 Welcome back to NPTEL, the National Program of Technology Enhanced Learning, a joint venture of Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institute of Science. As you are aware, these lectures are intended for students of engineering colleges and IITs. Humanities and social sciences are electives which are very, it has a very lasting influence on the curriculum of engineering students and we do believe while we teach these courses that it will lead to a deeper understanding of life, of literature and of values. I am Dr. Krishna Barwa. I teach English at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at IIT, Guwahati. As you are all aware that this is a lecture series which is emphasizing more on the language and literature modules. Today, we are in the module 3 of Language and Literature and titled, The History of English Literature. We are in the first lecture which is the age of saucer. Well, if we look back into how do we distinguish or classify the history of English literature? It becomes almost like a literary journey. It is an awareness of the canon or the delights of the history of the English literary tradition which is necessary to know what is about the study of English literature. First, we have to know literature by itself rather than what has been written about literature. We have to know about the profundity of it. The second is to interpret the question of the manner in which we see literature both personally and historically that is to show how a great book generally reflects not only the authors life and thought, but also the spirit of the age and the ideals of the nation's history. We enjoy this literary journey do not we of poems, stories and plays which could be from the Victorian era or even as far back as saucer's times. Well, as a classification it is by ways of approaching how English literature has come into being, tracing how a specific period of literature defines key elements. This lectures has attempted to look at the range of English literature from Anglo-Saxon period to the present day as a series of scenes divided by some basic historical markers or contradiction or contradistinctions over the centuries English traditions and language have been reshaped by the islands invaders. So, there will be a good deal in common between one when we divide it into phases or we divide it divided into the ages of literature. What we are going to see is to see what is a good deal in common between one age and the next or a good deal that is different to obtain a true picture of any period. Therefore, both the old and the new elements must be born in mind. So, how do we see the history of English literature? How do we understand and why is it necessary to understand the evolution of the literary tradition from one age to the other? It is for us to see how one age goes into the other characteristics of one age, what are the literary tradition or how one rejects it or repeats some of the elements which have gone before. Sometimes in forming a mental picture of a period in the past people sees whole of the new features and forget the overlap of the old well. So, let us look it is necessary for us in doing the age of sorcery to go back into the Anglo-Saxon period the beginnings of the written culture as you can say of English literature. When we look into this island of Great Britain it is a relatively small island and it has been invaded and settled many times. First by the ancient people, the Iberians, then by the Kales, then by the Romans, by the Angles, the Saxons, the Vikings and by the Normans. We see the successive you know invasions which has come place and with that the contact interconnections between the different people who had come in contact and also that changes between the foreigners as well as the ones who are the inhabitants. Whatever we think of as English today therefore, owe something to each of these invaders. Beginning with an invasion led by Julius Caesar in 55 BC the Britons were finally conquered by the legions of Rome. During Roman rule what happened in the middle of the 5th century the invaders, Angles, Saxons from Germany and Jews from Denmark crossed the North Sea. All from the northern seas they brought back the culture of the seas as well as of the places where they came from. They drove out the old Britons before them and eventually settled the greater part of Britain. Well, so the language of the Anglo-Saxons if we go and look into it became the dominant language in the land which was to take a new name which is was called England or England from the Angles. The re-emergence of Christianity with the emergence of Christianity and the role of Alfred the Great who was one of the greatest kings of that time combined to unify Anglo-Saxon England. Alfred and his descendants fought the Danish invaders until the Norman conquest in 1066. Therefore, it is perhaps difficult to live out the politics from the history of any people. So, when we are talking about this political influences the social influences it is difficult to live it out when we do the literary history or the social history of any people particularly the English people. Well, so if we look into the literature of this period the Anglo-Saxon or old English period goes back from the invasion of Celtic England by the Germanic tribes Angles, Saxons and Jews in the first half of the 5th century up till the conquest in 