good morning so welcome to the first lecture so this is our week one lecture one english

for english literature for competitive purposes a very exciting cause for ah those who want

to appear for national as well as international exams that tests your knowledge of literature

ah we will be doing a number of things in this course as i have already told you in

the introduction ah of this course in the introductory video of this course ah so there

will be a lot of focus on ah literature and how literature or literature based questions

can be asked for ah for national and international exams that test your ah ah power of literature

ok the way ah you have interpreted or understood literature

so ah of course ah the way i am going to do the course ah i will give you lot of information

where you can appear ah where you can even attempt the essay type questions that may

appear for ah ah for your ah competitive exams and there will also be ah lot of regour and

intense intensive training on ah the ah multiple choice kinds of questions also so this is

what we are going to do and literature as i have already told you we are not just restricting

ourselves to ah literature in ah the english language that is english literature the traditional

british literature we are also going to do american ah asian american asian writings

some indian writing as well american of course and also world literature

so you can except people like ah some information on people like ah perhaps ah the european

masters the existentialist and even earlier like ah ah cervantes and ah um boccaccio and

dante so there would be information about all those ah ah movements people personalities

and all those but ah remember the focus is not on ah ah any one particular trend or one

particular nation or one particular nationality or one ah or period it is i am trying to or

an attempting here to give you an overview of ah the kinds of ah material or information

that is sort for or that could be used for those who want to appear for competitive exams

testing literature now this is not an exhaustive course let me

tell at the beginning itself this is not ah i am not guaranteeing that by taking this

course you are going to is any exam but yes this is an ah ah this could be a very good

course for those who attempt to take ah um competitive exams testing or english literature

or literature in english rather and ah it could be an important add on it could be an

important reference for those who want to appear for such kinds of exams i am going

to do a lot of multiple choice questions also with you but as always let me tell you that

there is no guarantee that this is what that is going to be ah but i can always tell you

this is pattern that is asked for ah very credible kinds of exams that test your knowledge

of english literature or literature in english rather so yeah

lets start with this particular question i am going to just give you some warm up exercises

so look at the exercise here look at the question here look at the slide and ah i will also

tell you the question let first lets read this passage listen we of the spear danes

in the days of yore of those clan kings heard of their glory how those nobles performed

courageous deeds of scyld scefs son from enemy hosts from many peoples seized mead benches

and terrorised the fearsome heruli after first he was found helpless and destitute he then

knew recompensate for that he waved under the clouds throve in honours until to him

each of the bordering tribes beyond the whale road had to submit and yield tribute that

was a good king this is a question where are these lines from this is these are the lines

of questions you should and you can expect when you appear for ah literature based competitive

exams national and international please understand i am not mentioning the names of any particular

exams ok i am just giving you ah a good understanding of what to expect when you go in or when you

sign up for those kinds of exams so where are these lines for from the pilgrims

progress beowulf sir gawain and the green knight troilus and criseyde next question

the following lines is an example of swaddled in flames it came gliding and flexing and

racing towards its fate this is an example of which literary device of pun enjambed couplet

iambic pentameter caesura next question next slide please look at it identify who is the

speaker literature from the antiquity now since i am not going back to the beloved

land of my father since i was no light of safety to patroklos nor to any other companions

who in their numbers went down before glorious hector but sit here beside my ships a useless

weight on the good land why i wish that strife would vanish away from among gods and mortals

and gall which makes a man grow angry for all his great minds that gall of anger that

swarms like smoke inside of a mans heart and becomes a thing sweeter to him by far than

the dripping of honey who is the speaker ulysses agamemnon achilles apollo

next passage from chaucers the canterbury tales and i want you to tell me the story

the section or the part ah of the canterbury tales where the following passage appears

ho good sir no more of this said the knight what you have told is enough in truth and

much more for a little sorrow goes a long way with most people i believe as for me it

is a great distress to hear of the sudden fall of people who have been in great wealth

and ease alas and the contrary is joy and delight as when a man who has been in a low

station climbs up and becomes prosperous and remains there such a thing is joyful and pleasant

to speak of so choose the correct response is it from the nuns nuns priest tale the reeves

