英国文学期末整理

Questions for Revision:The Anglo- Saxon Period

Q1: What is the major literary form in this period?

Poetry

Q2: What is epic? What is the national epic in this period?

An Epic is a long narrative poem in elevated style presents characters of high relation to a central

figure of heroic proportions and through their development of episodes important to the history of

a nation or race.

Beowulf

Q3: What are the characteristics of Beowulf ?

1、 The most striking feature in its poetic form is the use of alliteration- repetition of initial

consonant sounds in a line of poem. In alliterative verse, certain accented words in a line

begin with the same consonat are generally 4 accents in a line, three of which

show alliteration ,as can be seen from the quotations on P.6-10 in the textbook.

2、 "kenning": a kind of figurative language

3、 The use of repetition and variation

Q4: What are two highlights in the developments of the Anglo-Saxon literature?

1、the Northumbrian School

2、during the reign of King Alfred

Questions for Revision-- The Middle English Period

Q1: What was the form of literature at the time? What features does it have?

Romance

1、 Romance which uses narrative verse or prose to sing of knightly adventures or other

heroic deeds is a popular literary form in the Middle Ages. The importance of romance

itself can be seen as a means of showing medieval aristocratic men and women in relation

to their idealized view of the world.

2、 Early feudal age，as it reflects the spirit of chivalry.

3、 The English romance mainly deals with three major subjects: Religious, Courtly love, and

Arthurian

3、Matter of France: a collection of tales about Chalemagne and his peers headed by Roland

and their wars against the Saracens.

4、Matter of Rome: covered everything that had come down from the ancient Romans and

from the Greeks Trojan War

5、Matter of Britain: the legendary history of Britain. e.g. King Arthur and His Round-Table

Knights, Sir Gawain and the Greenknight

Q2: What is the literary position of Geoferry Chaucer in English Literature?

Father of English poetry

Q3: What about the significance of The Canterbury Tales ?

1. It gives a comprehensive picture of Chaucer's time.

The pilgrims represent the whole range of 14th century society except the very top and the

very bottom. With his own wide experience and close observation of life, his characters are

so vivid and particular that there can be no substitution for the very person described.

2. The dramatic structure of the poem has been highly commended by critics. In The Canterbury

Tales, stories are cleverly woven together by links between the stories.

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Most of the stories are related to the personalities of the personality of each character,

his private life and habits, his mood and social status are revealed in the prologue and in the

story he tells, as well as by his behaviour along the road and his remarks on the way.

3. Chaucer's humour: gentle satire and mild irony

4. Chaucer's contribution to the English language: Chaucer wrote in the London dialect of his day,

which he handled dexterously.

He was at one moment serious and another lighthearted and full of fun and sometimes he

could be very poetical. He proved that the English language is a beautiful language and can be

easily handled to express different moods. In so doing Chaucer greatly increased the prestige

of the English language.

Q4: What are Chaucer‘s contributions to English literature?

1. Father of English poetry

2. Chaucer, for the first time in English literature, presented to us a comprehensive realistic picture

of the English society of his time and created a whole gallery of vivid characters from all walks of

life in his masterpiece The Canterbury Tales.

3. Chaucer develops characterization to a higher artistic level, i.e. characters who are morally and

socially typical but exquisitely individual and realistic in detail.

4. Chaucer introduced from France the rhymed stanzas of various types to English poetry to

replace the Old English alliterative verse.

5. Chaucer used for the first time in English the rhymed couplet of iambic pentameter which is to

be called later as the heroic couplet.

6. Chaucer greatly increased the prestige of English as a literary language and extended the range

of its poetic vocabulary and meters.

He is considered as a great master of the English language.

Questions for Revision-- The English Renaissance

Q1:What is Renaissance? What do you know about English Renaissance and its ideal

Humanism?

As a cultural movement, it encompassed a flowering of literature, science, art, religion, and

politics, and a resurgence of learning based on classical sources, the development of linear

perspective in painting, and gradual but widespread educational reform.

Historical Background

(Society, Politics and Economy)

Humanism: is the idea that man has a potential for culture which distinguishes him from lower

orders of beings, and which he should strive constantly to fulfill.

1. Rebellious spirit against the Medieval feudal value and blind faith in humbleness,

servitude, and after-life.

2. Belief in man’s divinity and capability of self perfection

3. Emphasis of the importance of personal worth and enjoyment of the present life

Q2:What are the major writers in this period? What about their representative works ?

Edmund Spenser The Shephearde’s Calender The Faerie Queene

Christopher Marlowe Tamburlaine the Great The tragical History of Doctore Faustus

The Jew of Malta

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William Shakespeare

History: Henry IV (1-2)

Comedy: Mid-summer Night’s Dream

The Merchant of Venice Much Ado about Nothing As You Like It Twelfth Night

Tragedy:

Hamlet Othello King Lear MacBeth

Famous Plays: Romeo and Juliet Julius Caesar Antony and Cleopatra The Tempest

Q3: What are the reasons for the flourishing of drama in the last thirty years of the 16th

century?

