Miscellaneous literature of the Norman period
It is well-nigh impossible to classify the remaining literature of this period, and very little of it is now read, except by advanced students. Those interested in the development of “transition” English will find in “The Ancren Riwle”, i.e. “Rule of the Anchoresses”, the most beautiful bit of old English prose ever written. It is a book of excellent religious advice and comfort, written for three ladies who wished to live a religious life, without, however, becoming nuns or entering any religious orders. The author was Bishop Poore of Salisbury, according to Morton, who first edited this old classic in 1853. Orm’s “Ormulum”, written soon after “The Brut”, is a paraphrase of the gospel lessons for the year, somewhat after the manner of Codmon’s “Paraphrase”, but without any of Codmon’s poetic fire and originality. “Cursor Mundi” is a very long poem which makes a kind of metrical romance but out of Bible history and shows the whole dealing of God with man from Creation to Domesday. It is interesting as showing a parapell to the cycles of miracle plays, which attempt to cover the same vast ground, they were forming in this age; but we will study them later, when we try to understand the rise of the drama in England.
Besides these greater works, an enormous number of fables and satires appeared in this age, copied or translated from the French, like the metrical romances. The most famous of these are “The Owl and th Nightingale”, a long debate between the two birds, one representing the gay side of life, the other the sterner side of law and morals, and “Land of Cockaygne”, i.e. “Luxury Land”, a keen satire on monks and monastic religion.
Beowulf.
Beowulf is an Old English heroic epic poem composed in the later Early Middle Ages (in the 8th, 9th or 10th century). At 3,183 lines, it is notable for its length. The poem is untitled in the manuscript, but has been known as Beowulf since the early 19th century. As the single major surviving work of Anglo-Saxon heroic poetry, the work in spite of dealing primarily with Scandinavian matters has risen to such prominence that it has become "England's national epic."In the poem, Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, battles three antagonists: Grendel, who is destroying Heorot and its inhabitants in Denmark, Grendel's Mother, and later in life (after he is King) a dragon. He is mortally wounded in the final battle, and after his death is buried in a barrow by his retainers. The events described in the poem take place in the late 5th century and during the 6th century after the Anglo-Saxons had begun their migration and settlement in England, and before it had ended, a time when the Anglo-Saxons were either newly arrived or in close contact with their Germanic kinsmen in Scandinavia and northern Germany. The poem could have been transmitted in England by people of Geatish origins, and it may not be a coincidence that whereas Beowulf is the most well-known Anglo-Saxon work left to posterity, the most well-known Anglo-Saxon archaeological find, Sutton Hoo, also showed close connections with Scandinavia. It has consequently been suggested that Beowulf was first composed in the 7th century at Rendlesham in East Anglia, and that the East Anglian royal dynasty, the Wuffings, were descendants of the Geatish Wulfings.The poem deals with legends, i.e. it was composed for entertainment and does not separate between fictional elements and real historic events, such as the raid by king Hygelac into Frisia, ca. 516. Scholars generally agree that many of the personalities of Beowulf also appear in Scandinavian sources, but this does not only concern people (e.g., Healfdene, Hroðgar, Halga, Hroðulf, Eadgils and Ohthere), but also clans (e.g. Scyldings, Scylfings and Wulfings) and some of the events (e.g. the Battle on the Ice of Lake Vänern). The Scandinavian sources are notably Ynglinga saga, Gesta Danorum, Hrólfr Kraki's saga and the Latin summary of the lost Skjöldunga saga. As far as Sweden is concerned, the dating of the events in the poem has been confirmed by archaeological excavations of the barrows indicated by Snorri Sturluson and by Swedish tradition as the graves of Ohthere (dated to c. 530) and his son Eadgils (dated to c. 575) in Uppland, Sweden. In Denmark, recent archaeological excavations at Lejre, where Scandinavian tradition located the seat of the Scyldings, i.e. Heorot, have revealed that a hall was built in the mid-6th century, exactly the time period of Beowulf. All the three halls found during the excavation were about 50 metres long. Beowulf may be based on oral traditions passed down by scops (tale singers), and the author of the poem is unknown. The epic poem was written down by monks, who at the time were among the few people who could read and write. Throughout the poem it is likely that the monks had Christianized the epic, because the Geats were pagan. The precise date of the manuscript is debated, but many estimates place it close to AD 1000. Traditionally the poem's date of composition has been estimated, on linguistic and other grounds, as approximately 750-800. More recently, doubt has been raised about the linguistic criteria for dating, with some scholars suggesting a date as late as the 11th century, near the time of the manuscript's copying. The poem appears in what is today called the Beowulf manuscript or Nowell Codex (British Library MS Cotton Vitellius A.xv), along with other works. The manuscript is the product of two different scribes, the second scribe taking over at line 1939 of Beowulf.The poem is known only from a single manuscript. The spellings in the the poem mix the West Saxon and Anglian dialects of Old English, though they are predominantly West Saxon, as are other Old English poems copied at the time. The earliest known owner is the 16th century scholar Laurence Nowell, after whom the manuscript is named, though its official designation is Cotton Vitellius A.XV due to its inclusion in the catalog of Robert Bruce Cotton's holdings in the middle of the 17th century. It suffered damage in the Cotton Library fire at Ashburnham House in 1731.
