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Period: 500 to 1300
Premodern or medieval period
Medieval English literature is a very broad topic, which includes all the works that were available in Europe during the Middle Ages. The literature of this era was dominated by religious writings, which included poetry, theology and the life of the saints, but there were also secular works and scientific works. -
731
The Venerable Bede
The Venerable Bede, in his monastery in Jarrow, completes his history of the English church and people -
800
Beowulf
The first great work of Germanic literature mixes Scandinavian legends with the Anglo and Saxon experience in England. -
950
Eddas
It takes shape in Iceland, it is derived from previous sources in Norway, Great Britain and Burgundy. -
1300
Duns Scotus
Give humanists the name Dunsman or dunce -
1340
William of Ockham
Advocates reducing arguments to the essentials, an approach later known as Ockham's Razor -
1367
William Langland
Piers Plowman's epic poem begins -
1387
Chaucer
An ambitious plan for 100 Canterbury Tales begins, of which he only turns 24 by the time of his death -
Period: 1485 to 1558
Early modern era or Renaissance
"The English Renaissance" is the term used to describe the artistic and cultural movement that existed in England from the 16th to the mid-17th centuries. -
1524
William Tyndale
He studies at the University of Wittenberg and plans to translate the Bible into English -
Period: 1559 to
Elizabethan literature
The Elizabethan era had a thriving literary production, especially in the field of theater. William Shakespeare was an outstanding author of poetry and plays, surely the most relevant figure that English literature has had in its history, but also other figures have had a relevant weight in the theater such as Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Dekker, John Fletcher and Francis Beaumont The urban comedy genre was also developed very often and admired. -
Marlowe
Marlowe's first play, Tamburlaine the Great, features the shocking blank verse of the Elizabethan and Jacobean drama. -
Shakespeare
He is considered the most important writer in English and one of the most famous playwrights of universal literature. -
Period: to
Jacobean literature
The poet and playwright Ben Jonson led the Jacobean literature, after Shakespeare's death. Several authors followed his style as Beaumont and Fletcher, all of them were called "sons of Ben." Another popular style of the time was the theater of revenge that became popular with John Webster and Tomas Kyd -
John Smith
He publishes "A Description of New England", a review of his exploration of the region in 1614 -
John Milton
Lycidas is published in memory of his Cambridge friend Edward King -
Anne Bradstreet
The poems of Massachusetts author Anne Bradstreet are published in London under the title The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America -
Period: to
Restoration Literature
The reopening of the theaters gave the opportunity to represent satirical works on the new nobility and the growing bourgeoisie. The mobility of society, which followed the social upheavals of the previous generation, provided the ideas for the creation of the comedy of manners. Aphra Behn was the first female novelist and professional dramatist. The allegory of John Bunyan, The Pilgrim, is one of the most read works of this period. -
Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost is published, earning its author John Milton just £10 -
John Locke
He publishes his Essay concerning Human Understanding, arguing that all knowledge is based on experience -
Period: to
Augustus era literature
The works of Alexander Pope show that the poetry of these years was very formal. The English novel was not very popular until the 18th century, although many works were very important, such as Robinson Crusoe (1719) by Daniel Defoe. In the middle of the XVIII the novel settled down of the hand of authors like Henry Fielding, Laurence Stern and Samuel Richardson, who perfected the epistolary novel; Richardson was moralist while Fielding and Stern moved closer to the comic genre. -
Augustan Age
The Augustan Age begins in English literature, claiming comparison with the equivalent flowering under Augustus Caesar -
Daniel Defoe
Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, with its detailed realism, can be seen as the first English novel -
Samuel Richardson
Samuel Richardson's Clarissa begins the correspondence that grows into the longest novel in the English language -
Samuel Johnson
He publishes his magisterial Dictionary of the English Language -
Encyclopaedia Britannica
A Society of Gentlemen in Scotland begins publication of the immensely successful Encyclopaedia Britannica -
William Blake
William Blake publishes Songs of Innocence, a volume of his poems with every page etched and illustrated by himself -
Mary Wollstonecraft
English author Mary Wollstonecraft publishes a passionately feminist work, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman -
Period: to
Romanticism
The reaction to industrialization and urbanism pushed poets to explore nature, such as the "Lake Poets" group in which we included William Wordsworth. These romantic poets brought to English literature a new degree of sentimentality and introspection. Among the most important authors of the second generation of romantic poets are Lord Byron, Percy Bysse Shelley and John Keats -
Jane Austen
English author Jane Austen publishes her first work in print, Sense and Sensibility, at her own expense -
Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice, based on a youthful work of 1797 called First Impressions, is the second of Jane Austen's novels to be published -
Charles Dickens
24-year-old Charles Dickens begins monthly publication of his first work of fiction, Pickwick Papers (published in book form in 1837) -
Period: to
Victorian Literature
The novel was the most important literary form of Victorian literature. Most of the authors were more focused on knowing the tastes of the middle class they read, than on satisfying the aristocrats. -
Peter Mark Roget
London physician Peter Mark Roget publishes his dictionary of synonyms, the Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases -
Lewis Carroll
Lewis Carroll publishes Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, a development of the story he had told Alice Liddell three years earlier -
Culture and Anarchy
English author Matthew Arnold publishes Culture and Anarchy, an influential collection of essays about contemporary society -
Art for art's sake
The Aesthetic Movement and 'art for art's sake', attitudes personified above all by Whistler and Wilde, are widely mocked and satirized in Britain -
Period: to
Modern Literature
Between the two World Wars we find important novelists like D.H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf, member of the Bloomsbury group. The Sitwells also gained strength between literary and artistic movements, but was less influential. The most important popular literature writers were P.G. Wodehouse and Agatha Christie. -
The Golden Bough
Scottish anthropologist James Frazer publishes The Golden Bough, a massive compilation of contemporary knowledge about ritual and religious custom -
The War of the Worlds
H.G. Wells publishes his science-fiction novel The War of the Worlds, in which Martians arrive in a rocket to invade earth -
Rudyard Kipling
He publishes Just So Stories for Little Children -
James Joyce
James Joyce's novel, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, begins a serial publication in a London newspaper, The Egoist. -
Henry Williamson
He wins a large number of readers with Tarka the Otter, a realistic story of the life and death of an otter in Devon -
Period: to
Postmodern Literature
Two examples of English postmodern son literature: John Fowles and Julian Barnes. Some important writers of the early 21st century son: Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, Will Self, Andrew Motion and Salman Rushdie. -
Kingsley Amis
Kingsley Amis and other young writers in Britain are known as Angry Young Men -
Roald Dahl
British author Roald Dahl publishes a children's novel, James and the Giant Peach -
Iris Murdoch
Publishes The Sea, the Sea, and wins the 1978 Booker Award -
Julian Barnes
The English author Julian Barnes publishes a multifaceted literary novel, Flaubert's Parrot -
Louis de Bernières
Louis de Bernières publishes Mandolin of Captain Corelli, a love story set in the Kefalonia occupied by the Italians -
Michael Frayn
Michael Frayn's work in Copenhagen dramatizes Werner Heisenberg's visit to Niels Bohr in Denmark during the war -
Philip Pullman
The Amber Spyglass completes Philip Pullman's trilogy, His Dark Materials
