# 1891 in poetry

Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).

## Events

* 1891–1893 –The Rhymers Club gathers at the Cheshire Cheese in Fleet Street, London, including John Davidson, Ernest Dowson, W. B. Yeats, and others.
* c. Late June – In a meeting of decadent poets in London, Oscar Wilde is first introduced to Lord Alfred Douglas by Lionel Johnson at Wilde's Tite Street home.
* Approximate date – Edmund Clerihew Bentley, G. K. Chesterton and fellow pupils of St Paul's School, London, compose the first pseudo-biographical comic verses which become known as clerihews.

## Works published in English
### Canada

* John Frederic Herbin, Canada, and Other Poems, Canada
* Seranus, Pine, Rose and Fleur De Lis, (Toronto: Hart).

### United Kingdom

* Sir Edwin Arnold, The Light of the World; or, The Great Consummation
* Alfred Austin, Lyrical Poems
* John Davidson, In a Music Hall, and Other Poems
* James Joyce, Et tu, Healy, Irish poet published in Ireland
* Arthur Clark Kennedy, Pictures in rhyme
* William McGonagall, Poetic Gems (second series)
* William Morris, Poems by the Way
* May Sinclair, Essays in Verse
* James Kenneth Stephen:
** Lapsus Calami
** Quo Musa Tendis
* Katharine Tynan, Ballads and Lyrics

### United States

* Thomas Bailey Aldrich, The Sisters' Tragedy
* Nathaniel Ames, The Essays, Humor, and Poems of Nathaniel Ames, published posthumously
* Emily Dickinson, Poems: Second Series
* Oliver Wendell Holmes, Over the Teacups, fiction, nonfiction and poetry
* Herman Melville, Timoleon
* Harriet Monroe, Valeria and Other Poems
* Frank Norris, Yvernelle: A Tale of Feudal France
* Lucy Creemer Peckham, Sea Moss
* Lizette Woodworth Reese, A Handful of Lavender

### Other in English

* Henry Lawson, Australia:
** "Freedom on the Wallaby"
** "The Babies of Walloon"

## Works published in other languages

* Stefan George, Pilgerfahrten, limited private edition; German
* Francis Jammes, Six Sonnets, France
* Màiri Mhòr nan Òran (Mary MacPherson), Gaelic Songs and Poems, Scottish Gaelic published in the United Kingdom
* Guido Mazzoni, Poesie, Italy

## Births

Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
* January 15 – Osip Mandelstam (died 1938), Russian poet and essayist, one of the foremost members of the Acmeist school
* April 9 – Lesbia Harford (died 1927), Australian
* May 15 – David Vogel (killed in concentration camp, 1944), Russian-born Hebrew poet
* May 21 – John Peale Bishop (died 1944), American poet and writer
* May 22
** Johannes R. Becher (died 1958), German poet, novelist and politician
** Edwin Gerard (died 1965), Australian poet
* July 5 – Tin Ujević (died 1955), Croatian poet
* August 19 – Francis Ledwidge (killed in action in World War I, 1917), Irish poet
* September 23 – Arthur Graeme West (killed in action in World War I, 1917), English military writer and poet
* November 14 – Josef Magnus Wehner (died 1973), German poet and playwright
* November 23 – Masao Kume 久米正雄 writing under the pen-name Santei (died 1952), Japanese, late Taishō period and early Shōwa period playwright, novelist and haiku poet (surname: Kume)
* December 9 – Maksim Bahdanovič (died 1917), Belarusian poet, journalist and literary critic
* December 10 – Nelly Sachs (died 1970), German-Swedish poet and dramatist, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1966
* Also – Peter Hopegood, born Cedric Hopegood (died 1967), English-born Australian poet

## Deaths

Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
* July 24 – Douglas Smith Huyghue (born 1816), Canadian and Australian poet, fiction writer, essayist and artist
* August 12 – James Russell Lowell, 72, American Romantic poet, critic, satirist, writer, diplomat, and abolitionist
* August 14 – John Henry Hopkins Jr. (born 1820), American clergyman and hymnist
* August 22 – Jan Neruda (born 1834), Czech writer
* September 28 – Herman Melville, 82, American novelist, essayist and poet
* November 10 – Arthur Rimbaud, 37 (born 1854) French poet
* Also:
** Venmani Acchen Nambudiri (born 1817), Indian, Malayalam-language poet associated with the Venmani School of poetry
** Moyinkutty Vaidyar (born 1857), Indian, Malayalam-language poet