LITERATURA INGLESA II

1. LITERATURA INGLESA II Lesson 2: Romanticis - The Romantic Poetry

2. Class content: • • The first and second generation of Romantic poets. • The works of Blake, Byron and Keats

3. The history of poetry is as long as the history of modern man.  Many scholars  believe poetry predates literacy. The oldest written works on Earth are all presented in some poetic form. The style is believed to have aided memorization and oral transmission. Ancient Greeks were fond of relaying historical events in the form of poetry. Homer’s Odyssey and  Iliad  Poetry as an art form predates literacy. In preliterate societies, poetry was frequently employed as a means of recording oral history, storytelling (epic poetry), genealogy, law and other forms of expression or knowledge that modern societies might expect to be handled in prose.

4. Romanticism in English literature began in the 1790s with the publication of the Lyrical Ballads of William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Wordsworth's "Preface" to the second edition (1800) of Lyrical Ballads, in which he described poetry as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings," became the manifesto of the English Romantic movement in poetry. William Blake was the third principal poet of the movement's early phase in England. The first phase of the Romantic movement in Germany was marked by innovations in both content and literary style and by a preoccupation with the mystical, the subconscious, and the supernatural. A wealth of talents, including Friedrich Hölderlin, the early Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and Friedrich Schlegel, Wilhelm Heinrich Wackenroder belong to this first phase.

5. ROMANTIC POETRY

6. Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress), movement in German literature that flourished from c.1770 to c.1784. It takes its name from a play by F. M. von Klinger, Wirrwarr; oder, Sturm und Drang (1776). The ideas of Rousseau were a major stimulus of the movement, but it evolved more immediately from the influence of Herder, Lessing, and others. With Sturm und Drang, German authors became cultural leaders of Europe, writing literature that was revolutionary in its stress on subjectivity and on the unease of man in contemporary society.

7. The movement was distinguished also by the intensity with which it developed the theme of youthful genius in rebellion against accepted standards, by its enthusiasm for nature, and by its rejection of the rules of 18th-century neoclassical style. The great figure of the movement was Goethe. The young writers also were influenced by the works of the English poet Edward Young

8. Romantic Poets: First Generation English Romanticism started in the 1740s.The word Romanticism derives from the French word "Romance", which referred to the vernacular languages derived from Latin and to the works written in those languages. Even in England there were cycles of "romances" dealing with the adventures of knights and containing supernatural element. Roamnticism attitude or intellectual orientation that characterized many works of literature, painting, music, architecture, criticism, and historiography in Western civilization over a period from the late 18th to the mid-19th century.

9. Romanticism can be seen as a rejection of the precepts of order, calm, harmony, balance, idealization, and rationality that typified Classicism in general and late 18th-century Neoclassicism in particular. It was also to some extent a reaction against the Enlightenment and against 18th-century rationalism and physical materialism in general. Romanticism emphasized the individual, the subjective, the irrational, the imaginative, the personal, the spontaneous, the emotional, the visionary, and the transcendental.

10. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

11. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH: William Wordsworth was born at Cockermouth in Cumberland, son of John Wordsworth, He died in 1850 (80) and was buried in Grasmere churchyard. “Come forth into the light of things, let nature be your teacher.” “Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility.” “Suffering is permanent, obscure and dark, And shares the nature of infinity.” “Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.”

12. Among All Lovely Things My Love Had Been AMONG all lovely things my Love had been;Had noted well the stars, all flowers that grewAbout her home; but she had never seenA glow-worm, never one, and this I knew.While riding near her home one stormy nightA single glow-worm did I chance to spy;I gave a fervent welcome to the sight,And from my horse I leapt; great joy had I.Upon a leaf the glow-worm did I lay,To bear it with me through the stormy night: And, as before, it shone without dismay;Albeit putting forth a fainter light.

