1772 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1772.

Events

 * March – Gottfried August Bürger obtains a magistracy and is reconciled with his family.
 * May 7 – The Stadsschouwburg theatre in Amsterdam is destroyed by fire.
 * June
 * At Marseilles, the Marquis de Sade embarks on an orgy, as a result of which he is convicted in absentia of sodomy and poisoning and receives a death sentence; he escapes.
 * Charles Burney tours Europe, researching for his History of Music.
 * September 12 – The Göttinger Hainbund of German poets is formed at a midnight ritual in an oaken grove.
 * November 10 – The wife of poet Pedro Correia Garção obtains an order for his release from prison, the very day of his death.
 * November 28 – Publication of the Bible in the Manx language is completed.
 * unknown dates
 * Thomas Paine produces his first published work, a political article entitled Case of the Officers of Excise.
 * Hannah More arrives in London.
 * An Armenian language press is set up in Chennai, India.

Fiction

 * Elizabeth Bonhôte – The Rambles of Mr Frankly, Published by his Sister
 * Jacques Cazotte – Le Diable Amoureux
 * Robert Fergusson – The Daft Days
 * Sarah Scott – The Test of Filial Duty
 * David Williams – Letter to David Garrick

Drama

 * György Bessenyei – Ágis tragédiája
 * Richard Cumberland – The Fashionable Lover
 * Samuel Foote – The Nabob
 * Vicente Garcia de la Huerta – Raquel
 * David Garrick – The Irish Widow
 * Gotthold Lessing – Emilia Galotti
 * Louis-Sébastien Mercier
 * Le faux ami (The False Friend)
 * Jean Hennuyer, évêque de Lisieux (written)
 * Arthur Murphy – The Grecian Daughter

Poetry

 * Mark Akenside – Poems
 * Thomas Chatterton – The Execution of Sir Charles Bawdin
 * William Jones – Poems, Consisting Chiefly of Translations from the Asiatick Languages
 * William Kenrick – Love in the Suds
 * William Mason – The English Garden
 * Christopher Smart – Hymns, for the Amusement of Children
 * George Alexander Stevens – Songs

Non-fiction

 * Alphabetum grandonico-malabaricum sive samscrudonicum (with a preface by Giovanni Cristofano Amaduzzi)
 * The Encyclopédie in 28 volumes by Diderot, d'Alembert, and many others
 * Moses Browne – The Excellency of the Knowledge of Jesus Christ
 * José Cadalso – Los eruditos a la violeta
 * William Chambers – A Dissertation on Oriental Gardening
 * Junius (possibly Philip Francis) – Junius: Stat Nominis Umbra
 * Francis Grose – The Antiquities of England and Wales
 * Johann Gottfried Herder – Abhandlung über den Ursprung der Sprache (Treatise on the Origin of Language)
 * Richard Hurd – An Introduction to the Study of Prophecies...
 * Carsten Niebuhr – Beschreibung von Arabien
 * Joseph Priestley – The History and Present State of Discoveries Relating to Vision, Light, and Colours
 * Francis Stoughton Sullivan (died 1766) – An Historical Treatise on the Feudal Law, and the Constitution and Laws of England
 * Catherine Talbot – Essays on Various Subjects
 * Wilhelm Abraham Teller – Wörterbuch des Neuen Testamentes zur Erklärung der christlichen Lehre (Dictionary of the New Testament for the Explanation of Christian Doctrine)

Births

 * January 15 – James Ballantyne, Scottish editor and publisher (died 1833)
 * March 10 – Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel, German poet, literary critic, philosopher and philologist (died 1829)
 * April 11 – Manuel José Quintana, Spanish poet (died 1857)
 * May 2 – Novalis (Georg Philipp Friedrich Freiherr von Hardenberg), German poet and philosopher (died 1801)
 * August 29 – Sarah Burney, English novelist (died 1844)
 * September 27 – Sándor Kisfaludy, Hungarian poet (died 1844)
 * October 21 – Samuel Taylor Coleridge, English poet (died 1834)
 * November 17 – Marc-Antoine Madeleine Désaugiers, French dramatist (died 1827)
 * November 28 – Johann Gottfried Jakob Hermann, German classical commentator and philologist (died 1848)
 * December 6
 * John Carr, English travel writer and lawyer (died 1832)
 * Henry Cary, Gibraltar-born Irish author, editor and translator (died 1844)
 * unknown date – Maria Riddell, West Indies-born poet, naturalist and travel writer resident in Scotland (died 1808)
 * probable – Charlotte Dacre, English Gothic novelist (died 1825)

Deaths

 * March 26 – Charles Pinot Duclos, French novelist and encyclopedist (born 1704)
 * March 29 – Emanuel Swedenborg, Swedish philosopher (born 1688)
 * May 22 – Durastante Natalucci, Italian historian (born 1687)
 * June – Thomas Whately, English politician and writer (born 1726)
 * June 18 – Johann Ulrich von Cramer, German philosopher (born 1706)
 * October 7 – John Woolman, American abolitionist author (smallpox, born 1720)
 * October 10 – William Wilkie, Scottish poet (ague, born 1721)
 * November 10 – Pedro Correia Garção, Portuguese poet (born 1724)
 * unknown dates
 * Thomas Hawkins, English editor and cleric (born 1729)
 * Margareta Momma, Swedish editor and writer (born 1702)