CAMBRIDGE ENGLISH

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CAMBRIDGE ENGLISH. A name for English literature as taught at the U. of Cambridge since the establishment in 1912 of the Edward VII Chair of English Literature, whose first incumbent was Arthur Quiller-Couch: ‘Eventually an English Tripos [final honours degree examination] was proposed and agreed to in 1917, when, it was remarked, many of the dons who might have opposed it were away at the war. The ensuing Golden Age of Cambridge English has been widely commemorated in myth and memoir’ ( Bernard Bergonzi, Exploding English, 1990). Major figures of the ‘golden age’ (1920s–30s) included I. A. Richards, William Empson, and F. R. Leavis. Compare OXFORD ENGLISH.

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CAMBRIDGE ENGLISH

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