英国文学2

英国文学史2

The understanding of English literature 一The brief introduction of English literature in renaissance The Renaissance marks a transition from the medieval to the modern world. Generally, it refers to the period between the 14th and mid-17th centuries. It first started in Italy, with the flowering of painting, sculpture and literature. From Italy the movement went to embrace the rest of Europe. The Renaissance, which means rebirth or revival, is actually a movement stimulated by a series of historical events, such as the rediscovery of ancient Roman and Greek culture, the new discoveries in geography and astrology, the religious reformation and the economic expansion. The Renaissance, therefore, in essence, is a historical period in which the European humanist thinkers and scholars made attempts to get rid of those old feudalist ideas in medieval Europe, to introduce new ideas that eased the interests of the rising bourgeoisie, and to recover the purity of the early church from the corruption of the Roman Catholic Church. The Renaissance was slow in reaching England not only because of England's separation from the Continent but also because of its domestic unrest. Thus began the English Renaissance, which was perhaps England's Golden Age, especially in literature. Among the literary giants were Shakespeare, Spenser, Johnson, Sidney, Marlowe, Bacon and Donne. The English Renaissance had no sharp break with the past. Attitudes and feelings which had been characteristic of the 14th and 15th centuries persisted well down into the era of Humanism and Reformation. Humanism is the essence of the Renaissance. It sprang from the endeavor to restore a medieval reverence for the antique authors and is frequently taken as the beginning of the Renaissance on its conscious, intellectual side, for the Greek and Roman civilization was based on such a conception that man is the measure of all things. Through the new learning, humanists not only saw the arts of splendor and enlightenment, but the human values resented in the works. In the medieval society, people as individuals were largely subordinated to the feudalist rule without any freedom and independence; and in medieval theology, people's relationships to the world about them were largely reduced to a problem of adapting to or avoiding the circumstances of earthly life in an effort to pare their souls for a future life. The 16th century in England was a period of breaking up of feudal relations and the establishing of the foundations of capitalism. At the beginning of the 16th century the outstanding humanist Thomas More (1478__1535) wrote his Utopia(1516) in which he gave a profound and truthful picture of the people’s sufferings and put forward his ideal of future happy society. At the end of the 16th century the great English scientist and philosopher Francis Bacon (1561_1626) wrote his famous philosopher and literary works. In the first half of the 16th century there appeared lyrical poems by Thomas Wyatt(1503_1542), Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517_1547) and others who

中世纪英国文学概述

中世纪英国文学概述 中世纪文学（约5世纪-1485） 英国最初的文学同其他国家最初的文学一样，不是书面的，而是口头的。故事与传说口头流传，并在讲述中不断得到加工、扩展，最后才有写本。公元5世纪中叶，盎格鲁、撒克逊、朱特三个日耳曼部落开始从丹麦以及现在的荷兰一带地区迁入不列颠。盎格鲁-撒克逊时代给我们留下的古英语文学作品中，最重要的一部是《贝奥武甫》（Beowulf），它被认为是英国的民族史诗。《贝奥武甫》讲述主人公贝尔武甫斩妖除魔、与火龙搏斗的故事，具有神话传奇色彩。这部作品取材于日耳曼民间传说，随盎格鲁-撒克逊人入侵传入今天的英国，现在我们所看到的诗是8世纪初由英格兰诗人写定的，当时，不列颠正处于从中世纪异教社会向以基督教文化为主导的新型社会过渡的时期。因此，《贝奥武甫》也反映了7、8世纪不列颠的生活风貌，呈现出新旧生活方式的混合，兼有氏族时期的英雄主义和封建时期的理想，体现了非基督教日耳曼文化和基督教文化两种不同的传统。 公元1066年，居住在法国北部的诺曼底人在威廉公爵率领下越过英吉利海峡，征服英格兰。诺曼底人占领英格兰后，封建等级制度得以加强和完备，法国文化占据主导地位，法语成为宫廷和上层贵族社会的语言。这一时期风行一时的文学形式是浪漫传奇，流传最广的是关于亚瑟王和圆桌骑士的故事。《高文爵士和绿衣骑士》（Sir Gawain and the Green Knight，1375-1400）以亚瑟王和他的骑士为题材，歌颂勇敢、忠贞、美德，是中古英语传奇最精美的作品之一。传奇文学专门描写高贵的骑士所经历的冒险生活和浪漫爱情，是英国封建社会发展到成熟阶段一种社会理想的体现。 14世纪以后，英国资本主义工商业发展较快，市民阶级兴起，英语逐渐恢复了它的声誉，社会各阶层普遍使用英语，为优秀英语文学作品的产生提供了条件。杰弗利·乔叟（Geoffrey Chaucer， 1343-1400）的出现标志着以本土文学为主流的英国书面文学历史的开始。《坎特伯雷故事》（The Canterbury Tales）以一群香客从伦敦出发去坎特伯雷朝圣为线索，通过对香客的生动描绘和他们沿途讲述的故事，勾勒出一幅中世纪英国社会千姿百态生活风貌的图画。乔叟首创英雄诗行，即五步抑扬格双韵体，对英诗韵律作出了很大贡献，被誉为"英国诗歌之父".乔叟的文笔精练优美，流畅自然，他的创作实践将英语提升到一个较高的文学水平，推动了英语作为英国统一的民族语言的进程。

