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450
Old English
The Christianity reached England and Christianization of the pagan English tribes began. Alfred the great who reigned over England encouraged education and supervised the compilation of the Anglo Saxon Chronicle. -
1066
Middle English
This period started with the Norman Conquest in 1066. There are two shorter ages in this period. The span between 1066 to 1340 is called Anglo-Norman Period, a French dialect spoken by the new ruling class of England. * From 1340 to 1400 is called the age of chaucer because the great poet dominated this period. All the period is call the middle ages. John Wyclif (1324-84) The father of English Prose: Traslation of the Bible into English. -
1500
English Renaissance Period
The renaissance was a cultural movement. Started in Italy and spread all over Europe. It is considered the division between the Middle Ages and the Modern era. This period between 1500 to 1660 is divided in three spans. The Elizabeth period , The Jacobean period and The Caroline period between. William Shakespeare was one of the most representative english writers from the Elizabeth period. His early plays were mainly comedies and histories He then wrote mainly tragedies like Hamlet. -
Puritan Period
This is the period was between 1653 to 1660. Started when there was no monarch in England. After the death of Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, the puritan leader, came to the power. The English People realized that monarchy was essential for them. Some Major Works in this Period:
*Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes
*Holy Living by Jeremy Tailor -
The Restoration Age
Between 1660 to 1700. This age is also called Neoclassical or Pseudo- Classical Age to mean the artificiality of the writers of this age. They imitated the ancient Greek and Roman Literaty tradition but lacked the originality of the writers of that period.
*General rather than the individual qualities of human beings are given more importance.
*The literaty ideal of the age is "art for humanity's sake" -
18th Century Period
The Period between 1700 to 1798 is almost called "The Classical Age" Is divided into three distinct periods:
The Ages of Dryden,The Age of Pope, The Age of Doctor Johnson
The term Classic was first applied to the works of the great Greek and Roman writers. In England tried to follow the simple and noble methods of the great ancient writers, They began be called Classical Writers.
Books were destroyed and writers captured for their ideas like Voltaire and Defoe. -
Romanticism
The romantic Age ( Between 1775 to 1837) is also known as "The Age of Revolution" In this period three revolutions took place: The American Revolution, The French Revolution and The Industrial Revolution. There was a new view of the world and a new literary style. Sensibility and Imagination began to replace rationality and harmony.
Pre Romantic Poets like Thomas Grey with "Elegy Written in a country Churchyard"
1st generation: The Lake Poets
2nd generation: George Byron -
Victorian Period
Between 1837 and 1901, Victorian literature is literature, mainly written in English, during the reign of Queen Victoria (1837–1901) it was the novel that was most important in the Victorian period.The Victorian era was the great age of the English novel—realistic, thickly plotted, crowded with characters, and long. It was the ideal form to describe contemporary life and to entertain the middle class. The novels of Charles Dickens, -
Modern Literature
Between 1901 to 1940, This was a period chracterized by experimentation. Writers rejected the traditional forms of narration. They use interior monologue like a new verbal expression. Narrations without introductory expressions or rules of punctuation, lack chronological order.Importance given to sound of words.
Some Writers like James Joyce with " Ulysses" and Virginia Woolf with " Mrs Dalloway ". -
Post Moderns
(Between 1940 to 2000) Postmodern literature is a literature characterized by reliance on narrative techniques such as fragmentation, paradox, and the unreliable narrator; and is often (though not exclusively) defined as a style or a trend which emerged in the post–World War II era. Post modern authors rejct outrigth meaning in their novels, stories and poems. There were graphic novels like Batman. -
Contemporary
Contemporary literature is defined as literature written after World War II through the current day. ... While there is some disagreement, most agree that contemporary literature is writing completed after 1940. Refers to the present literature. Some Important Contemporary Authors are: Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan and Jonathan Franzen.
