Course on English Literature, 2008/2009

COURSE OF ENGLISH LITERATURE

I PART

FROM THE ORIGINS TO THE AGE OF SHAKESPEARE

THE ORIGINS

BEOWULF

The Epic Hero and the Monster
The Celts, the Romans, the Anglo-Saxons.
Anglo-Saxon Civilization
Anglo-Saxon Poetry 
Alliteration, Stress, Stock Sentences and Kennings
The Epic Poem

THE MIDDLE AGES

THE CANTERBURY TALES

Geoffrey Chaucer and his time
The Prologue
The Pilgrims
The Tales

The Normans, Henry II, The Magna Carta, Edward I and Parliament, 
The Hundred Years’ War and the Black Death, Wyclif and Lollardy
The Rise of the Middle class
The Development of Middle English

LORD RANDAL

Medieval British Ballads in a European Context

EVERYMAN

Mystery Miracle and Morality Plays
Medieval Theatre

THE RENAISSANCE

UTOPIA

Thomas More
London during the Renaissance 
Henry VIII
The Anglican Reform
Queen Elisabeth I
The Spirit of the Age: the “Novum”
Literature at the Beginning of the Sixteenth Century

GO, AND CATCH A FALLING STAR
A VALEDICTION: FORBIDDING MOURNING
THE FLEA
DEATH, BE NOT PROUD

Donne’s Metaphysical Poetry

SHALL I COMPARE THEE TO A SUMMER DAY?
MY MISTRESS EYES ARE NOTHING LIKE THE SUN
TIR’D WITH ALL THESE, FOR RESTFUL DEATH I CRY

The Fortune of the Sonnet
Shakespeare’s Sonnets

ROMEO AND JULIET
HAMLET
KING LEAR
A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
THE TEMPEST

William Shakespeare’s life

His Production