The poem as we know it is shot through with elements of the Norse legendarium along with Christian statements. It is often assumed that the work was written by a Christian monk, on the grounds that they were the only members of Anglo-Saxon society with access to writing materials. However, the example of King Alfred suggests the possibility of lay authorship.In historical terms the poem's characters would have been pagans. The poem's narrator, however, places events into a Biblical context, casting Grendel and Grendel's Mother as the kin of Cain and placing monotheistic sentiments into the mouths of his characters. Although there are no direct references to Jesus in the text of the work, there are many indirect references. Also, the book of Genesis serves as a touchstone for the poem, since Grendel and Grendel's mother (due to their heritage) are seen as punished by the Curse and mark of Cain. Scholars disagree as to whether Beowulf's main thematic thrust is pagan or Christian in nature. Of particular note is the description of soldiers' helmets, decorated with boar-carvings, alongside references to God and Christ, such as when Beowulf is given up for lost in Grendel's Mere at the sixth hour, which was the time at which Christ dies on the cross in the Bible. This could possibly be evidence of Christian details being placed in the story alongside traditional accounts of ancient Germanic religious practices. However, the lack of a pre-Christian written version of the epic leaves the issue unresolved.
4. сынылан дебиет
1.M.Alexander A History of English Literature, 2000
2.Елистратова А.А. Ангийский роман эпохи Просвещения . М, 1966.
3.Урнов Д.Робинзон и Гулливер. М, 1973.
4.О.В.Тумбина Lectures on English Literature. Санкт-Петербург, 2000
5.A.Burgess nglish Literature. 1974.
6.M.Klarer An Introduction to literary studies, 1999.
1.Дріс таырыбы:The Pre-renaissance period in English literature
2. Дріс жоспары
А)The Literature of the 14th c.
В)G.Chaucer and his contribution to Literature.
С)The Literature of the 15th c. W.Caxton
D)The War of Roses.
3. Дріс тезистері
Objectives:to introduceliterature ofthe 14-15th cc, the main representatives of the period.
The Literature of the 14th c. Two great movements may be noted in the complex life of England during the 14th century. The first is political, and culminates in the reign of Edward III. It shows the growth of the English national spirit following the victories of Edward and the Black Prince on French soil, during the Hundred Year’s War. In the rush of this great national movement, separating England from the political ties of France and, and to less degree, from ecclesiastical bondage to Rome, the mutual distrust and jealousy which had divided nobles and commons were momentarily swept aside by a wave of patriotic enthusiasm. The French language lost its official prestige, and English became the speech not only of the common people but of courts and Parliament as well.The second movement is social; it falls largely within the reign of Edward’s successor, Richard II, and marks the growing discontent with the contrast between luxury and poverty, between the idle wealthy classes and the overtaxed peasants. Aside from these two movements, the age was one of unusual stir and progress. Chivalry, that medieval institution of mixed good and evil, was in its Indian summer, a sentiment rather than a practical system. Trade and its resultant wealth and luxury, were increasing enormously. Following trade, as the Vikings had followed glory, the English began to be a conquering and colonizing people, like the Anglo-Saxons. The native shed sometimes of his insularity and became a traveler, going first to view the place where trade had opened the way, and returning with wide interests and a larger horizon. Above all, the first dawn of Renaissance is heralded in England, as in Spain and Italy, by the appearance of a national literature.
Five writers of the age:The literature movement of the age clearly reflects the stirring life of the times. There is Langland, voicing the social discontent, preaching the equality of men and the dignity of labor; Wycliffe, greatest of English religious reforms, giving the Gospel in unnumbered tracts and addresses; Gower, the scholar an literary man, criticizing this vigorous life and plainly afraid of its consequences; and Mandeville, the traveler, romancing about the wonders to be seen abroad. Above all there is Chaucer, scholar, traveler, business man, courtier, sharing in all the stirring life of his time.
