Neoclassical period 1600-1785

John Milton, David Defoe

The Neoclassic period can be divided into three relatively coherent parts:
1. The Restoration Age (1660-1700), in which Milton was the dominant influences.
2. The Augustan Age (1700-1750), in which Pope was the central poetic figure, while
Defoe, Richardson, Fielding, and Smollett were presiding over the sophistication of
the novel.
3. The Age of Johnson (1750-1798), which, while it was dominated and characterized
by the mind and personality of the inimitable Dr. Samuel Johnson.
The development of a cult of Nature, the influence of German romantic thought, religious
tendencies like the rise of Methodism, and political events like the American and French
revolutions established the intellectual and emotional foundations of English Romanticism.
Romantic period 1785-1830
William Wordswoth
The romantic writer encourages the description of:
- Nature: source of aspiration and individual can find peace, as an association between the
mood of the nature and the mood of the human being. Ex: winter = sadness. Because nature
can feel what people feel.
- Individual: separated from society, they believe that when people are in society they are
corrupt and influenced.
- Spontaneity: of feeling and thoughts.
- Uncivilized way of life.
- Immigration: escaping reality and going to nature.
Victorian period 1830-1901
It was divided into two eras: the early Victorian period with Charles Dickens and the late
Victorian period with Oscar Wilde.
Because of the industrial revolution all literary works was about the social reform. For that the
literature was the mirror of society and the writer was focusing in the reality and do not try to
escape from it. And because of the industrial revolution it was two classes the upper class
(because they exploiting the worker class they were described as unfair) and the worker class
(described as the slaves): they lived in poor area slums and they havent the right to study;
segregation between the two classes so it emerge crimes.
Modern period 1914- 1945
- Fear: of another war; fear was in society as a constant feeling.
- Lost confidence: on the government because they promise that they will be equal but things
still like what it used to be.
- Contradiction: rich countries and poor countries.
- Flash back: we start (a film or a novel) from the end ten we return to the beginning (modern
technique).
- Expressionism: use of colour, sounds, symbolsex: red = love/ blood a clock = the end is
near.
- Dadaism: the use of things normally ca come together (words, objects) ex: woman beauty
(normally) but it refers to evil (Dadaism).

Mon site : chanou.e-monsite.com