1683 in literature explained

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1683.

Events

• May 17 – Jordaan Luchtmans, the predecessor of Brill Publishers, is registered as a bookseller by the Leiden booksellers' guild.^[1]
• May 25 – Lancelot Addison is appointed Dean of Lichfield.
• June 26 – Madame de La Fayette is widowed.
• August/September – John Locke flees to the Netherlands, under suspicion of involvement in the Rye House Plot in England.
• November 4 – Marriage of André Dacier and Anne Lefèvre in Paris.^[2]
• December 7 – English parliamentarian Algernon Sidney is executed for treason, based largely on the anti-monarchist views expressed in his Discourses Concerning Government, in manuscript
• unknown dates
  • John Banks' historical play The Innocent Usurper, about Lady Jane Grey, is banned from the stage by the censors.^[3]
  • A public library is first recorded at Kirkwall on Orkney.^[4]

New books

Fiction

• Alexander Oldys (?) – The London Jilt; or, the Politick Whore
• "Abbé du Prat" (pseudonym) – Venus in the Cloister; or, The Nun in her Smock (Vénus dans le cloître, ou la Religieuse en chemise)

Drama

• Joshua Barnes – Landgartha, or the Amazon Queen of Denmark and Norway^[5]
• Chikamatsu Monzaemon – Yotsugi Soga (The Soga Successors/The Soga Heir)
• John Crowne – City Politiques^[5]
• John Dryden and Nathaniel Lee – The Duke of Guise
• Nathaniel Lee – Constantine the Great
• Thomas Otway – The Atheist^[5]
• Edward Ravenscroft – Dame Dobson^[5]
• Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz – Los empeños de una casa (The Trials of a Noble House)
• Pedro Calderon de la Barca – El pintor de su deshonra

Poetry

• Robert Gould – Love Given O'er: Or a Satyr on the Inconstancy of Woman

Non-fiction

• "R. B." (i. e. Nathaniel Crouch), compiled – Two Journeys to Jerusalem
• John Dryden – Plutarch (one of the first biographies in the English language)
• Joseph Moxon – Mechanick Exercises
• John Pordage – Theologia Mystica
• Dr. Thomas Sydenham – Latin: Tractatus de podagra et hydrope

Births

• April 3 – Mark Catesby, English naturalist (died 1749)
• December 27 – Conyers Middleton, English controversialist and cleric (died 1750)

Deaths

• January 15 – Philip Warwick, English writer and politician (born 1609)
• March 19 – Thomas Killigrew, English dramatist and manager (born 1612)
• August – Ralph Josselin, English diarist and Anglican cleric (born 1616)^[6]
• August 24 – John Owen, English theologian (born 1616)
• October 20 – Marie-Catherine de Villedieu, French novelist and dramatist (born 1640)
• November 18 – Innokentiy Gizel, Ukrainian historian (born c. 1600)
• December 15 – Izaak Walton, English writer and biographer (born 1593)^[7]

Notes and References

1. Book: van der Veen, Sytze. Brill: 325 Years of Scholarly Publishing. Leiden. Brill. 2008. 978-90-04-17032-2. 11.
2. Book: Green, Karen. A History of Women's Political Thought in Europe, 1700–1800. 4 December 2014. Cambridge University Press. 978-1-107-08583-1. 18.
3. Book: Payne, Deborah. The Cambridge Companion to English Restoration Theatre. 11 May 2000. Cambridge University Press. 978-0-521-58812-6. 159.
4. Web site: History. Orkney Archive. 2014-05-21.
5. Book: Sylvia Stoler Wagonheim. The Annals of English Drama 975-1700. 21 August 2013. Routledge. 978-1-134-67634-7. 188.
6. Book: Ralph Josselin . Alan Macfarlane . The Diary of Ralph Josselin, 1616–1683 . 16 May 1991 . OUP/British Academy . 978-0-19-726103-3.
7. Book: Thomas Zouch. The Life of Izaak Walton: Including Notices of His Contemporaries. 1826. T. Gosden. 62.