Middle English Literature

• After a strange period of hiatus, following the Norman

conquest (1066), in the 14th century, a vernacular literature
reappears, written in Middle English language.

• A shift from alliterative verse to rhymed metrical verse.

• Literature: long-term consequences of the Norman Conquest

in the years between 1350 and 1400.

Historical context

• Saxon subjection and the change of the status of general mass

of English people – “churl” (thane) replaced by feudal villein.

• Norman French used in official and literary context from

1066 until 1350.

• Anglo-Norman (French) dialect of the new ruling class.

• A confident vernacular literature only re-emerges after 1350.

• Peasants' Revolt (1380) and the revival of literary activity.

• The voices of English people and currents of change - the rise

of English language.

• In 1362, English became a permitted language in law courts

and, in 1385, English became used in schools.

• Lexical loans from French and deletion of many Germanic

words.
 • The vernacular tongue expressing a distinctive sense of
national identity.

Literature

• Middle English Literature: diverse voices (including works

written by women), variety of genres: courtly (chivalric)
romances, religious dramas, prose narratives, lyric poems.

• A feature of English literature (in general) in the Middle

English literature: the new voices enabling the country to
redefine how it conceives itself.

• Language of everyday life seen where it was previously

excluded.

• Chaucer’s Canterbury tales general prologue:

• Some writers: Geoffrey Chaucer, William Langland, Margery
Kempe, and the Gawain poet.

• William Langland (p. 28): Writer of the alliterative poem

"Piers Plowman" (1370-90) that contains the first known
reference to a literary tradition of Robin Hood tales.
• It precedes and influences Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.
• There is a mix of theological allegory and social satire,
concerns the narrator/dreamer's quest for the true Christian
life in the context of medieval Catholicism.
• Illustration of corruption

• A deeply conservative poem: the value of traditional and

religious attitudes and the importance of a straightforward
moral frame.

• Sense of a gap between the ideal of religious order and the

actual state of England. "... it is as if, in the three elements
that constitute the nation - the church, the court and the
people - the last of these, the people, are becoming more and
more visible and assertive (p. 30)

• Dismayed vision of the diversity of English life.

• Margery Kempe, author of The book of Margery Kempe -

considered by some to be the first autobiography in the
English language.
• The relevance of Margery Kempe((c. 1373 – after 1438):
"she speaks on behalf of those who have contributed a great
deal, but who have no recognition from the church".
• "suddenly the voice of the disenfranchised is heard, speaking
a new way and from a new position".
(p. 18)

• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A late 14th-century

Middle English chivalric romance (The chivalric romance
poeticized the exploits of knights, performed in the name of
glory, love, and moral perfection).
• It is one of the best known Arthurian stories. It draws on
Welsh, Irish and English stories, as well as the French
chivalric romance.
• Diversity of language (excerpt on page 19)
• Diversity of genre: Chivalric romance
• Debt to French literary culture - influence of French medieval
romance (12th century)
• Romance: The idea of a single hero on a quest, chivalric code
(a model of how a male member of the court should conduct
himself).
• Romance X Epic: Romance - the importance of a chivalric
code / Epic - concerned with tribal warfare.

• The myth of Arthur can be traced back as far as the ninth

century in England and continued to be developed in France.
• Thomas Malory - Morte d'Arthur (15th century): the first
English-language prose version of the Arthurian legend,
completed about 1470 and printed by William Caxton in
1485.
• Morte d'Arthur: difference from French romances: emphasis
on the brotherhood of the knights rather than on courtly love
and on the conflicts of loyalty.
• Middle English literature and The myth of Arthur – England
as part of something larger that transcended the nation state.
• Crusades

• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight - plot: p. 20

• The tension provided by sex - moral concern
• A contest between the French framework of the literary form
of romance and the vernacular voices that is ill at ease with
the imported narrative structure

• Middle English Literature - an encounter between received

and continental forms and the lives and language of the
English people.