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Period: 450 to 1066
OLD ENGLISH PERIOD
This initial period of English literature takes place in the invasion of Celtic England (the Anglo and the Saxons).
In this period the literature was oral, an example of this was the prose with medical and religious themes, its greatest exponents were Buewolf, Caedmon and Cynewolf.
Buewolf Prose (sigle VIII)
"From Grendel, the Bloodshed
Like every day, Hrothgar came down from his room at dawn to meet his guests in the Herot room. While he was eating breakfas" -
Period: 1066 to 1500
MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD
In this period of English literature we see the transition that England had in aspects such as language, culture and lifestyle.
As examples of literature from this time we have the religious writings and secular literature of 1350, its greatest exponents were Chucer and Thomas Malury.
Example: Canterbury Tales by Chaucer (1392) -
Period: 1500 to
RENAISSANCE PERIOD
This period of English literature is divided into 4 stages: 1. Elizabethan age (English drama) 2. Jacobean age (King James translation of the Bible) 3. Carolina age (reign of Charles I) 4. Commonwealth age (end of the English Civil War and political writings). its greatest exponents were William Shakespeare, John Done, Robert Burton, Jhon Milton.
Example: Hamlet by William Shakespeare (1609) -
Period: to
NEOCLASSICAL PERIOD
This period is divided into 3 ages: 1. age of restoration: age of puritan exposure through theater and satire by William Congreve and Samuel Butler. 2. age of Augustus : time of poets such as Alexander Pope and Lady Mary Wortley who challenged the female stereotypes of the time. 3. The Age of Sensitivity : Neoclassicism and Enlightenment were shown in a critical and literary way at the hands of Edmund Burke and Henry Fielding.
Example: The Turskish Embassy Letters by Lady Mary Wortley (1716) -
Period: to
ROMANTIC PERIOD
Period marked by the approval of the reform law and the death of Sir Walter Scott, was a time of diverse British literature and Gothic literature at the hands of figures such as Wordsworth and Matthew Lewis.
Example: Intimations of Immortality by William Wordsworth (1802) -
Period: to
VICTORIAN PERIOD
This period is recognized by the reign of Queen Victoria characterized by social, economic and religious problems. In this period we see prose fiction at the hands of characters like Charles Dickens and Christina Rossetti.
Example: Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens (1838)
"Oliver is an orphan boy who spends his early years at Mrs. Mann's orphanage. Like the rest of the children at the orphanage, Oliver is continually starving" -
Period: to
MODERN PERIOD
Period characterized and marked by the beginning of the First World War. Narrative, verse, and drama was the literature expressed by writers such as James Joyce and Virginia Wolf.
Example: Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Wolf (1925)
"You're going to get married, because you're pretty enough, thought Mrs. Dempster. Get married, she thought, and that's how you'll learn. Yeah, sure! The cooking stuff and stuff. Every man is what he is. " -
Period: to
POSTMODERN PERIOD
This period began after the Second World War, during this period the poststructuralist literature was exposed to the hands of Samuel Beckett and Joseph Heller.
Example: Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett (1953)
"But… but, behind that veil of sweetness and calm (he looks up at the sky, the others imitate him, except Lucky), the night gallops and will fall on us, like this (Inspiration runs out), at the moment we least expect it. This is what happens in this fucking land "