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439
THE OLD ENGLISH PERIOD (439-1066)
(731) The Venerable Bede, in his monastery at Jarrow, completes his history of the English Church and people.
(959) The material of the Eddas, taking shape in Iceland, derives from earlier sources in Norway, Britain and Burgundy.
(975-1025) Beowulf, the first great work of Germanic literature, mingles the legends of Scandinavia with the experience in England of Angles and Saxons. -
1066
THE MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD (1066-1500)
(1367) A narrator who calls himself Will, and whose name may be Langland, begins the epic poem of Piers Plowman.
(1387) Chaucer begins an ambitious scheme for 100 Canterbury Tales, of which he completes only 24 by the time of his death.
(1469) Thomas Malory, in goal somewhere in England, compiles Morte d´Arthur – an English account of the French tales of King Arthur. -
1500
THE RENAISSANCE PERIOD (1500-1660)
(1510) Erasmus and Thomas more take the northern Renaissance in the direction of Christian humanism.
(1590) English poet Edmund Spenser celebrate the Protestant Elizabeth I as The Faerie Queene.
(1601) Shakespeare´s central character in Hamlet expresses both the ideals of the Renaissance and rhe disillusion of a less confident age. -
THE NEOCLASICAL PERIOD (1660-1785)
(1667) Paradise Lost is published, earningits author John Milton just 10 euros.
(1726) Jonathan Swift sends his hero on a series of bitterly satirical travels in Gulliver´s Travels.
(1755) Samuel Johnson published his magisterial Dictionary of the English Language. -
THE ROMANTIC PERIOD (1785-1832)
(1792) English author Mary Wollstonecrft publishes a passionately feminist work, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.
(1813) Pride and Prejudice, based on a youthful work of 1797 called First Impressions, is the second of Jane Austen´s novels to be published.
(1831) Oliver Wendell Holmes´ poem The Last Leaf is inspired by an aged survivor of the Boston Tea Party. -
THE VICTORIAN PERIOD (1832-1901)
(1843) Ebenezer Scrooge mends his ways Justin time in Charles Dickens´ A Christmas Carol.
(1895) H. G . Wells publishes The Time Machine, a story about a Time Traveller whose first stop on his journey is the year 802701.
(1900) Frank Baum introduces children to Oz, in his book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. -
THE EDWARDIAN PERIOD (1901-1914)
(1901) Beatrix Potter publishes at her own expense The Tale of Peter Rabbit.
(1908) Lucy Maud Montgomery´s first novel, Anne of Green Gables, brings her instant fame and fortune.
(1910) H.G. Wells publishes The History of Mr Polly, a novl about an escape from drab everyday existence. -
THE GEORGIAN PERIOD (1914-1936)
(1915) Rupert Brooke´s 1914 and Other Poems is published a few months after his death in Greece.
(1925) Virginia Woolf publishes her novel Mrs Dalloway, in wich the action is limited to a single day.
(1928) Irish author Frank Harris publishes the foruth and final volume of My Life and Loves. -
THE MODERN PERIOD (1936-1950)
(1936) US author Margaret Mitchell publishes her one book, which becomes probably the best-selling novel of all time- Gone with the Wind.
(1940) Ernest Hemingway publishes the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, set in the Spanish Civil War.
(1945) In George Orwell´s fable Animal Farm a ruthiess pig. Napoleon, controls the farmyard using the techniques of Stalin. -
THE POSTMODERN PERIOD (1950-2000)
(1950) C.S. Lewis gives the first glimpse of Narnia in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
(1979) US author Maya Angelou publishes her autobiographical first novel, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.
(1997) A schoolboy wizard performs his first tricks in J.K. Rowing´s Harry Potter and the Philosopher´s Stone. -
THE CONTEMPORARY PERIOD (2000- PRESENT)
(2010) Mockingjay completes Suzanne Collins´ trilogy, The Hunger Games.
(2013- present) J.K. Rowing (under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith) starts Cormoran Strikes, a series of crime fiction novels.