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Martian school of poetry

English literature

Learn about this topic in these articles:

British Surrealism

  • In British Surrealism

    The so-called Martian school of poetry was also founded on eccentric, defamiliarizing imagery pioneered by Surrealists of the 1930s.

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English literature

  • Beowulf
    In English literature: Poetry

    …came to be called the Martian school of poetry. The defining characteristic of this school was a poetry rife with startling images, unexpected but audaciously apt similes, and rapid, imaginative tricks of transformation that set the reader looking at the world afresh.

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makar

Scottish literature
Also known as: Scottish Chaucerian, makaris, maker, makeris
Quick Facts
Also spelled:
Maker (Scottish: “maker,” or “poet”)
Plural:
Makaris, or Makeris
Also called:
Scottish Chaucerian
Date:
1425 - 1550
Areas Of Involvement:
poetry
Scottish literature
courtly love
Related People:
Geoffrey Chaucer

makar, any of the Scottish courtly poets who flourished from about 1425 to 1550. The best known are Robert Henryson, William Dunbar, Gavin Douglas, and Sir David Lyndsay; the group is sometimes expanded to include James I of Scotland and Harry the Minstrel, or Blind Harry.

Because Geoffrey Chaucer was their acknowledged master and they often employed his verse forms and themes, the makaris are usually called “Scottish Chaucerians”; but actually they are a product of more than one tradition. Chaucerian influence is apparent in their courtly romances and dream allegories, yet even these display a distinctive “aureate” style, a language richly ornamented by polysyllabic Latinate words.

In addition, the makaris used different styles for different types of poems. The language that they used in their poems ranges from courtly aureate English, to mixtures of English and Scots, to the broadest Scots vernacular, as their subjects range from moral allegory to everyday realism, flyting (abuse), or grotesquely comic Celtic fantasy.