceman Cometh - Eugene O'Neill; Zorba the Greek - Nikos Kazantzakis
• 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; Animal Farm- George Orwell
• 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; Alamut - Vladimir Bartol
• 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 - Absalom, Absalom! - William Faulkner; 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 - As I Lay Dying - William Faulkner; 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; Steppenwolf - Hermann Hesse;
• 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 - Death of Sergey Esenin; The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald; The Painted Veil - W.Somerset Maugham; 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 - The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock - T. S. Eliot; Moonchild - 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 - The Sea-Wolf - Jack London; Nostromo - Joseph Conrad; Green Mansions - William Henry Hudson; The Golden Bowl - Henry James; Ghost Stories of an Antiquary - M. R. James
• 1903 in literature - The Call of the Wild - Jack London;The Souls of Black Folk - W. E. B. Du Bois; The Ambassadors - Henry James; The Jewel of Seven Stars - Bram Stoker
• 1902 in literature - The Immoralist - André Gide; The Wings of the Dove - Henry James; The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle; The Tale of Peter Rabbit - Beatrix Potter
• 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

Main article: 19th century in literature

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 New Woman - Bolesław Prus
• 1892 in literature - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; Children of the Ghetto - Israel Zangwill; Gunga Din - Rudyard Kipling

• 1891 in literature - Tales of Soldiers and Civilians - Ambrose Bierce; Diary of a Pilgrimage - Jerome K. Jerome; Tess of the d'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy; "The Picture of Dorian Gray"- Oscar Wilde
• 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
• 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; The Bostonians - Henry James
• 1885 in literature - King Solomon's Mines - Henry Rider Haggard; Marius the Epicurean - Walter Pater; Alfred, Lord 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 - Ben-Hur - Lew Wallace; 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; Black Beauty - Anna Sewell; Povídky malostranské ("Tales of the Little Quarter") - Jan Neruda;

• 1876 in literature - The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - Mark Twain; The Shadow of the Sword - Robert Buchanan; The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs - William Morris
• 1875 in literature - The Way We Live Now - Anthony Trollope; Beauchamp's Career - George Meredith
• 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; Red Cotton Night-Cap Country - Robert Browning
• 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; Lothair - Benjamin Disraeli

1860s

• 1869 in literature - War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy; L'Education Sentimentale - Gustave Flaubert; Les Chants de Maldoror - Comte de Lautréamont; Lorna Doone - R. D. Blackmore; The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoevsky
• 1868 in literature - Little Women - Louisa May Alcott; The Luck of Roaring Camp - Bret Harte; The Moonstone - Wilkie Collins
• 1867 in literature - The Gambler - Fyodor Dostoevsky
• 1866 in literature - 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; Notes from Underground - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• 1863 in literature - Capitan Fracassa - Théophile Gautier
• 1862 in literature - Les Misérables - Victor Hugo; Fathers and Sons - Ivan Turgenev
• 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; The Ordeal of Richard Feverel - George Meredith; Oblomov - Ivan Goncharov; On the Origin of Species - Charles Darwin
• 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; The Virginians - William Makepeace Thackeray; Tom Brown's Schooldays - Thomas Hughes; The Hasheesh Eater - Fitz Hugh Ludlow
• 1856 in literature - The Daisy Chain - Charlotte Mary Yonge; Aurora Leigh - Elizabeth Barrett Browning; Lilies In December - Agustus Montrose
• 1855 in literature - The Grandmother - Božena Němcová; Westward Ho! - Charles Kingsley
• 1854 in literature - Walden - Henry David Thoreau; The Newcomes - William Makepeace Thackeray
• 1853 in literature - Bleak House by Charles Dickens is the first English novel to feature a detective; The Heir of Redclyffe - Charlotte Mary Yonge; The Scholar Gipsy - Matthew Arnold; Bartleby, the Scrivener - Herman Melville
• 1852 in literature - Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe
• 1851 in literature - Moby-Dick - Herman Melville; Lavengro - George Borrow; The House of the Seven Gables - Nathaniel Hawthorne
• 1850 in literature - The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne; David Copperfield - Charles Dickens, Household Words edited by Charles Dickens begins publication; Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day - Robert Browning

