1. Anglo-Saxon English or Old English盎格鲁-撒克逊英语或旧英语: The Anglo-Saxon (Old English) period roughly dates from the coming of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes to England (about 450 A.D.) to about 1100. Old English contains some fifty or sixty thousand words, which were chiefly Anglo-Saxon with a small mixture of early Scandinavian words, and borrowed a considerable number of Latin words.
2. Epic叙事诗; 史诗;: long narrative poems that record the adventures or heroic deeds of a hero in vast landscapes. The style of epic is grand and elevated. e.g. Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey; Dante’s Divine Comedy; Beowulf and John Milton’s Paradise Lost
3. Alliteration: refers to a repeated initial consonant to successive words and it is the most striking feature in its poetic form. In alliterative verse, certain accent words in a line begin with the same consonant sound. There are generally 4 accents in a line, three of which show alliteration. It is a regular recurring structural feature of the Old English verse.
4. Metaphor隐喻: A figure of speech that makes a comparison between two things that are basically dissimilar. A metaphor does not use a connective word such as “like”, “as”, or resembles in making the comparison. Many metaphors are implied, or suggested.
5. Understatement保守的陈述: it is the opposite of hyperbole or overstatement. It achieves its effect of emphasizing a fact by a weaker statement, or by deliberately understating it. This quality is often regarded as a permanent characteristic of the English.
6. Romance爱情小说: was the prevailing form of literature in the Middle Ages. The romance was the upper-class literary form. It was a long composition, sometimes in verse, sometimes in prose, describing the life and adventures of a noble hero. The essential features are: ①It lacks general resemblance to truth or reality. ②It exaggerates the vices of human nature and idealizes the virtues. ③It contains perilous adventures more or less remote from ordinary life. ④It lays emphasis on supreme devotion to a fair lady. ⑤The central character of the romance is the knight, a man of noble birth skilled in the use of weapons. He is commonly described as riding forth to seek adventures, taking part in tournaments, or fighting for his lord in battle. He is devoted to the church and the king.
7. Ballad民谣: it is a story told in song, usually in 4-line stanzas, with the second and fourth lines rhymed. The subjects of ballads are various in kind, as the struggle of young lovers against their feudal-minded families, the conflict between love and wealth, the cruelty of jealousy, the criticism of the civil war, and the matters of class struggle. e.g. The Robin Hood Ballads
8. Allegory寓言: it is a figurative narrative or description, conveying a veiled moral meaning. This fictional literary narrative acts as an extended metaphor in which persons, abstract ideas or events represent not only themselves on the literal level, but also stand for something else on the symbolic level. An allegory reading usually involves moral or spiritual concepts that may be more significant than the actual, literal events described in a narrative. e.g. John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress
9. Heroic couplet（两行相互押韵、每行分五音节的）英雄偶句诗: it is a pair of rhymed lines of iambic pentameter. The form was introduced into English by Chaucer, and widely used subsequently, reaching a height of popularity in the works of Dryden and Pope.
1. Renaissance文艺复兴: in European history, refers to the period between 14th century to 17th century. It first started in Italy. “Renaissance” means “revival”, the revival of interest in Ancient Greek and Roman culture and getting rid of conservatism in feudalistic Europe and introducing new ideas that express the interests of the rising bourgeoisie, to lift the restrictions in all areas placed by the Roman church authorities.
2. Humanism人道主义，人本主义，人文主义; 人文学;：is the key-note of the Renaissance. Humanism
reflected the new outlook of the rising bourgeois class, which saw the world opening before it. According to the humanists, both man and world are hindered only by external checks from infinite improvement. Man could mould the world according to his desires, and attain happiness by removing all external checks by the exercise of reason.
3. Utopia: Book One: 1) 乌托邦（理想中美好的社会）; A picture of contemporary England: The poverty among the poor; The greed and luxury among the rich; The eagerness for war of the rulers; The suffering of the peasants for the enclosure movement. 2) An exposure of the evil reality of his time, the rich men’s conspiracy against the poor. Book Two: 1) More provided us a sketch of an ideal commonwealth where property was held in common and there was no poverty. 2) More showed a principle, “From everyone according to his capacities, to everyone according to his needs”. 3) More solved the problem of the separation of town and country by co-operation between them. 4) More emphasized the importance of labor for every member of the Utopian society. And the Utopians spent their spare time in study of literature, art and science.
4. Sonnet十四行诗; 短诗; 商籁体;: it is a poem of 14 lines, typically in rhymed iambic pentameter. The sonnet was introduced to England by Sir T. Wyatt and developed by Henry Howard and was thereafter widely used notably in the sonnet sequences of Shakespeare, Sidney, and Spenser.
5. Spenserian Stanza（英国诗人）斯宾塞诗体;: this stanza is invented by Edmund Spenser, in which he wrote The Faerie Queene. It consists of eight five-foot iambic lines, followed by an iambic line of six feet, rhyming ababbcbcc.
6. The Miracle Play奇迹剧: Miracle plays are simply plays based on Bible popular in England from the 13th to the late 16th century, covering from Creation to the Last Judgment. They were first performed in the churches in the Middle Ages, but later forbidden inside the church. So they went to the market place. People enjoyed them very much. Miracle plays, together with other kinds of early plays, keep alive the English Dramatic tradition, and pave the way for the flouring of drama in the English Renaissance period.