英国文学名词解释

Allegory is a tale in verse or prose in which characters, actions, or settings represent abstract ideas or moral qualities. Thus, an allegory is a story with two meaning, a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning. Bildungsroman: a novel that traces the initiation, development, and education of a young person. Examples are Dickens’s David Copperfield and James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Byronic hero is a character-type found in Byron’s narrative Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. He is a boldly defiant but bitterly self-tormenting outcast, proudly contemptuous of social norms but suffering for some unnamed sin. Emily Bronte’s Heath cliff is a later example. Conceit: a kind of metaphor that makes a comparison between two startlingly different things. A conceit usually provides the framework for an entire poem. An especially unusual and intellectual kind of conceit is the metaphysical conceit, used by certain 17th-century poets, such as John Donne.. Comedy of manners is a kind of comedy representing the complex and sophisticated code of behavior current in fashionable circles of society, where appearances count for more than true moral character. Its humor relies chiefly on elegant verbal wit and repartee. In England, the comedy of manners flourished as the dominant form of Restoration comedy in the works of Etheredge, Wycherley and Congreve. It was revived in a more subdued form in the 1770s by Goldsmith and Sheridan, and later by Oscar Wilde. An epic is a long narrative poem in elevated or dignified language, typically one derived from ancient oral tradition, narrating and celebrating the deeds and adventures of heroic or legendary figures or the past history of a nation. Epiphany(顿悟）: a sudden revelation of truth about life inspired by a seemingly trivial incident Heroic couplet is the rhymed couplet of iambic pentameter. Intrusive narrator: an omniscient narrator who, in addition to reporting the events of a novel’s story, offers further comments on characters and events, and who sometimes reflects more generally upon the significance of the story. Iambic pentameter: a poetic line consisting of five verse feet, with each foot an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. Iambic pentameter is the most common verse line in English poetry. Metaphysical poetry: the poetry of John Donne and other 17th-century poets who wrote in a similar style. It is characterized by verbal wit and excess, ingenious structure, irregular meter, colloquial language, elaborate imagery, and a drawing together of dissimilar ideas . Metaphysical Poetry Metaphysical Poetry is commonly used to name the work of the 17th century writers who wrote under the influence of John Donne. With a rebellious spirit, the metaphysical poets try to break away from the conventional fashion of the Elizabethan love poetry. They are characterized by mysticism in content and fantasticality in form. John Donne is the lead ing figure of the “metaphysical school.” Naturalism: a post--Darwinian movement of the late 19th century that tried to apply the laws of scientific determinism to fiction. The naturalists went beyond the realists’ insistence on the objective presentation of the details of everyday life to insist that the materials of literature

