Slide 4

Slide 1

British literature refers to literature associated with the United Kingdom, Isle of Man and Channel Islands. This includes literatures from England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The largest part of British literature has been written in the English language and has developed into a global phenomenon, because of its use in the former colonies of Britain. In addition the story of British literature involves writings in Anglo-Norman, Anglo-Saxon, Cornish, Latin, Manx, Scots, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh and other languages. In other words every people invading the British Isles contributed to the sum total of the writings known currently as British literature. Literature in the Celtic languages of the islands is the oldest surviving vernacular literature in Europe.

Let’s leave alone the writings of the earliest periods like Latin, Celtic and Norse and turn to the literature of the later epochs presented in the English language.

Slide 2

Conventionally the whole history of the British literature can be presented in several periods, which are as follows:

- Old English literature: 450-1153

- Middle English literature: 1154-1485

- Early Modern period: 1486-1800:

· Renaissance literature (1486-1625)

· Elizabethan era (1558-1603)

· Jacobean literature (1603-25)

· The Caroline, Interregnum and Restoration periods (1625-1689)

· Augustan literature (1689-1750)

- Romanticism (1798-1837)

- Victorian literature (1837-1901)

- Modernism (1901-1960)

- Postmodernism and Contemporary period

Slide 3

Old English literature 449–1066.

Old English literature (or Anglo-Saxon literature) encompasses literature written in Old English in Anglo-Saxon England, in the period after the settlement of the Saxons and other Germanic tribes in England after the withdrawal of the Romans until the Norman Conquest of 1066. These works include genres such as epic poetry, hagiography, sermons, Bible translations, legal works, chronicles, riddles, and others. In all there are about 400 surviving manuscripts from the period

Nearly all Anglo-Saxon authors are anonymous, only four are known by their vernacular works to us today with any certainty: Caedmon, Bede, Alfred the Great, and Cynewulf.

Cædmon is the earliest English poet whose name is known with his only surviving work Cædmon's Hymn, probably dating from the late 7th century.

The epic poem Beowulf is the most famous work in Old English, and has achieved national epic status in England, despite not being set in England. A hero of the Geats, Beowulf battles three antagonists: Grendel, Grendel's mother, and a Dragon.

Chronicles contained a range of historical and literary accounts; one notable example is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. This is a collection of annals in Old English chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. Nine manuscripts survive in whole or in part, though not all are of equal historical value.

The Anglo-Saxons were converted to Christianity after their arrival in England. A popular poem, The Dream of the Rood, was inscribed upon the Ruthwell Cross. It is one of the earliest Christian poems and an example of the genre of dream poetry.

The Old English Martyrology is a collection of over 230 hagiographies, probably compiled in Mercia, or by someone who wrote in the Mercian dialect of the Old English language, in the second half of the 9th century.

Slide 4

Поиск по сайту: