1. RENAISSANCE / EARLY MODERN (1500 – 1660)
(ii) THE PURITAN AGE or THE AGE OF MILTON (1603 - 1660)
The social scene in this age was to a
considerable degree dominated by the Puritans. The puritans were against excess
of sensuality and renaissance pastime such as theatre and dramatic
performances. They dislike cheap entertainments. They were a sort of
high-brows. This period may be sub-divided as follows
Important Events:
1. The Jacobean or
The Age of James I – 1603-1625: the
reign of James I, in Latin Jacobs, followed the Elizabethan Age.
2. The Caroline Age
or The Age of Charles I (1625-1649): it is the reign of Charles I, in Latin Carolus.
It was the period of English Civil War which led to the murder of Charles I and
establishment of Commonwealth under Oliver Cromwell.
3. The Commonwealth
Period – 1649-1660: this period is
remarkable for the raise of Puritanism.
4. Conflicts between
cavaliers (of Charles I) and the
Roundheads (of Parliament) victory of parliamentarians resulted Cromwell’s
ruling.
5. Long parliament 1640: Charles-I summoned the Parliament
6. Closure of theatre-1642 (drama disappeared for 18 years): Public
meetings, bull and bear baiting, may pole dance (all entertainments) were
banned.
1.The
Spencerian Poets: Inspired from
Spencer.
Giles Fletcher
1. Christ’s Victory and Triumph: Greatest religious poem after Langland’s Piers Plowman.
Phineas Fletcher
1. The Purple Island or The Isle of Men (1633): best known allegorical work.
George Wither:
1. Hymns & Songs of Church (1623): first hymns book in English
William Browne
1. Britannia’s Pastorals (1613): written about nature, in Heroic couplets
2. Shepherd’s Pipe
“One of the sweetest pastoral
writers in the world” - said by Neele
William Drummond:
1. History of Scotland (1655): famous work
Code to
remember: Fle-Fle-With-Brown-Drum
2.The
Caroline or Cavalier Poets: Inspired from Ben
Johnson, associated with the court of Charles I during English civil wars. These
poets are called as Sons of Ben
Jonson
''Carpe diem'' is
Latin for ''seize the day''. It is generally used to mean that one should make the most of the present
time since one can never be sure what the future will bring. This idea is a
prominent theme in the works of the Cavalier poets, who stressed the
importance of getting the full measure of joy and pleasure out of life whenever
one could, knowing that one would not live forever and that one's sources of
joy were also impermanent.
Robert Herrick: The greatest and most popular of the Cavalier poets was Herrick.
1. Hesperides and Noble Numbers –collection of secular poems.
His poems
2. Corinna’s Maying
3. Gather ye rose buds while ye may (To the
virgins, to make much of time)
4. To Daffodils
Thomas Carew: Inventor of love poetry. His poems were addressed to fictional mistress
‘Celia’
1.‘Ask Me No More where love bestows’.; “He that loves a
rosy check”- famous songs
John Suckling
1. Ballad Upon Wedding: romance
2. Account of Religion by reason: Prose work
3. Aglaura: a play (1638)
Richard Lovelace:
1. To Lucasta, going to the wars: poem
2. To Althea from Prison: famous line:
“Stone Walls do not a prison make
–
Nor iron bars a cage”
Code: Suckling- Loves- Herr- Carewfully
3.The Metaphysical Poets: group of 17th-century English poets,
well known for unnaturalness in writings. Metaphysical means beyond the
physical world i.e., abstract, religious or philosophical subjects. They wanted to show
their learning in poetry. Hence their poetry is intellectually rigorous with
full of metaphysical conecits (comparisons), figurative language, paradoxes,
irony and philosophical topics. The themes that are most common to metaphysical
poetry are love/lust, religion, and morality. John Donne is the chief of
metaphysical poets. Others are: Henry
Vaughan, Andrew Marvell, John Cleveland, Herbart, Crashaw and Abraham Cowley.
Dryden used the phrase “He
(John Donne) affects the Metaphysics, not only in his satires, but in his
amorous verses….” in Discourse Concerning Satire.