1066 by William of Normandy. We will do it later and we will see that this invasion of the Norman conquest I mean in 1066 becomes a landmark in the history of English literature. The word Anglo-Saxon was first used by Camden in his book History of Britain. They had no writing except runes used at charms until they learned the Latin alphabet from Roman missionaries. So, English literature began begins with songs and stories of a time when Teutonic ancestors basically oral all literature beginnings are oral. You have to remember that when you go into different literatures of the world we will find that the beginnings were always the oral tradition. So, the emphasis on the oral tradition is very very necessary for us to see how our literature has developed and they were living in the borders of the North Sea and they were probably composed orally at first all English literature is mostly chronicle and poetry. So, mostly it is chronicle and poetry nothing of the prose because people sang if it is an oral tradition naturally people would sing to communicate lyric descriptive but chiefly narrative or epic English birds they were called the scopes skilled storytellers. They would go from one place to another or birds sang of gods and heroes to the Anglo-Saxons creating poetry was as important as fighting hunting firming or loving. So, this is a very very unique characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon period that one who sang or one who was a poet or one who created was a creator in the real sense was as important as fighting hunting firming or loving. The mythology of the girls if we look into modern literature now that all the myths and the parables which has gone in from the oral literature transmitted to the original literature of a times has influenced English and Irish writers to this day. Well therefore, English poetry before the conquest may be roughly divided into two classes one is the heroic and one is the Christian. The heroic poem deal for the most part with Germanic legend and history naturally of adventures of beautiful places beautiful themselves about this poems there is nothing distinctively English except the language the Christian poetry adepts and paraphrases the biblical narrative recalls the lives of saints mostly or uses first for general moralizing more or less deductive more or less moralizing. The way of living pictured in this English poems now if we look into the way that this was shown the life is not without nobility there was a grandeur there was a grandeur and a ethnic splendor if you can call that and the impression they live is a corrective to the brief historical annals of the time which tells largely of treachery and last ten bloodshed. No virtue is more insisted on in the poems than the loyalty a warrior owes his leech lord. The oldest Anglo-Saxon poetry known as Witsit or the far wanderer another early poem of the similar type is complaint of Dior the most remarkable work however in Anglo-Saxon heroic poetry is way old it is a classic by itself a landmark by itself it stands apart by itself. This poem of nearly 3000 lines is looked upon as the oldest surviving epic of the Teutonic tribe ok it is written in England but the story is of Scandinavia besides the heroic poems there are some allergic poems and riddles in Anglo-Saxon literature lots of riddles were there Cademont, St. Olaf where the poets who wrote on Biblical and religious themes but most writing is anonymous most may be because even Bayolf was written by an unknown Anglo-Saxon poet many people think that it has come from oral tradition which was already there and how it has been put into writing. Besides this religious poetry also seem to flourish during Anglo-Saxon period mainly in northern England, Northumbria throughout the 8th century well. So, when we look into all these poems the among the most allergic poems where the lyrics are more properly perhaps the allergies name of them some of the important ones the seafarer, the wanderer, the life's lament, the husband's message, the ruin verge these pieces have much in common for with exception of the husband's message they are sorrowful in mood allergic in tone and looks back to happier times which have vanished. So, when we come again to Bayolf which stands apart as I told you as one of the most significant influences in Anglo-Saxon poetry viewed both as the archetypal Anglo-Saxon literary work and as a cornerstone of modern literature many people say that many of the modern epics have come with the features which have been put over there the dark grandeur the way the adventure came in the way of narration. It consists of 3182 alliterative long lines and let me remind you that Anglo-Saxon poetry mostly is based on alliteration alliteration is a figure of speech of a rhetorical device which is based on repetition of the same consonant words. The question of whether Bayolf was passed down to oral tradition has been the subject of much debate. By the time the story of Bayolf was composed by an unknown Anglo-Saxon poet around 700 AD much of his material had already been in circulation in oral narrative narrative for many years as I have told you. So, here is the story of Bayolf the earliest and the greatest epic or heroic poem in English literature 700 AD. Though it is often Bayolf has a peculiar history that complicates both his historical and his canonical position