The 18th Century English Literature

First Part: The Age of Johnson 

1744-1784

Second Part: 18th Century Novel and Drama

(The 18th Century Literature)

Lecture 11

History of English Literature

MA ENGLISH

COMSATS Virtual Islamabad

Introduction to the previous sessions• 18th Century Literature• Division of Age• Novel in 18th century (Introduction)• Drama in 18th century (Introduction)• The age of Pope

– Poetry– Prose– Eminent figures during this age

The age of Johnson

1750-1784

After his death, the Classical spirit in English literature began to give place to the Romantic spirit

Officially the Romantic Age started from the year 1798 when Wordsworth and Coleridge published the famous Lyrical Ballads.

(a)  Poets of the Age of Johnson

• An age of transition and experiment which ultimately led to the Romantic Revival

• Johnson broke the classical tradition and followed the romantic trends

Classicism

• Product of intelligence• Deficient in emotion and imagination• Town poetry• No love for mysterious supernatural elements• Didactic• Insisted writers to follow the prescribed rules and imitate

the standard model of writing

Romanticism

• Encouraged emotions, passions and imagination• Nature• Romantic spirit– love of the mysterious, the supernatural• Simple and natural forms of expression• Liberty of the poet in terms of choosing themes and

manners of writing

Goldsmith• Believed that classical standards of writing

poetry were the best• Works:

• The traveller• The Deserted Village

Classical in spirit

Didactic

Last work of artificial 18th century Literature

Touches of new age Romanticism

Treatment of nature and rural life

Poets of the Age of Johnson• James Thomson• Thomas Gray• William Collins• James• Macpherson• William Blake• Robert Berns• William Cowper• George Crabbe

Thomas Gray 1. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard– Manifestation of deep feelings of the poet and emotions

– Theme of death

2. The Progress of Poesy3. The Bard (more original and romantic…Independence of the

poet

His poems--- follow the classical model in form but their spirit is romantic

William CollinsOriental Eclogues

Romantic in feeling but written in classical tradition

Ode to simplicity

Ode To fear

Ode To the passion

How sleep the Brave

Ode to Evening

Focus on nature

James Macpherson

Works of Ossian

Translations of Gaelic folk literature

William Blake

Complete break from classical poetry

His works:

Songs of Innocence

Songs of Experience

Contains poems ---- Little Lamb who made thee?

Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright

The book of The

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

Robert Burns• Greatest song writer in English

language• Great lover of nature• Works:

– The Cotter`s Saturday Night– To a mouse– To a Mountain Daisy– Man was Made to Mourne

Elizabethan touch in most of his songs

William Cowper

• Works:– The Task– On the Receipt of My Mother`s Picture– Alexander Selkirk– Translation of Homer in blank verse

Natural elements

George Crabbe

Between the Augustans and RomanticsIn form----classicIn temper----romantic

Works:The VillageThe Parish RegisterThe BoroughTales in Versetales of the Hall

Prose of the age of Johnson

The tradition made by the writers of the earlier part of the 18th century-----Addison, Steele and Swift—was carried out.18th century is called the age of aristocracy

Well known writers: JohnsonBrukeGibbon

Literary dictator of this age

Struggled against poverty and ill-health

Very kind helpful to the poor

Works:

Dictionary and Lives of Poets

The Rambler

The Idler

Rasselas

Samuel Johnson

• Member of Parliament for 30 years• Political philosopher• Works:

– Thoughts on the Present Discontent– On American Taxation (Speech)– On Conciliation with America (Speech)– The Reflection on the French Revolution

Universality

Full of enthusiasm

Fearless

Edmund Burke

Edward GibbonFirst historian in England who wrote in literary manner.

Works:

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Authoritative and well-documented history

Letters and DiariesLady Mary Wortley Montagu`s Letter.

Lord Chesterfield's Letters to his son

The diaries of Samuel Pepys (Describing the period between 1660 and 1669)

John Evelyn`s diaries

Summary of the Lecture (First Part)

• The age of Johnson• Poets in the age of Johnson• Prose in the age of Johnson• Letters and Diaries

• Transition period from Classical thoughts to Romantic thoughts

Introduction to the previous Part (The age of Johnson)

• The age of Johnson• Poets• Prose writers• Diaries and Letters

Second part of Lecture18th Century Novel and Drama

• Background• The age of enlightenment• 18th Century Novel• 18th Century Drama• Important figures

The Age of Enlightenment

18th Century England:

• After the tempestuous events of the 17th century, England entered a period of comparatively peaceful development. The“Glorious Revolution" of 1688 ended and England became a constitutional monarchy.

• The 18th century England witnessed unprecedented technical innovations which equipped industry with steam, and new tools, and rapid growth of industry and commerce. This is called the Industrial Revolution.

• Great changes also took place in rural England. With the Enclosure Movement ,the majority of peasants were ruined, driven off their land, went to the cities and became workers.

