literary time periods

Homeric Time Period

1200 BCE - 800 BCE

Homeric Tenets

Xenia or hospitality to show respect to the Gods, Kleos or fame is crucial to establishing a kingdom's reputation, being loyal to king and kingdom, restraint and clarity, universality

Elizabethan Time Period

1558-1603

Elizabethan Tenets

Development in English commerce and maritime power, Nationalist feeling with defeat of Spanish Armada, Greatest age for drama in English literature, Intellectual coherence & social order, uncertainties & political and social conflicts

Age of Reasoning Time Period

1660-1790

Age of Reasoning Tenets

Emphasis on logic and reasoning, science allows for an understanding of the world, questioning of religious orthodoxy, focus on politics and constitutional governments, promotion of the separation of church and state

Romantic Time Period

1790-1830

Romantic Tenets

Emphasis on the individual, imagination, and emotion, use of the supernatural, valued spontaneous and creative output, against industrialism and materialism, concerned with personal events

Victorian Time Period

1832-1901

Victorian Tenets

Focus on expanding education and literacy, questioning politics and religion, sense of optimism with a period of stability, globalization, dramatic monologue in poetry

Modern Time Period

1914-1945

Modern Tenets

Growing alienation with one's society, undermining of faith, war creates disillusionment, search for meaning, focus on authentic truth

Post-Modern Time Period

1945-onward

Post Modern Tenets

Search for meaning becomes impossible, disorder is emphasized, non-linear timelines, multiple meanings in a literary work, emphasis on fragmentation

The Odyssey

Homeric

Othello

Elizabethan

John Donne Poems

Age of Reason

Wordsworth poems

Romantic

Lord Alfred Tennyson

Victorian

As I Lay Dying

Modern

The Stranger

Modern

And Every Morning the Way Home Gets Longer and Longer

Post-Modern