BRITISH LITERATURE

PERIODS OF BRITISH LITERATURE

Anglo-saxon Literature
Middle English Literature
The Renaissance and the 17th century
The era of realism and Romanticism (The 18th century)
The late Victorian Piriod
The 20th Century-Modern English
Late 20th century. C.S.
  The Old English Period or the Anglo-Saxon Period
Refers to the literature producedfrom the invasion of Celtic England
by Germanic tribes in the first half of the fifthcentury to the conquest
of England in 1066 by William the Conqueror.
 Old English Period
Written literature began to develop from
oraltradition, and in the eighth
century poetrywritten in the vernacular
Anglo-Saxon (alsoknown as Old English)
appeared. One of the most well-known
eighth century OldEnglish pieces of
literature is Beowulf a great Germanic epic
poem. Two poets of theOld English
Periodwho wrote on biblical and religious
themes were Caedmonand Cynewulf.
 The Middle English Period
Consists of the literature produced in the
four and a half centuries between
the Norman Conquest of 1066 and
about 1500, when the standardliterary
language, derived from the dialect of the
London area, became recognizableas
"modern English."Prior to the second
half of the fourteenth century,
vernacular literature consisted primarily
of religious writings. The second half of
the fourteenth century produced thefirst
great age of secular literature. The most widely known of these
writings are Geoffrey Chaucer 'sThe Canterbury Tales the
anonymous Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Thomas Malory's
Morte d'Arthur While the English Renaissnace began with the ascent of
the House of Tudor to theEnglish throne in 1485.
 The English Literary Renaissance
Began with Englishhumanists such as Sir Thomas More andSir
Thomas Wyatt.In addition, the English Literary Renaissance Consists
of four subsets:
TheElizabethan Age,The Jacobean Age,The Caroline Age,The
CommonwealthPeriod(which is also known as the Puritan
Interregnum
 Elizabethan literature
Refers to bodies of work produced during the reign of Queen
Elizabeth I (1558–1603), and is one of the most splendid ages of
English literature.Elizabeth I presided over a vigorous culture that saw
notable accomplishments in the arts, voyages of discovery, the
"Elizabethan Settlement" that created the Church of England, and the
defeat of military threats from Spain.
 Jacobean age
Literature begins with the drama, including some of Shakespeare's
greatest, and darkest, plays. The dominant literary figure of James's
reign was Ben Jonson, whose varied and dramatic works followed
classical models and were enriched by his worldly, peculiarly English
wit. His satiric dramas, notably the great Volpone (1606), all take a
cynical view of human nature. Also cynical were the horrific revenge
tragedies of John Ford, Thomas Middleton, Cyril Tourneur , and John
Webster (the best poet of this grim genre).
 The Caroline age
Is named after Charles I (1625-1649). Caroline is an adjective of
Carolus, the Latin word for Charles. The age of Caroline is an age of
poetry of three kinds or schools: Metaphysical, Cavalier and Puritan
schools of poetry. Let‘s see the characteristics of Caroline Age, the
cavalier poets Cavalier poets, a group of English poets associated with
Charles I and his exiled son. Most of their work was done between
1637 and 1660. Their poetry embodied the life and culture of upper-
class, pre-Commonwealth England. They mixed sophistication with
naïveté, elegance with raciness.
 Commonwealth period
Literature, Post-Colonial Literature in English, New Literature in
English, World Writing in English – these are just some of the terms
being used to describe the writings of ‘members’ of the former British
Empire.
The number of titles, however, reflects the growing international
importance of such writings as evidenced this month at the London
Festival of Commonwealth Literature, with writers coming from
around the globe. They tentatively include Michael Ondaatje, the Sri
Lankan- Canadian author of ‘The English Patient’, the book that
inspired the movie that swept the board at the latest Acadaemy
Awards ceremony.
 I. ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD
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CHARACTERISTICS ANGLO-SAXON LITERATURE
Anglo-Saxon literature that is the old English literature was almost
exclusively adults literature in Laurel of course it could be passed
down by Word of Mouth from generation to generation, its creators
for the most part where kowun it was given a writing from long after
its composition.
There were two groups all of poetry in Diablo Anglo-Saxon videos
video the first group was the poem poetry represented by Beale II.
Characteristics of anglo saxon literature
 It was almost exclusively a verse literatura in oral tradition
 It culd be passed down of generation from generation
 Its creators were unknown
II ANGLO –SAXON POETRY
BEOWULF
Beowulf is an anonymous Anglo-Saxon epic poem that was written in
Old English in alliterative verse. It has 3182 versos.Tanto the author
and the date of composition of the poem are unknown although
academic discussions often propose dates ranging from the eighth
century to XII d. C. The work is preserved in the Codex Nowell or
Cotton Vitellius A.xv and, given the fame of the poem, although it
coexists with other works in the same manuscript, it has been called
Beowulf Manuscript. Although the poem has no title in the
manuscript, it has been called Beowulf since the beginning of the 19th
century; It is preserved in the British Library.
IT HAS TWO LARGE PARTS:
The e first happens during the youth of the gauta hero (or geata, in
some translations, "godo") that gives name to the poem, and narrates
how he comes to the aid of the Danes or Jutes, who suffered the attacks
of a gigantic monster -Grendel- , and after killing him, he confronts
his terrible mother.
In the second part, Beowulf is already the king of the gautas and fight
to the death with a fierce dragon.
WRITTING FEATURES OF THE POEM.
 its not a Christian but a pagan poem
 the use of a strong actress in The predominance of consonants
are no table in the poetical lines lines.
 the use of alliteration is a normal timer feature of the poem.
 a lot of metaphors in understand Mills are using the poem.
RELIGIOUS POETRY
AND ANGLO-SAXON PROSE

