Romanticism: Introduction
The Englishmen William Wordsworth and Samuel Coleridge together generated a revolution in poetry. Their combined volume, the Lyrical Ballads of 1798, marked a significant turning away from the restraints of the classical tradition in poetry and a turning toward a freer, more experimental, and more emotionally charged lyricism. Everything written before seemed suddenly old‑fashioned or stale.
The reading public's taste in poetry was shaped for the rest of the century by the ideas of "what poetry really is," as stated by Wordsworth and Coleridge. The images and phrases of their poems passed into the common poetic discourse of the 19th century, bringing about such a change in taste that earlier poets were largely ignored or devalued.
During the romantic period poets and prose writers tended to share the assumption that all literature was basically about feelings and that the role of the writer was to recreate and explore feelings. They felt that mutually sympathetic feelings made people more morally sensitive and at the same time gave pleasure.
Joy and the loss of joy were popular topics. As the reading public grew in number and in sophistication, a variety of journals, reviews, and magazines‑‑different kinds of periodicals‑‑created outlets for poets and essayists to develop and mold public taste. Carrying out Wordsworth's proposal in the preface to Lyrical Ballads, they wrote familiarly, even intimately, of their own memories, dreams, and emotional histories.
With few exceptions, they found the self an inexhaustible source of material. Personal history and observation were assumed to be universally interesting, relevant, and full of meaning.
Romanticism coincided, especially in England and North America, with the coming of industrialism, and was in many ways a reaction against the ugly realities of cities and the assaults on nature that industrialism caused. But industrialism also produced the means by which authors could earn a living through the sale of hundreds or even thousands of copies of a single work. Technological developments in printing and reproducing pictures gave impetus to newspapers and illustrated magazines, which provided outlets for short works of many kinds—essays, reviews, articles, poems, and short stories. The combination of increased education and literacy, a ready commercial market, and the need for professional authors to make money, and the aesthetic possibilities offered by producing short works of tight narrative and emotional unity produced the new genre we now call the short story.
New “delivery systems” changed not only the content but also the cultural function of literature. Oral tales reflected communal values, but magazines supported by advertising were likely to reflect the social, political, and ethical ideas or preferences of those who wrote, edited, and distributed them. With the emergence of the Romantic period, the possibility existed for fiction to become a means of social control and critique.
Romanticism: Preface to Lyrical Ballads
William Wordsworth both proclaimed and embodied the newness of the Romantic Movement. Like other revolutionaries, Wordsworth and Coleridge created their identities by rebelling against their predecessors. Now no longer would poets write in "dead" forms; now they had discovered a "new" direction, "new" subject matter; now poetry could at last serve as an important form of human communication. Reading Wordsworth's poems with the excitement of that revolution long past, we can still feel the power of his desire to communicate. The human heart is his subject; he writes, in particular, of growth and of memory and of the perplexities inherent in the human condition.
Although it had a mixed critical reception, the first edition of Lyrical Ballads was a "sellout." Two years later, in 1800, Wordsworth and Coleridge prepared a new, two‑volume edition with additional poems, including the long narrative poem "Michael." Wordsworth also added an explanatory preface in which he defended the new type of poetry that he and Coleridge had put forth. It was this, Wordsworth's “Preface” of 1800 and, later, Coleridge's Biographia Literaria that were the manifestoes of the new aesthetic sense.
From Wordsworth's “Preface” to 2nd Edition of Lyrical Ballads, 1800
“Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let me ask, what is meant by the word poet? What is a poet? To whom does he address himself? And what language is to be expected from him?--He is a man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased with his own passions and volitions, and who rejoices more than other men in the spirit of life that is in him; delighting to contemplate similar volitions and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the universe, and habitually impelled to create them where he does not find them. To these qualities he has adds a disposition to be affected more than other men by absent things as if they were present; an ability of conjuring up in himself passions which are indeed far from being the same as those produced by real events, yet (especially in those parts of the general sympathy which are pleasing and delightful) do more nearly resemble the passions produced by real events than anything which, from the motions of their own minds merely, other men are accustomed to feel in themselves—whence, and from practice, he has acquired a greater readiness and power in expressing what he thinks and feels, and especially those thoughts and feelings which, by his own choice, or from the structure of his own mind, arise in him without immediate external excitement.
-----
“I have said that [Romantic] poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings; it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of reaction, the tranquility gradually disappears, and an emotion, kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in the mind. In this mood successful composition generally begins, and in a mood similar to this it is carried out….”
Analysis: Wordsworth's “Preface” to 2nd Edition of Lyrical Ballads, 1800
Definition:
"[Romantic] ... poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of reaction, the tranquility gradually disappears, and an emotion, kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in the mind."
A New Poetic Standard:
The preface argues for a new poetic standard. Wordsworth rejected the neoclassical theory of poetry, which arranged the different kinds of literature in a hierarchy, each with its own appropriate subject matter and level of diction. Wordsworth particularly rejected the elevated poetic diction of the 18th century poets such as Thomas Gray, whose language was artificial and whose style was unnatural, based on reading rather than speech. Wordsworth proposed making poetry through the selection and arrangement of the sincere and simple language of the ordinary individual, adapting prose language to poetic uses. Thus Wordsworth undermined the dignity of poetry, but he also gave it a newer, broader scope that included a range of persons and situations never written about before‑‑the humble and rustic life taken seriously.
A New Role for the Poet:
Wordsworth also redefined the role of the poet. The poet is merely "a man speaking to men," albeit one who has a greater than average sensibility and "knowledge of human nature." The poet's main qualifications are not in matters of craft or technique; he is a poet because his feelings allow him to enter sympathetically into the lives of others and to translate passions into words that please. "The poet thinks and feels in the spirit of the passions of men." It follows that poets must use the language of other men.
A New Definition of Poetry:
Poetry itself is redefined as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility." That is, poetry is the outcome of a creative process. The poet thinks about an emotional experience "in tranquility," after the original moment of feeling has passed. But as he thinks, the emotion returns, and while under the influence of this renewed feeling, the poet begins to write the poem. Pleasure is the state in which the poetic composition is written, and pleasure is also found in the result. Wordsworth assumes that the reader of such poetry will share the poet's pleasure. At least, said Wordsworth, that is what he aims for in his poetry.
Summary
Source: https://www.calvertonschool.org/uploaded/faculty/dwaldspurger//romanticism.doc
Web site to visit: https://www.calvertonschool.org
Author of the text: not indicated on the source document of the above text
HRS 135 -- The Romantic Spirit: Abbreviated Course Summary
1/27/03 -- The instructor introduced the course to the students. The course was to focus on 1) learning about the arts and humanities of the Romantic Era; and 2) writing literate, interesting thought essays based on subjects in this period.
