1702 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1702.

Events

 * March 8 (O.S.) – Accession of Anne, Queen of Great Britain, upon the death of her brother-in-law William III.
 * March 11 (O.S.) – The first regular English national newspaper, The Daily Courant, begins publication, in Fleet Street in the City of London. It covers only foreign news.
 * October – Jonathan Swift returns to Ireland in the company of Esther Johnson.
 * unknown dates
 * Ballet master John Weaver presents the burlesque Tavern Bilkers at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London, the first English pantomime. It is not a success.
 * The first book set in the Romain du Roi Roman type, devised for use by the Imprimerie nationale in France: Médailles sur les principaux événements du règne de Louis le Grand, is printed.
 * Castle Howard in Yorkshire, England, is completed to the design of playwright John Vanbrugh and architect Nicholas Hawksmoor.

Prose

 * Louise de Bossigny, comtesse d'Auneuil – La Tiranie des fées détruite (The Tyranny of the Fairies Destroyed)
 * Thomas Brown, et al. – Letters From the Dead to the Living
 * Edmund Calamy – An Abridgement of Mr Baxter's History of His Life and Times
 * Daniel Defoe
 * An Enquiry into Occasional Conformity
 * The Mock-Mourners (on the death of William III)
 * A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty
 * Reformation of Manners
 * The Shortest Way with the Dissenters (anonymous; December)
 * The Spanish Descent
 * John Dennis – The Monument
 * Laurence Echard – A General Ecclesiastical History
 * George Farquhar – Love and Business
 * Edmund Gibson – Synodus Anglicana (on the convocation)
 * Charles Gildon (?) – A Comparison Between the Two Stages (on the "War of the Theatres")
 * Examen Miscellaneum
 * Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon – The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England (1702–1704, written in the 1640s and late 1660s. Also known as Clarendon's History)
 * George Keith – The Standard of the Quakers Examined
 * John Kersey – A New English Dictionary; or, a complete collection of the most proper and significant words, commonly used in the language
 * Cotton Mather – Magnalia Christi Americana
 * Matthew Prior – To a Young Gentleman in Love
 * John Toland – Paradoxes of State
 * Catherine Trotter Cockburn – A Defence of the Essay of Human Understanding (re John Locke)

Drama

 * William Burnaby – The Modish Husband
 * Susanna Centlivre –
 * The Beau's Duel
 * The Stolen Heiress
 * Colley Cibber – She Would and She Would Not
 * John Dennis – The Comical Gallant
 * George Farquhar
 * The Inconstant
 * The Twin Rivals
 * Charles Gildon – The Patriot
 * Bevil Higgons – The Generous Conqueror (printed, performed in 1701)
 * Francis Manning – All for the Better
 * John Oldmixon – The Governor of Cyprus
 * Nicholas Rowe
 * The Fair Penitent (adaptation of Massinger and Field's The Fair Penitent, performed, printed in 1703)
 * Tamerlane (printed, performed in 1701)
 * Sir Charles Sedley – The Tyrant King of Crete
 * John Vanbrugh – The False Friend

Poetry

 * Matsuo Bashō (posthumously) – Oku no Hosomichi (Narrow Road to the Deep North)

Births

 * June 26 – Philip Doddridge, English religious and writer and hymnist (died 1751)
 * Unknown date – Margareta Momma, Swedish journalist and publisher (died 1772)

Deaths

 * January 1 – Samuel Green, American printer (born c. 1614)
 * January 17 – Roger Morrice, English journalist and diarist (born 1628)
 * February 17 – Peder Syv, Danish philologist, folklorist and priest (born 1631)
 * April 22 – François Charpentier, French archeologist and writer (born 1620)
 * May 17 (bur.) – Richard Sault, English mathematician, editor and translator (unknown year of birth)
 * May 27 – Dominique Bouhours, French literary critic (born 1628)
 * November – John Pomfret, English poet (born 1667)