Essay Comparing Keats And Henry Longfellow

The Romantic period of literature started in the late eighteenth century and is one of the shorter eras in our history. During this era, authors mainly wrote about what they were feeling in that moment. They did not write with rules and purely wrote spontaneously with imagination. Another characteristic that is found within Romanticism is individualism. Many of the poets created a sense of indictability and self-reliance within their stories by giving astronomical potentials for their characters. Finally, nature and supernatural are large themes within the Romantic era. These elements can be seen within all the works that we have covered during the semester. Three pieces that I have read that have helped me comprehend these elements and how they work cohesively together are “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” by Wordsworth, “The Rime of Ancient Mariner,” by Coleridge and “Ode to a Nightingale” by Keats. These stories have a common theme of nature and how it brings happiness.

While both Keats and Longfellow often reflect on their own unfulfilled dreams and impending deaths, the poems however contrast on their own dispositions towards death and the future. Here, Keats expresses a fear of not having enough time to accomplish all that he believes he is capable of doing, but as he recognizes the enormity of the world and his own limitations of life, he realizes that his own mortal goals are meaningless in the long run of things. On the other hand, Longfellow speaks of a regret towards his inaction for allowing time to slip away from him in his past and is at a crossroads for the ominous future that looms ahead of him. Through the use of light and dark imagery, and personification, Keats and Longfellow similarly yet also differently, reflect on their own ideas for death and the futures that lay ahead of them.

It all starts here….. Rational and well-reasoned ideas were embraced by writers and philosophers from the age of reason. In an orderly manner, these ideas could essentially help to define the world. Writers in this time period were more focused on traditional writing styles and using formal language. Romantics were rebelling against “constrained thinking,” and they celebrated emotion, creativity, and the mystery of nature. New forms of writing were explored by the romantics. Often writing about nature and everyday experiences of men and women, it eventually gave way to realism and romanticism stretched from the 1700’s to the 1800’s.

Imagine a candle-lit dinner on a starry night in Paris, the Eiffel Tower just in view with dazzling lights shining into the night. This image is probably what you think of when you hear the word “romantic,” correct. However, this image is a stumbling block when people think of the “Romanticism Period” in literature. Where “romantic” means having a lovely time with the person you love the most, “Romanticism” is a piece of literature written with key themes in mind. Those themes tend to be a strong emotion, imagery or worship of nature, and individuality and subjectivity. The peak of inspiration for these pieces was in the years 1800-1850, and there are famous poems that are well loved today from this period. Many of the poets that you enjoy reading and know are, in actuality, Romanticism writers, and instill the themes above in our minds.

The Romanticism era let writers express their thoughts about various ideas through their words. While some focused on nature or the imagination, others wrote about their own opinions on different subject matter. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Henry David Thoreau both depicted their individual thoughts in their works. To convey specific truths about life, Longfellow and Thoreau use their own views in their writings to reveal the truths.

Writers prominent in the latter half of the eighteenth century, and first decades of the nineteenth, were Romantic. Values held by these individuals include an ardent love of nature, pursuit of one’s true self, and embracement of imagination. Critics argue because of these values, the Romantics were mere escapists. American writer Thomas Wolfe describes the Romantic viewpoint as one concerned with,“not the desire to escape life, but the desire to prevent life from escaping you”. Romantic figures like Wordsworth, Wollstonecraft, and Shelley attempted to prevent life from escaping them through close observation of the natural world, and dedication to transformative societal change.

He also uses exaggeration to create a greater impact on the reader here as this is the first line of the poem. Keats and Wordworth personify in different ways from each other in the two sonnets. While Wordsworth is more positive and sees beauty in everything, Keats is more balanced ; as a result of this he makes the sea come alive with a more evil and angry character. Alternating moments in which the sea is calm and relaxed, and moments in which it seems evil and angry. Keats also makes us think that the moon has power on the sea as its the moon which makes the sea move; personification makes it seeem magical and powerful.

