CHAUCER'S PROSE

                          The prose of the late fourteenth century in England is not to the mere literary taster, with one notable exception, at all comparable in interest to the verse of the same time. For this time was in fact the beginning of English prose properly so called.Before 1350 it may be doubted whether there is a single English work in prose.
                           At the great turning-point, however, which, though it must have come sooner or later anyhow,was undoubtedly determined to no small extent by the concentration of English patriotic sentiment, owing to the conquests of Edward3, prose did not merely, like verse, make a fresh start, it made start almost for the first time. From the later years of Edward and the reign of richard2, date four writers prose, each noteworthy in his own way,- Chaucer the poet, Wyclif the controversialist, Trevisa the chronicler, and  the shadowy personage long know,and perhaps even yet not entirely exercised, as   "sir John Mandeville". All were translators in less or greater degree, but all also were originals of English prose writing.
                           The interest of Chaucer's prose work, the Treatise on the Astrolabe, the translation of Boethius, Tthe Parson's Tale, and the Tale of Melibee, is almost entirely an interest of form; and in the last that interest is minimised and almost confined to the fitful and straggling emergence of blank verse, or something like it , at the opening. So too the Parson's tale, a translation , does not advance us very much further than the prose treatises by or attributed to Hampole and his followers in the first half of the century. It is good straightforward English, but shows no attempt at style, while the well-worn and strictly prescribed common form of its matter expresses further limitations.The Boethius and the Astrolabe are superior. The version of the first, even if it were intrinsically less attractive, would inevitably invite comparison with Alfred's at the dawn of modern English prose, and the often noble,never contemptible, matter of original could not and did not fail to stimulate an artist like the Chaucer. But the most valuable point of the Boethius as an exercise for the 'metres' which, especially when rendered by such a poet as Chaucer into a language with such illimitable latent possibilities  as English , must needs results far more ambitious and far more successful attempts in 'the other harmony' than had appeared.                       
                                 Accordingly some of the metre passages in Chaucer's version, though quite legitimate and sound prose, attain a rhythmical as well as verbal dignity, which English prose was hardly to know again save in a few passages of Malory,Fisher, Berners, and the translators of the Bible, till late in sixteenth century.And whole shows that, if it had suited Chaucer to write more originally in prose, he might have effected a revolution there in at least as great as that which he did effect in verse, nay greater , seeing that he had practically no forerunners.










                         

JOHN GOWER

      

  Almost exactly contemporary with Chaucer were two others poets, both of more than ordinary mark- one of than Chaucer's own equal, if not superior, in intensity, though far his inferior in range and in art, both curious contrasts in more ways than one with him, and with each other.The first was the author of the Vision of Piers the Plowman; the second was John Gower.
      
John Gower, (born 1330?—died 1408, London?), medieval English poet in the tradition of courtly love and moral allegory, whose reputation once matched that of his contemporary and friend Geoffrey Chaucer, and who strongly influenced the writing of other poets of his day. After the 16th century his popularity waned, and interest in him did not revive until the middle of the 20th century.
It is thought from Gower’s language that he was of Kent origin, though his family may have come from Yorkshire, and he was clearly a man of some wealth. Allusions in his poetry and other documents, however, indicate that he knew London well and was probably a court official. At one point, he professed acquaintance with Richard II, and in 1399 he was granted two pipes (casks) of wine a year for life by Henry IV as a reward for complimentary references in one of his poems. In 1397, living as a layman in the priory of St. Mary Overie, Southwark, London, Gower married Agnes Groundolf, who survived him. In 1400 Gower described himself as “senex et cecus” (“old and blind”), and on Oct. 24, 1408, his will was proved; he left bequests to the Southwark priory, where he is berried.
 Beside the shadowy and in part apocalyptic figure of Langland, the solid, well-authenticated, some what prosaic personality and literary work of John gower present a contrast which has its interest. His birth-year is not certain ; he died, old and it is said blind, in 1408, and his tomb is one of the numerous literary illustrations of the great and recently  rebuilt church of St. Saviour's, or St.Mary Overy's, Southwark, with Gower seems to have been connected in various ways. Indeed, though married, he appears to have been in minor orders.
Gower is the last of the probably not small  other than English men of letters between 1200 and 1400 who were trilingual- writing and probably speaking, French, Latin, and English with equal facility. The principal existing piece of Gower's French is a set of fifty Ballads, the favourite French form, with untwisted identical rhymes, a recurrent refrain, and an envoy. But he also wrote in French one of the three divisions of his capital work, the Speculum Meditates,a moral poem,another part of this ,the vox Clamantis, also exists, but is in Latin.a lively political poem in elegies.The Confessio Amantis, third and English part of Gower's Opus msgnum, is much less vigorous and spirited than either of this Latin poems.
Gower was both. The want of zest and rest in his literary style, and still more in his poetical medium, must not be allowed to blind us to the fact that both show an enormous improvement on such immediate predecessors as Hampole,as the author of The Pearl, as the author Cursor Mundi.He knows his craft far better than they did; he has better tools; he can teach others to turn out work that can be depended on.
 

