1. Main features of Old English literature Alfred the Great was the father of Old English Prose

Conclusion
But Alfred is also a great name in the history of Anglo-Saxon literature. No other single name of that remote period has so much contribution to the development of Anglo-Saxon literature. It is to him that English prose owes its origin and stupendous success. It is due to his untiring efforts that the loose, detached, unformed prose of the period became a solid, robust and graceful edifice. After his victory against the Danes, Alfred, a wise king as he was, set himself to the task of reanimating and reconstructing his people and country. In his endeavour to make his people, who had sunk into the depths of barbarism and ignorance, orderly, disciplined and cultured, he devoted himself whole-heartedly to improve their literary ideal and intellectual and cultural standard. Of course, Alfred’s name is mainly connected with Anglo- Saxon prose, and his contribution to its growth is beyond any exaggeration. His contribution to the development of Anglo-Saxon prose is marked in a three-fold way:
First, he helped the development of The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle or simply The Chronicle which was the first true specimen of Anglo-Saxon prose.
Second, he initiated and encouraged the English translations of certain great Latin works. Third, he himself wrote and thereby contributed to the growth of Anglo-Saxon prose. Before Alfred, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was nothing but a loose and detached record of the birth and the death of certain kings and the history of their warfare. In fact, the Chronicle was far from a literary work at first, and had no literary standard at all. It was Alfred’s sincere efforts and spontaneous enthusiasm that immensely contributed to the growth of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as the first monumental work of English prose. Alfred was supposed to have written some portions of the Chronicle, but what more he did was to raise the formless Chronicle to the immortality of the first national history of a western nation in its own language.