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1. English Literature

3. What is literature?
What is the nature of
literature?
What is the value of
literature?
Why do we study
literature?
How do we study
literature?

4. Part I Course Description
 Definition of English Literature
 Literature mainly produced in English by the
people living in the UK (American citizens..
 Methodology
 Historical approach
 Thematic approach
 Analytical approach
 Requirements
 Reading before class
 Note-taking, participation and presentation
in class

5. Course book: History and anthology of English Literature
good and authoritative one;
Easy to understand;
 prepare a notebook and copy the outline I provide
especially important to your graduate entrance examination
Suggestions:
刘炳善《英国文学简史》河南人民出版社（条理较好，简单易懂，
很多学校考研的指定书目）；
张定铨《新编简明英国文学史》（以各时代兴盛的文学形式为主
导）；
侯维瑞《英国文学通史》（中文写成，内容庞大）

6. History of English Literature
Old English Literature
Medieval English Literature
Renaissance English Literature
17th century English Literature
18th century English Literature
Romantic English Literature
19th century English Literature
20th century English Literature

7. Old English Literature
 449A.D.---1066
 Formation of England
 Formation of Old English
 Poetic tradition
 The Song of Beowulf---the national
epic
 Anglo-Saxon period: from tribal society
to feudalism

8. Medieval English Literature
 About five centuries
 Feudal system, Roman Catholic church
 Literary forms: romance, popular
ballad
 Representatives:Geoffrey Chaucer,
William Langland

9. Renaissance English Literature
 Late 15th century---early 17th century
 The rise of bourgeois class
 Renaissance: the rebirth of letters
the key: humanism
 Thomas More: the greatest humanist
 Representatives:
--William Shakespeare: drama
--Edmund Spencer: poetry
--Francis Bacon: essay

10. 17th century English Literature
 English Revolution, Restoration, the
“Glorious Revolution”--constitutional
monarchy
 Literature of the Revolution:
--Poetry: John Milton
Metaphysical poetry
--Prose: John Bunyan
 Literature of the Restoration:
--comedies (comedy of manners)
--John Dryden

11. 18th century English Literature
 The industrial revolution, the rise of bourgeois
middle class
 The Enlightenment—the struggle of
bourgeoisie against feudalism
 Neoclassicism: Alexander Pope, Joseph
Addison, Richard Steele
 Realistic novel: Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift,
Henry Fielding
 Sentimentalism: Laurence Stern, Thomas
Gray
 Pre-Romanticism: William Blake, Robert

12. Romantic English Literature
 The French Revolution & the industrial
revolution
 Poetry
William Wordsworth, S. T. Coleridge
Robert Southey; Byron, Shelley, Keats
 Prose: Charles Lamb
 Novel: Walter Scott, Jane Austen

13. 19th century English Literature
 The Victorian period
 The struggle between the working
class and the capitalists
 Critical realism: novel (the 40s and early
50s)
Charles Dickens, W. M. Thackeray,
Bronte sisters, George Eliot etc.
 Prose & poetry: the mid and late 19th
century


14.  Literary trends at the end of the 19th
century
--Naturalism: George Gissing
--Neo-romanticism: Robert Louis
Stevenson
--Aestheticism: Oscar Wilde, Walter
Pater

15. 20th century English Literature
 The two world wars
 New ideas and new theories
 Realistic writing: early 20th century
--poetry: Thomas Hardy, war poets
--novel: John Galsworthy, H. G. Wells,
Arnold Bennett
--drama: George Bernard Shaw
 Modernism: the 20s and 30s
--a movement of experiments in
techniques

16. -- poetry: W.B. Yeats and T.S. Eliot.
-- novel: D.H. Lawrence, E.M. Foster, James
Joyce and Virginia Woolf
--drama: J.M. Synge
 English literature since 1945
--postmodernism
--drama: Samuel Becket, John
Osborne,Harold Pinter
--novel: William Golding, John Fowles,
Kingsley Amis (the Angry Yong man), Martin
Amis etc.
--poetry: Dylan Thomas, Philip Larkin, Ted
Hughes and Seamus Heaney

17. Part One The Anglo-Saxon Period
The History
The Literature:
The Song of Beowulf: consists of 3182 lines and to
be divided into two parts.
The Subject Matter: The whole song is pagan in spirit
and matter.
Appreciation

18. Part Two The Anglo-Norman Period
The History
The Literature:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: master the general
idea;
appreciate the first
part

19. Part Three Geoffrey Chaucer
Introduction of life and work of Chaucer:
the “father of English poetry” and one of the
greatest narrative poets of England.
Translation work: Romance of the Rose
Masterpiece: The Canterbury Tales
One of the most famous works in all literature.
The Prologue is a splendid masterpiece of
realistic portrayal, the first of its kind in the
history of English literature.

