1672 in literature
Events from the year 1672 in literature.
Events
- January 25 – London's Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, is destroyed by fire. The King's Company moves to the theatre at Lincoln's Inn Fields, which the rival Duke's Company left the previous year.
- June – Thomas Killigrew mounts another all-female production of his The Parson's Wedding with the King's Company. Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster and Dryden's The Maiden Queen are also staged with all-women casts and new prologues by Dryden for the productions.
- September 13 – John Bunyan is released after twelve years' imprisonment for preaching without a licence.
- December – John Dryden's play Marriage à la Mode is first performed in London by the King's Company.
- The Mercure de France is first published, under the title Mercure galant.
New books
Prose
- Nicolás Antonio – Bibliotheca Hispana Nova
- Nicolas Denys – Description Géographique et Historique des Costes de l’Amérique Septentrionale
- Richard Cumberland – De legibus naturae
- Melchor Fuster – Conceptos predicables
- Gadla Walatta Petros
- Nathaniel Hodges – Loimologia
- James Janeway – A Token for Children, Part 2
- John Milton – Art of Logic
- Pierre Nicole – A Discourse Against Plays and Romances
- César Vichard de Saint-Réal – ''Dom Carlos''
Drama
- Anonymous – Emilia
- Anonymous – The Illustrious Slaves
- Pedro Calderon de la Barca
- *Eco y Narciso
- *El hijo del sol, Faetón
- *La niña de Gómez Arias
- Thomas Corneille – Ariane
- John Dryden
- *The Assignation
- *Marriage à la mode
- John Lacy
- *The Dumb Lady, or The Farrier Made Physician
- *The Old Troop, or Monsier Ragou
- Molière – Les Femmes Savantes
- Henry Nevil Payne – The Morning Ramble
- Jean Racine – Bajazet
- Edward Ravenscroft – The Citizen Turned Gentleman
- Thomas Shadwell
- *Epsom Wells
- *The Miser
- George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, and others – ''The Rehearsal''
Poetry
- Miguel de Barrios – ''El coro de las musas''
Births
- January 18 – Antoine Houdar de la Motte, French writer,
- March – Sir Richard Steele, Irish dramatist, satirist and politician
- May 1 – Joseph Addison, English essayist, poet and politician
- August 2 – Johann Jakob Scheuchzer, Swiss paleontologist, historian and travel writer
- October 27 – Maria Gustava Gyllenstierna, Swedish writer
Deaths
- June 14 – Matthew Wren, English scholar and cleric
- June 20 – Alonso Andrada, Spanish biographer and ascetic writer
- September 12 – Tanneguy Le Fèvre, French classicist
- September 16 – Anne Bradstreet, pioneering American female author
- November 21 – Robert Creighton, Scottish classicist, politician and bishop
- December 27 – Jacques Rohault, French philosopher