13. When to the dwelling of my Love I came,I went into the orchard quietly;And left the glow-worm, blessing it by name,Laid safely by itself, beneath a tree.The whole next day, I hoped, and hoped with fear;At night the glow-worm shone beneath the tree;I led my Lucy to the spot, 'Look here,'Oh! joy it was for her, and joy for me!  William Wordsworth (1770 – 1850)

14. The Sparrow's Nest BEHOLD, within the leafy shade,Those bright blue eggs together laid!On me the chance-discovered sightGleamed like a vision of delight.I started---seeming to espyThe home and sheltered bed,The Sparrow's dwelling, which, hard byMy Father' house, in wet or dryMy sister Emmeline and ITogether visited.

15. She looked at it and seemed to fear it;Dreading, tho' wishing, to be near it:Such heart was in her, being thenA little Prattler among men.The Blessing of my later yearWas with me when a boy:She gave me eyes, she gave me ears;And humble care, and delicate fears;A heart, the fountain of sweet tears;And love, and thought, and joy.  William Wordsworth

16. Romantic Poets: Second Generation The second phase of Romanticism, comprising the period from about 1805 to the 1830s, was marked by a quickening of cultural nationalism and a new attention to national origins, as attested by the collection and imitation of native folklore, folk ballads and poetry, folk dance and music, and even previously ignored medieval and Renaissance works. The revived historical appreciation was translated into imaginative writing by Sir Walter Scott, who invented the historical novel. At about this same time English Romantic poetry had reached its zenith in the works of John Keats, Lord Byron, and Percy Bysshe Shelley.

17. The poets of the Second generation suffered because of society because of society and its injustices, mostly because of the post-revolutionary disillusionment, violence and the threat of the Napoleonic Empire. For this reason they tried to escape from reality by travelling around the world. There was a refusal of the real world and a creation of a different world where they lived in, usually by means of drugs. They didn't want to just repeat what the romantics of the first generation were doing, but wanted to be different, and even better than them.

18. WILLIAM BLAKE:William Blake was born in London on November 28, 1757, to James, a hosier, and Catherine Blake. “I must create a system or be enslaved by another mans; I will not reason and compare: my business is to create.” “Without contraries is no progression. Attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, love and hate, are necessary to human existence.” “The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity... and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself.”

19. “To see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower Hold infinity in the palms of your hand and eternity in an hour.”  “Without contraries is no progression. Attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, love and hate, are necessary to human existence.”

20. London I wandered through each chartered street,Near where the chartered Thames does flow,A mark in every face I meet,Marks of weakness, marks of woe.In every cry of every man,In every infant's cry of fear,In every voice, in every ban,The mind-forged manacles I hear:How the chimney-sweeper's cryEvery blackening church appals,And the hapless soldier's sighRuns in blood down palace-walls.

21. But most, through midnight streets I hearHow the youthful harlot's curseBlasts the new-born infant's tear,And blights with plagues the marriage-hearse.  William Blake

22. The Shepherd How sweet is the shepherd's sweet lot!From the morn to the evening he strays;He shall follow his sheep all the day,And his tongue shall be filled with praise. For he hears the lambs' innocent call,And he hears the ewes' tender reply;He is watchful while they are in peace,For they know when their shepherd is nigh.  William Blake

23. The Land of Dreams Awake, awake, my little boy!Thou wast thy mother's only joy;Why dost thou weep in thy gentle sleep?Awake! thy father does thee keep.'O, what land is the Land of Dreams?What are its mountains, and what are its streams?O father! I saw my mother there,Among the lilies by waters fair.'Among the lambs, cloth?d in white,She walk'd with her Thomas in sweet delight.I wept for joy, like a dove I mourn;O! when shall I again return?'

24. Dear child, I also by pleasant streamsHave wander'd all night in the Land of Dreams;But tho' calm and warm the waters wide,I could not get to the other side.'Father, O father! what do we hereIn this land of unbelief and fear?The Land of Dreams is better farAbove the light of the morning star.'  William Blake

25. Major themes in Blake’s poetry: • Opposition • Religion • Oppression / Repression • Innocence/ Experience • Poetry/ Imagination

26. GEORGE GORDON BYRON(1788-1824): George Gordon, Lord Byron was born at Holles Street in London, the son of a Guards Officer, Captain John Byron. Abandoned by her husband, his mother, Catherine Gordon, took him in 1790 (2) to Aberdeen, where they lived in considerable poverty. n April 19, 1824 (36) he died. “Love will find a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.” “Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; the best of life is but intoxication.” “The great art of life is sensation, to feel that we exist, even in pain.”