WILLIAM LANGLAND

               Almost exactly contemporary with Chaucer were two others poets, both of more than ordinary mark- one of than Chaucer's own equal, if not superior, in intensity, though far  his inferior in range and in art, both curious contrasts in more ways than one with him, and with each other.The first was the author of the Vision of Piers the Plowman; the second was John Gower.       WILLIAM LANGLAND, the generally accepted author of the Medieval allegorical poem Piers Plowman, is a figure of whom there is no mention in contemporary records. Everything written about his life is educated conjecture based on Langland's texts and later allusions.

Langland was born sometime around 1330. In the B-Text of Piers Plowman, composed around 1377, Imagination says he has followed him "this five and forty winters." In the Dublin manuscript (D.4.1), a note in a fifteenth-century hand claims that Langland's father was one "Stacy de Rokayle." In mid-sixteenth century, Bale in his Illustris Majoris Britanniae wrote that Langland was from "Mortymers Clibury" (now Cleobury Mortimer) in Shropshire near the Malvern Hills where Piers Plowman opens. There was a hamlet named "Langley" nearby, which may explain his last name.¹

The attribution of Piers to Langland rests principally on the evidence of a manuscript held at Trinity College, Dublin (MS 212). This directly ascribes 'Perys Ploughman' to one 'Willielmi de Langlond', son of 'Stacy de Rokayle, who died in Shipton-under-Wychwood, a tenant of the Lord Spenser in the county of Oxfordshire'. Other manuscripts also name the author as 'Robert or William langland', or 'Wilhelmus W.' (most likely shorthand for 'William of Wychwood'). The poem itself also seems to point towards Langland's authorship. At one stage the narrator remarks: 'I have lyved in londe...my name is longe wille' (B.XV.152). This can be taken as a coded reference to the poet's name, in the style of much late-medieval literature (see, for instance, Villon's acrostics in Le Testament). Although the evidence may appear slender, Langland's authorship has been widely accepted by commentators since the 1920s. It is not, however, entirely beyond dispute, as recent work by Stella Pates and C. David Benson has demonstrated.
Nevertheless he had a great literary talent, which perhaps amounted to genius. The literary craftsmanship which succeeds in impressing on a form so uncouth as the unrhymed and only faintly metred alliterative verse the combination of freedom and order, of swing and variety, which marks Piers Plowman, is of that kind which must distinguished itself whatsoever the form it happened to adopt. And although the architectonic gift, which might have enabled the poet to to present a real whole instead  of a series of dissolving views, ,is not present, yet it is astonishing with how little repugnance the reader who has once ''got his hand in'' accepts this apparent incoherence, and resigns himself to see the visions rise and gleam and melt, the bubbles swell and gleam and break. While as for the force of individual passages-the prologue, the fable, the best court scenes, the London Tavern, the Harrowing of Hell- these have never been mistaken by any competent critic who has read them.