1/29/03 -- Focused on definition of Romanticism.
Dictionary definition is complicated because of many ambiguities surrounding the term 'romantic.' The term comes out of the Middle Ages -- the medieval 'romance.' Used in modern times mostly to refer to heart-to-heart relationships between the sexes. In our course it refers to the arts and humanities in the Romantic Period and the word is always capitalized.
Wordsworth's "The Tables Turned" focuses on escaping books, society and intellectual strife to escape to a temperate climate in the woods and the fields where the throstles sing. Nature provides solace and wisdom for the individual alienated by learning, scholarship and the city.
In his "Life of Chopin" Franz Liszt indicates that with Chopin (and with any other Romantic artist) freedom matters; rules are made to be broken in the interest of artistic inspiration. In the arts there should be no objective standards of creativity valid in every age.
1/31/03 -- Definition of 'Romanticism' continued.
In Wuthering Heights Emily Brontë expresses a deep-seated, eternal bond between Heathcliff and Cathy that can never be broken. It is deeper and stronger than life itself. There is a dark, perhaps violent, undertone.
Hugo's article on defining 'Romanticism' gives a good list of things to look for. The cult of feeling (especially sadness and love) and of the individual's uniqueness (cf. Rousseau on p. 30). Romantics stimulate the imagination, by artificial means if necessary; they love exotic subject matter. Artists and poets must have absolute freedom to write/paint/compose as they see fit.
Romantics tend to have a soft spot for history, especially harking back to the Middle Ages, but admiration of the classical times and of Nordic/Scandinavian myths also appears in some authors.
2/3/03 -- Hugo, continued.
Romantics generally favor religion. Their impulse seems essentially spiritual. Not too many of them practiced one of the organized religions; those that did were mostly Catholic. Romantics tended to be pantheistic: God was the same thing as nature, or did nature just lead us to God? Love and nature are the viae regiae to God.
Romantics rejected the traditional western military and political hero who stood for the essential values of the civilization (cf. Achilles, Aeneas, Roland, etc.). They tended to focus on the plight of the artist as a sort of anti-hero, a prophet of beauty and truth and yet rejected by their society.
They reject the Enlightenment idea of nature as an objective physical entity that should be the object of scientific (rational) study. Nature is 'natural' nature outside of the city; it is filled with beauty and perhaps spiritual presences that can lead the individual to beauty and salvation.
The Enlightenment:
Definition: focused mainly on France between about 1725 and 1775, although there were also major Enlightenment movements in Britain (especially Scotland) and Germany. There was a major Enlightenment movement in the North American colonies, as manifested in documents like the 'Declaration of Independence' and the U.S. Constitution. Seeks the happiness/well-being of humanity; use of reason looking into nature (method based on the prestige of the scientific method) to discover how things are now and what needs to be done to make them better. The value of liberty is what will benefit humanity; Enlightenment authors prize civil liberties particularly (freedom of speech, press, religion; due process of law, etc.). They believe in moderate, peaceful progress achieved through good propaganda and education. They tend not to be social or political radicals, democrats or revolutionaries.
2/05/03 -- The class continued its discussion of the European Enlightenment.
Immanuel Kant gave a famous definition of the Enlightenment in his "Was heisst Aulfklärung?" He focused primarily on the image of an individual person passing from immaturity/childhood to adulthood. As children, we accept authority and do what we are told (more or less!); as adults we are prone to think for ourselves. Such should be humanity in general. Our period of childhood (domination by authority and faith) is over; our adulthood of independent reason is at hand. To facilitate this end, we must have civil liberties.
Joseph Addison's poem on the Augustan heavens expresses a typical Enlightenment deist view of God. The poem focuses on contemplation of the heavenly bodies and evokes the astronomy and science of the 17th and 18th centuries. Heaven is cold, orderly and regular, and is obviously following laws of motion. The poem gives a "proof" of the existence of God (the argument from order); and expresses the Enlightenment idea of a "watchmaker" God who creates the universe, endows it with certain properties and then sets it in motion, leaving it to its own devices. The Enlightenment is typically deist, but not Christian.
2/07/03 -- Voltaire's article on "Arius" (heresy in the Christian Church in the 3rd and 4th centuries) mocks the dogmatic/theological/metaphysical approach of western religion -- e.g., arguing over the nature of Jesus and his relationship with the father. Such focus is meaningless (it is impossible to understand such things) and it leads to religious conflict. Treat Jesus as a sage who taught us an admirable ethic -- love your neighbor, practice religious tolerance, help the weak, the poor and the ill, etc.
American authors agreed with Voltaire. Thomas Jefferson published a book on Jesus, in which he denied that Jesus was God (Jefferson was not a Christian) but he expressed admiration for Jesus as a moralist. In his letter to Ezra Stiles, Benjamin Franklin indicated that he admired and followed the teachings of Jesus, but he wasn't too sure whether he was truly God (since he was 84, he anticipated that he would find out soon enough). He advocated an easy-going tolerance in religious matters; his tone contrasted sharply with the shrillness of Voltaire's remarks on the Catholic Church in France.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was roughly a contemporary of Voltaire, but they disagreed on many issues and didn't get along personally. Rousseau is famous primarily for his democratic political theory (humanity should be free and independent living in a democratic state), and his cult of feeling and the heart (origins of Romanticism).
His "Fifth Promenade" takes place in western Switzerland, far from the iniquities of French cities (where people mock Rousseau and even stone him). He is in a beautiful temperate setting, in the country with no inhabitants other than peasants, around a lake that has two islands. According to him, true goodness lies inherently in children before they are spoiled by civilization (mine and thine), and to a lesser extent, in simple rural people living far from the corruption of the city. He does have "left-brain," scientific activities -- observing and classifying botany according to Linnaeus.
2/10/03 -- Rousseau's main activity is strolling through the countryside, observing the changing of the seasons, the beautiful details of nature, and particularly observing and listening to the action of the water on the lake. His most exalted experience in lying in the bottom of a boat, drifting through states of semi-consciousness, feeling the gentle, regular motion of the boat in the water, feeling only his own existence; the parallel with being in the womb (water and gentle motion) is unmistakable.
