COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1920. Norwood Press J. S. Cushing Co. - Berwick & Smith Co. Paull 7 ERES 5.27-42 PREFACE A History of English Literature, however brief, must survey twelve centuries of continuous and noble achievement. In the enormous accumulation of prose and poetry, an elementary textbook must neglect much that is of minor value and it must point the reader to what is best. Only through a vigorous selection can it hope to guide his interest and admiration to the great and permanent books in our literature. These books are not dead but still very much alive, stirring our minds and affecting our deeds to-day. Their history is a continuing record which brings the past close to the present and offers its wisdom and beauty as an illumination for our understanding and enjoyment of the world in which we live. Literature is not finished; it is day by day adding to its history; it is now one of the most extensive and engrossing occupations of men and women. The history of its twelve centuries of activity should lead to an acquaintance with its best, and to an understanding of its vital significance for our life to-day. Such is the general purpose which has determined the specific aims and methods of this book. These may be stated as follows: 1. The book attempts to reveal literature as a living thing, having a bearing on the life of its readers-something issuing from men's lives and appealing to men's lives. This involves the avoidance of the usual mass of non-significant facts and dates and second-hand criticism in favor of an effort to bring the student into immediate contact with great works and authors, and to stimulate his interest and enjoyment in reading. The book is an introduction to the right appreciation of the best literature. 2. Full treatment is given to those authors and works only that are the best of their kind, and the lesser names, with which textbooks have too often burdened and confused the minds of pupils, are subordinated or frankly omitted. Every care has been taken not to tire the reader with an excess of detail relating to minor figures, of interest only to specialists. 3. The approach to the great authors has been made easy by a careful reconstruction of their personal characteristics and of the social and political surroundings in which they lived and wrote. Each of these men was a part of his time and has made that time live again for us. 4. The main epochs and movements have been interpreted as expressions of persistent ideas which continue to affect our society to-day. Books are not mere casual records of personal experience; they reflect and interpret the great changes in thought and feeling by which civilization moves onward. 5. The chief types of literature, such as novel, epic, drama, have been emphasized and their history traced so as to account for modern developments. Some knowledge of the forms in which men have framed their imaginative expression is essential to an understanding of the elements of literary art. The more mechanical features of the book have been adapted to these aims and to the needs of students or readers who are undertaking a survey of literature. Attention is called to the following matters: 1. Each chapter is a carefully organized treatment of a unified subject and a topical outline is prefixed. A glance at these outlines will indicate to the experienced teacher how the authors have tried to meet the difficult problems of simplification and subordination in dealing with a vast and complicated subject. 2. Helps for the student at the end of each chapter include : (A) Suggestions for reading. The first paragraph gives a brief list of readings for the beginner, carefully selected from the chief authors. The second paragraph adds supplementary readings, critical, biographical, historical, or illustrative. (B) Questions on text and suggested reading. (C) Topics for oral and written composition. (D) A chronological outline of English and foreign literature and history. 3. Illustrations have been selected which really illustrate. Manuscripts, specimens of early printing, and title pages of famous volumes reproduce the forms in which books appeared to their first readers. Contemporary pictures, including illuminations on medieval manuscripts, the masterpieces of great modern illustrators such as Hogarth and Cruikshank, supply a sort of panorama of changing fashions in architecture, costume, and manners. Indeed they illustrate the history of art and of civilization as well as of literature. Some twenty fullpage portraits serve to bring the personalities of the authors vividly before the student. 4. A literary map of England has been specially prepared. 5. A general bibliographical guide precedes a full index of authors and titles. A manual has been prepared which discusses the general problems of teaching literature and supplies for each chapter a large amount of additional material and suggestions for the teacher. This separate publication makes it possible to address every word in the textbook itself to the pupil. Two suggestions to the teacher, duly emphasized in the manual, may be barely noted here. First, the teacher should give special aid to the pupil on the opening chapters, which survey periods remote and therefore difficult for the modern reader. The first two chapters might well be studied in the class under the teacher's guidance. Second, the teacher should never separate the study of the textbook from the study of literature itself. The book strives to guide the pupils to an interested reading of the best poetry and prose. This should also be the chief aim of the teacher. The authors are indebted for criticism and for assistance on the "Guides to Study" to Miss Katherine Morse of the New York Training School for Teachers. For permission to reproduce illustrations from various books, they are indebted to Longmans, Green and Company for those from Gardiner's "History of England," to the Oxford University Press for two from "Shakespeare's England," and to The Macmillan Company for those from Garnett and Gosse's "Illustrated History of English Literature," from Thorndike's "Shakespeare's Theater," and for portraits from the "Everyday Classics." W. A. N. A. H. T. |