Accession of Henry VIII   (1509)

The second Tudor king was well-educated, a poet and a musician and knew many languages, so he raised a lot of hope for prosperity among his people. Henry VIII was the second son of Henry VII. His elder brother, Arthur, married Catherine, the Princess of Spain, when he was just a 16 year old boy. His marriage was actually imposed on him and had political reasons.

Arthur died soon and instead of sending Catherine to her homeland, Henry VII made his younger son marry his brother's widow. Henry VIII was six years younger than Catherine. At that time no one was allowed to marry his sister- in- law, but since Henry VIII was unwilling t do so and he was asked earnestly by his father by the time of his death, Pope gave him a dispensation i.e. in the Roman Catholic Church it is referred to a permission to break the normal rules of the church.

Six children were the outcome of their marriage during nine years of whom just one daughter survived. She was Mary and later became the queen of England. When Catherine was not able to bear anymore children due to old age, Henry VIII became restless for, he needed an heir, a son. Consequently, he decided to get divorced although it was illogical according to the Catholic Church. Henry believed that by marrying his brother's widow he had committed a sin and God had punished him by giving him no son. He sent a message to Pope demanding a dispensation but at that time Pope and the church were just the playthings of the king of Spain who was Catherine's kindred.

Obviously, Henry VIII did not receive any dispensation. Vexed at his failure, Henry became more restless as he fell in love with Anne Boleyn. But after a short time the conflict intensified when Anne became pregnant. A royal heir could not be an illegitimate child. Henry, who was considered a catholic champion against Luther and his opinions and who for writing a book against Luther had been given the title The Defender of the Faith by Pope, split  with the Roman Catholic Church.

Henry's motives were dynastic not religious; he needed a legitimate son and he could not get one without the divorce that Rome refused him. He insisted on being          The Supreme Head of the English Church and imposed oaths on the parliament and councilors. This was Henry's Reformation in 1535.

He divorced Catherine, forcing the archbishop of Canterbury to administer it and married Anne. But the outcome of his second marriage was another girl, Elizabeth. Three years later Anne was beheaded because of adultery. Just one day after Anne's execution Henry got engaged to Lady Jane Seymour and eventually she gave birth to the long-sought son named Edward VI who was very fragile and died at 16.

Claiming to be the supreme head of the English Church, Henry made all clergies and officials swear an oath. Those who opposed him were beheaded. He had two groups of opponents: Catholics and Protestants. The latter was not satisfied with mere break from the Roman Catholic Church; they also believed in some purifications and reformations within the English Church.

Sir Thomas More   (1477 - 1535)

More was a Lord Chancellor of Henry VIII and one of the ones who refused to take an oath. He was the crown of English humanists, the son of a judge, a graduate from Oxford, a great literary man, a close friend of Erasmus, a member of the parliament, a gentle and kind person, etc. He married twice, his first wife died and his second wife was a widow. Sir Thomas More was on one hand against the king's divorcing Catherine and on the other hand in opposition to split with the Roman Catholic Church. Accordingly, he resigned. But Henry needed his oath, for he was an influential man. Henry then kept on forcing More for two years and eventually he imprisoned him in The Tower of London, tried him on the charge of treason, and in 1535 beheaded him. (400 years later, More was given the title of Saint.)

Sir Thomas More was also a great literary figure and his great work is "Utopia". It is a satire in prose on the political and social condition of his time, written in Latin. "Utopia" contains two books:

Book 1 discusses the corruption of European societies. Book 2 is about More's ideal society. It is the story of a traveler who had been in a land named Utopia where everything was in order and perfect. It was a land where everybody shared wealth. (More lived centuries before Marx but he talked about Communism). It was a land of freedom of religion. In Utopia there is an educational system in which everybody, men and women, had to be educated. By and large, Utopia was a place of no pain but freedom and perfection. Utopia literary means Nowhere Land, derived from Plato's "Republic".

Religious Movements

During Henry's reign, there were three groups of religious people: 1. Protestants, the followers of Luther, 2. Catholics, the followers of the shattered Catholic Church; and 3. The followers of Henry VIII's Anglican Church who were composed of officials.

An Oxford and Cambridge educated follower of Luther named William Tyndale (1484 - 1536) decided to translate the Bible into vernacular English. But it was against the rules of Catholic Church, so Tyndale left England. Indeed he was forced to leave the country and immigrated to Switzerland where he translated and published his Bible. Then his Bible was smuggled into England and was distributed among Protestants. He could never return to England, so he settled in Poland and started advocating Protestantism. Later, he was strangled and burned for heresy.

Tyndale's Bible was a great help for the translation of the present Bible i.e.          King James' Bible. King James' Bible is an authorized one and was translated by a group of theologians and translators. They got a lot of help from Tyndale's Bible in which some of Catholic terms were changed. For example "Church" was changed into "Congregation", "Priest" was transformed into "Elder" and "Confession" was changed into "Knowledge".

John Calvin was another Protestant leader who was a French theologian living in Switzerland. He had his own doctrine and added a few rules to those of Luther. The Protestants of England were mostly the follower of Calvin and are called Puritans.

Puritanism

It is a great aspect of American culture and the basis of a great war; hence quite important. In his idea of Puritanism, John Calvin shared two rules with Luther. The following are the bases for Puritanism:

1. Belief in the Bible

He believed in the Bible as a source of knowledge. He declared that the Bible and faith are means of salvation.

2. No Papal Authority

He also denied any hierarchy and Papal authority.

The above mentioned rules were common between Protestantism and Puritanism. John Calvin also added the following rules of his own:

3. The Doctrine of Election

Calvin believed that God chooses among people i.e. He chooses who is damned forever and decides who is rescued forever. Damnation and salvation of the souls are predetermined by God before one's birth, i.e. Predestination.

4. The Covenant of Work

Due to Calvin's stipulation there had been a contract between God and Adam by which God promised Adam immortality and peace in Paradise. But Adam broke the covenant by eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge and this way he brought pain and sin to this world.

5. The Covenant of Grace

God has mercy on man and cares for his soul's salvation. He sent his son, Christ, to make another covenant due to which man goes through salvation if he believes in Christ. Jesus Christ sealed the covenant with his own blood through Crucifixion. Therefore, this covenant is between Christ and his followers.

Edward VI

By the time Edward VI was born his mother, Lady Jane Seymour died. Henry VIII waited two years in her honor. (He married 6 women, two of whom he divorced and two others he beheaded). When Henry VIII died, Edward VI who was just a 9-year old boy ascended the throne, having his uncle as his councilor. Edward's reign was a period of political and religious disorder, no money was left and the young king could not regulate the situation.

Henry VIII's Anglican Church, established for political and royal reasons, intensified the situation. It was founded by a layman and needed some sort of doctrine to believe in. Thus, the ministers of the new church started establishing a kind of theological doctrine which was a mixture of Catholicism and Puritanism. They kept the framework of Catholic Church, hierarchy. Forty two articles were established by the name of Doctrinal Foundation of Puritanism.

Accession of Queen Mary   

After Edward's death, Mary mounted the throne. She hated her father and brother, for she was a Catholic and established her government as Catholic. She was the first queen of England, the Bloody Mary.

Queen Mary suffered a lot before her reign. She was the daughter of Catherine and was proclaimed illegitimate by her own father. She was not allowed to go to her mother's grave after her death. In order to receive her father's favor, she had to renounce Pope and proclaim her father's supremacy over the Church of England. All these facts were the major reasons for her acting cruelly during her reign.

When she became the queen she was 37 years old and still unmarried. After two Protestant rulers, (her father and brother), she was the first ardent Catholic one who undid whatever her father had founded. She needed the alliance of a matrimonial union between the prince of Spain, and herself. She married Philip II, who became the emperor of Spain later. Mary beheaded many people for heresy and almost burned 300, for Pope had allowed Catholics to arrest and burn Protestants if they did not accept to convert to Catholicism. She died soon after five or six years ruling the country and her reign was a period of terror and harsh execution.

Accession of Queen Elizabeth   (1558)

Elizabeth was the second queen of England mounting the throne after Mary's death. She was 25 years old, quite intelligent, bright, a perfect politician, a master of languages, (English, German, French, Latin), a musician, and a master of sciences. She was also a humanist and a Protestant.

During her childhood, she and her mother, Anne Boleyn used to be the favor of Henry VIII. Throughout Mary's reign she had a hard time, for she was a Protestant but had to use a little hypocrisy to deny her Protestantism. When she came to the throne, she was still unmarried; meanwhile, she thought of the future of the state. "Who would be her husband?" was a very important question. She was taught to need a man to accompany her in ruling the country.

She had a lot of suitors, yet she was very difficult to please and never married. In fact, the general assumption was that she would marry since her father had undoubtedly taught her that one of the monarch's major duties is to provide an unquestioned, strong, legitimate heir to the throne.

Condition of the Country

England's weakness was its political and religious divisions. The Catholics, who had never been reformed during Mary's reign and the Protestants, were the extremes. In matters of religion, Elizabeth chose a middle way which satisfied neither the Catholics nor the Puritans. She followed her father's way, The Anglican Church, and became the supreme head of England's national church. Between two religious extremes, were the majority of Englishmen whose main desire was for order, stability and peace; as a result, they followed their queen.

Meanwhile, Pope excommunicated Elizabeth and encouraged plots to overthrow the monarchy. Accordingly, he sent a group of Catholic terrorists to kill or dethrone her. Mary, Queen of Scots was one of Catholics and a friend of the emperor of Spain who performed a lot of plots against Elizabeth. So she was imprisoned by Elizabeth and by the last plot she was executed. Elizabeth pretended that her execution was against her will.

James VI of Scotland was Mary's son. Elizabeth told him either to support his mother or she would give him the throne of England. James VI consented to his mother's death in order to become the prince.

Mary, Queen of Scots was a real Catholic supported by the Roman Catholic Church and the emperor of Spain; consequently, her execution led to a great war between Spain and England in her avenge. In 1588, Philip II, the Spanish emperor arranged an armada and invaded England. Spain excelled in navigation and was the superpower of that period. Spanish armada was sure about the victory since England was quite insignificant to them. However, quite unexpectedly, Spanish Armada was defeated and the survived ships withdrew from England. The reasons of the defeat were:

1. Northern tempest

2. English commanders set ships on fire and sent them toward the Armada; Spanish              ships were burned and 20,000 people were killed.

1588 was a turning point in the history of England, for it manifested itself as a       superpower and ruled over other countries for almost 300 years afterward. Nationalistic spirit started from Elizabeth's reign and the popularity of the queen increased. Elizabeth became a mythic figure whom people admired and was given the title of "The Virgin Queen", especially by the Protestants. Trade and commerce flourished and England started a phase of prosperity and grew in wealth. People were proud to be English.

Predominant Literary Forms and Modes of Elizabethan Period

1. Pastoral

2. Sonnet

3. Mythological Erotic

1. Pastoral

It is a literary mode in which the urban poet, who is tired of his environment, chooses an ideal setting. This ideal land is occupied by simple people, mostly shepherds, living a peaceful life. They are not ambitious, often play the pipes, fall in love and compose poems. It is a simple life of leisure in a golden land. Their only suffering is disappointment in love.