John Wesley was the founder of the Methodist Church; he came out of a rather worldly existence as a priest in the Church of England. After a series of personal crises, he "found" Jesus Christ (Jesus found him?) while meditating and reading St. Paul and Martin Luther; he felt warmed and reassured that Jesus Christ had died for his sins and saved him, John Wesley. This experience gave him the confidence and dedication to become a great missionary for his movement. Wesley's experience and values are quite different from those of the mainstream Enlightenment: his fervent Christianity, his emphasis on evangelical enthusiasm, his dependence on feeling and the heart. Evangelicalism came out of the 18th century and was very popular in the North American colonies. It points forward to Romanticism in ways similar to Rousseau.
2/12/03 -- An excessive amount of class time was spent getting the computer containing the PowerPoint program to communicate with the projector.
Romantic painters emphasized: rejection of classical values and techniques in painting; emphasis on bright color with its expressive possibilities; a free painting style contrasting with the "brushless" meticulous style of classical painters; emphasis on energy, movement, dynamism; an interest in exotic subject matter.
Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825) is primarily a Neo-Classical painter who sticks a foot into Romanticism when useful to his career. His "Oath of the Horatii" displays classical subject matter (heroic civic duty taken from the Roman Republic) and technique (meticulous naturalistic painting and careful (obsessive?) organization of the campus). His "Death of Marat" appears to be a tribute to the French Revolution's "Tribune of the People;" it has more feeling than David's previous period and is perhaps his greatest painting. His "Napoleon at the Saint-Bernard" has some elements of romantic technique (stormy skies, flowing drapery), but also elements of the classical (molding and posture of the horse, etc.); it prepares the way for good commissions from the future dictator of France. Antoine-Jean Gros' "Napoleon at Arcole" celebrates the military heroism of Napoleon in Italy and projects the image of Napoleon as a man of destiny! Gros was a student of David. His canvas seems more 'Romantic' than David's version.
2/14/03 -- David's enormous canvas on "The Coronation of Napoleon" is a brilliantly painted, sumptuous pageant celebrating the power and the glory of Napoleon; it doesn't seem particularly Romantic nor particularly neo-classical.
Théodore Géricault was one of the first true Romantics among French painters. His "Woman with a Gambling Mania," painted after extensive visits to the mental asylum in Charenton, shows the artist's interest in abnormal psychology; he painted the mentally ill woman with dignity. His "Mounted Hussar of the Imperial Guard" was the true manifesto of Romanticism in French art in 1812. Comparison with David's "Saint-Bernard" defines its Romantic character: swirling action, dynamic (unrealistic?) drafting of the horse's body rearing, sumptuous depiction of textures, bright patches of color expressing the violence and romance of the subject matter. His most famous painting is "Raft of the Medusa," perhaps the most famous painting of the French Romantics. The subject matter is humanity in extremis, garnering energy to rise above the level of the waves to get the attention of the boat on the horizon; colors are dark and earthy; modeling of the human body obviously inspired by Michelangelo; depiction of abnormal psychology in the read of the raft where the father's indifferent expression indicates loss of hope.
Eugène Delacroix was the foremost French Romantic artist. He lived into the succeeding "realist" period, dying in 1863. His famous "Dante and Vergil in Hades" show a frightened Dante riding the boat of Charon across the Styx toward the glowing walls of Inner Hell. The boat is surrounded by the writhing bodies of the angry condemned to eternal suffering in the waters of the river. Monumental Michelangelesque bodies; emotional horror and agitation; glowing colors in the background.
2/17/03 -- "The Women of Algiers" is a common exotic (North African scene, in a harem) subject for Romantic painters. "Lion Hunt" may be unrealistic and unhistorical, but the free brushwork, exoticism, swirling action and violence were dear to Delacroix's heart. "The Death of Sardanapalus" is Delacroix at his most extreme: destruction rather than surrender; opulent oriental exoticism; bright sumptuous, sensuous color; scandalous violence and swirling action; the king's indifference as he is faced with death and loss of all he owns. "Liberty Leading the People" is less "Romantic" than many of his other works. It is politically committed to the revolutionary cause of liberty in 19th century France; Marianne as the symbol of liberty and the French Republic towers over a coalition of social types in attacking tyranny.
Francisco Goya (Spain) was probably the great painting genius of the Romantic period, passing from a brilliant baroque/rococo period through Romanticism and into an ugly expressionism obsessed by violence. His "Osorio Portrait" is an exquisite baroque-style portrait of a privileged little boy dressed in sumptuous clothes; the Goya touch is the cats eyeing hungrily the bird that the boy has hobbled with a piece of string. His "Nude Maja" rates as one of the most charming and brilliantly painted of all western nudes; the "Clothed Maja" is painted more sketchily and is clearly inferior. It would be nice if the story about the affair with the Duchess of Alba were true. His group portrait of the "Family of Charles IV" is also a brilliant exercise in sumptuous textures and color. But the presence of the painter in the canvas adds a subjective element to the work.
2/19/03 -- "The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters" is a critique of the Enlightenment, an indication of Goya's deteriorating mental state, and an example of his engraving in the last period of his career. "Worse" shows his fascination/obsession with the horrors of war and human bestiality. "The Third of May 1808" shows Goya's abandonment of the 'baroque' style, his fascination with terror and tyranny, and his passage to a more "modern" expressionist style. "Saturn Devouring His Children" was painted by the artists on the wall of his house of exile in France: it indicates his abandonment of the Renaissance tradition in Western art, his mental instability, and his disgust with the horrors visited by humans on one another.
Caspar David Friedrich (Germany) brought an entirely original sensibility to Romantic art. Vaguely Christian, he seeks out the spiritual component of northern landscapes. His "Window" suggests that he is spiritually imprisoned, and seeks fulfillment by escaping out the window to the urban landscape outside. His "Morning in the Riesengebirge" is a symbolic and spiritual landscape; painted in a painstaking "naturalist" style, nevertheless the mountains are mysterious and imposing, the gnarled oak tree is symbolic; a marvelous example of a spiritualized landscape. "Man and Woman Contemplating the Moon" depicts the backs of a couple contemplating the moon in a mysterious natural landscape.
2/21/03 -- "The Cross in the Mountains" is even more explicit. The Christian symbol of the cross surmounts the distant figure of a young woman (hiker?) helping her male companion to the top of the crag where the cross is located. A barren, mountainous, but beautiful blue landscape stretches to the horizon and then merges with the sky. The painting comes across as visionary. "A Sea of Ice" is a hard-hitting version of a "sublime" landscape (cf. the "picturesque" landscapes of Wordsworth, etc.), where man and his machines are puny and weak when confronted with the forces of nature; the latter are the shards and huge tablets of ice, which are shaped to emphasize their destructive power. "The Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog" depicts perfectly the Romantic individual wandering over the earth, looking over the craggy, fog-filled landscape in search of his destiny. This is perhaps Friedrich's masterpiece.
