History of English Literature

From Beowulf to Dickens

Course of Action

• Lessons • Lectures • Close reading of literary works • Creative exercises

• Examination • Group discussion • Multiple Choice Test

Jeff Buck’s Modern Bridge, Old Gatehouse at Beeston Castle at www.geograph.com. CC BY-SA 2.0

Literature PeriodsOld English Literature 450-1150 Middle English Literature 1150-1500 The Renaissance 1500-1650 The Restoration Period 1650-1789 The Romantic Period 1789-1837 The Victorian Age 1837-1901

…Modernism and Post Modernism will be covered in English 7

Image: Public Domain

Old English 450-1150Not accessible to us

Old English – BeowulfFirst English masterpiece

Beowulf is both the first English literary masterpiece and one of the earliest European Epics written in a language that wasn’t Latin. Only one single copy of it has been found.

Rythm & Alliteration Beowulf was probably composed – not written – during the 8th century. People retold the story to each other through generations. Beowulf uses two techniques to make it easier to remember – Rhythm and Alliteration. Scholars believe it was written down sometime during the 11th century.

The plot The poem, set in Scandinavia, sometime during the 4th century, tells the story of a Geat hero saving people from a man-eating monster and a fire spitting dragon

Public domain

Old English – BeowulfÐa wæs on burgum Beowulf Scyldinga,

leof leodcyning, longe þrage folcum gefræge fæder ellor hwearf, aldor of earde, oþþæt him eft onwoc heah Healfdene; heold þenden lifde,

gamol ond guðreouw, glæde Scyldingas. ðæm feower bearn forð gerimed

Now Beowulf bode in the burg of the Scyldings, leader beloved, and long he ruled

in fame with all folk, since his father had gone away from the world, till awoke an heir,

haughty Healfdene, who held through life, sage and sturdy, the Scyldings glad.

Then, one after one, there woke to him,

Old English is difficult to understand because it has different:

Letters Grammar Spelling Vocabulary Pronunciation

Middle English 1150-1500 The Age of Chaucer

Image: Public domain:

Middle English – The Canterbury Tales By Geoffrey Chaucer

Whan that Aprill, with his shoures sooteThe droghte of March hath perced to the rooteAnd bathed every veyne in swich licour,Of which vertu engendred is the flour;Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breethInspired hath in every holt and heethThe tendre croppes, and the yonge sonneHath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,And smale foweles maken melodye, (That slepen al the nyght with open eye)So priketh hem Nature in hir corages Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes…

…And palmers to be seeking foreign strands, To distant shrines renowned in sundry lands. And then from every English countryside Especially to Canterbury they ride, There to the holy sainted martyr kneeling That in their sickness sent them help and healing. Now in that season it befell one day In Southwark at the Tabard as I lay, Ready upon my pilgrimage to start Toward Canterbury, reverent of heart, There came at night into that hostelry Full nine and twenty in a company, People of all kinds that had chanced to fall In fellowship, and they were pilgrims all Riding to Canterbury.

The Renaissance 1500-1650Rebirth – Old classics were rediscovered

By David Stanley from Nanaimo, Canada (Shakespeare`s Globe Theatre Uploaded by russavia) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The Renaissance – SonnetsSonnet 18

by William Shakespeare !

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimm’d; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st, Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st; So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Rhyme schemea b a b c d c d e f e f g g

14 lines

Metrical line is iambic pentameter

Unstressed syllable followed by a stressed

Each line has five iambs

Use of similees

The Renaissance – SonnetsSonnet 18

by William Shakespeare !

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimm’d; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st, Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st; So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Summary by schmoop.com

!The speaker begins by asking whether he should or will compare "thee" to a summer day. He says that his beloved is more lovely and more even-tempered. He then runs off a list of reasons why summer isn’t all that great: winds shake the buds that emerged in Spring, summer ends too quickly, and the sun can get too hot or be obscured by clouds. He goes on, saying that everything beautiful eventually fades by chance or by nature’s inevitable changes. Coming back to the beloved, though, he argues that his or her summer (or happy, beautiful years) won’t go away, nor will his or her beauty fade away. Moreover, death will never be able to take the beloved, since the beloved exists in eternal lines (meaning poetry). The speaker concludes that as long as humans exist and can see, the poem he’s writing will live on, allowing the beloved to keep living as well.

Sonnet exerciseIn groups of four, create a sonnet on the theme of today’s love

By le vent le cri (Love you!) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The Renaissance – Drama

From religious and moral problems to tragedies and comedies with personal dilemmas

From travelling companies to playhouses

Men only

William Shakespeare 1564-1616Public domain

Romeo and Juliet – The Balcony Scene

Pair up with a friend and read the dialogue

Watch the clip

Act it out

Public domain

The Restoration Period – 1650-1789Monarchy restored after civil war

By John Barker [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The Restoration Period

Age of Reason

Age of Satire

Age of Poetry

A Modest Proposal

!

What does Swift propose?

What problem does Swift seek to solve?

Who are Swift’s real targets?

Jonathan Swift 1667-1745Public domain

Satire ExerciseIn pairs, find a target or a problem of today and propose a satirical solution

Public domain

The Romantic Period 1789-1837The Age of Revolution

Eugène Delacroix [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The Romantic Period

Caspar David Friedrich [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Freedom and Equality The political revolutions in America and France motivated young poets to revolt against social norms of the age of reason. Inspired by the calls for freedom and equality, they emphasized strong emotions, rather than being rational.

Escape from reality People tried to escape the restrictions from population growth, extended urbanization and industrialism made people yearn for something else.

Style • Use of everyday language • Imagination essential • Overflowing emotions common • Inspired by untamed nature & the exotic far

east • Folk traditions & medieval tales of knights • Gothic novels

The Romantic Period – The Gothic Novel

Focused a lot on the grotesque, occult, supernatural or human psychology

Medieval association

Edgar Allan Poe wrote gothic mystery and detective fiction

William Wordsworth wrote gothic poetry for the masses.

Av Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (Google books) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Exercise Read ”Understanding the Gothic

Style” and do the exercise on finding enticing phrases which

will thrill the reader

The RavenWhat is the poem about?

What possible themes can you detect?

During the course of The Raven, what changes occur in the narrator's attitude towards the bird?

How does the narrator's emotional state change during the poem?

Do you think the speaker is insane? Why, or why not?

Is it a representative poem for the Romantic Period? Why, or why not?

Av w:Gustave Dore (The Raven) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The Victorian Age 1837-1901The Age of Faith and Doubt

Elihu Vedder [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The Victorian Age

Transition period The Victorian age is a transition period between the old and the modern art styles. The period is also a cultural and social conversion era as mankind went from the old way of living to the modern way of life.

A period of peace and prosperity The period of relative peace in Europe (Pax Britannica 1815-1914) and being leaders of world trade led to that The British Empire was the dominant force of the world and boosted the nation’s confidence and pride.

Style • Poetry: Melancholic and political • Novels: Realistic, simple language & happy

endings • Children’s literature • Science & discovery

How to read a poem

Follow your ears

Become an archaeologist

Do not skim

Be patient

Look who’s talking