The Romantic Age (1770-1830)

- word comes from the Old French romans meaning a

vernacular language deriving from Latin
- also known as ”the Romantic Revival”
- became more popular during the first 30 years of the 19th
century
- focus on: rediscovery of local cultures, flowering of local
literatures
- reaction against 18th century rationalism, the supremacy
of reason
- witnessed big changes in philosophy, politics, religion,
literature, painting, music
- historical events influenced the change in thinking,
feeling, behaviour
- the French Revolution brought progressive ideas to
Europe
- the fall of the Bastille considered as a symbol of
regeneration and a prospect of friendship and common
progress
- the battle of Waterloo was a landmark for the younger
generation of Romantic Poets
- the Industrial Revolution left deep marks in the physical
appearance and the social structure of European
countries’
- the colonists’ rebellion in North America and their
achievement of independence decreased the influence of
the British Crown in this part of the world
- poets’ interest in nature as a spiritual influence on life
- they felt the menace of industrialization
- turned to nature for protection
- their spirituality became their religion
- nature, not society was the proper setting for Romantic
Poets
- in addition, primitive, heroic societies became sources of
inspiration
- also interested in folklore, especially ballads
- 1st generation of Romantic Poets turned to themselves,
looked into their own soul, feelings and sensations
- consequently, both simplicity and exoticism characterize
this literary age
- Wordsworth: the poet’s intention is to make mundane
and simple feelings a focus
- consequently, the 2 major directions in Romantic Poetry:
the mysterious world of the supernatural and the
everyday world of ordinary people
- major sources of inspiration: feelings and imagination
- imagination becomes a means to communicate truth
- the poets’ inability to draw inspiration from the
conventional attitudes, and the emergence of new ideas in
psychology and metaphysics made the Romantic Poets
concentrate on the inner self
- this is illustrated by Lord Byron in the following lines:

I love not man the less but nature more

From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.

- the lonely poet endeavouring to merge with the whole

Universe
- poets also consider a poem as an organic whole
- the poem refers back to the poet rather than forward to
the audience
- the essence of Romantic Poetry is the universe generated
by the poem
- it would be mistaken to consider Romantic Poetry just
‘escapist’ – although it rejected a socio-political
involvement, it engaged in a battle for the freedom of
feeling and thought
 William Blake (1757-1827)

- one of the most astonishing poets in world literature

- considered as a pre-Romantic poet (born 12 years before
Wordsworth, 15 before Coleridge)
- prepared the path for the first and second generation of
Romantic Poets
- also considered to be a seer, a visionary, a true mystic
- his poetic work: a well-defined system, a cosmogony
- powerfully influenced by religion, philosophy, mysticism
- read extensively treatises on Gnosticism and Druidism
- studied drawing at the Royal Academy, apprenticed to an
engraver
- made drawings in ancient churches in order to earn a
living
- his poetic work was powerfully influenced by Gothic art
- his poems are accompanied and embellished by his own
etchings and copper plates

-
- his 1st volume of verse “Poetical Sketches”(1783)
influenced by Shakespeare, Spenser, Milton and Dante
- influences of the Bible, Ossian and the mystic writers are
also traceable
- focus: the importance of the spiritual world and the
divine in man
 - in “To the Muses” he complains about the decadence of
poetry:

How have you left the ancient love

That bards of old enjoyed in you!

The languid strings do scarcely move!

The sound is forced, the notes are few.

- best known volumes of verse: ”Songs of

Innocence”(1789) and “Songs of Experience” ( 1794)
- the poems are evocations of the spirit of childhood and
illustrations of his Gnostic readings
- in “Songs of Innocence” he was influenced by ballads,
children’s songs or hymns
- the poet creates a pastoral world, like in “Piping Down
the Valleys Wild”:
Pipe a song about a Lamb!

So I piped with merry cheer,

Piper, pipe that song again.

So I piped: he wept to hear…

And I made a rural pen,

And I stained the water clear,

And I wrote my happy songs

Every child may joy to hear.

