Oscar Wilde's arrest and conviction
February 18 – John Douglas, 9th Marquess of Queensberry (father of Lord Alfred Douglas, Oscar Wilde's lover), leaves his calling card at the Albemarle Club in London, inscribed: "For Oscar Wilde, posing somdomite", i.e. a sodomite, inducing Wilde to charge him with criminal libel.
April 3–5 – Libel case of Wilde v Queensberry at the Old Bailey in London: Queensberry is acquitted. Evidence of Wilde's homosexual relationships with young men renders him liable to criminal prosecution under the Labouchere Amendment, while the Libel Act 1843 renders him legally liable for the considerable expenses Queensberry has incurred in his defence, leaving Wilde penniless.
April 6 – Wilde is arrested at the Cadogan Hotel, London, for "unlawfully committing acts of gross indecency with certain male persons" and detained on remand in Holloway Prison.
May 25 – Criminal case of Regina v. Wilde: After a retrial at the Old Bailey, Wilde is convicted of gross indecency and is taken to Pentonville Prison to begin his two years' sentence of hard labour.
November 21 – Wilde is transferred to Reading Gaol.
December 19 – Robert Frost marries Elinor Miriam White at Lawrence, Massachusetts.
Rudyard Kipling writes the poem If—.
Ernest Thayer recites Casey at the Bat at a Harvard class reunion, resolving the "mystery" of the poem's authorship.
Bliss Carman, A Seamark: A Threnody for Robert Louis Stevenson. Boston: Copeland & Day.
Bliss Carman, Behind The Arras: A Book Of The Unseen. Illus. Tom B. Meteyard. Boston: Lamson, Wolffe.
Sophia Almon Hensley, A Woman's Love Letters.
Emily Pauline Johnson, The White Wampum, Toronto: Copp Clark; London: John Lane.
Marie Joussaye, Songs that Quinte Sang.
Archibald Lampman, Lyrics of Earth
Arthur Stringer, Pauline and Other Poems.
Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald, The House of the Trees and Other Poems
Robert Bridges, Invocation to Music
Gelett Burgess, "The Purple Cow"
John Davidson, Fleet Street Eclogues, second series (first series, 1893)
Austin Dobson, The Story of Rosina, and Other Verses
Maurice Hewlett, A Masque of Dead Florentines
Lionel Johnson, Poems
William Morris, The Tale of Beowulf
Coventry Patmore, The Rod, the Root, and the Flower
Arthur Quiller-Couch, editor, The Golden Pomp, anthology of 16th- and 17th-century English lyricists
Arthur Symons, London Nights
James Thomson, Poetical Works, posthumously published; edited, with a memoir, by Bertram Dobell
William Watson, The Father of the Forest, and Other Poems
William Butler Yeats, Irish poet published in the United Kingdom:
Editor, A Book of Irish Verse, anthology
Poems, drama and poetry
Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Unguarded Gates
Katharine Lee Bates, "Pikes Peak" a poem later set to music and now known as "America the Beautiful", originally published in the July 4 edition of The Congregationalist, a church periodical
Ina Coolbrith, Songs from the Golden Gate
Stephen Crane, The Black Riders and Other Lines
Paul Laurence Dunbar, Majors and Minors
William Dean Howells, Stops of Various Quills
James Russell Lowell, Last Poems, published posthumously
Henry David Thoreau, Poems of Nature, published posthumously (died 1862)
James Whitcomb Riley, "Little Orphant Annie"
Sri Aurobindo, Song to Myrtilla, Calcutta: Arya Publishing House; India, Indian poetry in English
Banjo Paterson, The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, major single-author collection of Australian bush poetry
William Butler Yeats, Irish poet published in the United Kingdom:
Editor, A Book of Irish Verse, anthology
Poems, drama and poetry
José Santos Chocano, Peru:
En la aldea ("In the Village")
Iras santas
Francis Jammes, Un jour, France
Catulle Mendès, La Grive des vignes, France
Władysław Mickiewicz, Vie d'Adam Mickiewicz ("Life of Adam Mickiewicz"), four volumes, Poznań, Poland, published beginning 1890 through this year; published by the poet's son
K. C. Kesava Pillai, Asanna-Marana Chinta Satakam, lyric in the form of a monologue of a man about to die, Indian, Malayalam-language
Verner von Heidenstam, Dikter ("Poems"), Sweden
Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
May 2 – Lorenz Hart (died 1943), American lyricist
May 19 – Charles Hamilton Sorley (died 1915), Scots poet
May 28 – Gamel Woolsey, born Elizabeth (Elsa) Gammell Woolsey (died 1968 in Spain), American poet and writer
June 3 – Robert Hillyer (died 1961), American poet and academic
July 24 – Robert Graves (died 1985), English poet, translator and novelist
September 10 – Viswanatha Satyanarayana (died 1976), Indian poet writing in Tegulu; popularly known as the Kavi Samraat ("Emperor of Poetry")
September 22 – Babette Deutsch (died 1982), American poet, critic, translator and novelist
September 28 – Edward Harrington (died 1966), Australian poet, writer of Bush ballads
November 1 – David Jones, born Walter David Michael Jones (died 1974), English (Welsh-descended) artist and poet
November 25 – Helen Hooven Santmyer, American poet and author (d. 1986)
December 14 – Paul Éluard (died 1952), French poet, a founder of Surrealism
December 23 – Lilian Bowes Lyon (died 1949), English poet, a cousin of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother
Unknown dates
Padmadhar Chaliha (died 1969), Indian, Assamese-language poet
Max Dunn (died 1963), Irish-born Australian
W. E. Harney (died 1962), Australian
Khavirakpan (died 1950), Indian, Meitei language poet
Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
April 17 – Jorge Isaacs (born 1837), Colombian writer, politician and explorer
May 30 – Frederick Locker-Lampson (born 1821), English writer and poet
June 29 – Thomas Henry Huxley (born 1825), English controversialist, academic, scientist and occasional poet
October 7 – William Wetmore Story (born 1819), American sculptor, art critic, poet and editor
October 12 – Cecil Frances Alexander (born 1818), Irish hymn-writer and poet
October 21 – Louisa Anne Meredith (born 1812), Australian
November 4 – Eugene Field (born 1850), American writer best known for children's poetry and humorous essays
November 22 – John Warren, 3rd Baron de Tabley (born 1835), English
November 28 – Louisa Sarah Bevington (born 1845), English poet and anarchist
