An Overview of English Literature

The end of the 18th century was a revolutionary era: the Industrial Revolution changed the way people lived and worked; the American Revolution saw the rise of the United States of America as an independent country; and the French Revolution brought France’s despotic monarchy to an end. In this episode, learn how some influential English writers responded to the French Revolution in England.

Gothic literature started in England in 1764 with Horace Walpole’s “The Castle of Otranto”. It then boomed in the 1790s with the author Ann Radcliffe. Listen to this episode and know more about how this genre came to be, and how it expanded into the 20th and 21st centuries.

The 18th century is commonly known as the great age of letter writing. Everyone wrote letters! Listen to this episode and find out how this practice affected the literary production of the time.

The rise of the novel as a new literary genre sprang from two main currents: that of the popular and entertaining novel of amorous intrigue, and the counter-movement of the edifying high-brow novel. Listen to this episode and know more!

The 18th century was a period of wit, in which authors used different strategies to criticise the politics of the time. One of them was satire!

In this episode I talk about a dark period in English history, but which had a great impact on the ways of thinking about the human being in the 17th and 18th centuries: slavery and the slave trade.

In this episode you will know more about Daniel Defoe, the author of the famous “Robinson Crusoe”, and about his political writings in 18th-century England.

In this episode I talk about Eliza Haywood, the main female writer of the first half of the 18th century. She was an important name in the literary genre of amatory fiction: stories about love and sexual adventures with female protagonists.

Listen to this episode about the main name in the second literary phase of the long 18th century, which lasted from 1700 to 1744: the poet and king of satire, Alexander Pope.

In this episode you will know more about Aphra Behn (1640?-1689), the first professional woman writer in England, who worked as a spy during Charles II’s reign and left her mark in the history of English literature.

After the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660, Charles II reigned for almost 25 years. Listen to this episode and know what the main events of his reign were and what happened after his death.

John Dryden (1631-1700) was the main literary figure in the last decades of the 17th century in England. Listen to this episode and know more about his writing style.

The period between 1660 and 1785 in English literary history can be divided in three phases: the first from 1660 until 1700; the second from 1701 until 1744; and the last one from 1745 until 1785. Listen to the podcast to know more about the main authors and characteristics of each phase.

In this episode I talk about how books were printed and circulated in England after the Restoration up to the beginning of the 18th century.

The year is 1660 and Charles II has been summoned to restore the English monarchy. Listen to this episode to have a better understanding of the context surrounding this historical moment.