Dr. Johnson borrowed this
phrase and coined the term Metaphysical poets and further extended to a group of poets. In his
essay on ‘Abraham Cowley’ in Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets (1779–81), He
said, “In the beginning of the 17th century in which there
"appeared a race of writers that may be termed the metaphysical
poets".
Dr Johnson also says, “The Metaohysical poets were men of learning, and to show
their learning was their whole endeavour…. They never copied nature nor life…”
They never stood higher than in the 1930s and
’40s, largely because of T.S. Eliot’s influential essay “The Metaphysical
Poets” (1921), a review of Herbert J.C. Grierson’s anthology
Metaphysical Lyrics & Poems of the Seventeenth Century. He coined
the term “dissociation of sensibility” (See notes: T S Eliot under New
criticism)
John Donne (1571/72 – 1631): The founder of the Metaphysical School of
Poetry is the greatest poet of this school.
Izaak Walton wrote the biography of Donne.
1. An Anatomy of the World, Of the Progress of
the Soul- poems in memory of
‘Elizabeth Drury.’
2. The Pseudo Martyr, Ignatius His Conclave. – Anti Catholic poems.
3. Songs and Sonnets 1633– collection of love poems. His best love
poems published in this are:
a. Aire and Angels
b. A Nocturnal Upon St. Lucie Day,
c. A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning: It is a farewell speech to his wife in 1611.
Donne was going on a diplomatic mission to France, leaving his wife behind in
England. A pair of compasses in the process of drawing a circle—draws contrasts
between the two lovers, where one is fixed and "in the centre
sit[s]" while the other roams;
d. The Good Morrow- is an aubade, describes love as a profound
experience that's almost like a religious epiphany
e. The flea- poem-published
after Donne’s death, appearing in 1633- The speaker
uses a flea and how it sucks blood as a way of attempting to convince a woman
to sleep with him. Famous line ¨It sucked me first, and now sucks thee, And in this flea
our two bloods mingled be;
a. The Canonization 1633- presents love as so all-consuming that lovers
forgo other pursuits to spend time together. The speaker argues that his love
will canonise him into a kind of sainthood. Cleanth Brooks used it in
defining the concept of paradox in ‘The Well Wrought Urn”
b. To his Mistress Going to bed- Speaker’s wish to sleep with his mistress
2. Holy Sonnets 1933– also known as the Divine
Meditations or Divine Sonnets—are a series of nineteen religious poems
a. "Sonnet X", - opening words are "Death be not proud, though some have called thee Mighty and
dreadfull, for, thou art not soe"
3. A Hymn to Good the Father – religious poem
4. Biothanotos - Written in 1608 and published after his
death. defense of suicide, listing prominent Biblical examples including Jesus, Samson, Saul,
and Judas Iscariot. Thomas De Quincey responds to the work in his "On
Suicide
5. Sermons – Death’s Duel was the finest sermon.
6. Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and
severall steps in my Sicknes 1624- is a prose work
a. “No man is an Island entire of
itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main”.…. “For whom
the bell tolls, it tolls for thee”. (Meditation-XVII)”
7. Go and catch the falling star 1630- song-
Go and catch a falling star,
Get with child a mandrake root,
Tell me where all past
years are,
Or who cleft the devil's
foot,
His famous quote is “For God’s sake
hold your tongue and let me love”.
George Herbert
1. The Temple – collection of poems, inspired Bunyan’s
Pilgrims Progress.
2. The Pully- best known poem
His famous line: ‘’My lines and
life are free as the road”
Richard Crawshaw
1. Steps to the Temple
2. Hymns to St. Theresa & The Flaming Heart
Henry Vaughan
1. The Retreat- the poet describes the loss of innocence as one grows older. In the
process of growing, one is farther away from heaven and into the corrupted
state of adulthood. As an adult, one is unable to access the divine world as
easily. This poem is
compared to Immortality ode of Wordsworth. He was regarded as the fore runner of Wordsworth.
2. Silex Scintillans- collection of religious poems.
Andrew Marvell: He was Milton’s assistant as Latin Secretary
in the Cromwell Government. If Milton is the greatest and Herrick the most
popular, Marvell is the most attractive poet of the age.
