ENGLISH LITERATURE

LESSON OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you should be able to:

• name some well-known English writers and their works as well as
the body of English literature to which they belong; and
• analyze a few selected literary works representative of English
literature.
• Who are some of the important writers in the English literature?
Why are they important?
What literary forms are prominent in English literature
English literature

• is one of the richest, most developed, and

most important bodies of literature in the
world. It encompasses both written and
spoken works by writers from the United
Kingdom.
Old English Literature (600 - 1100)

• Old English, the earliest form of the English language,

was spoken by the Anglo-Saxons, a Germanic tribe living
in Britain during the fifth century. One significant work
written in Old English is Beowulf, the longest epic poem
in Old English. It is known for its use of kennings, which
are phrases or compound words used to name persons,
places, and things indirectly.
BEOWULF

• Beowulf (/ˈbeɪəwʊlf/;[2] Old English: [ˈbeːo̯wulf]) is an Old English

epic story consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It may be the
oldest surviving long story in Old English and is commonly cited as
one of the most important works of Old English literature. The
date of composition is a matter of contention among scholars; the
only certain dating pertains to the manuscript, which was
produced between 975 and 1025.The author was an anonymous
Anglo-Saxon poet, referred to by scholars as the "Beowulf author
BEOWULF

• The story is set in Scandinavia. Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, comes to

the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead
hall in Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel.
After Beowulf slays him, Grendel's mother attacks the hall and is then
also defeated. Victorious, Beowulf goes home to Geatland (Götaland in
modern Sweden) and later becomes king of the Geats. After a period of
fifty years has passed, Beowulf defeats a dragon, but is mortally
wounded in the battle. After his death, his attendants cremate his body
and erect a tower on a headland in his memory.
• The full story survives in the manuscript known as the Nowell Codex. It
has no title in the original manuscript, but has become known by the
name of the story's protagonist. In 1731, the manuscript was badly
damaged by a fire that swept through Ashburnham House in London that
had a collection of medieval manuscripts assembled by Sir Robert Bruce
Cotton.[6] The Nowell Codex is currently housed in the British Library.
Middle English Literature (1100 - 1500)

• Middle English is a blend Old English and Norman French,

the French dialect spoken by the Normans (people of
Normandy). The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer,
the father of English literature, is a fine example of
literature written in Middle English.
Elizabethan Literature (1558 - 1603)

• The Elizabethan period is the golden age of English

literature. Also, it is the golden age of drama. Known as
the “Bard of Avon,” William Shakespeare wrote his plays
during the period. His best plays include Hamlet, King
Lear, Macbeth, Othello, and The Merchant of Venice.
Also, he wrote 154 sonnets, many of which are the best
loved and the most widely-read poems in the English
literature.
The Romantic Period (1800 - 1837)

• This period is the golden age of lyric poetry. Poetry

became the expression of the poet’s personal feelings
and emotions. A few notable works of poetry of the
period are Songs of Innocence and of Experience by
William Blake, Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth and
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Eve of St. Agnes, and Other
Poems by John Keats, “Don Juan” by Lord Byron, and
“Ode to the West Wind” by Percy Bysshe Shelley.
The Victorian Period (1837 - 1900)

• The period saw the rise of the novel. Charles Dickens, considered to be the
greatest English novelist of the 19th century, wrote Great Expectations. This
novel was published as a serial in a weekly periodical from December 1860 to
August 1861. Alfred Lord Tennyson and Robert Browning each wrote fine poetry
during the period. Tennyson’s In Memoriam A.H.H. is a requiem for his friend
Arthur Henry Hallam. It is widely considered to be one of the great poems of
the 19th century. Browning, who is known for his dramatic monologues, wrote
the famous poem “My Last Duchess.” In a dramatic monologue, the poet
addresses an audience through an assumed voice.
• Oscar Wilde is the best dramatist of the period. He wrote the masterpiece The
Importance of Being Earnest.
Twentieth Century (1900 - 2000)

• William Butler Yeats and Thomas Stearns Eliot wrote

Modernist poems during the period. Yeats wrote The Tower,
The Winding Stair, and New Poems, all of which are known to
have potent images. Eliot’s masterpieces are “The Love Song
of J. Alfred Prufrock” and “The Waste Land.”
• Virginia Woolf in her story Mrs. Dalloway and James Joyce in
his work Ulysses use stream of consciousness, a literary
technique in which the flow of thoughts of a character is
described in words.