1803 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Events
- October – First appearance of the Literary Magazine and American Register, a United States monthly published in Philadelphia and edited by Charles Brockden Brown until 1807, when it becomes a semiannual almanac, American Register, which ceases publication in 1810.
- December 31 – "Sitting on the very sheepfold, dear William read to me his divine poem, 'Michael'".
Works published
United Kingdom
- Peter Bayley, Poems, includes parodies of works by William Wordsworth, including "The Fisherman's Wife," a parody of "The Idiot Boy"; "The Ivy Seat" parodying the Lucy poems; "Evining in the Vale of Festinog", parodying "Tintern Abbey"; "The Forest Fay" parodies Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"; London: printed for William Miller by W. Bulmer and Co.
- Sir Alexander Boswell, The Spirit of Tintoc; or, Johnny Bell and the Kelpie, published anonymously
- William Lisle Bowles, The Picture
- Thomas Campbell, Poems, includes the 7th edition of The Pleasures of Hope and new works, including "Lochiel's Warning", "Hohenlinden" and "The Soldier's Dream"
- Thomas Chatterton, The Works of Thomas Chatterton, Containing His Life, by G. Gregory, D.D., and Miscellaneous Poems, three volumes, London: printed by Briggs and Cottle, for T. N. Longman and O. Rees, posthumous
- Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Poems: Third Edition, a reprint of Poems... Second Edition omitting poems by Charles Lamb and Lloyd London: printed by N. Biggs for T. N. Longman and O. Rees
- Erasmus Darwin, The Temple of Nature; or, The Origin of Society
- Charles Dibdin, The Professional Life of Mr. Dibdin
- Henry Kirke White, ''Clifton Grove''
United States
- J. Warren Brackett, The Ghost of Law, or Anarchy and Despotism, A Poem, Delivered Before the Phi Beta Kappa, Dartmouth College, at Their Anniversary, August 23, 1803, Hanover, New Hampshire: printed by Moses Davis
- Thomas Fessenden, A Terrible Tractoration, a satire on medical quackery, vivisection, animal crossbreeding and scientific theories of some French and English naturalists, including Comte Georges Louis Leclerc de Buffon and Erasmus Darwin
Other
- C. Stanislaus Bouflers, Oeuvres, Paris: L. Pelletier, France
- Adam Oehlenschlager, Digte, Denmark
Births
Death years link to the corresponding " in poetry" article:- January 1 - Richard Henry Horne, English poet and critic
- January 19 - Sarah Helen Whitman, American poet, essayist, transcendentalist, spiritualist and a romantic interest of Edgar Allan Poe
- May 1 - James Clarence Mangan, Irish
- May 25 - Ralph Waldo Emerson, American essayist, philosopher, poet and leader of the Transcendentalist movement
- June 25 - Sumner Lincoln Fairfield, American poet and teacher
- June 30 - Thomas Lovell Beddoes English poet and playwright
- December 3 - Robert Stephen Hawker, also known as Stephen Hawker, English Anglican clergyman, poet, antiquarian of Cornwall and eccentric
- December 6 - Susanna Moodie, English-born Canadian author and poet
- December 26 - Friedrich Reinhold Kreutzwald, Estonian author and poet
Deaths
Birth years link to the corresponding " in poetry" article:- January 18 - Ippolit Bogdanovich, Russian classicist author of light poetry, best known for his long poem Dushenka
- February 9 - Jean François de Saint-Lambert, French poet
- February 18 - Johann Wilhelm Ludwig Gleim, German poet
- March 14 - Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, German poet
- May 14 - William Smith, Scottish American Episcopalian priest, educator, theologian, poet and historian
- June 22 - Wilhelm Heinse, German author and poet
- August 18 - James Beattie, Scottish scholar, writer and poet
- August 25 - Johann Gottfried Herder, German philosopher, poet and literary critic
- September 23 - Joseph Ritson, English antiquary and anthologist
- Also - Erika Liebman, Swedish poet and academic