一．中古英语时期
? Beowulf is the oldest poem in the English language, and the most important specimen (范例、典范)of Anglo-Saxon literature, and also the oldest surviving epic in the English language.
? The romance is a popular literary form in the medieval period（中世纪）. It uses verse or prose to sing knightly adventures or other heroic deeds.
? Geoffrey?Chaucer, one?of the greatest English poets, whose masterpiece, The Canterbury Tales（《坎特伯雷故事集》）, was one of the most important influences on the development of English literature.
? Chaucer is considered as the father of English poetry and the founder of English realism.
二．文艺复兴Renaissance
? Renaissance refers to the period between the 14th and mid-17th centuries. It marks a transition(过渡) from the medieval to the modern world. ? It started in Italy with the flowering of painting, sculpture（雕塑） and literature, and then spread to the rest of Europe.
? Humanism is the essence of Renaissance -----Man is the measure of all things. ? This was England’s Golden Age in literature. Queen Elizabeth reigned over the country in this period. The real mainstream of the English Renaissance is the Elizabethan drama. The most famous dramatists in the Renaissance England are Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare. ? The greatest of the pioneers of English drama was Christopher Marlowe. ? Francis Bacon was the best known essayist of this period. “Of Studies” is the most popular of Bacon’s 58 essays. ? Thomas More ——Utopia
? Edmund Spenser——The Faerie Queene 相关练习
? 1. Which is the oldest poem in the English language? ? A. Utopia B. Faerie Queene ? C. Beowulf D. Hamlet
? 2. _____ is the father of English poetry.
? A. Edmund Spenser B. William Shakespeare ? C. Francis Bacon D. Geoffrey Chaucer
? 3. ____ is not a playwright during the Renaissance period on England. ? A. William Shakespeare B. Geoffrey Chaucer ? C. Christopher Marlowe D. Ben Johnson 三．莎士比亚William Shakespeare
? “All the world 's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”——William Shakespeare
? William Shakespeare is considered the greatest playwright in the world and the finest poet who has written in the English language. Shakespeare understood people more than any other writers. He could create characters that have meaning beyond the time and place of his plays. His four tragedies are Hamlet(《哈姆雷特》), Othello(《奥赛罗》), King Lear(《李尔王》) and ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Macbeth(《麦克白》). Shakespeare’s sonnets, 154 in number, are the only direct expression of the poet’s own feelings; Sonnet 18 deserves its fame because it is one of the most beautifully written verses in the English language 诗选
Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a Summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And Summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
（我怎能将你与夏日相比? /你比它更温和可爱： /动人的花蕾在五月咆哮的风中颤抖， /夏日的美好时光也绝不长久： ） Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d; And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimm’d;
（太阳的金色光芒虽然耀眼， /却常常以灰暗的面貌出现；/再美貌的物什都逃不过凋谢，/命运流转或无意间将其拆解；） But thy eternal Summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal line to time thou grow’st. So long as men can breath or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
（可你如夏日般不会褪色, /你的美貌也将永存; /死神无法夸耀你曾在它的阴影中游荡, /伴随永恒的诗篇你将留存。/只要人类生生不息 我的诗句能被见证, /你就会在传承中得到永生！） 相关练习
1. Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies are the following works except ____. A. Hamlet B. King Lear C. Romeo and Juliet D. Othello
2. The Essence of Renaissance, the most significant intellectual movement, was_____.
A. Geographical exploration B. Religious reformation C. Publishing and translation D. Humanism.
3. In “Sonnet 18”, Shakespeare_________________.
A. Meditate on the destructive power of time and eternal beauty by poetry. B. Satirize(讽刺) human’s vanity. C. Predict(预测) the eternity of love.
D. Eulogize(颂扬) the power of the beauty.
4. Which of the following statement best illustrates the theme of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18?
A. The speaker eulogizes the power of Nature. B. The speaker satirizes human vanity.
C. The speaker praises the power of artistic creation.
? D. The speaker meditates on man’s salvation.
? 5. The Renaissance refers to between 14th-mid-17th century, which was under the reign of Queen ___and absolute monarchy in England reached its summit, and in which the ’real mainstream (真正的文学主流)’ was ____. ? A. Victoria/poetry ? B. Elizabeth/ drama ? C. Mary/ novel ? D. James/ drama
? 6. _____, the first of the great tragedies, is generally regarded as Shakespeare’s most popular play on the stage, for it has the qualities of a “blood-and-thunder” thriller and a ’philosophical exploration’ of life and death. ? A. The Merchant of Venice B. Hamlet ? C. King Lear D. The Winter’s Tale 四．18世纪英国文学
? The 18th-century England is known as the Age of Enlightenment or the Age of Reason.
? 17th century writer John Milton ranks as one of the greatest poets in the history of English literature. His masterpiece Paradise Lost (失乐园)was published in 1667. Later another epic poem Paradise Regained(复乐园), sequel to Paradise Lost, was published with the poetic drama Samson Agonistes(力士参孙).
