英美文学史复习资料-全.docx

Unit One The Anglo-Saxon Period
n I. Historical Background
n II. Anglo-Saxon Poetry
n III. Anglo-Saxon Prose
I. Historical Background
The English people are a complicated race.
The first inhabitants of the island were commonly known as the Celts (or Kelts).
n 55 BC saw the invasion of the island headed by Julius Caesar.
During the invasion these aborigines（ 土著人）Celts withdrew to the Welsh and Scottish mountains and left a great part of England to the Romans.
n Not until the 5th century did the Romans withdrew. England had been made a Roman Province since 80 AD.
As the Roman legions withdrew, the Celts came back.
n Originally the name Anglo-Saxon denotes two of the three Germanic（日尔曼）tribes --- Angles, Saxons and Jutes -- who in the middle of the 5th century left their homes on the shores of the North Sea and the Baltic（波罗的海） to conquer and colonize distant Britain.
They lived in the northern top of Germany and the southern part of Denmark at that time.
n The historical date that is worth memorizing is 449 AD.
n These three invading tribes came to settle down: Angles in the north of Thames, Jutes mainly in the southwest called Kent（英国东南部郡）, and Saxons in the other places.
English literature originated in the Angles and Saxons who formed a literary tradition of their own.

n Important historical events:
1. Heptarchy（七王国）:
n The informal confederation（联邦）of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms from the fifth to the ninth century, consisting of Kent, Sussex, Wessex, Essex, Northumbria, East Anglia, and Mercia.
2. the Vikings invasion:
n Vikings, collective designation of Nordic（北欧人）people— Danes, Swedes, Norwegians—who explored abroad during a period of dynamic Scandinavian expansion from about AD 800 to 1100.
n Land shortage, improved iron production, and the need for new markets probably all played a part in Viking expansion.
3. King Alfred the Great:
n In 871, Ethelred of Wessex is defeated by Danish forces January 4 at Reading, gains a brilliant victory 4 days later at Ashdown, is defeated January 22 at Basing, triumphs again March 2 at Marton in Wiltshire, but dies in April.
n His brother, 22, pays tribute（贡物）to the Danes but will reign until 899 and be called Alfred the Great.
4. Canute (994?-1035):
n King of England(1016-1035), Denmark (1018-1035), and Norway (1028-1035) whose reign, at first brutal, was later marked by wisdom and temperance.
n He is the subject of many legends.
5. The Norman Conquest in 1066
n The year 1066 was a turning point in English history. William I, the Conqueror, and his sons gave England vigorous new leadership. Norman feudalism (封建制度) became the basis for redistributing the land among the conquerors, giving England a new French aristocracy and a new social and political structure. England turned away from Scandinavia toward France, an orientation (倾向性) that was to last for 400 years.
6. St. Augustine: 
n Italian-born missionary and prelate (高级教士) who introduced Christianity to southern Britain 597 and was ordained as the first archbishop (大主教) of Canterbury 598. Died c 604.
II. Anglo-Saxon Poetry
1. Beowulf --- the national epic
n Beowulf, an Anglo-Saxon epic poem, the most important work of Old English literature.
The poem consists of 3183 lines, each line with four accents marked by alliteration and divided into two parts by a caesura (节律的停顿).
n The structure of the typical Beowulf line comes through in modern translation, for example: Then came from the moor under misted cliffs Grendel marching God's anger he bore . . .
n The somber (昏暗的,忧郁的) story is told in vigorous, picturesque (独特的) language, with heavy use of metaphor; a famous example is the term “whale-road” for sea.
n The poem tells of a hero, a Scandinavian prince named Beowulf, who rids the Danes of the monster Grendel, half man and half fiend (魔鬼) and Grendel's mother, who comes that evening to avenge Grendel's death.
n Fifty years later Beowulf, now king of his native land, fights a dragon who has devastated his people. Both Beowulf and the dragon are mortally wounded in the fight.
n The poem ends with Beowulf's funeral as his mourners chant his epitaph.
n Beowulf is a long verse narrative on the theme of “arms and man” and as such belongs to the tradition of a national epic in European literature that can be traced back to Homer’s Iliad (荷马史市诗,描写特洛伊战争)and Virgil’s (古罗马诗人) Aeneid (埃涅伊德叙事诗).
n The earliest poets, whose names have long since been forgotten performed as storytellers and minstrels before gatherings of listeners.
Often a lyre (七弦琴) or some other simple stringed instrument was used to accompany the poet's tale or song.