During the Romantic era poets were beginning to concentrate on nature, beauty, and explore the mysteries of life and death. The era was one that focused on the commonality of humankind and, while using emotion and nature the poets and their works shed light on people’s universal natures (Hall). Romantic works relate the author’s personal feelings and emotions and also focus on a more detailed natural setting. The period was also a time of poverty, urbanization, discrimination against women, and the debtor’s prison.

Romanticism took place in the early 1800's, it focused on the evolution and the effects nature has upon the universe. This time period helped grasp imagination, emotions, symbolism, and focus on the individual of one's self. I will be evaluating the authors, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathaniel Hawthorne to demonstrate how their works relate to the time era of the 18th century.

The Romantic period is a time where imagination and creativity in storytelling became key to the success of writers. Early authors of the time were radical in their writing and tended to be blunt when it came to social commentary of the industrial age and British rule as a whole. Later this would prove unwise and the idea of setting stories “long ago and far away” became popular. Romanticism was all about intense emotion and authenticity over realism. Beauty or romance was shown through writings about the past and nature.

In the poems “Mezzo cammin” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and “ When I have a fear” by John keats, both poems themes are about the imminence of death and their unfulfilled dreams in life. There are many similarities in the poem but they are mostly in the beginning of the poems, the conclusion on the other hand is not similar. In “Mezzo cammin’’ the main theme of the poem is the reminisce of his dreams from the past. Keats poems emphasize a theme of the waste of a physical life and his fears associated with this waste.

During the Romantic period, which began in the late 18th Century, and ended in the early 20th century, there were many political changes, such as the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, repression and reform, pre-industrial economic changes. There were also many changes throughout literature and culture during this time. Poetry during this time often had strong themes of nature, internalization, subjectivity, and imagination. Three highly influential poets who were also often characterized as poets of the Imagination are William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and William Blake. Imagination is important to romantic poets because it was used as a healing tool for the writers’ troubles, using reason and emotion to relate to and participate in the world around them.

Authors in the Romantic time period used a different style of writing that is not as a common today. The style they used was usually more aggressive, horror, or figurative. The story “Paul Revere’s Ride” is written in an informative style of writing. Although it is what he saw and experienced, Longfellow wrote the story as he was informing people from the future, like us. Another popular way to write in this time period was using figurative language and imagery. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote a story titled “Nature”.When Emerson says “The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart

Keats uses metaphors surrounding the growing and harvesting of grain to depict his fear that death will disrupt his career before he has a chance to be successful. “As the natural course of life is youth, adulthood and old age, so the growing of grain follows the natural progression of the seasons. For the poet to die young would eliminate his chance of ‘harvesting’ the fruits of his mind, which will become ‘ripen’d’ only as a poet ages” (Dagorn, “An Explication of ‘When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be’ - by John Keats.”). The fruits referred to are a representation of his works and creations (Dagorn, “An Explication of ‘When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be’ - by John Keats.”). He fears that as he grows older and gets nearer to death his chances of becoming a known poet dwindle. “Such anxiety is relatable to any artist and any human being who is dissatisfied with his or her current state, or those who fear the limitations of life despite the unlimited nature of their ideas” (Richards, "Analysis of John Keats's 'When I Have Fears:' Death & The Freedom of Limitations."). Keats’s use of the metaphor composed of harvest and grain also creates a paradox: “Keats is both the field of grain (his imagination is like the grain to be harvested) and he is the harvester (writer of poetry).” A harvest is a “fulfillment in time, the culmination [yields] a valued

John Keats is not only one of the greatest poets in English literature, but he is also one of its few heroes. Despite being relatively unknown during his life, Keats became the defining symbol of the late Romantic time period in which he lived Even after his premature death at the young age of twenty-five, Keats's poetry was scrutinized. If not for several profound occurrences in John Keats’s lifetime, and without the friendships that he made, he never would have been able to address the political issues at the time or find a way to release his feelings of heartbreak