BEDE THE VENERABLE Is a history of the Christian Churches in England, and of England
generally; its main focus is on the conflict between the pre-Schism
Roman Rite and Celtic Christianity. It was originally composed in
Latin, and is considered one of the most important original references
on Anglo-Saxon history and has played a key role in the development
of an English national identity. It is believed to have been completed
in 731 when Bede was approximately 59 years old
CAEDMON:
Cadmon or Cædmon is the oldest
Bede the Venerable (c. 672 - May 27, 735Benedictine monk in the known English poet. Born in
monastery of Saint Peter in Wearmouth (now part of Sunderland), and Northumbria, died in 680. He is
of his deputy monastery, Saint Paul, now Jarrow. Both monasteries a poet of the seventh century. He
were founded by San Benito Biscop, his teacher. He is known as a was a monk in the dublic or
writer and scholar, his most famous work being the Historia mixed monastery of
ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (Ecclesiastical History of the Streonæshalch (Abbey of
People of the Angles), which earned him the title of "Father of English Whitby), being the abbess Saint
History" Hilda (657 - 681). Only one of
his works is preserved, the hymn
The Ecclesiastical History of the English People of Cædmon (Anthem of Caedmon), in Old English or Anglo-Saxon.

Bede the Venerable (c. 672 - May 27, 735Benedictine monk in the writer and scholar, his most famous work being the Historia
monastery of Saint Peter in Wearmouth (now part of Sunderland), and ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (Ecclesiastical History of the english
of his deputy monastery, Saint Paul, now Jarrow. Both monasteries people
were founded by San Benito Biscop, his teacher. He is known as a
ALFRED THE GREAT:

He was King of Wessex from 871 until his death. He became famous
for defending his kingdom against the Vikings, becoming as a result
of this the only king of his dynasty to be called "The Great" or Great
for his people. He was also the first king of Wessex who proclaimed
himself king of the Anglo-Saxons. His life is known thanks to Asser,
Welsh chronicler. Educated man and literate, helped a lot to education
and improve the system of laws of his kingdom. Revered as a saint in
the Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican Churches, his liturgical feast is
celebrated on October 26.
His famous prose
The anglo-saxon chronicle is a collection of annals in old english
chronicling the history of the anglo-saxons. The original manuscript
of the chronicle was created late in the 9th century, probably in
wessex, during the reign of alfred the great (1871–899). Multiple
copies were made of that one original and then distributed to
monasteries across england, where they were independently updated.
in one case, the chronicle was still being actively updated in 1154.
 Geoffrey chaucer:
Middle English Literature: Poet Geoffrey Chaucer was born
Middle English’ – a period of roughly 300 years from around 1150 circa 1340 in London, England. In
CE to around 1450 – is difficult to identify because it is a time of 1357 he became a public servant to
transition between two eras that each have stronger definition: Old Countess Elizabeth of Ulster and
English and Modern English. Before this period we encounter a continued in that capacity with the
language which is chiefly Old Germanic in its character – in its British court throughout his
sounds, spellings, grammar and vocabulary. After this period we have lifetime. The Canterbury
a language which displays a very different kind of structure, with Tales became his best known and
major changes having taken place in each of these areas, many most acclaimed work. He died
deriving from the influence of French following the Norman Conquest October 25, 1400 in London,
of 1066.
England, and was the first to be buried in Westminster Abbey’s Poet’s
Corner. Major Works
Continuity between Old and Middle English is mainly to be seen in
texts of a religious, political or administrative character, thousands of
which have survived. Most of the surviving material is religious in The precise dates of many of Chaucer’s written works are difficult to
character – about a third are collections of homilies (a type of sermon). pin down with certainty, but one thing is clear: His major works have
The writings of Ælfric, in particular, continued to be copied retained their relevancy even in the college classroom of today.
throughout the period, and these overlap with sermons from the 12th Chaucer’s body of best-known works includes the Parliament of
century that are very clearly in an early form of Middle English. Fouls, otherwise known as the Parlement of Foules, in the Middle
English spelling. Some historians of Chaucer’s work assert that it was
Although the earliest surviving writings in the period are only about a written in 1380, during marriage negotiations between Richard and
century after the latest writings in Old English, Middle English texts Anne of Bohemia. Critic J.A.W. Bennet interpreted the Parliament of
feel very much closer to Modern English in their grammar and Fouls as a study of Christian love. It had been identified as peppered
vocabulary. By the time we get to Chaucer, in the 14th century, we with Neo-Platonic ideas inspired by the likes of poets Cicero and Jean
can find many phrases and sentences which – if we modernise the De Meun, among others. The poem uses allegory, and incorporates
spelling – look just like an archaic version of Modern English, as in elements of irony and satire as it points to the inauthentic quality of
the opening of The Canterbury Tales: courtly love.
REALISM LITERATURE:
It is often thought that realism is a particular tendency of Victorian
fiction, and it is certainly significant that the earliest uses of the
word realism to refer to the faithful representation of the real world in
literature or art date from the 1850s. The novelist of the period who
most often uses the word (commonly in opposition to ‘the ideal’) to
describe her own aims is George Eliot. In a review of a book by John
Ruskin she defines realism as ‘the doctrine that all truth and beauty
are to be attained by a humble and faithful study of nature, and not by
substituting vague forms, bred by imagination on the mists of feeling,
in place of definite, substantial reality’.[1] Eliot was influential in her
insistence on the modesty of true realism – its attention to what is
‘ordinary’. In her first novel, Adam Bede (1859), she steps into her
own story to liken the ‘truthfulness’, for which she aims, to the quality
of ‘many Dutch paintings, which lofty-minded people despise’. She
finds ‘delicious sympathy’ in ‘these faithful pictures of a monotonous
homely existence’.
ROMANTICISM LITERATURE:
As a term to cover the most distinctive writers who flourished in the
last years of the 18th century and the first decades of the 19th,
“Romantic” is indispensable but also a little misleading: there was no
self-styled “Romantic movement” at the time, and the great writers of
the period did not call themselves Romantics. Not until August
Wilhelm von Schlegel’s Vienna lectures of 1808–09 was a clear
distinction established between the “organic,” “plastic” qualities DANIEL DEFOE:
of Romantic art and the “mechanical” character of Classicism.
Many of the age’s foremost writers thought that something new was Defoe’s father, James Foe, was a hard-
happening in the world’s affairs, nevertheless. William Blake’s working and fairly prosperous tallow
affirmation in 1793 that “a new heaven is begun” was matched a chandler (perhaps also, later, a
generation later by Percy Bysshe Shelley’s “The world’s great age butcher), of Flemish descent. By his
begins anew.” “These, these will give the world another heart, / And middle 30s, Daniel was calling himself
other pulses,” wrote John Keats, referring to Leigh Hunt and William “Defoe,” probably reviving a variant
Wordsworth. Fresh ideals came to the fore; in particular, the ideal of of what may have been the original
freedom, long cherished in England, was being extended to every family name. As a Nonconformist, or
range of human endeavour. As that ideal swept through Europe, it Dissenter, Foe could not send his son
became natural to believe that the age of tyrants might soon end. to the University of Oxford or to
Cambridge; he sent him instead to the
JONATHAN SWIFT: excellent academy at Newington
Green kept by the Reverend Charles
Born on November 30, 1667, Irish Morton. There Defoe received an education in many ways better, and
author, clergyman and satirist certainly broader, than any he would have had at an English
Jonathan Swift grew up fatherless. university. Morton was an admirable teacher, later becoming first vice
Under the care of his uncle, he president of Harvard College; and the clarity, simplicity, and ease of
received a bachelor's degree from his style of writing—together with the Bible, the works of John
Trinity College and then worked as a Bunyan, and the pulpit oratory of the day—may have helped to form
statesman's assistant. Eventually, he Defoe’s own literary style.
became dean of St. Patrick's
Cathedral in Dublin. Most of his
writings were published under
pseudonyms. He best remembered for
his 1726 book Gulliver's Travels.
Walter Scott:
In the mid-1790s Scott became
interested in
German Romanticism, Gothic
novels, and Scottish border
ballads. His first published
work, The Chase, and William
and Helen (1796), was a
translation of two ballads by the
German Romantic balladeer
G.A. Bürger. A poor translation
of Goethe’s Götz von
Berlichingen followed in 1799.
Scott’s interest in border ballads
finally bore fruit in his collection
of them entitled Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, 3 vol. (1802–03).
His attempts to “restore” the orally corrupted versions back to their
original compositionssometimes resulted in powerful poems that
show a sophisticated Romantic flavour. The work made Scott’s name
known to a wide public, and he followed up his first success with a
full-length narrative poem, The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805),
which ran into many editions. The poem’s clear and vigorous
storytelling, Scottish regionalist elements, honest pathos, and vivid
evocations of landscape were repeated in further poetic romances,
including Marmion (1808), The Lady of the Lake (1810), which was
the most successful of these pieces, Rokeby (1813), and The Lord of
the Isles (1815).
Charles Dickens:
(Charles John Huffam Dickens) was
born in Landport, Portsmouth, on
February 7, 1812. Charles was the
second of eight children to John
Dickens (1786–1851), a clerk in the
Navy Pay Office, and his wife
Elizabeth Dickens (1789–1863).
The Dickens family moved to
London in 1814 and two years later
to Chatham, Kent, where Charles
spent early years of his childhood.
Due to the financial difficulties they moved back to London in 1822,
where they settled in Camden Town, a poor neighborhood of London.
Young DickensThe defining moment of Dickens's life occurred when
he was 12 years old. His father, who had a difficult time managing
money and was constantly in debt, was imprisoned in the Marshalsea
debtor's prison in 1824. Because of this, Charles was withdrawn from
school and forced to work in a warehouse that handled 'blacking' or
shoe polish to help support the family. This experience left profound
psychological and sociological effects on Charles. It gave him a
firsthand acquaintance with poverty and made him the most vigorous
and influential voice of the working classes in his age.
The late Victorian Period:
Victorian literature is called that produced in the United Kingdom
during the reign of Victoria (1837-1901). The so-called Victorian era
is a very important cultural stage in the history of England and of
Europe. Late victorian fiction may express doubts and uncertainties.
THOMAS HARDY:
Hardy was the eldest of the four
children of Thomas Hardy, a
stonemason and jobbing builder, and
his wife, Jemima (née Hand). He
grew up in an isolated cottage on the
edge of open heathland. Though he
was often ill as a child, his early
experience of rural life, with its
seasonal rhythms and oral culture,
was fundamental to much of his later
writing. He spent a year at the village
school at age eight and then moved on to schools in Dorchester, the
nearby county town, where he received a good grounding in
mathematics and Latin. In 1856 he was apprenticed to John Hicks, a
local architect, and in 1862, shortly before his 22nd birthday, he
moved to London and became a draftsman in the busy office of Arthur
Blomfield, a leading ecclesiastical architect. Driven back to Dorset by
ill health in 1867, he worked for Hicks again and then for the
Weymouth architect G.R. Crickmay.
WILLIAN GOLDING
He was born in Newquay, Cornwall, in
1911 and grew up in Marlborough, where
his father, Alec Golding, was a science
teacher. Professor Golding defined himself
as a socialist with great confidence in
scientific rationalism, a fact that decisively
influenced his two sons, William and Joseph, while his mother,
Mildred, was a fervent defender of women's suffrage.
GENRES
Allegorical fiction
Essay
Theater.
NOTABLE WORKS

