Prompt:
|
Throughout history, different intellectual and social movements have provided essential stepping-stones to new ways of thinking. Using the documents, discuss how the ideas of the Enlightenment influenced the Romantic Era.
|
Historical Setting:
|
Often referred to as the Romantic Era, during the 18th and 19th century, romanticism appeared as a western movement within the arts and society. Occurring in Europe, romanticism specifically affected visual arts, literature, music, philosophy, and everyday thought. A major aspect of romanticism is the idea of freeing the mind from the established and choosing the “natural” and “organic” over anything mechanical or fabricated. Romanticism is widely believed by scholars to be a response to the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment period stressed morality and knowledge, all the while harboring a need to take control and better society as a whole. Romanticism, on the other hand, focused on the individual man and freeing oneself from pre-set boundaries.
|
Documents:
Document 1: The Social Contract, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
|
A deep and sweet revery seizes your senses, and you lose yourself with a delicious drunkness in the immensity of this beautiful system with which you identify yourself. Then all particular objects fall away; you see nothing and feel nothing except in the whole...I never mediate or dream more delightfully then when I forget my self. I feel indescribable ecstasy, delirium in melting, as it were, into the system of beings, in identifying myself with the whole of nature.
|
Document 2: Thomas Gray, Poet
|
I am a sort of spider; and have little else to do but spin my web over again; or creep to some other place and spin there. Alas! for one has nothing to do but amuse himself; I believe that my amusements are as little musing as most folks. But no matter; it makes the hours pass, and is little better than [to pass one's life in ignorance and grossness].
|
Document 3: Samuel Taylor Coleridge
|
"A poem is that species of composition, which is opposed to works of science by having for its immediate object pleasure, 2 not truth; and from all other species- (having this object in common with it)- it is discriminated by proposing to itself such delight from the whole, as is compatible with a distinct gratification from each component part."
|
Document 4: John Keats
|
"Well, I compare my life to a large Mansion of Many Apartments, two of which I can only describe, the doors of the rest being as yet shut upon me. The first we step into we call the infant or thoughtless chamber, in which we remain as long as we do not think. We remain there a long while, and notwithstanding the doors of the second Chamber remain wide open, showing a bright appearance, we care not to hasten into it; but are at length imperceptibly impelled by the awakening of the thinking principle within us-- we no sooner get into the second chamber, which I shall call the Chamber of Maiden-- Thought, than we become intoxicated with the light and atmosphere, we see nothing by pleasant wonders, and think of delaying there forever in delight. However, among the effects this breathing is father of is that tremendous one of sharpening one's vision into the heart and nature of Man-- of convincing one's nerves that the world is full of Misery and Heartbreak, Pain, Sickness and oppression — whereby this Chamber of Maiden Thought becomes gradually darken'd on all sides.... Now if we live, we go on thinking, we too shall explore them."
|
Sample Essay
Starting in the Renaissance European intellectuals, philosophers, writers, etc. had progressed the framework by which ideas had moved in a more systematic and secular direction. The authority that ancient sources and the church once held over science and thought had begun to crumble. Movements like the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment had created a process by which thinkers attempted to discover universal laws based on observation and testing. These ideas laid the basis for modern intellectual thought. However, as a consequence of this progress later thinker would reject the Enlightenments emphasis on logic and reason, and instead insist that emotion and nature should guide human advancement. This new movement would be known as Romanticism due to its romancing of the past as better than the present. Although Romanticism did develop as a response to the harsh logic and reason of the Enlightenment, certain aspects of Romanticism owe their development to Enlightenment thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau and their ideas.
The roots of Romanticism can be found in the ideas of thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau. For example, in his book the Social Contract, Rousseau describes the joy he receives when thinking about how everything is somehow connected, and that being a part of nature is truly blissful. (Doc 1). Rousseau believed that in a state of nature man was truly free and can express himself without reservation. However, when people come in contact with society they lose this freedom and become chained to society. As Rousseau famously said, “man is born free, but is in chains everywhere.” Rousseau was critical of his contemporary Enlightenment intellectuals, fearing that they placed too much emphasis on logic and reason. This idea is echoed in the writing of John Keats who describes the process of thought from ignorance and superstition to enlightenment. (Doc 5) Keats writes that enlightenment is a good thing, however, if left unchecked it could end with a depressing view of the darker sides of society. As a Romantic poet Keats would have been predisposed to arguing against the enlightenment, but his argument is proof that the Enlightenment certainly helped shape romantic views of the world. The poet Thomas Gray also points out that even though it is only amusing to pass the time thinking, pursuing any thought is better than sitting in ignorance. (Doc 2) While many Romantics would have seen themselves as rebelling against the Enlightenment, their attempts continued the progress of intellectual thought.
