ROMANTICISM AGE OF MELANCHOLY DEATH AND FALLEN HEROES

ROMANTICISM: AGE OF MELANCHOLY, DEATH AND FALLEN HEROES Francesca Mastronardi Anno 2019/2020 Classe 4 G

THOMAS GRAY: “Elegy written in a Country Churchyard” exemplifies the forthcoming Romantic sensibility “Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest, Some Cromwell guiltless of his country’s blood. […] Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife, Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray; Along the cool sequester’d vale of life They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. ”

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways: “She lived unknown, and few could know When Lucy ceased to be; But she is in her grave, and, oh, The difference to me!”

DEATH AND DREAMS “Can death be sleep, when life is but a dream, And scenes of bliss pass as a phantom by? The transient pleasures as a vision seem, And yet we think the greatest pain’s to die. ” -John Keats “On Death”

DEATH AS A FAIRY FULL OF BEAUTY: “She found me roots of relish sweet, And honey wild and manna-dew; And sure in language strange she said, ‘I love thee true. ’ “She took me to her elfin grot, And there she wept and sigh’d full sore; And there I shut her wild, wild eyes With kisses four. […] “I saw pale kings and princes too, Pale warriors, death-pale were they all: They cried, ‘La belle Dame sans Merci Hath thee in thrall!”

LORD GEORGE GORDON BYRON: On The Death of a Young Lady “Yet is remembrance of those virtues dear, Yet fresh the memory of that beauteous face; Still they call forth my warm affection’s tear, Still in my heart retain their wonted place”

“DEATH URGE” “O World! O Life! O Time! On whose last steps I climb, Trembling at that where I had stood before; When Will return the glory of your prime? No more –Oh, never more!” -Percy Shelley, “A Lament”

EDGAR ALLAN POE: ANNABEL LEE “That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. But our love it was stronger by far than the love Of those who were older than we— Of many far wiser than we— And neither the angels in Heaven above Nor the demons down under the sea Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; ”

FRYDERYK CHOPIN: FUNERAL MARCH “After playing Chopin, I feel as if I had been weeping over sins that I had never committed, and mourning over tragedies that were not my own. Music always seems to me to produce that effect. It creates for one a past of which one has been ignorant, and fills one with a sense of sorrows that have been hidden from one’s tears. ” -Oscar Wild

THANK YOU FOR THE ATTENTION