From Chaucer to Tennyson by Henry A. Beers

Description

From Chaucer to Tennyson is the book that introduced generations of readers to the long story of English literature. Written by Henry A. Beers, a Yale professor of English whose lectures were famous for their ease and their learning, it covers six centuries in a single volume designed not for specialists but for anyone who wants the shape of the whole tradition. Beginning with the break the Norman Conquest made in the growth of the English language, it moves in nine great chapters from Anglo-Saxon survivals to the death of the Victorians.

Beers’s method is at once historical and literary. Each chapter sets the writers against their age — the court, the theatre, the printing house — and then lets the writers themselves speak, glossing what needs glossing in the way of an excellent teacher: cool, precise, and occasionally wry. The volume gathers a rich anthology of the poetry of each era, from ballads and sonnets to the great odes, so that the history and the literature arrive together.

The book’s lasting value is its proportions. Beers treats Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Pope, and the Romantics with the seriousness they are due and keeps the minor figures in view just long enough to enrich the map. For a reader beginning a serious acquaintance with English letters, or for anyone who wants an old friend’s account of them, it has never been bettered for its length.

Why readers pick it up

• Six hundred years of English literature in one fluent, companionable volume.
• A generous anthology of the era’s poetry woven directly into the narrative.
• Masterful classroom prose from a legendary Yale lecturer.

About this DodaBooks edition

This edition brings you the complete text with clean professional typesetting, a working table of contents, and chapter navigation optimized for phone, tablet, and e-reader. The chapters are broken so the narrative and its poems can be read in comfortable stretches.