1840 in literature

Events

New Books

• Colomba[?] - Prosper Mérimée
• Democracy in America (vol. 2) - Alexis de Tocqueville
• A Hero of Our Time[?] - Mikhail Lermontov
• The Hour and the Man[?] - Harriet Martineau
• The Novice[?] (poetry) - Mikhail Lermontov
• The Old Curiosity Shop[?] - Charles Dickens
• Olla Podrida[?] - Frederick Marryat
• Otho the Archer[?] - Alexandre Dumas, père
• Poor Jack[?] - Frederick Marryat
• Les Rayons et les Ombres[?] - Victor Hugo
• Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque[?] - Edgar Allan Poe
• The Tower of London[?] - William Harrison Ainsworth
• Two Years Before the Mast[?] - Richard Henry Dana, Jr.[?]

Births

• April 2 - Emile Zola, writer (+ 1902)
• June 2 - Thomas Hardy, novelist (+ 1928)
• November 29 - Rhoda Broughton (+ 1920)

Deaths

• January 6 - Fanny Burney, novelist

Awards