Literature is the question minus the answer. ~Roland Barthes

Anglo-Saxon Literature strong belief in fate religious and pagan subjects heroic warriors who prevail in battle literature - expresses religious faith - gives moral instruction oral tradition - poetry

Beowulf Beowulf (7 th -10th century)

Middle English Literature morality plays - instructed the illiterate masses in morals and entertained mystery plays – representations of Bible stories miracle plays - re-enacted miraculous interventions by the saints into the lives of ordinary people romances - stories about the adventures of knights goes on quests - the chivalric code of honor – ‘courtly love’

King Arthur and The Round Table

Geoffrey Chaucer Canterbury TalesCanterbury Tales

When fair April with his showers sweet, Has pierced the drought of March to the root's feet And bathed each vein in liquid of such power, Its strength creates the newly springing flower; When the West Wind too, with his sweet breath, Has breathed new life - in every copse and heath - Into each tender shoot, and the young sun From Aries moves to Taurus on his run, And those small birds begin their melody, (The ones who 'sleep` all night with open eye,) Then nature stirs them up to such a pitch That folk all long to go on pilgrimage And wandering travellers tread new shores, strange strands, Seek out far shrines, renowned in many lands, And specially from every shire's end Of England to Canterbury they wend The holy blessed martyr there to seek, Who has brought health to them when they were sick.

Elizabethan Age

Elizabethan Age Elizabeth I ( ) – the last Tudor monarch the golden age – prosperity, stability and peace expeditions – settlement of America the printing press The Globe

English Renaissance world view shifts from religion and after life to one stressing the human life on earth – themes: - development of human potential - aspects of love Sonnets : Edmund Spenser, Sir Philip Sidney Metaphysical poetry: John Donne Drama: Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare Comedies All's Well That Ends Well As You Like It The Comedy of Errors Cymbeline Love's Labours Lost Much Ado About Nothing The Taming of the Shrew The Tempest Twelfth Night The Merry Wives of Windsor The Merchant of Venice A Midsummer Night's Dream Two Gentlemen of Verona Winter's Tale Sonnets Historical plays King John Richard II, III Henry IV, V, VI, VIII

Tragedies Antony and Cleopatra Romeo and Juliet Hamlet (1600) Julius Caesar King Lear Macbeth Othello Hamlet

The Restoration after the Civil War ( ) Commonwealth ( ) Protectorate – Oliver Cromwell ( ) Charles II (1660) restored to the throne 1707 – the Act of Union

Neoclassical Period emphasis on reason and logic - harmony, stability, wisdom reaction to censorhip emphasis on the individual approach to life: “the world as it should be” John Locke – “the social contract” between the government and the people

Enlightenment – The Age of Reason Satire: irony and exaggeration to correct human behavior Poetry: Alexander Pope, William Blake Essays: John Locke, Steele & Addison Letters, diaries, biographies: Samuel Pepys drama- the comedy of manners Novels: John Bunyan – The Pilgrim’s Progress

1 st novel in British literature Samuel Richardson Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded – epistolary novel -serialised “Oh, please, Mr Richardson, don’t let her die!”

Novels

Romanticism human knowledge consists of impressions and ideas formed in the individual’s mind nature - comfort and peace gothic elements and terror/horror stories and novels

Romantic Poetry William Blake Lyrical Ballads William Wordsworth (1798) William Wordsworth (1798) Samuel Coleridge – Lord George Gordon Byron Percy Shelley John Keats

Romantic Novelists Jane AustenMary Shelley

VICTORIAN AGEVICTORIAN AGE ( )

Victorian Times Golden age- colonial expansion improved quality of life the Industrial Revolution rise of the lower classes - highlighted in literature to insist on reform Labour Party is created

Cosumerism of novels Factors: Growth of middle classes Improved educational system Improved printing techniques More freedom for women SERIALISATION – cliff-hangers

Victorian Literature Charles DickensBronte sisters Oliver Twist –

Later Victorianism Crisis of faith Pessimism REBELLION against conventions – Th. Hardy, R.L. Stevenson Oscar Wilde Pre-Raphaelite poets 1859

MODERNISM

20 th century ( ) World War I, II Eire- a free state The British Commonwealth of Nations – the suffragette movement – the flapper 1930s – the Great Depression Trade Unions the Welfare State

Radical Changes INNOVATION EXPERIMENTATION VARIETY – to reflect COMPLEXITY

Modernist literature lonely individual fighting to find peace and comfort in a world that has lost its absolute values and traditions no absolute values mixing of fantasy with nonfiction; blurs lines of reality for reader - MAGIC REALISM loss of the hero in literature Inner psychology - STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS - no chronological plot - disjointed flashes of thought

Virginia Woolf James Joyce “We all indulge in the strange, pleasant process called thinking, but when it comes to saying…then how little we are able to convey” “The artist, like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails.”

Looking into the Future

th Century prose

Modernist Drama

Modernist Poetry

20 th century The Cold War

20 th century Korea Vietnam

20 th century Fall of Communism

20 th century Post- industrial world

20 th century Advertising

20 th century Consumer Society

20 th century Entertain ment

20 th century Pop culture

20 th century Globalisation

20 th century Information

Contemporary/ post-modern literaturepost-modern Intertextuality - parody de-centralisation back to the storytelling No absolute truth MY truth No past, no future NOW No underlying meaning or purpose MY meaning

Poetry

Post-modernist Drama