英国文学史及选读__期末试题及答案

考试课程：英国文学史及选读考核类型：A 卷 考试方式：闭卷出卷教师: XXX 考试专业：英语考试班级：英语xx班 I.Multiple choice (30 points, 1 point for each) select from the four choices of each item the one that best answers the question or completes the statement. 1._____，a typical example of old English poetry ,is regarded today as the national epic of the Anglo-Saxons. A.The Canterbury Tales B.The Ballad of Robin Hood C.The Song of Beowulf D.Sir Gawain and the Green Kinght 2._____is the most common foot in English poetry. A.The anapest B.The trochee C.The iamb D.The dactyl 3.The Renaissance is actually a movement stimulated by a series of historical events, which one of the following is NOT such an event? A.The rediscovery of ancient Roman and Greek culture. B.England’s domestic rest C.New discovery in geography and astrology D.The religious reformation and the economic expansion 4._____is the most successful religious allegory in the English language. A.The Pilgrims Progress B.Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners C.The Life and Death of Mr.Badman D.The Holy War 5.Generally, the Renaissance refers to the period between the 14th and mid-17th centuries, its essence is _____. A.science B.philosophy C.arts D.humanism 6.“So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,/So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”(Shakespeare, Sonnets18)What does“this”refer to ? A.Lover. B.Time. C.Summer. D.Poetry. 7.“O prince, O chief of my throned powers, /That led th’ embattled seraphim to war/Under thy conduct, and in dreadful deeds/Fearless, endangered Heaven’s perpetual king”In the third line of the above passage quoted from Milton’s Paradise Los t, the phrase“thy conduct”refers to _____conduct. A.God’s B.Satan’s C.Adam’s D.Eve’s

英国文学题库2(含正确答案)

1.______ is not a novel written by Jane Austen. A. Jane Eyre B. Sense and Sensibility C. Pride and Prejudice D. Emma 2. Alexander Pope worked painstakingly on his poems and finally brought to its last perfection ______ Dryden had successfully used in his plays. A. the heroic couplet B. the free verse C. the bland verse D. the Spenserian stanza 3. ______ has been regarded by some as the “Father of the English Novel” for his contribution to the establishment of the form of the modern novel. A. John Bunyan B. Henry Fielding C. Daniel Defoe D. Alexander Pope 4. ______ defines the poet as a “man speaking to men,” and poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings, which originates in emotion recollected in tranquility.” A. William Blake B. William Wordsworth C. Samuel Taylor Coleridge D. John Keats 5. Romanticism does not emphasize ______ . A. the special qualities of each individual’s mind B. the inner world of the human spirit C. individuality D. the features that men have in common 6. Which of the following is NOT a typical aspect of Defoe’s language? A. Elegant. B. Colloquial. C. Vernacular. D. Smooth. 7. The Rivals and ______ are generally regarded as important links between the masterpieces of Shakespeare and those of Bernard Shaw. A. The School for Scandal B. The Duenna C. Widowers Houses D. The Doctor’s Dilemma 8. ______ was the only important dramatist of the 18th century. A. Alexander Pope B. Richard Brinsley Sheridan C. Samuel Johnson D. George Bernard Shaw 9. What makes Jonathan Swift’s satire all the more bitter, biting and poignant is that his satire is often masked by ______ on the part of the author. A. an apparent eagerness, gravity, sincerity and detachment in tone B. a softness and persuasiveness in manner and firmness and thoroughness in action C. a strong indignation in tone and open defiance and challenge D. a friendliness and frankness in tone and the seeming indifference and nonchalance

英国文学概述-王守仁

英国文学概述－王守仁 英国文学概述 英国文学源远流长，经历了长期、复杂的发展演变过程。在这个过程中，文学本体以外的各种现实的、历史的、政治的、文化的力量对文学发生着影响，文学内部遵循自身规律，历经盎格鲁—撒克逊、文艺复兴、新古典主义、浪漫主义、现实主义、现代主义等不同历史阶段。下面对英国文学的发展过程作一概述。 一、中世纪文学（约5世纪—1485） 英国最初的文学同其他国家最初的文学一样，不是书面的，而是口头的。故事与传说口头流传，并在讲述中不断得到加工、扩展，最后才有写本。公元5世纪中叶，盎格鲁、撒克逊、朱特三个日耳曼部落开始从丹麦以及现在的荷兰一带地区迁入不列颠。盎格鲁—撒克逊时代给我们留下的古英语文学作品中，最重要的一部是《贝奥武甫》（Beowulf），它被认为是英国的民族史诗。《贝奥武甫》讲述主人公贝尔武甫斩妖除魔、与火龙搏斗的故事，具有神话传奇色彩。这部作品取材于日耳曼民间传说，随盎格鲁-撒克逊人入侵传入今天的英国，现在我们所看到的诗是8世纪初由英格兰诗人写定的，当时，不列颠正处于从中世纪异教社会向以基督教文化为主导的新型社会过渡的时期。因此，《贝奥武甫》也反映了7、8世纪不列颠的生活风貌，呈现出新旧生活方式的混合，兼有氏族时期的英雄主义和封建时期的理想，体现了非基督教日耳曼文化和基督教文化两种不同的传统。 公元1066年，居住在法国北部的诺曼底人在威廉公爵率领下越过英吉利海峡，征服英格兰。诺曼底人占领英格兰后，封建等级制度得以加强和完备，法国文化占据主导地位，法语成为宫廷和上层贵族社会的语言。这一时期风行一时的文学形式是浪漫传奇，流传最广的是关于亚瑟王和圆桌骑士的故事。《高文爵士和绿衣骑士》（Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, 1375-1400）以亚瑟王和他的骑士为题材，歌颂勇敢、忠贞、美德，是中古英语传奇最精美的作品之一。传奇文学专门描写高贵的骑士所经历的冒险生活和浪漫爱情，是英国封建社会发展到成熟阶段一种社会理想的体现。 14世纪以后，英国资本主义工商业发展较快，市民阶级兴起，英语逐渐恢复了它的声誉，社会各阶层普遍使用英语，为优秀英语文学作品的产生提供了条件。杰弗利?乔叟（Geoffrey Chaucer, 1343-1400）的出现标志着以本土文学为主流的英国书面文学历史的开始。《坎特伯雷故事》（The Canterbury Tales）以一群香客从伦敦出发去坎特伯雷朝圣为线索，通过对香客的生动描绘和他们沿途讲述的故事，勾勒出一幅中世纪英国社会千姿百态生活风貌的图画。乔叟首创英雄诗行，即五步抑扬格双韵体，对英诗韵律作出了很大贡献，被誉为“英国诗歌之父”。乔叟的文笔精练优美，流畅自然，他的创作实践将英语提升到一个较高的文学水平，推动了英语作为英国统一的民族语言的进程。 二、文艺复兴时期文学（15世纪后期—17世纪初） 相对于欧洲其他国家来说，英国的文艺复兴起始较晚，通常认为是在15世纪末。文艺复兴时期形成的思想体系被称为人文主义，它主张以人为本，反对中世纪以神为中心的世界观，提倡积极进取、享受现世欢乐的生活理想。托马斯?莫尔（Thomas More, 1478-1535）是英国最主要的早期人文主义者，他的《乌托邦》（Utopia）批评了当时的英国和欧洲社会，设计了一个社会平等、财产公有、

英国文学史及选读 复习要点总结

《英国文学史及选读》第一册复习要点 1. Beowulf: national epic of the English people; Denmark story; alliteration, metaphors and understatements （此处可能会有填空，选择等小题） 2. Romance （名词解释） 3. “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”: a famous roman about King Arthur’s story 4. Ballad（名词解释） 5. Character of Robin Hood 6. Geoffrey Chaucer: founder of English poetry; The Canterbury Tales (main contents; 124 stories planned, only 24 finished; written in Middle English; significance; form: heroic couplet) 7. Heroic couplet (名词解释)8. Renaissance（名词解释）9.Thomas More——Utopia 10. Sonnet（名词解释）11. Blank verse（名词解释）12. Edmund Spenser “The Faerie Queene” 13. Francis Bacon “essays” esp. “Of Studies”（推荐阅读，学习写正式语体的英文文章的好参照，本文用词正式优雅，多排比句和长句，语言造诣非常高，里面很多话都可以引用做格言警句，非常值得一读） 14. William Shakespeare四大悲剧比较重要，此外就是罗密欧与朱立叶了，这些剧的主题，背景，情节，人物形象都要熟悉，当然他最重要的是Hamlet这是肯定的。他的sonnet也很重要，最重要属sonnet18。（其戏剧中著名对白和几首有名的十四行诗可能会出选读） 15. John Milton 三大史诗非常重要，特别是Paradise Lost和Samson Agonistes。对于Paradise Lost需要知道它是blank verse写成的，故事情节来自Old Testament，另外要知道此书theme和Satan的形象。 16. John Bunyan——The Pilgrim’s Progress 17. Founder of the Metaphysical school——John Donne; features of the school: philosophical poems, complex rhythms and strange images. 18. Enlightenment（名词解释） 19. Neoclassicism（名词解释） 20. Richard Steele——“The Tatler” 21. Joseph Addison——“The Spectator”这个比上面那个要重要，注意这个报纸和我们今天的报纸不一样，它虚构了一系列的人物，以这些人物的口气来写报纸上刊登的散文，这一部分要仔细读。 22. Steel’s and Addison’s styles and their contributions 23. Alexander Pope: “Essay on Criticism”, “Essay on Man”, “The Rape of Lock”, “The Dunciad”; his workmanship (features) and limitations 24. Jonathan Swift: “Gulliver’s Travels”此书非常重要，要知道具体内容，就是Gulliver游历过的四个地方的英文名称，和每个部分具体的讽刺对象; （我们主要讲了三个地方）“A Modest Proposal”比较重要，要注意作者用的irony 也就是反讽手法。 25. The rise and growth of the realistic novel is the most prominent achievement of 18th century English literature. 26. Daniel Defoe: “Robinson Crusoe”, “Moll Flanders”, 当然是Robinson Crusoe比较重要，剧情要清楚，Robinson Crusoe的形象和故事中蕴涵的早期黑奴的原形，以及殖民主义的萌芽。另外注意Defoe的style和feature，另外Defoe是forerunner of English realistic novel。 27. Samuel Richardson——“Pamela” (first epistolary novel), “Clarissa Harlowe”, “Sir Charles Grandison” 28. Henry Fielding: “Joseph Andrews”, “Jonathan Wild”, “Tom Jones”第一个和第三个比较重要，需要仔细看。他是一个比较重要的作家，另外Fielding也被称为father of the English novel. 29. Laurence Sterne——“Tristram Shandy”项狄传 30. Richard Sheridan——“The School for Scandal” 31. Oliver Goldsmith——“The Traveller”(poem), “The Deserted V illage” (poem) (both two poems were written by heroic couplet), “The Vicar of Wakefield” (novel), “The Good-Natured Man” (comedy), “She stoops to Conquer” (comedy),

英国文学2

Part One Anglo-Saxon Literature（大约450- 1066）Anglo-Saxon literature, that is, the Old English literature，is almost exclusively a verse（韵文）literature in oral form. It could be passed down by word of mouth from generation to generation. Its creators for the most part are unknown. It was only given a written form long after its composition. There were two groups of English poetry in Anglo-Saxon period. The first group was the pagan (非宗教的)poetry represented by Beowulf [be???w?lf]（《贝奥武甫》它被认为是英国的民族史诗。《贝奥武甫》讲述主人公贝奥武甫斩妖除魔，与火龙搏斗的故事，具有神话色彩。）课下网上欣赏电影“Beowulf” （女主角：安吉丽娜·朱莉）或《贝奥武夫与怪兽格兰戴尔》。 The second was the religious poetry represented by the works of Caedmon （凯德蒙，公元7世纪盎格鲁-撒克逊基督教诗人）and Cynewulf [K]（基涅武甫，盎格鲁-撒克逊诗人，生活在公元9世纪，其古英语诗稿于10世纪被发现，有《埃琳娜》、《使徒的命运》、《基督升天》和《朱莉安娜》等）.In the 8th century, Anglo-Saxon prose appeared.（《尚书》的出现标志着中国散文的形成。非成于一人之手，后由孔子编订，成于春秋末战国初,战国时期开始于公元前475年）The famous prose writers of the period were Venerable Bede（比德，英国历史学家和神学家, the most important of his works is The Ecclesiastical History of the English People《英国基督教会史》.）and Alfred the Great( he is the king of Wessex Kingdom. The most important of his works is The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles《盎格鲁撒克逊编年史》. Part Two Medieval English Literature (1066—1485) Medieval English literature can be divided into three parts, the first is Anglo-Norman literature, in 1066, the Duke of Normandy William the Great led the Norman army to invade England. After the conquest, the feudal system was established in English society. The body of customs and ideals known as chivalry(骑士精神表现为对个人人格的爱护和尊重；为被压迫者和被迫者牺牲全部力量乃至生命的慷慨勇敢精神；把女子作为爱和美在尘世上的代表及作为和谐，和平与安慰的光辉之神而加以理想化的崇拜等等，) was introduced by the Normans into England. The knightly code（道德尊则）, the romantic interest in women, tenderness and reverence paid to Virgin Mary（圣母玛丽亚）were reflected in the Literature. The Normans began to write histories or chronicles. Most of the books were written in Latin or French. The romance(传奇文学) was the main form of literature in the Middle Ages. It was a long composition, sometimes in verse, sometimes in prose, describing the life and adventures of a noble hero. The romance prospered for about 300 years (1200-1500). It was written for the noble class, so it had nothing to do with the common people. The second part is English Literature in Age of Chaucer(乔叟). Chaucer lived in the 14th century. Geoffrey Chaucer, th e last one, was the greatest of them. He was a scholar, traveler, a business man, courtier（朝臣）, who shared in all the stirring life of his age and reflected it in his works. He was the representative writer of the century.The