27. My Soul is Dark My soul is dark - Oh! quickly string The harp I yet can brook to hear; And let thy gentle fingers fling Its melting murmurs o'er mine ear. If in this heart a hope be dear, That sound shall charm it forth again: If in these eyes there lurk a tear, 'Twill flow, and cease to burn my brain. 

28. But bid the strain be wild and deep, Nor let thy notes of joy be first: I tell thee, minstrel, I must weep, Or else this heavy heart will burst; For it hath been by sorrow nursed, And ached in sleepless silence, long; And now 'tis doomed to know the worst, And break at once - or yield to song.  George Gordon Lord Byron

29. When We Two Parted When we two parted In silence and tears, Half broken-hearted To sever for years, Pale grew thy cheek and cold, Colder thy kiss; Truly that hour foretold Sorrow to this. 

30. The dew of the morning Sunk chill on my brow-- It felt like the warning Of what I feel now. Thy vows are all broken, And light is thy fame; I hear thy name spoken, And share in its shame.  They name thee before me, A knell to mine ear; A shrudder comes o'er me-- Why wert thou so dear? They know not I knew thee, Who knew thee so well-- Long, long I shall rue thee, Too deeply to tell. 

31. In secret we met-- In silence I grieve, That thy heart could forget, Thy spirit deceive If I should meet thee After long years, How should I greet thee?-- With silence and tears.  George Gordon Lord Byron

32. Major themes in Byron’s poetry: • Liberty • Nature • Love • Classical culture • Realism

33. JOHN KEATS: John Keatswas born in Moorfields, London. His father, Thomas, worked in the Swan and Hoop Inn and Stables owned by his wife Frances’ father. In 1819 he began to show the first signs of tuberculosis, and after overseeing the publication of his final book of poetry, Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems, he left England for Italy. He died in February 1821, in Rome.  “Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced.” “Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?” “I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affections, and the truth of imagination.”

34. “Poetry should surprise by a fine excess and not by singularity, it should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.”

35. A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness; but still will keep A bower quiet for us, and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing. Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing A flowery band to bind us to the earth, Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth Of noble natures, of the gloomy days, Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkn'd ways Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all, Some shape of beauty moves away the pall From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,

36. Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon For simple sheep; and such are daffodils With the green world they live in; and clear rills That for themselves a cooling covert make 'Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake, Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms: And such too is the grandeur of the dooms We have imagined for the mighty dead; An endless fountain of immortal drink, Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink. John Keats

37. Major themes in Keat’s poetry: • The Inevitability of DeathThe Contemplation of Beauty • Departures and Reveries • The Five Senses and Art • Music and Musicians • Nature • The Ancient World

38. Among the characteristic attitudes of Romanticism were the following: a deepened appreciation of the beauties of nature; a general exaltation of emotion over reason and of the senses over intellect; a turning in upon the self and a heightened examination of human personality and its moods and mental potentialities; a preoccupation with the genius, the hero, and the exceptional figure in general, and a focus on his passions and inner struggles; a new view of the artist as a supremely individual creator, whose creative spirit is more important than strict adherence to formal rules and traditional procedures; an emphasis upon imagination as a gateway to transcendent experience and spiritual truth; an obsessive interest in folk culture, national and ethnic cultural origins, and the medieval era; and a predilection for the exotic, the remote, the mysterious, the weird, the

39. occult, the monstrous, the diseased, and even the satanic. Literature. Romanticism proper was preceded by several related developments from the mid-18th century on that can be termed Pre-Romanticism. Among such trends was a new appreciation of the medieval romance, from which the Romantic movement derives its name. The romance was a tale or ballad of chivalric adventure whose emphasis on individual heroism and on the exotic and the mysterious was in clear contrast to the elegant formality and artificiality of prevailing Classical forms of literature, such as the French Neoclassical tragedy or the English heroic couplet in poetry. This new interest in relatively unsophisticated but overtly emotional literary expressions of the past was to be a dominant note in Romanticism.