GEORGE BERNARD

George Bernard Shaw (Dublin, July 26,

1856-Ayot St. Lawrence, United Kingdom,
November 1950), known at the request of
the author as Bernard Shaw, was a
playwright, critic and Irish debater whose
influence on the theater, Western culture
and politics extends from 1880 to the
present day.
NOTABLE WORKS
Pygmalion
Santa Juana (play)
Mrs. Warren's Profession
Cesar and Cleop
SAMUEL BECKETT:
Samuel Beckett was born in Foxrock, a
suburb of Dublin, on April 13, 1906. It has
also been noted that the date could be May
13.8 Beckett's father, William Beckett, was
a rigger, and his mother, May Roe, nurse
of deep religious convictions; "Almost
Quaker," in the words of the writer.9 While
his older brother, Frank, was a robust and
placid child, Samuel was thin, sickly and
constantly crying.10 In fact, the writer did
not keep good memories of his childhood:
«I had little talent for happiness.
GENRE
Drama
NOTABLE WORKS
Molloy
Malone dies
The nameless
Waiting for Godot
Watt
End of game
The last tape of Kra
C.S LEWIS
Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, on
November 29, 1898. His father was Albert
James Lewis (1863-1929), a lawyer whose
father (Richard; grandfather of C. S. Lewis. At
the age of four, shortly after his dog Jacksie was
killed by a car, Lewis announced that his name
would be Jacksie. At first he would respond
only to that name, but then he accepted to be
called Jack, the name by which he was known
among his friends and family for the rest of his life. When she was
seven, her family moved to "Little Lea.
GENDERS
Wonderful fantasy
Science fiction
Apologetics.
NOTABLE WORKS
The Chronicles of Narnia
Grouper Christianity