Hazlitt, William. Lectures on the Age of Shakespeare. Vivid and enthusiastic. Harrison, G. S. Platonism in English Poetry, 1903. Arber, E. English Reprints provide scholarly texts for many phases of the writing of this period. SHAKESPEARE Contains a Alden, R. M. A Shakespeare Handbook, 1925. Wendell, Barrett. William Shakespeare, 1894. A brilliant study of the poet's mind and art. Baker, G. P. The Development of Shakespeare as a Dramatist. 1907. A fine study of technical advance. Bradley, A. C. Shakespearean Tragedy, 1904. One of the best of modern books. Raleigh, Sir Walter. William Shakespeare (E. M. L.) A persuasive attempt to read Shakespeare's biography and character from his plays. Croce, Benedetto. Ariosto, Shakespeare and Corneille, 1920. The second essay contains some of the very best Shakespearean criticism. Masefield, John. William Shakespeare (Home University Library). A brief but excellent study. Dowden, Edward. Shakespeare, his Mind and Art, 1874. Long an authoritative commentary. Moulton, R. G. Shakespeare as a Dramatic Thinker, 1901. The Moral System of Shakespeare, 1903. A somewhat labored attempt to reconstruct the poet's moral points of view. Essays by Johnson, Hazlitt, Coleridge, Lamb, Lowell, More, etc. OTHER BOOKS ON THE DRAMA Schelling, F. E. The English Drama, 1914. The treatment of the Elizabethan drama is full and readable. Ward, A. W. History of the English Drama to the Reign of Queen Anne, 3v. 1899. The standard work on the Eng lish drama. Brooke, Tucker. The Tudor Drama, 1911. Adams, J. Q. A Life of William Shakespeare, 1923. Shakespearean Playhouses, 1917. Albright, V. E. The Shakespearean Stage, 1909. Campbell, Lily B. Scenes and Machines on the English Stage during the Renaissance, 1923. All of these are scholarly books dealing with the theatre and stage conditions. The first of Professor Adams's is the latest and one of the best of the lives of Shakespeare. Chambers, E. K. The Elizabethan Stage, 4v., 1923. This, like the same author's book on the Medieval stage, contains extremely interesting material. A masterly account of the history of the stage from the Middle Ages. Neilson, W. A. The Chief Elizabethan Dramatists, 1911. About thirty of the most important plays not written by Shakespeare. Belles Lettres Series. Plays carefully edited with scholarly introductions. Mermaid Series of English Dramatists. Contains the various dramatists in compact form. The poetry of the period has been collected in An English Garner, 1903. Schelling's A Book of Elizabethan Lyrics (Athenæum Press) is an excellent collection of lyrics with a scholarly introduction. On Spenser, the best essay is that by Lowell. A complete bibliography of the poet would contain a vast amount of material which it is not necessary to enumerate here. More's Utopia may be found in Morley's Universal Library and in Everyman's Library. CHAPTER IV WORKS OF GENERAL REFERENCE Saintsbury, George. Seventeenth Century Literature. Wendell, B. The Temper of the Seventeenth Century in English Literature, 1903. An interesting interpretation of the century. Dowden, E. Puritan and Anglican, 1901. A book that deserves careful reading. Masterman, J. H. B. The Age of Milton, 1897. Gosse, E. Seventeenth Century Studies, 1883. From Shakespeare to Pope, 1885. Study in poetical evolution. Spingarn, J. E. Critical Essays of the Seventeenth Century, 3v., 1908-9. An important aid to the interpretation of the growth of the critical spirit. BACON Bacon. Spedding, J. Life and Times of Francis Bacon, 1878. Essays by Hazlitt, Macaulay. CONTEMPORARIES OF SHAKESPEARE IN THE DRAMA Ward, Swinburne, Schelling. Essays by Gosse, Lowell, Hazlitt, Lamb. Lamb's Specimens from the Dramatic Poets, 1807, is a collection of exquisite gems from the dramatists. Of the seventeenth century prose writers, Browne has been treated by Leslie Stephen, Dowden, Pater, More; Jeremy Taylor by Dowden, Gosse, Hazlitt. Much of the lyric poetry of the century may be found in a series of books called The Muse's Library. Gosse's Jacobean Poets is an excellent treatment of the subject. Walton's lives of Donne and Herbert are charming old biographies. Johnson's famous dissertation on the metaphysical poets is to be found in his Life of Cowley. JOHN MILTON D. Masson's Life and Times of Milton, 6v., 1894, is the authoritative work on Milton. Hanford, J. H. A Milton Handbook, 1926. Havens, R. D. The Influence of Milton on English Poetry, 1922, is an exhaustive study of Milton and his influence upon subsequent poetry. Sampson, M. H. Selections (Crofts) 1925. The separate studies upon the great poet and the critical essays are of course very numerous. Essays by Lowell, Arnold, Macaulay, and Dowden may be mentioned. Scherer in France has written appreciatively of the English poet. BUNYAN Essays by Macaulay, Woodberry, and More. THE RESTORATION Chapter III of Macaulay's History of England is a vivid account of social conditions during the period. This is also true of his Essay on Addison. Garnett, Edward. The Age of Dryden, 1895. Beljame, A. Le Publique et les Hommes de Lettres en Angleterre, 1660-1744. A penetrating study by a distinguished Frenchman of literary conditions in England during these years. Gosse's From Shakespeare to Pope, 1885, treats of the rise of the classical school, particularly with reference to English versification. Wheatley, H. B. Pepys and the World He Lived In, 1880. RESTORATION DRAMA Hazlitt, W. Essays on the English Comic Writers. Read the following contrasting essays: Lamb's The Artificial Comedy of the Last Century and Macaulay's The Comedy of the Restoration. Nettleton, G. H. English Drama of the Restoration and Eighteenth Century, 1914. A good text is F. and J. W. Tupper's Representative English Dramas from Dryden to Sheridan, 1914. DRYDEN Life by Dr. Johnson; essay by Lowell. Sherwood, Margaret. Dryden's Dramatic Theory and Practice, 1899. Dryden's Essays, edited by W. P. Ker. 1900. CHAPTER V WORKS OF GENERAL REFERENCE Gosse, E. A History of Eighteenth Century Literature, 1887. Perry, T. S. English Literature in the Eighteenth Century, 1883. The first is full and readable; the second contains much interesting discussion of social and literary conditions. Dennis, J. The Age of Pope, 1906. Minto, W. Literature of the Georgian Era (Periods), 1894. Bernbaum, E. The Drama of Sensibility, 1915. Stephen, Leslie. A History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century, 2v., 1876. A remarkable survey of the intellectual life of the century. Indispensable to the student who would deal with moral and political speculation. Dobson, Austin. Eighteenth Century Vignettes, 3v., 1892. Charming excursions into various phases of eighteenth century life with the true antiquarian spirit. Thackeray, W. M. The English Humorists of the Eighteenth Century, 1853. A wonderfully sympathetic review of the chief figures of this time. Ashton, J. Social Life in the Reign of Queen Anne, 1883. Lane-Poole, S. Eighteenth Century Letters, 1897. SWIFT Essays by Stephen, More, Bernbaum (Introduction to Gulliver's Travels, Modern Student's Library), Dobson. POPE Essays by Stephen, Ste. Beuve, Lowell, Thackeray, More, Dr. Johnson. Bredvold, L. I. Selections (Crofts) 1926. Warton, J. The Genius and Writings of Pope, 1782. A celebrated eighteenth century critique. ADDISON AND STEELE Essays by Johnson, Macaulay, Thackeray. CHAPTER VI WORKS OF GENERAL REFERENCE Beers, H. A. English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century. |