1851 in literature
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1851.
- January 1 – The Georgian theatre company gives its first performance, under the direction of Giorgi Eristavi.
- June 5 – Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin begins serialization in the American abolitionist weekly The National Era.
- June – While waiting to cross the English Channel on honeymoon, Matthew Arnold probably begins to compose the poem "Dover Beach".
- September 29 – Marian Evans, the future George Eliot, takes up her appointment as (assistant) editor of the Westminster Review, published by John Chapman, in which capacity she will meet G. H. Lewes.
- November 14 – Herman Melville's novel Moby-Dick; or, The Whale is published in full, in a single volume, for the first time, by Harper & Brothers in New York, having been previously issued on October 18 as The Whale in an abridged 3-volume edition by Richard Bentley in London.
- December 2 – French coup d'état of 1851. Victor Hugo is a leader of the unsuccessful insurrection against it and is forced into exile, initially to Brussels.
- December 24 – A fire at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., destroys 35,000 books, about two–thirds of the collection.
- Albertus Willem Sijthoff establishes his own publishing business at Leiden.
- Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly – Une vieille maîtresse (An Old Mistress)
- George Borrow – Lavengro
- Mathilde Fibiger – Clara Raphael, Tolv Breve (Clara Raphael, Twelve Letters)
- Elizabeth Gaskell – Cranford (serialization begins)
- Nathaniel Hawthorne – The House of the Seven Gables
- Gottfried Keller – Der Grüne Heinrich
- Sheridan Le Fanu
- Ghost Stories and Tales of Mystery
- The Watcher
- Herman Melville – Moby-Dick
- John Ruskin – The King of the Golden River
Children and young people
- W. H. G. Kingston – Peter the Whaler
- Edward Bulwer-Lytton – Not So Bad as We Seem, or, Many Sides to a Character: A Comedy in Five Acts
- Ferdinand Dugué – Salvator Rosa
- Franz Grillparzer – The Jewess of Toledo (Die Jüdin von Toledo, written)
- Eugène Marin Labiche with Marc Michel – Un Chapeau de paille d'Italie (An Italian Straw Hat)
- Eugène Scribe – Bataille de Dames
- Matthew Arnold – "Dover Beach" (probably completed; not published until 1867)
- Heinrich Heine – Romanzero
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow – The Golden Legend
- Hans Christian Andersen – In Sweden
- Edward Creasy – The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World
- Catherine Dickens (as Lady Maria Clutterbuck) – What Shall We Have for Dinner?
- Søren Kierkegaard
- Henry Mayhew – London Labour and the London Poor (collected in book form)
- Francisco de Paula Mellado – Enciclopedia moderna
- John Ruskin – The Stones of Venice, vol 1
- February 21 – Ernst von Hesse-Wartegg, Austrian writer and traveler (died 1918)
- June 11 – Mary Augusta Ward (Mrs. Humphry Ward), Tasmanian-born English novelist (died 1920)
- June 29 – Jane Dieulafoy, French archeologist, novelist and journalist (died 1916)
- August 23 – Alois Jirásek, Czech novelist and playwright (died 1930)
- September 14 – H. E. Beunke, Dutch writer (died 1925)
- September 16 – Emilia Pardo Bazán, Galician Spanish novelist (died 1921)
- December 10 – Melvil Dewey, born Melville Dewey, American librarian (died 1931)
- February 1 – Mary Shelley, English novelist and essayist (born 1797)
- February 23 – Joanna Baillie, Scottish poet and dramatist (born 1762)
- May 23 – Richard Lalor Sheil, Irish dramatist and journalist (born 1791)
- July 17 – Esther Copley, English children's writer and tractarian (born 1786)
- August 1 – Harriet Lee, English novelist (born 1757)
- August 10 – Heinrich Paulus, German theologian (born 1761)
- September 14 – James Fenimore Cooper, American historical novelist (born 1789)
- December 19 – Henry Luttrell, English politician, wit and society poet (born c. 1765)
- Unknown date – Vanchinbalyn Gularans, Mongolian poet (unknown year of birth)
- Published 1867. Allott, Kenneth, ed. (1965). The Poems of Matthew Arnold. London; New York: Longman Norton. p. 240. ISBN 0-393-04377-0.
- Maas, Norbert Maria Hubert (1996). "Altyt Waek Saem: De drukker-uitgever A.W. Sijthoff (1829-1913)". Nieuw Letterkundig Magazijn (in Dutch). pp. 35–41. Retrieved 2010-08-29.
- Bennett, Betty T. Introduction to Selected Letters, xxvii.