GEOFFREY CHAUCER'S LIFE

The life of Chaucer has for greater part of century had its full share of that touching, if not always intelligent, devotion which justifiesthe theory that the human race is not after all indifferent to its heroes.There is no positive evidence of the the date of Chaucer's birth;for that of his death, 1400, we have not only tradition but the strong circumstantial proof that his pensions ceased to be paid at that time. He was pretty certainly the son the son of John and Agens Chaucer. Nor is there any doubt that Geoffrey Chaucer himself was in close  and constant connectionwith the Royal Family
.Geoffrey Chaucer (born 1340/44, died 1400) is remembered as the author of The Canterbury Tales, which ranks as one of the greatest epic works of world literature. Chaucer made a crucial contribution to English literature in using English at a time when much court poetry was still written in Anglo-Norman or Latin.
A considerable body of minor poems, original and translated - The Book of Duchess, The Parliament of Flowers, The Complaints of Mars and Arcite, with about  a score of shorts pieces, ballads, and more.
The House of Fame.
The Legend of good women.
Troilus and Cressid.
The canterbury Tales.
All his  this work divided into three periods- in the first of which, represented by The Romaunt of the Rose and most of minor poems, French influence predominates; in the second of which this is exchanged for Italian,as shown in Troilus [adapted from Boccaccio]; the House of fame, and the first draft of the Knight's Tale [again from Boccaccio]; while  in the third, of which the Canerbury Tales are the great outcom .The great feature of the Canterbury  Tales is the extraordinary vividness and precision of the presentment of images, whether complicated or simple.

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ANGLO-SAXON ERA

                                                                                                                                                                           It was said very naturally a popular opinion that the Norman Conquest sufficiently accounted for the practical disappearance of Anglo-Saxon literature. Saxon Conquest had swept away Roman Britain,so it was discerned that conquest only helped and turned to good a process in language which had been independently begun, which was going rapidly.A language by weakness ,by ancient, by ill luck may never produce literature at all.But if it produces things like the Ruin and the Phoenix,like the best parts of the poems attributed to Caedmon,and those thought to be signed by Cynewulf ,the language itself was showing signs of a complete "break of voice" of an important biological alteration.
We have seen that Anglo-Saxon succeed in producing work both in prose and verse which has not only intrinsic merit and interest and additional historic claim but which has further attraction. Icelandic itself was probably some two centuries behind Anglo-Saxon in use of vernacular prose. We are going to study the two literary form of literature Anglo-Saxon poetry and Anglo-Saxon prose.

ANGLO-SAXON POETRY
                                                                                                                                                          However this may be,it is certain, as literature the Anglo-Saxon in prose is very much less than its achievement in verse.
Anglo-Saxon poetry,then, as we see it in the sufficient if not very plentiful remains of its best period before the end of the eighth century , displays merits of what we my call poetical intention considerably surpassing those shown by most litterateurs in their early stages.In the first respect the author of Beowulf is at least not less richly and variously endowed than even the author of the Chanson De Roland; in second the author of Phoenix is very far ahead of the author of Poema del Cid. The alliteration supplied a musical charm which has never died out of English poetry, and therefore never can die out of it. For a certain meditative kind of poetry,like that of the Ruin and the great Phoenix passage, the whole scheme is well fitted, in its earliest form, as in Beowulf, and its latest and almost last, as in Layamon. The poem called Widsith, from its opening word,designation of a 'far-travelled' and interesting as sketching the gainful and varied life of a minstrel in dark ages. There are names in Widsith-Heorot, Hrothgar, and others Beowulf.  Beowulf presents itself in a manner which may be summarised as follows;it is a poem, in rather less than 3200 lines, which must necessary be very old first invasion of Britain by the Saxons. The other remains which certainly or probably belong to the same class chronologically with Widsith and Beowulf are of much shorter length The Fragment about sixty lines called Waldhere. So, too the Fight and Finnsburg about fifty lines and Complaint of Deor  shows us immense advance in poetical form.
 Some notice of the more remarkable contents and characteristics of these era's poem will be given presently. Caedmon, who towards the and of the century was servant of the monastery of Whitby , was miraculously inspired to write sacred poetry. The Runic charades or acrostics which compose the name 'Cynewulf' a great poet who wrote  merely poems.

