1612 in literature

Events

• January 6 – Ben Jonson's masque Love Restored is performed.
• January 12 – The King's Men and Queen Anne's Men unite for the first of two English Court performances in January, with Thomas Heywood's The Silver Age
• January 13 – The King's Men perform Heywood's The Rape of Lucrece.
• February 2 – Queen Anne's Men return to court to play Greene's Tu Quoque.
• May 11 – Shakespeare testifies in the Bellott v. Mountjoy lawsuit.
• November 6 – Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, eldest son and heir to King James I of England, dies of typhoid fever. His coterie of followers, which included literary figures like Ben Jonson and John Selden, are forced to seek other patrons.
• unknown dates
• *Thomas Shelton publishes The History of the Valorous and Wittie Knight-Errant Don-Quixote of the Mancha, the first translation of Cervantes' novel Don Quixote into English.
• *The Accademia della Crusca publishes the first dictionary of the Italian language.
• *"Printers Bible": Some copies of the King James Version of the Bible printed in England this year contain an erratum with Psalm 119:161 reading "printers" "have persecuted me without a cause."

  New books

• Traiano Boccalini – Ragguagli di Parnasso
• John Brinsley – Ludus literarius; or The Grammar Schoole
• John Davies – Discoverie of the True Causes why Ireland was never entirely subdued
• John Davies of Hereford – The Picture of a Happy Man
• Edward Grimeston
• * The Generall Historie of Spaine
• * The General History of the Magnificent State of Venice
• Thomas Heywood – An Apology for Actors
• Antonius Magirus – Koock-boeck ofte Familieren kevken-boeck
• William Strachey - The Historie of Travaile Into Virginia Britannia
• Francisco de Quevedo – La cuna y la sepultura

  New drama

• George Chapman – The Widow's Tears published
• Robert Daborne – A Christian Turn'd Turk published
• Nathan Field – A Woman is a Weathercock published
• Ben Jonson – Love Restored
• John Webster – The White Devil published

  Poetry

• Michael Drayton – Poly-Olbion
• Luis de Góngora – Fábula de Polifemo y Galatea
• Expanded edition of The Passionate Pilgrim
• George Wither – Elegy on the death of Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales

  Births

• February 6 – Antoine Arnauld, French theologian and philosopher
• February 7 – Thomas Killigrew, English dramatist
• February 28 – John Pearson, English theologian and scholar
• March 4 – Jan Vos, Dutch poet and dramatist
• March 20 – Anne Bradstreet, née Dudley, English-born American poet
• December 4 – Samuel Butler, English poet and satirist
• unknown date – Edward King, English poet
• probable – John Rushworth, English lawyer and historian

  Deaths

• February – John Gerard, English botanist and author of herbal
• March 16 – Thomas Holland, English theologian and Bible translator
• April 11 – Emanuel van Meteren, Flemish historian
• June 1 – Carlos Félix, 6-year-old son of Lope de Vega.
• July 29 – Jacques Bongars, French diplomat and scholar
• August 4 – Hugh Broughton, English Biblical scholar
• September – Giovanni de' Bardi, Italian music theorist and critic
• September 27 – Piotr Skarga, Polish hagiographer
• October 7 – Giovanni Battista Guarini, Italian poet
• November 20 – Sir John Harington, English courtier, writer and inventor of flush toilet