The Romantic Era

1798-1832
 Romanticism
• The words Romantic or Romance originally
referred to Medieval tales of knights written
in the original Roman language - Latin. These
tales often included love stories between a
knight and his lady - resulting in the modern
meaning of romance.

• When talking about the Romantic Era in

literature, we are actually referring to
romantic as “freely imaginative fiction” and
not romantic as in “romantic love”
 Age of Reason vs. Romantic Era
In the Age of Reason,
Writers stressed:
• Reason and Judgment
• Concerned with the
universal experience
• The value of society as a
whole
• The value of rules
In the Romantic Era,
Writers stressed:
• Imagination and
Emotion
• Concern with the
particular experience
• The value of the
individual human being
• The value of freedom
 Historical Events
The following historical events led to the
Romantic movement in Britain:
The French Revolution
 The “September massacre”
 The Guillotine
 Napoleon Bonaparte
The Industrial Revolution
 Laissez Faire economic policy
 The French Revolution
Began with the storming of the prison
called the Bastille on July 14, 1789
 democratic overthrow of the monarchy
 Triumph of radical principles
 The “September massacre” – hundreds of
French aristocrats were beheaded by
guillotine for their alleged allegiance to
Louis XVI
 Napoleon Bonaparte
 Emerged as a tyrannical
dictator, then emperor of
France
 Did implement some
positive changes:
abolished feudalism,
spread religious tolerance
 Was bent on world
domination, and almost
succeeded
 Napoleon Bonaparte

 English first defeated

Napoleon’s navy at the
battle of Trafalgar
 In 1815, with the help of
Allies, Britian finally
defeated Bonaparte at
Waterloo
 The Industrial Revolution
 City populations increased, resulting in
desperate living conditions
 Farmland was no longer communally
owned which resulted in large numbers of
landless people
 The homeless migrated to the cities to
search for work or, more likely, rely on
charity (poorhouses or begging),
furthering the congestion problem,
 Laissez Faire

 “let people do as they please”

Economic forces should be allowed to
operate freely without government
interference
 the result: the rich got richer, the poor got
poorer
 Characteristics
 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
 Imagination
 Considered necessary for creating all art.
 British writer Samuel Taylor Coleridge
called it “intellectual intuition.”
 Imagination and naturalness was
emphasized over “reason.” They were
fascinated with the ways nature and the
human mind “mirrored” each other’s
creative properties.
 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.” Thus, they rejected formal and witty
works of the previous century.
 They preferred poetry that spoke of
personal experiences and emotions in simple
unadorned language.
 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.”
 Idealism
 Idealism is the concept that we can make
the world a better place.
 Romantics turned to a past or an inner
dream world that they felt was more
picturesque and magical than the ugly
industrial age they lived in.
 Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher,
held that the mind forces the world we
perceive to take the shape of space-and-
time.
 Individuality
 Romantics celebrated the individual and
individual liberty.
liberty
 Sympathized with those who rebelled
against tyranny
 During this time period, Women’s Rights
and Abolitionism were taking root as
major movements.
Six Major Romantic Era Poets

William Wordsworth
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
William Blake
Lord Byron
Percy Shelley
John Keats
Romantic Poetry Presentation
 The Romantic Movement… brief overview
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rakesh_Ramubhai_Patel