The Literature of the 15th c.Caxton printed four-fifths of his works in English. He translated a large amount of works into English. He translated and edited a large amount of the work himself.However, the English language was changing rapidly in Caxton's time and the works he was given to print were in a variety of styles and dialects. Caxton was a technician rather than a writer and he often faced dilemmas concerning language standardization in the books he printed. (He wrote about this subject in the preface to his Eneydos.) His successor Wynkyn de Worde faced similar problems.
Wars of the Roses (1455–1485) were a series of civil wars were fought largely by the landed aristocracy and armies of feudal retainers. Support for each house largely depended upon dynastic factors, such as marriages within the nobility, feudal titles, and tenures. It is sometimes difficult to follow the shifts of power and allegiance because nobles acquired or lost titles through marriage, confiscation or attainture. For example, the Lancastrian patriarch John of Gaunt's first title was Earl of Richmond, the same title which Henry VII later held, while the Yorkist patriarch Edmund of Langley's first title was Earl of Cambridge.Although armed clashes had occurred previously between supporters of Henry and Richard, the principal period of armed conflict in the Wars of the Roses took place between 1455 and 1489.The name "Wars of the Roses" is not thought to have been used during the time of the wars but has its origins in the badges associated with the two royal houses, the Red Rose of Lancaster and the White Rose of York. The term came into common use in the nineteenth century, after the publication of Anne of Geierstein by Sir Walter Scott. Scott based the name on a fictional scene in William Shakespeare's play Henry VI Part 1, where the opposing sides pick their different-coloured roses at the Temple Church.Although the roses were occasionally used as symbols during the wars, most of the participants wore badges associated with their immediate feudal lords or protectors. The unofficial system of livery and maintenance, by which powerful nobles would offer protection to followers who would sport their colours and badges (livery) was one of the effects of the breakdown of royal authority which preceded and partly caused the wars. For example, Henry's forces at Bosworth fought under the banner of a red dragon, while the Yorkist army used the symbol of a white boar. Evidence of the importance of the rose symbols at the time, however, includes the fact that King Henry VII chose at the end of the wars to combine the red and white roses into a single red and white Tudor Rose.
G. CHAUCER.The 14th century was a difficult time for England. The country was waging the Hundred Years' War with France. It was started in 1337 be the English king Edward 2 because the French lords wanted to seize Flanders (Belgium) which was England's wool market. As the king needed money for the war Parliament voted for the poll tax. This and the policy of the Catholic priests angered the peasants and a revolt, called the Peasants' Revolt, took place in 1381. About 60,000 people, led by Wat Tyler, marched to London destroying the feudal castles on the way. But in the capital Tyler was treacherously killed by the king's men and the Revolt was suppressed. Yet serfdom was abolished.
At the same time England suffered from three epidemics of the plague. This was a real tragedy for the country, because half of its population died from "black death".
Though the power of the feudal nobles and the Church was still very great, there were already signs of the birth of a new class. The townspeople, that is the craftsmen and the tradesmen, were becoming an important social force. These townspeople later formed the class of the bourgeoisie.
During this stormy century the English nation was being formed; English became the spoken language of the country; English literature was born.
The scholastic literature of the Church ranked high, but a new spirit was already noticeable in the cultural life of the country. The new spirit was marked by an optimism unknown to the Middle Ages. It was best reflected in the works by Geoffrey Chaucer, the last poet of the Middle Ages and the first poet who paved the way for English realistic literature, free of the influence of the Church.
The 15th century is known in English literature as the century of folklore. Many songs, called ballads, were composed then by the common people of the country. The ballads were songs in verses of four lines, called quatrains; the second and fourth lines of the verse rhymed. Among them there were historical and legendary ballads. Some were humorous and others were lyrical. A favourite legendary hero of the English people is Robin Hood. Many ballads have been composed about him and his friends.
Geoffrey Chaucer was the greatest writer of the 14th century. He was born in London in the family of a wine merchant. At 20 he tok part in the war with France, was taken prisoner by the French and ransomed by his friends. He held a number of positions at the English king's court and several times visited Italy and France on diplomatic missions.
In Italy he got acquainted with the works of Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio. What they wrote was full of new, optimistic ideas and love of life and had a great influence on his future works, the most important of which was the "Cantenbury Tales".The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the 14th century (two of them in prose, the rest in verse). The tales, some of which are originals and others not, are contained inside a frame tale and told by a collection of pilgrims on a pilgrimage from Southwark to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral.[1] The Canterbury Tales are written in Middle English. Although the tales are considered to be his magnum opus, some believe the structure of the tales is indebted to the works of The Decameron which Chaucer is said to have read when he visited Italy in the 14th century.
