5H Lit - Romanticism

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• havo
• Leerjaar 5

The Romantic Period

• Historical context
• A poem about daffodils?
• Jane Austen, a Romantic author
• My Last Duchess

What are the main themes
of Romantic literature?

Historical context

Late 18th / early 19th century: great changes!

• Society: industrial cities; poverty among workers
  
• Nature: large-scale environmental pollution
  
• Great wealth vs great poverty
  

Romantic period

Very different from Age of Reason!

Romantic > "romance" > story of adventure + imagination

Main themes

• the beauty and value of nature 
  
• idealization of the countryside and country people 
  
• the (idealized) past 
  
• distant and exotic cultures 
  
• children (innocent, not yet corrupted by the world) 
  
• the supernatural
  

William Wordsworth

1770 - 1850 

The Lake District

Lyrical Ballads

• Tried to bring poetry withing reach of ordinary people
  
• Used normal, everyday language
  
• Subjects were simple, uneducated country folk
  

I Wandered Lonely ... 1

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. 

I Wandered Lonely ... 2

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

I Wandered Lonely ... 3

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought: 

I Wandered Lonely ... 4

For oft, when on my couch I lie  

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

Assigment

- Go to reader&workbook 

p. 14-15

- Do assignment 6.1

Jane Austen

1775-1817

• Focused on practical social issues
  
• Importance of love and common sese
  
• Elegant style with wit and humour
  

Pride and Prejudice / Sense and Sensibility /Emma

Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett

My Last Duchess

Poem by Robert Browning (1812-1889)

Best known for his dramatic monologues

Read the poem (p. 17-18) and do 

assignment 7 (p. 18-19)

What are the main themes
of Romantic literature?

Homework

Watch Pride & Prejudice and do assign. 6 (p. 16)