This lesson contains 25 slides, with interactive quizzes, text slides and 2 videos.
Lesson duration is: 45 min
Items in this lesson
Enlightenment
Slide 1 - Slide
The Eighteenth Century
Britain: becomes the world's leading economic power
Wealth based on colonies and trade
Tea, silks and spices (India)
Slide 2 - Slide
Literature
"Reason" > as defined in the 18th century
Rational + balanced judgement, based on knowledge, wisdom and common sense
Not hindered by personal emotions!
Literature had to stick to strict rules
Most people failed to live up to standards > satire
Slide 3 - Slide
Gulliver's Travels
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745)
Classic example of satire
Allegory about current social situation in England
Fairy-tale with dwarves, giants and talking horses
Slide 4 - Slide
What is NOT a part of literature in the Age of Reason?
A
personal emotions
B
balanced judgement
C
strict rules
D
knowledge and wisdom
Slide 5 - Quiz
The Enlightenment movement was in favor of:
A
ignorance
B
rationality
C
intolerance
D
inequality
Slide 6 - Quiz
The Enlightenment philosophers aimed to bring about progress in the world by:
A
religious ideas
B
revolution
C
rational ideas
D
spontaneous ideas
Slide 7 - Quiz
Gulliver's Travels
The Rape of the Lock
Robinson Crusoe
Daniel Defoe
Jonathan Swift
Alexander Pope
Slide 8 - Drag question
Because of the discrepancy between the idealistic world (everything ruled by reason) and the real world (human emotions and lusts are often dominant) satire, both in prose and poetry, became the most popular genre of the Neoclassical period.
Gap between Neoclassical prose and poetry read by the higher circles of society (upper class) and literature for the middle class: religious works and books with recognisable (middle class) characters and a clear moral at the end. . The outlook of the middle class was moral, practical and down-to-earth
The rise of the novel:
e.g. Defoe, Swift, Austen
Slide 9 - Slide
The Romantic Period
1800-1830
Slide 10 - Slide
Developments
Industrial revolution: brought wealth and prosperity to the country
Britain grew from a agricultural nation into an industrialised nation
Farmers had to find work in factories in the cities (long hours, miserable working conditions)
The gap between rich and poor became wider; wealth wasn’t equally divided -> social unrest
The ideals of the French revolution (1789), freedom, equality and the abolition of class distinctions appealed to many, especially young, people all over Europe, including English Romantic poets (e.g. Lord Byron)
Slide 11 - Slide
1798William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge:
Lyrical Ballads
Poetry of simplicity, both in form and in contents.
In a period of social change and growing unrest people longed for another world.
Coleridge
1772-1834
Wordsworth
1770-1850
Slide 12 - Slide
Romantic period
beauty and value of nature
distant and exotic cultures
innocence of children
The supernatural
God as the centre
Scientific knowledge
Clasical influences
Feelings
courtly love
Slide 13 - Drag question
The Romantic poets - the first generation
1789: publication of Lyrical Ballads(William Wordsworth & Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
Goal: bring poetry within reach of ordinary people
Form: simple poems > normal, everyday language
Subjects: ordinary country folk and their (highly idealized) pure lives in the country
Slide 14 - Slide
The Romantic poets - the first generation
William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850)
Probably England's greatest nature poet
Inspired by the Lake District
Famous for:
short, lyrical poems
I wandered lonely as a cloud
We are Seven
Slide 15 - Slide
The Romantic poets - the first generation
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)
Famous for his art ballad
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Slide 16 - Slide
The Romantic poets - the second generation
George, Lord Byron (1788-1824)
Notorious life-style!
Best known for two long narrative poems
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Don Juan
Slide 17 - Slide
The Romantic poets - the second generation
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 - 1822)
Unconventional life
Husband of Mary Shelley (author of Frankenstein)
Most famous for:
shorter verse - Ozymandias, Ode to the West Wind
masterpiece - Adonais (long elegy on the death of John Keats)
Slide 18 - Slide
The Romantic poets - the second generation
John Keats (1795 - 1821)
Early death from tuberculosis
Neglected during life-time
Now one of England's most beloved poets
Famous for:
Three famous odes: On a Grecian Urn, To A Nightingale, To Autumn