Cities and towns grew rapidly in the 16th century and since there was no other means of

entertainment than watching drama so it became the only form of amusement to city dweller and

nobleman.

Q4: What are William Shakespeare's major achievements to English literature?

课本P76

Q5:What is sonnet? What about Shakespeare's sonnet or English sonnet?

1、The sonnets comprise four stanzas of three quatrains and a final couplet composed in iambic

pentameter with designated rhyme scheme . Shakespeare also uses the iambic pentameter in most

of his plays, where they are called blank verse, as they do not usually rhyme.

2、The two basic types of sonnet are the Petrarchan(or Italian) and the Shakespearen(or English).

The Petrarchan sonnet follows the rhyme scheme:abbaabba cdecde, or abbaabbacdccdc.

The Shakespearen sonnet's thought-division is a 4-4-4-2 plan. There are four sections-three

quatrains and a final Shakespearen sonnet each quatrain deals with a different aspect of

the subject and the couplet either summarizes the theme or makes a final, sometimes contradictory

comment.

Q6:How to appreciate sonnet 18 ? What is the theme of this poem?

Figures of Speech

1) Simile

thee---a summer’s day

(compare…to…)

2) Metaphor

summer’s duration---a lease

the sun---the eye of heaven

3) Personification

summer---has a short lease

sun---has gold complexion

death---brag “thee” in his shade

poem---gives life to “thee”

Rhetorical Devices in Sonnet 18

1、rhetorical question: the first line, used to create a tone of respect, and to engage the audience.

2、personification: line 5,6 and line 11, used to elevate the sun and death.

3、parallelism: the final couplet, used to emphasize the message: the beauty of the subject will be

immortalized by the power of his art.

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The Theme of the poem:

Surface: love, beauty

Deeper meaning: the power of poetry/literature- -Beauty can be easily destroyed by accidents

or fade with the passing of time. However, it will be immortalized by the power of poetry or

literature.

Q8: What is soliloquy? How do you understand the famous line "To be, or not to be" in the

context of the soliloquy in scene I Act III of Hamlet?

To take action or to suffer / to continue live or to die, the speech conveys a sense of

world-weariness as well as the author’s incisive comments on the social reality of his time. Hamlet

lives between action and resolution. He is so contemplative that he examines the nature of the

action only to deny its possibility. He considers it better for people to die, but then says nobody

knows what happens in the afterlife.

Q9: What is the literary position of Francis Bacon?

He is regarded as the chief figure in English prose and progenitor of English materialism, and his

essays began the long tradition of the long tradition of the English essay in the history of English

literature.

Q10: What is the main idea of Bacon's "Of Studies"?

It is the most popular of Bacon’s 58 essays.

It analyzes what studies chiefly serve for, the different ways adopted by different people to pursue

studies, and how studies exert influence over human character.

Forceful and persuasive, compact and precise, “Of Studies” reveals to us Bacon’s mature attitude

toward learning. This essay impresses the reader not only by its argumentative strength but also by

its elegance of style.

Of studies

1. What lessons can we learn from Bacon’s “Of Studies” in our access to information?

right decisions and judgments over important matters are based upon comprehensive knowledge

which is acquired by studies. Without a wide range of knowledge, a person cannot digest

information, analyze information and take timely measures accordingly.

2. In what sense does reading make a full man.

引用+ Studies can train (shape) a person’s character and make up a person’s deficiencies. Every

defect of the mind may have a special receipt.

3. What does the essay deal with?内容

This essay analyzes what studies chiefly serve for, the different ways adopted by different people

to pursue studies, and how studies exert influence over human character.

4. What do you think of the language of the essay?

clearness, brevity, and force of expression. The sentences are short, pointed, incisive, and of

balanced structures. Conciseness of expression and simplicity of diction are two chief

distinguishing features of the prose style of Bacon who was among the earliest of English

essayists.

Q11: What is the writing style of Bacon's essays?

Language and Style

1. Bacon’s aphoristic style is characterized by the frequent use of parallelism. Find one such

example from the text and either translate or paraphrase the selected sentences.

2. Underline some of the metaphors or metaphorical descriptions in the essay. Select at least two

and explain what they illustrate.

Q12: What do you know about the metaphysical poets?

Metaphysical Poetry is a derogatory term describing a school of highly

The themes are love, death, religion.

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The chief representative of this school was John Donne.

人物及代表作

1. Geoffrey Chaucer Canterbury Tales

2. Francis Bacon of Studies

3. John Bunyan (1628—1688） Pilgrim’s Progress

4. John Milton (1608-1674 ） Paradise Lost

5. John Donne peculiar conceits

6. Daniel Defoe Robinson Crusoe

7. Henry Fielding

The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling5