Outline of English Literature

G. C. Thornley, Outline of English Literature ISBN: 0582749174 | edition 1985 | PDF | 216 pages | 34 mb A survey of the English prose, poetry and drama of Great Britain and Ireland from earliest times to the 1980s. This history of English literature is amazing in its scope: it will take you from Beowulf to Heany in just 197 pages! It seems to be written for speakers of English as a second language, since the back cover says the vocabulary used is restricted to just 2,000 words. But it is clear and really covers the bases in English literature, so it is appropriate for high school students, or for anyone wanting to know about the most important periods, movements, writers, and works of English literature in one short and easy-to-read volume. It could do with some kind of a preface to explain its goals and target audience; it has none. And the words defined in the footnotes are often very easy (like 'professor'), while difficult allusions (e.g. in Milton) are sometimes not glossed. But overall, this is an excellent work. I used it to teach a class of Taiwan senior high school girls who had mostly lived abroad before. While the material was quite difficult for them, the course seems to have been a success. We covered 12 of the 15 chapters in two semesters, which brought us up to the 20th century. I used a thicker history of English literature (Moody and Lovett) to prepare myself for the class, and chose and copied sample texts of selected writers from the Internet so the students could have a firsthand experience of some of the works. We all gained a lot from this course, and I would definitely stick with the same textbook if I did it again. 

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