The characters, introduced in the General Prologue of the book, tell tales of great cultural relevance. The first part of the prologue begins with "Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote" indicating the start of spring and the end of a brutal winter. The themes of the tales vary, and include topics such as courtly love, treachery, and avarice. The genres also vary, and include romance, Breton lai, sermon, beast fable, and fabliaux. Though there is an overall frame, there is no single poetic structure to the work; Chaucer utilizes a variety of rhyme schemes and metrical patterns, and there are as well two prose tales.Some of the tales are serious and others comical; however, all are highly accurate in describing the traits and faults of human nature. Religious malpractice is a major theme as well as focusing on the division of the three estates. Most of the tales are interlinked with similar themes running through them and some are told in retaliation for other tales in the form of an argument. The work is incomplete, as it was originally intended that each character would tell four tales, two on the way to Canterbury and two on the return journey. This would have meant a possible one hundred and twenty tales which would have dwarfed the twenty-four tales actually written.
People have sought political overtones within the tales, particularly as Chaucer himself was a significant courtier and political figure at the time, close to the corridors of power. There are many hints at contemporary events, although few are proven, and the theme of marriage common in the tales is presumed to refer to several different marriages, most often those of John of Gaunt. Aside from Chaucer himself, Harry Bailly of the Tabard Inn was a real person and it is believed to be quite likely that the cook is actually Roger Knight de Ware, a contemporary London cook.The structure of The Canterbury Tales is a frame narrative and easy to find in other contemporary works, such as The Book of Good Love by Juan Ruiz and Boccaccio's Decameron, which may have been one of Chaucer's main sources of inspiration. Chaucer indeed adapted several of Boccaccio's stories to put in the mouths of his own pilgrims, but what sets Chaucer's work apart from his contemporaries' is his characters. Compared to Boccaccio's main characters - seven women and three men, all young, fresh and well-to-do, and given Classical names - the characters in Chaucer are of extremely varied stock, including representatives of most of the branches of the middle classes at that time. Not only are the participants very different, but they tell very different types of tales, with their personalities showing through both in their choices of tales and in the way they tell them.
Chaucer does not pay much attention to the progress of the trip. He hints that the tales take several days but he does not detail any overnight stays. Although the journey could be done in one day this speed would make telling tales difficult and three to four days was the usual duration for such pilgrimages. The 18th of April is mentioned in the tales and Walter William Skeat, a 19th century editor, determined 17 April 1387 as the probable first day of the tales.
Scholars divide the tales into ten fragments. The tales that make up a fragment are directly connected, usually with one character speaking to and handing over to another character, but there is no connection between most of the other fragments. This means that there are several possible permutations for the order of the fragments and consequently the tales themselves.
4. сынылан дебиет
1.История английской литературы в 3-х томах. М. 1943-1948.
2.Аникин Г.В., Михальская Н.П. История английской литературы . М, 1975.
3.Аникст А. Творчество Шекспира. М, 1963
4.R.Carter and J.VcRae Guide to English literature , 1996
5.M.Alexander A History of English Literature, 2000
1.Дріс таырыбы:The Renaissance in England
2. Дріс жоспары
А) 1st period- Thomas More. Humanism.
B)2d period – Edmund Spencer. Theatre and drama.
C)The World importance of W.Shakespear`s creativity
D)English literature during The Bourgeois revolution.
