Litterature

1. ENGLISH – AMERICAN
LITERATURE
An Introduction and History

2. INTRODUCTION OF ENGLISH LITERATURE
• English literature traces its origin to the
beginning of the history of English people.
• The English are a composite race, because various
racial elements have entered into their making :
Celts, Anglo-Saxons, Danes, Normans.

3. • The Celts were the earliest inhabitants of England.
• The Romans conquered Britain in 43A.D.
• The Angles, Saxons and Jutes came to settle in
England in the latter part of the fifth century A.D. and
eventually gave the country it’s name and it’s language.
• The Angles being the most numerous gave their name
to the whole country – Angle- land or England.

11. • The first step that put the Anglo-Saxons on the
path of civilization was their conversion to
Christianity.
• Oral literature was popular and mainly secular and
religious in nature.
• Written English literature was said to have been
appeared between 450-1050 which is known as Old
English Period in the history of English language.

12. LANGUAGE
• Old English language, also called Anglo-
Saxon, language spoken and written in
England before 1100.
• It is the ancestor of Middle English and
Modern English.

13. Four dialects of the Old English language are known:
1. Northumbrian - northern England and southeastern Scotland;
2. Mercian in central England;
3. Kentish in southeastern England; and
4. West Saxon in southern and southwestern England.
Mercian and Northumbrian are often classed together as the
Anglian dialects. Most extant Old English writings are in the West
Saxon dialect; the first great period of literary activity occurred
during the reign of King Alfred the Great in the 9th century.

14. • In contrast to Modern English, Old English had three genders
(masculine, feminine, neuter)
• Old English had a greater proportion of strong verbs (sometimes called
irregular verbs in contemporary grammars) than does Modern English.
• Many verbs that were strong in Old English are weak (regular) verbs in
Modern English
Example
Old English: helpan, Modern English - help;
healp for past singular
hulpon for past plural
holpen for past participle

15. • In contrast to Modern English, Old English had three genders
(masculine, feminine, neuter)
• Old English had a greater proportion of strong verbs (sometimes called
irregular verbs in contemporary grammars) than does Modern English.
• Many verbs that were strong in Old English are weak (regular) verbs in
Modern English
Example
Old English: helpan, Modern English - help;
healp for past singular
hulpon for past plural
holpen for past participle

16. CHRONOLOGY OF IMPORTANT DATES
(BEGINNINGS – 1350)
• 449 : Landing of tribes in England.
• 547 : Settling of Angles.
• 635-665 :- Coming of St. Aidan.
• 700 :- Conversion of Northumbria.
Beowulf the poem was made.
• 867 :- Danes conquer Northumbria.
• 871 :- Alfred, King of Wessex.

17. CHRONOLOGY OF IMPORTANT DATES
(BEGINNINGS – 1350)
• 901 :- Death of Alfred.
• 1000 :- Beowulf was written down.
• 1189 :- Richard I – Third Crusade.
• 1215 :- Magna Carta.
• 1300-1400 :- York and Wakefield Miracle Plays.
• 1338 :- Beginning of Hundred Years War with France.
• 1340 :- Birth of Chaucer.
• 1350 :- Sir Gawain, The Pearl.

18. THE EARLY LITERATURE OF THE
ANGLO-SAXONS
THE PEOPLE:
• They were Low-German tribes, allied more closely to the
modern Dutch than to the modern Germans both by
language and by blood.
• They loved their homes, reverenced their women, felt the
influences of Nature, believed in their gods, loved personal
freedom, sought honor and glory.

19. THE EARLY LITERATURE OF THE
ANGLO-SAXONS
THEIR GLOOMY LIFE:
• This people was a stern and somber race, with a gloomy
religion, and with melancholy ideas of life and fate.
• Life was almost without joy save perhaps the joy of conflict
and the whole of man's life, with whatever of joy it might
have, was but the flicker of a candle between two great
darknesses.

20. THE EARLY LITERATURE OF THE
ANGLO-SAXONS
LITERATURE OF TRADITION:
• These poets and reciters kept alive the traditions of the
people, interpreting their ideals in myth and legend and
heroic story.
• Stories of gods and heroes passed from generation to
generation by word of mouth, even as the story of the wrath
of Achilles was handed down among the prehistoric Greeks.

21. ENGLISH VS. AMERICAN
LITERATURE
Characteristics and Common Genres

22. ENGLISH VS. AMERICAN
• HISTORY
• WRITERS
• NARRATION
• STYLE
•GENRE
•TOPICS
•GRAMMAR
•PUNCTUATION

23. HISTORY
• American literature’s history dates back to the
17th century, English literature emerged in
the 10th century.
• The English style is therefore considered
richer in this respect.

24. WRITERS
• Known US writers are J.
F. Cooper, J.D. Salinger,
Jack London, E.A. Poe,
Mark Twain, Scott
Fitzgerald, W. Faulkner,
O’Connor, Hemmingway,
and King, to name a few.
• Known English writers are
Shakespeare, Bronte, Lord
Byron, Kipling, Dickens,
Austin, Rowling, Woolf,
Tolkien, Orwell, and
Collins.

25. NARRATION
• The language of an
American writer is
simultaneously simpler
and more accessible.
• This language is more
modern than original
British English.
• British writers tend to use
classical British English;
their vocabulary is richer.

