THE AGE OF TRANSITION (1740-1800)

HISTORYCAL BACKGROUND

1.Decline of the Party Feud.: The contest between the Whigs and the Tories still

continues, but it is hardly of the previous bitterness. The chief reason for this change is

found in the weakness of the Tory party. In the middle of century the whigs had hardly any opposition.

2.Commercial and Imperial Expansion : Under the pacific management of the great Whig minister Walpole, and owing to the successful wars of his successors, the eighteenth century saw an immense growth in the wealth and

importance of the British Empire.

3. The French revolution : During the century new ideas were germinating; new forces were gathering strength; and the Revolution. Liberty, equity and fraternity were the wach words of French revolution.

Features of the age

1. The Double Tendency : Two movements can be clearly observedin the writing of the time.

(i)The allegiance to the old order of classicism.

(ii) The search after the new order of Romanticism.

2. The new Romanticism: The general features of the Romantic movement were:

(i) A return to Nature (not the bookish Nature).(ii) Sympathy for poor and oppressed.

(iii)A fresh interest in man's position in the world of nature. This led to great activity in

religious and political speculation.(change the thought).

(iv)A revolt against the conventional literary technique, such as that of the heroic

couplet.

3. The New Learning: The middle and later stages of the eighteenth century show a minor Renaissance that touched nearly all Europe. The increase in wealth and comfort coincided with a general uplifting of the standard of the human intellect particularly In France.

In England the new learning took several channels. In literature we have the revival of

the Romantic movement, leading to (a) research into archaic literary forms, such as the ballad, and (b) new editions of the older authors, such as Shakespeare and Chaucer.

4.The New Philosophy : The spirit of the new thinking, which received its consummate

expression in the works of Voltaire, was marked by keen scepticism and the zest for

eager inquiry. Scotland very early took to it, the leading Scottish philosopher being

Hume.

5.The Decline of Political Writing : With the partial decay of the party spirit the

activity in pamphleteering was over; poets and satirists were no longer the favourites of

Prime Ministers. Walpole, the greatest of contemporary ministers, openly despised the

literary breed, for he did not need them. Hence writers had to depend on their public,

which was not entirely an evil.

THE REACTIONARY SCHOOL 🏫

1. Samuel Johnson

Johnson has a faithful chronicler in Boswell, whose Life of Samuel Johnson

makes us intimate with its subject to a degree rare in literature. But even the prying zeal

of Boswell could not extort many facts regarding the great man's early life.

Born : Lichfield, son of bookseller.

Education: Oxford

He had skin disease

Works

1. Essay on Beswell's Life of Johnson.

2. Dictionary (first English dictionary)

3. London

4. Irene

5. The Gentleman 's Magazine

6. The life of savage

7.The rembler

8. The spectator

His style

- Miseries and indignity for poor scholar.

- Fighting every step with bitter tenacity.

- All his tricks of humour-

- his bearishness, his gruff good-will, his silent and secret

- benevolences; his physical aberrations--his guzzlings, his grunts, his grimaces,

- puffings and wallowings; his puerile

- superstitions; his deep and beautiful piety; his Tory prejudices.

THE TRANSITION POETS

1. James Thomson

Born: Kent
Works: Winter (1726),
The seasons (1730),
Liberty (1735).
"The praises of Liberty were condemned harbour spiders, and to gather dust."

2 .Oliver Goldsmith