CHRONOLOGICAL OVERVIEW OF ENGLISH LITERATURE

English history

The history of English, since its inception in a mixture of West Germanic dialects is now seen as the global language, it is a complex but interesting language. This timeline offers a glimpse of some of the key events, themes, works, authors that helped shape the English language in recent years.

History of English Language

Period (439-1066)

- (731). The venerable Bede, in his monastery at Jarrow, completes his history of the English Church and people.

- (975-1025). Beowulf, the first great work of Germanic literature, mingles the legends of Scandinavia with the experience in England of Angles and Saxons.

- (959). The material of the Eddas, taking shape in Iceland, derives from earlier sources in Norway, Britain and Burgundy.

1. The Old English Period

Period (1066-1500)

2. The Middle English

Period

- (1367). A narrator who calls himself will, and whose name may be Langland, begins the epic poem of Piers Plowman.

- (1387). Chaucer begins an ambitious scheme for 100 Canterbury Tales, of which he completes only 24 by the time of his death.

- (1469). Thomas Malory, in gaol somewhere in England, compiles Morte d'Arthur.

- An English account of the French tales of King Arthur.

Period (1500-1660)

3. The Renaissance

Period

- (1510). Erasmus and Thomas More take the northern Renaissance in the direction of Christian Humanism.

- (1590). English poet Edmund Spenser celebrates the protestant Elizabeth I as The Faerie Queene.

- (1601). Shakespeare's central character in Hamlet expresses both the ideals of the Renaissance and the disillusion of a less confident age.

Period (1660-1785)

- (1667). Paradise lost is published, earning its author John Milton just E10.

- (1726). Jonathan Swift sends his hero on a series of bitterly satirical travels in Gulliver's Travels.

- (1755). Samuel Johnson publishes his magisterial Dictionary of the English Language.

4. The Neoclassical

Period

Period (1785-1832)

5. The Romantic Period

- (1792). English author Mary Wollstonecraft publishes a passionately feminist work, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.

- (1813). Pride and Prejudice, based on a youthful work of 1797 called first Impressions, is the second of Jane Austen's novels to be published.

- (1831). Oliver Wendell Holmes' poem The Last Leaf is inspired by an aged survivor of the Boston Tea Party.

Period (1832-1901)

6. The Victorian Period

- (1843). Ebenezer Scrooge mends his ways just in time in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol.

- (1895). H.G. Wells publishes The Time Machine, a story about a time Traveller whose first stop on his journey is the year 802701.

- (1900). Frank Baum introduces children to Oz, in his book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

Period (1901-1914)

7. The Edwardian Period

- (1901). Beatrix Potter publishes at her own expense The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

- (1908). Lucy Maud Montgomery's first novel, Anne of Green Gables, brings her instant fame and fortune.

- (1910). H.G. Wells publishes The History of Mr Polly, a novel about an scape from drab everyday existence.

Period (1914-1936)

8. The Georgian Period

- (1915). Rupert Brooke's 1914 and Other Poems is publishes a few months after his death in Greece.

- (1925). Virginia Woolf publishes her novel Mrs Dalloway, in which the action is limited to a single day.

- (1928). Irish author Frank Harris publishes the fourth and final volume of My Life and Loves.

Period (1936-1950)

9. The Modern Period

- (1936). US author Margaret Mitchell publishes her one book, which becomes probably the best-selling novel of all time- Gone with the Wind.

- (1940). Ernest Hemingway publishes the novel for whom the bell tolls, set in the Spanish Civil War.

- (1945). In George Orwell's fable Animal Farm a ruthiess pig, Napoleon, controls the farmyard using the techniques of Stalin.

Period (1950-2000)

10. The Postmodern Period

- (1950). C.S Lewis Gives the first glimpse of Narnai in The Lion, the witch and the Wardrobe.

- (1979). US author Maya Angelou publishes her autobiographical first novel, I know why the caged Bird sings.

- (1997). A schoolboy wizard performs his first tricks in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

(2000 - Present)

- (2010). Mockingjay completes Suzanne Collins´ trilogy, The Hunger Games.

- (2013-present). J.K Rowling (under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith) starts Cormoran Strike, a series of crime fiction novels.

11. The Contemporary Period