英国文学选读知识总结
Geoffrey Chaucer (1343-1400) 乔叟He was born in 1343 in London.
He died in 1400 and was buried in Westminster Abbey, thus founding the “Poets Corner”.The father of English Poetry and one of the greatest narrative poets of England.“The Canterbury Tales” (1387-1400) It is Chaucer’s masterpiece and one of the monumental works in English literature.
Chaucer’s Contribution to English Literature Chaucer is regarded as the founder of English poetry and has been called “the founder of English realism.” He is the firs t great poet who wrote in the English language. He introduced from France the rhymed stanza of various types, especially the “heroic couplet” (英雄双韵体) to English poetry.His masterpiece “The Canterbury Tales” is one of the monumental works in English literat ure 公爵夫人之书，百鸟议会，声誉之堂，特罗勒思和克里西德
Structure of a poem: A poem can be broken down into three parts:
(1) Stanza (节) : a group of lines set off from the other lines in a poem. It is the poetic equivalent of a paragraph in prose. In traditional poems, the stanza usually contains a unit of thought.(2) The line (行) : a single line of poetry
(3) The foot (音步) : a syllable or a group of 2 or 3 syllables. To scan a line of poetry one counts the number of feet in a line. For a beginner, the easiest thing to do is to count the number of stresses. Typically a foot will contain a stressed and an unstressed syllable. William Shakespeare (1564-1616)playwright, poet, actor.Shakespeare and Aeschylus are the two greatest dramatic geniuses the world has ever known.—Carl Marks.The Great Tragedies: 《哈姆雷特》(Hamlet,1601 ) 《奥赛罗》(Othello, 1604) 《李尔王》(King Lear, 1605) 《麦克白》(Macbeth, 1606) The Great Comedies威尼斯商人》(The Merchant of Venice, 1596) 《仲夏夜之梦》(A Midsummer Night's Dream,1596) 《第十二夜》(Twelfth Night, 1600) 《皆大欢喜》(As You Like It, 1601)
Shakespeare’s career as a dramatist may be divided into four major phases.: The First Period(1590-1594)
This period is the period of his apprenticeship in play-writing.
Works: Henry VI The Comedy of Errors《错误的喜剧》/《连环错》Love’s Labor’s Lost 《迷失的爱》/《空爱一场》/《爱的徒劳》Romeo and Juliet, etc.
The Second Period (1595-1600)
This period is his mature period, mainly a period of “great comedies” and mature historical plays. It includes 6 comedies, 5 historical plays and 1 Roman tragedy. His sonnets are also thought to be written in this period.
The Third Period (1601-1607)
The third period of Shakespeare’s dramatic career is mainly the period of “great tragedies” and “dark comedies”. It includes 5 tragedies, 3 comedies and 2 Roman tragedies.Major works written in this period:Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra The Fourth Period (1608-1612)
The fourth period of Shakespeare’s work is the period of romantic drama. It includes 4 romances or “reconciliation（和解，复合）plays”.
Shakespeare’s Literary Posi tion:Shakespeare and the Authorized Version of the English Bible are the two greatest treasuries of the English language. Shakespeare has been universally acknowledged to be the summit of the English Renaissance, and one of the greatest writers in world literature.
Hamlet:Hamlet is considered the summit of Shakespeare’s art. It is one of Shakespeare’s canon, and it is universally included in the list of the world’s greatest works.It’s written in the form of blank verse.blank verse : poetry in rhymeless iambic pentameter.（素体诗剧）The story, coming from an old Danish legend, is a tragedy of the “revenge” genre. Shakespeare incorporates into the medieval story other major humanistic themes, including love, justice, good and evil, and most notably, madness, and the spirit of the time Injustice, conspiracy, and betrayal in the society。1. first blow: father’s murder and mother’s re-marriage2.second blow: betrayal of his two former friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern3. third blow: betrayal of his girl friend OpheliaThe greatness of the play: in praise of the noble quality of Prince Hamlet as a representative of humanist thinkers and his disillusionment with the corrupt and degenerated society in which he lived.
Hamlet is a humanist, a man who is free from medieval prejudices and superstitions. He has an unbounded love for the world instead of the heaven. Starting from his humanist love of man, he returned to those around him with the same eagerness. He loves good and hates evil. A king and a beggar are all the same to him. His intellectual genius is outstanding. He is a close observer of men and manners. He easily sees through people. His image reflects the versatility of the men of the Renaissance.The key-note of Hamlet’s character is melancholy. But his melancholy is not the negative kind.
