1851 in literature

This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1851.

Events

• 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".^[1]
• 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.^[2]

New books

• 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

New drama

• Edward Bulwer-Lytton - Not So Bad as We Seem, or, Many Sides to a Character: A Comedy in Five Acts
• 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

Poetry

• Matthew Arnold - Dover Beach (probably completed; not published until 1867)
• Heinrich Heine - Romanzero
• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - The Golden Legend

Non-fiction

• 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
  • For Self-Examination
  • On my Work as an Author
• 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

Births

• February 21 – Ernst von Hesse-Wartegg, Austrian writer and traveler (died 1918)
• June 11 – Mary Augusta Ward (Mrs. Humphry Ward, Mary Augusta Arnold), 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)

Deaths

• February 1 – Mary Shelley, English novelist and essayist (born 1797)^[3]
• 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, politician and society poet (born c. 1765)
• Unknown date – Vanchinbalyn Gularans, Mongolian poet (unknown year of birth)

Awards

References