ANGLO-SAXON PROSE

The prose division of Anglo-Saxon literature is of less than the verse; but it is more abundant in quality ,and it is not separated from later developments of the language. In all languages poetry as literature comes before prose, the immortal jest of Moliere said that though prose is more obviously natural to man in conversation. By the ninth century ,however, there is no doubt about the the plentiful production and the at least relative accomplishment  of Anglo- Saxon prose.Of the three writers of it who alone may be said to have a personal reputation , king Alfred, Elfric, and Archbishop Wulfstan,the first belongs to this century, the last third of which was was covered by his glorious and beneficent reign. The Saxon Chronicle, in its continuous and fairy accomplished shape, may be a little older than Alfred himself.
Alfred's works are, with the exception of some original insertions, translation-indeed, the matter is about the last that the Anglo-Saxon as a literature can claim. But in the special circumstances this makes far more for the king's honour. His literary work was inspired not by any desire of fame, nor by any need of satisfying a peremptory personal craving to write, but wholly and solely by the wish to benefit his people,to do something that might help England.His noteworthy works the History and Geography of Orosius;one in domestic history, the unrivalled Ecclesiastical History of Bede;the most popular ethical and philosophical treatise of the Dark Ages, the Consolation of Boethius; and an ecclesiastical book, the Cura Pastorals of Pope Greogory. Alfred's translation of Bede's History has yet again a different kind of interest; and to us it is specially welcome because it brings the Venerable one within the compass a history English Literature.
The two remaining known and distinctive writers of Anglo-Saxon prose come under the disqualification which attaches from the purely literary point of view to religious writers, in all cases but those of a very few periods and a few individuals outsides them-the disqualification not at all that they are religious but they are second hand the first is Elfric, is undoubtedly the greatest pose writer in the language known by his great work Blickling Homilies. And the third writer Wulfstone, Archbishop of York, in him we find more attempt at periodic prose.

 

Definition or Nature of literature

                                                                                                                                                                Here we are going to study of  English literature so first we have to define what is literature and how it is different from other
what is literature?

and

what is literary study?
we can define that that literature and literary study are two different activities,

• literature is creative
• it is art
• it is science

literary study is one of  the species of knowledge of learning .
The definition or nature of literature.
different critics have different views of definition of literature
as Edwin Greenlaw in his book "The Province of Literary History"says-
Nothing related to the history of civilization is beyond our province.We are not manuscript record in our efforts to understand a period or civilization,we must see our work in light of its possible contribution to the history of culture.
literature will be judged valuable only so far as it yields results for all disciplines 'Greats Books' The study of isolated great books commendable for pedagogical purpose, especially new students should real great or at least good books and not mere compilation or historical curiosities.
The word literature has its etymological origin in 'litra' or 'written'.The advocates of this theory,ignore oral literature like legends, folk tales and such other works which have literary values. In literature the  particular use of language as material like as stone is of sculpture and paint of painting .As in  The Nature of Literature the use of the language can be either literary or everyday use ;but this distinction is not satisfactory.
Nature of literature emerges most clearly under the represential aspects.The centre of literary art is to be found in lyric,the epic,the drama, it is the reference to a world of fiction,of imagination.Characters have no past ,no future and no continuity in life.time and space in a novel or drama are not those of real life.The distinguishing traits of literature are fictionality,invention or imagination.
Literature grows out of life;but it is difficult to define it. Anything in print can be literature but it is not true. Historical study overlooks literary values;literary study has the emotional content predominant. Purely informative books have aesthetic points, Oral literature is part of literature as found in legends, myths, and ballads epics etc.Style and language make literature distinct as it is expression of emotion in words. Imagination and fictionality are the distinctive features of literature,it is personal use or exercise of language.


 

Sharing my Literature experiance

Hello Everyone,

I'm very new to this blogger and just started today.
I'm sharing my English literature experience to everyone. this will helpful in your career , study.