UK Flashcards
Old English/Anglo-Saxon Period
450-1066
Literature:
There are barely any written English text at this time, Beowulf is a primary example, Geoffrey of Monmouth (Catholic cleric). +Manuscripts.
5th Century: Angles and Saxons first arrive in Britain and establish several kingdoms.
597: St. Augustine arrives in Kent and begins the Christianization of England.
8th Century: Viking invasions begin.
9th Century: Reign of Alfred the Great, who defends against Viking invasions and promotes education and legal reform.
Norman Conquest with the Battle of Hastings and William the Conqueror becoming king.
**1066 - **Norman Conquest. Edward the Confessor died and left a disputed succession line (due to childless marriage and piety), which led to the seizure by Harold Godwinson. He faced two invasions: from Norway and from William, Duke of Normandy (who was known as the Bastard, he was an illegitimate son).
William, Duke of Normandy, invaded the territory. His lands were divided and the second son, William Rufus, became the king of England (after William’s death), known as ‘the Conqueror’. William Rufus brought new aristocracy to England from Normandy. Then lordship and feodalism were strengthened.
Middle English/Late Medieval Period
1066-1500
1215: Magna Carta signed by King John, limiting royal power.
**1337–1453: Hundred Years’ War **between England and France.
1348–1350: Black Death, which drastically reduces the population.
Climatic deterioration began from about 1300, with colder winters and wetter summers. These conditions contributed to the Great European Famine of 1315 - 1322, in which millions perished. The Black Death arrived in Europe in 1347 and in England the following year.
1455–1487: Wars of the Roses between the houses of Lancaster and York.
**1485: **Henry VII establishes the Tudor dynasty after the Battle of Bosworth
The Crisis of the Middle Ages (Black Death, Political Instability)
The long view of the period from 1300 to 1485 suggests climate and demographic change were probably key determinants of developments.
Winchester Bible (1150-1175)
Printing/publishing + Reformed Christianity (literary tradition) made it possible to establish a sort of standardised language = Literature as well.
The cultural feast of the ‘12th-century renaissance’ in the arts, exemplified by the Winchester Bible (created from the skins of over 300 calves and lavishly decorated with lapis lazuli and gold applied by a team of manuscript illuminators from continental Europe.)
Legacies of the Norman invasion of 1066 remained. The aristocracy spoke French until after 1350.
Few literary works in English are known from this period. Law French became the standard language of courts, parliament, and polite society. (bilingualism)
**Geoffrey Chaucer (a period of late 14th- early 15th century) - The Canterbury Tales **
-popularised vernacular
-a source of influence for later generations of writers and playwrights
The Renaissance + The Elizabethan Era
1500-1660
Protestant Reformation
Literary themes an Devices: 1) love, 2) pastoral life, 3) mythology (renaissance), 4) humanism, 5) socio-political commentary
Spenserian stanza!
1534 Henry VIII breaks from the Catholic Church, establishing the Church of England.
1558–1603: Elizabethan Era, characterized by exploration, cultural flourishing, and the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588.
1603: Union of the English and Scottish crowns under James I.
**1642–1651: English Civil War, **leading to the temporary establishment of the Commonwealth under Oliver Cromwell.
Queen Elizabeth I (the last Tudor monarch)
1533-1603
**-Shakespeare **
-The First Folio (1623)
-Hamlet
-King Lear
-Romeo and Juliet
Shakespearean sonnet (ABBA ABBA CDE CDE)
Sir Thomas More
-Utopia (invented the term)
Christopher Marlowe
-INVENTED A BLANK VERSE, before Marlowe all the poems were mostly divided just into couplets
The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus (Doctor Faustus, end of the 16th-beginning of the 17th century) - the first great tragedy of humanism (the central figure is an individual)
John Lyly
Endymion (Keats also wrote the work with the same title) - aristocratic production
A dream-vision about Elizabeth, the paradox of the monarch (
The Virgin Queen = Virgin Mary
Moon is the border between a person and God - Cynthia (a heroine) embodies the Queen
The Neoclassical (neoclassicism)
1660-1785
1688: Glorious Revolution, resulting in the constitutional monarchy with William III and Mary II.
