-
600
The beginning
The ancestors of the language were wandering in the forests of
northern Europe. Their language was a part of Germanic branch of Indo‐European Family. The people talking this language
spread to the northern coast of Europe in the time of Roman Empire. Periods: Old English(7th century‐1100), Middle English(1100‐1450/1500), Modern English (1500‐now). In some books Modern English is divided in to two Early modern (1500‐1700), Late Modern (1700‐now). -
650
The Old English Period
Old English literature, also called Anglo-Saxon literature, literature written in Old English c. 650–c. 1100. -
1066
Middle English, from 1066 until the 15th Century
The Norman Invasion and Conquest of Britain in 1066 and the
resulting French Court of William the Conqueror gave the Norwegian‐Dutch influenced English a Norman‐Parisian‐
French effect. From 1066 until about 1400, Latin, French, and English were spoken. Present‐day
English is approximately 50% Germanic (English and Scandinavian) and 50% Romance (French and Latin). -
1500
Early Modern English, from the 15th Century to the 17th Century
During this period, English became more organized
and began to resemble the modern version of English. Although the word order and sentence construction was still
slightly different, Early Modern English was at least recognizable to the Early Modern English speaker. -
Modern English, from the 17th Century to Modern Times
Modern English developed through the efforts of literary and
political writings, where literacy was uniformly found. Modern English was heavily influenced by classical usage, the
emergence of the university‐educated class, Shakespeare, the common language found in the East Midlands section of
present‐day England, and an organized effort to document and standardize English. -
From 1900 to 1945
any writers of the Edwardian period, drawing widely upon the realistic and naturalistic conventions of the 19th century (upon Ibsen in drama and Balzac, Turgenev, Flaubert, Zola, Eliot, and Dickens in fiction) and in tune with the anti-Aestheticism unleashed by the trial of the archetypal Aesthete, Oscar Wilde, saw their task in the new century to be an unashamedly didactic one. -
The literature of World War I and the interwar period
The impact of World War I upon the Anglo-American Modernists has been noted. In addition the war brought a variety of responses from the more-traditionalist writers, predominantly poets, who saw action. -
The literature of World War II (1939–45)
The outbreak of war in 1939, as in 1914, brought to an end an era of great intellectual and creative exuberance. Individuals were dispersed; the rationing of paper affected the production of magazines and books; and the poem and the short story, convenient forms for men under arms, became the favoured means of literary expression. It was hardly a time for new beginnings, although the poets of the New Apocalypse movement produced three anthologies (1940–45) inspired by anarchism. -
Literature after 1945
Increased attachment to religion most immediately characterized literature after World War II. This was particularly perceptible in authors who had already established themselves before the war. W.H. Auden turned from Marxist politics to Christian commitment, expressed in poems that attractively combine classical form with vernacular relaxedness. -
The 21st Century
History remained the outstanding concern of English literature. Although contemporary issues such as global warming and international conflicts (especially the Second Persian Gulf War and its aftermath) received attention, writers were still more disposed to look back. Bennett’s play The History Boys (filmed 2006) premiered in 2004; it portrayed pupils in a school in the north of England during the 1980s.
