Literary Periods
The Story of the Word
Literary Periods
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As with visual arts and fashion, it is
possible to divide literature into
definitive historical periods.
The authors and works that are
mentioned in this lecture are the
most well-known and representative
exemplars for the literary period.
Caveats. . .
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This lecture deals with prose only, although
poetry generally follows the same pattern.
We only understand what defines a literary
period after it ends.
The years given are approximate. Literary
periods overlap each other.
This is an examination of Western
hemisphere literature only. African, Middle
Eastern and Asian literature do not follow
the same pattern.
The Ancient Greeks~600-200 BCE
“The gods must be crazy” The Epic
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The language was ancient Greek
long narrative poems
has a central hero who is important
consists of a series of episodes
setting is vast
deeds of great valor and courage are
done
supernatural forces (the gods)
intervene on behalf of their favorites
most famous: The Odyssey by Homer
Excerpt from Homer’s
The Odyssey
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Tell me, O muse, of that ingenious hero
who travelled far and wide after he had
sacked the famous town of Troy. Many
cities did he visit, and many were the
nations with whose manners and customs
he was acquainted; moreover he suffered
much by sea while trying to save his own
life and bring his men safely home; but do
what he might he could not save his men,
for they perished through their own sheer
folly in eating the cattle of the Sun-god
Hyperion; so the god prevented them from
ever reaching home. Tell me, too, about all
these things, O daughter of Jove, from
whatsoever source you may know them.
The Ancient Greeks:
Drama
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tragedies and comedies
unification of setting~one time and
one place
a chorus (choragos) that represents
the people and comments on the
action
male actors wore masks, robes &
platforms
Most famous: Oedipus Rex by
Sophocles
Excerpt from Sophocles’
Oedipus Rex
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OEDIPUS My children, latest born to Cadmus old,
Why sit ye here as suppliants, in your hands
Branches of olive filleted with wool?
What means this reek of incense everywhere,
And everywhere laments and litanies?
Children, it were not meet that I should learn
From others, and am hither come, myself,
I Oedipus, your world-renowned king.
Ho! aged sire, whose venerable locks
Proclaim thee spokesman of this company,
Explain your mood and purport. Is it dread
Of ill that moves you or a boon ye crave?
My zeal in your behalf ye cannot doubt;
Ruthless indeed were I and obdurate
If such petitioners as you I spurned.
The Romans~200 BCE to 500 AD
“Divide & Conquer”
Oratory & Satire
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The language was Latin
too busy building the Republic/Empire
so continued Greek literary styles.
A new emphasis on:
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Oratories ~ public speeches
Satires ~ derogatory arguments
both were intended to influence the
populace
Most famous: Virgil’s Aeneid (an epic)
Excerpt from Virgil’s The Aeneid
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Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc'd by fate,
And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate,
Expell'd and exil'd, left the Trojan shore.
Long labors, both by sea and land, he bore,
And in the doubtful war, before he won
The Latian realm, and built the destin'd town;
His banish'd gods restor'd to rites divine,
And settled sure succession in his line,
From whence the race of Alban fathers come,
And the long glories of majestic Rome.
O Muse! the causes and the crimes relate;
What goddess was provok'd, and whence her hate;
For what offense the Queen of Heav'n began
To persecute so brave, so just a man;
Involv'd his anxious life in endless cares,
Expos'd to wants, and hurried into wars!
The Middle Ages~500 AD to 1400
“In God we trust.” Dramas and romances
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written in Old English or French
Mystery Plays
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based on Old and New Testament stories
Morality Plays
 allegorical struggle between good and evil
 “characters” are personified human traits: Vanity,
Shame, Mercy, Conscience, etc.
 the protagonist represents humanity
The Romance
 tales of adventure~knights and ladies
 codes of chivalry and honor determine behavior
 love is always involved
 Most famous: “Sir Gawain & the Green Knight”
“Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”
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SIÞEN þe sege and þe assaut watz sesed at Troye,
Þe bor brittened and brent to bronde and askez,
Þe tulk þat þe trammes of tresoun þer wro t
Watz tried for his tricherie, þe trewest on erthe:
Hit watz Ennias þe athel, and his highe kynde,
Þat siþen depreced prouinces, and patrounes bicome
Welne e of al þe wele in þe west iles.
The siege and assault having ceased at Troy
as its blazing battlements blackened to ash,
the man who had planned and plotted that treason
had trial enough for the truest traitor!
Then Aeneas the prince and his honored line
plundered provinces and held in their power
nearly all the wealth of the western isles.
NEW!!!! Transition to the Renaissance:
circa 1400 to 1500: Epics and Short Stories
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Most famous epic: Dante’s Divine
Comedy
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written in Italian
Most famous collection of short
stories: The Canterbury Tales by
Chaucer
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frame is a pilgrimage to Canterbury
characters narrate their own tales
characters are ordinary people in all walks
of life
“The Wife of Bath” is very racy!
The Divine Comedy
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Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.
Ah me! how hard a thing it is to say
What was this forest savage, rough, and stern,
Which in the very thought renews the fear.
So bitter is it, death is little more;
But of the good to treat, which there I found,
Speak will I of the other things I saw there.
I cannot well repeat how there I entered,
So full was I of slumber at the moment
In which I had abandoned the true way.
