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The year '1698 in literature' involved some significant events.

Contents

Events

New books

New drama

Births

Deaths

Events

★ Peter the Great visited London.

★ East India Company (the "new" East India Company) chartered.

★ Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge

★ The latest edition of the ''Bay Psalm Book'' is the first to include music.

New books

The year was dominated by debates over the rights of the people and by the publication of Jeremy Collier's attack on the English stage.

★ Anonymous - ''The Maxims of the Saints Explained, Concerning the Interiour Life'' (transl. of François Fénelon)

★ ''Tooke’s Pantheon of the Heathen Gods and Illustrious Heroes''

★ Francis Atterbury - ''A Discourse Occasion'd by the Death of the Right Honourable the Lady Cutts''

★ Charles Boyle, 4th Earl of Orrery - ''Dr Bentley's Dissertations on the Epistles of Phalaris, and the Fables of Aesop''

★ John Bunyan - ''The Heavenly Foot-Man; or, A Description of the Man that Gets to Heaven''

★ Jeremy Collier - ''A Short View of the Immorality, and Profaneness of the English Stage'' (continued in 1699, 1700, 1703, and 1708)

★ William Congreve - ''Amendments of Mr Collier's False and Imperfect Citations''

★ Daniel Defoe - ''An Enquiry into the Occasional Conformity of Dissenters, in Cases of Preferment''

★
★ - ''The Poor Man's Plea''

★ John Dennis - ''The Usefulness of the Stage, to the Happiness of Mankind, to Government and to Religion''

★ Andrew Fletcher - ''A Discourse of Government with Relation to Militia's''

★ George Fox - ''A Collection of Many Select and Christian Epistles, Letters and Testimonials''

★ Robert Gould - ''A Satyr Against Wooing''

★ Charles Hopkins - ''White-hall; or, The Court of England''

★ John Hughes - ''The Triumph of Peace''

★ Charles Leslie - ''A Short and Easie Method with the Deists''

★ Edmund Ludlow - ''Memoirs of Edmund Ludlow Esq.''

★ Walter Pope - ''Moral and Political Fables, Ancient and Modern''

★ Elkanah Settle - ''A Defence of Dramatick Poetry''

★ Algernon Sidney - ''Discourses Concerning Government'' (vs. Robert Filmer)

★ John Vanbrugh - ''A Short Vindication of The Relapse and The Provok'd Wife, from Immorality and Prophaneness by the Author''

★ Ned Ward - ''The London Spy'' (begins, runs to 1700)

★
★ - ''A Trip to Jamaica''

★ Benjamin Whichcote - ''Select Sermons of Dr. Whichcot'' (ed. Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl Shaftesbury)

New drama

★ Catherine Trotter Cockburn - ''The Fatal Friendship''

★ Thomas D'Urfey - ''The Campaigners''

★ George Farquhar - ''Love and a Bottle''

★ Charles Gildon - ''Phaeton; or, The Fatal Divorce''

★ John Lacy - ''Sauny the Scot; or, The Taming of the Shrew: A comedy'' (adapt. Shakespeare)

★ Peter Anthony Motteux - ''Beauty in Distress: A tragedy''

★ William Philips - ''The Revengeful Queen: A tragedy''

★ Mary Pix - ''Queen Catharine, or, The Ruines of Love''

★ Edward Ravenscroft - ''The Italian Husband''

Births

★ January 13 - Metastasio, Italian poet (died 1782)

★ May 8 - Henry Baker, poet and son-in-law of Daniel Defoe (died 1774)

★ July 19 - Johann Jakob Bodmer, Swiss author (died 1783)

★ December 24 - William Warburton, English critic (died 1779)

Deaths

★ July 18 - Johann Heinrich Heidegger, theologian (born 1663)

★ ''date unknown''

★
★ Jacques Pradon, dramatist

★
★ Jacques Quétif, bibliographer