tale the friars tale or the millers tale next question name the work was every day

of my life to be as busy a day as this i will not finish the sentence till i have made an

observation upon the strange state of affairs between the reader and myself and this month

one whole year older than i was this twelve month and having got as you perceive almost

into the middle of my fourth volume and no further than to my first days life tis demonstrative

that i have three hundred and sixty four days more life to write just now then when i first

set out so that instead of advancing as a common writer in my work with what i have

been doing at it on the contrary i am just thrown so many volumes back was every day

of my life to be as busy a day as this and why not and the transactions and opinions

of it to take up as much description and for what reason should they be cut shot as at

this rate i should just live three sixty four times faster than i should write it must follow

an please your worships that the more i write the more i shall have to write and consequently

the more you your worships reads the more your worships will have to read this is from

choose the ah correct response this is from absalom and achitophel tristram shandy the

canterbury tales ulysses next now name the text here now as christian

was working solitary by himself he espied one ah afar off come crossing over the field

to meet him and their hap was to meet just as they were crossing the way of each other

the gentlemans name was mr worldly wiseman he dwelt in the town of camalpolicy a very

great town and also hard by from whence christian came so choose the correct response where

is this from the pilgrims progress beowulf odyssey vanity fair the first passage was

from beowulf so answer b second is ah caesura caesura ah is ah it provides a rhythm so answer

is d caesura they typically consists of a pause in the middle of a line so it could

also be a comma as you have already seen in that line with an equal number of syllabus

on or syllable sorry not syllabus syllables on both sides of the pause the third one is

from iliad homers iliad c achilles achilles is the speaker and the ah canterbury tales

is from the nuns priest tale fifth one is tristram shandy b it has taken him one year

to narrate one day in his life so he is digressing and this is ah and he is contemplating the

ah you know lag ah between narration and life so its a very mischievous kind of a ah writing

tristram shandy you can expect all these ah kinds of writings for your competitive exams

especially the international variety so we have talked about ah beowulf canterbury tales

pilgrims progress ah tristram shandy iliad this and some literary devices so this is

what you can generally expect so those of you who are really preparing seriously to

crack some of these exams you should know this is the nature this is the tenor of questions

that you are going to find sixth one is a ah the christian and mister wordly wise and

all its a dead giveaway its a piligrims progress so that was the warm up thats not what i wanted

to tell you that this is what the course is going to be all about we are going to do plenty

of exercises but it comes with a statutory warning these exercises [Laughter] i am not

guaranteeing that this is what you are going to get but what i can tell you is that how

to go about and how to get in start preparing for if this is what you want to do seriously

so um todays class i am going to focus on ah chaucer and the canterbury tales beowulf

return by an unknown anonymous writer then what is allegory so generally this is how

i am going to structure my lectures i am going to give you plenty of exercises so that you

can start thinking ah how to ah prepare for your exams at the same time i am also going

to give you an overview of important personalities writers poets etcetera playwrights of course

ah important literary movements and johns important literary periods little bit of literary

theory criticism important ah works ok so works of literature from across the world

but thats not going to be exhaustive it occurs like this can never be exhaustive we are not

looking at a period we are not looking at a particular nation so it is not going to

be exhaustive at all i am just giving to talk about what i feel are the major works one

of the earliest important works in the english language is beowulf its an old english epic

so you should know what is an epic it was composed around ah seven twenty five ad its

one of the earliest poem in a modern european language remember thats english modern european

language but if you look at the way the original beowulf was written you will hardly be able

to associate with the kind of english you know so the way english has developed over

the years over the past few centuries you should be attentive to that its also the most

celebrated survival from old english literature so you should know that also

author is unknown anonymous ah and the many script which dates from the late tenth century

was ah not really ah studied until the eighteen century from eighteen century on words ah

interest in beowulf started increasing its an its a very important ah work ah many of

us need not be familiar with it but ah people who do serious study of the english language

and literature they are expected to be familiar with beowulf you should know that it has individual

episodes echoes of old legends ah they may ah have been derived from the oral tradition

in spite of all this beowulf as we find today is an artistically finished and unified work

it runs in to three thousand one hundred and eighty two lines it is un rhymed alliterative

ok verse which was common to the early germanic peoples if you know your history of the english

language you should know that the that english traces its roots to several european languages

several other european languages in beowulf each line is divided into half

by a caesural pause so thats why that line that i just showed you was from beowulf and

the half lines each with two accented and a varying number of unaccented syllables are

linked by alliterations alliteration is an important aspect of beowulf grim and greedy

the gruesome ah monster so the reputation of the syllable ga look at this slide please

and here i want you to look at ah the opening lines of ah a reading of beowulf here is the

video now ah beowulf is also known for the canings

that is the compound nouns ah some of the very recognizable compound nouns are whale

path for sea ring bestower for king battle flesh for sword treasure holder for dragon

so its called the canings or compound nouns there are drawn from nature customs beliefs

and beowulf has a very distinctive and picturous stylistic effect by using two term metaphors

instead of similes remember this so canings that is compound nouns so if you come across

this passage from beowulf you may not really know the entire beowulf although it runs into

just three thousand hundred and eighty two lines which is not too much but you should

go through it just give it a cursory look the style of beowulf ah you should also know

that stylistic aspects of the poem because ah many a times this is one question that

can be asked that what is what is the style of this passage ok

so you should be able to identify beowulf by the historically elements natural scenes

and the ah ah the description of the deeds of the folk hero again these are all these

things are parallel in the literature of the germanic continental tradition and of pagan

scandinavia so that those are the roots of beowulf coming to the hero now this is an

adventurous hero one of the foremost important national heroes he is identified as a geat

g e a t ah probably from um southern sweden and there are also references to an actual

raid down the rhine the river in ad five twenty one by the king of the geats that is beowulfs

uncle hyglac h y g l a c so beowulf identified as a geat his uncle

king ah ah beowulfs uncle hyglac england is never mentioned yet the poem was written in

england with the original pagan in continental elements of history and folklore were modified

by the poets ideas and his ah christian view of society these are seen in ah hrothgars

court its not the crude barbaric civilization of the baltic but the cultivated refined christianaries

theocracy of the eight century anglo saxson court so the hrothgar court the hrothgars

court is known for the refinement in that particular society these also belief in magic

symbols cremation ah ceremonies pagan power of fate existing with faith in gods power

over man in the existence of heaven and hell so it is deeply religious in the significance

of biblical stories from the sinfulness of cain to the sacrifice of christ at the end

of that poem a complete reconciliation is never achieved word for fate wyrd w y r d

is both fate and gods plan for the world there are influences of vergils aeneid that is latin

classic and is use of certain rhetorical devices of language in his structure contras in climax

and understatements all these including bose and understatements so um all these seem to

reflect the classical epic tradition rhetoric contras structure you know the rhetoric um

understatement bose so ah all these things are combined together

in ah beowulf and then are references or not sorry not references but influences of classic

such as aeneid the main narrative of the poem is focused

ah and it derives from three folk stories ah to which the in which the historically

accrued raids and feuds between dains geats sweats etcetera are described in the first

of these episodes beowulf a mighty swimmer and wrestler freeze the mead hall of the danish

king hrothgar by wrenching out the claw like arm of the male monster grendel in the second

the hero slays grendels damp ah that is a hideous water hag and these two episodes are

closely related the second brings a poem to a dramatic climax the third ah when the beowulf

has aged is no longer merely fighting for his youthful glory now he is the wise and

aged king who has ruled the geats for fifty peaceful and prosperous years he fights and

dies to save his people from ah a fire breathing dragon who has ah who has been attacking their

kingdom so then the poem ends or the epic ends on a mood of allergy allergic mood

so its just a faerie tale and adventurous tale it is also ah it has deep religious allegories

it is also a a very mature and complex work of art especially for those times so that

it beowulf i would urge you to go through it at least understand if passage is from

beowulf stare at you in your competitive exams and dont get nervous now you know what the

story is all about you know the names major names and figures and characters ah just go

through give a very quick glance to the poem and you would understand what your ah looking

at coming to the ah device now we were talking

about allegory what is allegory allegory derives from the greek word ah allegoria literally

ah it means literally it means speaking otherwise saying something what meaning something else

