1724 in literature

This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1724.

Events

• January – Andrew Michael Ramsay goes to Rome to tutor the two sons of James Francis Edward Stuart, Jacobite pretender to the British throne.^[1]
• August – Thomas Longman establishes the Longman publishing house in London.

New books

Prose

• Anonymous (attributed to Daniel Defoe) – A Narrative of All the Robberies, Escapes, &c. of John Sheppard
• Gilbert Burnet (died 1715) – Bishop Burnet's History of His Own Time, Vol I
• Samuel Clarke – Sermons of Samuel Clarke
• Anthony Collins – Discourse of the Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Religion with An Apology for Free Debate and Liberty of Writing
• Mary Davys – The Reform'd Coquet (fiction)
• Daniel Defoe
  • Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress
  • A New Voyage Round the World
  • A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain
• John Dennis – Vice and Luxury Publick Mischiefs (on Mandeville)
• Richard Fiddes
  • A General Treatise of Morality (on Mandeville)
  • The Life of Cardinal Wolsey
• Eliza Haywood
  • La Belle Assemblé
  • The Fatal Secret (fiction)
  • Lasselia
  • The Masqueraders
• Thomas Hearne, ed. – Robert of Gloucester's Chronicle
• Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon (died 1674) – An Appendix to the History of the Grand Rebellion
• Captain Charles Johnson (attributed to Daniel Defoe or Nathaniel Mist) – A General History of the Pyrates
• William Law – Remarks Upon a Late Book (against Mandeville)
• John Oldmixon – The Critical History of England, Ecclesiastical and Civil
• Paul de Rapin – L'Histoire d'Angleterre
• Richard Stukeley – Itinerarium Curiosum
• Jonathan Swift
  • A Letter to the Shop-keepers... of Ireland (as M. B. Drapier)
  • A Letter to Mr. Harding the Printer (as Drapier)
  • Some Observations Upon a Paper Relating to Wood's Half-pence (as Drapier)
  • A Letter to the Whole People of Ireland (Drapier)
  • A Letter to the Right Honourable the Lord Viscount Molesworth (last of the Drapier letters)
  • Seasonable Advice
• Voltaire – La Henriade
• Isaac Watts – Logic, or The Right Use of Reason in the Enquiry After Truth With a Variety of Rules to Guard Against Error in the Affairs of Religion and Human Life, as well as in the Sciences

Drama

• Colley Cibber – Caesar in Aegypt
• John Gay – The Captives
• Eliza Haywood – A Wife to be Lett
• Ludvig Holberg – Henrich og Pernille (Henrik and Pernille)
• William Philips – Belisarius
• John Rich (producer) – The Necromancer; or, History of Dr. Faustus
• Richard Savage – The Tragedy of Sir Thomas Overbury

Poetry

• Matthew Concanen – Miscellaneous Poems
• Eliza Haywood – Poems on Several Occasions
• Allan Ramsay
  • The Ever Green: Being a collection of Scots Poems
  • Health
• Elizabeth Tollet – Poems on Several Occasions
• Leonard Welsted – Epistles, Odes, &c.
• See also 1724 in poetry

Births

• January 12 – Frances Brooke, English novelist and dramatist (died 1789)
• March 20 – Duncan Ban MacIntyre, Scottish Gaelic poet (died 1812)
• April 22 – Immanuel Kant German philosopher (died 1804)
• June 4 – William Gilpin, English writer, painter and originator of "picturesque" (died 1804)
• July 2 – Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, German poet (died 1803)
• October 31 – Christopher Anstey, English writer and poet (died 1805)
• December 13 – Franz Aepinus, German natural philosopher (died 1802)
• Unknown dates
  • Samuel Derrick, Irish writer (died 1769)
  • Ji Yun (纪昀), Chinese poet and scholar (died 1805)
  • Frances Sheridan (Frances Chamberlaine), Irish novelist and dramatist (died 1766)

Deaths

• January 1 – Charles Gildon, English critic and dramatist (born c. 1665)
• February 5 – Mary Cowper, English diarist (born 1685)
• February 12 – Elkanah Settle, English poet and dramatist (born 1648)
• July 11 – Delarivier Manley, writer, playwright and pamphleteer (born c. 1663)
• October 6 – Charles Rivière Dufresny, French dramatist (born 1648)
• October 29 – William Wollaston, English philosophical writer (born 1659)
• November 29 – Laurence Braddon, English writer and politician (year of birth not known)

References