英美文学

英国文学知识点梳理:

1. Renaissance: ( from 14th century to 17th century)

Definition: Renaissance is commonly applied to the movement or period in Western

civilization, which marks the transition from the medieval to the modern world. An age of

drama and poetry.

Reasons: the rediscovery of ancient Roman and Greek culture, the new discoveries in

geography and astronomy, the religious reformation and economic expansion

Significance: a reflection of the class struggle waged by the new rising bourgeoisie

against the feudal class and its ideology.

William Caxton—the first person who introduced printing into England.

Sonnet: originated in Italy, sonnet is a fourteen-line poem with a distinctive

rhyme scheme and metrical pattern. It was introduced to England by Sir Wyatt in the

early stage of English Renaissance and then further cultivated by Edmund Spenser and

William Shakespeare so as to produce respectively the Spenserian stanza and

Shakespearian stanza, both of which exerted great influence on the successing poets.

Shakespearian Stanza: Shakespearean Sonnet is made up of three quatrains(四行诗节)

with different rhymes, followed by a couplet. The rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg.

Spenserian Stanza: invented by Edmund Spenser. It is a stanza of 9 lines, with the

first eight lines in iambic pentameter 抑扬格五音步& the last line in iambic

hexameter抑扬格六音步, rhyming ababbcbcc.

blank verse—is unrhymed poetry with each line written in iambic pentamet

Metaphysical Poetry:

Definition: The term is commonly used to name the work in the 17th century written by the writers who wrote under the influence of John Donne. Representatives: John Donne & George Herbert

Technique: Peculiar/Metaphysical conceits(奇喻)

General Features: a. The diction is simple and echoes the words and cadence of

common speech.The imagery is drawn from the actual life yet subtle, the extended

metaphors for such images are typically called “metaphysical/peculiar

conceits”. The form is frequently that of an argument with the poet’s loved, with

God, or with himself.

2. Neo-classic Period:

1)The Enlightenment Movement—The Age of Reason

Definition: The Enlightenment refers to a progressive intellectual movement

throughout Western Europe that spans approximately one hundred years from

1680s to 1789.

Purpose: to enlighten the whole world with the light of modern philosophical and

artistic ideas.

2) Neoclassicism: (Main literary form—English Novels)

Definition: In literary criticism, this term refers to the revival of the attitudes and

styles of expression of classical literature. It is generally used to describe a period in

European history beginning in the late seventeenth century and lasting until about

1800.

Characteristics of Neoclassical Literature: fixed laws and rules for almost every

genre of literature. Prose: lyrical, epical, didactic, satiric or dramatic, each class

guided by its own principles. Drama: in Heroic Couplet; strictly observation of the 3

unity of time, space and action; regularity in construction; type characters

rather than individuals. Mainstream of literature: realism—writers described the

social realities.

3. Romantic Period: (an age of poetry)

1) Romanticism

English Romanticism is said to have begun in 1798 with the publication of

Wordsworth and Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads and to have ended in 1832 with

Sir Walter Scott’s death and the passage of the first Reform Bill in the

Parliament.

2) Characteristics of the Age

The Romantic Age is emphatically an age of poetry. Women novelists appeared in this age. It was during this period that women assumed, for the first time, an important place in English literature. (Jane Austen) The greatest historical novelists Walter Scott belongs to this period. His

historical novels combines a romantic atmosphere with a realistic depiction of

historical background and common people’s life. Scott marked the transition

from romanticism to the period of realism that followed it.

4. The Victorian Period:

1) Victorian Literature

The novel became the most widely read and most vital and challenging

expression of progressive thought.

The Victorian age was also a great one for non-fictional prose. The poets of this period were mainly characterized by their experiment with

new styles and new ways of expression.

2) Critical Realism

English critical realism of the 19th century flourished in the 1840s and early 1850s. It found its expression mainly in the writing of novels and the greatest

English critical realist of the time was Charles Dickens—a humorist and

satirist, a great bourgoisie intellect who could not overstep the limits of

his class. The English critical realism of the 19th century not only gave a satirical

portrayal of the bourgeoisie and all the ruling classes, but also showed

profound sympathy for the common people.

5. The Modern Period—marked by the publification of T. S. Eliot’s The Wast

Land: (Prevailing Genre: Fictions)

1) Cultural Background

Darwin’s Origin of Species and social Darwinism;Einstein’s theory of relativity; Freud’s

analytical psychology; irrational philosophers including Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and

Bergson.

2) The Differences Between Realism and Modernism:

Realism: Theoratical Base ---Rational Philosophy Function of Literature--- Educate

People and Criticize Social Evils Subject--- Public, Exterior World Conception of

Time &Space--- Clock Time, Geographic space Forms and Techniques--- Hero, Plot

Tone--- Optimistic

Modernism: Theoratical Base --- Irrational Philosophy Function of Literature---

Expression of "Self" Subject--- Private, Interior World

Conception of Time &Space--- Psychological Time &Space Forms and Techniques---

Anti-hero, Anti-plot

Tone--- Pessimistic

Modernism is , in many aspects, a reaction against rationalism, it rose out of

skepticism and disillusion of capitalism. The Major theme of Modernism:

distoreted, alienated and ill relationships between man and nature, man and society,

man and man, and man and himself.

Literary Trends: expressionism, surrealism(超现实主义), futurism, imagism and stream

of consciousness, existentialsm.

美国文学

1. Literature of Colonial Period

a. Indian tribes had a rich store of oral literature in the forms of songs, spells, charms,

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