大三_英国文学史(绝对标准中文版)

英国文学源远流长，经历了长期、复杂的发展演变过程。在这个过程中，文学本体以外的各种现实的、历史的、政治的、文化的力量对文学发生着影响，文学内部遵循自身规律，历经盎格鲁-撒克逊、文艺复兴、新古典主义、浪漫主义、现实主义、现代主义等不同历史阶段。下面对英国文学的发展过程作一概述。 一、中世纪文学（约5世纪-1485） 英国最初的文学同其他国家最初的文学一样，不是书面的，而是口头的。故事与传说口头流传，并在讲述中不断得到加工、扩展，最后才有写本。公元5世纪中叶，盎格鲁、撒克逊、朱特三个日耳曼部落开始从丹麦以及现在的荷兰一带地区迁入不列颠。盎格鲁-撒克逊时代给我们留下的古英语文学作品中，最重要的一部是《贝奥武甫》（Beowulf），它被认为是英国的民族史诗。《贝奥武甫》讲述主人公贝尔武甫斩妖除魔、与火龙搏斗的故事，具有神话传奇色彩。这部作品取材于日耳曼民间传说，随盎格鲁-撒克逊人入侵传入今天的英国，现在我们所看到的诗是8世纪初由英格兰诗人写定的，当时，不列颠正处于从中世纪异教社会向以基督教文化为主导的新型社会过渡的时期。因此，《贝奥武甫》也反映了7、8世纪不列颠的生活风貌，呈现出新旧生活方式的混合，兼有氏族时期的英雄主义和封建时期的理想，体现了非基督教日耳曼文化和基督教文化两种不同的传统。 公元1066年，居住在法国北部的诺曼底人在威廉公爵率领下越过英吉利海峡，征服英格兰。诺曼底人占领英格兰后，封建等级制度得以加强和完备，法国文化占据主导地位，法语成为宫廷和上层贵族社会的语言。这一时期风行一时的文学形式是浪漫传奇，流传最广的是关于亚瑟王和圆桌骑士的故事。《高文爵士和绿衣骑士》（Sir Gawain and the Green Knight，1375-1400）以亚瑟王和他的骑士为题材，歌颂勇敢、忠贞、美德，是中古英语传奇最精美的作品之一。传奇文学专门描写高贵的骑士所经历的冒险生活和浪漫爱情，是英国封建社会发展到成熟阶段一种社会理想的体现。 14世纪以后，英国资本主义工商业发展较快，市民阶级兴起，英语逐渐恢复了它的声誉，社会各阶层普遍使用英语，为优秀英语文学作品的产生提供了条件。杰弗利·乔叟（Geoffrey Chaucer， 1343-1400）的出现标志着以本土文学为主流的英国书面文学历史的开始。《坎特伯雷故事》（The Canterbury Tales）以一群香客从伦敦出发去坎特伯雷朝圣为线索，通过对香客的生动描绘和他们沿途讲述的故事，勾勒出一幅中世纪英国社会千姿百态生活风貌的图画。乔叟首创英雄诗行，即五步抑扬格双韵体，对英诗韵律作出了很大贡献，被誉为"英国诗歌之父".乔叟的文笔精练优美，流畅自然，他的创作实践将英语提升到一个较高的文学水平，推动了英语作为英国统一的民族语言的进程。 二、文艺复兴时期文学（15世纪后期-17世纪初） 相对于欧洲其他国家来说，英国的文艺复兴起始较晚，通常认为是在15世纪末。文艺复兴时期形成的思想体系被称为人文主义，它主张以人为本，反对中世纪以神为中心的世界观，提倡积极进取、享受现世欢乐的生活理想。托马斯·莫尔（Thomas More， 1478-1535）是英国最主要的早期人文主义者，他的《乌托邦》（Utopia）批评了当时的英国和欧洲社会，设计了一个社会平等、财产公有、人们和谐相处的理想国。Utopia现已成为空想主义的代名词，但乌托邦是作者对当时社会状况进行严肃思考的结果。《乌托邦》开创了英国哲理幻想小说传统的先河，这一传统从培根的《新大西岛》（The New Atlantis）、斯威夫特的《格列佛游记》（Gulliver's Travels）、勃特勒的《埃瑞璜》（Erewhon）一直延续到20世纪