literary time periods

Anglo-Norman

English literature period between 1100 and 1350, also often called the Early Middle English Period and frequently dated from the Conquest in 1066; dominated by diffusing of French culture into England

Middle English

English literature between supplanting of Norman-French as the language of the English court and the appearance of definitely Modern English writings

Anglo-Saxon, Old English

begins in 428 A.D. with sudden departure of ruling Romans; represented by first English translation of Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy, the first history of the English people, Bede's Ecclesiastical History, and flourishing of the School of Caedmon

Renaissance

term meaning "rebirth" applied to the period in English literature usually considered to have begun a little before 1500 and lasted until Commonwealth Interregnum; consisted of Early Tudor, Elizabethan, Jacobean, Caroline; transition from medieval to modern world in Western Europe; elements of humanism, individualism, Puritanism, melancholy, decadence, classical learning

Augustan

age of the Emperor Augustus of Rome for the perfection of letters and learning, "English" applies only to reign of Queen Anne (1702 - 1714), writers were aware of their parallels of their writing to Latin literature and frequently compared London to Rome

Modernist

begins with WWI in 1914; marked by strenuousness of war, flowering of talent and experiment during 20s which then fell during ordeal of economic depression in 30s; catastrophic/fortress time of WWII followed by a period of uncertainty which was giving way anger and protest in 65

Realistic, american

American literary history following Civil War for which fiction became the effective voice of the new turbulence, the growing skepticism and disillusionment, and culminating with the publication of Dreiser's Sister Carrie

Romantic

period between the Jacksonian Era and the close of the Civil War in American literature, recognized as the country's first great creative period; English literature beginning with publication of Wordsworth and Coleridge's Lyrical Ballads, ending with death of Dickens

Federalist

American literary history extending from 1790 to 1830; known as "Era of Good Feeling"; Charles Brockden Brown, James Fenimore Cooper, and Philip Freneau flourished; period between formation of U.S. national government and "Second Revolution" of Jacksonian Democracy during which the United States emerged as a world force and enjoyed a rapid literary development

Naturalistic and Symbolistic

american period of literary beginnings in which the voices of Hugh Henry Brackenridge, Phillip Freneau, Benjamin Franklin, Phyllis Wheatley, Washington Irving, and Royall Tyler found expression; divided by WWI between naturalsim(before) and symbolism(after); much realism

Revolutionary and Early National, american

from beginning of new nation of USA and ends with ascendancy of Jacksonian democracy; includes Revolutionary (1765-1790) and Federalist (1790-1830) literature; Revolutionary poets include Brackenridge, Freneau, Hopkinson

Revolutionary, american

includes Stamp Act in 1765 and formation of federal government in 1789; neoclassical poetry, dominating influence of Pope, Graveyard School popular; major prose writers include Franklin and Jefferson; important document: Declaration of Independence

Caroline

name applied to age of England's Charles I and in particular to the spirit of his court, including the literature of the time; applied in general to things English and in particular to English royal court during second quarter of 17th century; encompasses Cavalier and Puritan literary expression

Edwardian

between death of Victoria in 1901 and beginning of WWI in 1914; called after Edward VII; marked by reaction to conservatism of Victorian Age; critical and questioning; growing distrust of authority in religion, morality, and art; age of prose, realism, and naturalism; notable authors include Shaw, Yeats, Conrad, Joyce

Jacobean

portion of the English Renaissance during which there was a growth of realism in art and cynicism in thought and during which Shakespeare wrote his greatest tragedies and tragicomedies

Victorian

during reign of Queen Victoria; literature reflects romantically and realistically great changes of life and thought, doubts/hopes of new science, social problems from new industrial conditions, foreign sources of inspiration, rise of new middle-class audience, new media of publication

Early Victorian

1832 - 1870; time of gradual tempering of romantic impulse and growth of realism, heightened or even pathological romanticism of spirit; seeds of new movement but some still of old; new poetry of scoial issues, marked by doubts and uncertainties from Industrial Revolution and advances in science; writers include Tennyson, Brownings, Arnold, Swinburne, Dickens, Thackeray, Bronte sisters, Trollopw, Carlyle, Newman, Ruskin, De Quincey