The works of Eugene Delacroix and Samuel Taylor Coleridge are excellent examples of the Romantic Era. Both clearly broke from previous traditions to create new and unique works of art. However, they both still showed signs of being influenced by the Enlightenment. In his painting Liberty Leading the People, Eugene Delacroix captures a figurative scene from the revolutions that rocked France in the 1800’s. (Doc 5) Delacroix painted a number of works in support of the new French governments that developed during and after the French Revolution. Although the painting is a Romantic reimagining of the event, the event itself was only made possible by the ideas of the Enlightenment. Radical revolutionaries in France, like the Jacobins, wrapped themselves in the rhetoric of Enlightenment ideals. Delacroix then gave expression to these ideas as in his personification of Lady Liberty charging at the front leading people over the barricades. Delacroix also famously painted scenes upholding the ideals of the French revolution and its leaders, like his painting “The Death of Marat” in which he portraits Jean-Paul Marat stabbed to death in his bathtub. The poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge also shows the impact of Enlightenment thinking on Romanticism. In his quote from document 3 Coleridge describes what he sees as the purpose of poetry, that is gives one pleasure. However, in his description he uses enlightenment terminology like "species," almost as if he is giving a description of poetry for a dictionary. His clinical description of the joys of poetry again show just how much Romanticism owed to the ideas of the Enlightenment.
The roots of Romanticism can be found in the ideas of thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau. For example, in his book the Social Contract, Rousseau describes the joy he receives when thinking about how everything is somehow connected, and that being a part of nature is truly blissful. (Doc 1). Rousseau believed that in a state of nature man was truly free and can express himself without reservation. However, when people come in contact with society they lose this freedom and become chained to society. As Rousseau famously said, “man is born free, but is in chains everywhere.” Rousseau was critical of his contemporary Enlightenment intellectuals, fearing that they placed too much emphasis on logic and reason. This idea is echoed in the writing of John Keats who describes the process of thought from ignorance and superstition to enlightenment. (Doc 5) Keats writes that enlightenment is a good thing, however, if left unchecked it could end with a depressing view of the darker sides of society. As a Romantic poet Keats would have been predisposed to arguing against the enlightenment, but his argument is proof that the Enlightenment certainly helped shape romantic views of the world. The poet Thomas Gray also points out that even though it is only amusing to pass the time thinking, pursuing any thought is better than sitting in ignorance. (Doc 2) While many Romantics would have seen themselves as rebelling against the Enlightenment, their attempts continued the progress of intellectual thought.
The works of Eugene Delacroix and Samuel Taylor Coleridge are excellent examples of the Romantic Era. Both clearly broke from previous traditions to create new and unique works of art. However, they both still showed signs of being influenced by the Enlightenment. In his painting Liberty Leading the People, Eugene Delacroix captures a figurative scene from the revolutions that rocked France in the 1800’s. (Doc 5) Delacroix painted a number of works in support of the new French governments that developed during and after the French Revolution. Although the painting is a Romantic reimagining of the event, the event itself was only made possible by the ideas of the Enlightenment. Radical revolutionaries in France, like the Jacobins, wrapped themselves in the rhetoric of Enlightenment ideals. Delacroix then gave expression to these ideas as in his personification of Lady Liberty charging at the front leading people over the barricades. Delacroix also famously painted scenes upholding the ideals of the French revolution and its leaders, like his painting “The Death of Marat” in which he portraits Jean-Paul Marat stabbed to death in his bathtub. The poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge also shows the impact of Enlightenment thinking on Romanticism. In his quote from document 3 Coleridge describes what he sees as the purpose of poetry, that is gives one pleasure. However, in his description he uses enlightenment terminology like "species," almost as if he is giving a description of poetry for a dictionary. His clinical description of the joys of poetry again show just how much Romanticism owed to the ideas of the Enlightenment.