1787 in literature

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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1787.

Events

January 15 - Ann Ward marries William Radcliffe, gaining the surname under which she will become known as a writer of Gothic novels.^[1]
April 16 - Royall Tyler's The Contrast becomes the first comedy written by an American citizen to be professionally produced, at the John Street Theatre (Manhattan).
April 17 - The Edinburgh edition of Robert Burns' Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect is published by William Creech including a portrait of Burns by Alexander Nasmyth. The poet has great social success in the city's literary circles.
June 27 - Just before midnight, Edward Gibbon completes the writing of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in the small summerhouse in his garden in Lausanne, Switzerland.
November 21 - François-Joseph Talma makes his professional stage debut at the Comédie-Française as Seide in Voltaire's Mahomet.
December 4 - Robert Burns meets Agnes Maclehose at a party given by Miss Erskine Nimmo.^[2]
King George III of Great Britain issues a Proclamation for the Discouragement of Vice which can be used to prosecute obscene publications.
Friedrich Schiller arrives in Weimar.

Thomas Best - A Concise Treatise on the Art of Angling
Mathurin Jacques Brisson - Pesanteur Spécifique des Corps
(Sir) John Fenn (ed.) - The Paston Letters (Original letters, written during the reigns of Henry VI, Edward IV, and Richard III)
John Hawkins - Life of Samuel Johnson
Ottobah Cugoano - Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil and Wicked Traffic of the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species
Mary Wollstonecraft - Thoughts on the Education of Daughters

April 26 – Ludwig Uhland, German poet (died 1862)
September 13 – John Adamson, English antiquary and expert on Portuguese (died 1855)
November 4 – Edmund Kean, English actor (died 1833)
November 21 – Bryan Procter (Barry Cornwall), English poet (died 1874)
December 16 – Mary Russell Mitford, English novelist (died 1855)

April 2 – Francisco Javier Clavijero, Mexican-born historian (born 1731)
June 19 – John Brown, Scottish theologian (born 1722)
October 28 – Johann Karl August Musäus, German satirist and children's writer (born 1735)
October 30 – Ferdinando Galiani, Italian economist (born 1728)
November 3 – Robert Lowth, English poet, grammarian and bishop (born 1710)
December 19 – Soame Jenyns, English poet and essayist (born 1704)

^ "The Mysteries of Udolpho". eNotes.
^ Hecht, Hans (1936). Robert Burns: The Man and His Work. London: William Hodge. p. 106.