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It explains how early literature before Chaucer was difficult for modern readers, then outlines key historical forces: Anglo-Saxon migration and the conversion to Christianity. The discussion of surviving manuscripts clarifies how the record was preserved, while commentary on lost works and references to earlier lyric traditions highlights the gaps and the richness suggested by cultural artifacts.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":15,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/literature/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/a-short-history-of-english-literature/318025/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/a-short-history-of-english-literature/318025.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Finn","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-21","2026-09-20",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":39},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"Why does the book say early English literature before Chaucer is hard for modern readers?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"It states that although readers can grasp the general meaning of Chaucer, the earliest literature can read “like a foreign tongue,” which led to neglect. It also notes much of it can be obtained in translation today.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"What two major events does the book identify as shaping early English history?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"It highlights the arrival of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes before the Norman Conquest and the second event: the conversion of the English to Christianity. It links Anglo-Saxon poetry largely to these developments.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"How does the book explain the role of manuscripts in knowing Anglo-Saxon poetry?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"It says Anglo-Saxon poetry was recorded in manuscripts whose survival is difficult. It then identifies four manuscript groups as central sources and explains how the extant evidence may not fully represent the period’s lost works and earlier traditions.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},318025,1790852013,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":14,"category_name":15,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":39,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":139,"language":140,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":144,"read_time":145},34359740700684,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/avatar/1f400023980c374ae676?_k=1777273430885731487","CONTENTS  \n8  \nAcknowledgements  \nPreface  \n9  \nI Before the Conquest  \nII  \n2 English Poetry from Chaucer to JohnDonne23  \n3English Poetryfrom Milton to WilliamBlake46  \n66  \n4 The Romantic Poets  \n5 English Poetry from Tennyson to hePresent Day9r  \n6 English Drama to Shakespeare127  \n7 Shakespeare  \nI47  \n8 English Drama from Shakespeare toSheridan163  \n9 English Drama from Sheridan to thePresent DayI84  \n10 The English Novel to Defoe205  \nII The English Novel from Richardson toSir Walter Scott216  \nI2 The English Novel from Dickens to thePresent Day237  \n13 English Prose to the Eighteenth Century 289  \n14 Modern English Prose31IIndex345  \n# ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS\n\nFor permission to publish extracts from poems in thisbook,acknowledgement is made to the following:  \nFor Thomas Hardy,extract from Nature's Question-ing'from the Collected Poems of Thomas Hardy,to theHardy Estate,Macmillan and Co.Ltd,London,TheMacmillan Company,New York,and The MacmillanCompany of Canada Ltd;for A.E.Housman,extractsfrom ‘Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries'and Fromfar,from eve and morning',to The Society of Authorsas the literary representative of the Estate of A.E.Housman,and Jonathan Cape Ltd,publishers of A.E.Housman's Complete Poems;for George Bernard Shaw,extract from Heartbreak House,to The Society of Authorsfor the Bernard Shaw Estate;for W.B.Yeats,extractfrom ‘Sailing to Byzantium'from the Collected Poems ofW.B.Yeats,to M.B.Yeats,Macmillan and Co.Ltd,and The Macmillan Company,New York(copyrightI928 by The Macmillan Company,renewed 1956 byGeorgie Yeats);and for W.B.Yeats,extract from\"TheScholars'from the Collected Poems ofW.B.Yeats,to M.B.Yeats,Macmillan and Co.Ltd,and The MacmillanCompany,New York(copyright I919 by TheMacmillan Company,renewed 1947 by Bertha GeorgieYeats)。  \n# PREFACE\n\nThis edition has not only been fully revised but it is muchexpanded.Previous editions had,for considerations ofspace,to be confined to history and criticism.There wasno room for quotations.The absence of this illustrativematerial was always felt as a serious loss.Now in this largervolume the record of criticism and comment is confirmedby a wide range of carefully chosen quotations.It is to behoped that the many readers who have expressedappreciation of the shorter volume will find additionalpleasure in this volume,now that the writers can speakfor themselves.  \nIn preparing this revised edition I have been much as-sisted by the advice of two friends,Professor RandolphQuirk,Quain Professor at University College London,and Professor Terence Spencer,Professor at the Universityof Birmingham,and Director of the Shakespeare Institute.  \n# Before the Conquest\n\nENGLISH literature is often described as beginning withChaucer.This would give England six centuries of litera-ture.Actually there were more than six centuries ofliterature before Chaucer was born.The modern readercan make out the general meaning of a page of Chaucerwithout difficulty,but if he looks at our earliest literaturehe finds that it reads like a foreign tongue.This is thereason for the neglect ofour early literature,though todaymuch of it can be obtained in translation.  \nThe two most important events in the history of Eng-land took place before the Norman Conquest.It was inthat period that the Angles and Saxons and Jutes came toEngland in marauding bands and made English historypossible.From all accounts they were respectable gentle-men when at home,but they changed their manners whenthey were looking for Lebensraum.They were heathen,andthe second great event at that time is the conversion of theEnglish to Christianity.In 597 Augustine had come fromRome and begun to convert theJutes in Kent,while aboutthe same time monks from Ireland were setting upmonasteries in Northumbria.Most English poetry in theearly Anglo-Saxon period is associated with these twoevents.Either the stories are brought over by the invadingtribes from their Continental Germanic homes,or theyshow a keen interest in Bible stories,in Chri","cbCaii9caRWo2dr0","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaii9caRWo2dr0","pdf",42000617,167,"English","# Contents\n## Acknowledgements\n## Preface\n## Before the Conquest\n## English Poetry from Chaucer to John Donne\n## English Poetry from Milton to William Blake\n## The Romantic Poets\n## English Poetry from Tennyson to the Present Day","[{\"question\":\"Why does the book say early English literature before Chaucer is hard for modern readers?\",\"answer\":\"It states that although readers can grasp the general meaning of Chaucer, the earliest literature can read “like a foreign tongue,” which led to neglect. It also notes much of it can be obtained in translation today.\"},{\"question\":\"What two major events does the book identify as shaping early English history?\",\"answer\":\"It highlights the arrival of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes before the Norman Conquest and the second event: the conversion of the English to Christianity. It links Anglo-Saxon poetry largely to these developments.\"},{\"question\":\"How does the book explain the role of manuscripts in knowing Anglo-Saxon poetry?\",\"answer\":\"It says Anglo-Saxon poetry was recorded in manuscripts whose survival is difficult. It then identifies four manuscript groups as central sources and explains how the extant evidence may not fully represent the period’s lost works and earlier traditions.\"}]","A Short History of English Literature | PDF",1789939312,257]