The Romantic Period

(1798 – 1832)

The Second Creative Period of English

Literature
 Through this series of lectures we will try to understand the
following concepts and questions:

 What is Romanticism?

 Poets of the Romantic Age

 Core Principles of Romantic Poetry

 Events influencing Romanticism

 Difference between Neoclassicism and Romanticism

 Romanticism

 Romanticism is an artistic and intellectual movement originating in Europe in the late

18th century and characterized by a heightened interest in nature, emphasis on the
individual's expression of emotion and imagination.

 This also marks the departure from the attitudes and forms of classicism, and
rebellion against established social rules and conventions.
 Although it was partly a reaction to the Industrial Revolution, it was also a revolt against
aristocratic social and political norms of the Neoclassical Age or the Age of
Enlightenment, and a reaction against the scientific explanation of nature.

 The peak of this movement is estimated from 1798 to 1832 or 1800 to 1850.

 The main source of inspiration came from the French revolution and its ideologies.
(Liberty, Equality, Fraternity)

 The Romantic movement started from Germany and eventually spread to England and
France.

 Though Romantic elements were found in art and literature since several centuries, it
was the publication of Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge in 1798 that marked
the beginning of Romantic period in English Literature.

 This period is called the second creative period of English literature (Elizabethan Age is
the first). The literature of this period is largely poetical; it is the golden age of lyric.
Important poets of Romantic Age
 William Blake
Important poets of Romantic Age
 William Wordsworth
Important poets of Romantic Age
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Important poets of Romantic Age
 Percy Bysshe Shelley
Important poets of Romantic Age
 Lord Byron
Important poets of Romantic Age
 John Keats
 Core Principles of Romanticism
 See the world not how it was, rather how it could be

 Imagination
 Wordsworth describes poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”

 The creative mind is the human equivalent of the creative powers of a deity

 Sensory data from touch, taste, smell, sight, sound

 The mind stimulates to imagine

 Allows humans to constitute reality (we not only perceive the world around us but
we, in part, create it)

 Use of memory
 Core Principles of Romanticism
 Glorification of Nature

 Rousseau: “Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains.” In other words,

civilization is in part the cause of our corruption.

 Peaceful, calm, nurturing source for spiritual renewal. It often showed an innocent life
of rural dwellers, a world of peace and harmony which nurtures and comforts the human
spirit.

 Romantic nature poetry is essentially a poetry of meditation and reflection

 Put the myth back into nature—returned God to mystical and supernatural state
 Core Principles of Romanticism
 Individuality

 Emotion, and Intuition

 Opening statement of Rousseau's Confessions, first published in 1781—

"I am not made like anyone I have seen; I dare believe that I am not made like
anyone in existence. If I am not superior, at least I am different.”

 Human Consciousness
 Insight comprised of reason, logic, emotion and intuition on the same level
 Core Principles of Romanticism
 Speaker in Poetry

 Man speaking to Men (Heroic Outsider with valuable insight)

 Man speaking to Nature

 Nature speaking to Nature

 Example: Lyrical Ballads

Directed to many (Men)
Man
 The Historical Consideration
 Although 1798 is widely considered as the beginning of Romantic period, many
historical events that affected all arts started from the 1770s.

 The early Romantic period thus coincides with what is often called the ‘Age of
Revolution’ – including the American Revolution (1776) and the French Revolution
(1789).

It was an age of upheavals in political, economic and social tradition; the age witnessed
the initial transformation of the Industrial Revolution.

 The Romantic era was specially influenced by the French Revolution, but it was also a
protest against the Industrial Revolution and the neoclassical tendencies of putting more
emphasis on reason and enlightenment of mind rather than heart.
 The French Revolution

The storming of the Bastille, 14

July, 1789

The French Revolution (1789–1799), was a period of radical social and political upheaval
in France that had a major impact on France and throughout the rest of Europe.

The causes of the revolution were many, but we can pinpoint some crucial causes that led
the common people to start a revolution against the aristocrats. The motto of the revolution
was Equality, Liberty and Fraternity.
Louis XVI
(1774 – 1792) Marie
Antoinette (1774
– 1792)

The most important reason of the revolution was the Bourbon Monarchy, which ruled
France for over 200 years, had become inefficient, oppressive and weak.

The king and his queen Marie-Antoinette (who was falsely accused of being a spendthrift
and an Austrian spy) led a lavished and extravagant life. They were seen as being isolated
from, and indifferent to, the hardships of the lower classes.

 The Hatred towards them fueled the anger that drove commoners towards the revolution.
Another reason was the state's effective bankruptcy due to the enormous cost of
previous wars, particularly the financial strain caused by French participation in the
American Revolutionary War.

Economic factors included hunger and malnutrition in the most destitute segments
of the population, due to rising bread prices after several years of poor grain harvests.

Heavy taxes were imposed on the bulk of the population making lives of common
people miserable.

The churches were badly immoral and corrupt. Churches became dens of
corruption and all sorts of ills were practiced in them.
 Impact in England
The French revolution found a wide range of sympathizers in the English literary
area. English poets like Wordsworth and Coleridge hailed it as the dawn of a new
era of happiness and freedom.

With this, the tendency of literature shifted to individual human being and his
potential and sympathy with the common man. Wordsworth famously quoted that
language of poetry should be such as if a man is talking to men.

