1701 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1701. Events January Matthew Prior, English poet, enters Parliament as the member for East Grinstead. George Granville's The Jew of Venice, an adaptation of The Merchant of Venice, receives its première at Lincoln's Inn Fields, with Thomas Betterton as Bassanio. It is so popular it displaces the original from the stage for the next four decades. July 9 – St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, makes a grant for work on Marsh's Library, newly established by Narcissus Marsh (Archbishop of Dublin (Church of Ireland)) as the first public library in Ireland (architect: Sir William Robinson) with refugee French Huguenot scholar Élie Bouhéreau as its first librarian. September 7 – The Treaty of Den Haag is the catalyst for the War of the Spanish Succession, which will continue and have frequent discussion in literature until 1713. unknown date – Biblioteca Casanatense in Rome is established by the Dominican Order. New books Prose Daniel Defoe, The Original Power of the Collective Body of the People of England John Dennis, The Advancement and Reformation of Modern Poetry Richard Steele, The Christian Hero Jonathan Swift, A Discourse of the Contests and Dissensions Between the Nobles and the Commons in Athens and Rome William Temple (posthumously), Miscellanea: the Third Part John Toland, The Art of Governing by Partys Benjamin Whichcote, Several Discourses, posthumously published in four volumes, from this year to 1707