The Romantic Era
“the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”
-W. Wordsworth
World Literature and Composition
Revolt against
Neoclassicism/Enlightenment
• Romantic writers rebelled against the neoclassic
ideas of the 18th century.
• reason, form, and order.
• Wrote tightly controlled poetry in the classical
mold
• Maintained traditions
• Controlled emotion
• Focused on adult concerns (ruling class)
Background
• Late 18th century to early 19th century
• Romantic movement influenced the social and
political landscape of Europe.
• Romantics rejected science and reason
• Romantics embraced nature, emotion,
mythology, and individual experience
• The Power of Imagination was a major strength
of the Romantics
Romantic Ideas
• Emotions and imagination
• Subjective experiences of the individual- desires,
hopes, and dreams
• Nature- creative and destructive forces
• Spontaneity
• Experimentation
• Childhood, unsophisticated societies, common
people
• Passion and vision
Pioneers of Romantanicism
• Scotland’s Robert Burns
• Scotland’s James Macpherson
• Germany’s Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Robert Burns
•Regarded as the national poet of
Scotland.
•Pioneer of the Romantic movement
•Burns' themes included republicanism
(he lived during the French
Revolutionary period) and Radicalism
•Burns is generally classified as a
proto-Romantic poet, and he influenced
William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor
Coleridge, and Percy Bysshe Shelley
greatly.
“To a Mouse”
• Stanza 1: The poet is doing his • Stanza 3: Here he tells the
utmost to assure this terrified mouse that he realizes its need
little creature that he has no to steal the odd ear of corn, and
intention of causing it any harm. he does not really mind. He’ll get
by with remainder and never
miss it.
• Stanza 2: He then goes on to
apologize to the mouse for the
behavior of mankind using • Stanza 4: Dismay at the enormity
beautiful prose which requires of the problems he has brought
neither translation nor on the mouse causes him to
interpretation. Listen to what he reflect on what he has done -
is saying, and you will be well destroyed her home at a time
on your way to understand what when it is impossible to rebuild.
made Burns such a greatly There is no grass to build a new
loved man. Note how he home and the December winds
equates himself with the mouse are cold and sharp. Her
in life’s great plan. preparations for winter are gone!
“To a Mouse” continued:
• Stanza 5: Where the mouse had • Stanza 7: How many times have
thought that she was prepared people unknowingly trotted out,
for winter in her comfortable “The best laid schemes” without
little nest in the ground, now she realizing that they were quoting
from Burns? The sadness, the
is faced with trying to survive in despair, the insight contained
a most unfriendly climate, with within this verse are truly
little or no hope in sight. remarkable and deeply moving.
• Stanza 8: This final verse reveals
• Stanza 6: It seems probable that the absolute despondency that
here the poet is really Burns was feeling at this stage
comparing his own hard times in his life. Not at all what one
with that of the mouse – a life of might expect from a young man
of twenty-six, supposedly so
harsh struggle, with little or no popular with the lassies, and
reward at the end. with his whole life ahead of him,
but nevertheless expressing
sentiments with which many of
us today can easily relate.
Major Poets of the Romantic
Era
• William Wordsworth
• Lord Byron
• William Blake
• Percy Shelley
• John Keats
• Samuel Coleridge
• Matthew Arnold
William Wordsworth
1770-1850
• Politically radical as a
youth
• As he matured, his
popularity increased
• “Lyrical Ballads” (1798)
with Coleridge ushered in
the Romantic era.
• By his death, he was one
of the most sought after
poets of his era.
• Britain’s poet laureate in
1843
George Gordon Byron
or Lord Byron
1788-1824
• Privileged upbringing
• Loved to travel
• Scandal followed him
• Came to believe that action
was more important than
poetry
• Died tragically from illness
while fighting Turkish rule in
Greece
• “Don Juan”
• “Child’s Harold’s Pilgrimage”
William Blake
• Poet, painter, visionary
mystic, and engraver
• Understood by few and
misunderstood by many
• Focused much of his
work on imagination,
symbolism, and
childlike innocence.
• Very original
• “Songs of Innocence
and Experience”,
“Marriage of Heaven
and Hell”
Percy Shelley
1792-1822
• Idealist and rebel from a
privileged aristocractic
family
• Booted from Oxford
University
• Too radical for the English
establishment
• A bit of a nomad; he spent
a lot time in Italy
• Drowned off the coast of
Italy; age 29
• “Ode to the West Wind”
and “To a Skylark”
John Keats
1795-1821
Brilliant poet who’s life was
filled with tragedy
• Shelly very fond of Keats
• Critics were very harsh
• Famous for his odes- “Ode
to a Nightinggale” and “Ode
to a Greacian Urn”
• Died age 25 from
consumption
• Known for his intensity,
sensuous imagination, love
of beauty, and rich
descriptive power
• “Here lies one whose name
was writ in water.”
Matthew Arnold
1822-1888
• Professor of Poetry at
Oxford for a time
• Shared with great clarity his
own inner feelings
• Many of his poems and
ideas reflected his faith and
the sense of isolation that
man feels without faith
• “Dover Beach”
• Lacked the flair and
dramatic that surrounded
the other big names of the
Romantic movement