MODULE 14: REPRESENTATIVE TEXTS AND AUTHORS FROM EUROPE

The history of European literature and of each various periods is one of the prominent figures among
world literature. European literature emerges from world literature before the birth of Europe, whose classical
languages are the recipients to the complex heritage of the Old World. An additional unique feature is the global
expansion of Western Europe’s languages and characteristic of its literary forms, especially the novel, the poetry,
the epic beginning in the Renaissance.

The literary prominence of Europe is perceptibly known by its notable authors and their significant works.
Here in this module, together, we will venture towards learning their prolific literary fame.

Literature broadly refers to any collection of written or oral work, but it more commonly and narrowly
refers to writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose (fiction, non-fiction), epic drama,
poetry forms and the like, in contrast to academic writing and newspapers.
Literature, as an art form, can also include works in various non-fiction genres, such as autobiography, diaries,
memoir, letters, and the essay, as well as in the disciplines of history and philosophy.

The literatures of Europe are compiled in many languages; among the most important of the modern
written works are those in English, Spanish, French, Dutch, Polish, Portuguese, German, Italian, Modern Greek,
Czech, Russian, Macedonian, the Scandinavian languages, Gaelic and Turkish.

Important classical and medieval European literary traditions are those in Latin, Ancient Greek, Old
Bulgarian, Macedonian, Old Norse, Medieval French and the Italian Tuscan dialect of the renaissance.

PERIODS OF EUROPEAN LITERATURE

1. Old English or Anglo-Saxon (c. 450-1066)
- Encompasses the surviving literature written in Old English in Anglo-Saxon England, in the period after the
settlement of the Saxons and other Germanic tribes in England c. 450 and "ending soon after the Norman
Conquest" in 1066.

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ epic poetry ✓ Bible translations
✓ hagiography ✓ Chronicles
✓ sermons ✓ Riddles
2. Middle English literature (1066–1500)
- Middle English literature was written in many dialects that corresponded to the region, history, culture, and
background of individual writers.

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ allegorical narrative poem ✓ Hagiographies
✓ drama ✓ historiography
✓ liturgy ✓ Bible translations
✓ folk tales ✓ Romances
3. English Renaissance (1500–1660)
• The English Renaissance turns to be a cultural and artistic movement.
• introduced the sonnet from Italy to England

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ Romances ✓ vernacular literature
✓ allegorical narrative poem ✓ vernacular liturgy
✓ drama ✓ sonnet
✓ folk tales ✓ Bible translations
4. Elizabethan period (1558–1603)
• The rise of Edmund Spenser, Sir Philip Sidney
• William Shakespeare stands out in this period as a poet
• Renowned Christopher Marlowe, and Ben Jonson

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ English Renaissance theatre ✓ tragicomedies
✓ Poetry ✓ epic poem
✓ Tragedy ✓ songs
✓ romances

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5. Jacobean period (1603–1625)
• The birth of Shakespeare’s written genre "problem plays" and tragedy
• popularized the English sonnet

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ problem play ✓ English sonnet ✓ revenge play
✓ tragedies ✓ Metaphysical poem ✓ romance

6. Late Renaissance (1625–1660)

• Rise of the second generation metaphysical poets
• The birth of allegory and classical allusions, and epic works

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ Metaphysical poem
✓ allegory and classical allusions
✓ epic

7. Restoration Age (1660–1700)

• the pioneering of literary criticism
• The presentation of John Milton’s religious flux and political upheaval and his epic poem

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ sexual comedy play ✓ fiction and journalism ✓ long fiction
✓ moral wisdom prose ✓ political and economic ✓ fictional biographies
✓ literary criticism writing ✓ Romance fiction
narratives ✓ philosophical themes ✓ drama
✓ epic poem ✓ allegory ✓ comedy
✓ satirical verse ✓ novel

8. Age of Romanticism (1798–1837)

• originated artistic, literary, and intellectual movement in
• landscape is often prominent in the poetry of this period so much so that the Romantics, especially
perhaps Wordsworth, are often described as 'nature poets

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ elegy ✓ nature poem ✓ Romantic novel
✓ metrical romance ✓ romantic poem ✓ historical novel
✓ dramatic monologue ✓ elegy ✓ nature poem
✓ Romantic novel ✓ metrical romance ✓ romantic poem
✓ historical novel ✓ dramatic monologue

9. Victorian literature (1837–1901)

• the novel became the leading literary genre in English
• Charles Dickens emerged on the literary scene
• Introduction of detective novel in the English language.
• Development of science fiction novels and realistic fiction

