AMERICAN ROMANTICISM

Enter imagination

SHIFT FROM CLASSICISM TO ROMANTICISM

C

lassicism = the belief that reason dominates nature and human

nature & both are ruled by fixed and unchanging laws

T

he United States came together as a nation during this period

(Classicism = roughly 1750-1850)

W

ell known Classicists:• Thomas Paine• Ben Franklin• Patrick Henry

ROMANTIC NON-ROMANTIC/CLASSICAL

Emotional                      

Reasonable and Practical

Individualistic                  Public Responsibility

Revolutionary Conservative

Loves Solitude & Nature

  Loves Public, Urban Life

Fantasy/Introspection External Reality The Particular The Universal

Subjective Perception Objective Science

Right Brain Left Brain

Satisfaction of Desire Desire Repressed

Organic Mechanical

Creative Energy/Power Form

Exotic Mundane

"Noble Savage"/Outcasts

Bourgeois Family

Idealist Philosophy Materialist/Empirical Philosophy

ROMANTIC NON-ROMANTIC/CLASSICAL

A PERIOD OF GREAT CULTURAL CHANGE

R

omanticism focused on emotions and the individual

W

riters in this time period (roughly 1830-1870) emphasized… • Intuition• Imagination• Human potential for social progress and spiritual

growth

T

he Humanitarian Reform was a mark of this time period

Well-known Romanticists

Edgar Allan Poe

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Walt Whitman

H

erman Melville

W

ashington Irving

H

arriet Beecher Stowe

H

enry Wadsworth Longfellow

CHARACTERISTIC SUBJECT: NATURE

N

ature: beauty, strangeness, & the mystery of nature• Washington Irving, author of “The Legend of Sleepy

Hollow” & “Rip Van Winkle,” explored nature through legend and folklore

• James Fennimore Cooper (1st major American novelist), author of Last of the Mohicans, explored nature on the frontier• He created the 1st national literary hero, Natty

Bumppo• Edgar Allan Poe explored nature in the depths of his

imagination

CHARACTERISTIC SUBJECT: THE PAST

T

he Past: rise in nationalism = interest in American past• Irving and Cooper deal with the past directly

• Irving uses legend and folklore as history• Cooper wrote about great historical events:

Revolution, Indian border wars, & the conquest of the wilderness

CHARACTERISTIC SUBJECT: INNER WORLD OF HUMAN

NATUREI

nner World of Human Nature: emotion, intuition,

individual, & exploration of the private inner being• William Cullen Bryant (poet) focuses in the

inward observations and psychological reactions of people to aspects of life

• Poe takes exploration of the inner self to great depths