1. 1485-1660 - Renaissance Focused on complexities of human life on earth

2. 1660-1798 Restoration and Enlightenment (The Age of Reason) Focus:
Restoration and Enlightenment (The Age of Reason) Focus: -society the human intellect avoided personal feelings

3. Neoclassicism - modeled work from the classics: ancient Greeks and Romans -balance -order -logic -sophisticated wit -emotional restraint

4. Neoclassicist Writing
Importance placed on nature and wit
Nature: order and harmony
Wit: intellect, imagination and cleverness
Universal truths and form in writing were important.

5. Divisions of the Age of Reason
Restoration ( )
Satire – social commentary
Heroic Dramas
Heroic couplets – dominant verse of the period
Appealed primarily to the elite

6. Augustan Age ( )
Writers likened their society to Rome under Augustus
Also known as The Age of Pope
Satire

7. Age of Johnson (1750-1784) Samuel Johnson Influential man of letters
Affirmed neoclassicist ideas
Recall Johnson and the metaphysical poets

8. Late 17th Century: John Locke
Late 17th century political philosopher
Influenced the development of The Enlightenment/The Age of Reason

9. A government must guarantee the ‘natural rights’ of life, liberty and property and that any government that failed to uphold those rights should be changed or overthrown.

10. End of 18th Century – Shift
From
- neoclassicism (order, balance, logic, reason) To
-simpler, freer lyrics -subjects close to the human heart