Late Victorian

between 1870 and death of Queen Victoria; saw full flowing of movement toward realism then subordinated to romanticism, which had begun as early as 1830s but had been subordinated to dominant romanticism of middle decades of the nineteenth century; argued meanings of science, religion, society; notable writers include Eliot, Hardy, Spencer, Huxley, Newman, Arnold, Morris, Stevenson, Stoker, Kipling, Gilbert and Sullivan

Postmodernism, english

post-1965; continuance and completion; authors include Graham Green, Margaret Drabble, Kingsley Amis, Anthony Powell

Confession and Postmodernism, american

post-1990; uses of experimental forms such as historical discontinuity, alienation, asocial individualism, solipsism, existentialism, denial of order, highly fragmented universes in created art, critical theories that are forms of phenomenology

Georgian

English literary history beginning with WWI; literary voces include poets Yeats, Eliot, and Hardy; experimental fiction includes works by Woolf, Joyce and, to some degree, Conrad

Neoclassic

English literature between 1660 - 1798; include restoration age, augustan age, and age of johnson; between return of the Stuarts to the English throne in 1660 and publication of Coleridge and Wordsworth's Lyrical Ballads in 1798

Age of Romantic Movement

1798 - 1832; characterized by much romanticism, historical novel, novel of manners, gothic novel, science fiction; writers include Blake, Lyrical Ballads of Wordsworth and Coleridge, Byron, Mary and PB Shelley, Hemans, Keats, Scott, Lamb, DeQuincey, Hazlitt

Diminishing

British literary history represented by George Orwell, Samuel Beckett, Joyce Cary, and Graham Green; characterized by post-WWII struggle to re-establish a sense of nation and tradition

Commonwealth Interregnum

period between execution of Charles I in 1649 and restoration of the monarchy under Charles II; closed theaters in 1642, dramatic performances continued; major prose works of Milton, Taylor, Walton, Browne, Fuller; poets include Vaughan, Waller, Cowley, Davenant, Marvell

Modernism and Consolidation, american

1930 - 1960; Depression of stock market crash caused social and economic revolution New Deal; characterized by agrarianism, new criticism, radicalism, traditionalism, naturalism; writers include Hemmingway, Faulkner, Steinbeck, Miller, Williams, Wilder, O'Neill, Salinger, Jones, Mailer

Restoration

reflects reaction against Puritanism, receptiveness to French influence, dominance of classical points of view; comedy of manners and heroic drama developed; appeared on English stage Dryden's All for Love, Wycherley's The Country Wife, Etherege's The Man of Mode, Behn's Oroonoko, and Congreve's Love for Love and The Way of the World

Early Tudor

during 16th, in English literary history influenced by the importation of style and content from France and Italy and during which humanism modified English life and thought significantly, all of which paved the way for the Elizabethans

Colonial

1607 - 1765; began with founding of Jamestown until Stamp Act in 1765; characterized by ulilitarian, polemical, religious writings; period of American literature where Anne Bradstreet, Edward Taylor, Jonathan Edwards, and Benjamin Franklin flourished as authors

Age of Johnson

transitional age in British literary history, the interval between 1750 and 1798, during which Neoclassicism yielded towards Romanticism

Age of Sensibility

applied to last half of 18th century in England, resulting from historians' seeing the interval between 1750 and 1798 as a seed field for emerging Romantic qualities in literature

Age of Reason

often applied to Neoclassic Period in English literature and sometimes to the Revolutionary and Early National Period in American literature because both periods emphasized rationalism, self-knowledge, and rule of law; used for Enlightenment in late 17th and 18th, emphasized self-knowledge, self-control, rationalism, discipline, and rule of law, order, and decorum in public and private life and in art

Realistic, british

in English literature, 1870 - 1914: end reign of Queen Victoria and during reign of Edward VII, reaction to romanticism reached peak in full-fledged realism and became attacked by beginning of WWI

Elizabethan

part of renaissance during reign of Elizabeth I; age of naturalistic expansion, commercial growth, and religious controversy; saw development of the English drama to the highest level w great outburst of English poetry and new interest in criticism; authors include Sidney, Johnson, Shakespeare, Marlowe

period of the confessional self

period that marks a time of uncertainty, revolt, and cynicism in America and a strong turning inward of many American writers, during which Bellow, Updike, Plath, and Sexton flourished