British+literature

toc =BRITISH LITERATURE=

**How has british literature evolved?**
Literature can tell us much about society, culture and even about the author.Just by looking at the theme of the literature we can often tell which period inhistory the text was written. In the medieval period the author wrote about the knights, kings and royal people who lived at that time. Shakespeare's texts can tell us what state of mind he was, he had periods where the theme shifted from sad to happy comedies, and then to tragedies. You can read "Othello" and you can get reminded about how fragile our lives are and how evil the world can be. The writer such as Shakespeare and Dickens did not change the literature themselves, but the way they wrote about difficult social conditions did that people opened their eyes and were more aware of it. We can get much information about the society and people from literature.

In literature there are many main themes. The themes authors often had chosen and still choose is the difference between the rich and the poor, women and men and also about the government and all of them can also tell us about the conditions at the time. Only by looking at a text, the theme and dialect we can guess from what period of time the text was written in, and almost every time be right. ​ The first record of any writing is from the medieval period (1200-1500). The authors wrote in the Anglo-Saxon dialect and the texts could contain word such as accord that meant agreed, aiel that meant grandfather, caples instead of horses and many more. The authors wrote about romances in that time and tales about King Arthur and his court were especially popular to write about. The authors did not only write about romance, but they also wrote a lot about religion and the church. One example of that are __ “ __The Canterbury Tales” by Geoffrey Chaucer that in almost every tales includes something about religion. Look at texts from this period of time and you’llsee that almost every one of these texts will have romance,King Arthur or religion as the main or secondary theme.

In the renaissance period the greatest authors from Britain lived. One of them was Shakespeare and he wrote many plays that are known all over the world. Could you find one person that wouldn’t know of “__ Romeo and Juliet __”? By looking at the different plays of Shakespeare you can tell which period it was written, because the themes would change. In the beginning he wrote sad plays, then the theme shifted and he wrote happy comedies and in the end he wrote tragedies. You could ask yourself why there are so many famous writers from the renaissance, but first of all we have to know that renaissance means “New Birth” and Greek literature was a great inspiration. Many authors did get very inspired because the Greek literature had so strong and powerful writing that gave them new ideas. Other great writers from that period were Ben Johnson__, Philip Sidney __and __ John Fletcher. __Most of the poets/writers at that time also were playwrights.

Much later in the history around the 19th century the authors started to write to whole truth about the bad conditions and poor people. The fact that authors such as Charles Dickens and Jane Austen were writing about how it really was out in world, shocked most of the population and made that they started thinking about other people.__ “Oliver Twist” __(can be read) and “A Christmas Carol”(can be read) by Charles Dickens are two examples of text that showed you the conditions of the poor and how cruel the rich people could be. On the contrary Jane Austen’s novels showed you a life from the point of view of a woman, and people weren’t used that women could speak out and have their own minds. Literature helped the world evolve to a better place, without racism and prejudice because it helped people understand how others though and felt. We could say that we can thank the authors and the literature for the world that we know of today.

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Many things have changed since the first books were written and until now. The authors have changed the things they write about, like in the medieval period they wrote about King Arthur and romances, and now they write about the rich and poor and real life. There are not many now who’ll write about kings, castles and only the good things in life, there will always be something bad, but that makes only life better afterward.The literature have woken up people from their sleep and opened their eyes to what’s really going on.

There are many differences between the writing in medieval and the renaissance and now, but there are also some similarities. The one big similarity that has been going on from the very start and will probably go on forever is the big, important theme called love. In every text that has been written in Britain you will find a little bit at least about love. The writers also didn’t just tell us about the bad stuff, but that you for example can be happy even if you’re poor or have a good life if you just have someone to love you. British have had so many famous writers that have become world known and have influenced other cultures, literature and people to change. Any book, small or big can change something in a better way.

Written by Monika

Sources:
 * http://www.englishlanguageguide.com/english/culture/englishliterature.asp
 * http://classiclit.about.com/cs/britishliterature/
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_literature

Links:
 * http://www.dickens-literature.com/Oliver_Twist/index.html
 * http://www.dickens-literature.com/A_Christmas_Carol/index.html
 * http://www.william-shakespeare.info/shakespeare-play-romeo-and-juliet.htm
 * http://www.dickens-literature.com/l_biography.html
 * http://www.william-shakespeare.info/shakespeare-play-othello.htm
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Canterbury_Tales
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Jonson
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Philip_Sidney
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Fletcher_%28playwright%29
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Austen
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Twist
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol

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In what way does Shakespeare still affect the modern British literature?
The first thing I thought about when I read the abow question was the fact that Shakespeare has been one of the most popular authors for the last 300 years. The fact that Shakespeare wrote about love stories and other daily problems that people still can relate to is maybe one of the biggest reasons why Shakespeare still is popular. When you think about it, it’s maybe not that strange that Shakespeare still affects the modern literature and its authors, not just in Britain but all over the world.

William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare (1654-1616) lived all his life in England and is one of the biggest and most famous play writers in English history. He wrote plays such as [|Hamlet], [|Romeo and Juliet] and [|a Midsummer Night's Dream]. These plays are still played all around the world and have become a symbol for the old theater and the Renaissance period which was the literary period of Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet has even become a symbol for love and love stories, which many people are personated about.

Many authors today take inspiration from old authors and their stories. A lot of poets use automatically the most known authors and their Classics, as for example Shakespeare or Hemingway. Authors as J-K Rowling’s have taken inspiration from Shakespeare, and she says that he is one of the most genius writers ever. Many of his plays has been modernized and has become some of the most popular movies in the modern world, and many of the most known actors acts in them like Leonardo Dicaprio as Romeo in Romeo and Juliet. The balcony where Romeo and Juliet kiss in Verona is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Italy, and Shakespeare’s hometown has become one of the biggest tourist attractions in England. media type="youtube" key="XLWPg3SCYH4" height="268" width="331" align="left"

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Shakespeare has affected many different authors, not just regular authors, but also song text authors and philosophic authors. In fact scholars have shown that more than 20 000 song texts have been affected by Shakespeare, including [|Taylor Swift] and [|The Killers], which are popular artists and role models for children and teenagers. This means that the teenagers still connects to Shakespeare true their form of literature and cultural abuses.

All this means that Shakespeare still is one of the biggest and most inspirational authors and play makers of all time. The themes he wrote about are timeless. This means that his plays still are relevant for today’s conflicts and problems in the world. This is also a reason why so many different writers still use Shakespeare as an inspiration source.

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