This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1678.
Events
February – English dramatist Thomas Otway, perhaps escaping from an unhappy love affair with his leading actress, obtains a commission in an English regiment serving in the Franco-Dutch War and is sent in July to Flanders.
Probable date – Richard Flecknoe English dramatist and poet (born c. 1600)
References
^"The copy for the first edition of the First Part of The Pilgrim's Progress was entered in the Stationers' Register on 22 December 1677 ... The book was licensed and entered in the Term Catalogue for the following Hilary Term, 18 February 1678; this date would customarily indicate the time of publication, or only slightly precede it" [John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress, James Blanton Wharey and Roger Sharrock, eds., Second Edition, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1960), xxi].