-
-
completes his history of the English church and people.
-
mingles the legends of Scandinavia with the experience in England of Angles and Saxons.
-
derives from earlier sources in Norway, Britain and Burgundy.
-
later provides humanists with the name Dunsman or dunce.
-
an approach later known as Ockham's Razor.
-
begins the epic poem of Piers Plowman.
-
of a mysterious visitor to the round table of King Arthur.
-
his long poem about a legendary love affair in ancient Troy.
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of which he completes only 24 by the time of his death.
-
an English account of the French tales of King Arthur.
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the northern Renaissance in the direction of Christian humanism
-
and plans to translate the Bible into English.
-
is published with text by Thomas Cranmer.
-
with Marlowe the older by two months.
-
to be followed by the complete Bible in 1588.
-
Anne Hathaway in Stratford-upon-Avon
-
the swaggering blank verse of Elizabethan and Jacobean drama.
-
the Protestant Elizabeth I as The Faerie Queene
-
After tentative beginnings in the three parts of Henry VI.
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both the ideals of the Renaissance and the disillusion of a less confident age.
-
which is completed by forty-seven scholars in seven years.
-
the first of his many masques for the court of James I
-
is heard to powerful effect in Volpone.
-
written ten years previously, are published
-
The Tempest, is performed.
-
and is buried in Holy Trinity Church
-
A Description of New England, an account of his exploration of the region in 1614.
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becomes dean of St Paul's.
-
thirty-six Shakespeare plays in the First .
-
is published posthumously.
-
in memory of a Cambridge friend, Edward King
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in London under the title The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America
-
the classic work on the subject, The Compleat Angler.
-
eats the remains of the turkey and begins his diary.
-
earning its author John Milton just £10
-
after only writing it for nine years
-
is published and is immediately popular
-
an early protest against the inhumanity of the African slave trade
-
his Essay concerning Human Understanding, arguing that all knowledge is based on experience
-
claiming comparison with the equivalent flowering under Augustus Caesar.
-
followed two years later by the Spectator.
-
in his Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge.
-
a delicate vein of mock-heroic in English poetry
-
can be seen as the first English novel
-
his hero on a series of bitterly satirical travels in Gulliver's Travels
-
his Treatise of Human Nature, in which he applies to the human mind the principles of experimental science
-
the correspondence that grows into the longest novel in the English language
-
a character of lasting appeal in the lusty but good-hearted Tom Jones.
-
his Elegy written in a Country Church Yard
-
his magisterial Dictionary of the English Language
-
a detailed diary of everyday life.
-
the first two volumes of Tristram Shandy, beginning with the scene at the hero's conception.
-
a forgery in the spirit of the times by James MacPherson.
-
Samuel Johnson for the first time, in the London bookshop of Thomas Davies.
-
conceives the idea of Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
-
the immensely successful Encyclopedia Britannica
-
commits suicide in a London garret.
-
is produced in London's Covent Garden theatre
-
to America and settles in Philadelphia
-
the first volume of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
-
The School for Scandal, is an immediate success in London's Drury Lane theatre
-
The School for Scandal, is an immediate success in London's Drury Lane theatre
-
Songs of Innocence, a volume of his poems with every page etched and illustrated by himself.
-
Reflections on the Revolution in France, a blistering attack on recent events across the Channel
-
Tam o' Shanter, in which a drunken farmer has an alarming encounter with witches
-
a passionately feminist work, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
-
his poem 'Tyger! Tyger! burning bright'
-
his completed Age of Reason, an attack on conventional Christianity
-
that while writing Kubla Khan he is interrupted by 'a person on business from Porlock'
-
Lyrical Ballads, a milestone in the Romantic movement
-
his poem 'Jerusalem' in the Preface to his book Milton
-
The Lay of the Last Minstrel, the long romantic poem that first brings him fame
-
tourists in unprecedented numbers to Scotland's Loch Katrine
-
from Oxford university for circulating a pamphlet with the title The Necessity of Atheism
-
bringing him immediate fame
-
Is Pride and Prejudice, based on a youthful work of 1797 called First Impressions
-
probably his best-known poem, the sonnet Ozymandias
-
who died in the USA in 1809
-
Ode to a Nightingale, inspired by the bird's song in his Hampstead garden
-
his autobiographical Confessions of an English Opium-Eater
-
in London in Warren's boot-blacking factory
-
based on a 3-year stay
-
published in book form in 1837
-
in book form, 1838
-
a vivid narrative poem about the terrible revenge of The Pied Piper of Hamelin
-
his ways just in time in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol
-
the theme of Conservatism uniting 'two nations', the rich and the poor
-
The Condition of the Working Class in England
-
his Book of Nonsense, consisting of limericks illustrated with his own cartoons
-
publication of his novel Vanity Fair in monthly parts (book form 1848)
-
Branwell, Emily and Anne Brontë die.
