John Sutherland Research Paper

John Sutherland was born on October 9th, 1938, in England. He studied literature at the University of Leicester and graduated in 1964. Sutherland began his academic career as an assistant lecturer in Edinburgh, and is Emeritus Lord Northcliffe Professor of Modern English Literature at University College, London. John Sutherland also writes for The Guardian and is a renowned literary reviewer. His major publication is Stephen Spender: The Authorized Biography (2004), which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Biography Award.

In A Little History of Literature, John Sutherland writes about the most outstanding writers from around the world. Among many excellent authors, John Sutherland writes about Chaucer, William Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Charles

In A Little History of Literature, John Sutherland presents five reasons why he believes this is true. Firstly, Dickens was uniquely inventive. He created the first detective novel, and pioneered the ‘autobiographical novel.’ Furthermore, he was fascinated by the power of symbolism, and became one of the most poetic authors. The second reason for Charles Dickens’s greatness is that he did not make children the heroes or heroines of his stories. Instead, he depicted them as weak, vulnerable and gullible. He described a child’s-eye view of the world as very merry, as opposed to an adult’s view of the world, which is filled with hatred, and anger. The reason why Dickens is a great writer is because he was the most sensitive novelist of his time. In his writing he was very emotional, and wrote everything that was bothering him. Dickens was the first novelist to appreciate that fiction itself could change the world. In his novels, he wrote about what was happening around him in the world, and advocated changes that could be made. His work impacted society, and six years after his novel Bleak House came out, an engineer began the construction of a sewer system under the streets of London. Lastly, Dickens is considered to be the finest British novelist, because he believed in the essential goodness of people. Even though he included villains in his novels, he always felt that people were good at heart. “This faith in

Sutherland mentioned some of the most outstanding writers of all time, namely Homer, William Shakespeare, Charles Dickens, Edgar Allan Poe, Jane Austen and many others. In addition, Sutherland wrote about topics such as publishing rights, censorship, and different reading groups. Although the author of A Little History of Literature dedicated some chapters to non-British authors, he mainly focused on Anglo-Saxon literature. In some chapters, John Sutherland wrote mostly about the personal life of an author, instead of focusing on the style or evolution of the author's writing. This text is very opinionated. John Sutherland states who he believed is the most influential or best author of all