The Romantic Era

Political and societal trends are often reflected in the art of their time period. It is commonly said that “art imitates life,” however, it also imitates, and is shaped by the world and time period surrounding it. Leading up to the nineteenth century, Paris experienced time of recalcitrance, this manifested in many aspects of society – including the arts. The sociological and political events of Paris amidst the Romantic Era were reflected in the ballets of the time through their focus on the fantastical and supernatural themes as well as their exotic, foreign settings.

The Romantic Period centered on creative imagination, nature, mythology, symbolism, feelings and intuition, freedom from laws, impulsiveness, simplistic language, personal experiences, democracy, and liberty, significant in various art forms including poetry. The development of the self and self-awareness became a major theme as the Romantic Period was seen as an unpredictable release of artistic energy, new found confidence, and creative power found in the writings of the Romantic poets Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, and Shelley, who made a substantial impact on the world of poetry. Two of the Romantic poets, William Blake, and Percy Bysshe Shelley rebelled against convention and authority in search of personal, political and artistic freedom. Blake and Shelley attempted to liberate the subjugated people through the contrary state of human existence prevalent throughout their writings, including Blake’s “The Chimney Sweepers,” from “Songs of Innocence”, “London,” from “Songs of Experience” and Shelley’s A Song: “Men of England.”

In 1830 some of poets define romanticism as “liberalism in literature but the end of 18th century it was made cracks to classicism by poet called William Blake. Blake was inspired to write about the ancient thing as like all religions are one, and there is no religion, all their religion was made by people to improve life style. As this period of time all other poet like Wordsworth were writing about the war between France and England and

Blake’s poem, “London” represent how the city life has taken away the freedom of the people. Blake uses skills of alliteration, imagery, and word choice to create his poem. In the first two stanzas, Blake uses repetition to

As America sought to create their own literary voice following the Revolutionary War, the transition from the Colonial Era to the Romantic Era was a notable one, changing the voice of our country throughout the 19th century. Marked by themes of individualism, idealism, and being in touch with nature, Romanticism altered both the art and writing of the time and has certainly left a lasting impact to this day.

In "London", William Blake brings to light a city overrun by poverty and hardship. Blake discards the common, glorifying view of London and replaces it with his idea of truth. London is nothing more but a city strapped by harsh economic times where Royalty and other venues of power have allowed morality and goodness to deteriorate so that suffering and poverty are all that exist. It is with the use of three distinct metaphors; "mind-forg'd manacles", "blackning Church", and "Marriage hearse", that Blake conveys the idea of a city that suffers from physical and psychological imprisonment, social oppression, and an unraveling moral society.

In contrast to the certainties of the Enlightenment and fed the growth of popular nationalism — was the intellectual and artistic movement named Romanticism. Artists inspired by romanticism abandoned the emphasis on reason associated with well­-known Enlightenment philosophes like Voltaire or Montesquieu. Instead Romantics supported instead emotional exuberance, unrestrained imagination, and spontaneity in both art and personal life. Preoccupied with emotional excess, romantic works explored the awesome power of love and desire and of hatred, guilt, and despair. One of the first Romantic poets, William Blake protested the loss of the bucolic countryside to the pollution of new industry, as well, as describing the hardships of the poor people.

Many of the authors that demonstrated Romanticism were thinking outside of the box to get this sense of Romanticism incorporated into their work bringing creativity and the thought of emotion and individualism together in their work. We see Romanticism in our art, literature, and music. In the early years of Romanticism, it quickly spread to England in 1789, then, shortly after its expansion to England, it then was picked up on in America. The Romanticism movement was considered a philosophical movement which, in the midst of it gaining popularity, changed the way that people think about themselves and other people around them in the world. Many would agree that this time would be considered an “age of revolution.” with the French and American Revolution going on it changed America in a semi-drastic way both literary and as a whole society.

William Blake’s poem “London” takes a complex look at life in London, England during the late seventeen hundreds into the early eighteen hundreds as he lived and experienced it. Blake’s use of ambiguous and double meaning words makes this poem both complex and interesting. Through the following explication I will unravel these complexities to show how this is an interesting poem.

The Romanic period held great tools in which to develop personal expression within poetry – As popularity shifted from Neoclassism, a rigid writing form whereby poets and writers were encouraged to copy those who also shared the poetic platform, to an increased in the importance of the individual capabilities. Critic Christopher John Murray argues that “The idea of poetry as the sincere personal expression of the individual author emerged as central to the Romantic lyric and to aesthetics and hermeneutics more generally connected to the increasingly important idea of genius as a uniquely personal power of creative imagination and expression.” This confirms my theory that there during the Romantic Period there a shift from more social values in literature to a focus now on personal ability .

The romantic period of music began in the 1820s and with it came a change of stylistic features. Beethoven largely impacted the new way that the music of the Romantic era was viewed. He made people perceive music as a true form of art made to be taken seriously, rather than just a fun time passer. Another reason for the change of music during that time was due to nationalism and exoticism. Nationalism promoted music, such as folk songs and dances, which was created for the purpose of supporting the nation. Exoticism had the opposite effect as nationalism. It caused audiences to listen to folk music from other nations and it allowed people to have a better understanding of unique qualities and cultures of surrounding nations. These factors led to the music during the Romantic period becoming more personal and emotion than it was in the previous classical era, although it still contained a melody, harmony, tone color, and a form. Much of the music from the Romantic era can be recognized by its melody. The melodies became wider, more irregular, and dramatic during this time. The harmony of Romantic music was further advanced as well. The composers learned how to use harmony to build the melody and intensify its emotionality, while at the same time experimenting freely with new chords. The tone color of music during this time was expanded allowing the quality of the sound of the music to improve. One of the most important changes that were made to the features of music during

These visions made Blake believe in the belief of different powers despite his knowledge of religious ideas. As a child, his visions grew to diverse types of symbolic imageries, such as; elves, fairies, devils and angels (Long 329). These sights carried him through his childhood leaving grand impressions that inspired him to write poems and songs of Heavenly beings. “Blake saw visions and spoke a tongue like that of the illuminated cobbler.” (Sampson 495) William Blake was a very influential writer in his time; many poets were his successors from his ways of modernizing poetry in its rawest form. His works gave light to imagination and others to for see different symbols of life. Blake believed in the freedom in life because it makes a soul adventurous and creative in the paths you may take. Blake was very rebellious to the ordinary ways of style in his writings. “The most amazing thing about him is the perfectly sane and cheerful way in which he moved through poverty and obscurity, flinging out exquisite poems or senseless rhapsodies, as a child might play with gems or straws or sunbeams indifferently.” (Long

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.

Some of William Blake’s poetry is categorized into collections called Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. Blake explores almost opposite opinions about creation in his poems “The Lamb” and “The Tiger.” While the overarching concept is the same in both, he uses different subjects to portray different sides of creation; however, in the Innocence and Experience versions of “The Chimney Sweeper,” Blake uses some of the same words, rhyme schemes, and characters to talk about a single subject in opposite tones.

In the Romantic period a war and a battle took place, the era learned ways to spice up production, the play “Faust” was created, and there were connections between the time period and the play itself. The first war that took place was the French Revolution.