A short history of English literature Book

"The first reading of Troilus and Criseyde is one of life's great narrative experiences," writes Harry Blamires near the beginning and from that point on, I was hooked. Plot summaries, short biographical information and some critical points about hundreds of authors, poets and playwrights keep this fast and fun. I hit a bit of a hiccup when he seemed to excuse Jacobian anti-Semitic plays claiming that the performances did as much damage to Jews as wicked stepmother stories hurt second wives. I have to admit, though, the comparison is clever if open to discussion. I also took great pleasure in the tossed out sentences about writers Blamires found less worth of inclusion. About Noël Coward he writes, "whose talent for keeping the pot of verbal flippancy can be entertaining in short doses. His work raises the question whether flippancy can be labelled 'satire' in the absence of a morally anchored viewpoint." Nice one. But Blamires is not a snob, giving Tolkien as much attention as more canonized authors. This wasn't just a convenient and charming "expert" confirming my own vague opinions about various authors, there were many writers who I was completely unfamiliar with that are now on the too long "to-read" list in my head, and other writers I had already wanted to read acquired a greater sense of urgency. Why is the title about "English" literature, though, when Blamires surveys so many Irish, Welsh and Scottish writers? Some Americans, like T.S. Elliot and Henry James, make the cut. It seems the criteria is: did you write in English or English dialect and did you ever live in the British Isles. When I consider how much time and geography is covered in less than 500 pages it makes me smile, and I was smiling the whole time I was reading this.