• The Romantic Movement was a revolt against the

Enlightenment and its focus on rational and scientific thought.
• The characteristics of Romantic literature involved an
emphasis on passion, emotion, spontaneity, subjectivity,
mortality, and nature.
• Throughout the 19th century, romantic poetry, in particular,
became the most significant work of the period.
• William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Blake,
Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and John Keats are the
notable British Romantic poets.
• Nature, religious fervor, emotional response to beauty, and
Ancient Greek aesthetics, are some of the common themes in
their work.
• Note that each Romantic poet had his own style and
emphasized different aspects. That’s where you come in with
your research.
 Your Presentation:
The Task
• To collaborate with your peers to present an extensively
researched, creative, intelligent, and perceptive lesson to the
class, based upon your English Romantic poet.
• Your objective is to reveal a clear, deep understanding of
eighteenth century English Romanticism and its ideals,
precepts, style, and themes in poetry as it pertains specifically
to your poet.
• You should engage the class in an interesting lesson that will
enhance their understanding of the poems written by your
romantic poet, and you should test their knowledge with a
quiz at the end of the lesson.
• Divide the work up equally and fairly, and be a responsible
and positive group contributor.
 Components of the lesson:
Introducing Your Poet
• Provide an interesting, comprehensive, creative,
entertaining background insight into the poet, his
major works, and his “philosophy” of art (poetry)
• Select a format to impart the information (skit,
interview, talk show, video, lecture notes, visuals,
power-point, etc.)
 Teaching a poem to the class
• Select one of your Romantic poet’s poems to teach to the class.
• This means analyzing the poem thoroughly, paying special
attention to the language, poetic devices, structure, and overall
style of the poem, and its overall meaning.
• Be sure to connect the poem’s concepts to those of Romanticism.
• Turn in a written copy of your analysis of the poem, along with a
thoroughly annotated copy of the poem to Mrs. Abercrombie on the
day of presentation.
• Make sure that you give a copy of the poem to every student in the
class. (There are 8 students in the class.)
• Be sure to include the class and invite them to participate in your
lesson with some kind of activity, etc.
 Original poem written in the style of your poet

• Compose, and then read to the class an original poem

that models the style, format, structure, concepts, etc.
of your romantic poet.
• Turn in a copy of this poem to Mrs. Abercrombie on
the day of presentation, along with a one-page, typed
rationale/explanation of the techniques that you
employed in order to replicate your poet’s style.
 Class QUIZ
• Create a quiz for the class, based upon the poem that you
taught them in your lesson.
• Your quiz should address the literary devices, style, and
meanings of the poems, as well as the information that you
provided on the poet.
• Turn in a copy of the quiz and key to Mrs. Abercrombie on the
day of presentation.
• If there’s time, you will give your quiz at the end of your
lesson, or the class will take the quiz at the beginning of the
next class period.
• You will be responsible for grading the quizzes and turning
them all in with scores attached, to Mrs. Abercrombie the
following class period.
• Your quiz should contain ten multiple-choice questions and
five matching questions for a total of fifteen points.
 Have Fun!
• Please note! You must turn in a thorough
works cited and list of sources/references.
• No woks cited? No grade.
 William Wordsworth
• Helped to launch the Romantic Age with his
collaboration on Lyrical Ballads
• His most famous work is The Prelude
chronicles the spiritual life of the poet
• Has an interest and sympathy for the life and
troubles of the “common man”
• He is considered the nature poet by focusing
ordinary people in country settings
 The World is too Much With Us

Quickwrite
You have ten minutes to complete the following writing
assignment. Minimum one paragraph.

The “world” is sometimes thought of as the

world of material objects –the world of money
and status symbols, the world of power,
competition, and ambition. In seeking out the
pleasures of this material world, what could a
person lose?
The World is too Much With Us
Pg. 746
The World is too Much With Us
With your table/
a partner
Answer questions 1-6
on page 747. Your
written answers will not
be collected, however
we are going to discuss
the answers together.
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge
• Helped to launch the Romantic Age with his
collaboration on Lyrical Ballads
• Heavily addicted to opium
• Famous for his works: The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner and Kubla Khan
• His poetry was philosophical and metaphysical
in nature; the focus on dreams and the
supernatural
 Kubla Khan
Quickwrite
You have ten minutes to complete the following writing
assignment. Minimum two paragraphs.

Think of some dreams that you have had.

