英美文学第二篇：英美文学第三篇：英美文学。第五篇：英美文学 英国文学知识点梳理： 1.Renaissance: ( from 14th century to 17th century) Definition: Renaissance is commonly applied to the movement or period in Western civilization, which marks the transition from the medieval to the modern world. An age of drama and poetry. Reasons:the rediscovery of ancient Roman and Greek culture, the new discoveries in geography and astronomy, the religious reformation and economic expansion Significance: a reflection of the class struggle waged by the new rising bourgeoisie against the feudal class and its ideology. William Caxtonthe first person who introduced printing into England. Sonnet: originated in Italy, sonnet is a fourteen-line poem with a distinctiverhyme scheme and metrical pattern. It was introduced to England by Sir Wyatt in the early stage of English Renaissance and then further cultivated by Edmund Spenser and William Shakespeare so as to produce respectively the Spenserian stanza and Shakespearian stanza, both of which exerted great influence on the successing poets.Shakespearian Stanza: Shakespearean Sonnet is made up of three quatrains(四行诗节) with different rhymes, followed by a couplet. The rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg. Spenserian Stanza: invented by Edmund Spenser. It is a stanza of 9 lines, with the first eight lines in iambic pentameter 抑扬格五音步 strictly observation of the 3 unity of time, space andaction; regularity in construction; type characters rather than individuals. Mainstream of literature: realismwriters described the social realities. 3.Romantic Period: (an age of poetry) 1) Romanticism English Romanticism is said to have begun in 1798 with the publication of Wordsworth and Coleridges Lyrical Ballads and to have ended in 1832 with Sir Walter Scotts death and the passage of the first Reform Bill in the Parliament. 2) Characteristics of the Age The Romantic Age is emphatically an age of poetry.Women novelists appeared in this age. It was during this period that women assumed, for the first time, an important place in English literature. (Jane Austen)The greatest historical novelists Walter Scott belongs to this period. His historical novels combines a romantic atmosphere with a realistic depiction of historical background and common peoples life. Scott marked the transition from romanticism to the period of realism that followed it. 4.The Victorian Period: 1) Victorian Literature The novel became the most widely read and most vital and challenging expression of progressive thought. The Victorian age was also a great one for non-fictional prose.The poets of this period were mainly characterized by their experiment with new styles and new ways of expression. 2) Critical Realism English critical realism of the 19th century flourished in the 1840s and early 1850s.It found its expression mainly in the writing of novels and the greatest English critical realist of the time was Charles Dickensa humorist and satirist, a great bourgoisie intellect who could not overstep the limits of his class.The English critical realism of the 19th century not only gave a satirical portrayal of the bourgeoisie and all the ruling classes, but also showed profound sympathy for the common people. 5.The Modern Periodmarked by the publification of T. S. Eliots The Wast Land: (Prevailing Genre: Fictions) 1) Cultural Background Darwins Origin of Species and social Darwinism;Einsteins theory of relativity; Freuds analytical psychology; irrational philosophers including Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and Bergson. 2) The Differences Between Realism and Modernism: Realism: Theoratical Base -Rational PhilosophyFunction of Literature- Educate People and Criticize Social EvilsSubject- Public, Exterior WorldConception of Time Describing the exotic and the picturesque; Nostalgia; Showing things as they are; The influence of setting on character（environmental determinism） 2) Naturalism: a. Background: 1) Darwinisms key points: the struggle for existence or evolution, the survival of the fittest, natural selection. 2) SocialDarwinism: the weak and stupid would fall victim in the natural course of events to economic forces. b. Definition: Naturalism is a critical term applied to the method of literary composition c. Features:Humans are controlled by laws of heredity and environment. The universe is cold, godless, indifferent, and hostile to human desires. The literary naturalists have a major difference from the realists. (Violent, sensational, sordid, unpleasant and ugly vs. genteel) 5. The Literature of the Modernist Period: 1). Modernism: Cultural Background: Darwins Origin of Species; Freuds analytical psychology(libido, id, ego, superego); Irrationa