Reasons : 1)His mental world has gone through the shock of a personal wrong to an awakening of his great responsibility in reforming the world as a whole. But to realize his ideal in his time was beyond him. This is the cause of Ha mlet’s profound melancholy2)He has the opportunity of killing the king, yet he refuses to do so. Because when the king is praying, if he kills him, he will send him to the heaven. the villain has become the king, if he is killed abruptly, it will cause panic to the people and danger to the state.
Life and death Life is full of hardship Death is also very mysterious (undiscovered country from which no traveler returns)
Hamlet: character analysis Philosophical Contemplative Melancholic
Beowulf: the national epic of Anglo-Saxons contains at least 3182 lines (alliteration 头韵, the repetition of the first consonant or vowel) The Canterbury Tales: a narrative poem written in rhymed iambic pentameter, heroic couplet (英雄双韵体) Shakespeare’s plays and Sonnets: unrhymed iambic pentameter (无韵式抑扬格五音步), blank verse (素体诗Basic Knowledge of Poetry Tersa rima: three-lined stanza 三行诗节Quatrain: four-lined stanza 四行诗节Octave: 律诗Sonnet: 十四行诗Couplet: 双韵体Rhythm: 格律Poetic license: 诗的破格Poetic diction: 诗语（诗歌用词）：e.g. thou/thee—you; thy/thine—your; thyself—yourself; art—are; ow’st—own
单音步：monometer 两音步：dimeter 三音步：trimeter四音步：tetrameter五音步：pentameter六音步：hexameter七音步：heptameter 八音步：octameter
Rhythm 格律 1. iambic 抑扬格: weak+strong2. trochaic扬抑格: strong+weak3. anapaestic 抑抑扬格: weak+weak+strong4. dactylic 扬抑抑格: strong+weak+weak5. spondaic (n.) (扬扬格): strong+strong6. pyrrhic (抑抑格): weak+weak
How1) 诗节：This poem consists of ___ stanza (s).2) 诗行：Each stanza has ____ lines.3) 音步：Each line has ____ feet.4) 格律：The meter in each line is generally __ with the exception of __ feet in __ line, which is __.5) 押韵：The rhyme scheme of each stanza is ___.6) 标出来：Demonstratione.g. This poem consists of two quatrains, and each line is of iambic pentameter. The rhyme scheme is a b a b.
Caesura (行内停顿): the pause in the middle of a line is called caesura.
End-stopped line (结句行): when a line ends in a full pause, marked by some kind of punctuation, it is called an end-stopped line.一行正好构成一个完整的意思
Run-on line (跨行句): when a line does not end in punctuation, and the sentence carries on into the next line, then it is called run-on line.几行加起来表达一个意思e.g. I shot an arrow into the air, It fell to earth, I knew not where; For, so swiftly it flew, the sight Could not follow it in its flight. 前两行是end-stopped line，后两行是run-on line. Rhyme (押韵): the repetition of sound within and across lines
1. alliteration (头韵)
2. assonance (尾韵)
3. rhyme (韵脚
Sonnet：a fourteen-line poem usually in iambic pentameter with a specific rhyme scheme. 3）the English sonnet (the Shakespearean sonnet)rhyme scheme: a b a b, c d c d, e f e f, g g
Sonnet 18
Shakespearean Sonnet is also called the English Sonnet, with three four-line stanzas (quatrains) and a two-line unit called a couplet （对子）.
The rhyme scheme is：a b a b, c d c d, e f e f, g g
Metrical pattern: iambic pentameter
The first stanza/quatrain：beginning 起The second stanza/quatrain：development 承The third stanza/quatrain：turn 转The couplet: conclusion 含
Rhythm & Meter:Iambic pentameter (五音步抑扬格)
1. Rhetorical question / apostrophe (顿呼法）The 1st line, used to create a tone of respect, and to engage the audience./ Speaking to thee directly.
2. Personification Lines 5,6 & 11, used to elevate the sun and death.
3. Parallelism / hyperbole The final couplet, used to emphasize the message: the beauty of the subject will be immortalized by the power of his art.
Theme: eternal life of art Time, beauty and poetry
1. Time and nature are forever transient. 大自然反复无常
2. Beauty is always fading. 美人驻颜无术；
3. Only art /poetry can be eternal. 为艺术可以不朽。
The conventional theme of Elizabethan sonnets
Comment on Sonnet 18
Sonnet 18 is Shakespeare’s best known poem in all of his 154 sonnets. It is a typical Shakespearean sonnet which consists of three four-lined stanzas followed by a couplet, and has the characteristic rhyme scheme: a b a b, c d c d, e f e f, g g. This sonnet aims at praising the eternal power of man by describing the instability of nature.
