# 1744 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1744.

## Events

* February 6 – Samuel Foote makes his debut as an actor as Othello at the Haymarket Theatre, London, England.
* February 15 – Spranger Barry makes his debut as an actor at the Theatre Royal, Dublin.
* April – The Female Spectator (a monthly) is founded by Eliza Haywood in England, the first periodical written for women by a woman.
* April 14 – The Physico-Historical Society is formed in Dublin for the preservation of 'manuscripts, rare printed books, and natural curiosities relating to Ireland'.
* May 29 – Alexander Pope is received into the Catholic Church, a day before his death.

## New books
### Fiction

* Mary Collyer – Felicia to Charlotte
* Sarah Fielding – The Adventures of David Simple
* Eliza Haywood – The Fortunate Foundlings
* Edward Moore – Fables for the Female Sex
* William Oldys – The Harleian Miscellany (introduction by Samuel Johnson)
* Joseph Warton – The Enthusiast

### Children

* John Newbery – A Little Pretty Pocket-Book
* Tommy Thumb's Pretty Song Book (earliest extant English nursery-rhyme collection)

### Drama

* Robert Dodsley – A Select Collection of Old Plays
* William Havard – Regulus
* James Miller
** Joseph and his Brethren (music by Handel)
** Mahomet the Imposter (adapted from Voltaire's Mahomet; completed by John Hoadly)
* James Ralph – The Astrologer (adapted from Thomas Tomkis's Albumazar, itself adapted from Giambattista della Porta's L'astrologo)
* Antonio de Zamora – No hay deuda que no se pague y convidado de piedra

### Poetry

* Mark Akenside
** The Pleasures of the Imagination
** An Epistle to Curio
* Jane Brereton – Poems
* Gabriel Álvarez de Toledo (ed. Diego de Torres Villarroel) – Obras póstumas poéticas, con la Burromaquia

### Non-fiction

* John Armstrong – The Art of Preserving Health
* George Berkeley – Siris
* Pierre François Xavier de Charlevoix – Histoire et Description Generale de la Nouvelle France (History and General Description of New France)
* Émilie de Breteuil, marquise du Chatelet -Dissertation sur la nature et la propagation du feu
* Colley Cibber – Another Occasional Letter from Mr. Cibber to Mr. Pope
* David Garrick – An Essay on Acting (attrib.)
* Samuel Johnson
** Life of Mr Richard Savage
** An Account of the Life of John Philip Barretier
* Francis Moore – A Voyage to Georgia
* Alexander Pope – Essay on Man, volume 4: "Epistle: Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to" (4) "Happiness" (the first 2 epistles were written in 1732 and the third in 1733).
* John Ranby – The Method of Treating Gunshot Wounds
* Emanuel Swedenborg – The Animal Kingdom (Soul's Domain) (1744–45)
* Jonathan Swift – Three Sermons

## Births

* January 29 – Catharina Charlotta Swedenmarck, Swedish writer (died 1813)
* February 10 – William Mitford, English historian (died 1827)
* April 11 (baptised) – Elizabeth Bonhôte, English novelist, essayist and poet (died 1818)
* August 25 – Johann Gottfried Herder, German poet (died 1803)
* December – Elsa Fougt, Swedish editor and publisher (died 1826)

## Deaths

* January 28 – Thomas Innes, Scottish historian (born 1662)
* January 23 – Thomas Griffith, Irish actor and theatre manager (born 1680)
* March 31 – Antiochus Kantemir, Russian diplomat and writer (born 1708)
* April 27 – James Miller, English playwright, poet and satirist (born 1704)
* May 30 – Alexander Pope, English poet and satirist (born 1688)
* September 18 – Lewis Theobald, English literary historian (born 1688)