1723 in literature
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1723.
Events
- March – Voltaire makes an agreement with Abraham Viret to allow his work to be printed in Rouen.
- July – A new edition of Bernard Mandeville's The Fable of the Bees is presented as a public nuisance by the Grand Jury of Middlesex, England, to the Court of King's Bench. Mandeville escapes prosecution.
- November – After attending a party at the home of the marquis des Maisons, Voltaire contracts smallpox.
- unknown date – The book collection of Samuel Pepys, including his Diary, is transferred to the Pepys Library at his alma mater, Magdalene College, Cambridge, in accordance with his will.
New books
Fiction
- Penelope Aubin – The Life of Charlotta Du Pont, an English lady; taken from her own memoirs
- Jane Barker – A Patch-Work Screen for the Ladies
- Thomas-Simon Gueullette – Les Aventures merveilleuses du mandarin Fum-Hoam, contes chinois
- Eliza Haywood – Idalia: Or, the Unfortunate Mistress. A Novel. Written by Mrs. Eliza Haywood
- Anton Josef Kirchweger – Aurea Catena Homeri
- Margrethe Lasson – ''Den beklædte Sandhed''
Drama
- Elijah Fenton – Mariamne
- Francis Hawling – The Impertinent Lovers
- Eliza Haywood – A Wife to be Lett
- Ludvig Holberg – Erasmus Montanus
- Hildebrand Jacob – The Fatal Constancy
- Charles Johnson – Love in a Forest
- Pierre de Marivaux – La Double Inconstance
- Ambrose Philips – Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester
- Jane Robe – The Fatal Legacy
- Richard Savage – ''Sir Thomas Overbury''
Poetry
- Sir Richard Blackmore – Alfred: an epick poem
- Heyat Mahmud – Jangnama; Bengali
- David Mallet – William and Margaret
- William Meston – Knight of the Kirk
- Ambrose Philips – Ode on the Death of William, Earl of Cowper
- Matthew Prior
- *Down-Hall
- *The Turtle and the Sparrow
- Allan Ramsay – The Tea-Table Miscellany, Vol. 1
- Voltaire – La Henriade
- Ned Ward – Nuptial Dialogues and Debates, 3rd ed.
Non-fiction
- James Anderson – The Constitutions of the Free-Masons
- Henry Baker – An Invocation of Health: a poem
- Offspring Blackall, Bishop of Exeter – Collected Works
- Pietro Giannone – Storia civile del regno di Napoli
- Bernard de Mandeville – A Search into the Nature of Society
- Thomas Dempster – De Etruria regali libri VII
- Thomas Gordon and John Trenchard – Cato's Letters
- John Nott – The Cooks and Confectioners Dictionary or, the Accomplish'd Housewives Companion
- John Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham – ''The Works of John Sheffield, Earl of Mulgrave, Marquis of Normanby, and Duke of Buckingham''
Births
- January 21 – Baron d'Holbach, German-born French philosopher and encyclopedist
- February 23 – Richard Price, Welsh-born philosopher
- February 24 – John Burgoyne, English soldier and dramatist
- June 5 – Adam Smith, Scottish economist
- June 20 – Adam Ferguson, Scottish philosopher and historian
- July 11 – Jean-François Marmontel, French novelist and dramatist
- September 30 – William Hutton, English local historian and poet
- November 8 – John Byron, English vice-admiral and memoirist
- November 30 – William Livingston, American political writer and politician
- December 26 – Friedrich Melchior, Baron von Grimm, German-born French philosopher and encyclopedist
Deaths
- February 26 – Thomas d'Urfey, English dramatist
- March 13 – René Auguste Constantin de Renneville, French Protestant poet and historian
- March 15 – Johann Christian Günther, German poet
- May 11 – Jean Galbert de Campistron, French dramatist
- June 8 – Isaac Chayyim Cantarini, Italian poet, physician and preacher
- July 28 – Mariana Alcoforado, Portuguese nun
- August 21 – Dimitrie Cantemir, Romanian author
- September 23 – Jacques Basnage, French Protestant poet, linguist and preacher
- December 1 – Susanna Centlivre, English dramatist
- December 17 – John Trenchard, English politician and writer