26. STYLE
• American literature is to
be focused on politics,
economics, and social
status.
• American writers are more
cool-headed and cynical.
• British literature of the
same period mostly
invokes romance, human
values, ideals, and
manners.
• British writers’ works
come “from the heart”

27. GENRES AND TOPICS
• American writers discuss
American history and
social issues
• Revolutionary and
Puritanical morals in 17th
and 18th century
• English writers emphasize
their culture and manners
• Historical, Tragedy and
Comedy Plays during the
Romantic period.

28. GRAMMAR
• Americans tend to simplify
the English language by
removing letters from
words
• uses singular conjugation
for readers and audiences
• English creators follow
classical or conventional
paths in writing
• Pair up collective nouns
with plural verbs

29. PUNCTUATION
• American writers put
quotation marks inside
• single quotation marks
• uses comma for listings
• classical writers prefer to
leave quotation marks
outside
• double quotation marks
• uses Oxford comma

30. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(FICTION)
1. Detective Fiction
Genre of novel or short story in which a
mystery is solved mainly by the action of a
professional or amateur detective.
2. Historical Novel
A novel with a period in history as its setting,
which includes historical events and characters.

31. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(FICTION)
3. Letters
Written messages, ranging from those addressed
to the public and those sent from lover to lover, to
business letters and thank-you notes.
4. Mystery
Or mystery story, the cause of a mysterious
happening, often a crime, is gradually revealed by the
hero or heroine.

32. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(FICTION)
5. Novel
In modern literary usage, a sustained work of
prose fiction a volume or more in length.
6. Pastoral
Literary work in which the shepherd's life is
presented in a conventionalized manner.

33. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(FICTION)
7. Romance:
Tales of love and chivalric adventure, in verse
or prose, that became popular in France and spread
throughout Europe.
8. Short Story
Short work of prose fiction, usually consisting
of between 500 and 10,000 words

34. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(POETRY)
1. Ballad
A short, narrative poem usually relating a
single, dramatic event.
2. Concrete Poetry
Conveys meaning through the physical
arrangement of the words on the page as well as
through the words themselves.

35. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(POETRY)
3. Ode
A lyric poem, usually a fairly long one, with
lines of different lengths and complex rhythms,
addressed to a particular person or thing.
4. Sonnet
A short poem with 14 lines of 10 or 11 syllables
each and a regular rhyming pattern

36. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(POETRY)
5. Rondeau
A poem of 13 or sometimes 10 lines with only
two rhymes, and with the first line used as a refrain
after the eighth and thirteenth lines.
6. Sestina
The most complicated of the verse forms
initiated by the troubadours.

37. COMMON LITERARY GENRES
(POETRY)
7. Villanelle
A sequence of four 8-line stanzas with a refrain
of one or two lines repeated at the end of each
stanza.
8. Elegy
A poem of serious reflection, typically a lament
for the dead written in couplets.

38. THAT WAS IT!

39. BEOWULF
• It is the first written literary creation in English.
• It is the earliest and greatest epic in Anglo-Saxon.
• It is a poem of more than 3000 lines celebrating
the heroic deeds of the warrior who gives his name
to the poem.

40. BEOWULF

41. BEOWULF
• It is the first written literary creation in English.
• It is the earliest and greatest epic in Anglo-Saxon.
• It is a poem of more than 3000 lines celebrating
the heroic deeds of the warrior who gives his name
to the poem.

42. BEOWULF
• He saved the king from terrible monster Grendal
and his mother. Later he becomes the King of
Geatas. In the end he kills a firedrake but dies of
the dragon’s fiery breath.
• The story was in oral form in England. It was
later written by an eighth century poet in the form
of an epic.

43. OTHER SHORTER POEMS
• Beowulf was followed by other poetical works
like Widsith, Waldera and the Exetor Book.
The authorship of these poetical works is not
known.
• Life in all these poems is sorrowful and the
speakers are fatalistic, though at the same
time courageous and determined.

44. OTHER SHORTER POEMS
• The English passion for the sea and the
adventurous life is well illustrated by the Sea
farer, a lyrical poem of great power with a
similar mood of the hardship, the fascination,
the melancholy of the sea .

45. RELIGIOUS THEMES
• Two names are connected with Christian poetry,
Caedmon and Cynewulf.
• Caedmon’s work was historical while Cynewulf’s
work was mythical.
• Three outstanding poems on biblical themes are
Genesis B, The Dream of the Road and the story of
Tudith.

46. ANGLO – SAXON POETRY
• The language used is rough. Its words are hard and metallic .
Accordingly, the poetry is also crude and rough.
• Monotonous and artificial versification due to excessive use of
alliteration.
• Cheerless gloom and temper of the poems as most of them dealt
with Fate making short work of Man and his achievements.
• Poetry is marred by verbosity – high sounding words and long-
winded explanations and elaborations.

47. ANGLO – SAXON PROSE
• The earliest prose writers is Aldhelm (709), Bishop
of Sherborne, who wrote praises of virginity in an
ornate Latin.
• The greatest figure is Bede who wrote about history,
astronomy, saints’ lives and the lives of martyrs.
Foremost among his works is his great
Ecclesiastical History of the English Race.

48. ANGLO – SAXON PROSE
• Alfred was not only a great king, he was also a
great literary figure. He is usually regarded as the
founder of the English prose. His translations are :
• The History and Geography of Orosius,
• The Ecclesiastical History of Bede,
• The Consolations of Philosophy of Boethius.

49. ANGLO – SAXON PROSE
• In addition to these, under his aegis the famous
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle began to be written. It is the
most important work of Anglo-Saxon prose, which
records the history of England from the time of the
Roman occupation to the middle of the twelfth
century. Alfred died in 899, but additions continued
to be made even after his death.