Romanticism and Revolution. This political cartoon by James Gillray (1757-1815) illustrates the difference between opposing political views of the French Revolution by contrasting a dignified British freedom with the events of the Reign of Terror, or the rule of fear masquerading as liberty. The French Revolution is widely recognized as one of the most influential events of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Europe, with far reaching consequences in political, cultural, social, and literary arenas. Although scholars such as Jeremy Popkin point to more concrete political issues as grounds for the upheaval, supporters of the Revolution rallied around more abstract concepts of freedom and equality, such as resistance to the King’s totalitarian authority as well as the economic and legal privileges given to the nobility and clergy.
It is in this resistance to monarchy, religion, and social difference that Enlightenment ideals of equality, citizenship, and human rights were manifested. Shannon Heath. Romantic Politics. A printing press in William Hone's best-selling Political House that Jack Built (1819) shows the faith of reformers in language's power to produce political change. Romanticism emerged amidst political tumult, as evidenced by the French Revolution (1789) and First Reform Act (1832) that conventionally bookend this literary-historical period.
And yet, at the same time, Romanticism has repeatedly been associated with escape and fantasy, with the individual’s flight into the realms of vision, self-involvement, and retrospection. No better symptom of this view exists than the way the term “romantic” has come to stand as the antithesis of "realist. " But renewed attention to the historical conditions that grounded Romanticism has challenged this simplification. In the last 30 years, research has shown how the era’s economic realities, social concerns, and political contests found expression in Romantic poetry, novels, drama, and other forms of writing. Gerard Cohen-Vrignaud. The Culture of Rebellion in the Romantic Era. Eugene Delacroix, Liberty Leading the People, 1830. One of Delacroix’s best known works, the painting depicts a bare-breasted Liberty leading Parisians of mixed social and economic backgrounds into battle.
The Romantic era is typically noted for its intense political, social, and cultural upheavals. The period is conventionally marked as beginning with the French Revolution in 1789 and ending with the passing of the Great Reform Bill in 1832, occurrences which exemplify the political zeal of the late eighteenth- and early nineteenth centuries as well as the resultant changes brought about in society. Events initially external to England, such as the French Revolution, are internalized in Romantic literature as a part of the debates on more relevant, internal issues in English politics, such as the prededing American Revolution and the imminent Irish Uprising of 1798. One key area in which the influence of the French Revolution manifests itself is in the satiric poetry of the period. Victor Marie Hugo: Master of the Romantic Era. Romanticism. If the Enlightenment was a movement which started among a tiny elite and slowly spread to make its influence felt throughout society, Romanticism was more widespread both in its origins and influence.
No other intellectual/artistic movement has had comparable variety, reach, and staying power since the end of the Middle Ages. Beginning in Germany and England in the 1770s, by the 1820s it had swept through Europe, conquering at last even its most stubborn foe, the French. It traveled quickly to the Western Hemisphere, and in its musical form has triumphed around the globe, so that from London to Boston to Mexico City to Tokyo to Vladivostok to Oslo, the most popular orchestral music in the world is that of the romantic era. After almost a century of being attacked by the academic and professional world of Western formal concert music, the style has reasserted itself as neoromanticism in the concert halls.
Origins: Folklore and Popular Art Nationalism Shakespeare The Gothic Romance Medievalism. Famous people of the Romantic Period • The Romantic period or Romantic era lasted from the end of the Eighteenth Century towards the mid 19th Century. Romanticism was a movement which highlighted the importance of: The individual emotions, feelings and expressions of artists.It rejected rigid forms and structures. Instead it placed great stress on the individual, unique experience of an artist / writer.Romanticism gave great value to nature, and an artists experience within nature. This was in stark contrast to the rapid industrialisation of society in the Nineteenth Century.Romanticism was considered idealistic – a belief in greater ideals than materialism and rationalism and the potential beauty of nature and mystical experience.Romanticism was influenced by the ideals of the French and American revolution, which sought to free man from a rigid autocratic society.
Over time, it also became more associated with burgeoning nationalistic movements, e.g. movement for Italian independence. Famous Romantic Poets Romantic Artists. British Romanticism. The Romantic period was largely a reaction against the ideology of the Enlightenment period that dominated much of European philosophy, politics, and art from the mid-17th century until the close of the 18th century. Whereas Enlightenment thinkers value logic, reason, and rationality, Romantics value emotion, passion, and individuality. Chris Baldick provides the following description: “Rejecting the ordered rationality of the Enlightenment as mechanical, impersonal, and artificial, the Romantics turned to the emotional directness of personal experience and to the boundlessness of individual imagination and aspiration” (222-3).
These values manifested themselves in literature in several important ways, listed below. It is important to keep in mind that nothing on this list describes all Romantic literature or all Romantic writers. Art, as the product of individual creation, is highly prized. Famous Romantic Writers: John Keats: (1795 – 1821): Keats was the prodigy of the Romantics. Untitled Document. By the late 18th century in France and Germany, literary taste began to turn from classical and neoclassical conventions. The generation of revolution and wars, of stress and upheaval had produced doubts on the security of the age of reason. Doubts and pessimism now challenged the hope and optimism of the 18th century. Men felt a deepened concern for the metaphysical problems of existence, death, and eternity. It was in this setting that Romanticism was born. Origins Romanticism was a literary movement that swept through virtually every country of Europe, the United States, and Latin America that lasted from about 1750 to 1870.
The Romantic Style The term romantic first appeared in 18th-century English and originally meant "romancelike"-that is, resembling the fanciful character of medieval romances. Romanticism stresses on self-expression and individual uniqueness that does not lend itself to precise definition.