英国文学总结（1）
第一章　古英语时期和中世纪时期的英国文学考点

1. The Old English poetry can be divided into two groups: the religious group and the secular one. The Bible consists of the Old Testament and the New Testament. Beowulf 《贝尔武夫》, a typical example of Old English poetry, is regarded as the greatest national epic of the Anglo-Saxons. The epic describes the exploits of a Scandinavian hero, Beowulf, in fighting against the monster Grendel, his revengeful mother, and a fire-breathing dragon in his declining years. While fighting against the dragon, Beowulf was mortally wounded. However, he killed the dragon at the cost of his life. Beowulf is shown not only as a glorious hero but also as a protector of the people.

2. Romance is a popular literary form in the medieval England. It sings knightly adventures or other heroic deeds. Chivalry (such as bravery, honor, generosity, and kindness to the weak and poor) is the spirit of romance.

3. John Gower is the author of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the best romance of the period.
William Langland is a more realistic writer who dealt with the religious and social issues of his day in Piers Plowman《农夫皮尔斯》.

4. Geoffry Chaucer is the greatest writer of Middle Ages. His masterpiece The Canterbury Tales《坎特伯蕾故事集》presents, for the first time in English literature, a comprehensive realistic  picture of the medieval English society and creates a whole gallery of vivid characters from all walks of life. In “The Canterbury Tales”, Chaucer developed his art of poetry still further towards drama and the art of the novel. In Troilus and Criseyd, he gave the world what is virtually the first modern novel. Chaucer wrote in Middle English and did much in making London dialect the foundation for modern English language. Though essentially still a medieval writer, Chaucer bore marks of humanism and anticipated a new era to come. As a forerunner of humanism, he praises man’s energy, intellect, quick wit and love of life. His tales exposed and satirized the evils of his time. These tales attacked the degeneration of the noble, the heartlessness of the judge, the corruption of the church, etc. In his works, he developed his characterization to a higher level by presenting characters with both typical qualities and individual dispositions. “The Wife of Bath” is a famous tale in which the heroine is depicted as the new bourgeois. Taking the stand of the rising bourgeoisie, he affirms men and opposes the dogma of asceticism preached by the church. Chaucer introduced from France rhymed stanzas of various types into English poetry to replace the Old English alliterative verse. It was he who used for the first time in English the rhymed couplet of iambic pentameter that was later called the “heroic couplet”. The Chaucer’s reputation has been securely established as one of the best English poets for his wisdom, humor, and humanity. John Dryden called Chaucer the father of English poetry.

第二章文艺复兴时期的英国文学考点

1. Renaissance refers to the transitional period from the medieval to the modern world. It first started in Italy in the 14th century, lasting into the 17th century. The Renaissance means rebirth or revival. It was marked by a humanistic revival of ancient Roman and Greek classics expressed in a flowering of the arts and literature and by the beginnings of modern science. Humanism is the essence of the Renaissance. The English Renaissance did not begin until the reign of Henry VIII. It was usually regarded as England’s Golden Age, especially in literature. Among the literary giants were Shakespeare, Spenser, Johnson, Sidney, Marlowe, Bacon and Donne, and John Milton was the last great poet of the English Renaissance. The real mainstream of the English Renaissance is the Elizabethan drama.

2. Humanism is the essence of the Renaissance. It emphasizes the dignity of human beings and the importance of the present life. Humanists voiced their beliefs that man was the center of the universe and man did not only have the right to enjoy the beauty of the present life, but had the ability to perfect himself and to perform wonders.

3. Petrarch was regarded as the fountainhead of literature by the English writers. Wyatt introduced the Petrarchan sonnet into England. Surrey brought in blank verse（无韵体诗），i.e. the unrhymed iambic（抑扬格的）pentameter（五音步的）line.       

4. Renaissance drama: the Elizabethan drama is the real mainstream of the English Renaissance. English dramas were influenced by the Greek and Roman classics. Thomas Kyd wrote the earliest popular tragedy of blood and revenge, The Spanish Tragedy. The most famous dramatists in the Renaissance England are Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, and Ben Johnson. Elizabethan drama reached its peak in Shakespeare’s works. Shakespeare’s compassionate understanding of the human fate has perpetuated his greatness and made him the representative figure of English literature for the whole world. Francis Bacon was the first important English essayist. He was the founder of modern science in England. His writing paved the way for the use of scientific method.

5. University Wit refers to any of a notable group of pioneer English dramatists writing during the last 15 years of the 16th century. They transformed the native dramatic inheritance of interlude and chronicle play into a potentially great drama by writing plays of quality and diversity. In doing so they prepared the ground for genius of William Shakespeare. Their forerunner was John Lily, Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Nashe, Robert Green, and Thomas Kyd, etc. All these writers except Thomas Kyd took degrees from universities like Oxford and Cambridge.

6. Edmund Spenser: The Shepherd’s Calendar is his early work. Spenser’s masterpiece is the Faerie Queene 《仙后》, a great poem of its age. There are five main qualities in Spenser’s poetry: a perfect melody; a rare sense of beauty; a splendid imagination; a lofty moral purity and seriousness, and a dedicated idealism. It is Spenser’s idealism, his love of beauty, and his exquisite melody that earn him the title of “the poets’ poet.” (诗人的诗人)The Faerie Queene is written in the stanza invented by Spenser himself, the Spenserian stanza, i.e., a stanza（诗的一节）of nine lines, with the first eight lines in iambic pentameter and the last line in iambic hexameter（六音步）, rhyming ababbcbcc