First the poet compares his friend as “a summer’s day”, and then he says his friend is “more lovely and more temperate” than the summer. He lists a lot of negative images to show the instability of the summer. It is short—“summer’s lease hath all too short a date,” and sometimes the sun is too hot—“sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines.” The poet also uses internal rhythm tospeed up the rhythm of the poem, such as in line 7, “And every fair from fair sometime declines.” Here, “fair” means beauty. It means the beauty of summer is fading very soon. While his friend’s beauty “shall not fade” nor “lose possessio n of that fair thou ow’st.” Even Death can not take him away. In the poet’s opinion, the summer which refers to nature is always changing, but his friend’s personality will last forever.
In conclusion, the poet compares his friend to summer, and then by describing the instability of summer to show his friend’s immortality. His purpose is to tell us that the power of beauty comes from man. Connecting the background, the poet is praising the spirit of Renaissance—Humanism.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626)Born in a family that had connections with the court. Went to Cambridge at 12.The founder of English materialist philosophy.The founder of modern science. The first English essayist.
essayist and a humanist, English philosopher and statesman, one of the pioneers of modern scientific thought
Essays (1597)《散文集》Advancement of Learning (1605)《学术的进步》Novum Organum (New Instrument) (1620) 《新工具》De Augmentis (1623) 《辩论之论》NewAtlanti(1624)《新大西岛》(a utopian novel)
Comments on “Essays”
First, Bacon borrowed the title from the French philosopher Montaigne. But different from Montaigne’s personal and informal style, Bacon’s style is more formal and more tightly organized. Second, these essays cover a variety of subjects, such as “the meaning of truth,” “the composition of beauty,” “friendship,” “marriage,” and “parents and children.”Third, these essays, though short, are sinewy（强壮的）, full of wisdom, and elegantly phrased. They offer people useful and practical advice, and encourage people to play more active roles in their social life.
Bacon’s Style: Brevity（简短）Compactness(紧密，简洁) Powerfulness Metaphysical Poets refer to a school of poets that appeared at the beginning of the 17th century. The works of are characterized by mysticism in content and fantasticality in form.The main themes of the metaphysical poets are love, death and religion
John Donne(1572-1631) Lived and wrote during the succeeding reigns of Elizabeth I,James I and Charles I. Donne was educated at Hart‘s Hall, Oxford, and Lincoln’s Inn; he became prodigiously (=very much) learned, speaking several languages and writing poems in both English and Latin The founder of the Metaphysical school of poetry. Features Wit 诙谐Subtle argumentation 论辩细致Muscular rhythms 强劲的韵律Conceit (metaphor) 夸张的比喻Metaphysical poetry uses conceits to express ideas.
A conceit can also be called far-fetched comparisons. A comparison becomes a conceit
when we are made to concede likeness while being strongly conscious of unlikeness.
. Love is the basic theme of his poems. Donne holds that the nature of love is the union of soul and body
Donne's father died when he was very young, as did several of his brothers and sisters, and his mother remarried twice during his lifetime. His early life was passed in dissipation （放荡，花天酒地）and roguery（无赖行为，淘气）, but later turned to saintly divine and ended as the Dean of St. Paul Cathedral, London. Donne's adult life was colorful, varied, and often dangerous; he sailed with the royal fleet and served as both a Member of Parliament and a diplomatIn 1601, he secretly married a woman named Ann More, and he was imprisoned by her father, Sir George More; however, after the Court of Audiences upheld his marriage several months later, he was released and sent to live with his wife's cousin in Surrey, his fortunes now in tatters. For the next several years, Donne moved his family throughout England, traveled extensively in France and Italy, and attempted unsuccessfully to gain positions that might improve his financial situationIn 1615, Donne was ordained a priest in the Anglican Church; in 1621, he became the Dean of St. Paul's Cathedral, a post that he retained for the rest of his life. A very successful priest, Donne preached several times before royalty; his sermons were famous for their power and directness. For the last decade of his life, before his death in 1631, Donne concentrated more on writing sermons than on writing poems, and today he is admired for the former as well as the latterHowever, it is for his extraordinary poems that Donne is primarily remembered; and it was on the basis of his poems that led to the revival of his reputation at the beginning of the 20th century, following years of obscurity.
