2The English Renaissance (自动保存的).docx

Session 3 The English RenaissanceWhat is Renaissance?Renaissance is a cultural and intellecutal movement, which marks the transition from medieval to the modern world.It first sprang in Florence and Venice of Italy, with the flowering of painting, sculpture and architecture from the 14th century and mid 17th century. The word Renaissance is actually a French word, meaning re-birth“ Features of Renaissance1. A thirsty curiosity for classical literature; 2. A general revival of the study of Greek and Latin authors, the keen interest in the welfare of human beings;3. People ceased to look upon themselves as living only for God and a future world.English Renaissance 1. Background InformationThe New Monarchy The Reformation The English Bible The Enclosure Movement 圈地运动 The Renaissance and Humanism 2. The Flowering of English Literature Edmund Spencer Johnn Donne William Shakespear Francis BaconEnglish Renaissance Historical background1.The War of Roses(1455-1485)-weaken the feudalism and pave the way for development of bourgeois society2. The Tudors Medieval Peior(1066-1485) Henry VII(1485-1509) Henry VIII(1507-1547) Edward VI(1547-1553) Mary I(1553-1558) The reign of Queen Elizabeth(1558-1603)Henry VIIIs Reformation He broke with Rome, confiscated the property of Church, established Protestant. It is a political movement in a religious guise, struggle of bourgeois class for power. The War with Spain: “Armada” the bourgeoisie came to fore in the arena of history Commercial Expansion: exploration and travel abroad, colonies.Queen Elizabeth Renaissance literaturePoetry: Sir Philip Sidney, Edmund Spenser, William Shakespeare, John Donne Drama: Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, Ben JohnsonProse: Thomas More, Francis BaconEdmund Spenser (1552-1599) Born in a middle-class family Worked as a secretary Developed a friendship with Philip Sydney Appointed as a secretary to the new lord deputy of Ireland and lived mostly in Ireland.Masterpieces The Shepheardes Calendar(1579) 牧羊人日记The Shepheardes CalendarA series of 12 ecologues(pastoral poem).A dialogue between shepherds.12 calendar represent the twelve months of the year.Discuss themes of love, religion,poetry and other contemporary affairs. Amoretti (after 1594, dedicated to his wife)Faerie Queen (dedicated to the Queen)( written in the1590s) 仙后1.The poem tells 12 virtues of the private gentleman, and plans to write 12 books, each one with a different hero distinguished for one of the private virtues, finally 6 books were written.2. The six books related the adventures of the knights who represent the qualities of holiness, temperance,chastity,friendship, justice, and courtesy 3. The Faerie Queen attempts to hold together a unified vision of the world. Shakespeare as a poet and his sonnet Sonnet is a lyric poem in a single stanza consisting of 14 iambic pentameter（五音步抑扬格） lines linked by an intricate rhyme scheme（韵式）. Shakespeare out-performs the verbal gymnastics of any of his contemporaries. The majority of Shakespeares sonnets are addressed to a man. The rhyme scheme of the sonnets follow two basic patterns1. Italian sonnet ( also called Petrarchan sonnet) comprises an 8-line octave ( or octet), rhymed abbaabba, followed by a 6-line sestet usually rhymed cdecde or cdcdcd.2. Shakespearean sonnet ( also called the The English sonnet) comprises three quatrains and a final couplet, rhyming ababcdcdefefgg. John DonneLeader of metaphysical poets: a great visitor of ladies a great frequenter of plays a great writer of conceited verses1584 Studied in Oxford 1587 Studied in Cambridge1592 Studied in Lincolns Inn 1598 To be Secretary to a Lord Keeper 1601 Married Anne More, cast into prison 1621-1631 Be appointed as Dean of St. Pauls Church Metaphysical PoetryDefinition: The term metaphysical is used to designate the work of 17th-century writers, represented by John Donne, who were part of a school of poets using similar methods and who revolted against the romantic conventionalism of Elizabethan love poetry, in particular the Petrarchan conceit. Metaphysical Poets(P.50)John Dryden first labeled John Donne a metaphysical poet.George Herbert(1593-1633)Richard Crashaw(c.1613-1649)Henry Vaughan(1621-1695)Metaphysical Features Emphasized intellect or wit as against feeling and emotion Rejected the romantic exaggeration of Elizabethan love poetry The language was rough but the poetry had a psychological depth that Elizabethan