in English literature it begins with a preloach which is not an essential part of the story. Poem reflects also another side of life in the heroic age the frequency of poets and tribal wars well. So, what are the features if we do quickly look over the Anglo-Saxon period and because we are going into the age of saucer in a few minutes we will see that Anglo-Saxon literature reveals 5 striking characteristics. One is this love of freedom and responsiveness to nature. Nature is very much coexistence with how a man lives specially in her stoner moods in its dark grandeur and their strong religious conviction to and a belief in fate, fatalistic, reverence for womanhood which was a special place in their respect for woman, a devotion to glory as the ruling motive in every warrior's life. All the poetry was you can say civil rick, was earnest and somber yes, but pervaded by fatalism and religious feelings. So, now up to the 12th century therefore, writing in the western vernaculars dealt almost exclusively with religious historical and factual themes. So, we are coming to 12th century AD all of which were understood to convey the truth. The second half of the 12th century saw the emergence of a new genre which was the romance which was consciously conceived as fictional and therefore, allowed to break free from traditional presuppositions the genesis of medieval fiction. So, here is this emergence of the romance and it is clear an accessible account of early Germanic alliterative verse which I had stated earlier that alliteration which was a form of the technique which was used in the poetry that explained how such verse was treated by the Beowulf poet. There are differences of poetic style between Beowulf and otherwise similar verse of ancient Scandinavia and continental Europe. So, you find that there is a slight difference which is going on between that of Beowulf and of other Scandinavian narrative poems. Well, so now we come to that date which is so important 1066 began the Norman conquest and event that radically affected English history, the English character and the English language. Unlike the Romans, the Normans never withdrew from England. The Anglo-Norman entirety that resulted from the Norman conquest brought England into mainstream European civilization which included feudalism well. So, this Norman conquest 1066 we now term it as the Middle English literature. This term refers to the literature written in the form of the English language known as Middle English from the 12th century until the 1470s. First back to its more popular elements English literature soon began to rise again slowly in the social scale gradually acquiring an ease. So, you have to understand what were the other European literatures which was going on at the same time right and Polish which would enable it to hold its own with French. The Norman conquest provided a convenient landmark for the history of England and brought about radical changes in all matters in English life and mind. They no doubt they imported into England a French literary ideal and French culture on the English language the effect of the conquest was indeed performed. It is true that there was nothing sudden in this growth of the distinctly distinctive English nationhood and distinctive English literary tradition. The process neither began nor ended in the lifetime of Saucer, but during those years the principle is more active and more observable than in the three previous centuries when the Christian and feudal civilization of Europe including England was not national, but cosmopolitan. So, Saucer, Geoffrey Saucer 1340 to 1400. So, then the method of this lecture is to present a series of successive text and backgrounds of English literature and the first of the scenes presented is the lifetime of Saucer. So, a single poet or a single writer dominates the age as Shakespeare will do in the next. For in Saucer's time the English people first clearly appear as a racial and cultural unit, just what I had mentioned earlier. The component races and languages have been mentaled into one from the cosmopolitan you have become one who is a national entity. Upper class is no longer French nor the present class Anglo-Saxon all are English. England has ceased to be mainly a recipient of influence from without. In Saucer's England we see for the first time when you look into the social history, when we look into the national history, when we look into the literary history that the modern mingling with the medieval and England herself beginning to emerge as a distinct nation no longer a mere overseas extension of Franco-Latin Europe. This is very, very important very important assessment. There are three main categories therefore, of middle English literature. The module on the history of English literature and it is important for us to be aware that as we are doing the ages of literature. Let us see what are the main components of the all these ages which are being presented here in every phase. So, the main categories of middle English literature is religious, courtly love and authoritarian. William Langlund's Pious Plowman is considered by many critics to be one of the early great works of English literature which falls in this period along with sources Canterbury Tales and Sir Gawain and the Green Wright dating during the Middle Ages. Pious Plowman also contains the earlier surviving