The dream vision was a favorite genre of medieval narrative poetry, in which a narrator falls asleep and dreams what becomes the main body of the story. This genre typically follows a structure whereby a narrator recounts his experience of falling asleep, dreaming, and waking; and the story is oftenContinue Reading
The amount of surviving Old English prose is much greater than the amount of poetry. Of the surviving prose, the majority consists of sermons and translations of religious works that were composed in Latin, for literacy in Anglo-Saxon England was largely the province of monks, nuns, and ecclesiastics (or ofContinue Reading
Religious poetry seems to have flourished in northern England-Northumbria-throughout the eighth century, though most of it has survived only in West Saxon transcriptions of the late tenth century. Much of it consists of retellings of books and episodes from the Old Testament. Much of this religious poetry is anonymous, butContinue Reading
Anglo Saxon literature frequently took up the theme of fights and hostilities, in which the nobility of a character was brought out through a display of courage, valour, loyalty to the lord and the community and a thirst for glory. Glory was the most coveted thing because death lurked everywhere.Continue Reading
Beowulf credited with being a quintessential piece of epic. An epic is a long and highly stylized narrative poem on a grand scale about the deeds of warriors and heroes. It is a polygonal, ‘heroic’ story incorporating myth, legend, folk tale and history. Epics are often of national significance inContinue Reading
Except for a few scattered poems, most of the Old English poetic material we possess comes to us in four manuscripts. The first manuscript is called the Junius manuscript (also known as the Caedmon manuscript), which is an illustrated poetic anthology. The second manuscript is called the Exeter Book, alsoContinue Reading
Historians normally divide English literature into periods for convenience of discussion. Sometimes the numbers, dates or the names of the periods seem to vary. The following list follows the widespread practice of listing: 450-1066 Old English (Anglo-Saxon) Period1066-1500 Middle English Period1500-1600 The Renaissance (Early Modern) Period1558-1603 Elizabethan Age1603-1625 Jacobean Age1625-1649Continue Reading
📜 Introduction The Rape of the Lock (first published in 1712, revised in 1714) is a mock-epic poem by Alexander Pope, written in heroic couplets. It satirizes a real-life incident in which a young nobleman, Lord Petre, cut a lock of hair from the head of a young woman, ArabellaContinue Reading
Alexander Pope (1688–1744) stands as one of the most important and influential English poets of the 18th century. Best known for his satirical verse and mastery of the heroic couplet, Pope played a central role in shaping the Augustan age of English literature—a period that prized order, wit, and reason.Continue Reading
Bravely Fought the Queen, while exposing the hypocrisy of society, dwells upon the subaltern position of women and those men who fall outside the sexual norm. ‘Family’ is the most important theatrical space in Mahesh Dattani’s plays including Bravely Fought the Queen. The dramatist depicts the battles being fought amongContinue Reading
