This is an attempt to write a history of English literature admittedly with an innovative approach. The traditional as well as the more modern views in the West on literary movements， schools， traditions and influences in the field of English literature and on individual English authors and their major and minor works are here given due respect and serious consideration， but with the reservation sometimes to differ and occasionally to introduce new and totally contrary judgments from the viewpoint of historical materialism i.e.， the writers and their writings are to be given their proper places in each case in accordance with the roles， healthful or otherwise， that they play in the progress of history， social and literary. Of course，whether or how far have I succeeded in these pages in living up to the theory advanced above awaits judgment from my readers.

Chapter Ⅰ ENGLISH LITERATURE OF THE ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD

1.The Historical Background

2.“Beowulf” the National Epic of the Anglo-Saxons

3.Minor Anglo-Saxon Poetry：Caedmon and Cynewulf

4.Anglo-Saxon Prose: Bede；Alfred; “The Anglo Saxon Chronicle”;

Aelfric

Chapter Ⅱ ENGLISH LITERATURE OF THE LATE MIDDLE AGES

 Section Ⅰ English Literature from the Mid-11th Century to the Mid-14th

1.The Background: Political and Social

2.Folk Literature and Religious Literature from the Mid-11th to the

Mid-14th Century

3.Early Alliterative and Metrical Romances in the 12th， 13th and

Early 14th Centuries

 Section Ⅱ English Literatuire of the Second Half of the 14th Century

1.The Background：Political and Social

2.John Wycliffe； John Gower；William Langland

3.Geoffrey Chaucer

 Section Ⅲ English Literature of the Fifteenth Century

1.The Background：Political and Social

2.The English and Scottish Popular Ballads: “Robin Hood Ballads”

3.Early English Drama: Folk Drama; The Mystery Plays; The Miracle

Plays; The Morality Plays

4.The English Chaucerians; Early Scottish Poetry and the Scottish

Chaucerians

5.English Prose of the 15th Century: Sir Thomas Malory and His "Le

Morte d'Arthur"

Chapter Ⅲ ENGLISH LITERATURE OF THE RENAISSANCE

 Section Ⅰ The Historical Background： Economic， Political and Cultural

1.The Renaissance in Europe

2.Stages and Trends of English Literature of the Renaissance

 Section Ⅱ English Literature of the Early 16th Century

1 The Oxford Reformers;Thomas More

2.Court Poetry: Skelton; Wyatt and Surrey

3.Morality Plays and Interludes of the 16th Century：David Lyndsay;

John Heywood

 Section Ⅲ English Literature of the Second Half of the 16th Century.

1.Court Poetry：Philip Sidney; Edmund Spenser

2.Prose Fiction: Lyly， Lodge， Greene， Sidney， Nashe，Deloney

3.Pre-Shakespearean Drama: English Drama under Classical Influence；

University

Wits：Lyly， Peele，Lodge， Nashe， Greene， Kyd and Marlowe

 Section Ⅳ Shakespeare

1.Shakespeare's Life and Literary Career

2.Shakespeare's Poems and Sonnets

3.Early Period of Shakespeare's Plays： History Plays

(“Richard Ⅲ”， “Henry IV”， Parts 1 and 2， “Henry V”)；Early Tragedies

(“Romeo and Juliet”， “Julius Caesar”)； Comedies (“The Merchant of Venice”，

“Much Ado about Nothing”， “As You Like It”，“Twelfth Night”)

4.Mature Period of Shakespeare's Plays.Tragedies(“Hamlet”， “Othello”，

“King Lear”， “Macbeth”，“Antony and Cleopatra”， “Coriolanus”，

“Timon of Athens”)， Tragi-Comedies (“Measure for Measure”，“All's Well

that Ends Well”， “Troilus and Cressida”)

5.Last Period of Shakespeare's Dramatic Career：“Pericles”， “Cymbeline”，

“The Winter's Tale”， “The Tempest”， “Pericle”， “Henry VIII”

6.General Comments on Shakespeare：Shakespeare's Progressive Significance and

Limitations；His Indebtedness to the English Dramatic Tradition；His

CharacterCreations；His Plot Construction；His Mastery of Language；His Literary

Influence

 Section Ⅴ English Literature of the First Quarter of the 17th Century

1.Drama of Shakespeare's Contemporaries: Ben Jonson，Chapman， Dekker， Thomas

Heywood， Beaumont and Fletcher

2.The Decline of Drama in Early 17th-Century England up to the Closing of the

Theatres in London in 1642：Marston， Tourneur， Webster， Ford， Middleton，

Massinger，Shirley

3.Francis Bacon

4.The King James Bible and Other Prose in Early 17th Century

5.English Non-Dramatic Poetry in the First Thirty Years of the 17th Century:

John Donne， Ben Jonson，the Spenserians

Chapter Ⅳ ENGLISH LITERATURE DURING THE ENGLISH BOURGEOIS REVOLUTION AND THE RESTORATION

 Section Ⅰ The Historical Background:Political and

Ideological

1.The Political Background from the Eve of the English

Bourgeois Revolution to the Downfall of Stuart

Absolutism (1625-1688)

2.The Ideological Background of EngliSh Literature in the

17th Century.

 Section Ⅱ Minor Currents of English Literature from 1625

to 1660

1.Minor English Poets andProse Writersof the Period

2.The Pamphlet Literature of the Levellers and the

Digger.s: John Lilburne and Gerrard Winstanley

 Section Ⅲ John Milton

1.Milton's Life and Literary Career

2.Milton's Early Works

3.The Middle Period of Milton's Literary Career: His

Prose and His Sonnets

4."Paradise Lost", "Paradise Regained" and "Samson

Agonistes'"

 Section Ⅳ English Literature of the Restoration

1.John Bunyan

2.John Dryden

3.Th.e English Drama of the Restoration.

4.Minor English Poetry and Prose.of the Restoration:

Samuel Butler's "Hudibras" and the Diaries of Samuel

Pepys and John Evelyn