is a sort of an extended metaphor the characters actions and scenery are symbolic referring

to spiritual political psychological confrontations there is a surface meaning there is a deep

meaning john bunyans pilgrim progress written in sixteen seventy eight ah story of christian

salvation and this one of the most important one of the earliest known examples of an allegory

and of course now we know george orwells nineteen eighty four is a political allegory

so all sorts of allegories ok salman rushdie is known for writing allegories myths of orpheus

and eurydice their examples of redemption salvation quiz quest so that is an also an

allegory ah the anonymous work ah again piligrims progress and all these are all ah an even

earlier than there morality place we will soon do mysteries and moralities place where

there is a character of every man which is also a deeply allegorical character italian

writer dantes his divine comedy is also an example of allegory it its a journey of the

individual soul towards god so these are the various examples of allegories

one of the most important allegory ever written is pilgrims progress by john bunyan i have

already told you hero is an everyman he could be any men christian other characters are

mister worldly wiseman faithful hope giant despair these are the names of characters

so very typical characters um the the work describes a journey journey of christian every

men flew who flews the city of destruction notes the name of the city passes through

the slough of despond the interpreters house the house of beautiful the value of humiliation

vanity fair ok vanity fair is not just the title of thackerays novel but itaho its a

its a town in john buyans pilgrim progress and he finally arise at the celestial city

what does all it mean this journey of every man thats what we have to go though humiliation

vanity slough despair and then finally if you are good if you have if you have retained

your goodness you will be rewarded with celestial city

so as an allegory it represents mass journey through trails of life towards heaven its

related to a parable or a fable hero is a zero cipher ok the reader is supposed to identify

with the hero ok its a typical plot ah jonathan swift later on used it in gullivers travels

innocent hero and his journey allicin wonderland ok so lewis carrolls for that is also an innocence

quest and travel journey k in kafkas the castle so all these are the ah derived from every

men all these characters are put through experiences tests trapstem temptations etcetera remember

allegory was a popular literary device in the middle ages in the fourteen century dantes

divine comedy the french a work roman de la rose and chaucers house of fame and william

langlands pearse ploughmen these are important allegories in ah presence in the ah in the

twentieth century the stories and novels of franz kafka can be considered instances of

allegories of course there is the mother of all allegories um edmund spensers faerie queene

look at this ah slide and look at reading of spensers faerie queene one of the greatest

allegories ever written its something that is very frequently asked

in most competitive exams please be prepared with it from allegory lets move on to a fable

a fable is a short narrative in prose or verse that exemplifies an abstract moral thesis

of principle of human behavior and then there is a moral at the end at in the form of an

epigram for example we have beast fables in which animals talk and act like the human

types they represents so aesops fables so sometimes you may come across this also

fables in the western culture they ah derive mainly from the stories that were um sometime

mistaken ah mistakenly attributed to aesops so was the most well known author of fables

there was also a john de la fontaine ah french man who wrote a city of ah ah sorry a set

of very ah clever fables in verb in versus then also remember chaucers the nuns priest

tale ah is the story of the cock and the foxs is a beast fable germane to all this you have

a parable parable is a very short narrative about human beings presented not beas and

animals so as to stress the analogy a parel with a

general lesson or moral or a thesis that the narrator is trying to ah put forward parable

was one of jesusses favourite devices as a teacher for example his parable of the good

samaritan and of the prodigal son so bible the bible is an important reading as well

for those who are interested in competitive exams there is something called an exemplum

which is a story told as a particular instance of the general theme in a religious sermon

the device was popular in the middle ages when extensive collections of exempla some

historical and legendry were prepared for used by preachers for example um later on

ah again we are in the middle ages so let me talk about chaucers the pardoners tale

the pardoner is preaching on the theme that greed is the root of all evil greed is not

good ok as someone tells us in wall street the movie thats the digression greed is the

root of all evil thats what we have been told traditionally this incorporates as an exemplum

of the tale of the three drunken marry makers revelers who set out to find and defy death

and find a heap of gold instead only to find death after all when the kill one another

in the attempt to gain soul possession of the treasure ok so this is an example of exemplum

so thank you very much and ah we will soon meet for our next class