All key topics covered, including Old English language and poetry; Beowulf; Middle English masters such as Chaucer and Malory, Renaissance masters such as Shakespeare, Bacon, Donne, and Milton; Restoration and the 18th century, including Dryden, Pope, Sheridan, Boswell, and Johnson; the Romantic poets and novelists; the Victorians; the moderns, including G.B. Shaw, James Joyce, and Samuel Beckett.