2. Secular (非宗教的) Poems  
  (1) Narrative Poems
(2) Lyrical Poems
(3) Riddles
n 3. Religious poems:
n (1) Caedmon (7th century): Died c. 680. The earliest English poet.
n According to Bede, Caedmon was an elderly herdsman who received the power of song in a vision.
n Caedmon was an illiterate herdsmen who had a vision one night and heard a voice commanding him to sing of “the beginning of created things.”
n Later Caedmon supposedly wrote the poem about the creation known as Caedmon's Hymn, which Bede recorded in prose.
Cynewulf
n (2) Cynewulf (8th century)
n Cynewulf (flourished AD 750), Anglo-Saxon poet, possibly a Northumbrian minstrel.
n In his poetry, he is revealed as a man of learning familiar with the religious literature of his day.
n Cynewulf’s (基涅武甫,古诗诗稿公元十世纪被发现) poems are religious works in Old English entitled Ascension (耶稣升天), The Fates of the Apostles (使徒的命运), Juliana, and Elene; the latter two are legends about saints.
III. Anglo-Saxon Prose
n 1. Anglo-Latin Prose
n The Venerable Bede (673? – 735): English Benedictine (天主教本笃会修士或修女) monk and scholar, Father of English history, chiefly known for his Ecclesiastical (教会) History of the English People, a history of England from the Roman occupation to 731, the year it was completed.
n The Ecclesiastical History of the English People (55 BC -- 731):
This work is the only source of information about the most momentous (重大的) period in English history -- the period of change from barbarism to civilization.
n 2. Anglo-Saxon Prose (Old English Prose)
n (1) King Alfred (849 -- 901)
a. Numerous translations from Latin
b. The development of a natural style in English
c. The launching of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (1 AD -- 1154 AD)
n (2) Aelfric (c. 965 -- 1020)
Anglo-Saxon abbot 修道士) who is considered the greatest Old English prose writer.
His works include Catholic Homilies, Lives of the Saints, and a Latin grammar.
Aelfric brought English prose to high cultivation before the Norman Conquest -- a clear, flexible and popular English prose.
Unit Two The Late Middle Ages
· I. The Anglo-Norman Period
· II. The Age of Chaucer
· III. Geoffrey Chaucer

· The Middle Ages: In European history, the Middle Ages was the period between the end of the West Roman Empire in 476 AD and the beginning of Renaissance about 1500 AD, especially the later part of this period.
I. The Anglo-Norman Period (1066-1350)
History:
(1) the Norman Conquest of 1066
feudalism -- a strong centralized government
· (2) the Magna Carta (the great charter) of 1215: charter granted by King
John of England to the English barons (男爵,英国最低贵族爵位) in 1215, and considered the basis of English constitutional liberties.
· This is a document of concession made by King John to the feudal lords
· The charter covered a wide field of law and feudal rights, but the two most
important matters were :
· A. no tax should be made without the approval of the council,
· B. no freeman should be arrested or imprisoned except by the law of the
land.
· (3) the Hundred Years’ War
· Hundred Years' War, series of armed conflicts waged from 1337 to 1453
between England and France.
· The origin of the dispute lay in the fact that successive kings of England
controlled large areas of France and thus posed a threat to the French monarchy.
· During the 12th and 13th centuries, the kings of France attempted to
re-impose their authority over those territories.
· (4) the Black Death of 1348 -- 49
· outbreak of the plague, so called from the symptoms of internal
haemorrhage （内出血） which blackens the skin of the sufferer 
· The Black Death struck England in 1349, reducing the population by as
much as a third.
· A labour shortage resulted, and when attempts to freeze wages were made,
unrest developed among serfs and workers, leading to the demise (瓦解) of serfdom in the next century.
· (5) the Statute of Pleading (辩护法令)
· Passed in 1362, according to which it was required that court proceedings
be conducted in English
· 2. Literature
· (1) Anglo-Latin literature
· Geoffrey of Monmouth (c. 1100 - c. 1155): English historian and ecclesiastic(牧师).
· He was the author of Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain), a work purporting to delineate (描绘) the lives of British kings from Brutus the Trojan, the mythical progenitor(祖先)of the British people, to Caedwalla, king of North Wales (reigned about 625-34).
· Roger Bacon (1214?-1294), English Scholastic philosopher and scientist, one of the most influential teachers of the 13th century.
· In the late 1260s Bacon wrote his Opus Majus, an encyclopedia of all science.
· He has been called Father of experimental science.
· (2) Anglo-Norman literature
· romance (Chanson de Roland)--- fabliau (讽刺性寓言诗)
· (3) Folk literature in Middle Ages
· A few themes:
· Social satires
· The popular lyric, with nature and love as the theme
· (4) Religious work:
· The Pearl : a didactic poem
· The Pearl is an allegorical (寓言的) poem of 101 stanzas of 12 lines each, with both alliteration and rhyme, and relates the vision of one who has lost a pearl of a daughter.
