1824 in literature

Events

• January 24 – The first issue of a radical quarterly founded by Jeremy Bentham, The Westminster Review, is published in London.
• February 9 – Because of dire family financial straits, Charles Dickens, just turned 12, begins work in a blacking factory in London. On February 23 his father, John Dickens, is committed to the Marshalsea prison as a debtor.
• February 15 – Lord Byron falls ill at Missolonghi while taking part in the Greek War of Independence. He dies of fever on April 19.
• April – The United States Literary Gazette, a semi-monthly, begins publication. It publishes poetry by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and William Cullen Bryant, among many others.
• May 7 – The première of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 is played at the Theater am Kärntnertor in Vienna. It incorporates a setting of Schiller's "Ode to Joy".
• May 17 – The publisher John Murray and with five of Lord Byron's friends and executors, decide to destroy the manuscript of Byron's memoirs, because of scandalous details that would damage Byron's reputation. Opposed only by Thomas Moore, the two volumes of memoirs are dismembered and burnt in the fireplace at the John Murray 's office, 50 Albemarle Street in London.
• June 21 – The Vagrancy Act in England provides for the prosecution of "every Person wilfully exposing to view, in any Street... or public Place, any obscene Print, Picture, or other indecent Exhibition".

• Julia Catherine Beckwith's St. Ursula's Convent or, The Nun of Canada; Containing Scenes from Real Life becomes the first novel published in Canada by a native-born Canadian.
• The British periodicals The Children's Friend and The Child's Companion both publish their first issues.

New books

Fiction

• William Cardell – The Story of Jack Halyard, the Sailor Boy
• Mary Charlton – The Homicide
• Lydia Maria Child – Hobomok
• James Fenimore Cooper –
• Susan Ferrier – The Inheritance
• Catherine Gore – Theresa Marchment, or The Maid of Honour
• James Hogg – The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
• Washington Irving – Tales of a Traveller
• Charles Maturin – The Albigenses
• Mary Russell Mitford – Our Village
• James Justinian Morier – Hajji Baba of Ispahan
• Regina Marie Roche – The Tradition of the Castle
• Susanna Rowson – Charlotte's Daughter
• Sir Walter Scott – Redgauntlet
• Catharine Maria Sedgwick – Redwood
• Louisa Stanhope – The Siege of Kenilworth

  Children

• William Cardell – The Story of Jack Halyard, the Sailor Boy
• Agnes Strickland
• *The Aviary; Or, An Agreeable Visit. Intended for Children
• *The Use of Sight: Or, I Wish I Were Julia
• *The Little Tradesman, or, A Peep into English Industry

  Drama

• Manuel Bretón de los Herreros – Á la vejez viruelas

  Poetry

• Thomas Campbell – Theodric; a domestic tale; and other poems
• Letitia Elizabeth Landon – The Improvisatrice, and Other Poems
• Giacomo Leopardi – Canzoni and Versi
• Alfred de Vigny – Éloa, ou La sœur des anges

  Non-fiction

• Louisa Gurney Hoare – Friendly Advice on the Management and Education of Children, Addressed to Parents of the Middle and Labouring Classes of Society

  Births

• January 7 – Julia Kavanagh, Irish novelist
• January 8 – Wilkie Collins, English mystery novelist
• January 15 – Anna Mary Howitt, English writer, painter and feminist
• January 26 – Katharine Sarah Macquoid, English novelist and travel writer
• March 5 – Lucy Larcom, American author, teacher, and poet
• March 19 – George Murray Smith, English publisher, founder of the Dictionary of National Biography
• April 27 – Edward Bruce Hamley, English military writer, general and politician
• May 19 – William Allingham, Irish poet
• June 20 – Rowena Granice Steele, American journalist, author, editor, publisher, and performer
• July 11 – Mary Charlotte Ward Granniss Webster Billings, American writer, activist, hymn writer, evangelist, and missionary
• July 27 – Alexandre Dumas, fils, French novelist
• September 15 – A. D. T. Whitney, American poet and girls' writer
• October 18 – Juan Valera y Alcalá-Galiano, Spanish realist novelist
• November 8 – Annie Chambers Ketchum, American author, educator, and lecturer
• December 10 – George MacDonald, Scottish author, poet and Christian minister

• Anna Harriet Drury, English novelist

Deaths

• January 28 – John Larpent, English theater censor
• March 2 – Susanna Rowson, American novelist, poet and playwright
• April 13 – Jane Taylor, English poet and novelist
• April 19 – Lord Byron, English Romantic poet
• September 23 – John Cartwright, English political reformer
• October 30 – Charles Maturin, Irish playwright, novelist and cleric
• November 23 – Matthäus Casimir von Collin, Austrian poet and dramatist

  Awards

• March – Samuel Taylor Coleridge elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature
• Chancellor's Gold Medal – Winthrop Mackworth Praed
• Newdigate Prize – John Thomas Hope