-
the publication in monthly numbers of David Copperfield, his own favourite among his novels
-
captures perfectly the Victorian mood of heightened sensibility
-
his dictionary of synonyms, the Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases
-
a poem finding heroism in the disaster,Within six weeks of the Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimea.
-
a long narrative poem, Maud, a section of which ('Come into the garden, Maud') becomes famous as a song
-
the often brutal aspects of an English public school
-
fame with her first full-length novel, Adam Bede
-
the theory of evolution in On the Origin of Species, the result of 20 years' research
-
"Great Expectations" (in book form 1861)
-
her first novel, East Lynne, which becomes the basis of the most popular of all Victorian melodramas
-
10-year-old Alice Liddell, on a boat trip, a story about her own adventures in Wonderland
-
an improving fantasy for young children, The Water-Babies
-
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, a development of the story he had told Alice Liddell three years earlier
-
Victorian Britain with his first collection, Poems and Ballads
-
in London and is published in Hamburg
-
Culture and Anarchy, an influential collection of essays about contemporary society
-
Middlemarch, in which Dorothea makes a disastrous marriage to the pedantic Edward Casaubon
-
Through the Looking Glass, a second story of Alice's adventures
-
his first success with his novel Far from the Madding Crowd
-
in the Atlantic Monthly and is published in book form in 1876
-
The Hunting of the Snark, a poem about a voyage in search of an elusive mythical creature
-
21-year-old Joseph Conrad, a Polish subject.
-
Henry James's story Daisy Miller, about an American girl abroad
-
are widely mocked and satirized in Britain
-
Long John Silver and Ben Gunn
-
the A volume of its New English Dictionary, which will take 37 years to reach Z
-
of his multi-volume translation from the Arabic of The Arabian Nights
-
his novel The Mayor of Casterbridge, which begins with the future mayor, Michael Henchard selling his wife and child at a fair
-
in Conan Doyle's first novel, A Study in Scarlet
-
Essays in Socialisman influential volume of essays edited by Bernard Shaw
-
The Golden Bough, a massive compilation of contemporary knowledge about ritual and religious custom
-
his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray in which the ever-youthful hero's portrait grows old and ugly
-
the National Literary Society in Dublin, with Douglas Hyde as its first president
-
surrounds the child Mowgli with a collection of vivid animal guardians
-
The Time Machine, a story about a Time Traveller whose first stop on his journey is the year 802701
-
his first collection, A Shropshire Lad
-
his first novel, Liza of Lambeth, based on the London life he has observed as a medical student
-
his science-fiction novel The War of the Worlds, in which Martians arrive in a rocket to invade earth
-
The Story of the Treasure Seekers, introducing the Bastable family who feature in several of her books for children
-
his novel Lord Jim about a life of failure and redemption in the far East
-
at her own expense The Tale of Peter Rabbit
-
his Just So Stories for Little Children
-
The Ambassadors, the second of his three last novels written in rapid succession
-
Joseph Conrad publishes
-
Kipps: the story of a simple soul, a comic novel about a bumbling draper's assistant
-
The Railway Children, the most successful of her books featuring the Bastable family
-
Father and Son, an account of his difficult relationship with his fundamentalist father, Philip Gosse
-
a success with The Autobiography of a Super-Tramp, his account of life on the road and in dosshouses
-
a determined example of the New Woman
-
Prester John, the first of his adventure stories
-
the only collection to appear before his early death in World War I
-
his reputation with the title poem of his collection The Listeners
-
the first volume of his autobiographical novel Sinister Street
-
posthumously in an abbreviated version
-
his semi-autobiographical novel Of Human Bondage
-
his first book of poems, Over the Brazier
-
their first appearance in P.G. Wodehouse's The Man with Two Left Feet
-
her first novel, The Return of the Soldier
-
a strong attack on the reparations demanded from Germany
-
his first appearance, taking on the villainous Carl Peterson in Bull-dog Drummond
-
his influential study of the philosophy of logic, Tractatus Logico Philosophicus
-
his novels about the Forsyte family as a joint collection under the title The Forsyte Saga
-
his first appearance in Dorothy Sayers' Whose Body?
