1744 in literature

List of years in literature (table)
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This article presents a list of the literary events and publications in 1744.

Events

• February 5 – Spranger Barry makes his debut as an actor at the Theatre Royal, Dublin.
• February 6 – Samuel Foote makes his debut as an actor as Othello at the Haymarket Theatre, London.
• April – The Female Spectator (a monthly) is founded by Eliza Haywood in England, the first periodical written for women by a woman.
• April 14 – The Physico-Historical Society is formed in Dublin for the preservation of 'manuscripts, rare printed books, and natural curiosities relating to Ireland'.
• May 29 – Alexander Pope is received into the Catholic Church, a day before his death.

New books

Fiction

• Mary Collyer – Felicia to Charlotte
• Sarah Fielding – The Adventures of David Simple
• Eliza Haywood – The Fortunate Foundlings
• Edward Moore – Fables for the Female Sex
• William Oldys – The Harleian Miscellany (introduction by Samuel Johnson)
• Joseph Warton – The Enthusiast

Children

• John Newbery – A Little Pretty Pocket-Book
• Tommy Thumb's Pretty Song Book (earliest extant English nursery-rhyme collection)

Drama

• Robert Dodsley – A Select Collection of Old Plays
• William Harvard – Regulus
• James Miller
  • Joseph and his Brethren (music by Handel)
  • Mahomet the Imposter (adapted from Voltaire's Mahomet; completed by John Hoadly)
• Thomas Odell – The Prodigal
• James Ralph – The Astrologer (adapted from Thomas Tomkis's Albumazar, itself adapted from Giambattista della Porta's L'astrologo)
• Antonio de Zamora – No hay deuda que no se pague y convidado de piedra

Poetry

• Mark Akenside
  • The Pleasures of the Imagination
  • An Epistle to Curio
• Jane Brereton – Poems
• Gabriel Álvarez de Toledo (ed. Diego de Torres Villarroel) – Obras póstumas poéticas, con la Burromaquia

Non-fiction

• John Armstrong – The Art of Preserving Health
• George Berkeley – Siris
• Émilie de Breteuil, marquise du Chatelet -Dissertation sur la nature et la propagation du feu
• Colley Cibber – Another Occasional Letter from Mr. Cibber to Mr. Pope
• David Garrick – An Essay on Acting (attrib.)
• Samuel Johnson
  • Life of Mr Richard Savage
  • An Account of the Life of John Philip Barretier
• Alexander Pope – Essay on Man, volume 4: "Epistle: Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to" (4) "Happiness" (the first 2 epistles were written in 1732 and the third in 1733).
• John Ranby – The Method of Treating Gunshot Wounds
• Emanuel Swedenborg – The Animal Kingdom (Soul's Domain) (1744–45)
• Jonathan Swift – Three Sermons

Births

• January 29 – Catharina Charlotta Swedenmarck, Swedish writer (died 1813)
• February 10 – William Mitford, English historian (died 1827)
• April 11 (baptised) – Elizabeth Bonhôte, English novelist, essayist and poet (died 1818)
• August 25 – Johann Gottfried Herder, German poet (died 1803)
• December – Elsa Fougt, Swedish editor and publisher (died 1826)

Deaths

• January 28 – Thomas Innes, Scottish historian (born 1662)
• March 31 – Antiochus Kantemir, Russian diplomat and writer (born 1708)
• April 27 – James Miller, English playwright, poet and satirist (born 1704)
• May 30 – Alexander Pope, English poet and satirist (born 1688)
• September 18 – Lewis Theobald, English literary historian (born 1688)