Literary Time Periods

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1914-1965

During this time period, modernism gained a powerful ascendancy. Writers of the time turned inward for their subject matter and expressed bitter and often despairing cyunicism.

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Modern Period
(British)

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1700-1750

Classical ideals of taste, polish, common sense, and reason were more important that emotion and imagination. Deism was advancing, and the rule of reason resulted in literature that was realistic, satirical, moral, correct, and strongly affected by politics. The most prevalent poetry came from Pope, James Thomson, and the Graveyard School.

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Augustan Age
(British)

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1649-1660

This was the period between the execution of Charles I in 1649 and the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II in 1660. Although the theaters were closed in 1642, dramatic performances continued more or less openly. The prose of the time came from Milton, Hobbes, Taylor, Walton, Sir Thomas Browne, and Thomas Fuller. The poets of the time were Vaughan, Waller, Cowley, Davenant, and Marvell.

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Commonwealth Interregnum
(British)

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1750-1798

The novel continued to flourish with sentimental attitudes and Gothic horrors. Little was accomplished in Drama besides the creation of laughing comedy by Sheridan and Goldsmith in reaction against sentimental comedy. The poets were Burns, Gray, Cowper, Johnson, and Crabbe and the major literary figure was Samuel Johnson. Interest in the past, primitive, and the literature of the folk was developing and contributin to the increase of strength towards the growth of romanticism. New attitueds and the development of sensibility became major in literary expression.

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Age of Johnson
(British)

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1625-1649

This period coincides with the reign of Charles I, 1625 - 1649. The writers of this age wrote with refinement and elegance. This era produced a circle of poets known as the "Cavalier Poets" and the dramatists of this age were the last to write in the Elizabethan tradition.

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Caroline Age
(British)

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1066-1500

This is the period between the replacement of French by Middle English as the language of court and the early appearances of definetly Modern English writings. This time was marked by the Age of Chaucer (political and religious unrest,) the Black Death, the Peasants' Revolt, the rise of the Lollards, and the War of the Roses. Increase in nationalistic spirit in England and early traces of humanism began to appear. The great cycles of mystery flourished and towards the end of the period the morality came into existence. The first major English poet was Chaucer, but this was a time of weak poetry, mostly Chaucerian imitations.

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Middle English Period
(British)

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1558-1603

This was during the reign of Elizabeth I. It was an age of great nationalistic expansion, commercial growth, religious controversy (which all saw the development of English drama to its highest level,) a great outburst of lyric poetry, and a new interest in criticism. Sidney, Spenser, Marlowe, and Shakespeare flourish, and Bacon, Jonson, and Donne appear on the scene.

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Elizabethan Age
(British)

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Also known as the Golden Age of English Literature

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428-1100

This was the period between the invasion of England by the Teutonic tribes of Angles, Saxons, and Jutes and the establishment of Norman rule. Learning and culture flourished in the monastaries. Whitby was the cradle of English poetry in the North and Winchester of English prose in the South.

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Old English Period
(British)

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1603-1625

This occurred during the reign of James I. Early literature was a rich flowering of the Elizabethan, and later literature showed the attitudes characteristic of the Caroline Age. The breach between the Puritans and the Cavaliers widened. There was a robust growth of realism in art and cynicism in thought. It was the best time of literature for Shakespeare, Jonson, Beaumont, Fletcher, Webster, Chapman, Middleton, Massinger, Drayton and Donne. It was also the time of the King James translation of the Bible.

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Jacobean Age

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1660-1798

This is the time between the return of the Stuarts to the throne in 1660 and the publication of 'Lyrical Ballads' by Wordsworth and Coleridge in 1798. It consists of the Restoration Age, Augustan Age, and Age of Johnson.

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Neoclassic Period
(British)

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1870-1914

The complacency and optimism of the early years of Victoria's rule was being replaced by Newton's mechanics, Darwin's evolution, Marx's view of history, Comte's view of society and Taine's view of literature. It was a time of revolt against Victorian standards. Poets included Tennyson and Browning. Playwrites included Wilde, H.A. Jones, and John Galsworthy. Essayists included Arnold, Huxley, and Spencer. Novelists included George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Joseph Conrad, H.G. Wells, and Arnold Bennett.

