1. History of Literature

2. Epochs in History of Literature
Discuss with a friend:
Which literary epochs do you know about?
What are they called and what characterize them?
Which English or American writers do you know about? Think about written material but also film adaptations of famous works.
Write suggestions on the board if possible

3. Epochs in History of Literature
: Old English
: Middle English
: The Renaissance begins to spread
: The Renaissance and The Reformation
: The Restoration, The Age of Enlightenment
: The Romantic Age
: The Victorian Age
: Modernism
1946: Postmodernism
Map of nations using English as an official language or as the predominant language
Year 2006 aggregate estimates suggest approximately 375 million native English speakers, and a combined native and non-native number of English speakers of over 1.5 billion worldwide.
A number of countries use English as an official language as a unifying force despite the influence of major local languages in countries such as Kenya, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Malta, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, South Africa, Tanzania. English may also be a widely-used unofficial language, as is the case in Bangladesh

4. Timeline History of Literature

5. Old English (500-1100) History and epic poems
Oral tradition  writing tradition
Example: King Alfred
Christian slant on earlier known tales, like the poem about Beowulf, a Scandinavian hero
2) The tradition of telling changes from oral to writing as Christiany spreads
3) King Alfred, ”father of English literature”, translates The Venerable Bede into English and encourages other writings in English

6. Middle English (1100-1400) Latin and French Poetry Drama
Example: Geoffrey Chaucer
ENfOMU (General Prologue from Canterbury Tales, end of 14th century)
Latin and Frenc dominate written work, not so much is written in English. Invasion and occupation from France makes French official Language for 100 years. English ruling classes increasingly in conflict with the French.
Written poetry emerges, mostly romance about knights. Written in poetic style like Old English, but now in Middle English. Oxford and Cambridge unversitites founded.
Chaucer – Canterbury Tales (end of 14th century), a group of pilgrims headed for Canterbury in East England, satiries character types

7. Canterbury Tales General Prologue
When April's gentle rains have pierced the drought Of March right to the root, and bathed each sprout Through every vein with liquid of such power It brings forth the engendering of the flower; When Zephyrus too with his sweet breath has blown 5 Through every field and forest, urging on The tender shoots, and there's a youthful sun, His second half course through the Ram now run, And little birds are making melody And sleep all night, eyes open as can be 10 (So Nature pricks them in each little heart), On pilgrimage then folks desire to start. The palmers long to travel foreign strands To distant shrines renowned in sundry lands; And specially, from every shire's end 15 In England, folks to Canterbury wend: To seek the blissful martyr is their will, The one who gave such help when they were ill.
Listen first on Youtube, look at the Middle English text to see if you can follow. Did you manage to hear any words? Listen again but try to follow in this text at the same time. Differences in English language.

8. The Renaissance Begin to Spread (1400-1500)
Romances increasingly popular
Folk ballads
Early Modern English
Example: Sir Thomas Malory
knights, monsters, love, mystery, miracle, morality
Folk ballads became popular
Early Modern English begins to develop, pronunciaton changes. English becomes official language in 1415 with Henry V as the king.
Sir Thomas Malory – Morte d’Arthr (romance), published in 1485

9. The Renaissance and the Reformation (1500-1650)
Interest in education, science, arts, the classic
Lyric poetry
Non-fiction prose
Early Modern English
Theatres
Examples: Shakespeare, Marlowe
n3gclQ1ak (10 things I hate about you, 1999, based on The Taming of the Shrew by Shakespeare)
Lyrc poetry –developed form, the sonnet, the pastoral poems, drama
Non –fiction prose like essays, biographies
Early Modern English established, inventiveness in English
Theatres popular for all social classes, had to close dwn in 1642 due to Puritanism, thus for a time stopping dramatists’ creative art

10. The Restoration and The Age of Enlightenment (1650-1800)
Religious content
Age of Reason
Poetry
The rise of the novel
Examples: John Milton, Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift
TNNM (Gulliver’s travels, 2010, based on the book with the same name by Jonathan Swift)
Restoration – reaction against Puritanism, wishes to restore monarchy. Comedy of manners – light, witty style
Age of Englightenment/reason: scientific revolution with descriptive, argumentative analytical and philosophical non-fiction. Satire used to criticise and attack people/types or insitutions
Poetry – admiration of Classics, intellectual way
The rise of the novel: more common to follow a central character through varous often unrelated events.

11. The Romantic Age (1800-1835) Romantic poetry Use of everyday language
Mystery and terror
Late Modern English
Examples: Jane Austen, Lord Byron, Sir Walter Scott
nGkJmxlZ7o (Ivanhoe, 1982, based on the book with the same name, by Sir Walter Scott)
Romantic poetry used with breaking away from earlier norms to seek new form of expression
Use of everyday language to express imagniation and overflowing emotions, inspired by Nature, the Far East, Medieval tales of knights, folk traditions
Mystery and terror – tales about dark forces, ghosts etc.
Late Modern English – no major structural differences from today’s English
Jane Austen – novels express highly ironic observations of human nature in the period of social setting during this time

12. The Victorian Age (1837-1901) Prose From Romantic  realism
Episodic writing
Detective stories
Drama
Examples: the Brontë sisters, Lewis Carroll, Charles Dickens, Oscar Wilde, Rudyard Kipling
o&feature=related (Alice in Wonderland, 1951, based on the book with the same name by Lewis Caroll)
Prose important with both ficition and non-fiction texts. Novels became widely read and more accepted
Gradually went from the romantic novel to a more realistic sense, wanted to show how life really is, which often resulted in hard realities and the poor
Episodic writing with cliff-hangers by the ending of the chapter, for publication in magazines
Detective stories common
Drama with social comments and satire

13. Modernism (1900-1945) Modernism develops The ”ice-berg technique”
Imaginative children’s literature
War poets
Examples: Joseph Conrad, Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, TS Eliot, George Orwell
Oaqo&feature=related (The Hours, 2002, based on Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Wolf)
Focus from externally observable to internal human state and psychology
The ice-berg technique – few words but highly charged between the lines
Imaginative children’s literature – popular genres with detective/spy fiction, sci fi and fantasy (Tolkien)
War poets – write about the suffering in the war. Poetry develop into a flora of isms with much symbolism, generally seeking to express inner truths

14. Postmodernism (1945) Diversity in all forms ”The angry young men”
Novels
Examples: Doris Lessing, VS Naipul, Harold Pinter, Toni Morrison
Diversity in all forms – highly structured, concrete, realistic to wildly fantastic
After WWII – The angry young men, hard social realities
Novels with different narrative techniques (different narrators, non chronological etc.)

15. Timeline History of Literature

16. Info on Assignment Instructions Form pairs
Make research in the classroom our outside
Pick one writer
Tell me
Back in classroom at xx.xx