Critical analysis of Jane Eyre

   

Charlotte Bronte first successful novel like many other authors and poets wrote the book based on personal experiences. Bronte had a tragic life and mostly she was based in churches, so we can clearly see from where the biblical reference in the novel originated. Jane Eyre depicts the strict, hierarchical class system in England that required everyone to maintain carefully circumscribed class positions. Primarily through the character of Jane, it also accents the cracks in this system, the places where class differences were melding in Victorian England. The novel represented the typical women who had confidence, intelligent, courage and strong in heart and soul. Jane Eyre is not materialistic as other women in other novel. 

   

To start off with, the lead character is a very strong willed woman. She’s not beautiful and is keenly aware of the fact. She doesn't aspire to be the typical Victorian woman who cares about her looks. Bronte ties up the story nicely in quite a touching manner.  Jane’s lover Mr Rochester is not a handsome man and is almost ugly. Bronte’s characterization of the honest Jane Eyre, tortured Mr Rochester, and the tragically insane Bertha Mason continues to spur the imagination of readers. There is a good deal of depth of character in the main actors. The given time and setting in which the novel takes place; this must have been a pretty radical or practical characterization of the lead woman in a novel especially by a female author which itself must have been something out of the ordinary.

It is also instructive to see how children were treated in those days and how their guardians could legally ill treat them without any social backlash. Since Bronte worked in churches she was very familiar to these circumstances of the children.

The main theme of the book, and what could be seen in Jane’s character, is her open and unquestioning devotion to God and the “duties” which she’s supposed to follow. It’s interesting to see that even though Jane is not bound by societal norms, indeed having no relatives and no one whose opinion would affect her in the slightest, she is bound by the virtue of the Bible. One can guess in today’s world, that it would be very different with people everywhere publicly questioning the existence of God. But Jane and Charlotte Bronte takes the existence of God as an accuracy of the Bible as the highest truth. In several situations this prevents up from reaching out and taking the happiness that is offered to her and which has been missing in her life so far. At one stage, she totters on the brink of throwing her life away as an ill-suited missionary in India because she is persuaded to believe that it is her “duty to God”. One thing to keep in mind with biblical references is that they are open to interpretation and different people and religious sects will look at these differently. Light and darkness is often used throughout the novel. There is the theme of light in the beginning that light ends all darkness which symbolizes good versus evil. There is the light of God which represents God himself which leads people to him and the end of darkness. In this portion of the story, Jane appears to be lost and heading towards darkness as she is hungry, tired and on her own. It would almost appear to be a helpless situation. In this case, there is a light that somehow leads her to this house. Of all the places she could stop, she stops at a house that is willing to help her and take her in and an even greater coincidence that these turn out to be relatives.

Since its publication, "Jane Eyre" has become a staple source of English literature. The novel has inspired several films, as well as numerous literary sequels and prequels.

Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood

First let me start off with a small introduction of “ode”. An Ode is a type of lyrical verse. A classic ode is structured in three major parts: the strophe, the antistrophe, and the epode. Ode may be defined as “a rimmed lyric, often in form of an address; generally dignified or exalted verse, directed to a fixed purpose, and dealing progressively with dignified theme”. In this age Keats made ode famous through his works like “Ode to a Nightingale" and "Ode on a Grecian Urn”. Ode written by Keats reached the height of perfection and subjectivity. It was primarily under the influence of negative capability. Among them were William Worthsworth and Coleridge.

The poet William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850) in the ode Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood believes that every human being is a sojourner in the mortal world, whereas his real home being heaven. In fact, the poet starts with the major premise that men descend from God. To Wordsworth, God was everywhere manifest in the harmony of nature, and he felt deeply the kinship between nature and the soul of humankind. Indeed, Wordsworth thinks that the child is the mighty prophet, the blessed. But one does not say that ‘innocence’ is the monopoly of the child. It is his idea that when man or a child or an adult, has imagination at his command, he is in a state ‘innocence’. But Wordsworth excludes those who are far beyond their childhood. One can lay stress on imagination for this ode, whereas Wordsworth advocates the advantage of remaining a child.

