British PoetryFrom 449 to Present

A Multimedia Unitby Ed Emmett

Positive Outcomes Charter School193 S. Dupont Hwy.Camden, DE 19934

eemmett@pocs.k12.de.us

Let’s Get Started

Legal Stuff

• All videos used in this presentation have been downloaded from UnitedStreaming.com

• All music and sounds are part of the public domain and do not infringe on any copyright laws

What is this?

• This will be a fully integrated PowerPoint unit

• The entire unit will be presented in this manner

• There will be links throughout this presentation

Links

• There are many links throughout this presentation. These links will lead to the necessary application. These links may open Word, PowerPoint, Internet Explorer, Adobe Acrobat, or Image Viewer. The links will all look like this.

What it will not have

• Video of most of the authors (Most are no longer living)

• The actual authors reading parts (See above)

• A sequel

British PoetryTime Periods

• 449-1485• 1485-1625• 1625-1798 (Under Construction)

• 1798-1832 (Under Construction)

• 1832-Present (Under Construction)

449-1485Early British Empire to The Middle

Ages

“Who pulleth out this sword of this stone and anvil, is rightwiseking born of all England.”

-Sir Thomas Malory,from Morte d’Arthur

Significant Events

• 449 Anglo Saxon Invasion (Video)• 542 Plague kills half of the population• 591 China: Beginning of book printing• 731 Bede completes A History of English

Church and People• 750 Beowulf composed• 975 Saxon Monks copy Old English poems

into the Exeter book (Web)• 1066 Normans defeat Saxons (Video).

William the conqueror becomes King of England

• 1073 Canterbury becomes England’s religious center

• 1221 First known sonnet appears

Significant Events Continued

• 1348 Black Death begins sweep through England

• 1372 Bible first translated into English• 1375 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight written• 1386 Chaucer begins writing The Canterbury

Tales• 1453 First Gutenberg Bible printed in Germany

(Web)• 1476 William Caxton builds first English

printing press• England at the End of Century (Video)

Literature of the Period

Saxon Literature • Started as oral traditions and not in books• Poems were recited at ceremonial occasions• Early poetry falls into two categories: heroic

poetry and elegiac poetry (glossary)• Beowulf is an example of heroic poetry• “The Wanderer” is an an example of a famous

elegiac poem (e-Version) (Web)

Life in the Time Period

• Anglo Saxon Life (Video)• Various Anglo Saxon Links

(Web)

Literature of the Period Continued

Middle English Literature • Falls into two main categories: secular and

religious• Usual topics of secular (Glossary) poetry are

love and nature• Begin to see ballads. (Glossary)• Early plays and poems were performed at

churches.

Cædmon

• Student PowerPoint Presentation(PowerPoint)

Geoffrey Chaucer (1343-1400)

• Early poems were based on the works of others

• Translated several French poems• Major work is the Canterbury

Tales• Considered the greatest English

Poet of his time period• Since his death, his poems have

never gone out of print

Canterbury Tales

• Only 24 of the projected 124 tales were finished

• In the tales, each character speaks of a pilgrimage (Glossary) to the cathedral of Canterbury

• The tales are told to a host in sequential order

Canterbury Tales Continued

• Each of the story tellers came from different section of medieval society

• Reader is given insight into all aspects of society

• Take a virtual tour of Canterbury (Web)Map of Canterbury Trail

Click to Enlarge

The Nun’s Priest’s Tale

• We will be reading this poem from our textbooks on page 112

• After reading please refer to these notes for discussion (PDF)

Chaucer on the Web

• Chaucer Bio Page http://icg.harvard.edu/~chaucer/

• Electronic Version of the Canterbury Tales http://www.librarius.com/cantales.htm

• Middle English Collection of Texts http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/mideng.browse.html

from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

• No known author• Poet became know as the Pearl

poet• Written in 1375• Draws on the legends of King

Arthur (Glossary)• Two plots in the poem—the

beheading contest and the temptation

• Summary of Characters (Web)• Poem is found on page 142 of our

textbooks

from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Continued

• Summary of the Story(Web)

• Study Questions (Web)• Sir Gawain and the Green

Knight Web Resources(Web)

Folk Ballads

• Read “Get Up and Bar the Door”(Word) or pg.173 of text

• Hear “Get Up and Bar the Door”(Sound File)

• Discussion and Review Questions(Web)

• Music used to sing this ballad (Music)

• Search Web for Articles on “Get Up and Bar the Door” (Web)

Additional Links for 449-1485

• http://www.georgetown.edu/cball/oe/oe-texts.html

• http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/rp/authors/caedmon.html

DITC Instruction PPT

1485-1625Reformation and Restoration

“What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! in form, in moving, how express and admirable! In

action how like an angel!”-William Shakespeare,

from Hamlet

Significant Events

• 1492 Columbus landed in America• 1503 Leonardo da Vinci paints Mona

Lisa• 1519 Magellan sails around the world• 1520 Thomas Moore publishes Utopia• 1534 Church of England (Video)

established• 1563 20,000 Die in plague• 1564 Shakespeare Born• 1567 2 Million die of typhoid• 1590 Edmund Spenser publishes The

Faerie Queen

Significant Events

• 1594 Shakespeare composes Romeo and Juliet

• 1599 Globe Theatre opens• 1605 Cervantes publishes Don Quixote• 1607 Colony at Jamestown established• 1611 King James Bible published

Literature of the Period

Elizabethan Poetry• English Literature Matures• Lyric Poetry (Glossary) becomes favored• Narrative Poems (Glossary) decrease in

popularity• About Sonnets (Web)• Sonnet cycles (Glossary) are created• Love becomes a major element• Religion begins to take a back seat• The Church has fallen out of prominence