Introducing the Romantic Era:1798-1832

A Multimedia Presentation by Dr. Christopher Swann

Liberty Leading the People, Eugène Delacroix (1830)La Belle Dame Sans Merci, John William Waterhouse

(1893)

The Romantic Era

William Blake (1757-1827)

Painter, Poet, Visionary

“The Garden of Love” and “The Tyger”

William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

“Father” of Romantic Poetry

The Prelude and “Tintern Abbey”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)

Poet of the Imagination

“Kubla Khan” and Rime of the Ancient Mariner

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824)

Scoundrel, Womanizer, Poet

“She Walks in Beauty” and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)

Romantic Revolutionary

“Ode to the West Wind” and “Ozymandias”

John Keats (1795-1821)

“Greatest” Romantic Poet?

“La Belle Dame sans Merci” and “Ode on a Grecian Urn”

“First Generation”

“Second Generation”

Major Early Romantic Poets

• William Blake (1757-1827): Blake's poetry dwelled upon his divine vision and rebelled against traditional poetic forms and techniques. He created his own mythological world with man as the central figure. His more famous poems include The Lamb,The Tyger, The Chimney Sweeper, and The Clod and the Pebble.

The Illuminated Books The Lamb

Write 3 sentences responding to this poem. What is the subject? The tone? Mood? Why might Blake have written this poem?

The Illuminated Books The Tyger

Write 3 sentences responding to this poem. What is the subject? The tone? Mood? Why might Blake have written this poem?

• Now, write 5 sentences comparing and contrasting “The Lamb” and “The Tyger.” How are they different in tone, mood, and subject? Why might Blake have chosen these particular animals for these particular poems?

The Illuminated Books-Songs of Innocence and of Experience,

Showing Two Contrary States of the Human Soul• Songs of Innocence deals

with the innocence and joy of the natural world, advocating free love and a closer relationship with God

• Songs of Experience instead deals with the loss of innocence after exposure to the material world and all of its mortal sin during adult life

• Art Brochure

Major Early Romantic Poets

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): The most famous of the British Romantics, Wordsworth is considered the nature poet. He revolutionized poetic subjects, focusing on ordinary people in rustic settings. He, in addition, wrote about and considered the poet as superior to all other writers. His most famous poems include I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, We are Seven,and I Travelled Among Unknown Men.

Major Early Romantic Poets

• Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834): Coleridge and Wordsworth are often grouped together as The Lake Poets, and for good reason. Together they are credited as the founders of the Romantic movement. Coleridge's most famous poems, RIme of the Ancient Mariner, Kubla Kahn, and Christabel have a distinct supernatural element and strongly influenced American Romantics such as Poe and Hawthorne.

RomanticismROMANTICISM

examination of inner feelings, emotions; imagination

literature of the Middle Ages

idealisticinterested in the mysterious & supernaturalconcerned with the particular

sought to develop new forms of expressions

romanticized the past

tended towards excess and spontaneity

appreciated folk traditions

desired radical change

favored democracy

concerned with common peopleconcerned with the individualfelt that nature should be untamed

SOURCES OF INSPIRATION

ATTITUDES AND INTERESTS

SOCIAL CONCERNS

Adapted from chart in Prentice Hall Literature: The English Tradition (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1991): 631.

In groups of 3, pick a Blake poem from the book. You must create a poster on which you: (1) rewrite the poem neatly, (2) “ILLUMINATE” or illustrate the poem, (3) Write a paragraph analyzing the poem, and (4) pick out which Romantic characteristics it shows.