Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).
May – First publication of one of 16-year-old English poet Thomas Chatterton's poems attributed to the imaginary medieval monk "Thomas Rowley", "Elinoure and Juga", in Alexander Hamilton's Town and Country Magazine. This year also Chatterton sends specimens of "Rowley"’s poetry and history The Ryse of Peyncteynge yn Englade to Horace Walpole who at first offers to print them but, discovering Chatterton's age and considering the pieces might be forgeries, later scornfully dismisses him.
Mary Bowes, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne, The Siege of Jerusalem, drama
Thomas Chatterton, "Elinoure and Juga"
Thomas Gray, Ode Performed in the Senate-House at Cambridge, July 1, 1769
Richard Hurd, Ancient and Modern Scots Songs
John Ogilvie, Paradise, published anonymously
Clara Reeve, Original Poems on several Occasions
Tobias Smollett, The History and Adventures of an Atom, published anonymously
Jacques Delille, verse translation of Virgil's Georgics from the original Latin into French; the translation led to the author's award of the chair of Latin poetry at the Collège de France and membership in the Académie Française in 1774
Basílio da Gama, O Uraguai, an epic Brazilian poem
Jean-François, marquis de Saint-Lambert, Saisons, modeled on Thomson's Seasons
Martin Wieland, Musarion, Germany
Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
May 21 – John Hookham Frere (died 1846), English diplomat, poet and author
November 12 – Amelia Opie (died 1853), English novelist and poet
December 7 (bapt.) – Ann Batten Cristall (died 1848), English poet
December 26 – Ernst Moritz Arndt (died 1860), German patriotic author and poet
Also:
Robert Hetrick (died 1849), Scottish poet and blacksmith
George Howe (died 1821), Saint Christopher Island-born Australian printer and poet
Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
January 5 – James Merrick (born 1720), English poet and scholar
January 20 – Sneyd Davies (born 1709), English poet and churchman
November 27 – Kamo no Mabuchi 賀茂真淵 (born 1697), Japanese Edo period poet and philologist
December – William Falconer (born 1732), Scottish poet (drowned at sea)
December 13 – Christian Fürchtegott Gellert (born 1715), German poet