Joseph William Mallard Turner (England) was a successful, famous, reclusive artist of the day, living in London. His style is far more abstracted than any other Romantic painter; it seems to point to both an expressionist and impressionist future (the early Impressionists like Monet were much influenced by him). His "Grand Canal" comes across as an impressionist-like rendering of the shapes and colors of Venice (one of his favorite cities); Turner is much interested in light, its reflections, etc. His "Fighting Téméraire Towed to its Berth" has an impressionist element (the play of light of the setting sun on the water and clouds), but also a "message" of the passing of the old and the coming of the new world -- the old "ghost" warship and the new steam tugboat with the lurid smoke pouring out of its stack. The comparison with Monet's "Impression Sunrise" (painted about 30 years after Turner's masterworks -- 1872) shows Monet's affinity with Turner.
2/24/03 -- "Rain, Steam and Speed" mixes Turner's fascination with new technology (the training speeding over a bridge), and his interest in portraying impressions of light and color on the canvas (water, steam, clouds, fog, etc.). No one was able to find the rabbit. His "Slave Ship" (1845) is perhaps the most apocalyptic of his paintings. He paints the usual setting sun creating hues of red on clouds and sea, but this time they are more lurid and melodramatic. He obviously is referring to a slave ship tossing "excess" cargo overboard as it tries to weather a violent storm. He has added to the right side of the canvas strange little fish feeding on a carcass of one of the jettisoned bodies. His subject would seem to be the inhumanity and cruelty of human action.
Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock (1724-1803) was a German 18th century poet associated with the Storm and Stress period: Charlotte and Werther were obviously great admirers of his poetry in the first part of Werther. His poem "Das Rosenband" portrays intense romantic feelings between a man and a young woman -- their lives depend on one another, and they are in "Elysium." His "Die Frühen Gräber" is on the other hand, quite melancholy; it is an elegy (perhaps derived from Roman examples) on the theme of dear friends dead, buried and sorely missed. The final poem in the set is a theological poem powerfully addressing the relationship of God and his providence and nature.
2/26/03 -- Goethe's Sorrows of Young Werthermay annoy some readers, but it was one of the most influential books in German literary history. It was the first German novella; the first German epistolary novel (composed almost exclusively of letters; the epistolary form seems to correspond to Romantic needs of individualistic self-expression); and the first German international best seller that had a big impact on popular culture (cf. the Werther costume). It is also the first psychological novel in German literature. It represents the German "Storm and Stress" ("Sturm und Drang") period (1770's) where authors bathed their works in sentiment.
Werther is generally a sympathetic, sensitive character that becomes more irritating in the course of the novel because of his obsessiveness and indecision.
The social and political scene of the novel are significant. Germany was characterized by Kleinstaaterei (myriad of small states) and a stratified, aristocratic society. The highest status was occupied by the aristocracy, presented only in the middle section of the novel as a snobbish, powerful group that annoys and alienates Werther. The majority of the population were peasants and common townspeople -- generally poor and illiterate. Werther, Charlotte and Albert belonged to the middle classes -- professional people, merchants, small estate owners, etc. -- who valued education and respectability.
2/28/03 -- Werther's social environment in the beginning is semi-rural, small town Germany -- sitting in the town square, reading Homer, sketching what he sees, communing with children and the good common people. The loyalty and simplicity of the swineherd Eumaeus in Homer's Odyssey seems to appeal to Werther when he is calm. He sometimes presents his ideal lifestyle as growing his own cabbages, and then eating steaming cabbage dishes at dinner. The agitation and weirdness of the Ossian excerpt at the end of the novel expresses the alienation of Werther as despair sets in.
Nature is extremely important in the novel. Werther's attachment to and reverence for nature is shown by his horrified reaction at the cutting down of the walnut trees by the vicar's wife. Werther's state of mind seems to be parallel to the change of the seasons -- hope in the spring, decline in the fall, and despair and death in the winter. Several passages toward the beginning of the novel express Werther's rapture in nature, and the religious intensity of the temperate landscape -- immersion in fertile, vibrant nature leads us to an ecstatic union with, or at least closeness to, God. Nature is his religion! Nature also reflects Werther's psychological state: when he falls in love with Charlotte, thunder and lightning rages outside; as he enters the final phase of despair, destructive floods cover the plain.
3/3/03 --
Albert in Werther is depicted as a fairly conventional character -- hard worker, family man, good provider, who does however seem to be gone from home fairly often. Sensitivity and adventure were not his middle names. Charlotte came from a conventional milieu. Some conventional things about her (attention to the elderly, a genuine love for children, etc.) appealed to Werther. She seems sometimes to be playing a double game: she is "devoted" and faithful to her husband, and yet seems to enjoy Werther's assiduous attentions, and usually doesn't try very hard to deter him. At the end of the novel, she allows Werther to kiss her; she throws a look full of love in his direction; she actually hands the suicide pistols to Werther's servant.
Werther is a complex character. Despite his tempestuous feelings and conviction that his heart is what is most important about him, he spends much of the first part of the novel trying to find a satisfying bucolic existence, dreaming he would be married to Charlotte and eat the cabbages that he had raised and harvested and that she had cooked. This attempt was not successful. As soon as he lays eyes on Charlotte, he falls violently in love; his pursues her obsessively, and can do nothing to separate himself from her.
3/5/03 -- Werther began a more or less uninterrupted decline the first moment he saw Charlotte. His obsessiveness makes it impossible to "get over" her, and to recognize that he must leave her since she is unavailable. Some readers may be impatient with Werther, since he refuses to recognize "reality" and to make the decisions necessary for his survival. To them suicide may seem an easy way out. To others Werther may be noble because of his unselfish (?) devotion to his beloved, even to the point of being willing to sacrifice himself for his ideal. At the least, there is a certain drama and catharsis at the end of the novel, all based on a pity we feel for the poor fool who loved too much.
The evolution of orchestral music from the beginning of the classical period (about 1770) to the High Romantic period (about 1840). The form of the classical Romantic symphony was dominated by the sonata-allegro form in the first and last movements. Composers enjoyed a combination of structure and freedom in this approach that is still influential today. The texture of the music evolved from a small classical orchestra dominated by strings with a few woodwinds to (c. 1840) a much larger orchestra with greatly expanded wind, brass and percussion sections and even new instruments (harp, timpani, bass clarinet, etc.). The function of the music evolved from a desire to create something "abstractly" beautiful to a piece that projected dramatic emotion, evoked a picture (poem, painting, landscape, etc.), or even told a story.
The first movement to Mozart's "Eine kleine Nachtmusik" provides a very clear and simple example of the sonata-allegro form; the small orchestra is composed only of string instruments. The music is not trying to play any dramatic or evocative role.
The fourth movement to Mozart's Symphony #40 in g minor is also in a clear version of the sonata-allegro form. The orchestra includes woodwinds and French horns as well as strings. The tempo is very fast (headlong rush!), and the texture of the music is dense and complex; parts of the first theme recur constantly throughout the music. The texture at times seems Romantic. Mozart appears to have been studying Bach, judging by the complexity and unity of the movement.
3/7/03 -- Franz Josef Haydn's first movement to his Symphony #104 in D also follows the classical style, although his music is quite distinct from Mozart's. Haydn was older and was the inventor of much of the classical style. The movement has a solemn introduction followed by a regular version of the sonata-allegro form. The first thematic group is quite extensive. In the Development section he modulates and fragments the first theme. The mood is happy and good humored; presumably the listener feels the same way listening to such inventive and witty music. The symphony is scored for Mozart's orchestra with trumpets and timpani added.
Beethoven's Symphony #5 in b minor is still in the classical style, but the sonata-allegro form has been adapted for dramatic expressiveness. The movement in overwhelmingly monothematic until the Coda when a new rising theme suggests some progress toward a solution to the composer's dilemma. The sound is usually heavy (loud chords, trumpets, drums etc.) with few, quickly interrupted interludes of quiet. The function of the music appears to be "Fate Knocking at the Door" of a normal individual challenging him/her to actuate his humanity (?); the listener resists and hesitates, all to no avail as the voice of fate keeps insisting. The movement ends with a temporary truce, but no true assurance that fate will disappear.
3/10/03 -- With Mendelssohn we move into a more "typical" Romantic period in orchestral music. His Overture to a 'Midsummer Night's Dream' combines beautiful music with an expert evocation of the atmosphere, characters, and actions of Shakespeare's play. Mendelssohn retains the sonata-allegro form, and inserts references to an enchanted forest filled with fireflies, ecstatic lovers, grandiloquent love declarations, festive marches, pomp and circumstance, elves and sprites flitting about, donkeys braying, etc. The 'wandering lovers' chords are played three times. The piece ends with the curtain going down and the audience filled with regret that its time of enchantment is past.
Gioacchino Rossini's Overture to William Tell (1829) is also a piece of expert evocation -- of Swiss landscapes and patriotic actions in which the Swiss gain their independence from the German Empire. Rossini's orchestration is very rich and varied: he uses new instrument (the English horn); he uses instruments in Romantic ways (the high, lyrical cello register); he writes beautiful, lyrical music in the process. In this piece, in which he abandons the sonata-allegro form, he depicts a Swiss dawn in the high cello; then paints a violent storm in glissando strings and noisy trombones; then the calm after the storm with a beautiful duet between flute and English horn; finally the famous cavalry charge (source of the 'Lone Ranger' theme) in heavily rhythmic trumpets, French horns, low strings and timpani.
3/12/03 -- Summary of orchestral music: Mozart and Haydn fall clearly in the classical school; Beethoven is a transitional figure who maintains classical form transforming it into drama; Mendelssohn and Rossini (in 'William Tell') are clearly evocative-style Romantic composers.
Romantic Poetry consists of some combination of the following: 1) the poet seeks freedom from the tyranny of classical forms; 2) focuses on lyric poetry that emphasizes perception and feeling; 3) pursuit of the Romantic themes of nature, love and God; 4) indulges in a keener use of imagination and fantasy; 5) often interest in popular forms of literature, folklore.
William Blake should be classified as a Pre-Romantic. He sets himself in contrast to the Enlightenment ("Mock on...Voltaire Rousseau"). He takes a dark and often negative tack in his themes -- exploitation of children in "The Chimney Sweeper," sexual disease and moral corruption in "The Sick Rose," the puzzling ways of God in "The Tyger." His imagery is striking, sometimes shocking (the worm in the rose and the image of red and blood, the blazing, burning eyes of the tiger glowing in the night, the little boy black with soot); he uses biblical imagery in a great many of his poems; he uses surprising contrasts like "fearful symmetry," the rose and the worm, etc. He has a keen and fertile imagination. He is almost more like a religious prophet than a lyric poet.
3/14/03 -- William Wordsworth's poetry is perhaps the most "typical" of all Romantic poetry. "We Are Seven" shows Wordsworth's commitment to the use of popular diction, and the sometimes simple naivete of his poetry. Other short poems show his devotion to unspoiled rural nature and his aversion to the hustle and bustle, the "Getting and spending" of life in the city. Englishmen are "out of tune" with nature, and are living a life alienated from their true selves. Children are close to nature and innocence, but the older one grows, the farther one is from one's origins, and the greater the opportunity to be seduced and corrupted by the city. In "Tintern Abbey" Wordsworth recalls through memory his experience in nature, the "woods." As a young man his reaction was energetic and wild, running through the woods. As a mature man, immersion in nature has more of an uplifting feeling that leads him to a deep wisdom and understanding of the meaning of life. Nature leads the poet, and thus potentially the common man, to God, the deeper force within the universe. Nature never seems terrible or destructive; Wordsworth says that he was never betrayed by nature. The poet always focuses on the emotional impact of nature on the man, and emphasizes the theme of memory many years later lying on his "couch" as he recalls his experiences.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge shared with Wordsworth the beginning of the Romantic Movement in poetry in 1798. Coleridge wrote much less poetry than his friend; he concentrated largely on critical writing. The "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" shares with Wordsworth the use of popular idioms, but the impact of Coleridge's poetry is quite different. The "Rime" follows a curve from England to the South Pole, to the torrent doldrums of the Pacific (?) Ocean, then painfully returning to England under the sign of the kirk (church) and lighthouse. It is filled with famous poetic images -- the Albatross hung around the Mariner's neck, "Water, water everywhere...," the sun shining through the grate of the phantom ship, the Moon following the Mariner's ship from above, etc.
3/17/03 -- "Rime" is obviously an allegory; what of is perhaps up to individual interpretation. It has a strong Christian reference (the Albatross, guilt, punishment, contrition, penance, forgiveness, the Hermit and return to the kirk). One might interpret it as an allegory of individual salvation; or more likely, an allegory of the consequences of an offence against Nature and the life principle. Coleridge is more given than Wordsworth to the fantastic and the exotic; many of the scenes in "Rime" are downright phantasmagoric, even "psychedelic!"
"Kubla Khan," one of the most influential Romantic poems, excels in exotic imagery (the please dome, caves of ice, the fountain ejaculating rocks, the Abyssinian maid playing music on her dulcimer, honey-dew and the milk of paradise, etc.), apparent non-sequiturs, and openness to multiple interpretations. Coleridge confesses that he composed (wrote down) the poem after dreaming most of the lines and imagery in an opium-induced sleep. A reasonable interpretation might be the process of artistic creation with a nod to Freudian sexual imagery, the horror of society when confronted with the revealing work of the artist, and the efforts of the artist to defend his integrity.
Percy Bysshe Shelley's "Ode to the West Wind" apostrophizes the West Wind as an obvious stand-in for Nature. In the first stanza the Wind is presented in autumn as a frantic destroyer, although the poet makes reference to the regeneration of spring after the sepulcher of winter.
3/19/03 -- Nature is depicted as powerful like a threatening storm, but also calm, sensuous and soothing like a Mediterranean breeze. Shelley relates his personal situation to the West Wind/Nature in the 4th and 5th stanzas. Shelley is obviously going through a personal crisis associated with age, bad health perhaps, and certainly, he thinks, a flagging of his creative poetic powers. Great art comes from the wind of nature blowing through the artist evoking "a deep, autumnal tone" and "might harmonies." He prays to Nature (God) to inspire him so that his thoughts may be spread like sparks upon all of mankind, and thus he may acquire immortality. "The Spring" he awaits is just around the corner. In this poem Shelley is expressing a "sublime," as opposed to Wordsworth's "picturesque" view of nature.
John Keats' "Ode to a Nightingale" has, it seems to the instructor, a style somewhat similar to the previous poem. Keats, lying in bed slowly dying from tuberculosis (consumption), begins his incantatory, spellbound meditation on death as he hears the nightingale sing outside his window. The poet dreams of escape from a pessimistic vision of the human condition (Stanza III) into the warm, sunny South (Italy) where he drinks a Hippocrene vintage. Such an escape attracts him less than an immersion into "Poesy." Even Poetry suggests to him death ("for many a time/ I have been half in love with easeful Death"), but even that association recedes as he reflects on the enduring fame of Poetry and Beauty. Finally in the last stanze, Keats comes back to "reality;" the spell is broken, but even now he is not sure what is real and what is a dream. Keats style is emotional, somewhat morbid, focused on a conscious evocation of beauty, very sensuous imagery, etc.
3/21/03 -- Heinrich Heine's Romantic poetry seems completely different from Shelley, Keats and Wordsworth; it is simple, folkloric, humorous, straightforward. He was German, but exiled himself from his native country to spend the last 25 years of his life in Paris. In one short poem, he evoked the German reverence for trees, and spoke of the ambivalent attitude of Germans toward foreign countries and emigration. He wrote much of young Romantic love, where the lover poet finds complete fulfillment in his adoration of a young woman, and then finds great sorrow in the inevitable disappointments of true love. "Lorelei," perhaps the most famous lyric poem in German literature, is a finely chiseled description of a Rhenish boatman's shipwreck due to the alluring musical beauty of a Siren-like creature. It deals with the image of the femme fatale alluring men to their destruction. Perhaps it concerns also the poet's dangerous relationship with his art.
The Romantic Piano developed out of the instrument invented in the early 18th century, and then perfected in several countries at the end of the century. Its chief advantage over its keyboard predecessors is its dynamic flexibility, its ability to move from piano (soft) to forte (loud) from one note to another. Mozart's style takes advantage of this feature, but is essentially very classical -- following the sonata-allegro form literally, downplaying dynamic contrasts and drama, using a linear style with the melody carried by the right hand and harmonic accompaniment in the left. The first movement of Beethoven's "Pathétique" Sonata follows the sonata-allegro form, but differs in several ways: it inserts a slow, grave section three times in the movement; it is more passionate and dramatic; it is aggressive and anxious.
Source: http://www.csus.edu/indiv/c/craftg/hrs135/summary%20i.doc
Web site to visit: http://www.csus.edu
Author of the text: not indicated on the source document of the above text
Romanticism (literature), a movement in the literature of virtually every country of Europe, the United States, and Latin America that lasted from about 1750 to about 1870, characterized by reliance on the imagination and subjectivity of approach, freedom of thought and expression, and an idealization of nature. The term romantic first appeared in 18th-century English and originally meant “romancelike”—that is, resembling the fanciful character of medieval romances.
II ORIGINS AND INSPIRATION
By the late 18th century in France and Germany, literary taste began to turn from classical and neoclassical conventions (see Classic, Classical, and Classicism). Inspiration for the romantic approach initially came from two great shapers of thought, French philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau and German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
A The Romantic Spirit
Rousseau established the cult of the individual and championed the freedom of the human spirit; his famous announcement was “I felt before I thought.” Goethe and his compatriots, philosopher and critic Johann Gottfried von Herder and historian Justus Möser, provided more formal precepts and collaborated on a group of essays entitled Von deutscher Art und Kunst (Of German Style and Art, 1773). In this work the authors extolled the romantic spirit as manifested in German folk songs, Gothic architecture, and the plays of English playwright William Shakespeare. Goethe sought to imitate Shakespeare's free and untrammeled style in his Götz von Berlichingen (1773; translated 1799), a historical drama about a 16th-century robber knight. The play, which justifies revolt against political authority, inaugurated the Sturm und Drang (storm and stress) movement, a forerunner of German romanticism. Goethe's novel The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774; translated 1779) was also in this tradition. One of the great influential documents of romanticism, this work exalts sentiment, even to the point of justifying committing suicide because of unrequited love. The book set a tone and mood much copied by the romantics in their works and often in their personal lives: a fashionable tendency to frenzy, melancholy, world-weariness, and even self-destruction.
B The Romantic Style
The preface to the second edition of Lyrical Ballads (1800), by English poets William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge was also of prime importance as a manifesto of literary romanticism. Here, the two poets affirmed the importance of feeling and imagination to poetic creation and disclaimed conventional literary forms and subjects. Thus, as romantic literature everywhere developed, imagination was praised over reason, emotions over logic, and intuition over science—making way for a vast body of literature of great sensibility and passion. This literature emphasized a new flexibility of form adapted to varying content, encouraged the development of complex and fast-moving plots, and allowed mixed genres (tragicomedy and the mingling of the grotesque and the sublime) and freer style.
No longer tolerated, for example, were the fixed classical conventions, such as the famous three unities (time, place, and action) of tragedy. An increasing demand for spontaneity and lyricism—qualities that the adherents of romanticism found in folk poetry and in medieval romance—led to a rejection of regular meters, strict forms, and other conventions of the classical tradition. In English poetry, for example, blank verse largely superseded the rhymed couplet that dominated 18th-century poetry. The opening lines of the swashbuckling melodrama Hernani (1830; translated 1830), by the great French romantic writer Victor Hugo, are a departure from the conventional 18th-century rules of French versification; and in the preface to his drama Cromwell (1827; translated 1896), a famous critical document in its own right, Hugo not only defended his break from traditional dramatic structure but also justified the introduction of the grotesque into art. In their choice of heroes, also, the romantic writers replaced the static universal types of classical 18th-century literature with more complex, idiosyncratic characters; and a great deal of drama, fiction, and poetry was devoted to a celebration of Rousseau's “common man.”
III THE GREAT ROMANTIC THEMES
As the romantic movement spread from France and Germany to England and then to the rest of Europe and across to the western hemisphere, certain themes and moods, often intertwined, became the concern of almost all 19th-century writers.
A Libertarianism
Many of the libertarian (see Libertarianism) and abolitionist movements of the late 18th and early 19th centuries were engendered by the romantic philosophy—the desire to be free of convention and tyranny, and the new emphasis on the rights and dignity of the individual. Just as the insistence on rational, formal, and conventional subject matter that had typified neoclassicism was reversed, the authoritarian regimes that had encouraged and sustained neoclassicism in the arts were inevitably subjected to popular revolutions. Political and social causes became dominant themes in romantic poetry and prose throughout the Western world, producing many vital human documents that are still pertinent. The year 1848, in which Europe was wracked by political upheaval, marked the flood tide of romanticism in Italy, Austria, Germany, and France.
In William Tell (1804; translated 1825), by German dramatist Friedrich von Schiller, an obscure medieval mountaineer becomes an immortal symbol of opposition to tyranny and foreign rule. In the novel The Betrothed (1825-1827; translated 1834), by Italian writer Alessandro Manzoni, a peasant couple become instruments in the final crushing of feudalism in northern Italy. Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who for some most typify the romantic poet (in their personal lives as well as in their work), wrote resoundingly in protest against social and political wrongs and in defense of the struggles for liberty in Italy and Greece. Russian poet Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin, whose admiration for the work of Byron is clearly manifested, attracted notoriety for his “Ode to Liberty” (1820); like many other romanticists, he was persecuted for political subversion.
The general romantic dissatisfaction with the organization of society was often channeled into specific criticism of urban society. La maison du berger (The Shepherd's Hut, 1844), by French poet Alfred Victor de Vigny, expresses the view that such an abode has more nobility than a palace. Earlier, Rousseau had written that people were born free but that everywhere civilization put them in chains. This feeling of oppression was frequently expressed in poetry—for example, in the work of English visionary William Blake, writing in the poem “Milton” (about 1804-1808) of the “dark Satanic mills” that were beginning to deface the English countryside; or in Wordsworth's long poem The Prelude (1850), which speaks of “... the close and overcrowded haunts/Of cities, where the human heart is sick.”
B Nature
Basic to such sentiments was an interest central to the romantic movement: the concern with nature and natural surroundings. Delight in unspoiled scenery and in the (presumably) innocent life of rural dwellers is perhaps first recognizable as a literary theme in such a work as “The Seasons” (1726-1730), by Scottish poet James Thomson. The work is commonly cited as a formative influence on later English romantic poetry and on the nature tradition represented in English literature, most notably by Wordsworth. Often combined with this feeling for rural life is a generalized romantic melancholy, a sense that change is imminent and that a way of life is being threatened. Such intimations were early evinced in “Ode to Evening” (1747) by William Collins, “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” (1751) by Thomas Gray, and The Borough (1810) by George Crabbe. The melancholic strain later developed as a separate theme, as in “Ode on Melancholy” (1820) by John Keats, or—in a different time and place—in the works of American writers: the novels and tales of Nathaniel Hawthorne, which probe the depths of human nature in puritanical New England, or the macabre tales and melancholy poetry of Edgar Allan Poe.
In another vein in American literature, the romantic interest in untrammeled nature is found in such writers as Washington Irving, whose Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. (1819-1820), a collection of descriptive stories about the Hudson River valley, reflects the author's knowledge of European folktales as well as contemporary romantic poetry and the Gothic novel. The Leather-Stocking Tales by James Fenimore Cooper celebrate the beauty of the American wilderness and the simple frontier life; in romantic fashion they also idealize the Native American as (in Rousseau's phrase) the “noble savage.” By the middle of the 19th century the nature tradition was absorbed by American literary transcendentalism, chiefly expressed in the essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.
C The Lure of the Exotic
In the spirit of their new freedom, romantic writers in all cultures expanded their imaginary horizons spatially and chronologically. They turned back to the Middle Ages (5th century to 15th century) for themes and settings and chose locales ranging from the awesome Hebrides of the Ossianic tradition, as in the work of Scottish poet James MacPherson (see Ossian and Ossianic Ballads), to the Asian setting of Xanadu evoked by Coleridge in his unfinished lyric “Kubla Khan” (1797?). The compilation of old English and Scottish ballads by English poet Thomas Percy was a seminal work; his Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) exerted a significant influence on the form and content of later romantic poetry. The nostalgia for the Gothic past mingled with the tendency to the melancholic and produced a fondness for ruins, graveyards, and the supernatural as themes. In English literature, representative works include Keats's “The Eve of St. Agnes,” the Gothic novels of Matthew Gregory Lewis, and The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole. The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805), by Scottish writer Sir Walter Scott, and his historical novels, the Waverley series (1814-1825), combine these concerns: love of the picturesque, preoccupation with the heroic past, and delight in mystery and superstition.
D The Supernatural
The trend toward the irrational and the supernatural was an important component of English and German romantic literature. It was reinforced on the one hand by disillusion with 18th-century rationalism and on the other by the rediscovery of a body of older literature—folktales and ballads—collected by Percy and by German scholars Jacob and Wilhelm Karl Grimm (see Grimm Brothers) and Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen. From such material comes, for example, the motif of the doppelgänger (German for “double”). Many romantic writers, especially in Germany, were fascinated with this concept, perhaps because of the general romantic concern with self-identity. Poet Heinrich Heine wrote a lyric apocryphally titled “Der Doppelgänger” (1827; translated 1846); The Devil's Elixir (1815-1816; translated 1824), a short novel by E. T. A. Hoffmann, is about a double; and Peter Schlemihl's Remarkable Story (1814; translated 1927), by Adelbert von Chamisso, the tale of a man who sells his shadow to the devil, can be considered a variation on the theme. Later, Russian master Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky wrote his famous novel The Double (1846), an analysis of paranoia in a humble clerk.