· (5) Romances in Middle English
· Three themes:
· the matter of France;
· the matter of Britain;
· the matter of Rome.
· The most outstanding single romance on the Arthurian legend was the anonymous Sir Gawain and the Green Knight......
· Two motifs (主题):
· (the tests of faith, courage and purity; the human weakness of self-preservation自卫本能).
· King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table
· The semi-legendary King Arthur is probably the most well-known king in all of English literature. Tales of Arthur and his knights span several centuries and many different languages. The so-called Round Table, the meeting place of Arthur and the knights, was round so that no one member seemed favored over the others.
· In Arthurian legend, the Round Table at Camelot served as a gathering place for King Arthur’s knights.
· The table’s shape ensured that all who sat around it were equals.
· This replica of the Round Table can be seen at Winchester Castle in England.
· King Arthur’s Round Table
· Artistic merits:
· (1) careful interweaving of episodes;
· (2) the elements of suspense and surprise;
· (3) psychological analysis;
· (4) elaborate descriptions;
· (5) simple, straightforward language
II. The Age of Chaucer (1350 -- 1400)
· 1. History:
· (1) the Peasants’ Uprising in 1381:
· led by Wat Tyler, Jack Straw and John Ball
· “When Adam delve and Eve span,
· Who was then the gentleman?”
· Wat Tyler, died in 1381
· English revolutionary who led the Peasants' Revolt against Richard II's poll tax in June 1381.
· The uprising ended when he was killed.
· (2) The Lollards: church reformers, John Wycliff and his followers
· Lollards, members of a religious sect in 14th- and 15th-century England. They were led by the English theologian (神学者) and religious reformer John Wycliffe and followed the doctrines he preached. Lollards held the Bible to be the only authentic rule of faith; exhorted the clergy to return to the simple life of the early church; and opposed war, the doctrine of transubstantiation（圣餐的变体）, confession, and the use of images in worship.
· (3) the decline of feudalism in England
· 2. Three important writers:
· (1) John Wycliff (1324 -- 84)
· Church reformer;
· Father of English Prose: earliest translation of the entire Bible
· (2) John Gower (1330 -- 1408)
· three chief works in three different languages
· (3) William Langland (1332?-1400?), English poet, who was supposedly the author of the religious allegory The Vision of William Concerning Piers the Plowman (written 1360?-1400?), better known as Piers Plowman.
· Piers the Plowman holds up a mirror to Langland’s England, showing on the one hand the corruption prevalent among the ruling classes, both secular and clerical, and on the other hand the uprightness and worthiness of the labouring folk and the miseries of the poor and needy.
· In the form of allegory and vision, it is a “gospel of the poor”.
III. Geoffrey Chaucer
· Father of English Literature, and Father of English Poetry. A great master of the English language
· 1. Three periods:
· (1) The first period (1360 -- 1372): French influence
· The Book of Duchess （公爵夫人之书）
· (2) The second period (1372 -- 1385): Italian influence
· The House of Fame （声誉之堂）;
· Troylus and Criseyde （特罗勒斯与克丽西斯）;
· The Legend of Good Women （善良女子徇情记）
· (3) The third period (1386 -- 1400): English period or mature period
· The Canterbury Tales （坎特伯雷故事集)
· The Canterbury Tales, generally considered to be Chaucer’s masterpiece, was written chiefly in the years 1386-1400.
· It begins with a general prologue that explains the occasion for the narration of the tales and gives a description of the pilgrims who narrate the tales. 120 tales are intended, but only 24 are completed.
The Canterbury Tales
· Significance
· a comprehensive picture of the social reality of the poet’s day
· a framed story
· anthology of medieval literature
· humour, satire, irony
· Chaucer, a master of the English language
Unit Three The Transitional Period (The 15th Century
· I. Popular Ballads
· II. Early English Drama
· III. Chaucerian Poets
· IV. Le Morte d’Arthur
Historical Background
· 1. The 15th century was a period of transition for Britain from the medieval to the Renaissance world.
· 2. The War of the Roses (1455 -- 85): The rival houses of Lancaster and York, which were both descended from Edward III, started a fight for power.
The flag for Lancaster showed a red rose, and the flag for York showed a white rose, so the struggle between them became known as the War of the Roses.
· 3. Printing press was introduced into England by William Caxton in 1476.
William Caxton (1422?-1491), first English printer, born probably in Tenterden, Kent. His translation and print of The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye (1474?) was the first book printed in English.
· The more notable boo