Describe how dreams seem to work. Are they
logical or illogical? How do they progress? Do
they tell coherent stories or do they consist
mostly of images and fragments of stories?
 Kubla Khan

The poem you are about to read may challenge

the limits of your imagination. Fantastical and
strange, it is like a vivid yet incomprehensible
dream. Coleridge, in fact, suggested that the
poem came to him in a dream (brought on by
opium).
 Kubla Khan
Like a dream, the poem contains allusions to the
deepest human desires –for pleasure, order,
beauty, even chaos and war. It also holds within it
the moment when, upon waking, the vividness and
the supposed logic of the dream are suddenly –
perhaps forever– lost to the dreamer.

As you read, think about how the poem may

imitate or reproduce this process.
Kubla Khan

Page 759
Kubla Khan

Page 759
 Kubla Khan
Writing Assignment
You have the remainder of the class to complete the following writing
assignment. Minimum five paragraphs.

Review the prewriting assignment you did earlier

describing dreams. How do your thoughts on the way
dreams work compare to the dreamlike flow of “Kubla
Khan”? Use your notes to evaluate Coleridge’s claim that
the poem began as a dream. Explain whether “Kubla
Kahn” reads like a dream, using examples from the poem
as evidence. Then, draw your own conclusion about
Coleridge’s Claim. Do you think the poem is in fact the
product of a dream?
 Kubla Khan
Writing Assignment
Par I: Introduction and Thesis
Par II: Review the prewriting assignment you did earlier
describing dreams. How do your thoughts on the way
dreams work compare to the dreamlike flow of “Kubla
Khan”?
Par III: Use your notes to evaluate Coleridge’s claim that
the poem began as a dream. Explain whether “Kubla
Kahn” reads like a dream, using examples from the poem
as evidence.
Par IV: Then, draw your own conclusion about Coleridge’s
Claim. Do you think the poem is in fact the product of a
dream?
Par V: Conclusion
 William Blake
• Started writing poetry when he was twelve
• Blake was a nonconformist who associated
with some of the leading radical thinkers of
his day
• He rebelled against traditional poetic forms
and techniques
The Life of a Chimney Sweep

HANDOUT
 The Chimney Sweeper

Quickwrite
You have ten minutes to complete the following writing
assignment. Minimum one paragraph.

If you could cry out against an evil of our day –

and actually get people to listen– which social
injustice would you protest?
The Chimney Sweeper
Page 726-727
The Chimney Sweeper
Assignment
In complete sentences,
answer questions 1-10
on page 730. Be as
detailed as possible. Be
sure to incorporate
evidence from the
poems when necessary.
 Lord Byron
• He was the “rebel” of this
group.
• He indulged in excesses and
had huge debts and many love
affairs
• His most famous creations are
his dark heroes, called Byronic
heroes, who, in fact, were not
heroes at all, but stood out
from ordinary humans as
larger than life HANDOUT
 Lord Byron
Quickwrite
You have ten minutes to complete the following writing
assignment. Minimum two paragraphs.
No matter how often we hear that beauty is only skin deep, we
all know the undeniable allure of an extremely good-looking
person beauty moves us. Often, we want to believe that outer
appearances express inner qualities of goodness and beauty of
character as well.
Can a person’s inward nature be accurately judged by
his or her outward appearance?
 Lord Byron
1. Please read “She Walks in Beauty” on page
795.
2. Answer questions 1 – 6 on page 795 with a
partner.
3. On your own, answer the writing prompt
under the heading Only Skin Deep? on page
795. You may use the same sheet of paper on
which you did your quick write.
 Lord Byron
• He was the “rebel” of this
group.
• He indulged in excesses and
had huge debts and many love
affairs
• His most famous creations are
his dark heroes, called Byronic
heroes, who, in fact, were not
heroes at all, but stood out
from ordinary humans as
larger than life
 Please Read

Characteristics of the
Byronic Hero
 Byronic Heroes
• Hypersensitive rebels that are isolated from society as
wanderers or in exile of some kind.

