A Web Site for Mrs. Adams' English Classes
| Studyguide.org |
A Web Site for Mrs. Adams' English Classes | |||||||
|
|
|
||||||
| Homepage | |
|||||||
British Literature through Time
Click one of the links below to go directly to literary time period information.
| Anglo-Saxon Period | Neoclassical/Restoration | Modern/Post-Modern |
| Medieval Period | Romantic | Contemporary |
| Renaissance | Victorian |
Old
English/Anglo-Saxon Period
Content:
Ø
strong
belief in fate
Ø
juxtaposition
of church and pagan worlds
Ø
admiration
of heroic warriors who prevail in battle
Ø
express
religious faith and give moral instruction through literature
Style/Genres:
Ø
oral
tradition of literature
Ø
poetry
dominant genre
Ø
unique
verse form
·
caesura
·
alliteration
·
repetition
·
4
beat rhythm
Effect:
Ø
Christianity
helps literacy to spread
Ø
introduces
Roman alphabet to Britain
Ø
oral
tradition helps unite diverse peoples and their myths
Historical Context:
Ø
life
centered around ancestral tribes or clans that ruled themselves
Ø
at
first the people were warriors from invading outlying areas: Angles, Saxons,
Jutes, and Danes
Ø
later
they were agricultural
Key Literature/Authors:
Ø
Beowulf
Ø
Bede
Ø
Exeter
Book
(The Medieval Period)
Content:
Ø
plays that
instruct the illiterate masses in morals and religioun
Ø chivalric code of honor
>
romances
Ø religious devotion
Style/Genres:
Ø
oral
tradition continues
Ø
folk
ballads
Ø
mystery
and miracle plays
Ø
morality
plays
Ø
stock
epithets
Ø
kennings
> frame stories
> moral tales
Effect:
Ø
church
instructs its people through the morality and miracle plays
Ø
an
illiterate population is able to hear and see the literature
Historical Context:
Ø
Crusades
bring the development of a money economy for the first time in Britain
Ø
trading
increases dramatically as a result of the Crusades
Ø
William
the Conqueror crowned king in 1066
Ø
Henry
III crowned king in 1154 brings a judicial system, royal courts, juries, and
chivalry to Britain
Key Literature/Authors:
Ø
Domesday
Book
Ø
L’Morte
de Arthur
Ø
Geoffrey
Chaucer
Content:
Ø
world
view shifts from religion and after life to one stressing the
human life on earth
Ø
popular
theme: development of human potential
Ø
popular
theme: many aspects of love explored
Ø
unrequited
love
Ø
constant
love
Ø
timeless
love
Ø
courtly
love
Ø
love
subject to change
Style/Genres:
Ø
poetry
o
sonnet
Ø
drama
o
written in
verse
o
supported
by royalty
o
tragedies,
comedies, histories
Ø
metaphysical
poetry
o
elaborate
and unexpected metaphors called conceits
Effect:
commoners welcomed at some play productions (like ones at the Globe) while conservatives try to close the theaters on grounds that they promote brazen behaviors
not all middle-class embrace the metaphysical poets and their abstract conceits
Historical
Context:
Ø
War
of Roses ends in 1485 and political stability arrives
Ø
Printing
press helps stabilize English as a language and allows more people to read a
variety of literature
Ø
Economy
changes from farm-based to one of international trade
Key Literature/Authors:
* William
Shakespeare
*Cavalier Poets
* Metaphysical Poets
* Andrew Marvell
|
Neoclassical
Period |
Years: 1660-1798
|
|
Content: Ø
emphasis
on reason and logic Ø
stresses
harmony, stability, wisdom Ø
Locke:
a social contract exists between the government and the people. The
government governs guaranteeing “natural rights” of life, liberty, and
property Style/Genres: Ø
satire:
uses irony and exaggeration to poke fun at
human faults and foolishness
in order to Ø
poetry Ø
essays Ø
letters,
diaries, biographies Ø
novels
* belief that man is
basically evil
* approach to life:
“the world as it should be” Historical
Context: Ø
50%
of the men are functionally literate (a dramatic rise) Ø
Fenced
enclosures of land cause demise of traditional village life Ø
Factories
begin to spring up as industrial revolution begins Ø
Impoverished
masses begin to grow as farming life declines and factories build Ø
Coffee
houses—where educated men spend evenings with literary and political
associates Key
Literature/Authors:
|