-
for the first time in A.A. Milne's When We Were Very Young
-
her characteristic voice in her second novel, Pastors and Masters
-
The Preservation of Rural England, calling for rural planning to prevent the encroachment of towns
-
her first novel, The Hotel
-
Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man, the first volume of a semi-autobiographical trilogy
-
an immediate success with his first novel, The Good Companions
-
her first appearance, in Murder at the Vicarage
-
the most fluid of her novels, The Waves, in which she tells the story through six interior monologues
-
a narrative epic, Conquistador, about the conquest of Mexico
-
an autobiographical first novel, Frost in May
-
his hero Tony Last to a disastrous fate, far away in the Amazon rain forest
-
Murder in the Cathedral has its first performance in Canterbury cathedral
-
his economics in The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
-
the harsh realities of contemporary British life in The Road to Wigan Pier
-
a classic Fleet Street novel, Scoop, introducing Lord Copper, proprietor of The Beast
-
to the USA, later becoming US citizens
-
by numerous publishers before becoming, decades later, his best-known novel
-
an account of Yugoslavia, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon
-
the Famous Five in Five on a Treasure Island
-
for the first time as a single volume, published in New York
-
her first success with the novel The Pursuit of Love
-
British author Mervyn Peake's trilogy of gothic novels
-
a play in which moral guilt spreads like an infection
-
engages in high-spirited poetic word play
-
her most successful character, Noddy, a small boy who can't avoid nodding when he speaks
-
the first glimpse of Narnia in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
-
a dark fantasy in his novel The Day of the Triffids
-
Men at Arms, the first novel in the Sword of Honour trilogy based on his wartime experiences
-
his novel The Go-Between in the summer of 1900
-
his six-volume history The Second World War
-
US poet Sylia Plath
-
Lawrence Durrell's Alexandria Quartet
-
The Hostage is produced in Dublin
-
a Cotswold boyhood in Cider with Rosie
-
Thomas More in Robert Bolt's A Man for All Seasons
-
James and the Giant Peach
-
is first performed in the rebuilt Coventry Cathedral
-
English author John Le Carré publishes a Cold-War thriller The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
-
a fantasy treat for a starving child, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
-
The Jewel in the Crown, the first volume in his 'Raj Quartet'
-
recognition with her quirky second novel, The Magic Toyshop
-
his two-volume life of Lytton Strachey
-
The French Lieutenant's Woman, set in Lyme Regis in the 1860s
-
Owners, is produced in London
-
an influential economic tract, Small is Beautiful
-
his monumental 46-volume Buildings of England
-
the Booker Prize with her novel Heat and Dust
-
The Sea, the Sea, and wins the 1978 Booker Prize
-
about Mozart, Amadeus, has its premiere in London
-
Salman Rushdie's novel Midnight's Children uses the moment of India's independence to launch an adventure in magic realism
-
Noises Off opens in London's West end
-
attacks monetarism in The Economic Consequences of Mrs Thatcher
-
publishes a multi-faceted literary novel, Flaubert's Parrot
-
publishes his second collection as The Dread Affair
-
in a volume of satirical poems, Partingtime Hall
-
a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for his Satanic Verses
-
a trilogy on the British establishment by English playwright David Hare
-
The Madness of George III is performed at the National Theatre in London
-
The Man with Night Sweats deals openly with AIDS
-
publishes Birdsong, set partly in the trenches of World War I
-
Captain Corelli's Mandolin, a love story set in Italian-occupied Cephalonia
-
A schoolboy wizard performs his first tricks in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
-
The Amber Spyglass completes Philip Pullman's trilogy