5. CHAUCERS “CANTERBURY TALES” AS THE FIRST EXAMPLE OF THE HUMAN COMEDY IN ENGLAND The 14^th century was the century of Chaucer, but there was a poet, who was very much unlike Chaucer and whose manner of writing was different from that of Ch. His verse stemmed from the O.E. alliterative trade.Jeffery Chaucer’s vision of the world was very much different from that of Langl. He could not complain of his destiny. Chaucer was born in a middle-class family. His father, John Chaucer, was a vintner and deputy to the king's butler. His family's financial success came from work in the wine and leather businesses. Chaucer served under a number of diplomatic missions. He became knight of the shire for Kent. He’s different from the Langlan in the respect that he never intended to teach, he only wanted to laugh at human follies. The thing that unites them is that they wanted to give a panorama of contemporary life. The manner of narration is very different. We don’t listen to the vowel music assonance gives way to rhyme. We are listening to the full body of conversation implying accents, even bodily gestures.Chausser is an innovator, he gave us dramatic poetry, which was not the case with other poets. He includes peoples words, actions, reactions. He gives us a diversity of forms no single literary genre dominates The Canterbury Tales. The tales include romantic adventures, fabliaux, saint's biographies, animal fables, religious allegories and even a sermon, and range in tone from pious, moralistic tales to lewd and vulgar sexual farces. The form that Chaucer most often employs for his tale is the fabliau.The structure of The Canterbury Tales is indebted to Boccaccio's Decameron, a work by Chaucer's contemporary in which ten nobles from Florence, to escape the plague, stay in a country villa and amuse each other by each telling tales. Boccaccio had a significant influence on Chaucer. The Knight's Tale was an English version of a tale by Boccaccio, while six of Chaucer's tales have possible sources in the Decameron: the Miller's Tale, the Reeve's, the Clerk's, the Merchant's, the Franklin's, and the Shipman's. However, Chaucer's pilgrims to Canterbury form a wider range of society compared to Boccaccio's elite storytellers, allowing for greater differences in tone and substance. The Cant.Tales were designed after Boccaccio’s Decameron.But Chaucer produced a more lifelike picture than his great predecessor. Boccacio described a party of 10 ladies & gentlemen who had retired at some villa because of the plague [pla:k] (тарелка как настенное украшение). For 10 days they intertained each other with feasting, music, dancing & telling the stories. As the party members belong to the same class, the same age, & the same education there’s no room for any effective contrast of ch-rs. And the plague & the people & the villa serve as a slight thread but not a good plot on which you can string together a hundred pleasant stories. There’s nothing personal in any of the story.Ch.’s Pilgrims have different social backgrounds and thus different personal characteristics which are important for the narration Chaucer gives portraits of real people. They are not allegories, not embodied ideas. And they are represented not for moral purposes. With the broad variety of people portrayed we get a broad panorama of the English life of that time. In the General Prologue, Chaucer sets up the general structure of the tales and introduces each of the characters who will tell the tales. Alongside with general prologue we find the characteristics of the pilgrims in the prologues preceding each of the stories. Chaucer gives relatively straightforward descriptions of the characters. A number of these pilgrims are described as 'perfect' in some way or another, most often in their craft. Furthermore, these pilgrims exist almost entirely in terms of their profession. Within some descriptions he allows for subtle criticism and sly wit. The ch-rs are Knight, Squire, Miller, Cook, Shipman, Monk, Wife of Bath (ткачиха), Man of Law, Priest, Prioress (настоятельница), the Parson (пастор) of town, Merchant, Manciple (эконом), Pardoner (продавец индульгенций), Clerk, Physician.The descriptions of the upper members of the clergy (духовенство) deserve special note in context of the tales. Each of the clergymen defy traditional expectations; the Monk is a rough laborer, while the Friar is resolutely immoral. Chaucer lists the various sins of the Friar: he sells pardon from sin for a price, seduces women who ask for pardons, and spends more time in bars than he does aiding the poor. The Friar further contrasts with the later description of the Parson, a man who performs his duties honorably and cares for his congregation. In his description of the Parson, Chaucer lists the various admirable qualities, none of which are held by the Friar. The Wife of Bath is the most significant of the travelers low on the social scale. Chaucer describes her as lewd and boisterous (неистовый, буйный). Her clothing, all variations of bright red, is ostentatious, meant to attract attention from others. Chaucer even indicates that she is quite promiscuous ­ she has been married five times and had an undetermined number of lovers. The character of the pilgrims is usually revealed through the story he or she tells. E.g. The Knight tells a tale of courtship and chivalry, focused on the deeds of soldiers and princes. Even the structure of the tale obeys the structure and hierarchy within society. The Knight does not start with the main characters of the tale, Arcite