The Enlightenment in Europe:

• The 18th century marked the beginning of an intellectual movement in Europe, known as the Enlightenment, which was on the whole, an expression of struggle of the bourgeoisie against feudalism. The enlighteners fought against class inequality, stagnation, prejudices and other survivals of feudalism. They attempted to place all branches of science at the service of mankind by connecting them with the actual needs and requirements of people.

Classicism

• an attitude to literature that is guided by admiration of the qualities of formal balance, proportion, decorum and restraint attributed to the major works of ancient Greek and Roman literature. As a literary doctrine, classicism holds that writers must be governed by rules, models, or conventions, rather than by inspiration. Neoclassicism required the observance of rules derived from Aristotle’s Poetics and Horace’s Ars Poetica.

• Addison, Steele and Pope belonged to the school of classicism. The classicists modeled themselves on Greek and Latin authors, and tried to control literary creation by some fixed laws and rules drawn from Greek and Latin works. Rimed couplet instead of blank verse, the three unities of time, place and action. Poetry, following the ancient divisions.

The Rise of the English Novel

• The modern European novel began after the Renaissance, with Cervantes’s "Don Quixote" (1605-1615). The modern English novel began two centuries later, in the l8th century. The rise and growth of the realistic novel is the most prominent achievement of 18th century English literature.

• Swift’s "Gulliver’s Travels“, Defoe’s “ Robinson Crusoe”

• Richardson’s " Pamela”, "Clarissa" and "Sir Charles Grandison".

• Fielding’s novels unfold a panorama of life in all sections of English society. Fielding was the real founder of the realistic novel in England.

• Another 18th century novelist of the realistic school was Smollett, the author of “ Roderick Random". and "Humphry Clinker."

The new element of sentiment or sensibility was added to the novel by Sterne whose “Tristram Shandy" was the strangest novel in English Literature.

Introduction

Birth of the "Novel", with its associations of newness and originality, occurs in the eighteenth century. Before that there had been forms of long and continuous narrative prose, but it was only in the 1720s that we begin to see the emergence of a recognisable "Novel" form, i.e, concerned with the realistic depiction of middle class life, values and experience, showing the development of individual (and individuated) characters, over time.

Contrast with the forms of Elizabethan and Jacobean drama (concerned either with the Aristocracy, or with gratuitous investigation of low-life). In terms of the subsequent development of the novel, ie. the Realist 19th Century novel, the period of the eighteenth century is a mixture of consolidation and experimentation, either establishing foundations, or of experimenting with new possibilities. (epistolary form, confession, rogue biography, anti-romance, picaresque, moral tract, etc)

The major novelists

Daniel DefoeSamuel RichardsonHenry FieldingTobias SmollettLaurence Sterne

Daniel Defoe (Novelist)

3.1. Brief Introduction of Defoe Daniel Defoe (1661-1731) was born in London,

the son of a butcher. As a merchant, Defoe had seen ups and downs in his business. He became bankrupt in 1692. Within four years, he was doing well again, as the manager of a tile factory. He remained in fairly prosperous circumstances until he was ruined, in 1703, by his imprisonment. Defoe was a kind of jack-of -all -trades. He was a merchant, economist, politician, journalist, pamphleteer, publicist and novelist.

Daniel Defoe

Works:• Tour Thro' the Whole Island of Great

Britain• Robinson Crusoe• A Journal of the Plague Year• Moll Flanders • Roxana

Samuel Richardson

Works:• Pamela• Clarissa: or, the History of a Young Lady• The History of Sir Charles Grandison

Henry Fielding

Works:• An Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela

Andrews • The History of the Adventures of Joseph

Andrews• The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling• The Life of Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great• Amelia

Tobias Smollett

Works:• The Adventures of Roderick Random • The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle • The Expedition of Humphry Clinker

Laurence Sterne

Works:• Tristram Shandy• Sentimental Journey Through France and

Italy

Eighteenth Century Drama

Dramatic literature was not of high orderReason of decline:

Licensing Act of 1737 which curtailed the freedom of expression of dramatists

Good writers left theatre

Tragedy Influence of romantic and classic traditions

Romantic: Elizabethan way of writing Violence and horror on the open stage

Classical French traditions of writing tragedies Unfolding of a single action without any sub-plot

Works:Otway`s Venice PreservedAddison`a CatoJames Thomson`s SophonishbaDr. Johnson`s Irene

Comedy

Steele: The Funeral The Laying Lover The Tender Husband The Conscious Lovers

Goldsmith The Vicar of Wakefield The Deserted Village She Stoops to Conquer

Richard Brinsley Sheridan The Rivals The School for Scandal

REFERENCES

• A critical history of English literature by David Daiches

• A critical history of English literature by Dr. Mullik

• http://mural.uv.es/franrey/novel.html

Thank you!!!!