A Movement Across A Movement Across the Artsthe Arts

Romanticism refers to a movement in art,

literature, and music during the 19th century. Romanticism is characterized by the 5 “I”s

Imagination Intuition Idealism Inspiration Individuality

Definition

Imagination 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.

British writer Samuel Taylor Coleridge called it “intellectual intuition.”

Imagination

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.”

Intuition

Idealism is the concept that we can make the

world a better place. Idealism refers to any theory that emphasizes

the spirit, the mind, or language over matter – thought has a crucial role in making the world the way it is.

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

Idealism

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.”

Inspiration

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…”

Individuality

Romanticism began to take root as a

movement following the French Revolution. The publication of Lyrical Ballads by William

Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1792 is considered the beginning of literary Romanticism.

Origins

Romanticism was a movement across all the

arts: visual art, music, and literature. All of the arts embraced themes prevalent in

the Middle Ages: chivalry, courtly love. Literature and art from this time depicted these themes. Music (ballets and operas) illustrated these themes.

Shakespeare came back into vogue.

The Arts

Visual Arts

Neoclassical art was rigid, severe, and unemotional; it hearkened back to ancient Greece and Rome

Romantic art was emotional, deeply-felt, individualistic, and exotic. It has been described as a reaction to Neoclassicism, or “anti-Classicism.”

Visual Arts: Examples

Neoclassical Art

Romantic Art

Music

“Classical” musicians included composers like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Franz Josef Haydn.

Romantic musicians included composers like Frederic Chopin, Franz Lizst, Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky

Mozart Haydn LizstTchaikovsky

Chopin

Music: Components

1730-1820. Classical music

emphasized internal order and balance.

1800-1910. Romantic music

emphasized expression of feelings.

In America, Romanticism most strongly impacted

literature. Writers explored supernatural and gothic

themes. Writers wrote about nature – Transcendentalists

believed God was in nature, unlike “Age of Reason” writers like Franklin and Jefferson, who saw God as a “divine watchmaker,” who created the universe and left it to run itself.

Literature

Important Dates

1775-1783: American Revolution (fighting ended in 1781)

1789-1815: French Revolution

1798: Publication of Lyrical Ballads

1798-1832: Romantic Period

“The Big Six” Romantic Poets

William Blake William Wordsworth Samuel Taylor

Coleridge Percy Bysshe Shelley John Keats George Gordon, Lord

Byron

Other Romantic Writers

Jane Austen Leigh Hunt Mary Shelley Mary Wollstonecraft Sir Walter Scott Robert Southey

Lyrical Ballads

First published anonymously in 1798 as Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems

by Wordsworth and Coleridge

Includes “Tintern Abbey” and “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”

In the Preface, Wordsworth writes that good poetry is the “spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”

Key Romantic Themes

Imagination Egotism The particular The remote The primitive The medieval The East The sublime Nature

Irrational experiences (dreams and drugs)

Awareness of process and current conceptions of art and introspection

Longing for the infinite encounter through intense experiences of sublime nature (storms, mountains, oceans)

1798: Lyrical Ballads published 1812: Byron publishes Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage 1813: Jane Austen publishes Pride and Prejudice 1818: Mary Shelley publishes Frankenstein 1819: Percy Bysshe Shelley publishes “Ode to

the West Wind” 1820: John Keats publishes “Ode on a Grecian

Urn” 1832: First Reform Act extends voting rights and

end of the Romantic Age

Key Events of Romantic Age

Definition: “An elegy is a lament setting out

the circumstances and character of a loss. It mourns for a dead person, lists his or her virtues, and seeks consolation beyond the momentary event. It is not associated with any required pattern, cadence, or repetition.”

Examples: “Elegy Written in a Country Courtyard” by Thomas Gray and “Adonais” by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Elegy

Definition: “The pastoral is a mode of poetry

that sought to imitate and celebrate the virtues of rural life (a nature poem).”

Examples: “To My Sister” by William Wordsworth and “Ode on a Grecian Urn” by John Keats

Pastoral

Definition: “An ode is a formal address to an

event, a person, or a thing not present. There are three types: Pindaric, Horatian, and Irregular.”

Examples: “Ode to the West Wind” by Percy Bysshe Shelley and “To Autumn” by John Keats

Ode

Definition: “An ancient subdivision of poetry.

One of poetry’s three categories, the others being narrative and dramatic. The poet addresses the reader directly and states his own feelings.”

Examples: “Frost at Midnight” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge and “To Spring” by William Blake

Lyric

Definition: “A sonnet is a poem of fourteen

lines, usually iambic. There are two prominent types: the Petrarchan and the Shakespearean.”

Examples: “Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802” by William Wordsworth and “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Sonnet

The End