The Role Of The Child In Romantic Poetry Analysis

As a new way to criticize the Romantic period, desperate times call for desperate measures and it did through the use of children’s point of view in Romantic poetry. A period of fifty years called Romantic period included the French Revolution, the American Revolution and wars of national independence in Europe. William Blake, one of well known Romantic poets, commented on his society by viewing it through the child’s eyes in the two sets of ‘Songs of innocence and of Experience’. It is said that ignorance is a blessing but not according to William Blake.

"The attitudes of the Romantics were a deepened appreciation of the beauties of nature, a general exaltation of emotion over reason and of the senses over intellect" (Romanticism 1). The Romantics took their own feelings and brought them to life in their poetry. Traditional beliefs or formal rules of poetry no longer governed them. The Romantics not only held a greater ability to express themselves but they also possessed a greater sensitivity and a sense of optimism, which is prevalent in their work.

The start of the Romantic Age coincided with the start of the French Revolution in 1789. It ends in 1837. Just as the revolution was changing the social order, the romantic poets were taking literature in a whole new direction. The mechanical reason that pervaded the work of the previous era was replaced by strong emotions and a return to nature. Animals and respect for nature were frequently used subjects in works of his period. The first generation of poets included William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Sir Walter Scott. Their primary contribution to literature was with their lyrical ballads. They used the typical romantic themes of respect for nature and all of its creatures. Wordsworth is above all the poet

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.

Another ideal of Romanticism is the valuing of nature as the best habitat rather than the city life. Nature became an important key of inspiration for the Romantics. It was becoming more appreciated by people as it began to appear in art, music, poems, literature, and many other works. Nature was not just a place in the minds of Romantics. Nature meant several

With a prior appreciation of nature, Wordsworth took this appreciation to another level as he obtained a great interest in scenery and the countryside. Adding sensibility and imagery to his works, his reader could gain a dominant amount of culture from his writings. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau’s most famous and introductory works on the course of nature are allegedly owed to growing up on William Wordsworth's romantic approach and nature and the beauty of it all. “Nature” has said to have been the finishing product of Wordsworth’s beginning poems. Becoming more conservative as time went on, William Wordsworth only found tranquility in writing and nature as events in his life took a turn for the worse.

The Romantic Period was an explosion of artistic energy from 1790-1820, which began in Germany and quickly spread to the United States, almost all of Europe, and Latin America. It was a period full of emotion, intuition, intense feelings, and the revolt against any authority or order. Those in this time idealized nature and embraced the uncivilized, and imagination was a key component to their writing and way of thinking. Steven Kreis, author for The History Guide writes, “…one power possessed by the Romantic…was imagination…” (Kreis 1).

In the first stanza it is the semantic field of water: ‘waters’ (twice), ‘sea’, ‘drowning’ and ‘being drawn’. As I mentioned earlier, water is often the symbol of life but it also evokes tears, sadness and despair.

Romanticism has a strong connection with nature and the people of Romanticism take lessons from it and learn from nature. “Pearl gathered the violets, and anemones, and columbines, and some twigs of the

Romanticism is an era where creativity and new ideas immersed; mostly from people of the arts. “Many point to the publication of William Wordsworth's Lyrical Ballads in 1792 as the

Spanning from roughly 1750 to 1837, the Romantic period was an artistic and literary movement that sought after and treasured creativity and emotion, a drastic variation from prior periods in which logic and reason were valued (Wilhelm 669). Sometimes considered one of the greatest ages in literature, poets during Romanticism were greatly inspired and fascinated by nature, human passions, quests, folk culture, the Middle Ages, physical sensations, mental states, and the innocence of children (669). Romantic works capture whimsy and imagination through a use of the five senses: touch, sight, smell, and sound (676). They view nature as lively and genuine and express the belief that nature is best when left wild and untouched by man (678). Most

To the Romantics, the imagination was important. It was the core and foundation of everything they thought about, believed in, and even they way they perceived God itself. The leaders of the Romantic Movement were undoubtedly Samuel Taylor Coleridge and his close friend, William Wordsworth. Both were poets, and both wrote about the imagination. Wordsworth usually wrote about those close to nature, and therefore, in the minds of the Romantics, deeper into the imagination than the ordinary man. Coleridge, however, was to write about the supernatural, how nature extended past the depth of the rational mind.

Smith1Austin D. SmithENGL 25111-19-17It’s a hard knock lifeChildren of the Romantic Period became more prevalent not only in the politics of society, but also within the poetry, composition, and political debates of the time period. Such a controversy arose due to society's understanding of what it meant to be a child of the Romantic Period. Prior to the nineteenth century, children were viewed as having an identity in correlation to the parents. However, this began to change at the turn of the Romantic Period with the introduction of more prominent children's literature rising to popularity within society via the literary and political figures of politicians. The figure of the child prompted poetry and political debate during the Romantic period. This debate occurred because society reconsidered what it meant to be a child. Before the nineteenth century, children were seldom viewed as having an identity separate from adults. Children were viewed as miniature adults or adults in training. Most children were orphans, but even families with both parents living might still have to fight

Romanticism came to be in the 18th and 19th centuries which emphasized the imagination and emotions of romanticism. Many people viewed this type of literature as the quality or state of being impractical or unrealistic meaning romantic feelings or ideas. During this time many poets were encouraged to express their true colors and individual uniqueness. The Romantic Era expanded all throughout the world, and reached poets such as Keats, Byron, Shelley, and Wordsworth.

One of the most popular themes for Romantic poetry in England was nature and an appreciation for natural beauty. The English Romantic poets were generally concerned with the human imagination as a counter to the rise of science. The growing intellectual movement of the 18th and 19th centuries placed scientific thought in the forefront of all knowledge, basing reality in material objects. The Romantics found this form of world view to be restrictive. They felt that imagination was crucial to individual happiness. The imagination also provides a common human bond; a means of sympathy, of identification. However, the absence of imagination, the Romantics felt, would lead