allusion to literary tradition of the legendary English outlaw Robin Hood which must be very familiar to all of you students. Geoffrey Sausser however, marks the brilliant culmination of middle English literature. Well, so the literary movement of the age clearly reflects the stirring life of the times. There is Langlund voicing the social discontent we will just see just pass through all these writers and texts preaching the quality of man and the dignity of labor. We have Whitecliff greatest of English religious reformers giving the gospel to the people in their own tongue. We have Gower the scholar and literary man criticizing this vigorous life and Mondeville the traveler who talks about the beauty of travel narratives sharing all the stirring life of his times reflecting it in literature as no other but Shakespeare has ever done. Outside of England you have to remember what was the parallel going on, parallel outpourings of of creativity. We have the age was that of Dante, Petrach, Boccaccio whose works then at the summit of the influence in Italy profoundly affected the literature of all Europe all the great switchware day in European literature. Now, Sausser who spent long hours of his busy day in court circles had the culture of medieval France at his fingers end no doubt. So, you can divide his work into three periods first is the French then the Italian then the English. When therefore, he said the pattern of modern English poetry for centuries to come he set it in forms and meters which were derived from France and Italy no doubt in both of his countries he had travelled several times on business of state no doubt this is true, but he brought in that ethnic flavour and that that national characteristic which was one of his most important contribution. Nonetheless, he stuck a new English note it was he who in the contemporary details gave the first full expression of the English sense of humor one quarter cynical and the three quarters can. Now, if we consider this colloquial character which is so much close to the grass roots which is so much close to everyday speech of everyone of the people living there of Sausser's English even in search of his poetry is not dialogue or monologue it is unmistakably it was the English spoken by the community to which we belong. There are implied in Sausser's English not only the courtly folk, but the country folk and the new bourgeois who figure also as characters in his human comedy and for all his diversity therefore, the community implied in Sausser's English in Sausser's poetry strike us as a remarkably harmonious whole it becomes almost not only literary documents, social document and anthropological document. The most important of the changes preceding during the lifetime of Sausser was the breakup of the feudal manner. Well, picture of Sausser, Joffrey Sausser often regarded as the father of English literature, father of English poetry, father of English novel, you can name it and he will be always leading it. Sausser is widely credited as the first author to demonstrate the artistic legitimacy of the vernacular English language rather than French or Latin. With Sausser therefore, the English language and English literature grew up. So, when we try to assess the age we will have to see how Sausser was the one who used the initial building blocks to make the literature grow up. His first works well Love Lyric, his earliest work as I said falls in the French period translation and the two other early works of Sausser when Anneldina and our site and the House of Fame and he wrote many of his major works in this prolific period. His Parliament of Faust, The Legend of Good Omen and Troilers and Cressida all date from this time. Also, it is believed that he started work on the Canterbury Tales in the early 1380, but we come to his magnum opus that is the Canterbury Tales. Sausser is best known as the writer of the Canterbury Tales which is the collection of stories told by fictional pilgrims on the road to the cathedral at Canterbury. This tales would help to shape English literature a lot because as I told you he was a precursor of modern narration, he was a precursor of modern poetry and so many other precursors. Sausser introduced the Iambic pentameter line, the rhyming couplet and other rhymes used in Italian poetry for the first time. Although Sausser was the most dominating literary figure in middle English literature and his great works constitute the bulk of its glory, the literary history of his a's contains some other significant literary works. Yeah, this is the search of Canterbury. Sausser like Boccaccio in now Italy tells many folk tales. Only the 17th century did such literature come to be guarded as low and even style however enriched it might be by writing or by learn poet was of the same sort at high and low level. Even the elaboration of medieval rhetoric were no more and no less than a rationalization of traditional style. Sausser is the basis of the style of medieval romance and lyric of the great 14th century poets of the book of common prayer and Shakespeare and of much folk literature even today the influences that it one had. This where the pilgrims were going to Canterbury. If we ask why we are justifying in saying that Sausser like Shakespeare is for all time, one partial answer is perhaps that the greatness of his poetry particularly as a presentation of