1. To His Coy Mistress (Coy=shy, hesitant) – best of his poems. The speaker (Marvell), is
talking to a woman he loves. He spends the poem trying to convince her that they
need to go to bed together. Life, he declares, is much too short to waste it
not enjoying oneself.
Two rivers: Ganges and Humber
are mentioned in “To His Coy Mistress”. India’s Ganges,
which is sacred to the Hindu religion and thought of as the earthly embodiment
of a goddess; and England’s Humber, which flows past Marvell’s hometown of
Hull.
2. Ode upon Cromwell’s return from Ireland- in Horatian Stylet.
3. The Rehearsal Transprosd- an attack on Samuel Parker
Edmund Waller: “known as father of Closed Couplet”
1.
Go lovely Rose – his famous lyric.
2.
To the king upon
his Majesty’s happy return, this was
written after Restoration.
Abraham Cowley: Dr. Johnson began his Lives of poets with
Abraham Cowley, as the last of the Metaphysical and the first of the moderns.
He had read Spencer’s ‘The Faire Queen’ twice before he was sent to
school
1. Devidies– religious epic, his unfished epic
2. The Mistress- collection of poems.
Metaphysical
conceits:
Odd comparisions
(similie or metaphor) associated with the Metaphysical poets of the 17th
century.
It is a more
intricate and intellectual device.
It usually sets up
an analogy between one entity’s spiritual qualities and an object in the
physical world.
Sometimes they
control the whole structure of the poem.
1. “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,”-poem by Donne- compares two lovers’ souls to compass
2. “The Flea”- poem by
Donne - insect is the link between to lovers
3. “To His Coy Mistress” -poem by Marvell- Vegetable love that grows vaster than empires
4. “Canonization”- poem by Donne - Lovers compared to Saints
John
Milton (1608-1674):
William Hayley’s 1796 biography
called him the “greatest English author”
Poems:
1. Ode on the Morning of Christ’s Nativity 1629: describes Christ's Incarnation and Cruxification.
2. On Shakespeare 1630- It was Milton’s first published poem in English, anonymously included in
the Second Folio edition of William Shakespeare's plays in 1632. Milton has a
high opinion of Shakespeare. He refers to him as ‘dear son of memory’, ‘my
shakespeare’. opening
line: What needs my Shakespeare for his honoured bones
3.
On His Being
Arrived to the Age of Twenty-Three (1631): metaphor of
Time as a bird (thief) flying away with (“stol’n on his wing”) Milton’s youth.
Opening line: How
soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth, Stolen on his wing my three and
twentieth year!
4. L’Allegro 1645 (Happy man)- sunrise, II
Penseroso 1645 (Melancholy Man)-
moon -both are masques, called as twin
poems, Italian in title but English in spirit).
5. Comus or A Masque Presented at Ludlow Castle
1634– a masque, The plot concerns two
brothers and their sister, simply called "the Lady", lost in a
journey through the woods. The Lady becomes fatigued, and the brothers wander
off in search of sustenance.
6.
Lycidas (1637) – pastoral elegy on the death of his friend
Edward King. Tennyson remarks ‘Lycidas is the touchstone of poetic taste’. Famous
line: ‘’Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep
no more’’ Last line is: To-morrow to fresh
woods, and pastures new
7.
Paradise Lost- Christian Epic in Blank verse. It was published in 1667 in 10 books. It was
reissued in 1674 with 12 books. It is the biblical story of the fall of man.
Satan wants to defeat God by seducing the Man - i.e., by temptation of Adam and
Eve. Finally, the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. It begins
in hell (In Medias Res). The main theme of “Mans disobedience”. His purpose to write this is to justify the ways of God
to man. For many critics “Satan is the
Hero” of this poem.
Famous Lines:
Ø
“Awake, arise,
or be forever fallen!”;
Ø
“The
mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of
heaven”;
Ø
“Better to reign in Hell, then serve in
Heav'n”;
Ø
“Solitude
sometimes is best society.”
