英美文学作品赏析

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)
• He was not of an age, but for all time! • the greatest of all English authors • A landmark in the history of world culture
Lecture 1 Geoffrey Chaucer and his The Canterbury Tales
Geoffrey Chaucer (13401400)
• Messenger of Humanism • The first realistic writer • Father of English poetry • Master of the English language
American Literature
• • • • • “Rip Van Winkle” “The Tell-tale Heart” “Because I Could not Stop for Death” “I heard a fly buzz” Excerpt from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn • 20th century poems • “A Clean Well-lighted Place”
The Canterbury Tales
• It gives a comprehensive picture of Chaucer’s time. (There are 29 pilgrims and they are from all walks of life.) • It popularizes the literary use of the vernacular English.
The Wife of Bath
• One of two female storytellers (the other is the Prioress), the Wife has a lot of experience under her belt. She has traveled all over the world on pilgrimages, so Canterbury is a journey for pleasure or enjoyment compared to other dangerous journeys she has endured.
John Donne
• His poetry is noted for its vibrancy of language and inventiveness of metaphor, especially compared to that of his contemporaries. Donne's style is characterized by abrupt openings and various paradoxes, ironies and dislocations.
• meter: the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse the pattern of syllables in a line of poetry a rhythm of accented and unaccented syllables arranged into feet. iambic: 抑扬格(轻读音节与重读音节交替出现） pentameter:五音步 (five feet） syllable: 音节，通常包含一个元音和若干辅音 vowel: 元音 consonant: 辅音
英美文学赏析
English Literature
• “The Wife of Bath” from The Canterbury Tales • “Sonnet 18” • Excerpt from Romeo and Juliet • “Song” • “Letter to Lord Chesterfield” • “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” • A discussion of Jane Eyre • Excerpt from Mrs. Dalloway
• Example: The Flea
Lecture 4 Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson (17091784)
• an English writer who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer
iambic pentameter
• Example： 1. if you would put the key inside the lock
if YOU | would PUT | the KEY | inSIDE | the LOCK
2. Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
William Shakespeare
• Sonnet: A sonnet is a fourteen-line lyric poem, traditionally written in iambic pentameter—that is, in lines ten syllables long, with accents falling on every second syllable. • The Shakespearean sonnet is divided into four parts. The first three parts are each four lines long, and are known as quatrains, rhymed ABAB; the fourth part is called the couplet, and is rhymed CC. The Shakespearean sonnet is often used to develop a sequence of metaphors or ideas, one in each quatrain, while the couplet offers either a summary or a new take on the preceding images or ideas.
Metaphysical poets (玄学 派）
• a loose group of British lyric poets of the 17th century, whose work was characterized by the inventive use of conceits, and by speculation about topics such as love or religion. • Conceits（奇喻）—far-fetched or unusual similes or metaphors “the most heterogeneous ideas are yoked by violence together”
Bath
Back
Lecture 2
William Shakespeare
The Renaissance
Renaissance: Together with the development of bourgeois relationships and formation of the English national state, the 16th century is marked by a flourishing of national culture known as the Renaissance. The term Renaissance originally indicated a revival of classical (Greek and Roman) arts and sciences after the dark ages of medieval obscurantism.
Shall I / com PARE/ thee TO / a SUM / mer’s DAY? Thou ART / more LOVE / ly AND / more TEM / per ATE
Sonnet 18
• In the sonnet, the speaker compares his beloved to the summer season, and argues that his beloved is better. He also states that his beloved will live on forever through the words of the poem.
William Shakespeare
• Shakespeare wrote 154 sonnets. • The first group (1126): to Mr. W. H. • The second group (127-152): to a Dark Lady
iambic pentameter
RomHale Waihona Puke Baiduo and Juliet
Lecture 3
John Donne
John Donne (1572-1631)
• an English poet, satirist, lawyer and a cleric in the Church of England. • He is considered the pre-eminent representative of the metaphysical poets.
Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary
• After nine years of work, Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language was published in 1755. It had a far-reaching effect on Modern English and has been described as "one of the greatest single achievements of scholarship. " • This work brought Johnson popularity and success; until the completion of the Oxford English Dictionary 150 years later, Johnson's was viewed as the pre-eminent British dictionary.
The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales
• The Canterbury Tales was written in the years between 1387 and 1400. It has a general prologue and twenty four tales that are connected by “links”.
The Renaissance
The study and propagation of classical learning and art was carried on by the progressive thinkers of the humanists. They held their chief interest not in ecclesiastical(教会的) knowledge, but in man, his environment and doings and bravely fought for the emancipation of man from the tyranny of the church and religious dogmas.