English Literature

  William Congreve: A Great Playwright William Congreve is a very popular playwright of Restoration era in England. He was born in 1670 in Bardsey, Yorkshire. He is appreciated in the entire world for his comedies of manners. It is he who shaped the English comedy of manners through his brilliant comic dialogue, his satirical portrayal of the war of the sexes, and his ironic scrutiny of the affectations of his age. His comedies of manners satirize the social conventions and manners of the upper class in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Congreve was educated at Trinity College, Dublin. After that he went on to study law at the Middle Temple in London. However, he soon abandoned his legal studies in favor of a career in literature. Congreve’s major plays are  The Old Bachelor  (1693),  The Double-Dealer  (1693),  Love for Love  (1695), and  The Way of the World  (1700). Congreve's plays were influential in their time. These play...

QUESTION: What is Free Verse? ANSWER:  Free Verse is unrhymed verse with a traditional metrical form. It was employed by French poets to free themselves from the metrical regularity of the alexandrine. Seeking greater liberty in verse structure, English poets also used it. Example: [1] A child said what is the grass? Fetching it                        To me with full hands,                        How could I answer the child? I do not know                        What it is any more than he. [Whitman: Leaves of Grass]

QUESTION: What is Elegy? ANSWER: Elegy is an important form of poetry. It is a dignified poem mourning the death of an individual or of all men. Here the poet laments the death and loss of his near and dear. Examples: [1] Milton's Lycidas.                  [2] Gray's Elegy.                  [3] Shelley's Adonais.                  [4] Tennyson's In Memoriam.                  [5] Arnold's Thyrsis.                 [6] Whitman’s O Captain, My Captain.

Q: What is an Ode? ANS: Ode: Ode is an important form of poetry. It is a short poem written in a rapid and irregular meter, fit to be sung or recited. Such poems are of much higher order than ballads and may be either descriptive or narrative. For example:   [1] Dryden's Ode On Alexander's Feast.                           [2] Pope's Ode on St. Cecilia's Day.                           [3] Collins's Ode On Evening.                          [4] Keats's Ode To Nightingale.                        ...

Question: What is Lyric? Answer:   Lyric is an important form of poetry. It is a short poem which is fit to be sung or recited. The term lyric denotes a poem of limited length expressing the thoughts and feelings of single speaker. Example: [1] Wordsworth's The Solitary Reaper                  [2] Rossetti's The Song                  [3] Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn

Question: What is Sonnet? Answer:  Sonnet is a very important verse form. It contains fourteen lines and each line consists of five iambic feet. The first eight lines are called octave and the last six sestette. Sonnet is of various types as- Miltonic Sonnet, Petrarchan Sonnet, Shakespearean Sonnet and Spenserian Sonnet. Example: [1] Shakespeare's Love God.                 [2] Milton's On His Blindness.                 [3] Donne's Death, Be Not Proud.