1884 in literature

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The year 1884 in literature involved some significant new books.

Events

• February 1 - Edition one of the Oxford English Dictionary is published.

New books

• Edwin Abbott Abbott - Flatland
• Henry Brooks Adams - Esther
• Aluísio de Azevedo - Casa de Pensão
• Richard Doddridge Blackmore - Tommy Upmore
• Mary Elizabeth Braddon - Ishmael. A Novel
• Wilkie Collins - I Say No
• Joris-Karl Huysmans
  • Controcorrente
  • À rebours
• Helen Hunt Jackson - Ramona
• George A. Moore - A Mummer's Wife
• Margaret Oliphant
  • The Ladies Lindores
  • The Wizard's Son
• Rachilde - Monsieur Vénus
• Leo Tolstoy - The Death of Ivan Ilyich
• Jules Verne
  • The Vanished Diamond
  • The Archipelago on Fire
• Mary Augusta Ward - Miss Bretherton

New drama

• Henrik Ibsen - The Wild Duck

Poetry

• William Watson -Epigrams of Art, Life and Nature

Non-fiction

• Friedrich Engels - The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State
• Herefordshire Pomona
• Henry James - A Little Tour in France
• George Fletcher Moore - Diary of Ten Years Eventful Life of an Early Settler in Western Australia

Births

• January 2 - Oscar Micheaux, African-American author & filmmaker (died 1951)
• March 13 - Sir Hugh Walpole, novelist (died 1941)
• August 8 – Sara Teasdale, poet (died 1933)
• August 10 - Panait Istrati, Romanian novelist and short story writer (died 1935)
• August 24 - Earl Derr Biggers, writer (died 1933)

Deaths

• January 11 - Hermann Ulrici, philosopher (born 1806)
• March 10 - William Blanchard Jerrold, journalist (born 1826)
• March 24 - François Mignet, historian (born 1796)
• April 5 - John Wisden, originator of the Cricketers' Almanack (born 1826)
• April 6 - Emanuel Geibel, poet (born 1815)
• April 11 - Charles Reade, English writer (born 1814)
• May 27 - Caroline Dexter, feminist writer (born 1819)
• May 28 - Joseph d'Haussonville, historian (born 1809)
• June 10 - Johann Gustav Droysen, historian (born 1808)
• September 18 - Boleslav Markevich, novelist, critic (born 1922)
• October 16 - Paul Lacroix, novelist and journalist (born 1806)
• October 19 - Karl Hillebrand, literary historian and philosopher (born 1829)
• November 6 - William Wells Brown, African-American writer (born 1814)
• date unknown
  • František Doucha, translator (born 1810)
  • John Harris, poet (born 1820)

Awards