Donne’s poems can be classified into 2 kinds: the youthful love lyrics and sacred verses.DonIn his poetry sensuality（淫荡，好色）is blended with philosophy, passion with intellect and contraries are ever moving into the other.On the one hand, he is impulsive（易冲动的）, playful（嬉戏的，幽默的）, and cynical in his poetry; on the other hand, he is a bold and serious thinker.ne is a poet of peculiar conceits, having his own way of reasoning and comparison.
Analysis of “The Flea”
The poet, John Donne wrote "The Flea." The Flea is a love sonnet bordering on the absurd. This flea is used to assist the poet in making his case for sex.
The poem ends with two pentameter lines at the close of each stanza. This Poem consists of three stanzas, and each stanza has nine lines.
This poem alternates metrically between lines in iambic tetrameter and lines in iambic pentameter, a four and five stress line, respectively. The rhyme scheme is in couplets with the final line in each stanza rhyming with the final couplet. The rhyming pattern is as follows AABBCCDDD.
Stanza 1: drawing the hearer’s attention to one flea.Stanza 2: warning the hearer not to kill the flea.Stanza 3: lamenting the killing of the flea and exposing his real purpose of doing something.
John Donne’s Holy Sonnets
John Donne’s religious poems are called “Divine poems”, which include 19 Holy Sonnets, reflecting his religious thoughts and his interest in Protestant meditative procedures. Death Be Not Proud死神，你莫骄傲John Donne
First part: argumatation(line1~2)Second part:supports(line3~12)
Third part: conclusion(line13~14)
ThemeDeath has no right to be proud, since human beings do not die but live eternally after “one short sleep.”
?Death is but momentary while happiness after death is eternal.
a lot of the poem’s wit comes from combining literal and symbolic uses of the words “death” and “die”.
Lines 1-2: This has got to be one of the most famous examples of personification. The speaker treats death like a person who is considered "mighty" and "dreadful," which is personification. And, he addresses this person-like Death directly, even though Death obviously can’t respond. Line 5: This me taphor compares "rest" and "sleep" to "pictures of death ," like a painting or drawing. The point is that the rest and sleep are pale imitations, and Death is the real thing. Death is only a much stronger version of sleep, and not
something scary and different. Line 9: This metaphor calls Death a "slave" to "fate, chance, kings, and desperate men." Implicitly, all these things are personified as Death’s master. Line 10: Although it’s not as obvious as in other parts of the poem, we think “poison, war, and sickness” are personified as thugs(暴徒), and the friends of Death.Line 8.It’s a pun(双关语).To "deliver" someone can mean to set them free, as in the Lord’s Prayer: "Deliver us from evil...." But, the speaker also wants to be "delivered" into the afterlife, like a baby is "delivered" into the world during birth.The comparison of death to rebirth is such a common metaphor that we rarely even think of it as a being a metaphor.
John Milton’s Life (1608-1674)Milton was born in London.He studied at Christ’s College, Cambridge and received his Master’s degree in 1632.From 1632 to 1638, he retired to his father’s country house at Horton, and devoted himself to private study.From 1638-1639, he traveled on the Continent.After his return, he first acted as a teacher.Then he began his first entry into political conflict and devoted himself to the Revolution for more than 20 years.He got married in 1624.In 1652, he became totally blind.In 1652, his first wife died, and several years later(1655), he got married again.He was put in prison in the Restoration period and then set free.He died of gout in 1674.
He is the greatest English poet after Shakespeare. His masterpiece, Paradise Lost, is considered unsurpassed among English epic poems. It is a powerfully imaginative and dramatic work, based in part on the biblical story of the temptation and fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
Masterpieces :Areopagitica (1644) 《论出版自由》Paradise Lost (1667) 《失乐园》Paradise Regained (1671) 《复乐园》Samson Agonistes (1671) 《力士参孙》
Paradise Los t”It is a long epic in 12 books, written in blank verse.
John Milton composed the entire work when he was completely blind, with the help of secretaries and friends. He claimed that a divine spirit inspired him during the night, leaving him with verses that he would recite in the morning.The poem concerns the Christian story of the Fall of Man: the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. Milton's purpose, stated in Book I, is to “justify the ways o f God to men and elucidate the conflict between God's eternal foresight and free will.”
Daniel Defoe (1660-1731) Father of English novel
His masterpiece: “Robinson Crusoe” (1719) The novel is based upon a real story.
The character of Robinson Crusoe is representative of the English bourgeoisie at the earlier stages of its development.
