MIDDLE ENGLISH LITERATURE

1. MIDDLE ENGLISH LITERATURE

2. Dates • 1066: Norman Conquest, end of Old English (Anglo-Saxon) period. • c.1200: beginnings of Middle English Literature. • 1360-1400: summit of ME literature (Chaucer). • 1485: accession of Henry VII to the English throne, beginning of the Tudor period, William Caxton prints Sir Thomas Malory’s Morte D’Arthur, beginning of the English Renaissance.

3. ME Language and Culture • French-speaking aristocracy. English spoken by lower classes but by the e.14th c. English is revived. • At the beginning of the ME period there are many dialects spoken. By the end of the period the East Midland dialect (London speech) becomes standard. 1204: loss of lands in Normandy. • 1224: it is made illegal to hold land in England and France at the same time; Normans become bound to England and the English language. • 1362: English is introduced into the law courts. • 1363: English is used in the opening of the Parliament for the first time. • A new Europe: Christian civilisation based on a Roman past. • End of the heroic age. • Courtly ideals: courtesy, honour, prudence, fortitude, • Rise of the trading and manufacturing middle-classes: justice, faith, hope, charity. • In literature: • ease, polish, refinement. • Teacing morals and religion.

4. Middle English Drama

5. ME drama • Religious • Emerged in the northern provincial centres: • York, Coventry and Chester, 14th c. • Genres: • allegory, miracle, mystery play, morality play

6. Religious sources • The Mass: birth, life and passion of Christ • Festivals: Easter, Christmas • Source of dramatic action: • Conflict between Good and Evil • Source of dramatic dialogue: • Priest and congregation • Two halves of antiphonal choir • The Bible • Purpose of dramatic performance: • Remind peole of Christ’s sacrifice • Provide religious and moral education

7. Authority • Medieval drama is always sacred: • A reinforcement of sermons and religious instruction • The enactment is privilege of associations of pious laymen (eg trading guilds)

8. Facts • Medieval plays date from 14th c • Emerge in norther provincial towns (York, Coventry, Chester) • 14-17th c: more than a 100 towns in England involved in the performance of such plays • Catholic theology • Reformation

9. York Minster [video]

10. Genres • Pageants

11. Wagons: roofed platforms on wheels moving from point to point in the market • The audience could see the stages of the cycle while remaining in one place

12. Mystery plays

13. Dramatisation of events from the OT and the NT • Biblical episodes from the Creation to Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection • Comic relief • Psychological insight

14. Miracle plays

15. Dramatisation of saints’ lives and other miraculous events from outside the Bible • Miralce of Saint Nicholas, tainted glass window in York Minster

16. Allegories

17. Dramatisations of christian moral lessons concerning sins and salvation

18. Morality plays

19. Morality play • ‘the dramatisation of a spiritual crisis in the life of a representative mankind figure in which his spiritual struggle is portrayed as a conflict between personified abstractions representing good and evil’. • ‘Moral Plays’ or ‘Interludes’. • Psychomachia • Shakespeare, Marlowe. • There are about 60 surviving morality plays • Mankind, Mundus, The Castle of Perseverance and Everyman.

20. Tree of Vices The Hague, KB, 72 A 23

21. The Pilgrim meets ‘Lazyness’ The Hague, KB, 76 E 6

22. The Pilgrim is attacked by Hypocrisy and Gluttony The Hague, KB, 76 E 6

23. Second prologue of Augustine’s The Heavenly City and the Earthly City: Envy, Jealousy and Charity, Benevolence, Piety represented by contrast between the slanderer and devout men and women by Maître François

24. The virtuous man listening to Reason, the vicious man listening to Lust Master of the Crowning of Charles VI of the Grandes Chroniques de France The Hague, MMW, 10 D 1

25. Castle of Perseverance

26. Everyman

27. Everyman • anonymous author • translation of a Dutch play • uncertain date of composition • earliest edition produced between 1510-1525 • source: a Flemish morality play Elckerlijc. • the narrative framework of both plays can be traced to the oriental folk tale of ‘The Faithful Friend’. It tells of a man who is in trouble and is summoned to appear before the king. He finds that those he has loved best soon desert him, whereas the one he has loved least, agrees to go with him, and to plead for him, and to support him to the end: ‘In prosperity men friends may find, Which in adversity be full unkind.’ (ll. 309-10)

28. Everyman • It describes man’s struggle in the face of death to raise himself to a state of grace so that he may die a holy death, secure in the expectation of everlasting life.

29. CONCLUSIONs

30. The plot is unusual for a morality play but the teaching is usual: • because of the Original Sin, man is not capable of saving himself • through Christ’s death on the Cross the free gift of salvation is available • the benefits of salvation are passed to man through the ministration of the Church • salvation is possible even for the sinner faced with death so long as he is repentant.

31. differences from other morality plays: • it lays down an exceptionally detailed course of contrition, confession, absolution, and satisfaction • careful to explain the function of priests in administering the sacraments