Romanticism and It's Authors

Characterized by freedom of the mind and an idealistic view of human nature, Romanticism slowly crept out of Neoclassicism to become one of the most influential periods of British literature. It is the emergence of this new literary period called Romanticism that stirred an interest in those who were hungry for a new form of writing and thought. This idea, although relatively short-lived and lasting only from 1798-1832, had enormous effects on the philosophy and literature of the time while leaving its mark on the history of England. Poets; William Blake, William Wordsworth and John Keats, who are considered the landmark figures of romantic poetry, responded to the revolution through their literary works such as “The Chimney Sweeper”, “The World Is Too Much with Us”, and “Ode to a Nightingale.”

Romanticism began in the early 19th century and radically changed the way people perceived themselves and the state of nature around them. Major political and social changes at the end of the eighteenth century, particularly the French Revolution, prompted a new breed of writing now known as Romanticism. It was in France, not Britain, where all political events changed the way British people thought (Kinsella 614). The French Revolution had an important influence on the writing of the Romantic period, inspiring writers to address themes of democracy and human rights and to consider the function of revolution as a form of change. In the beginning, the French Revolution was supported by writers because of the opportunities it seemed to offer for political and social change. This chaos led to France declaring war against Austria and Prussia, which created an invasion of troops from those countries. It was during this time that a radical group called Jacobins gained control of the French legislative assembly. They abolished monarchy and declared the nation a republic. Many prisoners were killed by the mob in what became known as the “September massacres“. Few weeks after, Louis XVI was convicted on a charge of treason and sent to the guillotine. Thus began the reign of terror led by Maximilien de Robes Pierre (615). Because the September massacres and the reign of terror were so shocking, many supporters of the French Revolution suddenly turned against it (616).

William Blake was a revolutionary poet of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, whose poem “The Chimney Sweeper” was a striking representation of life in England in the late 1700s.

Blake expressed his poem “The Chimney Sweeper” in first person. This gave his poetic voice creditability because the subject of the poem was chimney sweepers. In addition, using first person created a deeper sense of sympathy in the reader. This young boy, the poetic voice, lost his mother while “he was very young” (L.1 643). Soon after the loss of his mother “his father sold him while yet his tongue/ Could scarcely cry weep weep weep” (Ll.3-4). Blake used images for innocence in the second stanza to describe Tom Dacre. His hair "curl'd like a lamb's back" and was "white" (Ll.6-8). The dream that Tom had in stanza three showed how awful chimney sweeping was. He saw the sweepers "lock'd up in coffins of black" (L.12). The main theme of this poem was lost childhood innocence. This poem dealed with the abusive treatment of children when they were sold by their parents to work in dangerous conditions as chimney sweepers .

In his poem “ The World Is Too Much with Us,” Wordsworth sought to break the pattern of artificial situations of eighteenth-century poetry, which had been written for the upper classes, and to write in simple, straightforward language for the common man. In it, Wordsworth criticized the modern world for being absorbed in materialism and distancing itself from nature. The title and first line "The world is too much with us", expressed Wordsworth's belief that his contemporaries were too absorbed in material things. The material world, he suggested, is always uppermost in humanity’s mind, crowding out their love of the finer things, especially nature (Ll.2-3 675). Humanity is preoccupied with “getting and spending,” it does not appreciate the beautiful sea, which “bares her bosom to the moon”,