1681 in literature
Encyclopedia
The year 1681 in literature involved some significant events.
Events
- Birth of Abigail WilliamsAbigail WilliamsAbigail Williams was one of the initial accusers in the Salem witch trials of 1692, which led to the arrest and imprisonment of over 150 innocent people.-Salem Witch trials:...
, much later a central character in Arthur MillerArthur MillerArthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...
's play, The CrucibleThe CrucibleThe Crucible is a 1952 play by the American playwright Arthur Miller. It is a dramatization of the Salem witch trials that took place in the Province of Massachusetts Bay during 1692 and 1693. Miller wrote the play as an allegory of McCarthyism, when the US government blacklisted accused communists...
.
New books
- Robert KnoxRobert Knox (sailor)Robert Knox was an English sea captain in the service of the British East India Company. He was the son of another sea captain, also called Robert Knox....
- An Historical Relation of the Island CeylonAn Historical Relation of the Island CeylonAn Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon together With somewhat Concerning Severall Remarkable passages of my life that hath hapned since my Deliverance out of Captivity is a book written by the English trader and sailor Robert Knox in 1681... - Anne LefèvreAnne LefèvreAnne Le Fèvre Dacier , better known during her lifetime as Madame Dacier, was a French scholar and translator of the classics....
- Anacreon and Sappho - Hiob LudolfHiob LudolfHiob Ludolf was a German orientalist, and born at Erfurt. Edward Ullendorff rates Ludolf as having "the most illustrious name in Ethiopic scholarship".-Life:...
- Historia Aethiopica
New drama
- Aphra BehnAphra BehnAphra Behn was a prolific dramatist of the English Restoration and was one of the first English professional female writers. Her writing contributed to the amatory fiction genre of British literature.-Early life:...
- The False Count and The Roundheads - John CrowneJohn CrowneJohn Crowne was a British dramatist and a native of Nova Scotia.His father "Colonel" William Crowne, accompanied the earl of Arundel on a diplomatic mission to Vienna in 1637, and wrote an account of his journey...
- Thyestes - Thomas d'UrfeyThomas d'UrfeyThomas D'Urfey was an English writer and wit. He composed plays, songs, and poetry, in addition to writing jokes. He was an important innovator and contributor in the evolution of the Ballad opera....
- Sir Barnaby Whigg - Edward RavenscroftEdward RavenscroftEdward Ravenscroft , English dramatist, belonged to an ancient Flintshire family.He was entered at the Middle Temple, but devoted his attention mainly to literature. Among his pieces are...
- The London Cuckolds - Thomas ShadwellThomas ShadwellThomas Shadwell was an English poet and playwright who was appointed poet laureate in 1689.-Life:Shadwell was born at Stanton Hall, Norfolk, and educated at Bury St Edmunds School, and at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, which he entered in 1656. He left the university without a degree, and...
- The Lancashire Witches (adapted from BromeRichard BromeRichard Brome was an English dramatist of the Caroline era.-Life:Virtually nothing is known about Brome's private life. Repeated allusions in contemporary works, like Ben Jonson's Bartholomew Fair, indicate that Brome started out as a servant of Jonson, in some capacity...
and HeywoodThomas HeywoodThomas Heywood was a prominent English playwright, actor, and author whose peak period of activity falls between late Elizabethan and early Jacobean theatre.-Early years:...
's The Late Lancashire WitchesThe Late Lancashire WitchesThe Late Lancashire Witches is a Caroline era stage play, written by Thomas Heywood and Richard Brome, published in 1634. The play is a topical melodrama on the subject of the witchcraft controversy that arose in Lancashire in 1633.-Performance:...
) - Nahum TateNahum TateNahum Tate was an Irish poet, hymnist, and lyricist, who became England's poet laureate in 1692.-Life:Nahum Teate came from a family of Puritan clergymen...
- The Sicilian Usurper (adapted from Shakespeare's Richard IIRichard II (play)King Richard the Second is a history play by William Shakespeare believed to be written in approximately 1595. It is based on the life of King Richard II of England and is the first part of a tetralogy, referred to by some scholars as the Henriad, followed by three plays concerning Richard's...
)- - The Ingratitude of a Common-Wealth (adapted from CoriolanusCoriolanusGaius Marcius Coriolanus was a Roman general who is said to have lived in the 5th century BC. He received his toponymic cognomen "Coriolanus" because of his exceptional valor in a Roman siege of the Volscian city of Corioli. He was then promoted to a general...
)
- - The Ingratitude of a Common-Wealth (adapted from Coriolanus
Poetry
- Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of OrreryRoger Boyle, 1st Earl of OrreryRoger Boyle redirects here. For others of this name, see Roger Boyle Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of Orrery was a British soldier, statesman and dramatist. He was the third surviving son of Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork and Richard's second wife, Catherine Fenton. He was created Baron of Broghill on...
- Poems on Most of the Festivals of the Church - John DrydenJohn DrydenJohn Dryden was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden.Walter Scott called him "Glorious John." He was made Poet...
- Absalom and AchitophelAbsalom and AchitophelAbsalom and Achitophel is a landmark poetic political satire by John Dryden. The poem exists in two parts. The first part, of 1681, is undoubtedly by Dryden...
(part 1) - Andrew MarvellAndrew MarvellAndrew Marvell was an English metaphysical poet, Parliamentarian, and the son of a Church of England clergyman . As a metaphysical poet, he is associated with John Donne and George Herbert...
- Miscellaneous Poems (posthumously published)
Births
- March 18 - Esther JohnsonEsther JohnsonEsther Johnson was the English friend of Jonathan Swift, known as "Stella".Newfoundland-born author Trudy J. Morgan-Cole wrote a novel in 2006 detailing fictionalized portions of the Swift/Johnson friendship in The Violent Friendship of Esther Johnson...
, the "Stella" of Jonathan SwiftJonathan SwiftJonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...
(died 1728) - November 17 - Pierre François le CourayerPierre François le CourayerPierre François le Courayer was a French Catholic theological writer, for many years an expatriate in England.-Life:Pierre François le Courayer was born at Rouen...
, Roman Catholic theologian (died 1776)
Deaths
- May 25 - Pedro Calderón de la BarcaPedro Calderón de la BarcaPedro Calderón de la Barca y Barreda González de Henao Ruiz de Blasco y Riaño usually referred as Pedro Calderón de la Barca , was a dramatist, poet and writer of the Spanish Golden Age. During certain periods of his life he was also a soldier and a Roman Catholic priest...
, Spanish dramatist and poet (born 1600)