THE AUGUSTAN AGE: THE MAIN FEATURES The colonial empire started to expand (it would reach its maximum expansion one century later) - Period of relative wealth - Rise of the middle class -Rise of the novel with new literary genres like Satire and Epistolary Novel -Rise of Journalism, The Tatler, The Spectator -The new middle class model of the self made man

AUTHORS OF THE AUGUSTAN AGE: DANIEL DEFOE THEMES AND FEATURES Main works: Robinson Crusoe, Moll Flanders, --Robinson Crusoe brings to life the ideal of the self made man, it reflects also a rising interest in exoticism, due to the colonial expansion which was being carried out in those years --It draws attention to the issue of meeting new cultures, through the character of Friday --It is highly descriptive and pays a lot of attention to details --LIMITS: Robinson Crusoe lacks realism and psychological insight

JONATHAN SWIFT AND HIS SATIRE: Swift’s most important work is “Gulliver’s Travels” -With the term satire we refer to a sharp and bitter criticism of society -Through his novel, Swift wanted to make the reader aware of the problems of contemporary England - Gulliver’s Travels shows Swift bitter cynicism toward society

SAMUEL RICHARDSON AND THE EPISTOLARY NOVEL: FEATURES AND THEMES Richardson most important works are “Pamela, or virtue rewarded” and “Clarissa” Both novels are built up using a series of letters written by the main characters This new narrative technique allows us to see what’s going on inside a character’s mind. - With Richardson we have far more psychological insight than with Defoe

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION The thirteen American Colonies were deeply dissatisfied with the taxation system imposed by the mother country - 1776 (July, 4th) Declaration of Independence with Thomas Jefferson -European Enlightenment welcomed and supported the American Revolution, since it claimed that all men are born equal, with the same rights -1783 England accepted American Independence

THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION: MAIN FEATURES The new ideas of freedom for the individual brought about by Enlightenment gave rise to economic liberalism -Free trade and technical innovations are the main causes of the Industrial Revolution, which started in England and soon spread around Europe -We have the invention of new machines that greatly increased production -new organization of work (division of labor according to the new theories of TAYLORISM and FORDISM)

BAD CONSEQUENCES OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION New machines meant a drastic reduction in the number of people employed: unemployment rate steadily rose -In factories people worked up to 16 hours a day, in appalling hygienic conditions and poor safety -Workers coming from the countryside lived in overcrowded slums, which lacked the most elementary sanitation - Alcoholism spread quickly in the Industrial towns

SOME IMPORTANT REFORMS BROUGHT ABOUT IN THE PERIOD OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION 1833 THE FACTORY ACTS which forbade the employment of children under 9 and generally improved the working conditions -ABOLITION OF SLAVERY in the British Colonies -EDUCATION ACT (1834) influenced by the new liberal theories, now more children had right to receive a proper education

ROMANTICISM: THEMES AND FEATURES -Romanticism can be explained through a series of antinomies with Enlightenment -The leading principle of the Enlightenment, reason, had failed, since the ideals which inspired the French Revolution did not succeed in establishing democracy in Europe. (Napoleon took over France and started to conquer Europe, but he was defeated and soon the old sovereigns gained their thrones back - Because of this failure, writers and intellectuals searched for a new leading principle, which was found in the opposite of reason, that is feeling, the sphere of the irrational

THE PREROMANTIC LITERATURE, FEATURES AND THEMES As a contrast with Enlightenment, Preromanticism rejected the Neoclassical tradition and paved the way for a renewed interest in Middle Ages and Gothicism - The Gothic Novel was born; it contained a lot of medieval features like settings in castles, ghosts, witchcraft and other supernatural elements - Thomas Gray, Ann Radcliffe and Horace Walpole are the most representative authors of the genre

A PREROMANTIC POET: WILLIAM BLAKE Blake was born in 1757, he was a revolutionary artist, deeply influenced by the new democratic ideals which were spreading in Europe. - His poetry was characterized by a use of complex symbols, metaphors and other figures of speech - He tended to use a plain Anglo-Saxon English (not Latinate), this was in contrast with the poetic diction of the eighteenth century - He was attracted to the two contrary states of the human soul, which he investigated in “Songs of Innocence” and “Songs of Experience”

THE FIRST GENERATION OF ROMANTIC POETS Wordsworth and Coleridge wrote together a collection of poems whose title is “Lyrical Ballads” - Their poetic production is characterized by love of nature, a stress on imagination and supernatural - Interest in Middle Ages

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Born in 1770 in the Lake District He is renowned for his poetry of the child, since he wrote several poems centered on children’s feelings -Wordsworth, like Coleridge, saw Nature as a possible way out from the ugliness and shabbyness of the industrial towns -His most important poems are “I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud” and “Lines Composed A Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey”

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE Born in 1772 at Ottery, St Mary, Devon -His poems are rich in supernatural elements, they are always referred to with the term “demonic poems”, due to their medieval charm - Like Wordsworth, he thought that Nature could be a source of solace and consolation - “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is one of the most important poems included in The Lyrical Ballads

THE SECOND GENERATION OF ROMANTIC POETS . Shelley, Byron and Keats are the representants of the second generation . The reason why we talk about second generation is not on account of the fact that Shelley, Byron and Keats could be children of Wordsworth and Coleridge. The difference was not in age, but in their attitude -The poets of the first generation thought that they could convey a message to people, whereas the poets of the second generation were more disillusioned, so they withdrew into a more complex language

GEORGE GORDON LORD BYRON Born in 1788, he was an aristocratic - His personality was so charismatic that the sterotype of Byronic hero was born - The Byronic hero is characterized by Titanism, tendencies toward Satanism, aspirations of freedom and hatred for social hypocrisy - Byron’s most important works are: Don Juan, Manfred, The Two Foscari

SHELLEY Born in 1792 in Horsham, Sussex -He attended Oxford University, but soon he was expelled for writing a pamphlet called “The Necessity of Atheism” -He got married to Mary Wollstonecraft, the author of “Frankenstein” .Shelley’s most important works are: Ode to the West Wind and Prometheus Unbound

JOHN KEATS Born in 1795 in London and died very young, thus increasins his romantic charm - Keats was inspired by the Ancient Greece and was obsessed with the cult of beauty - His most important poems are Ode on a Grecian Urn and La Belle Dame Sans Merci, the latter found its roots in the Romantic Medievalism

THE ROMANTIC NOVEL: JANE AUSTEN Jane Austen was born in 1775 in Steventon, Hampshire -Her novels are mostly set during the period of the Napoleonic Wars, but they are somehow detached from the crucial events of that time, since the plot is centered on characters living in a placid countryside - Jane Austen created the so called novel of manners, whose characters are women hunting for a husband -Her most famous novels are Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Persuasion, Mansfield Park