1803 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1803.

Events

 * June 30 – Novelist Mary Butt marries her cousin, Captain Henry Sherwood, acquiring the surname by which she will become best known.
 * September 9 – Bamberg State Library is established in Upper Franconia.
 * unknown date – The library which becomes the National Széchényi Library, established in 1802 by Count Ferenc Széchényi, opens to the public in Pest, Hungary.
 * Jane Austen's novel Northanger Abbey, a satire on Gothic fiction, is advertised by a London publisher but is not in fact published until 1817, after her death.

Fiction

 * Charles Brockden Brown – Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist
 * Sophie Ristaud Cottin – Amélie de Mansfield
 * Catherine Cuthbertson – The Romance of the Pyrenees
 * Elizabeth Gunning – The War-Office
 * Francis Lathom – The Mysterious Freebooter
 * Mary Meeke – A Tale of Mystery, or Celina
 * Jean Paul - Titan
 * Jane Porter – Thaddeus of Warsaw
 * Germaine de Staël – Margaret of Strafford

Drama

 * John Allingham
 * Hearts of Oak
 * The Marriage Promise
 * George Colman – John Bull
 * William Dunlap – Voice of Nature (adapted from the French)
 * Collin d'Harleville – Malice pour malice
 * Thomas Holcroft – Hear Both Sides
 * Heinrich von Kleist – Die Familie Schroffenstein
 * August von Kotzebue – Die deutschen Kleinstädter (comedy, German Small-towners)
 * Frederick Reynolds – The Three Per Cents
 * Friedrich Schiller – The Bride of Messina (Die Braut von Messina), premiere in Weimar on March 19
 * Isaac Reed (ed.) – The Plays of William Shakspeare (first variorum edition)

Poetry

 * Henry Kirke White – Clifton Grove, a Sketch in Verse, with other Poems
 * Adam Oehlenschlager – Digte (Poems)

Non-fiction

 * Alexandre Balthazar Laurent Grimod de La Reynière – Almanach des gourmands (1st edition)
 * Immanuel Kant – Über Pädagogik (On Pedagogy)
 * Adamantios Korais – Present Conditions of Civilisation in Greece
 * Joseph Lancaster – Improvements in Education as It Respects the Industrious Classes
 * Thomas Malthus – An Essay on the Principle of Population (2nd edition)
 * Humphry Repton – Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening

Births
Unknown date – Evan Bevan, Welsh writer of satirical verse (died 1866)
 * January 3 – Douglas William Jerrold, English dramatist (died 1857)
 * January 15 – Marjorie Fleming, Scottish child writer (died 1811)
 * January 27 – Eunice Hale Cobb, American writer, public speaker, and activist (died 1880)
 * May 16 – Amelie von Strussenfelt, Swedish novelist (died 1847)
 * May 25
 * Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, English novelist, poet and dramatist (died 1873)
 * Ralph Waldo Emerson, American poet, essayist and philosopher (died 1882)
 * July 20 – Dudley Costello, Irish writer and journalist (died 1865)
 * September 20 – Catherine Crowe, English novelist, playwright and children's writer (died 1876)
 * September 28 – Prosper Mérimée, French dramatist and historian (died 1870)
 * October 25 – Maria Doolaeghe, Flemish novelist (died 1884)
 * November 14 – Jacob Abbott, American children's writer (died 1879)
 * December 6 – Susanna Moodie, English-born Canadian writer (died 1885)
 * December 31 – José María Heredia y Heredia, Cuban poet (died 1839)

Deaths

 * January 1 – James Woodforde, English diarist (born 1740)
 * February 11 – Jean-François de La Harpe, French dramatist and critic (born 1739)
 * March 14 – Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, German poet (born 1724)
 * April 9 – Mihály Bakos (Miháo Bakoš), Slovene hymnist and Lutheran minister (born c. 1742)
 * June 12 – Richard François Philippe Brunck, French classical scholar (born 1729)
 * August 2 – John Hoole, English translator (born 1727)
 * September 5 – Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, French novelist (born 1841)
 * October 8 – Vittorio Alfieri, Italian dramatist and poet (born 1749)
 * December 18 – Johann Gottfried Herder, German philosopher, poet and critic (born 1744)