8. Paradise Regained 1671- it is the sequence of Paradise Lost. It discusses
Christ’s temptation and victory. It issued into 4 books.
9. Samson Agonistes 1671 –a tragic closet drama on the Greek models of
Sophocles and Aeschylus. - the last work of Milton appeared in the same volume
with Paradise Regained.
10. On His Blindness: Petrarchan Sonnet. Original title is: “"When I Consider How My Light is Spent". It is an Acrostic Poem (first letter of each line makes a word)
11. Aeropagitica, A speech of Mr. John Milton for
the Liberty of Unlicenc'd Printing, to the Parlament of England (1644): -speech of Milton about freedom of speech and expression. It opposed the
licensing and censorship
12. On Education, On Divorce, History of Britain- his prose works
Quotes about Miton:
1. Keats said ‘Milton corrupted the English language’
2.
William Blake said ‘Milton was of the Devil’s party without knowing it’
(about the hero in Paradise lost)
3. Coleridge said ‘Milton is in every line of Paradise lost’
4. Tennyson said, ‘Milton is the God gifted voice of England”
5. English
epic begins and ends with Milton- other writers tried and failed.
6.
He is the
acknowledge master of what Mathew Arnold
called ‘the
grand style’
William Blake
considered Milton the major English poet. Blake placed Edmund Spenser as
Milton's precursor, and saw himself as Milton's poetical son. In his Milton:
A Poem in Two Books, Blake uses Milton as a character.
Prose
King James Bible 1611: He is known as Wisest Fool. The
Authorized Version of the Bible. about 50 writers were appointed by Kings James
I to bring out a uniform translation of the Bible. Well known for famous
phrases: Bite the dust, Go the extra mile, A wolf in sheep’s clothing, A
thorn in the flesh, A leopard cannot change its spots, the shadow of death, The
Eleventh hour, Flesh and blood, Take his cross, a labour of love.
Robert Burton: He was clergyman who resided permanently at
Oxford. He was a bookworm.
1. The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621)–the book treats of the causes, symptoms and
cure of melancholy. Based on the four fluids of the human body. Dr. Johnson
kept it as a bedside book.
Keats Lamia’s
story was taken from The Anatomy of Melancholy
Sir Thomas Browne: By profession he was a doctor.
1. Religio Meddici (1642) – his most popular work which means the
Religion of aDoctor.
2. Pseudo doxia Epidemica or Vulgar Errors – it is the bulkiest
works of him. It is the study of popular superstitions.
3. Hydrotaphia or Urn Burial - is dissertation on the
vanity of earthly hope and ambitions.
4. The Garden of Cyrus - it deals with arrangement in fives like the
five of playing cards.
5. A Letter to a Friend and Christian Morals – these are interconnected.
Jeremy Taylor: called as ‘Shakespeare of Divines’
1. Liberty of Prophesying (i.e., preaching)– it is plea for toleration
in matters of faith.
2. Holy Living and Holy Dying (1650,51)– his famous sermons.
Thomas Hobbes: He was the great political theorist of 17th
century.
1. Complete translation of Iliad and Odyssey.
2. Leviathan (1651) – his most famous work, a huge sea monster is
the name Hobbes gives to the Commonwealth State. His conception of the State is
absolutely monarchy.
Izaak Walton: He was a small tradesman in London who had a
passion for fishing. He is the “First Professional Biographer in English”
1. Complete Angler – his famous work. It is in the formof a
dialogue between the author Piscator (fisherman) and his disciple Venator
(Hunter). It is the most popular book of 17th century. It is the
practical guide to the art of fishing/ angling.
2. Wrote biographies of
Donne, Herbart, Hooker…. etc.
Thomas Fuller
1. The Worthies of England: first
attempt at dictionary of National Biography.
2. Andronicus (unfortunate Politician) – Satire on Cromwell’s life.
3. The History of the Holy War, Church History of
Britain- other works
John Selden
1. Table- talk – a collection of his sayings published after
his death.
There are two famous character writers:
1. Bishop Hall – Characters of Virtues and Vices
2.
Sir Thomas
Overbury– Characters
Lord Clarendon:
1. History of Rebellion – it was published posthumously.
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