and Palamon; instead, he begins at the top of society, describing the feats of Theseus of Athens, working downward until he reaches the less distinguished Theban soldiers. The Knight's Tale adheres to traditional values of honor in which there are strict codes of behavior which one must follow. This code of chivalry is not necessarily polite and decent. In the morality of the tale, Theseus' sudden decision to ransack (обыскать) Thebes is perfectly acceptable as punishment for a offence the honor of the dead soldiers. Theseus condemns Arcite's and Palamon's actions not because they were fighting one another, but because they did not do so under the proper rules set for a duel, such as the requirement for a superior to judge fair conduct.The Wife of Bath is perhaps the most fully realized character in the Canterbury Tales. Headstrong, boisterous and opinionated, she wages a perpetual struggle the taboos against female sexuality. She issues a number of objects strict religious claims for chastity and monogamy, using Biblical examples including Solomon to show that the Bible does not overtly condemn all expressions of sexuality, The Wife of Bath begins the prologue to her tale by boasting of her experience in marriage. She has married five men already. The Wife of Bath uses a language of commerce throughout her tale in reference to marriage. While this could be conceived of as a comparison of marriage to prostitution. The theme of the Wife of Bath's Tale is thus not female equality in marriage, but rather the power struggles between the husband and wife. She does not seek an equal partnership with a husband, but a situation in which she has control over her spouse. The personalities of the Wife of Bath and the old woman of the story are even identical; the old woman is apt to argumentative speeches, such as her defense of poverty and low status, similar to the Wife of Bath's defense of female sexuality in the prologue.  The ideas & themes: 1) the idea of human comedy (we laugh at ourselves not noticing it); 2) the idea of an unfaithful wife & on the contrary the idea of the patient & suffering woman who is exalted (превознесенная) for her steadfast (преданный) behavior; 3) the Christian motifs; 4)the idea of chauvinism.  The significance: 1) to show the mediaeval civilization; 2) to show the human relationships; 3) to show a very close community typical of English; 4) prediction of the development of humanity & the beginning of a new epoch; 5) the usage & the development of the English language; 6) the first sample of fiction (a novel). Chaucer didn’t complete the plan for the tales. He wanted his pilgrims to tell two stories on the way to Canterbury & two stories on the returning way. But the surviving manuscripts leave some doubt as to exact order of the tales that remain. However the work is sufficiently complete to be considered a united book rather than a collection of unfinished fragments.

10. English literature of 17 century. J. Milton’s poem “Paradise Lost”, the plot, the portrayal of Satan, the concept of God and man.PL was written at the time when the bourgeois revolution had ended unsuccessfully, but the powerful voice of the poet declared that the spirit of revolution was not broken, that it still lived in the hearts of the people, In his PL M shows revolt. PL is an epic poem written in 12 ‘books’. The place of action is the universe. The char-s are: Satan and his rebel-angels, God the Almighty, 3 guardian angels –Raphael, Gabriel [ei] and Michael, and the 1^st man and woman – Adam and Eve (A&E). The revolutionary spirit is shown in Satan, who revolts against God, draws to his side many rebel-angels and is driven out of Heaven. They fall down into the Hell. But Satan hasn’t been overcome and is determined to go on with the war against God. A&E are allowed by God to live in of Paradise, in the Garden of Eden, as long as they don’t eat the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge. Satan assumes the form of a serpent and next morning, while A&E work in diff. parts of the Garden, persuades E to eat an apple from the Tree of Knowledge. E eats an apple and plucks (срывает) another for A. as a punishment for the sin they have committed, God banishes them from Paradise to the newly-created world, where they are to face a life of toil and grief. The angel Michael leads them out of Paradise. From a hill, he shows A a picture of the tyranny which is to befall mankind.The major theme of PL is the idea of the Fall. The books opened immediately after the fall of Satan and will now close on the fall of mankind. M began his poem by saying that he meant to justify the ways of God to man. But in PL M was not only justifying God's ways to humans in general; he was justifying His ways to the English people between 1640 and 1660. That is, he was telling them why they had failed to establish the good society by deposing the king, and why they had welcomed back the monarchy (at the end of the Civil war -1649- the king -Charles- was beheaded and England was proclaimed a Commonwealth = a Republic). Like A&E, they had failed through their own weaknesses, their own lack of faith, their own passions and greed, their own sin. The failure of the Puritan revolution was equal for M to the people's failure to govern themselves according to the will of God. PL was more than a work of art. It was a poetic explanation for the course that English history had taken.A sense of religiosity and patriotism drive M's work. On the one hand, he felt that he could best serve God by following his vocation (призвание) as a poet. On the other hand, his poetry would best serve England by putting before it noble and religious ideas in the highest poetic form. In other words, Milton sought to write poetry would serve to teach delightfully. In PL M tries to harmonize these intentions and becomes the Christian singer.  “Paradise Lost” is written in blank verse; it’s the 1st specimen of that kind of poetry. Previously, it was drama that was written in blank verse with a rich range of voc-ry and classical allusions. The epic reveal the contradiction that tortures the author: dissatisfaction with God’s law vs. importance of obedience to God - M presents us 2 moral paths after the Fall: like Satan = to insist on disobedience = degradation and like Adam = to repent and redeem.Milton restored epic poem again to life from Middle Ages. For Enlightenment novel is a typical kind of writing. For Renaissance writers time and history didn’t exist. For them time was an element of philosophy, they regarded it as some substance, through which the successive generations of men have moved. It wasn’t something that changed men or made one generation unlike the other. For a novelist (and for Enlightenment writer, therefore) it’s important to put his char-s within a specific place and time. Space and time have become characteristic features. NB! Epic – is a along poem describing the deeds of a legendary or traditional hero. Characteristic features: 1. the characters are of noble birth or they aresupernatural beings from the past; 2. the action is connected with the fate of the whole human race; 3. gods or semidivine creatures come to help; 4. the poem begins at a critical point in the action; 5. the style is noble and majestic; 6. the characters speak ceremoniously in long speeches; 7. there are long descriptions of characters or things; 8. we can see magic things and numbers.

11. English literature written after the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660 following the period of the Commonwealth. Some literary historians equate its era with the reign of Charles II (1660–85), while others add the reign of James II (1685–88). Many typical modern literary forms (e.g., the novel, biography, history, travel writing, and journalism) began to develop with sureness during the Restoration period. Pamphlets and poetry (notably that of John Dryden) flourished, but the age is chiefly remembered for its glittering, critical, and often bawdy comedies of manners by such playwrights as George Etherege, Thomas Shadwell, William Wycherly, John Vanbrugh, William Congreve, and George Farquhar.

Wycherley, William, 1640?–1716, English dramatist, b. near Shrewsbury. His first comedy, Love in a Wood (1671), was a huge success and won him the favor of the duchess of Cleveland, mistress of Charles II. His next play, The Gentleman Dancing-Master (1672), was followed by his two masterpieces, The Country Wife (1674?), in which the hero feigns castration as a cover for his affairs, and The Plain Dealer (1676), an exposé laden with satirical irony on the deception inherent in love and friendship. His brilliant wit and savagely clever satire give him a prominent place in the history of English Restoration drama. He lost court favor by his marriage (c.1680) to the countess of Drogheda, and after her death he spent several years in prison for debt. With the accession of James II he was released from prison and given a pension. The publication of his Miscellany Poems in 1704 led to a friendship with young Pope, who revised many of the elder poet's verses.Congreve, William, 1670–1729, English dramatist, b. near Leeds, educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and studied law in the Middle Temple. After publishing a novel of intrigue, Incognita (1692), and translations of Juvenal and Persius (1693), he turned to writing for the stage. His first comedy, The Old Bachelor (1693), produced when he was only 23, was extremely successful and was followed by The Double Dealer (1693) and Love for Love (1695). In 1697 his only tragedy, The Mourning Bride, was produced. About this time Congreve replied to the attack on his plays made by Jeremy Collier, who in a famous essay attacked the English stage for its immorality and profaneness. Congreve reached his peak with his last play, The Way of the World (1700), which has come to be regarded as one of the great comedies in the English language. The leading female roles in Congreve's plays were written for Anne Bracegirdle, who was probably his mistress. He never married. After 1700, Congreve did little literary work, perhaps because of the cool reception accorded his last play or because of his failing health—he suffered from gout. He subsequently held various minor political positions and enjoyed the friendships of Swift, Steele, Pope, Voltaire, and Sarah, duchess of Marlborough. The plays of Congreve are considered the greatest achievement of Restoration comedy. They are comedies of manners, depicting an artificial and narrow world peopled by characters of nobility and fashion, to whom manners, especially gallantry, are more important than morals. Congreve's view of mankind is amused and cynical. His characters are constantly engaged in complicated intrigues, usually centering around money, which involve mistaken identities, the signing or not signing of legal documents, weddings in masquerade, etc. His plays are particularly famous for their brilliance of language; for verbal mastery and wit they have perhaps been equaled only by the comedies of Oscar Wilde.

