Periods of English Literature (Anglo SaxonPostmodern) Anglo Saxon Period (4501066) Literature Arena • Angles, Saxons and Jutes were prominent tribes • Angla- land converted into England Historical Background • The invasion of Celtic England by Germanic tribes • The culture and forming of borders was developed • Religious evolution by Christian missionaries (Columba, Aidan, Finan and Colman) • Paganism swept away and replaced by New Testament religion • Ethelbert, the King of Kent, is the first English king to convert to Christianity • The Battle of Hastings: The conquest of England, by the Norman-French William the Conqueror in 1066 ended Saxon rule. 2 Literature Arena Prominent Focus 1 Genre/Style • Poetry (Epic and Elegiac) • German heroes • Prose • Positive and negative aspects of life • Metaphorical and alliterative • Religious messages • Handed down orally from one generation to another • Latin used in schools and churches • Paraphrasing of Biblical texts 2 Literary Works • Beowulf (Epic) • The Wanderer (Elegiac) • Writings of Alfred the Great • Caedmon's Hymn. • Monk Venerable Bede's the Ecclesiastical History of the English People • Exeter Book (collection of religious poems) 3 Literature Arena Middle English Period (1066-1500) (Norman Conquest, Age of Chaucer and Baron Age) . Historical Background • Founding of the universities of Oxford and Cambridge • King John signed the Magna Carta in 1215 • English replaces Latin in school instruction around 1350 (except at Cambridge and Oxford) • Hundred Years War (1337-1453) • The Black Death kills 1/3 of the population (1348) • Peasant Revolt or wat Tyler's Rebellion (1381) • Fall of Constantinople (1453) • First English printing press in 1476 • Wars of Roses (Between house of Lancaster and York’s) • Columbus travels to America in 1492 4 Literature Arena Prominent Focus • Arthurian/Chivalry • Secular and religious themes • Appeal to popular audience • Mystery and morality Genre/ Style • Legends • Ballads • Songs • Drama • Elegy • Devotional books • Allegories • Biblical translations Literary works • King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table • Wycliffe Bible • Piers the plowman • Sir Gawain and the Green Knight • Malory's Morte D'Arthur • Chaucer's Canterbury Tales • Everyman 5 Historical Background Literature Arena English Renaissanc e (15001660) • Henry VIII becomes king • Increase in publishing ventures • English Church breaks away from Roman Catholicism under Henry VIII • More than 10,000 words added • Martin Luther posted his Ninety-Five Theses (1517) • Civil war (1642-60) Eras: The Tudors; the Elizabethan Age; Jacobean Age; Caroline Age; Puritan Interregnum) ( . Prominent Focus • Humanism stressed • Theatre re-emerges • Violence shown on stage, which eventually led to the closing of the theatre • Some poems intended to be set to music • Religious focus • Focus on chastity and housewifery 6 Literature Arena Genre/Style • Poetry • Drama • Epic • Sonnets (Delia, Idea, Diana, Astrophel and Stella) • Non-fiction prose • Translations • Lyrical style • Elegy • Tragedy - Comedy (Gorboduc & Ralph Royster Doyster) • Pastoral • Blank verse • Revenge Tragedies (Webster, Kyd) Literary Works • King James Bible (1611) • University Wits works • Ben Jonson's works • Marlowe's Doctor Faustus • Philip Sydney's Astrophel and Stella • Tottels miscellany (1557) • Shakespeare's Hamlet and Macbeth • Sir Thomas More's Utopia (1516) • Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy (1621) • Poems of Mr. John Milton, both English and Latin • Metaphysical and Cavalier poets • Edmund Spenser's the Faerie Queene • Bacon's Essays • Holinshed chronicle 7 Literature Arena Neoclassical Period (16601798) (Eras: Restoration Age; Augustan Age; the Age of Sensibility) Historical Background Charles II is crowned • Puritan ban on theatres was lifted • 1665-66 Great plague • 1666 great fire of London • 1678-81 popish plot Titus Oates • 1688 glorious revolution also named bloodless revolution • The flourishing of art and architecture • England and Scotland became Great Britain in 1707 • America declares independence from Britain on July 4, 1776 • 8 Literature Arena Prominent Focus • Aristocracy • Life in the court • Social needs outweigh individual needs • Themes of restraint and order Genre/Style • Drama • Novels • Poetry • Prose • Diaries • Essays • Letters • Satire • Wit • Classic style • Heroic couplet 9 Literature Arena Literary Works • John Milton's Paradise Lost • Diary of Samuel Pepys • John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress • Isaac Newton's Principles of Mathematics • Congreve’s The Way of the World • Swift's Gulliver's Travels • Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe • Joseph Addison- prose The Romantic Period (1798-1837) Historical Background • Britain goes to war with France • Slave trade is abolished in Britain in 1807 • Reform of Britain's social security • Poor Law of 1834 • Revolt against aristocracy 10 Literature Arena Prominent Focus • Focus on emotions, adventure, and imagination • Rejection of the emphasis on logic and reason of the Enlightenment • Gain insight into the divine through nature • Importance of personal experiences and individuality • Escape from reality • Art to be enjoyed by all Genre/Style • Poetry • Novel • Gothic novel: romance, the supernatural, and terror • Prose • Drama Literary Works • Mary Shelley (Frankenstein) • Poetry of Burns, Blake, Coleridge, Lord Byron, Shelley, and Keats • Novels by Jane Austin, Sir Walter Scott, and Ann Radcliffe • Wordsworth's lyrical ballad • Lamb, Hazzlit and De Quincey's Essays 11 Literature Arena Victorian Age (18371901) Historical Background • The Great Reform act 1832 • The Great exhibition of London 1851 • Technology and Innovation • Industrial Revolution Prominent Focus • Aestheticism • Positivism • Faith on progress • Optimist • Moralism • Utilitarianism • Intellectual development • Class based society 12 Literature Arena Genre/style Poetry • Novel • Drama • Non-fiction • Gothic and supernatural literature • Children’s literature • Autobiography • Essay • Art and Literary criticism • Literary works • Publication of Darwin's Origin of species (1859) • Poetry of Tennyson, Browning, Arnold • Novels of Dickens, Thackeray, Bronte sisters, George Eliot, Thomas Hardy and Henry James • Carlyle's Sartor Resartus (1836) • Macaulay's Minute • Arnold's Culture and Anarchy 13 Literature Arena Modern Age (1901-1945) Historical Background • Two world wars (1914-18 &1939-45) • Great Depression (1929-39) • Einstein Unveils the theory of special relativity (1905) • Easter rising in Dublin (1916) • Saffrogate movement (1920) 14 Literature Arena • Breakdown of social norms and cultural traditions • Stream of consciousness • Dislocation of meaning and sense from its normal context • Disillusionment • Open ended • Free Verse • Discontinuous narrative • Juxtaposition Intertextuality • Classical allusions • Borrowing from different cultures and languages • Unconventional use of metaphors • Fragmentation • Literary movements (Dadaism, Surrealism, Expressionism, Imagism etc.) Characteristics of Modernism Literature Arena Literary works Genre/Style • Poetry • Novel • Drama • Essay writing • Travelogues • Criticism • Novels of Conrad, Wells, E.M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, D.H. Lawrence, Aldous Huxley, Somerset Maugham and Graham Greene) • Poetry of War, W.B Yeats, Kipling, Ezra pound, T.S. Eliot and W.H. Auden • Plays of Galsworthy, Bennet, G.B Shaw, Synge and Eliot • Room of one's own by Woolf • Aspects of Novel by Forster • Traditional and Individual Talent by Eliot Literature Arena Postmodern Age (1945- to present time) Historical Background • Labour Government (1945) • Indian Independence • US Launches First Satellite (1958) • Cold war ends in 1992 • England loose colonies 17 Literature Arena Characteristics of Postmodernism • Irony, playfulness and black humor • Pastiche • Intertextuality • Temporal distortion • Technoculture and hypperreality • Paranoia • Maximalism • Minimalism • Magical realism • Absurdism 18 Literature Arena Literary works • Animal farm by George Orwell • Lord of the flies by William Golding • A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess • The loneliness of the Long distance Runner by Allan sillitoe • Prime of Miss Jean broodie by Muriel sparks • Plays of Beckett, Pinter, Stoppard, wesker and John Osborne • Possesion by A.S Byatt • Hilary mantel, Ian McEwan, Angela Carter John fowles and Malcolm Bradbury 19 Literature Arena Akash bure 7774987602 t.me/literaturearena 20
