Tag: Literature

• Podcast

15th April 1755: Samuel Johnson publishes ‘A Dictionary of the English Language’ in London

• 15th April 2026
• Tagged as: Britain, Culture, Dictionary, England, English, Language, Literature, United Kingdom

Johnson’s finished dictionary contained 42,773 words, each of which featured a number of notes on their specific usage.

• Podcast

14th October 1892: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle first published, containing 12 stories

• 14th October 2025
• Tagged as: Books, Britain, Culture, England, Fiction, Literature, London, Publishing, Sherlock Holmes

The twelve stories that make up The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes were originally serialised between July 1891 and June 1892, and included cases such as “A Scandal in Bohemia,” and “The Adventure of the Speckled Band.”

• Podcast

22nd September 1888: First edition of National Geographic Magazine published

• 22nd September 2025
• Tagged as: Culture, Geography, Literature, Magazine, Publishing, Science

The first edition of the National Geographic Magazine was published by the National Geographic Society.

• Podcast

21st September 1937: J. R. R. Tolkien’s fantasy novel The Hobbit first published in the United Kingdom

• 21st September 2025
• Tagged as: Art, Author, Britain, Culture, Fiction, Literature, Lord of the Rings, Mythology, Novel, Publishing, Tolkien

The initial run of 1,500 copies of The Hobbit sold out within three months, and further runs proved similarly popular prompting Tolkien to write the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

• Podcast

4th July 1862: Charles Dodgson (aka Lewis Carroll) first tells the story of Alice in Wonderland

• 4th July 2025
• Tagged as: Books, Culture, England, Literature, Mathematics, Novel, Oxford, Printing

Charles Dodgson, better known as the author Lewis Carroll, told a story to the sisters Alice, Lorina and Edith Liddell that was to develop into Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

• Podcast

18th February 1885: Mark Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” published in the United States

• 18th February 2025
• Tagged as: African-American, America, American Civil War, Antebellum, Books, Culture, Fiction, Literature, Novel, Slavery, United States

Samuel Langhorne Clemens, under his pen-name Mark Twain, had previously published the novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in which the character of Huckleberry “Huck” Finn is introduced for the first time.

• Podcast

23rd December 1823: The poem A Visit from St Nicholas, better known as The Night Before Christmas, published anonymously in the Troy Sentinel

• 23rd December 2024
• Tagged as: America, Christmas, Culture, Literature, Poetry, Santa Claus, United States, USA

The poem is significant for being the first source to give the names of Santa’s reindeer, as well as establishing the image of the jolly fat Santa that we know today.

• Podcast

19th October 1953: Ray Bradbury’s dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 first published

• 19th October 2023
• Tagged as: America, Books, Censorship, Culture, Literature, Publishing, United States, USA

Set in the distant future where books are outlawed, the story focuses on Guy Montag whose job as a fireman sees him burn houses that are found to contain books.

• Podcast

26th May 1897: Bram Stoker’s Gothic horror novel Dracula first published

• 26th May 2022
• Tagged as: Books, Bram Stoker, Culture, Dracula, Literature, Romania, Vampire

Although not the first ever vampire novel, Dracula was enormously influential in defining modern ideas of vampires, and for forever associating them with Romania.

• Podcast

21st December 1913: First modern crossword puzzle printed

• 21st December 2021
• Tagged as: America, Culture, Game, Literature, New York, Newspaper, USA

On the 21^st December 1913, the first modern crossword puzzle was printed in the New York World newspaper.