12. English literature of 17 century. J. Dryden, the founder of classicism. The general characteristics of his works.

The poetry of John Dryden possesses a grandeur, force, and fullness of tone that were eagerly received by readers still having something in common with the Elizabethans. At the same time, however, his poetry set the tone of the new age in achieving a new clarity and in establishing a self-limiting, somewhat impersonal canon of moderation and good taste. His polished heroic couplet (a unit of two rhyming lines of iambic pentameter, generally end-stopped), which he inherited from less accomplished predecessors and then developed, became the dominant form in the composition of longer poems.In a number of critical works Dryden defined the stylistic restraint, compression, clarity, and common sense that he exemplified in his own poetry and that he showed to be lacking in much of the poetry of the preceding age, particularly in the exuberant and mechanically complex metaphorical wit of the older metaphysical school. His reputation rests primarily on satire. This form became the dominant poetic genre of the age, both because of the religious and political factionalism of the times and because mocking denunciation of the ludicrousness or rascality of the opposition comes naturally to an age with so strong a public sense of norms of behavior. Absalom and Achitophel (1681-1682) and Mac Flecknoe (1682) are the most remarkable of Dryden's political satires. Among his other poetic works are noteworthy translations of Roman satirists and of the works of Virgil, and the Pindaric ode “Alexander's Feast,” a tour de force of varied cadences, which was published in 1697.The bulk of Dryden's work was in drama. By means of it, following the new mode of living of the professional literary man, he could derive his support from a large public rather than from private patrons. In his heroic tragedies The Conquest of Granada (1670) and All for Love; or, The World Well Lost (1678), a rewriting of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra in the new taste, Dryden showed a different and not always satisfying side of his talent and exemplified the dominant quality of all Restoration tragedy. In order to achieve splendor and surprise on the stage, he sacrificed reality of characterization and consistency in motivation for sensual display in exotic locales and extravagance in plot and situation, presented in a style verging on the bombastic. The affinities of this kind of drama are with Beaumont and Fletcher rather than with the great Elizabethan age; and the indirect influence of Ben Jonson is apparent also, for these two men were Jonson's disciples. Probably the best example of this genre of tragedy was produced by Thomas Otway, whose Venice Preserved (1682) avoids the worst excesses to which this form is liable and also possesses considerable tenderness and sensibility. By this time, however, the vogue of heroic tragedy was coming to an end; the style already had been successfully parodied in The Rehearsal (1671), by George Villiers, 2nd duke of Buckingham, and his collaborators.The comedy of the time is much more successful than the tragedy. It is derived directly from the comedies of Ben Jonson but tries for more refinement while displaying less strength. In a cool, satiric spirit, it criticizes middle-class ambition and other variations from the courtly social norm, of which the canons are aristocratic good taste and good sense, rarely conventional morality. In the eyes of succeeding generations, the chief defects of Restoration comedy are its reduction of sentiment and emotion to silliness and its frequent amorality. Reaction against this type of comedy, known as the comedy of manners, already had developed by the time that its greatest practitioner, William Congreve, was displaying his subtle artistry in Love For Love (1695) and The Way of the World (1700).Just as Dryden's poetry defined the tone of his time, so too did his easy, informal, clear prose style, notably in his Essay of Dramatic Poesie (1668) and in various prefaces to his plays and translations. Noteworthy prose of a rather different nature was produced by two other figures of the age, Samuel Pepys and John Bunyan.