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Realistic Period
(British)

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1901-1914

This is the period between the death of Victoria in 1901 and the beginning of the First World War in 1914. It was marked by a strong reaction in thought, conduct, and art to the stiff propriety and conservatism of the Victorian Age. There was a growing distrust of authority in religion. Poets included Kipling, Yeats, Masefield, and Hardy. It was primarily an age of prose: Arnold Bennett, Joseph Conrad, Kipling, Ford Madox Ford, and Barrie.

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Edwardian Period
(British)

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1965-

The empire continued to shrink to an island realm. Struggles in Ireland between Catholics and Protestants instensified and demanded more and more of the attention of the English. Playwrites were John Osborne, Harold Pinter, and Tom Stoppard. Poets were Philip Larkin, Cecil Day Lewis, Sir John Betjeman, and Ted Hughes. Novelists included John Fowles and Margaret Drabble.

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Post-Modernist Period
(British)

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1500-1557

There was literary experimentation and borrowing from French and Italian writings. The late medieval drama was still dominant, with mystery plays, moralities, and interludes. The most important single books was Tottel’s Miscellany (1557.)

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Early Tudor Age
(British)

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1100-1350

Writings in native English were few. The last entry in the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicles" was made at Peterborough in 1154. The first recorded miracle play in England was the "Play of St. Catherine," which was performed in circa 1100. The literature absorbed French qualities of grace, harmony, humor, and chivalric idealism.

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Anglo-Norman Period
(British)

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1660-1700

The literature reflects the reaction against Puritanism, the receptiveness to French influence, and the dominance of classical points of view. There was a revival of drama under new influences and theories. Dryden was the greatest poet of the time, but no one equaled Milton. Prose were Locke, Temple, and Pepys after John Bunyan. There was heroic drama by Dryden, Howard, and Otway.

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Restoration Age
(British)

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1798-1832

The careers of Wordsworht, Coleridge, Byro, Mary and P.B. Shelley, Felicia Hemans, and Keats flowered. Scott created the historical novel. Wordsworth and Coleridge articulated a revolutionary theory of romantic poetry. Jane Austen wrote her novels of manners. Mary Shelley uncannily combined the Gothic novel and scientific fiction along with philosophic vision. Personal essayists Lamb, DeQuincey, and Hazlitt.

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Age of the Romantic Movement
(British)

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1870-1901

This is the time between 1870 and the death of Queen Victoria. There was a tendency to look with critical eyes on human beings, society, ,and God, to ask pragmatic questions, and to seek utilitarian answers. Novelists were George Eliot and Hardy. Essayists were Spencer, Huxley, Newman, Arnold, and Morris argued the meaning of the new science, religion, and society. Drama was revived through Ibsen and the Celtic Renaissance. Romantic fiction was revived by Stevenson, W.H. Hudson, and Kipling.

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Late Victorian
(British)

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1500-1660

It consists of the Early Tudor Age, Elizabethan Age, Jacobean Age, Caroline Age, and Commonwealth Interregnum. Early on authors felt the impact of classical learning and of foreign literatures, together with some release from church authority. Near the end there was a growing cynicism, a classcial dissatisfaction with the extravaganceand unbounded enthusiasm of the sixteenth century, and a tendency toward melancholy and decadence.

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Renaissance
(British)

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1832-1870

There was a gradual tempering of the romantic impulse and steady growth of realism in English letters. A new poetry developed, more keenly aware of social issues and more makrked by doubts and uncertainties resulting from the pains of the industrial revolution and advances in scientific thought. Poets were Tennyson, Browning, Arnold, and Swinburnes. Novelists were Dickens, Thackeray, the Bronte sisters, and Tollope. Essayists were Carlyle, Newman, Ruskin, Arnold, and DeQuincey.

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Early Victorian Age
(British)