3rd Meeting (2nd Quarter) Students' Copy PDF

Recognize authors and literary pieces from the different parts of the world. Understand how culture and tradition impact the aesthetic creation of literature. Identify which make these representative texts standout. “The difference between the present and the past is that the conscious present...

Recognize authors and literary pieces from the different parts of the world. Understand how culture and tradition impact the aesthetic creation of literature. Identify which make these representative texts standout. “The difference between the present and the past is that the conscious present is an awareness of the past in a way and to an extent which the past’s awareness of itself cannot show.” T.S. Eliot, Tradition and the Individual Talent: An Essay  The world, especially the West, has categorized literature unto periods. The Classical period was a time in Western art, music, and literature that lasted from roughly 1750 to 1820. The first stories that propagated the world were about gods and goddesses. Literature, even before the term existed and before a system of writing was invented, was spread orally. When civilizations had invented a system of writing, they preserved oral literature in clay tablets along with other records of history. The very first written work of literature, The Epic of Gilgamesh, was written in Mesopotamia.  This centers on the hero, Gilgamesh, an abusive ruler in Mesopotamia who was sent to a journey by the gods to teach him a lesson. Written on 12 incomplete Akkadian-language tablets found in the mid-19th century by the Turkish Assyriologist Hormuzd Rassam at Nineveh in the library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal (reigned 668–627 bce). Mesopotamia arose in a valley between two rivers. These rivers were Tigris and Euphrates. In fact, the word Mesopotamia in Greek means, 'the land between rivers'. So Mesopotamia is a region between these rivers and not a country.  This period is home for great Greek and Roman mythologies, epics, and ideologies that still interest people even nowadays. It is a golden age for literature and art, and many writers, poets, and playwrights that we look up to until today are from this age. Some Writers known in this era include Homer, who wrote the great epics The Iliad and The Odyssey; Tragedian Playwrights such as Aeschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles; Notable Poets such as Virgil and Horace; and Greek Philosophers such as Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle.  Also known as the Dark Ages, the Medieval Period is an era that comes after the fall of the Roman Empire. It was a chaotic period embodied by wars and fueled by different reasons such as territorial dispute, feudal concerns, religion, and others. This chaos is also mirrored in the literary production of this time as its themes centered on wars and chivalry, aand featured knights and courtly love. One example is the epic poem Beowulf.  Beowulf is our first great epic which features the hero, Beowulf, and his journey in fighting monsters. This epic is an important piece of literature, as it is the earliest surviving and complete Anglo-Saxon epic told in a language now regarded as Old English. Much of romantic tropes that we know today, such as a knight saving a damsel-in-distress, is a direct influence of the medieval Ages.  The French word renaissance literally means “rebirth,” and that was the goal of this era: to reestablish the standards set in the Classical period or to even surpass it. This era is also marked by several changes and milestones: the creation of printing press, which allowed literature and information to be available to the masses; the changes in the church and the creation of Protestantism and the Church of England; and the discovery that the world is not the center of the universe. The Renaissance was a period of cultural, artistic, political, and economic rebirth in Europe that occurred from the 14th to the 17th centuries.  With Humanism as its prevalent theme, writers and the people of this period valued human dignity and explored human worth. A great example of this was Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy that centers on the hero’s journey from inferno (hell) to paradiso (heaven). The work mirrors the classical style of an epic poetry while addressing the concerns about human existence and morality in the story.  The very first printing press, the Gutenberg Press, was established in the 15th century, and this made storytelling and writing even more popular. Invented by Johannes Gutenberg, a German craftsman and inventor who originated a method of printing from movable type. This period is also known as the Age of reason, marked by pursuits in different fields of science, mathematics, astronomy, physics, medicine, philosophy, and politics. Thinkers such as René Descartes, Galileo Galilei, and Johannes Kepler made significant contributions in the fields of mathemetics and science. This encouraged a more rational and secular perspective about the world.  Thinkers such as Thomas Hobbes and John Locke wrote their scrutiny of the nature of humankind, which has served as our basis in understanding humans and communities even until today. Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) and John Locke (1632-1704) were both English political thinkers who shared some ideas but had different views on the nature of government and human nature  Hobbes was a proponent of Absolutism, a system which placed control of the state in the hands of a single individual, a monarch free from all forms of limitations or accountability. Locke, on the other hand, favored a more open approach to state-building. Locke believed that a government’s legitimacy came from the consent of the people they governed. The Romantic period was an artistic movement that took place from roughly 1820 to 1900. Take note that Romanticism does not equate to love alone; in fact, Romantics were poets and writers who explored the nature of emotions. They wrote about happiness, sadness, joy, alienation- everything else that humans feel. It is a literary movement that emphasizes the idea of beauty, emotion, subjectivity, and imagination. This movement in arts arose as an opposition to the idea espoused by the Enlightenment Period. Romantics were writers who rejected conformity and emphasized individuality. In the previous eras, there is a greater weight put in the characters’ actions and decisions, but the Romantics devised characters whose feelings and thoughts were more important. Notable poets in this movement are John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and William Blake.  While Percy Bysshe Shelly was known for his lyrical poems, his wife, Mary Shelley, established her name through the gothic novel Frankenstein. Gothic Literature also became popular during the Romantic period as writers did not only explore the positive side of human beings but also their dark side. American writer Edgar Allan Poe is usually referred to as the Father of Gothic literature.  The name of the period is an homage to Queen Victoria, the ruler of England from 1837-1901, who had one of the longest reigns in British history. This era is known as the age of industrial revolution, which paved way to technological advances and the expansion of British territories. Ironically, even at the tip of modernity, Victorians were conservatives. People of this era were known to be earnest and gave importance to manners. This earnestness is exemplified even in their fictional characters who are either morally upright or the opposite.  The period also saw more women writers such as the Brontë Sisters and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Elizabeth Barrett Browning was published at a young age, wit her first poem being privately printed by her father. On the other hand, the Brontë Sisters- Charlotte, Emily, and Anne- used names that would rid of the feminine character- Currer, Ellis, and Acton Belle- to be able to publish their novels. This was possible as it was in this era when writers were allowed to submit works anonymously and to use pseudonyms, which women writers took advantage of.  There is an ongoing argument as to where and when Modernism started. For most scholars, Modernism is a literary movement dominant from 1914 to 1945 as a direct consequence of technological advancements brought about by the 20th century, as well as the changes brought about Word Wars I and II. This is a period where poets incorporated stranger metaphors and figures of speech in their verses. Free Verse was more dominantly embraced rather than the carefully constructed and metered potery. “The difference between the present and the past is that the conscious present is an awareness of the past in a way and to an extent which the past’s awareness of itself cannot show.” T.S. Eliot, Tradition and the Individual Talent: An Essay One of the notable literary figures during this time.