Studio per verifica di inglese

Inglese/Augustan Age.md

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-- Enclosures
+The Augustan age started with the first Hanoverian king who was **George I**, he was German and he didn't spoke well English, so he managed to delegate power to the **Cabinet** ("il gabinetto") headed by the Prime Minister, who in that time was **Sir Robert Walpole**.
+There was two main political parties, the **Tories** and the **Whigs**.
+
+The Augustan Age was a golden age form political and cultural debate.
+There was a spreading of the Coffee Houses, which were public places where people reunited to talk about social and political concerns.
+
+The new middle class had a greater social mobility. The noblemen started to do grand tours, in which they gone across the Europe, this brought a big Italian influence to architects.
+
+A new religious movement called Methodism brought support and education to the lower classes.
+
+George I was succeed by **George II** who fought  2 foreign wars, the war of Austrian succession, and the Seven Years war. There was also an unsuccessful Scottish Rebellion, who brought an end to the Stuart's claim, because he was headed by Jacobites, who supported the Stuart's return to English's trone. He chose as prime minister William **Pitt**, who had a mercantilist trade policy and aimed to maintain a favorable balance of bower in Europe.
+# Political Organization
+
+|               | Whigs                                     | Tories                                        |
+| ------------- | ----------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------- |
+| Descendant of | Parlamentarians                           | Royalists                                     |
+| Believers in  | Constitutional monarchy, no divine rights | divine right of king, no religious toleration |
+| Supported by  | Wealthy and merchant classes              | Church of England and landowners              |
+| Later became  | Liberal party                             | Conservative Party                            |
+The upper classes from now on includes, along with landowners and aristocracy, also merchants, tradesmen and manufacturers.
+There was also a growing middle class, which included artisans, shopkeepers and tradesmen.
+The lower class included poor, who lived in urban and rural areas, they had no political right and lived in terrible conditions. They had been affected by smallpox
+# Toughs
+Generally regarded as a golden age, the 18th century in Britain was called ‘Augustan' after the period of Roman history which had achieved political **stability** and power along with a flourishing of the arts. This was a distinctive moment in the making of modern Britain. It was an age of **traditionalism**, elegance and wit. The virtues of politeness, moderation and rationality were commonly praised. It was a materialistic society – worldly, pragmatic and responsive to economic pressure. Yet, its institutions were **hierarchical**, hereditary and privileged. There was a growing tendency to focus on personal gain and pleasure as the main objectives of life. Elections were largely controlled by the local landowners. Politicians were not concerned with winning over the electorate but with **bribing** them, either with money or with the promise of jobs.
+
+Eighteenth-century society championed **individualism**, seizing opportunities in the sectors of economy that provided scope for initiative, enterprise and enrichment. It was in many ways an extraordinarily free and open age, whose characteristics distinguished Britain from the other European countries. Many travellers were surprised by what they saw as the **comparative** freedom enjoyed by the British people in contrast with the more absolutist regimes of their own countries. Enlightened thinkers, from the philosopher John Locke to journalists such as Joseph Addison, rejected the strict, **pessimistic** values of Puritanism, like original sin and the depravity of man. Liberal thought influenced the new view of the world and affirmed free will, salvation for all, as well as the belief in the goodness of mankind and its capacity for progress. **Optimism** encouraged faith in progress and human perfectibility, and made people eager to try new ways of trusting their own capabilities: reason, which made them different from animals, and common sense.
+# Literature
+![18cnovels](18cnovels.png)
+The population who was able to read increased to 60% of adult males and 40% adult females. This was caused by the increased number of volume published by the writers. This became an economic-driven work.
+The works wanted to be more realistic, the protagonists were usually from the middle class, struggling for survival or social success. The primary aim of the writer was to write in a simple way to make everyone understand.
+## Daniel Defoe
+He was born in a Protestant family, he was well-educated. His father wanted for him a religious career but he began working as an apprentice and then he make his own business.
+He had financial crisis and he was arrested for his political works like *The Review*. He was brought to the pillory but the third time his friend throw him flowers.
+He refused his ideals and become a secret agent for the government.
+He started writing stories like Robinson Crusoe and novels like Roxana. He gain money so he could afford a comfortable life. His creditors haunted him 'till his death.
+### Robinson Crusoe
+His a story about a man who spent nearly 30 years on an island.
+He traveled the world to search for success but he is captured by pirates, who get him to Brasil, where he became owner of a successful plantation. While travelling to Africa to buy slaves he is shipwrecked and he find himself alone on a desert island.
+He records his struggles to improve his life on the island and reflects on his situation. He made himself the reader and god.
+After 12 years he find footprint in the sand and evidences of cannibal activities. He manage to save Friday, one of their victims. He teach him to speak and read the bible. Then he save Friday's father.
+After some years he manage to get saved by a ship and find he has become rich by the plantation.
+
+A big part of the book is set on the desert island, where Crusoe is the prototype of the English colonizer.
+The book has an individualistic view, where a man can modify reality by working hard. The novel is a Spiritual Autobiography, because God and the Bible are fundamental to Crusoe.
+## Jonathan Swift
+He was born and educated in Ireland, he gone to England and has been involved in politics, his patron encouraged him to write his first book. He returned to Ireland where he became Dean of a Cathedral. He gave money to poor people and he published his masterpiece: Gulliver's Travel, and also A Modest Proposal.
+He did not share the optimism of his age.
+### Gulliver's Travel
+4 journeys of Gulliver.
+In the first he is shipwrecked and arrives to Lilliput (small people)
+In the second he arrives to Brobdingnag (gigantic people, he become the king's pet)
+In the third voyage he arrive to the flying island of Laputa (book-eaters, the unhappiest people are immortal)
+The last voyage lands Gulliver to the Land of the Houyhnhnms (civilized horses who rules Yahoos)
+
+---
+
 Augustan Age inspiring from the emperor August. That was a moment with:
 - Political stability
 - Flourishing of arts