1820 in literature

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This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1820.

Events

• January 16 – Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery by "Northamptonshire peasant poet" John Clare is published in England by John Taylor.
• April 22 – Walter Scott is created 1st baronet of Abbotsford in the County of Roxburgh in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom.
• September – Poet John Keats, suffering from tuberculosis, leaves London to take up residence in the house on the Spanish Steps in Rome where he will die in 1821.
• November 20 – An 80-ton sperm whale attacks the Essex, a whaleship from Nantucket, Massachusetts, 2,000 miles off the western coast of South America. Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick is in part inspired by this story.
• unknown dates
  • More than 20 years after the poet's death, Robert Chambers edits and publishes The Songs of Robert Burns.
  • Thomas Kendall has the first book printed in the Māori language, A korao no New Zealand; or, the New Zealander's first book; being an attempt to compose some lessons for the instruction of the natives, published in Sydney, Australia.
  • The first translation of the Old English epic poem Beowulf into a modern language, Danish, Bjovulfs Drape, by N. F. S. Grundtvig, is published.
  • The Cambridge Apostles, an intellectual discussion group, is established at the University of Cambridge in England.

New books

Fiction

• James Fenimore Cooper – Precaution
• Thomas Gaspey – Forty Years Ago
• Robert Huish – Castle of Nielo
• Francis Lathom – Italian Mysteries
• Charles Maturin (anonymously) – Melmoth the Wanderer
• Regina Marie Roche – The Munster Cottage Boy
• Sir Walter Scott (anonymously)
  • Ivanhoe (published 1819, dated 1820)
  • The Abbot
  • The Monastery
• Louisa Stanhope – The Crusaders
• Rosalia St. Clair – The Highland Castle, and the Lowland Cottage

Children

• Maria Hack
  • English Stories, illustrating some of the most interesting events and characters between the Accession of Alfred and the Death of John
  • English Stories. Second series, between the Accession of Henry the Third and the Death of Henry the Sixth
• Mary Shelley – Maurice, or the Fisher's Cot (written 1820 then lost, published 1997)

Drama

• James Sheridan Knowles – Virginius
• Percy Bysshe Shelley – Prometheus Unbound
• George Soane – The Hebrew
• Charles Edward Walker – Wallace

Poetry

• Robert Burns (died 1796) – The Songs of Robert Burns
• John Clare – Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery
• John Keats
  • The Eve of St. Agnes
  • Lamia and Other Poems
• Alphonse de Lamartine – Méditations poétiques
• Adam Mickiewicz – Ode to Youth (Oda do młodości)
• Nguyễn Du – The Tale of Kieu (斷腸新聲, Truyện Kiều)
• Aleksandr Pushkin – Ruslan and Ludmila (Руслан и Людмила)
• Percy Bysshe Shelley – To a Skylark

Non-fiction

• Thomas Brown – Lectures on the Philosophy of the Human Mind
• Howard Douglas – A Treatise on Naval Gunnery
• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel – Elements of the Philosophy of Right
• John George Hoffman – Pow-Wows; or, Long Lost Friend
• Claude François Lallemand – Recherches anatomico-pathologiques sur l'encéphale et ses dépendances (to 1832)
• Charles Lamb – Essays of Elia (begin publication in The London Magazine)
• Thomas Malthus – Principles of Political Economy
• Charles Mills – History of the Crusades for the Recovery and Possession of the Holy Land
• Robert Southey – Life of Wesley
• Mariana Starke – Travels on the Continent: written for the use and particular information of travellers

Births

• January 17 – Anne Brontë, English novelist and poet (died 1849)
• January 30 – Concepción Arenal, Spanish feminist writer and activist (died 1893)
• February 28 – John Tenniel, English illustrator and cartoonist (died 1914)
• March 2 – Multatuli (Eduard Douwes Dekker), Dutch writer (died 1887)
• March 17 – Jean Ingelow, English poet and novelist (died 1897)
• March 30 – Anna Sewell, English novelist (died 1878)
• April 4 – Mkrtich Khrimian, Armenian Catholicos, essayist and poet (died 1907)
• April 16 – Charlotte A. Jerauld, American poet and story writer (died 1845)
• April 26 – Alice Cary, American poet and short-story writer (died 1871)
• April 27 – Herbert Spencer, English philosopher (died 1903)
• June 21 – James Halliwell-Phillipps, English bibliophile (died 1889)
• August 13 – Sir George Grove, English writer and lexicographer on music (died 1900)
• September 2 – Lucretia Peabody Hale, American journalist and author (died 1900)
• September 17 – Émile Augier, French dramatist (died 1889)
• October 14 – John Harris, English poet (died 1884)
• November 23 (December 5 N.S.) – Afanasy Fet, Russian lyric poet, essayist and short-story writer (died 1892)
• November 28 – Friedrich Engels, German socialist writer (died 1895)

Deaths

• February 5 – William Drennan, Irish poet, radical and educationalist (born 1754)
• February 23 – Alojzy Feliński, Polish poet (born 1771)
• March 20 – Eaton Stannard Barrett, Irish satirical poet and novelist (born 1786)
• April 2 – Thomas Brown, Scottish philosopher and poet (born 1778)
• May 1 – Richmal Mangnall, English schoolbook writer (born 1769)
• July 16 – William Hazlitt Sr., Irish writer, radical and Unitarian minister, father of William Hazlitt (born 1737)
• August 23 – Michel de Cubières, French poet, dramatist and historian (born 1752)
• September 16 – Nguyễn Du, Vietnamese poet (born 1766)
• October 5 – Augustin Barruel, French Jesuit priest and writer (born 1741)
• November 8 – Lavinia Stoddard, American poet and educationist (born 1787)
• November 12 – William Hayley, English poet and biographer (born 1745)
• Probable – Dionisie Eclesiarhul, Wallachian scribe, chronicler and illustrator (born c. 1740)