1585 in literature encompasses significant developments and events within the literary landscape of the [[Elizabethan era|Elizabethan]] England and the broader European [[Renaissance]]. While this year did not see the publication of many of the most famous canonical works of the era (which were often circulating in manuscript form or published later), it was a period of active intellectual and artistic exchange, marked by notable births and deaths of literary figures.
Events
- Giordano Bruno spent much of his time in England (1583-1585), where he published several influential philosophical dialogues in Italian. Works like [[Cena de le Ceneri]] (The Ash Wednesday Supper) and [[De la Causa, Principio et Uno]] (On Cause, Principle, and Unity) were published around this period. These treatises, while primarily philosophical, represent significant contributions to intellectual prose and thought during the Renaissance.
- The [[Elizabethan theatre]] continued to thrive, with various acting companies performing new plays across London. However, no specific major play premieres from 1585 are widely documented as being of canonical literary significance that year.
- This period also saw the ongoing circulation of significant manuscript works by authors such as [[Sir Philip Sidney]] (e.g., [[Astrophil and Stella]] and [[Arcadia]]), which would later be formally published.
New Books
- Giordano Bruno: Cena de le Ceneri (The Ash Wednesday Supper) and De la Causa, Principio et Uno (On Cause, Principle and One), though written in Italian, were published in London and contributed to the intellectual discourse in England.
Births
- December 12 – [[William Drummond of Hawthornden]], Scottish poet (died 1649)
Deaths
- December 27 – [[Pierre de Ronsard]], French poet, a leading figure of the [[La Pléiade|Pléiade]] group and one of the most important poets of the French Renaissance (born 1525)