This article is a summary of the major literary events and publications of 1720.

List of years in literature (table)
In poetry
1717
1718
1719
1720
1721
1722
1723
+...

Events

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  • September–October – The "South Sea Bubble", i.e. the collapse of the South Sea Company in England, affects the fortunes of many writers, including John Gay. It features in several works of literature. There are suspicions of complicity by Robert Walpole's government.
  • December 29 – The Haymarket Theatre in London opens with a performance of La Fille à la Morte, ou le Badeaut de Paris.
  • unknown date
    • Jonathan Swift begins major composition work on Gulliver's Travels in Ireland.[1]
    • 18-year-old London apprentice printer John Matthews is hanged for treason for producing the anonymous Jacobite pamphlet Vox Populi Vox Dei, the last time a British printer suffers execution for his work.[2]

New books

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Prose

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Drama

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Poetry

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Births

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Deaths

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References

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  1. ^ Jonathan Swift (17 July 2017). Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift - Delphi Classics (Illustrated). Delphi Classics. p. 8. ISBN 978-1-78877-565-6.
  2. ^ Mullan, John (2007). Anonymity. London: Faber. p. 142. ISBN 978-0-571-19514-5.
  3. ^ B. Overton (23 October 2007). The Eighteenth-Century British Verse Epistle. Springer. p. 57. ISBN 978-0-230-59346-6.
  4. ^ Sir Richard Steele (1791). The Theatre. editor. p. 119.
  5. ^ Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (1971). History of the French Academy. Corneille. Mademoiselle de Scudéry. Molière. La Fontaine. Pascal. Madame de Sévigné. Bossuet. Boileau. Racine. Madame de Caylus. Fénelon. Comte Antoine Hamilton. The Princess des Ursins. p. 402.
  6. ^ Anthony Hamilton (Count) (1908). Memoirs of Count Grammont. John Grant. p. 192.
  7. ^ DeBartolo Professor in the Liberal Arts Pat Rogers; Pat Rogers (2004). The Alexander Pope Encyclopedia. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 330. ISBN 978-0-313-32426-0.
  8. ^ Cunningham, George Godfrey (1835). Lives of Eminent and Illustrious Englishmen: From Alfred the Great to the Latest Times, on an Original Plan. A. Fullarton & Company. pp. 236.
  9. ^ John Lemprière; Eleazar Lord (1825). Lempriere's Universal Biography: Containing a Critical and Historical Account of the Lives, Characters, and Labours of Eminent Persons, in All Ages and Countries. R. Lockwood. pp. 498.
  10. ^ Christian-Muslim Relations. A Bibliographical History. Volume 12 Asia, Africa and the Americas (1700-1800). BRILL. 1 November 2018. p. 649. ISBN 978-90-04-38416-3.