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The American Revolution
The American Revolution was a political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break from the British Empire, combining to become the United States of America. They first rejected the authority of the Parliament of Great Britain to govern them from overseas without representation, and then expelled all royal officials. -
William Blake publishes Songs of Innocence
Songs of Innocence was the first of Blake’s illuminated
books published in 1789. The poems and artwork were
reproduced by copperplate engraving and colored with
washes by hand. In 1794 he expanded the book to include
Songs of Experience. -
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The French Revolution
The French Revolution was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France that had a lasting impact on French history and more broadly throughout the world. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed within three years. -
Mary Wollstonecraft critiques female educational restrictions in A Vindication of the Rights of Women
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects (1792), written by the 18th-century British feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, is one of the earliest works of feminist philosophy. In it, Wollstonecraft responds to those educational and political theorists of the 18th century who did not believe women should have an education. She argues that women ought to have an education commensurate with their position in society, claiming that women are essential to the nati -
Charles and Mary Lamb publish Tales from Shakespeare
Tales from Shakespeare is an English children's book written by Charles Lamb with his sister Mary Lamb in 1807.
The book reduced the archaic English and complicated storyline of Shakespeare to a simple level that children could read and comprehend. -
English artisans called Luddites riot and destroy textile machines, fearing that industrialism threatens their livelihoods
The movement emerged during the harsh economic climate of the Napoleonic Wars, which saw a rise in difficult working conditions in the new textile factories. The principal objection of the Luddites was the introduction of new wide-framed automated looms that could be operated by cheaper, relatively low-to-unskilled labour, resulting in unemployment among the skilled textile workers. The movement began in Nottingham in 1811 and spread rapidly throughout England over the following two years. -
Brother’s Grimm begin to publish Grimm’s Fairytales
Children's and Household Tales is a collection of German fairy tales first published in 1812 by the Grimm brothers, Jacob and Wilhelm. The collection is commonly known in the Anglosphere as Grimm's Fairy Tales.The first volume of the first edition was published, containing 86 stories; the second volume of 70 stories followed in 1814. -
United States declares war on Great Britian
The War of 1812 was a 32-month military conflict between the United States and the British Empire.The United States declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions brought about by Britain's ongoing war with France, the impressment of American merchant sailors into the Royal Navy, British support of American Indian tribes against American expansion, outrage over insults to national honor after humiliations on the high seas, and possible American interest in annexing Canada -
Jane Austen publishes Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice is a novel by Jane Austen, first published in 1813. The story follows the main character Elizabeth Bennet as she deals with issues of manners, upbringing, morality, education, and marriage in the society of the landed gentry of early 19th-century England. Elizabeth is the second of five daughters of a country gentleman living near the fictional town of Meryton in Hertfordshire, near London. -
Mary Shelley, daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft, publishes Frankenstein
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel written by Mary Shelley about a creature produced by an unorthodox scientific experiment. Shelley started writing the story when she was nineteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first edition was published anonymously in London in 1818. Shelley had travelled in the region of Geneva,where much of the story takes place. -
One of a series of ineffective Factory Acts prohibits employment of children under nine
Cotton Mills and Factories Act prohibited children under the age of nine years from working in cotton mills, and restricted those over the age of nine to a 12 hour day. Enforcement was in the hands of local magistrates. The act owed much to the efforts of Robert Owen. -
Noah Webster publishes An American Dictionary of the English Language
Noah Webster, the Father of American Christian education, wrote the first American dictionary and established a system of rules to govern spelling, grammar, and reading. This master linguist understood the power of words, their definitions, and the need for precise word usage in communication to maintain independence. Webster used the Bible as the foundation for his definitions. -
Charles Darwin serves as naturalist on HMS Beagle during expedition along the coast of South America
The young graduate Charles Darwin had hoped to see the tropics before becoming a parson, and accepted the opportunity. By the end of the expedition he had already made his name as a geologist and fossil collector, and the publication of his journal which became known as The Voyage of the Beagle gave him wide renown as a writer. -
Victor Hugo publishes The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Victor Hugo began writing The Hunchback of Notre-Dame in 1829. The agreement with his original publisher, Gosselin, was that the book would be finished that same year, but Hugo was constantly delayed due to the demands of other projects. In the summer of 1830 Gosselin demanded that Hugo complete the book by February 1831. Beginning in September 1830, Hugo worked nonstop on the project thereafter. The book was finished six months later. -
Slavery is abolished in British Empire
The Slavery Abolition Act 1833 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom abolishing slavery throughout the British Empire (with the exceptions "of the Territories in the Possession of the East India Company," the "Island of Ceylon," and "the Island of Saint Helena", which exceptions were eliminated in 1843). The Act was repealed in 1998 as part of a wider rationalisation of English statute law, but later anti-slavery legislation remains in force.