E)The Restoration
3. Дріс тезистері
.Objectives:to introduceliterature ofRenaissance, the main representatives of the period. In the 14th and 15th century there emerged in Italy and France a group of thinkers known as the "humanists." The term did not then have the anti-religious associations it has in contemporary political debate. Almost all of them were practicing Catholics. They argued that the proper worship of God involved admiration of his creation, and in particular of that crown of creation: humanity. By celebrating the human race and its capacities they argued they were worshipping God more appropriately than gloomy priests and monks who harped on original sin and continuously called upon people to confess and humble themselves before the Almighty. Indeed, some of them claimed that humans were like God, created not only in his image, but with a share of his creative power. The painter, the architect, the musician, and the scholar, by exercising their intellectual powers, were fulfilling divine purposes. This celebration of human capacity, though it was mixed in the Renaissance with elements of gloom and superstition (witchcraft trials flourished in this period as they never had during the Middle Ages), was to bestow a powerful legacy on Europeans. The goal of Renaissance humanists was to recapture some of the pride, breadth of spirit, and creativity of the ancient Greeks and Romans, to replicate their successes and go beyond them. Europeans developed the belief that tradition could and should be used to promote change. By cleaning and sharpening the tools of antiquity, they could reshape their own time.Archaeological excavations on the foundations of the Rose and the Globe in the late twentieth century showed that all the London theatres had individual differences; yet their common function necessitated a similar general plan. The public theatres were three stories high, and built around an open space at the centre. Usually polygonal in plan to give an overall rounded effect (though the Red Bull and the first Fortune were square), the three levels of inward-facing galleries overlooked the open center, into which jutted the stage—essentially a platform surrounded on three sides by the audience, only the rear being restricted for the entrances and exits of the actors and seating for the musicians. The upper level behind the stage could be used as a balcony, as in Romeo and Juliet or Antony and Cleopatra, or as a position from which an actor could harangue a crowd, as in Julius Caesar.Usually built of timber, lath and plaster and with thatched roofs, the early theatres were vulnerable to fire, and were replaced (when necessary) with stronger structures. When the Globe burned down in June 1613, it was rebuilt with a tile roof; when the Fortune burned down in December 1621, it was rebuilt in brick (and apparently was no longer square).A different model was developed with the Blackfriars Theatre, which came into regular use on a longterm basis in 1599. The Blackfriars was small in comparison to the earlier theatres and roofed rather than open to the sky; it resembled a modern theatre in ways that its predecessors did not. Other small enclosed theatres followed, notably the Whitefriars (1608) and the Cockpit (1617). With the building of the Salisbury Court Theatre in 1629 near the site of the defunct Whitefriars, the London audience had six theatres to choose from: three surviving large open-air "public" theatres, the Globe, the Fortune, and the Red Bull, and three smaller enclosed "private" theatres, the Blackfriars, the Cockpit, and the Salisbury.Around 1580, when both the Theatre and the Curtain were full on summer days, the total theatre capacity of London was about 5000 spectators. With the building of new theatre facilities and the formation of new companies, the capital's total theatre capacity exceeded 10,000 after 1610.[6] In 1580, the poorest citizens could purchase admittance to the Curtain or the Theatre for a penny; in 1640, their counterparts could gain admittance to the Globe, the Cockpit, or the Red Bull—for exactly the same price. (Ticket prices at the private theatres were five or six times higher).The acting companies functioned on a repertory system; unlike modern productions that can run for months or years on end, the troupes of this era rarely acted the same play two days in a row. Thomas Middleton's A Game at Chess ran for nine straight performances in August 1624 before it was closed by the authorities—but this was due to the political content of the play and was a unique, unprecedented, and unrepeatable phenomenon. Consider the 1592 season of Lord Strange's Men at the Rose Theatre as far more representative: between Feb. 19 and June 23 the company played six days a week, minus Good Friday and two other days. They performed 23 different plays, some only once, and their most popular play of the season, The First Part of Hieronimo, (based on Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy), 15 times. They never played the same play two days in a row, and rarely the same play twice in a week. The workload on the actors, especially the leading performers like Edward Alleyn, must have been tremendous.The sonnet was introduced into English by Thomas Wyatt in the early 16th century. Poems intended to be set to music as songs, such as by Thomas Campion, became popular as printed literature was disseminated more widely in households. Other important figures in Elizabethan theatre include Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Dekker, John Fletcher and Francis Beaumont. Had Marlowe (1564-1593) not been stabbed at twenty-nine in a tavern brawl, says Anthony Burgess, he might have rivalled, if not equalled Shakespeare himself for his poetic gifts. Remarkably, he was born only a few weeks before Shakespeare and must have known him well. Marlowe's subject matter, though, is different: it focuses more on the moral drama of the Renaissance man than any other thing. Marlowe was fascinated and terrified by the new frontiers opened by modern science. Drawing on German lore, he introduced Dr. Faustus to England, a scientist and magician who is obsessed by the thirst of knowledge and the desire to push man's technological power to its limits. He acquires supernatural gifts that even allow him to go back in time and wed Helen of Troy, but at the end of his twenty-four years' covenant with the devil he has to surrender his soul to him. His dark heroes may have something of Marlowe himself, whose untimely death remains a mystery. He was known for being an atheist, leading a lawless life, keeping many mistresses, consorting with ruffians: living the 'high life' of London's underworld. But many suspect that this might have been a cover-up for his activities as a secret agent for Elizabeth I, hinting that the 'accidental stabbing' might have been a premeditated assassination by the enemies of The Crown. Beaumont and Fletcher are less-known, but it is almost sure that they helped Shakespeare write some of his best dramas, and were quite popular at the time. It is also at this time that the city comedy genre develops. In the later 16th century English poetry was characterised by elaboration of language and extensive allusion to classical myths. The most important poets of this era include Edmund Spenser and Sir Philip Sidney.