英国文学选读名词解释

Byronic hero： a proud, mysterious rebel figure of noble origin，which is s a variant of the Romantic hero as a type of character, named after the English Romantic poet Lord Byron. Example: Don Juan by George Gordon Byron

Post colonialism is a specifically postmodern intellectual discourse that consists of reactions to, and analysis of, the cultural legacy of colonialism and imperialism. Post colonialism is defined in anthropology as the relations between nations and areas they colonized and once ruled. Example: Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Symbolism is the practice of representing things by symbols, or of investing things with a symbolic meaning or character. A symbol is an object, action, or idea that represents something other than itself, often of a more abstract nature. Example:The Waste Land by T.S.Eliot

Mysticism: refers to conceal or hidden in ancient times ,it can also be thought of as a constellation of distinctive practices, discourses, texts, institutions, traditions, and experiences aimed at human transformation, variously defined in different traditions. Example: A Vision by William Butler Yeats

Ode: it is a dignified and elaborately structured lyric poem of some length, praising and glorifying an individual, commemorating an event, or describing nature intellectually rather than emotionally. Example: Ode on a Grecian Urn by John Keats

Dramatic monologue: A literary, usually verse composition in which a speaker reveals his or her character, often in relation to a critical situation or event, in a monologue addressed to the reader or to a presumed listener.

Dramatic monologue: a monologue is a lengthy speech by a single person. Dramatic monologue does not designate a component in a play, but a type of lyric poem that was perfected by Robert Browning. By using dramatic monologue, a single person, who is patently not the poet, utters the speech that makes up the whole of the poem, in a specific situation at a critical moment. For example, Robert Browning’s famous poem “My Last Duchess” was written in dramatic monologue.

Naturalism: it first appeared in France, there naturalists including Zola turned especially to “slum life”, in England flourished in the 2nd half of 19th century; naturalists argued that literature reflect life, be “true to life”, writer must reproduce in his writings life exactly as it is, (including all details without any selection), theory of “a slice of life”; However, a fallacy, for impossible to include all the details in real life; only give the appearance of life but not its essence. In England, two outstanding writers in the last decades: George Gissing, George Moore.

Naturalism: a movement in theatre, film, and literature that seeks to repeat/copy a believable everyday reality, as opposed to such movements as Romanticism in which