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Literary Overview
Elizabethan literature
generally reflects the exuberant self-confidence of a nation expanding its
powers, increasing its wealth, and thus keeping at bay its serious social
and religious problems. Disillusion and pessimism followed, however, during
the unstable reign of James I (1603–25). The 17th century was to be a time
of great upheaval—revolution and restoration of the monarchy, and, finally,
the victory of the Parliament, landed Protestantism, and the moneyed
interests.
1. Literature in Jacobean Period and
Revolution Period
The literature of Jacobean period (1603-1625) begins with the
drama, including some of Shakespeare’s greatest, and darkest, plays. The
dominant literary figure of James’s reign was Ben Jonson, whose varied and
dramatic works followed classical models and were enriched by his worldly,
peculiarly English wit. His satiric dramas, notably the great Volpone
(1606), all take a cynical view of human nature. Also cynical were the
horrific revenge tragedies of
John Ford,
Thomas Middleton,
Cyril Tourneur,
and
John Webster. Novelty was in great demand, and the possibilities of plot
and genre were exploited almost to exhaustion. Still, many excellent plays
were written by men such as George Chapman, the masters of comedy
Thomas Dekker and
Philip Massinger, and the team of
Francis Beaumont and
John
Fletcher. Drama continued to flourish until the closing of the theaters at
the onset of the English
The foremost poets of the Jacobean era, Ben Jonson and John
Donne, are regarded as the originators of two diverse poetic traditions—the
Cavalier and the Metaphysical. Jonson and Donne shared not only a common
fund of literary resources, but also a dryness of wit and precision of
expression. While Donne’s poetry is distinctive for its passionate
intellection, Jonson’s for its classicism and urbane guidance of passion
Although George Herbert and Donne were the principal
metaphysical poets, the meditative religious poets Henry Vaughan and
Thomas Traherne were also influenced by Donne, as were
Abraham Cowley and Richard Crashaw. The greatest of the Cavalier poets was the sensuously lyrical
Robert Herrick. Such other Cavaliers as Thomas Carew, Sir John Suckling, and
Richard Lovelace were lyricists in the elegant Jonsonian tradition, though
their lyricism turned political during the English Revolution. Although
ranked with the metaphysical poets, the highly individual Andrew Marvell
partook of the traditions of both Donne and Jonson
Among the leading prose writers of the Jacobean period were
the translators who produced the classic King James Version of the Bible
(1611). The work of Francis Bacon helped shape philosophical and scientific
method.
Robert Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy (1621) offers a varied,
virtually encyclopedic view of the moral and intellectual atmosphere of the
17th century. Like Burton,
Sir Thomas Browne sought to reconcile the
mysteries of religion with the newer mysteries of science.
Izaak Walton,
author of The Compleat Angler (1653), produced a number of graceful
biographies of prominent writers.
Thomas Hobbes wrote the most influential
political treatise of the age, Leviathan (1651)
In the revolutionary period there appeared pamphlet
literature which flourished in England in the last decades of the 16th
century, and became popular again in the middle decades of the 17th century.
These pamphlets, which served mainly for political purposes, were valuable
documents of that period.
The revolution era’s most fiery and eloquent author of
political pamphlets (many in defense of Cromwell’s government, of which he
was a member) was also one of the greatest of all English poets, John
Milton. His Paradise Lost (1667) is a Christian epic of large scope.
In Milton the literary and philosophical heritage of the Renaissance merged
with Protestant political and moral conviction. His work, both poetry and
prose, showed the indomitable revolutionary spirit with its noblest
expression. For this reason, this period is always called the Age of Milton.
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