1769 in poetry

Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).

Events

 * May – First publication of one of 16-year-old English poet Thomas Chatterton's poems attributed to the imaginary medieval monk "Thomas Rowley", "Elinoure and Juga", in Alexander Hamilton's Town and Country Magazine. This year also Chatterton sends specimens of "Rowley"’s poetry and history The Ryse of Peyncteynge yn Englade to Horace Walpole who at first offers to print them but, discovering Chatterton's age and rightly considering the pieces might be forgeries, later scornfully dismisses him.

United Kingdom

 * Mary Bowes, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne, The Siege of Jerusalem, drama
 * Thomas Chatterton, "Elinoure and Juga"
 * Thomas Gray, Ode Performed in the Senate-House at Cambridge, July 1, 1769
 * Richard Hurd, Ancient and Modern Scots Songs
 * John Ogilvie, Paradise, published anonymously
 * Clara Reeve, Original Poems on several Occasions
 * Tobias Smollett, The History and Adventures of an Atom, published anonymously

Other

 * Jacques Delille, verse translation of Virgil's Georgics from the original Latin into French; the translation led to the author's award of the chair of Latin poetry at the Collège de France and membership in the Académie Française in 1774
 * Basílio da Gama, O Uraguai, an epic Brazilian poem
 * Jean-François, marquis de Saint-Lambert, Saisons, modeled on Thomson's Seasons
 * Martin Wieland, Musarion, Germany

Births
Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
 * May 21 – John Hookham Frere (died 1846), English diplomat, poet and author
 * November 12 – Amelia Opie (died 1853), English novelist and poet
 * December 7 (bapt.) – Ann Batten Cristall (died 1848), English poet
 * December 26 – Ernst Moritz Arndt (died 1860), German patriotic author and poet
 * Also:
 * Robert Hetrick (died 1849), Scottish poet and blacksmith
 * George Howe (died 1821), Saint Christopher Island-born Australian printer and poet

Deaths
Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
 * January 5 – James Merrick (born 1720), English poet and scholar
 * January 20 – Sneyd Davies (born 1709), English poet and churchman
 * November 27 – Kamo no Mabuchi 賀茂真淵 (born 1697), Japanese Edo period poet and philologist
 * December 13 – Christian Fürchtegott Gellert (born 1715), German poet