1728 in literature

Events

• January 28 – On the night of Esther Johnson's death, Jonathan Swift begins writing The Death of Mrs. Johnson.
• January 29 – John Rich, manager of the theatre at Lincoln's Inn Fields in London, mounts the first production of The Beggar's Opera, a ballad opera by John Gay. Its great success makes "Rich gay and Gay rich". By the summer, it has been imitated in Thomas Walker's The Quaker's Opera; and William Hogarth begins painting scenes from it.
• May – Jonathan Swift and Thomas Sheridan launch The Intelligencer.
• October 12 – The Universal Spectator and Weekly Journal is founded by Daniel Defoe and Henry Baker.
• unknown dates
• *The utenzi Utendi wa Tambuka is written by Mwengo, son of Athumani, one of the earliest known examples of Swahili literature.
• *Construction of the Biblioteca Joanina at the University of Coimbra, begun in 1717, is completed.

  New books

Prose

• Penelope Aubin – The Life and Adventures of the Young Count Albertus
• Peter Browne – The Procedure, Extent, and Limits of Human Understanding
• "Captain George Carleton" – Memoirs of an English Officer
• Ephraim Chambers – Cyclopaedia, or, A Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences
• John Dennis – Remarks on Mr. Pope's Rape of the Lock
• James Gibbs – A Book of Architecture
• Eliza Haywood – The Agreeable Caledonian
• Francis Hutcheson – An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections
• John Oldmixon
• *The Arts of Logick and Rhetorick
• *An Essay on Criticism
• Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie – The Historie and Chronicles of Scotland, 1436–1565
• Christopher Pitt – An Essay on Virgil's Aeneid
• Antoine François Prévost – Mémoires et aventures d’un homme de qualité qui s’est retiré du monde
• Elizabeth Singer Rowe – Friendship in Death
• Richard Savage – Nature in Perfection
• George Sewell – Posthumous Works of Dr. George Sewell
• Jonathan Swift – A Short View of the State of Ireland
• William Wycherley – The Posthumous Works of William Wycherley, edited by Lewis Theobald
• Edward Young – A Vindication of Providence

  Drama

• Colley Cibber and Sir John Vanbrugh – A Journey to London
• Henry Fielding – Love in Several Masques
• John Gay – The Beggar's Opera
• Pierre de Marivaux – Le Trionphe de Plutus
• John Mottley – The Craftsman
• Alexis Piron – Les Fils ingrats
• Lewis Theobald – Double Falsehood, or the Distress'd Lovers
• Sir John Vanbrugh – The Provok'd Husband

  Poetry

• Joseph Addison – The Christian Poet: A miscellany of divine poems
• Thomas Cooke – The Works of Hesiod
• Henry Fielding – The Masquerade
• David Mallet – The Excursion
• Alexander Pope – The Dunciad
• James Ralph
• *Night
• *Sawney: An heroic poem. Occasion'd by the Dunciad
• *Zeuma; or, The Love of Liberty
• Allan Ramsay – Poems
• Richard Savage – The Bastard
• Thomas Sheridan – The Satyrs of Persius
• James Thomson – Spring
• Ned Ward – Durgen; or, A Plain Satyr upon a Pompous Satyrist
• Edward Young
• *Love of Fame, the Universal Passion
• *Ocean: An Ode

  Births

• Early – Lady Dorothea Du Bois, Irish writer
• January 9 – Thomas Warton, English literary historian and poet laureate
• March 11 – Robert Bage, English novelist
• September 14 – Mercy Otis Warren, political writer
• November 10 – Oliver Goldsmith, Irish writer and poet

  Deaths

• April 25 – John Woodward, English naturalist and antiquary
• February 12 – Cotton Mather, American pamphleteer and minister
• June 23 – Gabriel Daniel, French historian
• September 23 – Christian Thomasius, German publisher and author
• November 13 – William Wall, English theologian
• December 19 – White Kennett, English antiquary, religious writer and bishop