• This social separation can be imposed by an external

force or self-imposed.

• The Byronic Hero has emotional and intellectual

capacities that are superior to the average man, which
causes him to be arrogant, abnormally sensitive, and
very conscious of himself.
 Byronic Heroes

“The Byronic hero, incapable of love, or capable

only of an impossible love, suffers endlessly. He
is solitary, languid, his condition exhausts him. If
he wants to feel alive, it must be in terrible
exaltation of a brief and destructive action”
Albert Camus, The Stranger
 Byronic Heroes
• Dark, Handsome appearance
• Brilliant but cynical and self-destructive
• A restless tortured soul
Jim Stark
James Dean from
Tony Stark Rebel without a Edward Cullen
Cause (1955)
 Assignment
Choose a character from a novel, play, TV show, or film, that has Byronic qualities. Write a
minimum 5-paragraph essay convincing your reader that he/she has what it takes to be
classified as a Byronic hero. For a maximum score, you must have plenty of examples to support your
claim.
Due at the end of the period
100 point quiz grade
Percy Shelley
Percy Shelley
Percy Shelley
 Percy Shelley
Quickwrite
The faces of nature range from peaceful to terrifying and
the Romantics explored all of them. What attracted the
Romantics to nature was the aspect philosophers call the
sublime: the wildness, the immensity, terror, and awesome
grandeur of natural phenomena like the Alps or violent
storms. To experience nature’s power by suddenly—
whether by living through a hurricane or viewing Niagara
falls– is while terrible, also exhilarating, even transporting .
Why do you think people find such displays of
power so thrilling? What emotions are evoked?
Freewrite about a time when you experienced the
sublime in nature.
 Percy Shelley
• Very idealistic
• Was a radical nonconformist
• Left his first wife Harriet for Mary Godwin, the
daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft and William
Godwin. She is the author of Frankenstien.
• Mary’s stepsister had a brief affair with Lord
Byron, which is how Shelley was introduced to
him.
 Terms
• Apostrophe – figure of speech in which a
writer directly addresses an absent or dead
person, a personified inanimate object, or an
abstract idea

• Ode - A favorite form among Romantics. A

complex, generally long lyric poem on a
serious subject.
 Ode to the West Wind
Was inspired by an oncoming storm. It marks
Shelley’s creative life, a temporary note of
exaltation after a period of intense grief over
the death of his three year old son.

Page 806
 Assignment
Write an essay explaining why humans are
drawn to the sublime in nature. Draw
conclusions about Shelley’s own attraction to
–and identification with –the west wind.
Include how you would answer the question
he poses at the end of the poem.
(You may use the article “Shelley and the Ode”
on page 809 as reference)
 John Keats
• Studied most of his life to be a doctor, but at
age twenty-one, before becoming legally
licensed as a surgeon, switched careers to
poetry.
• Did most of his writing at age twenty-three
• Died at twenty-five of tuberculosis
• One of England’s major poets; though he died
so young.
 Terms
• Synesthesia – one sense experience (like
smell) is described as another (such as touch)

e.g. In “Ode to a Nightingale” the speaker

remarks that he “cannot see…what soft
incense hangs upon the boughs”
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This poem is a work of art
about the contemplation
of a work of art –a Grecian
urn, or jar. That means the
ode is both concrete
(descriptive) and
contemplative
(philosophical). It moves
from rich images to
abstract ideas about art
versus life, permanence
Page 836 versus change, and body
versus spirit.
Ode on a Grecian Urn
 Writing Assignment
Ode on a Grecian Urn
In the age of Facebook, Twitter, Vine,
tumblr., etc., we can often tailor our
lives to look ideal to others, creating
our own little Grecian urn. However,
unlike the Urn, the internet is forever,
so anything that goes on the internet
doesn't come back (kind of like a
black hole). What is the relevancy of
our past urns today, and what do they
really tell us about the past?