Henry VIII
Restoration (1660-1688) - The Restoration of the Stuart monarchy in the kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland took place in 1660 when King Charles II returned from exile in continental Europe. The preceding period of the Protectorate and the civil wars came to be known as the** Interregnum** (1649–1660). = 11 years without a monarch
John Milton
The Romantic (romanticism) Period
1785-1832
Was pre-met with the **graveyard poets **
A reaction to political tensions
Romanticism:
1) senses over rational thinking
2) exoticism
3) a return to the past as a result of Industrial and Agricultural Revolutions (The Romantic period was one of social change in England because of:
1) the depopulation of the countryside
2) the rapid growth of overcrowded industrial cities between 1798 and 1832)
4) theme of nature and its glorification, excessive use of nature-related metaphors
5) celebration of creativity and imagination
6) individuality (personal focus)
7) vivid imageries
8) theme of solitude
The movement of so many people in England was the result of two forces:
1) the Agricultural Revolution, which involved enclosures that drove workers and their families off the land
2) and the Industrial Revolution, which provided jobs “in the factories and mills, operated by machines driven by steam-power”
Indeed, Romanticism was also a revolt against the aristocratic social and political norms of the Age of Enlightenment, as well as a reaction against the scientific rationalisation of nature.
The French Revolution had an important influence on the political thinking of many Romantic figures at this time as well.
Scholars say that the Romantic Period began with the publishing of** Lyrical Ballads (1798) by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge**
John Keats:
Endymion (poem), To Autumn (an ode), On Melancholy (an ode)
Mary Shelley:
Frankenstein (Gothic novel, 1818)
The Victorian Period
1832-1901
Literary features:
Realism
Morality and Didacticism
Social Critique
Idealism vs. Realism
Industrialisation and Its Discontents
Psychological Character Development
The Woman Question
Narrative Experimentation
Thomas Hardy
Charles Dickens
Charlotte Bronte
Emily Bronte
The Edwardian Period
1901-1914
The Georgian Period
1910-1936
The Jacobean Era
A period shortly after the death of Queen Elizabeth I (1603-1625), called after James I.
**King James Version of the Bible: **Commissioned the translation of the Bible into English, resulting in the publication of the King James Version in 1611, which became one of the most influential English translations. (1611)
Theatre tradition
The British Empire
The first tentative steps toward the establishment of the British Empire began with overseas settlements in the 16th century. Great Britain’s maritime expansion accelerated in the 17th century and resulted in the establishment of settlements in North America and the West Indies. The East India Company began establishing trading posts in India in 1600, and the first permanent British settlement in Africa was made at James Island in the Gambia River in 1661.
Queen Elizabeth I (The Virgin Queen)
Elizabeth I (1533-1603) was the queen of England (1558–1603) during a period, often called the Elizabethan Age, when England asserted itself vigorously as a major European power in politics, commerce, and the arts.
Elizabeth restored England to Protestantism.
The Act of Supremacy, passed by Parliament and approved in 1559, revived the antipapal statutes of Henry VIII and declared the queen supreme governor of the church.
Henry VIII
1509–1547
Initiated the English Reformation (separation from papal authority)
Queen Victoria
1837-1901
During her reign Britain expanded its imperial reach and experienced great cultural expansion, advances in science, industry, and technology, and the development of railways.
By the time she was queen, Britain governed Canada, large areas of India, Australia, and small parts of South American and Africa. Queen Victoria added to her royal title Empress of India.
During the 1870s, in search of new markets to trade with and facing competition from Germany and France, Britain set out to gain control over new overseas territories, particularly in Africa.
By the end of the 19th century the British Empire was the largest the world had ever seen, and Queen Victoria was head of nearly a quarter of the world’s people.
The Commonwealth
**The Commonwealth was an evolutionary outgrowth of the British Empire. **
These dependent but self-governing states attained growing measures of sovereignty, and their autonomy was subjected only to a British veto.
The Imperial Conference of 1926 declared that such states were to be regarded as “autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations.”
The Statute of Westminster (1931) implemented the decisions made at both that and a subsequent conference, formally allowing each dominion to control its own domestic and foreign affairs and to establish its own diplomatic corps.
Modern Period
**1760–1820: **Industrial Revolution begins, drastically changing the economy and society.
**1801: Act of Union **with Ireland, forming the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
**1837–1901: **Victorian Era, marked by British imperial expansion and social changes.
**1914–1918: **World War I, significantly affecting British society and economy.
**1921: **Partition of Ireland, leading to the creation of Northern Ireland.
1939–1945: World War II, after which Britain emerges as a welfare state.
1945 onwards: Decolonisation and the end of the British Empire.
**1973: **Britain joins the European Economic Community (EEC), later the European Union (EU).
**2016: **Brexit referendum, leading to the UK’s departure from the EU in 2020.
