The Romantic Period

The Romantic Period of British Literature 1785-1832

Context (starting on p.3) • ___________ Revolution • ___________ Revolution both result in _________ for England English government developed “counter__________ alarm” mindset and policies

Context (starting atop p. 7) • Industrial ___________ • development of “labor class” as opposed to an “______________ class” • populations shifts to labor-centered ________, often over-crowded and very _____________ • “polarized” population of “two classes…________ and _________” • Little or no governmental regulation of industrial or capitalistic pursuits • Landed classes, industrialist & merchants ___________

Context • aggressive expansions of the British __________ • “Consumerism” increased due to trade and innovations in production of goods

Context (starting on p. 8) • few legal rights gained by ___________ in this era, though the call for such became louder and more common • more publications by ___________ for the first time in British history

Context (not in this text – from prior edition) • “_________ of the age” = a “pervasive intellectual and imaginative climate” • “evidence of _____________ boldness that marks a literary renaissance” • some writers associated with “Protestant Dissent” – where “accounts of the Apocalypse and the coming of the Kingdom of God had long been central” • others associated more with the “revolution of _______________”

Capital-“R” Romanticism (starting on p. 10) • Precursors seen by last two decades of 1700s, especially as poetry “penetrated everyday life” • officially marked by first edition of ___________ ____________ in 1798, anonymously, but by William ___________ and Samuel Taylor ______________, commonly called the “first generation Romantics” • marked by its “manifesto for a new poetics” of British poetry • “a turning point in literary history”

Poetry of Romanticism • note all italicized headers of poetry section • Concept of Poet & the Poem (starting on p. 13) • “source of the poem was not outer nature but in the psychology of the individual poet”... Essential material for the poem found in the inner feelings of the poet • Wordsworth: poetry is the “spontaneous overflow of powerful __________” • Coleridge: good poetry is “______-originating” and “_______-organizing”, like the “growth of a plant”

Poetry of Romanticism • Common focus on nature, but as a “stimulus to the most characteristic human activity, that of ______________” • critical development of lyric poetry written in ________ -person, commonly called the “autobiographical ‘I’” • “introspective tendency” of the poet “could also lead to ______________ and madness”

Poetry of Romanticism • Spontanaity and the Impulse of Feeling (starting on page 14) • “rules” – what “rules”?! ... impulse = a driving force of poetry at this time (remember the rebuttal of the “Age of Reason” concepts) • added to Wordsworth’s idea of good poetry being “spontaneous overflow of feeling” is his concept of poetry being that same feeling or “emotion” now “recollected in __________” • Wollstonecraft: “silken wings of ________ are shriveled by rules”

Poetry of Romanticism • Spontanaity and the Impulse of Feeling • Keats: “if poetry comes not as naturally as ________ from ________ it had better not come at all” • Shelley: proposed that it is “an error to assert that the finest passages of poetry are produced by ________ and study” • Coleridge: “Deep thinking is attainable only by a man of deep ___________”

Poetry of Romanticism • The Glorification of the Ordinary (starting on p. 16) • Subject matter expands to include “all things” as “equally fit subjects” • used the “disgraced, _________ and delinquent” as frequent subjects of serious poems • Wordsworth: “choose incidents and situations from ___________ life” as well as “language really spoken” • Nature and rustic life was a common focus, often in reaction to industrialized cities and the effects of urbanization

Poetry of Romanticism • The Glorification of the Ordinary (starting on p. 16) • Often, but not always, “elevated humble life and __________ style” • attempts by some to “refresh” readers’ “sense of wonder in the everyday, the trivial and the lowly” – often aligned with a “child-like sense of wonder”

Poetry of Romanticism • The Supernatural, the Romance and the Psychological Extremes (starting on p. 17) • “__________point” to the focus on “familiar” • Some poetry “founded on frank violation of natural laws and the ordinary course of events” • linked to the focus upon the importance of imagination, a.k.a. “_______”, as well as to chemically-induced states, among other issues • “bewitchings, hauntings, possessions … demonology, folklore…Gothic” (remember the reaction to the earlier “Age of Reason”)

Poetry of Romanticism • The Supernatural, the Romance and the Psychological Extremes (starting on p. 17) • linked to the focus upon the importance of imagination, a.k.a. “_______”, as well as to chemically-induced states, among other issues, i.e. dreams, nightmares, altered consciousness • Coleridge = the forerunner of this concept amongst Romantics • similar to _________ concepts – with that era becoming a common setting at this point

Poetry of Romanticism • Individualism and Alienation (starting on p. 19) • celebrations of creativity and artistic self-sufficiency • “poets and philosophers alike put an extraordinarily high estimate on human potentialities and powers”

Poetry of Romanticism • “fragment poems” developed – as “most poetic poetry” could be “defined as much by what was _______ as by what was present”, so a poem could be a “trace of an original concept that was too grand to ever be fully realized” • poems often seen as “products of solitude” and nature as a place where an individual could “find ___________ from social laws” • Subjects were often a “single figure, stark and solitary … disillusioned visionaries … whose thwarted ambitions and torments connected them”

Poetry of Romanticism • “Nature Poetry”(not discussed in this preface in isolation) • As noted, nature is often the solace and inspiration of Romantic poets • love of nature often expressed in verse of many, but not all, Romantics

Writing in the Marketplace & Courts(starting on p. 20) • “Even Romantics who wished to associate literature with isolated poets holding mute converse with their souls had to acknowledge that in real life the writer did not dwell in solitude but confronted, and was accountable to, a crowd. For many commentators the most revolutionary aspect of the age was the spread of _________ and the dramatic expansion of the potential audience for literature.”

Writing in the Marketplace & Courts • printed materials became more plentiful and cheaper (think about the development of production techniques and the subsequent surge in consumerism aligned with the Industrial Revolution) • British government reacted to publication and literacy advances with various attempts to control mass information dissemination (think about the earlier note on the reactions to various political and social revolutions in neighboring countries and in colonies)

Various Literary Genres • Prose and drama also experienced developments in the Romantic period, but not to the same extreme of poetry. • Novels were initially popular, yet often not critically acclaimed. The exceptions are novels by Jane Austen. • Poetry will be our primary focus in this unit, along with some essays and autobiographies.

Pre-Romantics • those publishing prior to 1798 • many __________ among in this timeframe • generally considered to end after William Blake • precursors here of what would soon become a full-blown rebuttal of the “Age of ________” which dominated the earlier 18th century writers and thinkers, particularly Samuel Johnson

Anna Letitia Barbauld(starting p. 39) • considered a Pre-Romantic • Family was part of “Dissenters” or “Nonconformist” communities, based upon their religious denominations and other social views • Received an education not afforded most women of her era and was also an educator • “To a Little Invisible Being” • “Washing Day” audio at http://ecaudio.umwblogs.org/barbauld-washing-day-read-by-keetje-kuipers/

Other Pre-Romantics • Charlotte Smith • Mary Robinson • precursors for Romanticism in each = _______ • Both options for lit analysis research project

Other Pre-Romantics • Robert Burns • from Scotland • “Heaven-taught ploughman” • audio for “To a Mouse” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvvozS4jSyw • Audio for “Auld Lang Syne” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1edtLulXImo

The Romantic Period