1765 in literature

This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1765.

Events

 * January 10 – Arthur Murphy introduces Hester Thrale and her husband to Samuel Johnson.
 * August 12 – I'tisam-ud-Din writes the Treaty of Allahabad between the Mughal Empire and the British East India Company
 * October 10 – Samuel Johnson's edition of The Plays of William Shakespeare is published in London after ten years in the making.
 * unknown date – Denis Diderot completes the Encyclopédie.
 * Approximate year – Beginning of the Sturm und Drang movement in German literature.

Fiction

 * Henry Brooke – The Fool of Quality (volume one; the fifth and last appeared in 1770)
 * Madame Riccoboni – L'Histoire d'Ernestine
 * Laurence Sterne – The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (vol vii–viii)
 * Anonymous – The Fruit-Shop

Children

 * Anonymous – The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes (attributed to Oliver Goldsmith)

Drama

 * Isaac Bickerstaffe – operas
 * Daphne and Amintor
 * The Maid of the Mill
 * Dorothea Biehl – Den listige Optrækkerske
 * George Colman the Elder – The Comedies of Terence
 * Ramón de la Cruz – El Prado por la noche
 * Charles Dibdin – The Shepherd's Artifice
 * Samuel Foote – The Commissary
 * Carlo Gozzi – L'augellino bel verde
 * Elizabeth Griffith – The Platonic Wife
 * Michel-Jean Sedaine – Philosophe sans le savoir
 * William Shirley – Electra

Poetry

 * James Beattie
 * The Judgment of Paris
 * Verses Occasioned by the Death of Charles Churchill
 * William Collins – Works
 * Edward Jerningham – An Elegy Written Among the Ruins of an Abbey
 * James Macpherson – The Works of Ossian
 * Thomas Percy – Reliques of Ancient English Poetry
 * Christopher Smart – A Translation of the Psalms of David
 * Percival Stockdale – Churchill Defended
 * Nicolás Fernandez de Moratín – La Diana o Arte de la caza

Non-fiction

 * William Blackstone – Commentaries on the Laws of England (publication begins)
 * John Bunyan (died 1688) – Imprisonment of Mr. John Bunyan
 * Anders Chydenius – The National Gain (Den nationnale winsten)
 * Benito Jerónimo Feijóo y Montenegro – Opera omnia
 * Henry Fuseli – Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks (translation of Johann Joachim Winckelmann)
 * Oliver Goldsmith – Essays
 * William Kenrick – A Review of Doctor Johnson's New Edition of Shakespeare
 * Filip Lastrić
 * Epitome vetustatum Bosnensis provinciae
 * Od uzame
 * Friedrich Christoph Oetinger – Swedenborg und anderer Irrdische und himmlische Philosophie
 * Joseph Priestley – Essay on a Course of Liberal Education for Civil and Active Life
 * George Alexander Stevens – The Celebrated Lecture on Heads
 * Tobias Smollett – Continuation of the History of England (a supplement to Hume's History of England; final volume)
 * Pedro Rodríguez, Conde de Campomanes – Tratado de la regalía de amortización

Births

 * January 11 – Antoine Alexandre Barbier, French librarian (died 1825)
 * March 27 – Franz Xaver von Baader, German philosopher (died 1841)
 * April 22 – James Grahame, Scottish poet (died 1811)
 * September 14 – Carl Friedrich Ernst Frommann, German bookseller (died 1837)
 * September 15 – Manuel Maria Barbosa du Bocage, Portuguese poet (died 1805)
 * October 24 – James Mackintosh, Scottish historian (died 1832)
 * November 30 – Johann Friedrich Abegg, German theologian (died 1840)
 * unknown date – Jippensha Ikku (十返舎 一九 Shigeta Sadakazu), Japanese novelist (died 1831)
 * Probable year of birth – Henry Luttrell, English wit (died 1851)

Deaths

 * March 3 – William Stukeley, English antiquary (born 1687)
 * April 5 – Edward Young, English poet, playwright and literary theorist (born 1683)
 * April 11 – Lewis Morris, Welsh poet, antiquary and lexicographer (born 1701)
 * April 15 – Mikhail Lomonosov, Russian polymath (born 1711)
 * April 23 – Sarah Dixon, English poet (born 1671 or 1672)
 * May 1 – Franz Neumayr, German controversialist and theologian (born 1697)
 * December 31 – Samuel Madden, Irish social and political writer (born 1686)
 * Unknown date
 * David Mallet, Scottish poet and playwright (born c. 1705)
 * James Ridley (Sir Charles Morell), English novelist and story writer (born 1736)