English Literary Criticism

The Medieval Phase

J. W. H. Atkins

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN:
  9780367763305
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000378795
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

In England literary consciousness had its beginning in the middle ages, and this book, originally published in 1943, describes and illustrates the first phases of the growth of a tradition of criticism. It does not confine itself to writers whose interest was in the vernacular, for there was a larger European movement of which English criticism was a part. It embodied much of the ancient teaching, but it shows recurring efforts to arrive at the nature and art of poetry; it provides a key to contemporary literature and is of great help in understanding what really happened at the 16th Century Renaissance.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Title Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Preface
• Table of Contents
• Chapter I Introduction
• Chapter II The Medieval Inheritance
• Chapter III Early Grammarians: Bede and Alcuin
• Chapter IV The Dawn of Humanism: John of Salisbury
• Chapter V Medieval Poetics: Geoffrey of Vinsauf and John of Garland
• Chapter VI Check and Counter-Check to Literary Studies: John of Garland, Robert Grosseteste, Roger Bacon, and Richard of Bury
• Chapter VII Native Literary Problems: The Owl and the Nightingale, Wiclif, Chaucer
• Chapter VIII Native Literary Problems (continued): Caxton, Hawes, Skelton
• Chapter IX Conclusion
• Summary of Medieval Poetic (Geoffrey of Vinsauf)
• Index