ABSTRACT

The paperback edition, in four volumes, of this standard work will make it readily available to students.

The scope of the work makes it valuable as a work of reference, connecting one period with another and placing each author clearly in the setting of his time.

Reviewing the first edition, The Times Literary Supplement commented: ‘in inclusiveness and in judgment it has few rivals of its kind’.

This first volume covers The Middle Ages (to 1500) in two sections: The Old English Period (to 1100) by Kemp Malone (John Hopkins University), and The Middle English Period (1100-1500) by Albert C. Baugh (University of Pennsylvania).

chapter |8 pages

Anglo-Latin Writings

chapter |12 pages

The Old Tradition: Poetic Form

chapter |13 pages

The Old Tradition: Popular Poetry

chapter |15 pages

The Old Tradition: Courtly Poetry

chapter |18 pages

Religious Poetry: Cynewulf and His School

chapter |8 pages

Secular Poetry

chapter |13 pages

Literary Prose

chapter |8 pages

General Characteristics of the Period

chapter |8 pages

Anglo-Norman Literature

chapter |9 pages

Early Latin Writers

chapter |6 pages

Wit and Wisdom

chapter |15 pages

For Their Soul’s Need

chapter |12 pages

The Romance: I

chapter |15 pages

The Romance: II

iii. The Matter of France

chapter |8 pages

The Omnibus of Religion

chapter |24 pages

The Lyric

chapter |24 pages

Chaucer: I

chapter |15 pages

The Beginnings of the Drama

chapter |12 pages

Ebb Tide

chapter |43 pages

Looking Forward