- not all the songs are inspired by happy experiences:

When my mother died I was very young,

And my father sold me while yet my tongue,

Could scarcely cry weep, weep, weep, weep,

So your chimneys I sweep and in soot I sleep. (“The Chimney

Sweeper”)
 - in “Songs of Experience” the perspective changes
radically
- the poems are gloomy, speak about death, desolation,
menace, oppression
- in “The Holy Thursday” the reader senses protest, even
fury:

Is this a holy thing to see,

In a rich and fruitful land,

Babes reduced to misery,

Fed with cold and usurous hand?

- “The Sick Rose” being eaten by a worm is symbolical of

disillusioned love but also of the decay of life’s important
values:

And his dark secret love

Does thy life destroy.

- his later poems are somber, symbolical, an expression of
Blake’s strange mythology

-
- in his view the evil in the world is passed on from
generation to generation
- man can be liberated by the Poetic Genius or
Imagination, the capacity to grasp realities beyond the
limits of the senses
- his doctrine is a protest against tyranny and repression,
and a plea for social, political, religious and intellectual
freedom
- the last period of life was marked by sadness and utter
disappointment
- Blake was grossly misunderstood or ignored by his
contemporaries (Wordsworth and Coleridge hardly knew
of his existence and verse)
- his poems are mainly characterized by compressed highly
symbolical meaning
- he was often criticized during his lifetime, died in
poverty
- hardly any of his writings were published during his
lifetime, and if so, in very few copies
 Robert Burns (1759-1796)

- W. Blake’s contemporary
- most celebrated Scottish poet
- also known as the ploughman poet
- like Blake born into a religious home, where morality,
honesty and respect played a very important role
- nevertheless, whereas Blake created his own mythology,
Burns forsook faith, considering it a form of repression
- many of his poems are comic and satiric:
Ye ugly, creepin’, blasted wonner,

Detested, shunn’d, by saunt an’sinner,

How dare ye set your fit upon her,

Sae fine a lady!

Gae somewhere else, and seek your dinner

On some poor body. (“To a Louse”)

- decided to use the tongue of simple people in his poems

- many of these are written in the Scottish dialect and can
be sung
- in “Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect” (1786) he
brought back to life the dying songs of his country, like
in “A Red, Red Rose”:

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,

So deep in love I am:

And I will love thee still, my dear,

Till a’the seas gang dry.

- his best known longer poem is “Tam O’Shanter” (1790)

- deals with rustic themes, manners, circumstances,
superstitions and customs
- a mixture of serious and comic, of supernatural and
macabre elements
- his comic and satiric verse deals with human nature and
behaviour, not landscape or the poet’s own feelings
- he was not an unlettered peasant, a mere folk-singer, but
well-read, knew some Latin and read French, including
Racine
- but most of all the people in his native country provide
him with a spoken language which is his own poetry
- through rhythm and imagery he created a sense of
community of particular people
To the Muses
William Blake
Whether on Ida’s shady brow,
Or in the chambers of the East,
The chambers of the sun, that now
From ancient melody have ceased;

Whether in Heaven ye wander fair,

Or the green corners of the earth,
Or the blue regions of the air,
Where the melodious winds have birth;

Whether on crystal rocks ye rove,

Beneath the brown of the sea
Wandering in many a coral grove,
Fair Nine, forsaking Poetry!

How have you left the ancient love

That bards of old enjoyed in you!
The languid strings do scarcely move!
The sound is forced, the notes are few.

The Sick Rose

William Blake
O ROSE, thou art sick!
The invisible worm
That flies in the night,
In the howling storm,
Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy,
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.
A Red, Red Rose
Robert Burns
My love is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June:
My love is like the melody
That’s sweetly played in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,

So deep in love am I:
And I will love thee still, my dear,
Till a’ seas gang dry.

Till a’ seas gang dry, my dear,

And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;
And I will love thee still my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my love,

And fare thee weel a while!
And I will come again, my love,
Thou’ it were ten thousand mile.