# 1881 in poetry

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

## Events

* Frederick James Furnivall founds the Browning Society

## Works published in English
### Canada

* Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon, Poetical Works, posthumously published, Canada
* Pamela Vining Yule. Poems of the Heart and Home.

### United Kingdom

* Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, The Love Sonnets of Proteus (see also Sonnets and Songs 1875, Love Lyrics 1892)
* Katherine Harris Bradley and Edith Emma Cooper, writing as "Arran and Islan Leigh", Bellerophon, and Other Poems
* Amy Levy, Xantippe, and Other Verse
* George Moore, Pagan Poems
* Constance Naden, Songs and Sonnets of Springtime
* Christina Rossetti, A Pageant, and other Poems
* Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Ballads and Sonnets, with "The House of Life" complete, and Poems
* Oscar Wilde, Poems, three editions published this year, first edition in June

### United States

* Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Friar Jerome's Beautiful Book
* Ina Coolbrith, A Perfect Day
* James T. Fields, Ballads and Other Verses, Boston: Houghton Mifflin & Company, Riverside Press imprint, United States
* Joel Chandler Harris, Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings, including poetry
* Fitz-James O'Brien, Poems and Stories
* Epes Sargent, Harper's Cyclopaedia of British and American Poets (scholarship), posthumously published, United States
* John Greenleaf Whittier, The King's Missive

## Works published in other languages

* François Coppée, Conies en tiers, France
* Victor Hugo, Les Quatres vents de l'esprit, France
* Jorge Isaacs, Saulo, 1st canto (no more published), Colombia
* Helena Nyblom, Digte ("Poems"), Denmark

## Births

Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
* January 9 – Lascelles Abercrombie (died 1938), English poet and literary critic called the Georgian Laureate and one of the "Dymock poets"
* February 13 – Eleanor Farjeon (died 1965), English author and poet
* February 15 – Piaras Béaslaí (died 1965), Irish writer and poet
* February 17 – Puran Singh (died 1931), Indian, writing Indian poetry in English
* March 6 – John Cournos, born Ivan Grigorievich Korshun (died 1966), Russian-American Imagist poet, but better known for his novels, short stories, essays, criticism and translations of Russian literature (pen name: John Courtney)
* April 4 – Gertrud von Puttkamer, born Gertrud Günther (died 1944), German homoerotic poet (pen name: Marie-Madeleine)
* April 6 – Furnley Maurice (died 1942), Australian
* April 16 – Alice Corbin Henderson (died 1949), American poet
* May 18 – Alan Edward Mulgan (died 1962), New Zealand
* June 10 – Jaime Sabartés (died 1968), Catalan Spanish poet and longtime secretary to Pablo Picasso
* August 1 – Aizu Yaichi 会津 八一 (died 1956), Japanese poet, calligrapher and historian (surname: Aizu)
* August 10 – Witter Bynner (died 1968), American poet, writer and scholar
* August 20 – Edgar Albert Guest (died 1959), prolific American poet
* September 16 – Clive Bell (died 1964), English critic associated with the Bloomsbury group
* October 30 – Elizabeth Madox Roberts (died 1941), American novelist and poet
* November 15:
** Franklin Pierce Adams (died 1960), American columnist (pen name: F.P.A.), writer and wit, part of the Algonquin Round Table of the 1920s and 1930s whose newspaper column introduced the public to many poets and writers
** Masamune Atsuo 正宗敦夫 (died 1958), Japanese poet and academic (surname: Masamune)
* November 16 – Ernest O'Ferrall (died 1925), Australian poet and short-story writer (pen name: Kodak)
* December 8 – Padraic Colum (died 1972), Irish poet, novelist, dramatist, biographer, collector of folklore and a leading figure of the Celtic Revival
* December 24 – Lady Margaret Sackville (died 1963), English poet and children's author
* Also:
** Swami Ananda Acharya (died 1945), Indian poet who wrote Indian poetry in English
** Deepakba Desai (died 1955), Indian, Gujarati-language woman poet who wrote khandakavyas
** Ardoshir Faramji Kharbardar (died 1953), Indian, Gujarati-language, Parsi poet
** Sotiris Skipis (died 1951), Greek

## Deaths

Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
* January 30 – Arthur O'Shaughnessy (born 1844), 36, British poet
* August 2 – Marcus Clarke (born 1846), 35, Australian novelist and poet
* September 7 – Sidney Lanier (born 1842), 39, American musician and poet
* October 12 – Josiah Gilbert Holland (born 1819), 62, American novelist and poet
* November 1 – Jacques Perk (born 1859), 22, Dutch poet
* November 4 – Estella Hijmans-Hertzveld (born 1837), 44, Dutch poet
* Also – Mangkunegara IV (born 1809), Javanese ruler of Mangkunegaran and poet