2. Sonnet

It is a kind of lyric poem made up of 14 lines of iambic pentameter with different rhyme schemes. Thus, as far as rhyme scheme is concerned there are different sonnets:

A. Italian Sonnet / Petrarchan Sonnet

Petrarch was the 14^th century Italian practitioner of this mode. Sidney's sonnets are also examples of this. It includes an octave i.e. a stanza of 8 lines, and a sestet i.e. a stanza of 6 lines, with the rhyme scheme:  a b b a a b b a   c d e c d e.

B. English Sonnets / Shakespearean Sonnet

Includes 3 quatrains i.e. stanzas of 4 lines and 1 couplet i.e. a stanza of 2 lines with the rhyme scheme:  a b a b   c d c d   e f e f   g g.

During the Elizabethan period sonnet was a predominant poetic form i.e. all great poets composed sonnets. But Petrarch gave the subject matter and treatment to the English sonnets; that was Petrarchan Convention.

Petrarchan Convention

In such a sonnet a lover is the speaker and is madly in love with a lady. His beloved is a goddess-like creature, possessing a divine beauty and exists to be admired. Yet, she is cold and cruel toward her lovers. The lover keeps awake at night, engaged in tears, groans and sighs. He experiences different kinds of feeling both sweet and bitter like love, jealousy, despair, etc.

3. Mythological Erotic / Ovidan Convention

This is the third genre of poetry during the Elizabethan period, composed by Christopher Marlow for the first time. It is a new form borrowed from classical literature. It is the story of a passionate love with a sexual connotation. The character of the story comes from Greek and Roman mythology. The classical practitioner of this genre was Roman, Ovid, whose book was titled "Metamorphosis".

Sir Philip Sidney   (1554 – 1586)

Sir Philip Sidney, a courtier, soldier, humanist, scholar, philosopher, critic, poet, a great friend and a patron to Elizabeth, embodied all the traits and virtues of the character and personality Elizabethans admired.

 He was the son of Sir Henry Sidney, Lord Deputy of Ireland, and the sister of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, the most spectacular and powerful of all the queen's subjects. Earl of Leicester was the one with whom Queen Elizabeth fell in love. His mother was an exceptionally literate figure. He had a very good education and attended Oxford, but he left without getting a degree. He went to Europe and spent mostly in Italy, Venice under Italian influence.

He found it very easy to enter the court of Elizabeth and he was a close courtier of the queen. He enjoyed Queen's favor until he was dismissed from the court for two reasons: 1. Once he opposed to the projected marriage of Elizabeth and               Duke of Manju and 2. His uncle who was a favorite of the queen married secretly.

After his dismissal, he went to his sister's state who was The Countess of Pembroke, where he wrote a romance in prose for her enjoyment: "Arcadia". It is the first English prose fiction, including some pieces of poems, too.

Later, the queen forgave him and he was titled as Knight. He was a member of the parliament from Kent and was sent to diplomatic missions by the queen and was successful in all of them. He was an ardent Protestant and chose military service as his profession but during the war with Spain, he was wounded and died.

Sidney was also a critic. Once he received a book written by a Puritan in which all kinds of entertainments were condemned and called immoral. Sidney wrote a book in answer and in defense of poetry by the title of "An Apology for Poetry" in which he believed in the following points:

1. Poetry is as old as man, it is antique.

2. Poetry is universal; thus, it spreads through time and place.

3. Poets are like prophets. A poet is a mirror to nature and tries to show things beyond      

    nature. He was after showing the Golden World not the Bronze one.

Aristotle was the first person who defended poetry. Plato believed that art is an imitation of the world which is an imitation itself of something genuine; as a result, art is a second-handed imitation and has no values. Plato did not allow poets into his "Republic".

Sir Philip Sidney fell in love with a young girl named Penelope, the daughter of    Earl of Essex. Though he was engaged to her, she married Lord Rich. Sidney wrote a sonnet sequence in Petrarchan convention titled "Astrophil and Stella". Astrophil means The Lover of the Star and Stella means Star in Latin. The speaker of the sonnet is a lover named Astrophil whose beloved is Stella and there are hints that the poet is telling his own life story.