20. In this work, Chaucer created a strikingly
brilliant and picturesque panorama of his time
and his country.
In this poem, Chaucer’s realism, trenchant irony
and freedom of views reached such a high level of
power that it had no equal in all the English
literature up to the 16th century.
Appreciation:
The Canterbury Tales
Popular Ballads:
Destination: Ballads are anonymous narrative

21. that have been preserved by oral transmission.
Appreciation: Robin Hood; Allin-a-Dale;
Get up and Bar the Door;
Sir Patrick Spens

22. Part Four The Renaissance
The History: the 16th century in England
was a period of the breaking up of feudal
relations and establishing of the foundations
of capitalism.
The works:
At the beginning of the 16th century: Utopia
by Thomas More
In the first half of the 16th century: lyrical
poems(appeared) by Thomas Wyatt
In the second half of the 16th century:

23. lyrical poetry became widespread in
England: Outstanding poets : Philip Sidney.
Thomas Campion. Edmund Spenser( The
Fairy Queen)
At the end of the century: Francis Bacon
wrote his famous philosophical and literary
works.
William Shakespeare:
Life:
Works: During the twenty-two years of his
literary work he produced 37 plays,

24. literary work he produced 37 plays, two narrative
poems and 154 sonnets.
Appreciation: Hamlet ;The Merchant of Venice and
Sonnet 18,29,106.
Francis Bacon:
Life:
Works: may be divided into three classes:
the philosophical, the literary, and the
professional works.
Appreciation: Of Truth, Of Studies.

25. Part Five The 17th Century
The Period of Revolution and Restoration
Historical Background:
 Literary Characteristics:
 John Donne: A more thoroughly characteristic
figure of the early seventeenth century.
Works: Songs and Sonnets; The Relic
Appreciation: Song, A Valediction: Forbidding
Mourning and Sonnet
John Milton: English poet

26. Life:
Works: L’Allegro;Il
Penseroso;Comus;Areopagitica,
Eikonoklastes; Defense for the English
People.
The famous is: Paradise Lost; Paradise Regained.
Appreciation: Paradise Lost; sonnet
John Bunyan:
Life:
Works: The Pilgrim’s Progress

27. Part Six The 18th Century
The Age of Enlightenment in England
Daniel Defoe:
Life:
Masterpiece: Robinson Crusoe
Appreciation : Robinson Crusoe
 Jonathan Swift: the supreme master in the
first part of the century.
Works: Tale of a Tub; Gulliver’s Travels;
The Battle of the Books

28. Appreciation: Gulliver’s Travels
Henry Fielding: the greatest novelist of the
eighteenth century.
Works: Joseph Andrews; Jonathan Wild; The
History of Tom Jones; Amelia
William Blake: the most independent and the
most original of all the romantic
poets of the 18th century.
Works: Poetical Sketches; Song of Innocence;
The Book of Thel; Tiriel;The Marriage

29. of Heaven and Hell, The French Revolution, The
Visions of the Daughters of Albion, The Songs of
Experience
Appreciation: London; The Tiger; The Chimney
Sweeper
Robert Burns: the greatest of Scottish poets
Works: Kilmarnock Burns( Poems Chiefly in
Scottish Dialect; To a Mouse; To a Mountain
Daisy; Man was Made to Mourn; The Two
Dogs; Address to the Devil.

30. Appreciation: My Heart’s in the Highlands ;John
Anderson, My Jo; A Red, Red Rose;
To a Mouse; Auld Lang Syne.
( Try to get the main content of these
works.)

31. Part Seven The Romantic Period
Romanticism in England
Background:
William Wordsworth:
Works: the Lyrical Ballads;
the principal poems: Lines Composed
a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey;
The Prelude; The Excursion.
Appreciation: Lines; sonnet
Shelley:

32. Life:
Works: Queen Mab; Alastor or The Spirit of
Solitude; Lane and Cythna;Prometheus
Unbound; The Cenci; Ode to the West
Wind; To a Sky-Lark
Appreciation: Ozymandias; A Song: Men of
England; Ode to the West
Wind; To a Sky-Lark
Jane Austen:
Works: Pride and Prejudice; Northanger Abbey;

33. Sense and Sensibility; Emma; Walter Scott;
Persuasion; Mansfield Park
Appreciation: Pride and Prejudice
(Try to get the main content)

34. Part eight The Victorian Age
Critical Realism in England
Historical Background:
Charles Dickens:
Life:
Works: Pickwick Papers; Oliver Twist (first true
novel);Nicholas Nickleby; Master
Humphrey’s Clock; The Old Curiosity
Shop;
Barnaby Rudge; Martin Chuzzlewit;A

35. Household Words; Bleak House; Little Dorrit; A
Tale of Two Cities; Great Expectation; Our
Mutual Friend; Edwin Drood.
Appreciation: Oliver Twist
Charlotte Bronte And Emily Bronte:
Life Story:
Works: The Professor; Jane Eyre; Wuthering
Heights; Shirley; Villette
Appreciation: Jane Eyre; Wuthering Heights
Robert Browning:

36. Life story:
Style: individual
Works: Pauline; “history of a soul”; Sordello;
Pippa Passes; In a Balcony; Colombe’s
Birthday; A Blot in the Scutcheon; The
Return of the Druses
Appreciation: My Last Duchess; Home-Thoughts,
from Abroad

37. Part nine:Twentieth Century Literature
The Transition From 19TH to 20th Century in
English literature
George Bernard Shaw:
works: Widowes’ Houses; The Philanderer; Mrs.
Warren’s Profession; Arms and the Man;
Candida; The Man of Destiny; a mock
heroic skit on Napoleon; You Never Can
Tell; Caesar and Cleopatra; Man and
Superman; Getting Married.

38. Appreciation: Mrs. Warren’s Profession
D.H.Lawrence:
Life:
Works: Sons and Lovers; The White Peacock; The
Rainbow;
Appreciation: Sons and Lovers
James Joyce:
Works: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man;
The Day of the Rabblement
Appreciation: Araby