human comedy. Everyone is shown in his own colors in his own community in his own type depends on an inexhaustible source which is very close to life. There is no doubt about Sausser at least since Dryden he has been established for a ascent or descent as the first great classic of English literature. So, when we look into the Canterbury tales for depth of interest we see that it has the wealth of impressions of human comedy and for its wisdom for his observation for its unrivaled amongst Sausser's world. In the context of the crisis in English society in the 14th century it examines the social diversity of Sausser's pilgrims and the stylistic range of the tales and psychological richness of the interaction. So, this are the absolute anticipation of what modern narrative is going to be. He wrote his first major poem Roma of the Rose and the first part of the poem will introduce the reader to medieval allegory and its setting within a dream vision. This is the Tabard Inn which was mentioned in the Canterbury tales. Yes, so now we come to another rhetorical device the allegory. It is an extended metaphor yes, but although Sausser's poetry not only grows out of, but away from allegory towards a larger freer realism yet allegory still underlies even the Canterbury tales. Allegory was the way the medieval mind characteristically worked. So, what do you understand by allegory personifications which falls under different levels mostly telling about a moral mostly going about a religious view. Therefore, it is an extended metaphor it can be an extended metaphor and is full of personifications or of words and phrases that are on the point of becoming so. As in Dante so in Sausser frequency millies promote the distinct visualisation which is an essential aspect of allegory and still an aspect of realism of the Canterbury tale. Another contribution of Sausser in medieval literature was how he introduced the bird and the beast fables. The masterpiece among the alliterative poems which have survived from the 14th century of course, apart from Sausser's is are going under Green Knight. The contrast between some of Sausser's tale is sufficiently striking. Therefore, what do we examine after this Sausser was an innovator in English the extent to which he brought English poetry into court with the poetry of France and Italy number one and also what he did that was new not only in English, but in European literature. So, when we look at Sausser's contemporaries the name of William Langlund is known in the English language or on his singular work the book of Piers De Plamen. In the English literature of the 14th century this work of Langlund stands out as the most renowned work. The framework of the poem is again allegorical it describes a series of remarkable visions that the dreamer has in a sleep. Then before that we know that there are about 60 English medieval metrical romances extent. The extent English metrical romances appear to belong to stages in the transition of medieval literature during 13, 14 and 15 centuries from oral poetry to written composition. There is one English poem of about 1200 the Owl and the Nightingale which though not a song, but a debate is a poem of considerable length may properly be associated with the 13th century English lyrics and read along with them. John Gower is another name which comes just after Sausser. He was a medieval scholar of English well versed equally in French and Latin. He was a linguist you can say and what he wrote was in three languages French English and Latin and in his dream allegory in what he had written in English and Vox Clamentis and his third work is Confessio Amantis written in English was an ambitious project to present in pleasing versus numerous stories taken from different verses. So, in the overview that we have of the age of Sausser what have we come to see? Sausser early or French period we have seen how he translated the romans of the rose and wrote many minor poems then his middle or Italian period and his late or English period of the Canterbury tales dominated by the Canterbury tales. Then we have Langlin the poet and prophet of social reforms, his chief work was Pius Plowman, Wycliffe the religious reformer who first translated the Gospels into English and Mandeville the alleged traveller who represents the new English interest in distant lands. We will go into the Renasa in the next lecture and we will see how most of these writers had influenced the outpourings of different avenues in different ways of creativity, development of foreign trade and also and very truly John Gower. Well this whole lecture on the age of of Sausser will not be complete without mentioning of the miracle cycles what had happened in drama right and what was happening as the beginnings of drama you can call in the in English literature. Four versions of the complete English mystery or miracle cycle have been preserved which was going on during this time Deyork the Sester Townley and M.S. probably Wakefield and N town probably East Anglian Anglican cycles certain of this place will seem to stand out from the rest of the cycle as being more what we think of as place comedy or tragedy presented to an audience. So, when we look into the history of drama as such we find that it began in the search mostly as liturgical place very true yes, but we find that the beginnings was there that this where the