1750 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1750.

Events

March – The Rambler is founded by Edward Cave; it lasts for 208 issues, and is mostly written by Samuel Johnson.
March 5 – Shakespeare's Richard II is presented at their theatre on Nassau Street (Manhattan) by Walter Murray and Thomas Kean, the earliest known significant professional performance of Shakespeare in North America.
unknown dates
*Weekly meetings for contributors to the Encyclopédie begin, at the salon of Baron d'Holbach.
*Jean-Jacques Rousseau wins the prize of the Academy of Dijon for his Discourse on the Arts and Sciences.
*London theatres wage "the Romeo and Juliet war" – competing productions appear with David Garrick and Anne Bellamy at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane and with Spranger Barry and Susannah Cibber at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden.
*Old Orchard Street Theatre opens in Bath (England) under the management of John Palmer, with a performance of Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2.
*Carlo Goldoni commits himself to writing a comedy for each week of the 1750–1751 seasons at Gerolamo Medebach's Teatro San Angelo in Venice – 16 plays.
After taking an M.D. at Aberdeen, Tobias Smollett travels in France, collecting material for The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle.

John Barrow – Navigatio Britannica
William Blackstone – An Essay on Collateral Consanguinity
Samuel Bownas – A Description of the Qualifications Necessary to a Gospel Minister
John Campbell – The Present State of Europe
Zachary Grey – A Free and Familiar Letter to William Warburton
Eliza Haywood – A Present for Women Addicted to Drinking
Francis Hutcheson – Reflections Upon Laughter
Jean-Jacques Rousseau – Discourse on the Arts and Sciences
George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax, edited by Alexander Pope – A Character of King Charles the Second: and political, moral and miscellaneous thoughts and reflections
Laurence Sterne – The Abuses of Conscience
Madeleine de Puisieux – ''La Femme n’est pas inférieure à l'homme''

January 7 – Robert Anderson, Scottish critic
June 13 – James Burney, English rear-admiral and naval writer
September 5 – Robert Fergusson, Scottish poet writing in Braid Scots
October 21 – Juraj Fándly, Slovak non-fiction writer, entomologist and priest
October 31 – Leonor de Almeida Portugal, 4th Marquise of Alorna, Portuguese noblewoman, painter, and poet
unknown date – Henrietta Maria Bowdler, English author and expurgator