Content:
*human
knowledge consists of impressions and
ideas formed in the individual’s
mind
* introduction
of gothic elements and
terror/horror stories and novels
* in
nature one can find comfort and peace that the man-made urbanized towns and
factory environments cannot offer
Style/Genres:
*poetry
* lyrical ballads
Effects:
* evil
attributed to society not to human
nature
* human
beings are basically good
* movement of protest:
a desire for personal freedom
* children seen as
hapless victims of poverty and
exploitation
Historical
Context:
* Napoleon rises to power in France and opposes England
militarily and economically
* gas lamps developed
* Tory philosophy that government should NOT
interfere with private enterprise
* middle class gains
representation in the British parliament
* Railroads begin to run
Key
Literature/Authors:
* Novelists: Jane Austen, Mary Shelley
* Poets: Robert Burns,
William Blake, William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lord Byron, Percy
Shelley, John Keats,
Content:
*
conflict between those in power and the common masses of laborers and the poor
*shocking life of
sweatshops and urban poor is highlighted in literature to insist on reform
* sexual
discretion (or lack of it)
* romantic
triangles
* heroines in
physical danger
* aristocratic
villains
* misdirected
letters
* bigamous
marriages
Genres/Styles:
*novel
becomes
popular for first time; mass produced for the first time
*bildungsroman: “coming of age”
* political novels
* detective
novels: (Sherlock Holmes)
*
serialized novels
* elegies
* poetry: easier to understand
* drama:
comedies of manners
* magazines
offer stories to the masses
Effect:
*
literature begins to reach the masses
Historical Context:
*
paper becomes cheap; magazines and novels cheap to mass produce
* unparalleled
dominance of nations, economies and
trade abroad
Key Literature/Authors:
* Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy , Rudyard Kipling, Robert Louis Stevenson,Modern/Post
Modern Period of Literature
Years: 1900-1980
Content:
*lonely
individual fighting to find peace and comfort in a world that has lost its
absolute values and traditions
* a belief in situational ethics—no
absolute values. Decisions are based on the situation one is involved in at the
moment
* loss of the hero in
literature
* destruction made
possible by technology
Genres/Styles:
* poetry: free verse
* epiphanies begin to appear
in literature
Ø
stream
of consciousness
Ø detached, unemotional, humorless
Ø present tense
Ø
magic
realism
Effect:
*an
approach to life: “Seize life for the moment and get all you can out of it.”
Historical
Context:
*British Empire loses 1 million soldiers to World War
I
* Winston Churchill leads Britain through WW
II, and the Germans bomb England directly
* British
colonies demand independence
1980-Present
Content:
*
concern with connections between
people
* open-mindedness and
courage that comes from being an outsider
* escaping those ways of
living that blind and dull the human spirit
Genres/Styles:
* all genres represented
* fictional confessional/diaries
*humorous irony
*storytelling emphasized
*autobiographical essays
* mixing of fantasy with
nonfiction; blurs lines of reality for reader
Effect:
* too soon to tell
Historical Context:
* a world growing smaller due to ease of
communications between societies
* a world launching a new beginning of a
century and a millennium
* media culture interprets values and events
for individuals
Key Literature/Authors:
Seamus Heaney, Doris Lessing, Louis de Bernieres, Kazuo Ishiguro, Tom Stoppard, Salman Rushdie. John Le Carre, Ken Follett
The material on this page was developed by Cindy Adams for use with her high school English classes. May be reproduced for face-to-face instruction. Copyright 2002. Sources consulted in the development of the timeline: ELEMENTS OF LITERATURE, Sixth Course,2001, produced by HRW and THE LANGUAGE OF LITERATURE: BRITSH LITERATURE, 2000, produced by McDougal Littell.
visitors have accessed this page since June 6, 2002
Questions? Email: adams@studyguide.org