Romanticism in the english literature 1798-1837

ROMANTICISM IN THE ENGLISH LITERATURE 1798-1837

Romanticism (Romantic Age)

• Romanticism began to take root as a movement following the French Revolution (cca. 1793).
• The publication of Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1798 is considered the beginning of Romanticism in English literature.

Age of Reason vs. Romantic Age

• In the Age of Reason, authors proclaimed:
• Reason and judgment
• Concern with the universal experience
• The value of society as a whole
• The value of rules

• In the Romantic Age , authors proclaimed:
• Imagination and emotion
• Concern with the particular experience
• The value of the individual human being
• The value of freedom

Romantic poets

• Passive Romanticists (also called Lake
• Poets): William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey
• Revolutionary Romanticists: George Gordon Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats.

William Wordsworth(1770-1850)

• - announced the literary ideas of the English Romantic Age (Lyrical Ballads co-authored with Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
• poems:
• Guilt and Sorrow
• The Prelude
• I Wandered Lonely as a
• Cloud

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)

• - announced the literary ideas of the English Romantic Age (Lyrical Ballads co-authored with William Wordsworth)
• poems:
• Kubla Khan
• The Nightingale:
• A Conversation Poem
• Frost at Midnight (blank verse)
• literary criticism
• Biographia Liberaria

Robert Southey ( 1774-1843)

• epic poems:
• Joan of Arc
• Madoc
• Thalaba the Destroyer
• closet drama:
• The Fall of Robespierre
• *closet drama - a play that is designed mainly to be read but not to be performed on the stage

George Gordon Byron (1788-1824)

• “He who loves not his country can love nothing.”
• poems:
• Oriental Tales (cycle)
• Hebrew Melodies
• (collection of verses)
• Child Harold’s Pilgrimage
• (novel in verse)
• closet drama:
• Beppo
• Don Juan

A Byronic Hero:

• is a rebel (against convention, society, etc.)
• has a distaste for society and social institutions
• is isolated from society (a wanderer, an exile)
• is not impressed by rank and privilege (though he may possess it)
• is capable and proud
• has a hidden curse or crime
• suffers from titanic passions
• tends to be self-destructive

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)

• poems:
• Ode to Liberty
• Ode to the West Wind
• To Skylark
• The Cloud
• lyrical dramas:
• Prometheus Unbound
• Cenci
• * ode - a lyrical poem of some length, usually of a serious or meditative nature and having elevated style and formal structure

John Keats (1795-1821)

• poems:
• On Looking into Chapman’s
• Homer
• The Eve of St. Agnes
• La Belle Dame sans
• Merci

Romantic Essayists:

• Charles Lamb (1775-1834)
• William Hazlitt (1778-1830)
• Thomas de Quincy(1785 -1859)

Romantic Novelists:

• Sir Walter Scott (1771-1882)
• Jane Austen (1775-1817)
• Mary Shelley (1795-1821)

Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832)

• Writer and poet, a born storyteller and master of
• dialogue, one of the greatest historical novelists.
• 26 novels, e.g.:
• Ivanhoe
• Rob Roy
• The Antiquary
• Quentin Durward
• Waterly

Jane Austen (1775-1817)

• novels:
• Pride and Prejudice
• Sense and Sensibility
• Mansfield Park
• Emma
• Persuasion
• Northanger Abbey

Mary Shelley (1795-1821)

• Novelist, short story writer, dramatist and biographer.
• gothic novel:
• Frankenstein