The Canterbury Tales
in Middle English
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Whan that Aprille, with hise shoures soote,
2 The droghte of March hath perced to the roote
3 And bathed every veyne in swich licour,
4 Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
5 Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breeth
6 Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
7 The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
8 Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,
9 And smale foweles maken melodye,
10 That slepen al the nyght with open eye-
The Canterbury Tales
in modern English
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1 When April with his showers sweet with fruit
2 The drought of March has pierced unto the root
3 And bathed each vein with liquor that has
power
4 To generate therein and sire the flower;
5 When Zephyr also has, with his sweet breath,
6 Quickened again, in every holt and heath,
7 The tender shoots and buds, and the young
sun
8 Into the Ram one half his course has run,
9 And many little birds make melody
10 That sleep through all the night with open eye
The Renaissance
~1500 to 1650 ~
“Eat, drink and be merrie…”
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A “rebirth” of Greek ideas and
culture, especially art and literature
Focus shifts from works of God to
works of man as a being created by
God and given the power to create
A carpe diem attitude toward life
Began with The Divine Comedy
The Renaissance
Drama
The most important work is The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, by William
Shakespeare
Scene 1. Elsinore. A platform before the castle.
FRANCISCO at his post. Enter to him BERNARDO
Bernardo: Who's there?
Francisco: Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold
yourself.
Bernardo: Long live the king!
Francisco: Bernardo?
Bernardo: He.
Francisco: You come most carefully upon your hour.
Bernardo: 'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed,
Francisco.
Francisco: For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter cold,
And I am sick at heart.
Renaissance
Poetry
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The sonnet was the preferred form.
Fourteen lines of iambic rhyme.
Sonnet contests were common.
Italian sonnet rhyme scheme: abba
abba cde cde
Shakespearean rhyme scheme:
abab cdcd efef gg
Renaissance
Poetry
Sonnet 130
By William Shakespeare
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun,
Coral is far more red than her lips red,
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun,
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks,
And in some perfumes is there more delight,
That in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a more pleasing sound,
I grant I never saw a goddess go,
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
The Neoclassical Period
“Cogito, ergo sum”
(The Age of Reason)~1650 to 1800
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The goal was serenity, balance, and
modest common sense
Essays and poems had dialectic
reasoning
Satire and Irony
Deism: the acceptance of God’s
rationally ordered universe.
Most well-known work: Jonathan
Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”
“A Modest Proposal” Jonathan Swift
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”I have been assured by a very
knowing American of my
acquaintance in London, that a
young healthy child well nursed
is at a year old a most delicious,
nourishing, and wholesome
food, whether stewed, roasted,
baked, or boiled ...”
Romanticism ~1800 to 1860
“The hills are alive…”
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Celebrated the individual and equality
Believed in the basic goodness and perfectability of
mankind
Nature is the model for harmony
Imagination is important
Emotion is more powerful than logic, intuition over
thought, the senses over the mind
The “dark side” was Gothic, e.g. Poe
Famous work: “Kubla Khan” by Samuel Taylor
Coleridge
“Kubla Khan”
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And here were gardens bright with sinuous rills
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.
But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
REALISM--1860 to 1920
“Tell it like it is.”
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A faithful reproduction of life
ordinary people in real settings with
common events
Plain style
“Slice of life” stories
Women writers begin to have
credibility
One example: Virginia Woolf’s Mrs.
Dalloway
excerpt from Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia
Woolf
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What a lark! What a plunge! For so it had always
seemed to her, when, with a little squeak of the
hinges, which she could hear now, she had burst open
the French windows and plunged at Bourton into the
open air. How fresh, how calm, stiller than this of
course, the air was in the early morning; like the flap
of a wave; the kiss of a wave; chill and sharp and yet
(for a girl of eighteen as she then was) solemn, feeling
as she did, standing there at the open window, that
something awful was about to happen; looking at the
flowers, at the trees with the smoke winding off them
and the rooks rising, falling; standing and looking until
Peter Walsh said, "Musing among the vegetables?"-was
that it?-"I prefer men to cauliflowers"-was that it?
Modernism--1920 to 1965
“Life sucks, and then you die.”
The past is dead, God is dead.
 All that is left is the “inner person”
who makes his or her own reality
 The unconscious outweighs the
conscious
 Subjectivity (existentialism,
surrealism & nihilism) and stream of
consciousness
 The most famous work is Ulysses,
by James Joyce
Ulysses by James Joyce
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Her secrets: old featherfans, tasselled
dancecards, powdered with musk, a gaud
of amber beads in her locked drawer. A
birdcage hung in the sunny window of her
house when she was a girl. She heard old
Royce sing in the pantomime of Turko the
Terrible and laughed with others when he
sang:
I am the boy That can enjoy Invisibility.
Phantasmal mirth, folded away:
muskperfumed. And no more turn aside
and brood.
Post-Modernism~1965 to ?
“Anything Goes”
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Exploring the dilemma of self and
meaning
An explosion of genres, styles, and
new ways of writing
Brisk plots with lots of action and
less imagery
Multi-cultural and personal
One of my favorite post-modern
books: The Lovely Bones, by Alice
Sebold
The Lovely Bones by Alice
Sebold
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My name was Salmon, like the fish; first
name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was
murdered on December 6, 1973. In
newspaper photos of missing girls from
the seventies, most looked like me: white
girls with mousy brown hair. This was
before kids of all races and genders
started appearing on milk cartons or in
the daily mail. It was still back when
people believed things like that didn't
happen.