See also: 1887 in literature, other events of 1888, 1889 in literature, list of years in literature.

Events

New books

• Adrift In The Pacific - Jules Verne
• Aspern papers - Henry James
• L'Aveu, drame en un acte en prose - Sarah Bernhardt
• The Boyhood of Christ - Lew Wallace
• Confessions of a Young Man - George A. Moore
• The Devil's Die - Grant Allen
• The Fatal Three - Mary Elizabeth Braddon
• John Marr and Other Sailors - Herman Melville
• Looking Backward - Edward Bellamy
• Maiwa's Revenge - H. Rider Haggard
• Master of Ballantrae - Robert Louis Stevenson
• Princess Casamassima - Henry James
• Robbery Under Arms - Rolf Boldrewood
• Robert Elsmere - Mary Augusta Ward
• Spring Days--A Prelude to Don Juan - George A. Moore
• The White Man's Foot - Grant Allen
• A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder - James De Mille
• The Secret Doctrine - Helena Blavatsky

Births

• January 24 - Vicki Baum, writer
• April 26 - Anita Loos, novelist, screenwriter
• October 14 - Katherine Mansfield short story writer
• October 16 - Eugene O'Neill, playwright
• July 23 - Raymond Chandler, novelist, screenwriter
• Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, Australian illustrator
• Fernando Pessoa, Portuguese writer

Deaths

• March 6 - Louisa May Alcott, American novelist
• April 15 - Matthew Arnold, poet
• May 12 - Edward Lear, poet
• August 9 - Charles Cros, French poet
• August 20 - Henry Richard, political writer
• September 24 - Karl von Prantl, philosopher
• December 8 - Frederick Apthorp Paley, scholar
• December 23 - Laurence Oliphant, travel writer

Awards