INTRODUCTION
ENGLISH LITERARY FORMS AND MOVEMENTS
INTRODUCTION
“tis a poor way to make a child
love study by beginning with the
things which he naturally
dislikes.”
- William Joseph Long
What is Literature?
• English literature, Japanese literature, Russian literature,
Contemporary literature
• Are all books and writings literature?
• If not, what kinds are excluded and by what criteria?
Etymology – Literature
• Root word: littera (Latin), meaning “letter of the alphabet”
• Literature – a quality - polite learning acquired through reading
• Polite Learning – mastery of Greek and Latin, refined taste in
reading
• A man of literature or letters, meant a man of wide reading
• “hes nocht sufficient literatur to undirstand the scripture” (1581)
• “learned in all literature and erudition, divine and humane”
(Bacon, 1605)
• Literate, literary - The condition of being well-read
• Later closely connected to the word literacy
Etymology – Literature
• Literacy: an ability to read and a condition of being well-read
• The meaning of literate/literature can be confirmed from the
negatives: illiterate, illiterature
• Illiterate: poorly-read or ill-educated
• As late as 1748 illiterate meant somebody who did not know
Greek or Latin
• Illiterature (16th century): “the cause… of ignorance or illiterature”
(1592)
• Literati, by contrast, meant those who were highly-educated
• ‘Literature distinguished from blotterature (non-elite)
18th Century - Changes in Meaning
• Change in attitude in 18th century: literary was extended beyond
literate
• Literary (18th Century) - apart from the sense of well-read, it
referred to the practice and profession of writing: “literary
merit”, “literary reputation”
• Connected to the heightened consciousness of the profession of
authorship
Meaning of literature – 18th Century
• Used since 18th century
• Equivalent of French belles lettres (“fine letters”)
• Designates fictional & imaginative writings—poetry, prose
fiction, plays
• Expanded meaning: writings (philosophical, historical, or
scientific) addressed to a general audience
• For example: “Kindly send me all your literature concerning
the use of cow manure as a fertilizer.” (sum of works that
deal with a particular subject matter
Nationhood & English Literature
• Developed from the German idea of National literatur
• Other European countries borrowed the idea before England
• Uber die neuere deutsche Litteratur (1767), Les Siecles de litterature
frangaise (1772), Storia della letteratura italiana (1772)
• Nationhood - literature is a crucial, social, cultural & political
development
• English literature - creative or imaginative literature in the
English language
• Teaching of English in universities - the teaching of literature,
meaning mainly poems, plays and novels
Literary Criticism
• Literary criticism is the judgement of how a creative or
imaginative work is written
• Popular literature or sub-literary - poems, novels, plays—
not considered literature – viewed as not substantial or
important enough - devoid of aesthetic interest and are not
works of Art
Why Study Literature?
• Literary works - instruments of enjoyment - Research and analysis
(less joyous)
• Literary work the expression of life in forms of truth and beauty –
Literary Appreciation
• Socio-political events- dual in nature – outer & inner
• History – records the outward acts – biography of a nation
Why Study Literature?
• Literature – autobiography - dwells on the inner emotions-
elite & laypersons
• Literature – preserves ideals – love, faith, liberty
• Interpret &analyze – theme, style , context
Qualities of Literature
• Artistic – expression of life – forms of beauty and truth
• Suggestive – appeals- emotion and imagination – not
intellect
• Permanence – advent of the printing press
• Universality – appeals to people across ages/ place – human
emotions
LITERATURE & CONTEXT
• A literary work – creative genius of an author
• The author – product of their society - impacted by socio-
political events
• Every author – presents new things- unnoticed aspects of
their society
• “Behind every book is a man; behind the man is the race;
and behind the race are the natural and social environments
whose influence is unconsciously reflected.”
- William [Link]
History of Literature
Study of literature across ages :
[Link] the growth of a genre/ a literary movement
[Link] the Impact of the society on the writer
[Link] the author’s position / contribution within the literature
milieu
[Link] the common characteristics of a period – transition
from one period to another
History of English Literature
• Linkage between the historical periods and literary movements
• Periods of English Literature :
a. Pre-Chaucerian or Old English Period – 450-1340 C.E
b. Age of Chaucer or Middle English period – 1340-1400 C.E
c. Elizabethan age (Renaissance & Reformation)- 1557- 1625 C.E
d. Neo-classical age ( Restoration age & Augustan age)1625-1798
e. Romantic age - 1798 – 1832
f. Victorian age - 1832- 1887
g. Modern age – 1887 – 1960
h. Post modern age – 1960 onwards
Yesterday's flowers am I,
And I have drunk my last sweet draught of dew.
Young maidens came and sang me to my death;
The moon looks down and sees me in my shroud,
The shroud of my last dew.
Yesterday's flowers that are yet in me
Must needs make way for all to-morrow's flowers.
The maidens, too, that sang me to my death
Must even so make way for all the maids
That are to come.
And as my soul, so too their soul will be
Laden with fragrance of the days gone by.
The maidens that to-morrow come this way
Will not remember that I once did bloom,
For they will only see the new-born flowers.
Yet will my perfume-laden soul bring back,
As a sweet memory, to women's hearts
Their days of maidenhood.
And then they will be sorry that they came
To sing me to my death;
And all the butterflies will mourn for me.
I bear away with me
The sunshine's dear remembrance, and the low
Soft murmurs of the spring.
My breath is sweet as children's prattle is;
I drank in all the whole earth's fruitfulness,
To make of it the fragrance of my soul
That shall outlive my death.
REFERENCES
• Long, William. J English Literature: Its History and its
Significance. Kolkata: Books Way, 2009.
• Abrams, M. H., and Geoffrey Galt Harpham. A Glossary of
Literary Terms. Tenth Edition. 2012. USA: Wadsworth
• Williams, Raymond. Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and
Society. Oxford: OUP, 2015