This module addresses the literature of the seventeenth century, tightly defined as the period running from the accession of Charles I in 1625 through the Civil War (1642-9) and the Restoration of the monarchy under Charles II (1660) to the end of the so-called ‘early-modern’ era in 1700. This was an age of political and cultural revolution and counter-revolution, and its literature is equally searching and seismic. Towering over the century as its literary colossus is the figure of Milton whose forty-year career encompassed, in addition to Paradise Lost, conceptually and generically radical variants of the entire gamut of the period’s poetic, dramatic and prose modes. The period’s other major geniuses include: Herbert, Marvell, Dryden, Rochester and Congreve. Beyond these familiar names, recent scholarship has significantly expanded and diversified the seventeenth-century literary canon, in particular calling attention to the achievements of the pioneering women writers of the age, Margaret Cavendish, Lucy Hutchinson and Aphra Behn, and recovering the work of visionary extremists such as the ‘Ranter’ Abiezer Coppe and eccentrics like Sir Thomas Browne, arguably the most singular stylist in the history of English prose. This diversity will be fully reflected in the module, whose manageable chronological span will ensure that students can encounter the literature of the seventeenth century in all its fertile variousness.

Seminars in the autumn term will address the four 'set texts', chosen to introduce students to the principal genres and styles of the period across its full chronological range. In the spring term, you will have the opportunity to choose from a range of optional seminar courses, focusing either intensively on a single major author (e.g. Milton or Dryden) or else exploring the development of a particular literary mode (e.g. drama) or recurrent preoccupation within the period (e.g. revolution or sexuality).

Lectures in the course will alternate between treatments of single authors and more broad-based accounts of schools or movements (e.g. ‘Civil War literature’; ‘Restoration Comedy’). The key historical divide of the Restoration will provide a natural hinge between the two terms, with lectures in the autumn concentrating on writers and topics from before that divide, and those in the spring addressing authors and themes from after it.

Examination is by means of a 3-hour written paper, or by Course Essay if preferred and if no other Course Essay is being submitted by the candidate in that year.