7. The Morality Play道德剧: is a kind of medieval and early Renaissance drama that presents the conflict between the good and evil through allegorical characters. The characters tend to be personified abstractions of vices and virtues, which can be named as Mercy, Conscience, Shame and Lust. Unlike a mystery or a miracle play, a morality play does not necessarily use Biblical or strictly religious material because it takes place internally and psychologically in every human being. The protagonist often has a name that represents this universality, such as “ Everyman”, “ Mankind”, “Soul”, or “Adam” etc. Prevailing in the Middle Ages, Morality Plays contribute to the flowering of English drama in the Renaissance England.
8. The Interlude: a short performance slipped into a play to enliven the audience after a solemn scene.
9. Comedy 喜剧;: is a light form of drama that aims primarily to amuse and that ends happily. Since it strives to provoke smile and laughter, both wit and humor are utilized. In general, the comic effect arises from recognition of some incongruity of speech, action, or character revelation, withintricate plot. In Shakespeare’s comedies, the playwright sings of youth, love and ideals of happiness. The heroes and heroines fight against destiny and mold their own fate according to their own free will. The general spirit of those comedies is optimism.
10. Tragedy悲剧: the word is applied broadly to dramatic works in which events move to a fatal or disastrous conclusion. It is concerned with the harshness and apparent injustice of life. Often the hero falls from power and his eventual death leads to the downfall of others. The tragic action arouses feelings of awe in the audience. 11. Blank verse无韵诗，素体诗（不押韵的五音步诗行）: also called unrhymed poetry, has been the dominant verse form of English drama and narrative poetry since the mid-sixteenth century. In 1540, from Italy, this verse form was brought into English literature by the poet Henry Howard (Earl of Surrey), who first used it in his translation of The Aeneid.
12. Masques (masks) 假面舞会;: are dramatic entertainments involving dances and disguises, in which the
spectacular and musical elements predominated over plot and character. They were acted indoors by amateurs, and were designed to include their spectators in the action, sometimes simply by a concluding dance. As they were usually performed at court, many have political overtones. They were perhaps of Italian origin, but assumed a distinctive character in England in the 16th and 17th century.
13. Three unities三一律: The unities of time, place and action. It required that the events of a play not exceed a single day (time), be confined to a single location or to several locations within a small area (place), and not have subplots (action). It is term given by Aristotle and strictly adhered in 17th France and then over Europe.
1. Elegy挽歌;: The term is used to refer to the subject matter of change and loss frequently expressed in the elegiac verse form (usu hexameter and pentameter), esp in complaints about love.
2. Metaphysical Poets挽歌; [?met?'f?z?kl]：were a loose group of British lyric poets of the 17th century, including John Donne, George Herbert, and Andrew Marvell, who shared an interest in metaphysical concerns and a common way of investigating them. Their works were characterized by inventiveness of metaphor (these involved comparisons being known as metaphysical conceits, that is, far-fetched or unusual similes or metaphors), wit, imaginative picturing, compressions, often cryptic expression and play of paradoxes. Generally, their poetry is characterized by mysticism in content and fantasticality in form.
3. Cavalier Poets: 骑士诗人： a group of supporters of Charles Ⅰin the Bourgeois Revolution consists of John Suckling, Thomas Carew and Robert Herrick. These poets were not a formal group, but all were influenced by Ben Jonson and like him paid little attention to the sonnet; their lyrics are distinguished by short lines, precise but idiomatic diction, and an urbane and graceful wit.
1. The Enlightenment: 启蒙运动 also called the neoclassic movement. It refers to the philosophical and artistic movement growing out of the Renaissance and continuing until the 19th century. The term is generally used to describe the philosophical, scientific, and rational spirit, the freedom from superstition, the skepticism and faith in religious tolerance of much of 18th century Europe. It celebrated reason or rationality, equality and science. It advocated universal education. The Enlightenment writers would use satire to ridicule the illogical errors in government, social custom, and religious belief.
2. Classicism古典主义，古典风格;：when applied generally, means clearness, elegance, symmetry, and repose produced by attention to traditional forms. More precisely, the term refers to the admiration and imitation of Greek and Roman literature, art and architecture. It stands for certain definite ideas and attitudes including dominance of reason balance and order etc. Classicism is usually contrasted with romanticism.
3. Didactic poems说教诗: poems that are “preachy” or seek overtly to convince a reader of a particular point of lesson. Medieval homilies and Victorian moral essays are often help up as examples of didactic literature. 4. Sentimentalism感情主义: The term is used in two senses. The first is overindulgence in emotion, esp. the conscious effort to induce emotion and the failure to restrain emotion. The second is optimistic overemphasis of the goodness of humanity. Sentimentalism turned to the countryside for its material. Meanwhile, the poetry of the sentimentalists is marked by a sincere sympathy for the poverty-stricken, expropriated peasants. The representative writers of 18th century sentimentalism include Steele, Sterne and Goldsmith.
5. Graveyard School墓地学校: Graveyard School refers to a school of poets of the 18th century whose poems are mostly devoted to a sentimental lamentation or meditation on life. Past and present, with death and graveyard are the usual themes. Thomas Gray is considered to be the leading figure of this school and his Elegy written in a country churchyard is its most representative work. 6. Romantic Revival: in the latter half of the 18th century, a new literary movement arose in Europe, called the Romantic Revival. It was marked by a strong protest against the
(完整版)英国文学史名词解释
