1787 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1787. Events January 15 – Ann Ward marries William Radcliffe, gaining the surname by which she will be known as a writer of Gothic novels. April 16 – Royall Tyler's The Contrast becomes the first comedy written by an American citizen to be professionally produced, at the John Street Theatre (Manhattan). April 17 – The Edinburgh edition of Robert Burns' Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect is published by William Creech. It includes a Burns portrait by Alexander Nasmyth. The poet has great social success in the city's literary circles; 16-year-old Walter Scott meets him at the house of Adam Ferguson. June 1 – King George III of Great Britain issues a Proclamation for the Discouragement of Vice, which can be used to prosecute obscene publications. June 27 – Just before midnight, Edward Gibbon completes The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in the small summerhouse in his garden in Lausanne, Switzerland. July – Friedrich Schiller arrives in Weimar. November 21 – François-Joseph Talma makes his professional stage debut at the Comédie-Française as Seide, in Voltaire's Mahomet. December 4 – Robert Burns meets Agnes Maclehose at a party given by Miss Erskine Nimmo. New books Fiction Elizabeth Bonhôte – Olivia, or, The Deserted Bride Jean-Baptiste Louvet de Couvrai – Les Amours du chevalier de Faublas Johann Wolfgang von Goethe – The Sorrows of Young Werther (revised edition) Johann Jakob Wilhelm Heinse – Ardinghello and die glückseligen Inseln Elizabeth Helme – Louisa; or the Cottage on the Moor Johann Karl August Musäus – Volksmärchen der Deutschen (fifth volume) Elizabeth Sophia Tomlins – The Victim of Fancy Betje Wolff and Aagje Deken – Abraham Blankaart