IV DECLINE OF THE TRADITION By about the middle of the 19th century, romanticism began to give way to new literary movements: the Parnassians and the symbolist movement in poetry, and realism and naturalism in prose.
See also American Literature: Poetry; American Literature: Prose; Brazilian Literature; Danish Literature; Dutch Literature; English Literature; French Literature; German Literature; Italian Literature; Latin American Literature; Polish Literature; Portuguese Literature; Russian Literature; Spanish Literature; Swedish Literature.
Source: http://www.csus.edu/indiv/c/craftg/hrs135/romanticism%20lit.doc
Web site to visit: http://www.csus.edu
Author of the text: not indicated on the source document of the above text
CHAPTER 20 – Test Bank
Multiple-Choice Questions
1. Romantic artists
a. were interested in the wild and ghostly.
b. yearned for the past or a golden future.
c. loved wild landscapes.
d. All these answers are correct.
Answer: d
2. 1830 is the date of
a. the Restoration of the Bourbon monarchy.
b. the July Revolution in France.
c. the attack on Fort Sumter.
d. the Spanish-American War.
Answer: b
3. Which is NOT a tenet of Romanticism?
a. nostalgia
b. exoticism
c. chivalric tales
d. the sublime
e. social realism
Answer: e
4. The Houses of Parliament are an example of
a. Classical revival architecture.
b. Palladian architecture.
c. Gothic revival architecture.
d. Islamic revival architecture.
Answer: c
5. “La Marseillaise” is
a. a French city.
b. a French building.
c. the French anthem.
d. a French epic.
Answer: c
6. François Rude’s sculpture La Marseillaise represents
a. a parade in Paris.
b. Liberty leading France to protect the motherland.
c. the French Revolution led by Louis XVI.
d. the battle of the Centaurs.
Answer: b
7. The Brighton Pavilion is an example of
a. Gothic revival.
b. Islamic Gothic.
c. Classical revival.
d. Indian Gothic.
Answer: d
8. Gouache is a kind of
a. etching.
b. paint.
c. woodcut.
d. pigment.
Answer: b
9. Which best describes the work of William Blake?
a. Classical
b. Gothic
c. down-to-earth
d. military
e. visionary
Answer: e
10. Géricault’s paintings reflect his interest in
a. combating social injustice.
b. horsemanship.
c. psychology.
d. both psychology and combating social injustice.
e. All these answers are correct.
Answer: e
11. In the Raft of the “Medusa,” “Medusa” refers to
a. a jellyfish.
b. a life raft.
c. a ship.
d. a hospital.
e. a painting by Caravaggio.
Answer: c
12. Géricault’s Raft of the “Medusa” was based on
a. a Romantic concoction under the influence of opium.
b. an event taken from the newspapers of the day.
c. a scene from the French Revolution.
d. a mythological scene.
Answer: b
13. The Salon refers to
a. an official art exhibition.
b. a room in a château.
c. a room in a private Paris apartment.
d. an art gallery.
Answer: a
14. ________ marked the high point in Romantic influence on politics.
a. The publishing of Lyrics of Ballads
b. The “return to nature” movement
c. Charles X ascending to the French throne
d. The July Revolution
e. The Sturm und Drang movement
Answer: d
15. The war depicted in Massacre at Chios was between
a. America and England.
b. France and Italy.
c. Greece and Turkey.
d. Greece and Italy.
Answer: c
16. Massacre at Chios is sympathetic to
a. Greece.
b. Turkey.
c. Italy.
d. France.
e. England.
Answer: a
17. In Liberty Leading the People, the figure of Liberty is an example of
a. irony.
b. allegory.
c. satire.
d. metonymy.
e. realism.
Answer: b
18. Aquatint combines
a. watercolor and drawing.
b. engraving and oil.
c. watercolor and silverpoint.
d. watercolor and engraving.
Answer: d
19. Which is NOT a theme in Goya’s painting?
a. social injustice
b. child psychology
c. irrational thinking
d. frivolity
Answer: d
20. Chronos was
a. a bad Spanish father.
b. the father of the Olympians.
c. the father of Goya.
d. the father of Hermes.
Answer: b
21. Which is NOT a correct match?
a. Burke – the sublime
b. Goethe – Sturm und Drang
c. Freud – “The Uncanny”
d. Rousseau – Les Misérables
Answer: d
22. Constable’s painting of Salisbury Cathedral is an example of
a. Gothic revival.
b. Realism.
c. Romanticism.
d. watercolor.
Answer: c
23. Towards the end of his career, Turner painted
a. carefully delineated scenes of upper class virtue.
b. realistic landscapes.
c. broadly imagined, expressionistically colored landscapes.
d. photographic-quality portraits.
Answer: c
24. Which is NOT an American Romantic writer?
a. Coleridge
b. Thoreau
c. Emerson
d. Cooper
e. Poe
Answer: a
25. ________ was a literary movement that exalted individualism and nature as a reaction against French Classical taste.
a. Walden Pond
b. Gouache
c. Storm and Stress
d. Gothic Revival
e. Alhambra
Answer: c
26. Which of the following is a correct match?
a. Coleridge – “The Solitary Reaper”
b. Shelley – “Kubla Khan”
c. Byron – “Don Juan”
d. Keats – “Ozymandias”
Answer: c
Source: http://highered.mheducation.com/sites/dl/free/0073379239/825429/adams4_tb_ch20.doc
Web site to visit: http://highered.mheducation.com
Author of the text: not indicated on the source document of the above text
If you are the author of the text above and you not agree to share your knowledge for teaching, research, scholarship (for fair use as indicated in the United States copyrigh low) please send us an e-mail and we will remove your text quickly. Fair use is a limitation and exception to the exclusive right granted by copyright law to the author of a creative work. In United States copyright law, fair use is a doctrine that permits limited use of copyrighted material without acquiring permission from the rights holders. Examples of fair use include commentary, search engines, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching, library archiving and scholarship. It provides for the legal, unlicensed citation or incorporation of copyrighted material in another author's work under a four-factor balancing test. (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use)
The information of medicine and health contained in the site are of a general nature and purpose which is purely informative and for this reason may not replace in any case, the council of a doctor or a qualified entity legally to the profession.
The following texts are the property of their respective authors and we thank them for giving us the opportunity to share for free to students, teachers and users of the Web their texts will used only for illustrative educational and scientific purposes only.
All the information in our site are given for nonprofit educational purposes
The information of medicine and health contained in the site are of a general nature and purpose which is purely informative and for this reason may not replace in any case, the council of a doctor or a qualified entity legally to the profession.
www.riassuntini.com