1840s

• 1849 in literature - David Copperfield - Charles Dickens, published as a serial in installments; 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; Tancred - Benjamin Disraeli
• 1846 in literature - Cousin Bette - Honoré de Balzac
• 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
• 1843 in literature - A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens; Windsor Castle - William Harrison Ainsworth; Either/Or - Søren Kierkegaard; Repetition (Kierkegaard) - Søren Kierkegaard; The Ugly Duckling - Hans Christian Andersen
• 1842 in literature - Dead Souls - Nikolai Gogol
• 1841 in literature - The Deerslayer - James Fenimore Cooper; Demon - Mikhail Lermontov
• 1840 in literature - A Hero of Our Time - Mikhail Lermontov; 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; 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 - The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club - Charles Dickens; Death of the Poet - Mikhail Lermontov
• 1836 in literature - Máj - Karel Hynek Mácha; The Captain's Daughter - Alexander Pushkin; The Government Inspector and The Nose - Nikolai Gogol
• 1835 in literature - Le Père Goriot - Honoré de Balzac; Taras Bulba - Nikolai Gogol
• 1834 in literature - Sartor Resartus - Thomas Carlyle; The Queen of Spades - Alexander Pushkin
• 1833 in literature - Gamiani - Alfred de Musset; Eugene Onegin - Aleksandr Pushkin; Eugénie Grandet - Honoré de Balzac
• 1832 in literature - Eugene Onegin - Alexander Pushkin; Faust Part Two - Goethe; Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka - Nikolai Gogol
• 1831 in literature - 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 - Boris Godunov - Alexander Pushkin; The Betrothed - Alessandro Manzoni
• 1824 in literature - Our Village - Mary Russell Mitford
• 1823 in literature - The Pioneers - James Fenimore Cooper; Woe from Wit - Alexander Griboyedov; The Fountain of Bakhchisaray - Alexander Pushkin
• 1822 in literature - The Vision of Judgment - Lord Byron
• 1821 in literature - Confessions of an English Opium Eater - Thomas De Quincey
• 1820 in literature - Ruslan and Ludmila - Alexander Pushkin

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; Julian and Maddalo - Percy Bysshe 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; Death of Thomas Paine
• 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

Main article: 18th century in literature

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; Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals - Immanuel Kant, Anton Reiser (to 1790) - Karl Philipp Moritz; The Task - William Cowper
• 1784 in literature - Barham Downs - Robert Bage; Death of - Samuel Johnson and Denis Diderot
• 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 - Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever - Joseph Priestley

1770s

• 1779 in literature - Nathan the Wise - Gotthold Lessing; Fables and Parables - Ignacy Krasicki
• 1778 in literature - Evelina - Fanny Burney; death of Voltaire (b. 1694)
• 1777 in literature - The School for Scandal - Richard Brinsley Sheridan
• 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 - 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.
• 1771 in literature - Jacques the Fatalist (to 1773) - Diderot
• 1770 in literature - Épître à l'Auteur du Livre des Trois Imposteurs - Voltaire

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 - Birth of Thomas Paine, free thinker and revolutionary (died 1809)
• 1736 in literature -
• 1735 in literature - At the end of the trial of John Peter Zenger for seditious libel in the New York Weekly Journal, he is found not guilty by the jury determining that truth was a defense against charges of libel..

• 1734 in literature - Copies of Voltaire's Lettres philosophiques sur les Anglais are burned, and a warrant is issued for the author's arrest.
• 1733 in literature - Letters Concerning the English Nation - Voltaire
• 1732 in literature - Essay on Man (to 1744) - Alexander Pope
• 1731 in literature - Insel Felsenburg (to 1743) - Johann Gottfried Schnabel
• 1730 in literature - Le Jeu de l'Amour et du Hasard - Pierre de Marivaux

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, La 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 - Oedipe - Voltaire's first play
• 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 - Ode à Sainte-Geneviève - Voltaire's first published work
• 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

Main article: 17th century in literature

1690s

• 1699 in literature -Death of Jean Racine
• 1698 in literature
• 1697 in literature
• 1696 in literature
• 1695 in literature
• 1694 in literature - Feb 20th, birth of Voltaire
• 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; John Dryden The Hind and the Panther
• 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 - Death of Molière (b. 1622), D'Artagnan, soldier, inspiration for Dumas' character
• 1672 in literature - Les Femmes Savantes - Molière
• 1671 in literature - Samson Agonistes - John Milton

• 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 Death of René Descartes, philosopher (born 1596)

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 - René Descartes completes Meditations on First Philosophy: "I think therefore I am"