Genre, elements, structures, traditions:

✓ vampire literature ✓ dramatic monologue ✓ science fiction
✓ horror fiction ✓ musical burlesques ✓ realistic fiction
✓ invasion literature ✓ comic operas ✓ Romanticism
✓ short stories ✓ novel ✓ ghost story
✓ Literature for children ✓ feminist novels ✓ horror story
✓ poetry ✓ literary realism

10. Modernism (1901–2000)

• English literary modernism developed in the early twentieth-century
• lyric poet and major novels evolved
• maintained a conservative approach to poetry by combining romanticism, sentimentality and hedonism.
• The emergence of British writer of the early years of the twentieth-century Rudyard Kipling

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Genre, elements, structures, traditions:
✓ Radio drama ✓ thriller writing ✓ Conservatism
✓ genre fiction ✓ comic science fiction ✓ Impressionism
✓ fantasy ✓ darkly comic fantasy ✓ lyric poetry
✓ science fiction ✓ children's novels ✓ feminism
✓ short stories ✓ Modernist poetry in ✓ allegorical novel
✓ detective novels English ✓ television plays

Representative texts and authors from Europe Literature of the Ancient Greece:
John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual
who served as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under its Council of State
and later under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote at a time of religious flux and political upheaval,
and is best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost (1667), written in blank verse, and
widely considered to be one of the greatest works of literature ever written.

PARADISE LOST
John Milton

Paradise Lost has two narrative arcs, one about Satan (Lucifer) and the other following Adam and Eve. It begins
after Satan and the other rebel angels have been defeated and banished to Hell, also called in the poem, Tartarus.
In Pandæmonium, the capital city of Hell, Satan employs his rhetorical skill to organize his followers; he is aided by
Mammon and Beelzebub. Belial and Moloch are also present. At the end of the debate, Satan volunteers to corrupt
the newly created Earth and God's new and most favoured creation, Mankind. He braves the dangers of the Abyss
alone in a manner reminiscent of Odysseus or Aeneas. After an arduous traversal of the Chaos outside Hell, he
enters God's new material World, and later the Garden of Eden.

At several points, an Angelic War over Heaven is recounted from different perspectives. Satan's rebellion follows
the epic convention of large-scale warfare. The battles between the faithful angels and Satan's forces take place
over three days. At the final battle, the Son of God single-handedly defeats the entire legion of angelic rebels and
banishes them from Heaven. Following this purge, God creates the World, culminating in his creation of Adam and
Eve. While God gave Adam and Eve total freedom and power to rule over all creation, he gave them one explicit
command: not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil on penalty of death.

Adam and Eve are having a romantic and sexual relationship while still being without sin. They have passions and
distinct personalities. Satan, disguised in the form of a serpent, successfully tempts Eve to eat from the Tree by
preying on her vanity and tricking her with rhetoric. Adam, learning that Eve has sinned, knowingly commits the
same sin. He declares to Eve that since she was made from his flesh, they are bound to one another- – if she dies,
he must also die. Adam was seen as a heroic figure, but also as a greater sinner than Eve, as he is aware that what
he is doing is wrong.

Soon as they fall asleep, both have terrible nightmares, and after they awake, they experience guilt and shame for
the first time. Realizing that they have committed a terrible act against God, they engage in mutual recrimination.

Meanwhile, Satan returns triumphantly to Hell, amid the praise of his fellow fallen angels. He tells them about how
their scheme worked and Mankind has fallen, giving them complete dominion over Paradise. As he finishes his
speech, however, the fallen angels around him become hideous snakes, and soon enough, Satan himself turns
into a snake, deprived of limbs and unable to talk. Thus, they share the same punishment, as they shared the same
guilt.

Eve appeals to Adam for reconciliation of their actions. Her encouragement enables them to approach God, and
sue for grace, bowing on supplicant knee, to receive forgiveness. In a vision shown to him by the Archangel Michael,
Adam witnesses everything that will happen to Mankind until the Great Flood. Adam is very upset by this vision of
the future, so Michael also tells him about Mankind's potential redemption from original sin through Jesus Christ
(whom Michael calls "King Messiah").

Adam and Eve are cast out of Eden, and Michael says that Adam may find "a paradise within thee, happier far."
Adam and Eve also now have a more distant relationship with God, who is omnipresent but invisible (unlike the
tangible Father in the Garden of Eden).

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