ROMANTICISM IN ENGLISH LITERATURE.

BACKGROUND.
1. The movement emphasized intense emotion as an authentic source of aesthetic experience, placing new emphasis on such emotions as apprehension, horror and terror, and awe—especially that experienced in confronting the new aesthetic categories of the sublimity and beauty of nature.
2. They were unconventional. Since they believed in being true to their emotions, they refused to be constrained by social or literary or political conventions—conventions of any kind, for that matter. They were rebellious, they were individualistic…and their writing reflected it. They were all about poetic experimentation, which means that the most important Romantic writers revolutionized the way poetry was written.
  1. Romanticism (also the Romantic era or the Romantic period) was an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement that originated in Europe toward the end of the 18th century and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate period from 1800 to 1850.
    1. Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather than the classical.
  2. It was embodied most strongly in the visual arts, music, and literature, but had a major impact on historiography, education, and the natural sciences.
  3. It had a significant and complex effect on politics, and while for much of the Romantic period it was associated with liberalism and radicalism, its long-term effect on the growth of nationalism was perhaps more significant.
3. The Romantics were a group of poets writing and publishing in the late 18th and early 19th century in Britain.
KEY INFORMATION.
1. The French Revolution:The French masses got sick of Louis XVI and his wife Marie-Antoinette living the high life in Versailles…so they cut of their heads. The French Revolution was the start of a whole new revolution in politics and society.
  1. The Industrial Revolution The rise of the machines! When mechanized manufacturing processes transformed work and production, factories started popping up everywhere and people left the country for the city to work in them.
    1. Emotion: We can't help the way we feel, and the Romantics would say that we shouldn't try to. Let's just let ourselves be washed over by emotions. That's what being human is all about, isn't it?
      1. Rebellion: The Romantics didn't like conventions. They rebelled against literary conventions, they rebelled against political conventions, and they rebelled against social conventions. They believed that we should first and foremost be true to ourselves, which means not going along with the herd.
        Sublime: Generally, we experience the sublime when we're out in nature and we're totally overwhelmed by it. Think of the feeling you might get when you saw Niagara Falls, the Grand Canyon, or Mount Everest for the first (or thousandth) time. This is nature at its biggest and baddest, and when we see it, we feel a whole mess of very powerful emotions including both terror and joy. .
  2. Nature: Trees, rivers, birds, bees…the Romantics lapped it up. According to the Romantics, we simply could not be happy or whole without a connection to nature. Lots of people like to refer to the Romantics' nature as Nature with a capital N because it was more than just the grass and the oceans—it was the whole concept.
    1. Heroism: The Romantics were really into characters who exemplified bravery, courage, and other hero-like qualities. They wrote about and cherished characters who went against the grain, who were larger than life, whose actions were bold and spectacular. Think Don Juan, Frankenstein's monster, or Prometheus, all of whom were heroes (or, in some cases, anti-heroes) that the Romantics made famous.
      1. Ruins and Relics of the Ancient Past: The Romantics really dug dug-up stuff: vases from ancient Greece, old statues, and ruined buildings. They used all this as a way to reflect on time, and the passing of time.
      2. Sense and Sensuality: Sounds, sights, smells, and textures are a hallmark of Romantic literature. These writers believed that if we just sit there (preferably under a tree) and look around, listen, and sniff the air, we'll learn a lot. Our body is a learning instrument that's just as important as our mind or "intellect." Why let it go to waste?
        Experimentation with Poetic Form: The Romantics weren't just innovative in terms of content; they also loved to play with style. They broke with the literary conventions that they'd inherited from their predecessors, and in turn, changed the way that poetry was written.
THE ROMANTICISM AUTHORS.
1. William Blake (1757 – 1827)
  1. Lord Byron (1782 – 1824)
    1. John Keats (1795 – 1821)
      1. William Wordsworth (1770 – 1850)
        Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772 – 1834)
        Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 – 1822)
        John Clare (1793 – 1864)
        Matthew Arnold (1822 – 1888)

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ROMANTICISM IN ENGLISH LITERATURE.

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	Created by Zaiba Butt over 8 years ago