English novelist and journalist, whose work reflects his diverse experiences in many countries and in many walks of life. Besides being a brilliant journalist, novelist, and social thinker, Defoe was a prolific author, producing more than 500 books, pamphlets, and tracts（尤指道德或宗教题材的小册子）.
Robinson Crusoe Captain Singleton Moll Flanders A Journal of the Plague Year Roxana Robinson Crusoe (1719)The first novel in English
The book, although based on the true story of a Scotsman, Alexander Selkirk, is a fictional autobiography of the title character, a castaway (被社会遗弃者) who spends 28 years on a remote tropical island near Venezuela, encountering Native Americans, captives, and mutineers (海事哗变者) before being rescued.
The novel can be read in different ways:①It is a story of sea adventures. ②It is an artistic projection of colonial expansion.③It implies the Western cultural values and sings a song of “the dignity of labor” . ④ It expl ores the theme of “back to nature”⑤It also shows the theme of “religious devotion”.
Politically, European colonialismSocially, western cultural values including industrialism & self-relianceReligiously, Protestantism
In the novel, the first person narrator tells the story and enables the strange events to be realistic.he description of Robinson Crusoe’s life and experience is in great detail.
The structure of the novel is clear and the language is plain and easy to be understood. Robinsonade is a literary genre that takes its name from the 1719 novel Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. The success of this novel spawned（大量出现）enough imitations that its name was used to define a genre, which is sometimes described simply as a "desert
island story".
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) Born in Dublin, https://www.sodocs.net/doc/584289095.html,cated at the the Trinity College.Worked in a relative’s house for many years.Appointed dean of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin.Jonathan Swift (1667-1745), Anglo-Irish satirist and political pamphleteer, considered one of the greatest masters of English prose and one of the most impassioned satirists of human folly and pretension.
A Tale of a Tub The Battle of the Books Bickerstaff Almanac
Gulliver’s Travels A Modest Proposal The Draper’s Letters
Swift is one of the greatest masters of English prose. His language is simple, clear and vigorous.
Swift is a master satirist, and his irony is deadly. But his satire is masked by an outward gravity, and an apparent calmness conceals his bitter irony.
William Blake(1757-1827最复杂最有个性诗人英国文学上)The son of a London hosier （零售商）.Never went to school and educated by his mother at home.poet, printer（印刷工人）, illustrator（插图画家）and engraver（版画家，雕刻家
Songs of Innocence (1789) Songs of Experience (1794) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790)
Songs of Experience the song of Los Visions of the daugters of Albion
Little Lamb The poem begins with the question, “Little Lamb, who made thee?” The speaker, a child, asks the lamb about its origins: how it came into being, how it acquired its particular manner of feeding, its “clothing” of wool, its “tender voice.”In the second stanza, the speaker attempts a riddling answer to his own question: the lamb was made by one who “calls himself a Lamb,” one who resembles in his gentleness both the c hild and the lamb. The poem ends with the child bestowing（给予，赠与）a blessing on the lamb.
he poem is a child’s song, in the form of a question and answer. The first stanza is rural and descriptive, while the second focuses on abstract spiritual matters and contains explanation and analogy（类推）The child’s question is both naive and profound. The question is a simple one, and yet the child is also tapping into the deep and timeless questions that all human beings have, about their own origins and the nature of creation. This poem, like many of the Songs of Innocence, accepts what Blake saw as the more positive aspects of conventional Christian belief.
William Wordsworth Life (1770-1850)Birthplace Cockermouth, Cumberland, in the Lake District. Orphanage at the age of 14.was educated at Cambridge University traveled in France and Switzerland.married Mary Hutchinson in 1802. became Poet Laureate in 1843.died of pneumonia.
“Lyrical Ballads“The Prelude” The ‘Lucy Poems
Robert Burns(1759-1796) Nationality: ScottishFamily: His father was William Burns, a gardener and https://www.sodocs.net/doc/584289095.html,cation: Tutored at home.Career: poet, lyricist and farmer.
Burns is the national poet of Scotland. His songs are Scottish to the core. As a poet of the peasant, he was very good at presenting the rural theme. His peasant origin and environment especially aided him in mastering the happy simplicity, humor, directness and optimism, which are characteristics of old Scottish songs. He often revised old songs and improved them by a process of omission, condensation and addition, so that they become transformed into noble and finished masterpieces.
1794《My heart’s in the Highlands》,《A Red Red Rose》,1796《John Anderson,My Jo》,1788《Auld Lang Syne》,1794《The Tree of Liberty》