1630s

• 1639 in literature - Birth of Jean Racine
• 1638 in literature
• 1637 in literature
• 1636 in literature - the Annals of the Four Masters are completed
• 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 - Birth of Molière (d. 1673)
• 1621 in literature
• 1620 in literature - Novum Organum – Francis Bacon

1610s

• 1619 in literature
• 1618 in literature
• 1617 in literature
• 1616 in literature - Death of William Shakespeare, genius, dramatist and poet (b. 1564), Miguel de Cervantes, Spanish writer (b.1547)
• 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 - William Shakespeare - Hamlet
• 1603 in literature - Measure for Measure - William Shakespeare
• 1602 in literature
• 1601 in literature - William Shakespeare - Twelfth Night
• 1600 in literature - William Shakespeare - Henry IV, Part 2, The Merchant of Venice, Henry V, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Much Ado About Nothing published

16th century

Main article: 16th century in literature

1590s

• 1599 in literature - William Shakespeare - Henry V,

Julius Caesar

• 1598 in literature - William Shakespeare - Henry IV, Part 1 and Love's Labor's Lost published
• 1597 in literature - Francis Bacon Essays
• 1596 in literature - Edmund Spenser - The Faerie Queene, Books 4-6

• 1595 in literature - William Shakespeare - Richard II, Romeo and Juliet
• 1594 in literature - The Unfortunate Traveller, Thomas Nashe
• 1593 in literature - Death of Christopher Marlowe, dramatist and poet (born 1564)
• 1592 in literature
• 1591 in literature
• 1590 in literature - Christopher Marlowe - Tamburlaine (both parts published); Edmund Spenser - The Faerie Queene, Books 1-3; Sir Philip Sidney - Arcadia
• unknown year in 1590s - Journey to the West, Wu Cheng'en

1580s

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

1570s

• 1579 in literature
• 1578 in literature
• 1577 in literature
• 1576 in literature
• 1575 in literature
• 1574 in literature
• 1573 in literature
• 1572 in literature
• 1571 in literature
• 1570 in literature Abraham Ortelius - Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (the first modern atlas)

1560s

• 1569 in literature – La Araucana, part 1 - Joan Perez de Lazarraga
• 1568 in literature - Giorgio Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects; Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki - De optimo senatore
• 1567 in literature - William Salesbury - New Testament (first Welsh language version); Magdeburg Centuries
• 1566 in literature - William Painter - The Palace of Pleasure
• 1565 in literature - Bernardino Telesio - De natura juxta propria principia
• 1564 in literature – Birth of William Shakespeare dramatist and poet (d.1616); Christopher Marlowe, dramatist and poet (d. 1593)
• 1563 in literature – Foxe's Book of Martyrs - John Foxe
• 1562 in literature – Arthur Brooke - The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet

• 1561 in literature - John Calvin - Institutes of the Christian Religion
• 1560 in literature – Geneva Bible (first full edition)

• 1550s in literature – The Elizabethan version of the Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England, which remained in use until the mid-17th century and was the first English Prayer Book in America.

• 1547 in literature – Birth of Miguel de Cervantes (d.1616)

• 1540s in literature – Nicolaus Copernicus - De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres)
• 1530s in literature – Niccolò Machiavelli - The Prince; François Rabelais - Pantagruel; Luther Bible translation by Martin Luther
• 1520s in literature – Baltissare Castiglione - The Book of the Courtier
• 1510s in literature – Thomas More - Utopia
• 1500s in literature – Marko Marulić - Judita; Erasmus - In Praise of Folly

Middle Ages

Further information: Medieval literature

• 15th century in literature – Johann Gutenberg prints the Vulgate Bible; – Sir Thomas Malory – Le Morte d'Arthur;
• 14th century in literature – The Divine Comedy – Dante Alighieri; The Decameron – Giovanni Boccaccio; Canterbury Tales – Geoffrey Chaucer
• 13th century in literature – Theologus Autodidactus, Gesta Romanorum – Ibn al-Nafis; The Travels of Marco Polo – Marco Polo
• 12th century in literature – Hayy ibn Yaqdhan – Ibn Tufail
• 11th century in literature – The Tale of Genji – Murasaki Shikibu
• 10th century in literature – One Thousand and One Nights
• 6th to 9th centuries in literature – Book of Kells; The Pillow Book – Sei Shōnagon

Ancient times

• Ancient literature

Template:Lists of years