English mystery cycles or miracle cycle that can be said and that represents or reproduce what might perhaps be called the history of the world of mankind in relation to God or values of ethics from the creation to the large judgment. The historical origin of the place that have come to form the mystery cycle can we know be traced back to the embryo Latin place which appears first as intrinsic part of the search services at Easter and at Christmas the first of this formal liturgical place seems to have been the representation of the resurrection. The mystery cycle is a truly communion or national drama in the making of course, later the search conduct handle most of the themes which were being represented and therefore, it came out of the search and formed the cycle of their own well. So, in summing up why do we say that this is the age of saucer right, saucer's influence upon English poetry upon literature of all dialects even after his death appears almost unparalleled in the history of English literature and his central role in the developing literary culture of his time. And when we look at saucer we find that he was indebted also to the Anglo-Saxon period Anglo-Saxon period and in that Anglo-Saxon period which I had said about the alliterative verse tradition not only of that many of the techniques of writing a poem and also of narrating an episode or of representing nature had influenced later poetry and literature in the different ages. We have Geralt Manly Hopkins with a sprung rhythm which he had got from Anglo-Saxon poetry. We have W. B. Yates who had gone to the Celtic myths and the legends to represent his ideas in his poetry. We have so many people who have talked about the grandeur of the natural landscapes of English poetry. That is why the years of his literary activities and of his imitators and successors are termed as the age of saucer. Saucer was perceived as the father of English poetry and his works gave rise to a diversity of traditions. Creative and critical both interest arising from the effects of saucer's work had on subsequent writers in the trade centuries even leading up to Dryden. So, in our discussion let us see how do we look into this age. Can we tell in our own words the general qualities of Anglo-Saxon poetry? How did it differ in its magical form from modern poetry? Just now I had mentioned that modern poetry may be the same in many aspects indebted to some of the elements which we find. Metrical innovations which were there in the alliterative verse of Anglo-Saxon period. Can you explain why poetry is more abundant and more interesting than prose in the earliest literature of all nations? And this is an analysis that you should observe. This is something that you have to see because almost all if you go into the cultural history of all nations you will find that most of them communicated or exchanged notes through song. And songs and folk songs and the way that they would relate to things was something which was a binding force. Well, why is Beowulf a work of all time or as the Anglo-Saxons would say why is it worthy to be remembered? So, you have to look into this and when you read the story of Beowulf, you see it is a adventure of the way he goes and tries to release the evil I mean the good from the evil. All these are allegorical devices which the unknown writer had written during the time. There is something very permanent quality in literature and the ideals and emotions which are emphasized in Beowulf. Tell briefly the story of Saucer's life. It would be good if you are interested to read the life of Saucer who had a variegated experience as a court with life as a pilgrim. What foreign influences are noticeable and you have to see how he also went into the different techniques experimented with the different techniques which he had seen from the European tradition and the way that he illustrated his three periods of work and why is he called the English national first English poet. Well, so for the refer text, if you want to know about the social English social history, I would want you to read G. M. Cavalines English social history as a survey of six centuries a very very interesting account how social history is being reflected by the English poets of the time from the say from the time of Saucer to the time of Kexton to the time of Shakespeare to the moderns. Then we have a very interesting Cambridge history of English and American literature in 18 volumes by A. W. Ward. Then we have Andrew Bannett's literature criticism and theory. If you look into the theoretical aspect of Anglo-Saxon period, David Dices who has been regarded as almost a tool of English literature students, a critical history of English literature. When you look into each age and you go into detail into how each space has contributed to that age, then we have Robert Scholl's elements of literature, how you study literature and a book which you should have or all literature students should have in all volumes it has. It is about six volumes, The New Pelican Guide to English Literature and then Anglo-Saxon poetry by R. K. Gordon and William J. Long which is available in the net. English literature is history and its significance for the life of the English speaking world. This is a e-book by Project Gutenberg and you will find most of the references which we have dealt here has been mentioned there in much detail.