Romanticism

Notes on Romanticism Nature + inwardness + religious experience =sublime

Natural beauty and power → inner awareness of God and His works→exalted feeling **Romanticism valued the individual’s feelings and emotions** • one's inner voice o conscience o speaking from the heart or with one’s heart o “still small voice” that one hears when one is away from human-made noise, confusion, and commotion o Spontaneous feelings, intuitions of one’s better (kinder, more generous) impulses • one's personal, subjective experiences

//Poetry should begin with acts of self-exploration and self-expression.//

•  impulse of feelings and desires seeking expression • the compulsion of the creative imagination
 * Romanticism valued spontaneity.**

//Poetry is the” spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”//.

•  God-given abilities, • almost a small part of the sublime creative imagination of God
 * Romanticism valued creativity and imagination**

• the emotions, experiences, and speech of ordinary persons.
 * Romanticism valued ordinary men.**

//Romantic poetry should be expressed in “the ordinary language of men.”//

1. The Enlightenment of the Eighteenth Century a. order, restraint, logic, disinterested objectivity, balance & moderation b. decorum and enduring rules c. attention to classical models 2. Industrial Revolution: a. growing industrial cities, b. anonymous, mechanical ordering of people c. treatment of people as components of machines in factories d. utilitarian set of values.
 * Romanticism was a rebellion against excessive rationality.** 

Introduction to Romanticism http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/rom.html

Toward a Definition of Romanticism http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/romanticism.html