love poems lack.Metaphysical Poets(P.52) Dryden and Samuel Johnson criticize the style as being excessive in showing off knowledge. Metaphysical poetry emphasized intellect or wit as against feeling and emotion. They used conceits(类比修辞) to express ideas in a sharp and harsh manner. A conceit is an elaborate and surprising figure of speech, camparing two very dissimilar things.Poem: The Flea characteristics (1) a tendency to psychological analysis of emotion of love and religion a penchant for imagery that is novel, unpoetical and sometimes shocking, drawn from the commonplace (actual life) or the remote (erudite sources), including the extended metaphor of the metaphysical conceit simple diction (compared to Elizabethan poetry) which echoes the cadences of everyday speech Characteristics (2) meter: often rugged, not sweet or smooth like Elizabethan verse. This ruggedness goes naturally with the Metaphysical poets attitude and purpose: a belief in the perplexity of life, a spirit of revolt, and the putting of an argument in speech rather than song. form: frequently an argument (with the poets lover; with God; with oneself) The best metaphysical poetry is honest, unconventional, and reveals the poets sense of the complexities and contradictions of life. It is intellectual, analytical, psychological, and bold; frequently it is absorbed in thoughts of death, physical love, and religious devotion. English DramaThe Beginning Period The Miracle Play: Bible stories, the creation of the world, Noah and the flood, the birth of Christ The Morality Play: conflict of good and evil, allegorical personages-Mercy, Peace, Hate, Vice (clown) “Everyman” The Interlude: a short performance to enliven the audience after a solemn scene, “The Play of the Weather”: Jupiter, weather, boy: catching birds and throwing snowballs The Classical Play: Greek and Latin drama, structures and style and conceptions and divisions. Comedy and tragedy on classical models appeared in the middle of the 16th centuryThe Developing Period: University WitsRobert Greene: “Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay”George Peele: “The Old Wives Tale” Thomas Lodge: “ Rosalynde” John Lyly:Christopher Marlowe: “ Doctor Faustus”Thomas Kyd: “The Spanish Tragedy” Thomas Nashe: The Monumental Period William ShakespeareThe Ending Period Ben Jonson (1573?-1637)Christopher MarloweThe most great English dramatist, the most individual and the most suggestive Elizabethan playwright before Shakespeare Born in 1564, the same year as Shakespeare. The son of a shoemaker. Received formal education and supposed to start a career in teaching, the church or the law. Turned to writing plays. Died violently in 1593, in a brawl(quarel) in a tavern, receiving a dagger wound about the eye.Masterpieces: Tamburlain the Great(c.1587) Doctor Faustus(c.1592)The Monument of English DramaWilliam Shakespeare(1564-1616) merely players.”Born in Stratford Widely regarded as the greatest writer in English Literature 154 sonnets, 37 plays, and 2 long narrative poems; Four Great Tragedies: Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, and Hamlet.The PlaysHistory PlaysHenry VI Richard III Richard II Henry IVComedy The Taming of the Shrew 驯悍记 Midsummer Nights Dream仲夏夜之梦 Much Ado About Nothing无事生非 As You Like It 皆大欢喜 Twelfth Night第十二夜Tragedy Hamlet (1600 or 1601) Othello (1604) King Lear (1605) Macbeth (1605-06) The play deals with the issues that concerned the Elizabethans, specifically questions of succession and political intrigue at court. The world changes, and the traditional ruling structures and conventions can never cope adequately with the new state of affairs or with the new voices that insist on being heard. In all four of the major tragedies there is a sense of an established order that has collapsed or is in the process of disintegrating.Julius Caesar Mainly deals with a line of English monarchs from Richard II through to the defeat of Richard III by Henry VII, the first Tudor monarch. The plays justifies the legitimacy of the Tudor dynasty. Shakespeares focus is always on rulers, specifically kings, or on father figures in positions of authority while Ben Johnson focuses on ordinary people in London. Prose Francis Bacon The Bible of King James Version( P101-103)Francis Bacon (1561-1626) A representative of the English Renaissance, is a well-known philosopher, scientist and essayist. Praised by Marx as “ the progenitor (先驱) of English materialism” becaus