1887 in literature

This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1887.

List of years in literature (table)
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In poetry 1884 1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890
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Events

• February – Oscar Wilde publishes "The Canterville Ghost", his first short story, in The Court and Society Review.
• March 30 – Théâtre Libre, established by André Antoine to promote naturalism in theatre, gives its first performances in Paris, originally as an amateur ensemble.
• April 22 – Syracuse University in New York State purchases the Ranke Library from the estate of historian Leopold von Ranke, outbidding the Prussian government.
• November – Arthur Conan Doyle's first detective novel, A Study in Scarlet, is published in Beeton's Christmas Annual by Ward Lock & Co. in London, introducing the consulting detective Sherlock Holmes and his friend and chronicler Dr. Watson (illustrated by D. H. Friston).
• December 5 – The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (1886) comes into effect.
• December 15 – The Romanian literary magazine Revista Nouă is launched in Bucharest by Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu, who answers a request made by Ioan Bianu, Barbu Ștefănescu Delavrancea, Alexandru Vlahuță and others. The first issue, illustrated by George Demetrescu Mirea, hosts Delavrancea's Hagi Tudose and Petre Ispirescu's Sarea în bucate[1] (a localized folkloric version of the King Leir myth).[2]

Uncertain dates

• Futabatei Shimei writes and begins to publish The Drifting Cloud (浮雲, Ukigumo), the first modern novel in Japan.
• George Hutchinson establishes Hutchinson & Co. as a publisher in London.
• John Lane and Elkin Mathews set up in partnership under the name The Bodley Head in London, originally as antiquarian booksellers.

New books

Fiction

• Herman Bang – Stucco (Stuk)
• Mary Elizabeth Braddon – Cut by the County
• Hall Caine – The Deemster
• Marie Corelli – Thelma
• F. Marion Crawford – Saracinesca
• José Maria de Eça de Queiroz – A Relíquia (The Relic)
• Barbu Ștefănescu Delavrancea – Hagi Tudose
• Anna Bowman Dodd – The Republic of the Future
• Arthur Conan Doyle – A Study in Scarlet
• Édouard Dujardin – Les Lauriers sont coupés (early example of Stream of consciousness, narrative mode)
• Benito Pérez Galdós – Fortunata y Jacinta (publication completed)
• Enrique Gaspar – El anacronópete, first fiction to feature a time machine[3]
• George Gissing – Thyrza
• H. Rider Haggard
  • Allan Quatermain
  • Jess
  • She
• Thomas Hardy – The Woodlanders
• W. H. Hudson – A Crystal Age
• Joris-Karl Huysmans – En rade (Becalmed; serialization concludes, book publication)
• Petre Ispirescu – Sarea în bucate
• Pierre Loti – Madame Chrysanthème
• Paolo Mantegazza – Testa
• Appu Nedungadi – Kundalatha (കുന്ദലത)
• Bolesław Prus – The Doll (Lalka; serialization begins)
• José Rizal – Noli Me Tangere
• Mark Rutherford (pseudonym of Hale White) – Revolution in Tanner's Lane
• Futabatei Shimei – The Drifting Cloud
• August Strindberg – The People of Hemsö (Hemsöborna)
• Jules Verne
  • The Flight to France (Le Chemin de France)
  • Texar's Revenge, or, North Against South (Nord contre Sud)
• O. F. Walton – A Peep Behind the Scenes
• Émile Zola – La Terre (The Earth)

Children and young people

• Palmer Cox – The Brownies, Their Book
• Robert Louis Stevenson – The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables

Drama

• Anton Chekhov – Ivanov
• Arthur Wing Pinero – Dandy Dick
• Victorien Sardou – La Tosca
• August Strindberg – The Father
• Thomas Russell Sullivan – Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, adapted from 1886 Robert Louis Stevenson novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

Non-fiction

• Mikhail Bakunin – God and the State
• Hall Caine – Life of Samuel Coleridge Taylor
• Charles Darwin (died 1882) – The Autobiography of Charles Darwin
• Julius Dresser – The True History of Mental Science
• Friedrich Engels (translated by Florence Kelley) – The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 (first English language edition)
• George William Foote – Royal Paupers: a radical's contribution to the Jubilee
• Franz Hartmann – The Life of Philippus Theophrastus Bombast of Hohenheim, better known by the name of Paracelsus, and the substance of his teachings
• Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers – The Kabbalah Unveiled
• Friedrich Nietzsche – On the Genealogy of Morality
• Marius Nygaard, Jan Johanssen and Emil Schreiner – Latinsk Ordbog
• A. E. Waite – The Real History of the Rosicrucians
• L. L. Zamenhof – Unua Libro

Births

• January 7 – Oskar Luts, Estonian author and playwright (died 1953)
• February 1 – Charles Nordhoff, English-born author (died 1947)
• February 3 – Georg Trakl, Austrian poet (died of overdose 1914)
• February 11 – John van Melle, South African writer (died 1953)
• February 18 – Nikos Kazantzakis, Greek poet (died 1957)
• March 3 – Rupert Brooke, English poet (died 1915)
• March 9 – Ion Buzdugan, Romanian poet and political figure (died 1967)
• March 14 – Sylvia Beach (Nancy Woodbridge Beach), American publisher and memoirist (died 1962)
• May 15 – Edwin Muir, Scottish poet and translator (died 1959)
• June 2 – Orrick Glenday Johns, American poet and playwright (died 1946)
• July 1 – Amber Reeves, New Zealand-born English scholar, feminist and novelist (died 1981)
• September 1 – Blaise Cendrars (Frédéric-Louis Sauser), Swiss-born French writer (died 1961)
• September 8 – Constantin Beldie, Romanian literary promoter and memoirist (died 1954)
• October 1 – Barbu Nemțeanu, Romanian poet and translator (died 1919)
• December 15 – A. de Herz, Romanian playwright and journalist (died 1936)

Deaths

• February 10 – Mrs Henry Wood (Ellen Wood), English novelist (born 1814)
• February 19 – Multatuli (Eduard Douwes Dekker), Dutch-born writer (born 1820)
• April 23 – John Ceiriog Hughes, Welsh poet and folk song collector (born 1832)
• May 4 – William Murdoch, Scottish-born Canadian poet (born 1823)
• August 20 – Jules Laforgue, French poet (born 1860)
• August 25 – Emma Jane Guyton (Worboise), English novelist and magazine editor (born 1825)
• October 12 – Dinah Craik, English novelist and poet (born 1826)
• November 2 – Alfred Domett, English-born New Zealand poet and politician (born 1811)
• November 19 – Emma Lazarus, American poet (born 1849)
• December 5 – Eliza Roxcy Snow, American poet (born 1804)

Uncertain date

• Frances Browne, Irish poet and novelist (born 1816)

References

1. Sperantia, Eugeniu (1967). "Reviste de altădată: Revista Nouă". Steaua (in Romanian) (1): 48–49.
2. Cernătescu, Radu (2013). "Shakespeare și colindele românilor". România Literară (in Romanian) (50).
3. Westcott, Kathryn (2011-04-09). "HG Wells or Enrique Gaspar: Whose time machine was first?". BBC News. Retrieved 2011-04-09.