Essential facts about English Literature
 

1_ The English language is split into three large time periods, each represented by a main author or work: Old English (Beowulf), Middle English (Geoffrey Chaucer), and Modern English (William Shakespeare).

2_ The oldest surviving English text is Caedmon’s Hymn of Creation.

3_ When King Henry VIII had England’s monasteries burned down in 1535, many of the oldest texts written in English also went up in flames.

4_ The first novel wasn’t written in English (critics usually give that honor to Cervantes’ Don Quixote), but the first extremely successful novel was: Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe.

5_ Works written in English have won twenty-six Nobel Prizes in Literature, more than any other language. Of those twenty-six, nine were won by authors from the United Kingdom.

6_ Bede- the father of English learning. The first Historian.

7_ Caedmon- the first English poet.

8_ Cynewulf- first writer to sign his works.

9_ Alfred- first prose writer in English.

10_ Chaucer- father of English literature

11_ Dryden- father of English criticism

Bacon- father of English esaay