The Big Questions of the Romantic Period What

The Big Questions of the Romantic Period What can people learn from Nature? • When might nature provide comfort? • When might nature create anguish? Ø Cite examples that support both types of experiences. Ø Draw conclusions about the general lessons nature seem to offer humanity.

The Big Questions of the Romantic Period Is EMOTION stronger than REASON? • What is the main purpose of poetry and fiction writer’s today? To entertain, inform, persuade, express thoughts and emotions? Ø Support your answer with thoughtful reasons and examples. Ø Compare a current poet or fiction writer with a writer of the past.

The Big Questions of the Romantic Period When is the Ordinary Extraordinary? • Think of an ordinary experience—some simple pleasure—you’ve had that has become extraordinary in your memory. • Think of an ordinary object that you treasure. Ø Describe the experience or object. Ø Discuss the emotions you associate with the experience or object. Ø Is your experience or object worthy of poetry? Why or why not?

The Big Questions of the Romantic Period How does WAR change our values? • What ways do we as a nation respond to the threat of war? • How do our social values change as a response to war? For example, our individual rights may change if a nation decides to draft soldiers for battle. Privacy laws have changed since 9 -11. • Are there some social values that should never change, even in the throes of war?

History • July 14, 1789 -the French Revolution and Parliamentary reform of 1832 laid the political foundations for modern Britain. • England moves from agricultural to industrial nation with large and restless working class concentrated in mill towns.

HISTORY Beginning in 1776 revolution swept western Europe, releasing political, economic, and social forces that produced some of the most radical changes ever experienced by man.

HISTORY For the ruling class of England, the French Revolution came to represent their worst fears: the overthrow of an anointed king by a democratic “rabble. ” They feared the revolutionary fever would spread across the Channel. Writers such as Wordsworth thought revolution was right but soon became disillusioned due to the “September massacre” –the Reign of Terror that killed hundreds of aristocrats and middle class citizens by the new invention: The Guillotine.

HISTORY: Napoleon • After turmoil, control of French Government went to Napoleon Bonaparte and in 1804 he was declared the first dictator (tyrant). He was as ruthless as the former French King. • These changes made England more rigid: outlawed collective bargaining, kept spies in prison without trial. Conservative economic and political measures and lengthy war (1793 -1818) with Napoleon caused England to consolidate the power of the rich.

HISTORY Tyranny of Laissez Faire: “Let the people do what they please; no government interference” The Industrial Revolution and improvements in farming brought prosperity to middle and upper classes but degrading poverty to families employed in factories and mills. Previously, goods were made by hand or at home. Now, production switched to factories where machines worked faster. Land previously shared by small farmers was taken over by individual owners for their own pleasure, which created homeless who migrated to the city. Populations of the cities increased, which caused terrible living conditions.

HISTORY: Laissez Fair’s Effect • No child labor laws— children were used as beasts • No laws for factory safety, workers’ hrs, or minimum wages. • No effort to control economy’s boom and bust fluctuationsresulted in layoffs, unemployment.

HISTORY: Luddite Riots Unemployed factory workers rioted and smashed machinery, which they blamed for taking their jobs away. The violence was frightening to so many that Parliament passed a law making the breaking of machines an offense punishable by death.

HISTORY: Corn Law (any grain) • A law to keep foreign grain from glutting the market; taxprotected the large landowners and small farmers, but devastated the poor and unemployed by keeping food prices high

Peterloo Massacre (pun on Battle of Waterloo) • Labor unions were illegal, so when workers assembled in defiance of the law, government troops were called in to suppress their meetings. • In one incident, 11 people were killed at St. Peter’s Fields, Manchester.

Literature of Romanticism • Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poems by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, began the Romantic period. • Both desired to explore new modes of literary expression. • “Romanticism” = Both nature and meditation were linked with insight into the human experience flowing freely from communion with nature.

Romantic Literature § Writers revolted against the order, propriety, and traditionalism of the Age of Reason. § Neoclassical writers had great respect for rules, both in literature and society, and wrote about the human being as an integral part of organized society rather than as an individual. § Frustrated by resistance to political and social change to improve conditions, poets went from formal, public verse to private, spontaneous lyric poetry.

ROMANTIC LITERATURE v Writers used the elements of romance (not sentimental writing) to go beyond refinements of neoclassical literature to older types of writing they saw as genuine. v Emotion more important than reason to the Romantics. v The individual’s relationship to nature was a major Romantic concern.

Romanticism • First, Romantic(ism) signifies fascination with youth, innocence, and growing up by exploring and learning to trust our emotions and our sense of will and identity. • Romantics delight in the commonplace & celebrate in verse the ordinary: a bird’s song, flower, etc.

Second, the Romantics questioned tradition and authority in order to imagine better--that is, happier, fairer, and healthier (associated with Idealism).

Third, the Romantics believed that people acquire a stronger and stronger awareness of change and find ways to adapt.

Elements of Romanticism • Emphasis on Imagination • Emphasis on Personal Experiences and Emotions • Believed lyric poetry is best for self-revelation • Democratic attitude • Turned to past or inner contemplation • Individual liberty • Nature is transformative • Fascination with youth and innocence • Questioned authority

Romanticism: Poetry, Nature, and Imagination Explored the commonplace, beauty of nature and power of human imagination Romantics no longer used complex arguments in witty style Form is often a lyric that lends itself to spontaneity, immediacy, quick burst of emotion, and self-revelation.

Romantic Poet William Wordsworth focused on rural instead of city life because in the country “the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and permanent forms of Nature. ”

Romanticism Romantics often called nature poets, but that term is misleading; they prized experience, beauty and the majesty of nature. To them, Nature not hostile but mysterious. Thought the human mind and nature act on each other.

The Romantic Poet • The Romantic poets found a way through the imagination to fulfill the poet’s traditional role as “prophet, priest, and king” in a time of change. • Used Gothic Setting - gloomy; eerie; supernatural; provoked wild emotions. • Ruins reflect human aspirations and failures. • Romantic age expressed a sense of helplessness about forces beyond their control: Revolutions and industrializations’ changes.

Romantic Writers Dominated by six poets • William Blake- mystical verse (innocence and experience) • William Wordsworth - writing to capture everyday experience in simple language without concern for artificial rules or conventions • Samuel Taylor Coleridge -explores the supernatural events with a human interest and semblance of truth. • George Gordon, Lord Byron -the Byronic hero (dark, brooding, diabolical) literary staple • Percy Shelley -wrote verse dramas and lyric poetry celebrating nature, freedom, and artistic expression. • John Keats -sonnets, odes, ballads that used nature as a starting point for philosophical meditations