Romanticism

NatureAnd

Eternal

DEFINITION Contrary to what

you may think, the term Romanticism is not just about romantic love (although love is sometimes the subject of romantic art).

Romanticism is characterized by the 5 “I”s

ImaginationIntuitionIdealismInspirationIndividuality

IMAGINATIONImagination was emphasized over

“reason.”This was a backlash against the

rationalism characterized by the Neoclassical period or “Age of Reason.”

Imagination was considered necessary for creating all art.

THE ROLE OF IMAGINATION As the poet Wordsworth

would suggest, humans not only perceive and experience the world

around them; they also, in part, create it. The

imagination unites reason and feeling, enabling humans to reconcile differences and opposites—this reconciliation is a central ideal for

Romantics. Finally, the imagination enables humans to “read “

nature as a system of symbols.

INTUITION Romantics placed value

on “intuition,” or feeling and instincts, over reason.

Emotions were important in Romantic art.

British Romantic William Wordsworth described poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.”

IDEALISMIdealism is the concept

that we can make the world a better place.

Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, held that the mind forces the world we perceive to take the shape of space-and-time.

INSPIRATION The Romantic artist,

musician, or writer, is an “inspired creator” rather than a “technical master.”

What this means is “going with the moment” or being spontaneous, rather than “getting it precise.”

INDIVIDUALITY Romantics celebrated

the individual. During this time period,

Women’s Rights and Abolitionism were taking root as major movements.

Walt Whitman, a later Romantic writer, would write a poem entitled “Song of Myself”: it begins, “I celebrate myself…”

IDEALIZATION OF NATURE Embracing the uncivilized,

the wild, the pre-civilized. Rousseau: “Man is born free

and everywhere he is in chains.” In other words, civilization is in part the cause of our corruption.

The “noble savage,” and James Fennimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking novels, I.e. The Last of the Mohicans.

BUT THERE WERE 2 VIEWS OF NATURE The first viewed nature as peaceful, calm, nurturing, a source for spiritual renewal.

JOHN CONSTABLE: THE HAY WAIN

BUT NATURE COULD ALSO BE FRIGHTENING IN

ITS POWER, AND CAUSE A DIZZYING SENSE OF

AWE AND WONDER.

J.M.W. TURNER: AVALANCHE

EDMUND BURKE DEFINED THESE TWO VIEWS OF

NATURE AS:

• The beautifuland

• The sublime

NATURE

CELEBRATION OF NATURE Nature often presented as a work of art

from the divine imagination Nature as a healing power Nature as a refuge from civilization Nature viewed as “organic,” (alive)

rather than “mechanical” or “rationalist”

Nature viewed as a source of refreshment and meditation

SYMBOLISM AND MYTH

Valued as the human means for imitating nature in art

Could simultaneously suggest many things in a creative way

Based on a desire to “express the inexpressible” through the resources of language

THE ROMANTIC HERO As the Romantic

writers show us, our heroes were not always cowboys:

1. The hero as artist 2. The hero striving

beyond the moral restrictions of society

3. The hero who reappears from the ancient classics

THE EVERYDAY AND THE EXOTIC Romantic writers

embraced everyday realism (poetry of Wordsworth)

Also sought the folk legends of the past

Promoted exotic ideas suggested by technology and the imagination (a beautiful soul in an ugly body, as in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein or Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame).

THE ROMANTIC ARTIST IN SOCIETY The Romantics were

often ambivalent toward the “outside” world. On the one hand, they were socially and politically passionate—involved in worthy causes and social issues. On the other hand, they isolated themselves from the public.

RECENT DEVELOPMENTS

Today a number of literary theorist have called into two major romantic perceptions:

1. That the literary text is a separate, individuated, living organism.

2. That the artist is fiercely independent genius who creates original works of art

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