# 1702 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1702.

## Events

* March 8 (O.S.) – Accession of Anne, Queen of Great Britain, upon the death of her brother-in-law William III.
* March 11 (O.S.) – The first regular English national newspaper, The Daily Courant, begins publication, in Fleet Street in the City of London. It covers only foreign news.
* October – Jonathan Swift returns to Ireland in the company of Esther Johnson.
* unknown dates
** Ballet master John Weaver presents the burlesque Tavern Bilkers at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London, the first English pantomime. It is not a success.
** The first book set in the Romain du Roi Roman type, devised for use by the Imprimerie nationale in France: Médailles sur les principaux événements du règne de Louis le Grand, is printed.
** Castle Howard in Yorkshire, England, is completed to the design of playwright John Vanbrugh and architect Nicholas Hawksmoor.

## New books
### Prose

* Louise de Bossigny, comtesse d'Auneuil – La Tiranie des fées détruite (The Tyranny of the Fairies Destroyed)
* Thomas Brown, et al. – Letters From the Dead to the Living
* Edmund Calamy – An Abridgement of Mr Baxter's History of His Life and Times
* Daniel Defoe
** An Enquiry into Occasional Conformity
** The Mock-Mourners (on the death of William III)
** A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty
** Reformation of Manners
** The Shortest Way with the Dissenters (anonymous; December)
** The Spanish Descent
* John Dennis – The Monument
* Laurence Echard – A General Ecclesiastical History
* George Farquhar – Love and Business
* Edmund Gibson – Synodus Anglicana (on the convocation)
* Charles Gildon (?) – A Comparison Between the Two Stages (on the "War of the Theatres")
* Examen Miscellaneum
* Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon – The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England (1702–1704, written in the 1640s and late 1660s. Also known as Clarendon's History)
* George Keith – The Standard of the Quakers Examined
* John Kersey – A New English Dictionary; or, a complete collection of the most proper and significant words, commonly used in the language
* Cotton Mather – Magnalia Christi Americana
* Matthew Prior – To a Young Gentleman in Love
* John Toland – Paradoxes of State
* Catherine Trotter Cockburn – A Defence of the Essay of Human Understanding (re John Locke)

### Drama

* William Burnaby – The Modish Husband
* Susanna Centlivre –
** The Beau's Duel
** The Stolen Heiress
* Colley Cibber – She Would and She Would Not
* John Dennis – The Comical Gallant
* George Farquhar
** The Inconstant
** The Twin Rivals
* Charles Gildon – The Patriot
* Bevil Higgons – The Generous Conqueror (printed, performed in 1701)
* Francis Manning – All for the Better
* John Oldmixon – The Governor of Cyprus
* Nicholas Rowe
** The Fair Penitent (adaptation of Massinger and Field's The Fair Penitent, performed, printed in 1703)
** Tamerlane (printed, performed in 1701)
* Sir Charles Sedley – The Tyrant King of Crete
* John Vanbrugh – The False Friend

### Poetry

* Matsuo Bashō (posthumously) – Oku no Hosomichi (Narrow Road to the Deep North)

## Births

* June 26 – Philip Doddridge, English religious and writer and hymnist (died 1751)
* Unknown date – Margareta Momma, Swedish journalist and publisher (died 1772)

## Deaths

* January 1 – Samuel Green, American printer (born c. 1614)
* January 17 – Roger Morrice, English journalist and diarist (born 1628)
* February 17 – Peder Syv, Danish philologist, folklorist and priest (born 1631)
* April 22 – François Charpentier, French archeologist and writer (born 1620)
* May 17 (bur.) – Richard Sault, English mathematician, editor and translator (unknown year of birth)
* May 27 – Dominique Bouhours, French literary critic (born 1628)
* November – John Pomfret, English poet (born 1667)