The Romantic writers (especially the poets) were enormously influenced by the
revolution of the era and they also started a new tendency of writing in their
creative arena.
 Industrial Revolution

 Starting in the later part of the 18th century, there began a transition in parts of Great
Britain's previously manual labor and draft-animal–based economy. It now marched towards
machine-based manufacturing instead. It started with the mechanization of the textile
industries, the development of iron-making techniques and the increased use of refined coal.
Trade expansion was enabled by the introduction of canals, improved roads and railways.
Features of Industrial Revolution
 It replaced human or animal labors by mechanical labor.

 It was not an event but a continuous process of development and scientific

advancement.

 Small scale industries were substituted by large scale mechanical industries.

 Rise of big and populous towns took place. Rural population was replaced by
urban population.

 Scientific Progress and technical advancements were made.

 It introduced the system of huge investments and encouraged capitalist system

of production.
Although Industrial Revolution helped England progress in economy and mechanization,
it also had its darker side.

As industrial towns were created, the inevitable deforestation and destruction of natural
resources started happening. People started losing their connection with nature, and they
became more frustrated and mechanized.

Urbanization increased, so did the population. As many peasants lost their land to
industries, they had no other option but to come to cities and look for jobs. Thus, slums
were created, and the urban poor came into existence.

With so much wealth in their hands people became greedier, and they started to lose their
human emotions and imagination. Acquiring more money was the first priority.

To contest this social malice, the Romantic writers started a new revolution that urged
people to look again into the nature to understand the true meaning of human potential.
Romanticism took people to the world of nature and simple life of rural community. It
brought again the dream and imagination of the medieval golden age of England, where the
realities of life were forgotten and the ideals of youthful spirit remained as only reality. The
Romantic Movement emphasized the eternal ideals of youth and Romance.
 The Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements
in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music,
and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical"
art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome.

The main neoclassical movement coincided with the

18th century Age of Enlightenment, and continued into the
early 19th century, latterly competing with Romanticism.

Neoclassicism Movement (1660 – 1798) predicted upon

and derived from both classical and contemporary French
models towards art and human existence – ideals of order,
logic, restrain, accuracy, correctness, decorum and so on.

It enabled the artists and writers to imitate and reproduce

the structures and themes of Greek and Roman originals.

Neoclassical sculpture
Neoclassicism represented a reaction against the optimistic, exuberant, and enthusiastic
Renaissance view of man as a being fundamentally good, and of an infinite potential for
spiritual and intellectual growth.

Neoclassical theorists, by contrast, saw man as an imperfect being, inherently sinful,

whose potential was limited. They replaced the Renaissance emphasis on the imagination,
invention, experimentation, and mysticism with an emphasis on order and reason, on
restraint, on common sense, and on religious, political, economic and philosophical
conservatism.

They maintained that man himself was the most appropriate subject of art, and saw art
itself as essentially pragmatic — valuable because it was somehow useful — and as
something which was properly intellectual rather than emotional.

Their favorite prose literary forms were the essay, the letter, the satire, the parody, the
burlesque, and the moral fable.

In poetry, the favorite verse form was the rhymed couplet, which reached its greatest
sophistication in heroic couplet of Pope; while the theatre saw the development of the heroic
drama, the melodrama, the sentimental comedy, and the comedy of manners.
Difference between Neoclassicism and
Romanticism
Both Neoclassicism and Romanticism are poles apart from a variety of perspectives.
However, the visible differences between the two are as follows:

i.The Neoclassical writers gave importance of thought, reason and commonsense. On the other
hand, the romantic writers gave importance to emotion, imagination and self experience. To
them imagination should be spontaneous and unbound.

ii.The neoclassicists gave importance to poetic 'eye' where the reader sees the other person
through the poet's eye. Whereas, the romanticists gave importance to poetic 'I', meaning the
reader sees the poet in the protagonist.

iii.To the neoclassicists, formal rules, diction, vocabulary and grammar were more important.
On the contrary, diction was viewed as less important by the romanticists, and they
emphasized more on the language of the common man.

iv.The neoclassicists believed in order in all things, but the romanticists believed in
spontaneity of thought and action.

v.The neoclassicists wrote about objective issues that concerned society as a whole such as,
politics and religion. Conversely, the romanticists wrote about subjective experiences of the
individual, such as, desires, hopes, and dreams.
 Sum up…
Neoclassicism is a revival of the styles and spirit of classic antiquity inspired directly
from the classical period, which coincided and reflected the developments in philosophy and
other areas of the Age of Enlightenment, and was initially a reaction against the excesses of
the preceding style.

Romantic Movement, thus, can be shown as a reaction against Neoclassicism. Romantic

art is portrayed in a bold and dramatic manner, and there is often a stress on the past.

Although these two are very different in the way they treat art and literature, they did
influence the whole of English literature for more than one hundred years.
 The Reform Act of 1832
 Over all the Romantic age talked about the freedom of individuals and their rights in the
society. With the spirit of French Revolution, the English political arena made some
significant changes to ensure some rights for the individual citizen.

 To pursue those changes the Reform act of 1832 was passed in the parliament.

 The Reform Bill stood for a few things to work of reform at home. The most notable
changes include:
 Destruction of the African slave trade
 Mitigation of horribly unjust laws (that included poor debtors and petty criminals in
the same class)
 Prevention of child labor
 Freedom of press
Establishment of hundreds of popular schools
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Worksheet 01