? The mid-18th century was, however, predominated by a newly rising literary form, the modern English novel, which, contrary to the traditional romance of aristocrats, gives a realistic presentation of life of the common English people. ? Daniel Defoe is considered to be the father of the English novel. His masterpiece is Robinson Crusoe. It is considered to be the first English novel ? Jonathan Swift is generally considered the greatest prose satirist(讽刺散文家) in English literature. His language is simple, clear and vigorous. He once asserted: “ Proper words in proper place, makes the true definition of a style.” 他曾把文字风格定义成“恰到好处的词语用在恰到好处的地方”
? There are no ornaments in his writings. In simple, direct and precise prose, Swift is almost unsurpassed in English literature.
? Gulliver's Travels, Jonathan Swift's best fictional work, contains four parts, each about one particular voyage during which Gulliver has extraordinary adventures on some remote island after he has met with shipwreck or piracy or some other misfortune. ? 相关练习
? 1. In which of the following works can you find the proper names \\”?
? A. The Pilgrim’s Progress B. The Farrie Queene
? C. Gulliver’s Travels D. The School of Scandal ? 2. ______is a typical feature of Swift’s writings. ? A. Elegant style B. Causal narration
? C. Bitter satire D. Complicated sentence structure
3. The Houyhnhnms depicted by Jonathan Swift in Gulliver’s Travels
are________.
A. horses that are endowed with reason.
B. pigmies that are endowed with admirable qualities C. giants that are superior in wisdom.
D. Hairy, wild, low and despicable creatures, who resemble human beings not only in appearance but also in some other ways. 五．浪漫主义诗歌
? （一）先驱：Robert Burns 罗伯特·彭斯 ，William Blake 威廉·布莱克 ? Robert Burns is a national poet of Scotland, a poet of peasants, his poems are written in Scottish dialect. A Red, Red Rose(《红红的玫瑰》) and Auld lang Syne are his most popular poems.
? To see a world in a grain of sand, /And a heaven in a wild flower, /Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, /And eternity in an hour. ——William Blake一花一世界，一沙一天国， 君掌盛无边， 刹那含永劫。 ?
? （二）代表诗人：
? 1. Escapist romanticists / Lake Poets(湖畔派诗人) (William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey) ? 2. active romanticists /demonic group/Satanic school (撒旦派) (George Gordon Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats)
? English Romanticism is generally said to have began in 1798 with the publication of Wordsworth & Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads and to have ended in 1832 with Sir Walter Scott’s death.
? William Wordsworth started with Samuel Taylor Coleridge the English Romantic movement with their collection Lyrical Ballads in 1798. Lyrical Ballads 《抒情歌谣集》followed by “The Preface to the Lyrical Ballads”—served as the manifesto（宣言） of the English Romantic Movement in poetry. ? “All good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings that takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility.”—— William Wordsworth（诗是强烈情感的自然流露；诗源于在平静中积累的情感。） ? 相关练习
? 1. The Romantic Movement expressed a more or less______ attitude toward the existing social and political conditions.
? A. positive B. negative C. neutral D. indifferent
? 2. For the Romantics, ____is not only the major source of poetic imagery, but also provides the dominant subject matter.
? A. love B. man C. nature D. death
? 3. In the Romantic period, ____is the most prosperous literary form. ? A. prose B. poetry C. fiction D. play
? 4. Romanticism is a period of British literature roughly dated from__. ? A.1660-----1798 B.1798----1832 ? C.1483-----1546 D.1836-----1901
? 5. The two major novelists of the English Romantic Period are _____and Walter Scott.
? A. Washington Irving B. Jane Austen
? C. Herman Melville D. Charles Dickens
? 6.William Wordsworth, a romantic poet, advocated all the following EXCEPT ___.
? ?A. the use of everyday language spoken by the common people ? ?B. the expression of the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings ? ?C. the use of humble and rustic life as subject matter
? ?D. the use of elegant wording and inflated figures of speech
? 7. The publication of “_______” marked the beginning of Romantic Age. ? A. Don Juan B. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner ? C. The Lyrical Ballads? D. Queen Mab
? 8. The major representatives of the poetic revolution in English Romantic period were Samuel Taylor Coleridge and____.
? A. William Blake B. William Wordsworth ? C. John Keats D. Percy Bysshe Shelley ? ?
? 诗选
? I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud——William Wordsworth ? I wandered lonely as a cloud
? That floats on high o'er vales and hills, ? When all at once I saw a crowd, ? A host, of golden daffodils;
? Beside the lake, beneath the trees, ? Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. ? Continuous as the stars that shine ? And twinkle on the milky way, ? They stretched in never-ending line
? Along the margin of a bay: ? Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
? Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. ? The waves beside them danced, but they ? Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: ? A poet could not but be gay, ? In such a jocund company:
? I gazed--and gazed--but little thought ? What wealth the show to me had brought: ? For oft, when on my couch I lie
? In vacant or in pensive mood, ? They flash upon that inward eye ? Which is the bliss of solitude;
? And then my heart with pleasure fills, ? And dances with the daffodils. ? 我好似一朵孤独的流云，
英国文学期末考试题目英语专业必备
