Renaissance
forced the occasional closing of the theaters was symptomatic of what was to come. The
increasing strength of the predominantly Puritan middle class in the House of Commons
during the reign of James I and his son Charles I, made confrontation inevitable. A civil
war broke out in 1642 between Royalists and Roundheads (puritans). With the outbreak
of the Puritan revolution, literature polarized. The theatre remained a popular form of
entertainment until the Puritan government closed all the playhouses in 1649.
The greatest of the Puritan poets was John Milton. Sightless, he composed Paradise Lost,
his greatest work and the only successful English Epic.
The Renaissance 1500 1650: background
1. What does the word ,,renaissance mean? Characterise briefly the period called the
Renaissance.
2. Where did the Renaissance start and why?
3. Why did the Renaissance focus on the human spirit?
4. What kind of ideas and beliefs did the Renaissance develop?
5
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