English of literature timeline

English of literature timeline
The following list of the most important eras in English literature mostly includes major representatives of the given period until 1945.

Old English literature
One of the earliest pieces of English literature, Beowulf, was written by an unknown author probably in the 8th century. It’s an epic poem of heroes and myths. The legends of king Arthur and the Knights of the Round table come from this period, while the literature of ´ Wales ´ is represented in poems in the late 13th century Book if Taliesin.

The Anglo Saxon Chronicles tell of the history, language, and civil life from around the 890´s leading up to the invasion of Britain by William the Conqueror in 1066.

Medieval literature
Geoffrey Chaucer (1340 – 1400)
Geoffrey Chaucer, the father of English poetry, was unusual because he wrote poetry in English rather than Latin of French. Poetry was the main way to tell a tale or story rather than the prose form we use today.

Chaucer’s collection of travellers´ tales, The Canterbury Tales, is his best known work. It is about imagined conversations that pilgrims would have had as they journeyed from London to the Shrine of Thomas Becket at Canterbury. Amongst the pilgrims were ordinary people such as merchants and traders, so the tales are full of gossip and are often rude.

Renaissance and Reformation
William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616)
At the time Shakespeare was writing thousands were dying of the plague and often the theatres in London were closed. When they were open, Shakespeare wrote at lightening speed and the plays were rehearsed and put on at very sort notice. He wrote historical plays about the Kings of England (Henry IV., Richard II.), and comedies such as The taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night´ s Dream and Twelfth Night were great successes. His tragedies such as hamlet and Macbeth followed.

Shakespeare is also known for his 154 poems, The Sonnets. They start by giving advice to a young man about marriage. There is great debate over who he was and also about the identity of a character referred to as “the dark lady”.

Revolution and Restoration
John Milton (1608 – 1674)
When a king is killed and the people are not happy someone needs to write an explanation. After the execution of Charles I, the Puritan government asked John Milton, a government minister to do the job. After several years, the political climate changed and Milton spent some time on jail, but later he continued writing. His most famous epic poem Paradise Lost deals with the worst side of human life. It really reflects Milton’s own determination and struggle to continue after the loss of the world he had helped to create.

18th = century literature

Daniel Defoe (1600 – 1731)
Journalist Daniel Defoe wrote a novel about a castaway called Robinson Crusoe. Defoe paid attention to thoughts, actions and the reality of his character. This was a new idea in descriptive writing and “the novel” was born.

Samuel Richardson (1689 – 1761)
Samuel Richardson published a novel in 1740 entitled Pamela or Virtue Rewarded. This recorded the life of a poor young girl who was a maid for wealthy lady. The maid eventually marries the son and becomes a lady herself. The novel was a tremendous success because it touched on the fantasies of thousands of English woman of the time.

Henry Fielding (1707 – 1754)
Henry Fielding wrote The History of Tom Jones, a Founding where the hero Tom is a fine, strong and carefree character. Women simply fall for him and he has many adventures and pleasures but he really loves one woman, Sophia Western. Fielding showed that Tom’s true love was in the end more important than his lifestyle.

Jane Austen’s (1775 – 1817)
Many fine novels were written including Jane Austen’s masterpieces Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. They portray the social life of the upper classes and praise the virtues of reason and intelligence.

The Bronte sisters´
The Bronte sisters´ lonely childhood in remote Yorkshire (the north of England) intensified the imaginative powers producing their remarkable love stories Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights in the 1840s.

Charles Dickens (1812 – 1870)
Charles Dickens a master of tears and laughter, and satirical humour, created many typical characters in his books and produced a series of well – known novels set in London (Oliver Twist, Hard Times, Little Dorrit, Great Expectations, etc.) in the middle part of the 19th Century.

Sir Walter Scott (1771 – 1832)
Sir Walter Scott – Scottish novelist and poet influenced by the old and romantic poetry (The Lady of the Lake and Rokeby). His historical novels were his masterpieces (Waverly, Ivanhoe).

William Makepeace Thackeray (1811 – 1863)
William Makepeace Thackeray is mainly famous for his novel Vanity Fair describing a vivid picture of early 19th century society.

Late Victorian literature

Robert Louis Stevenson’s (1850 – 1894)
Robert Louis Stevenson’s romantic adventure treasure island contrasts with the often grim reality of Thomas Hardy (1840 – 1928) Far from the Madding Crowd and Tess of the d’Urbervilles.

Rudyard Kipling (1865 – 1936)
Rudyard Kipling wrote vivid stories of life in India. Jungle Books and the Just So Stories have fascinated children over the generations.

Modernism

Virginia Woolf (1882 – 1941)
Virginia Woolf, the foremost woman writer of the 20th century, was recognized as a new development in the art of fiction and became a representative of modernism. Her major works include the novels: To the Lighthouse and Mrs. Dalloway.

D. H. Lawrence (1885 – 1930)
D. H. Lawrence achieved fame because his novels challenged the literary and social status quo with defiant eroticism, (e.g. Lady Chatterley’s Lover), and an insistence on seeing English literature as part of world literature in a time of global crisis.

Aldous Leonard Huxley (1894 – 1963) ¨
Aldous Leonard Huxley – a novelist and essayist famous for his fiction Brave New World and The Doors of Perception.

E. A. St John Waugh’s (1903 – 1966)
E. A. St John Waugh’s main work includes the novels Decline and Fall and Black Mischief, Brideshead Revisited and his wartime trilogy Men at Arms and Officers and Gentlemen.