Coleridge does not agree with Wordsworth on the point that a child is a natural philosopher – a phenomenon endowed with penetrating vision. Coleridge says unless one is well-read one cannot be a true philosopher. But whatever Coleridge may say, Wordsworth’s ‘ode’ asserts its claim to immortality. Poetry is, says Wordsworth, the most philosophical of all writings and this ‘ode’ amply confirms the validity of the observation. It Wordsworth is a poet, he has per-eminently a leaning to philosophy, and this is what makes the ‘ode’ a metaphysical composition about man’s withdrawal from Heaven with the bass age of time.  

To summarize the poem in short I’ll be taking some important lines from the ode. The speaker begins by declaring that there was a time when nature seemed mystical to him, like a dream, “apparelled in celestial light.” But now all of that is gone. No matter what he does, “The things which I have seen I now can see no more.”

In the second stanza the speaker says that even though he can still see the rainbow, the rose, the moon, and the sun, and even though they are still beautiful, something is different, something has been lost.The speaker is saddened by the birds singing and the lambs jumping in the third stanza. Soon, however, he resolves not to be depressed, because it will only put a damper on the beauty of the season. He declares that all of the earth is happy, and exhorts the shepherd boy to shout.

In the fourth stanza the speaker continues to be a part of the joy of the season.The fifth stanza contains arguably the most famous line of the poem: “Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting.” He goes on to say that as infants we have some memory of heaven, but as we grow we lose that connection: “Heaven lies about us in our infancy!” As children this connection with heaven causes us to experience nature’s glory more clearly. Once we are grown, the connection is lost. In the sixth stanza, the speaker says that as soon as we get to earth, everything conspires to help us forget the place we came from: heaven. “Forget the glories he hath known, and that imperial palace whence he came.”

In the seventh stanza the speaker sees (or imagines) a six-year-old boy, and foresees the rest of his life. He says that the child will learn from his experiences, but that he will spend most of his effort on imitation. It seems to the speaker that his whole life will essentially be “endless imitation.” In the eighth stanza the speaker speaks directly to the child, calling him a philosopher. The speaker cannot understand why the child, who is so close to heaven in his youth, would rush to grow into an adult. In the ninth stanza (which is the longest at 38 lines) the speaker experiences a flood of joy when he realizes that through memory he will always be able to connect to his childhood, and through his childhood to nature.

In the tenth stanza the speaker harkens back to the beginning of the poem, asking the same creatures that earlier made him sad with their sounds to sing out.Even though he admits that he has lost some of the glory of nature as he has grown out of childhood, he is comforted by the knowledge that he can rely on his memory. In the final stanza the speaker says that nature is still the stem of everything is his life, bringing him insight, fuelling his memories and his belief that his soul is immortal.

“Ode; Intimations of Immortality” is a long and rather complicated poem about Wordsworth’s connection to nature and his struggle to understand humanity’s failure to recognize the value of the natural world. The poem is elegiac in that it is about the regret of loss. Wordsworth is saddened by the fact that time has stripped away much of nature’s glory; depriving him of the wild spontaneity he exhibited as a child.

As seen in “The world is too much with us,” Wordsworth believes that the loss stems from being too caught up in material possessions. As we grow up, we spend more and more time trying to figure out how to attain wealth, all the while becoming more and more distanced from nature. The poem is characterized by a strange sense of duality. Even though the world around the speaker is beautiful, peaceful, and serene, he is sad and angry because of what he (and humanity) has lost. Because nature is a kind of religion to Wordsworth, he knows that it is wrong to be depressed in nature’s midst and pulls himself out of his depression for as long as he can.

In the seventh stanza especially, Wordsworth examines the transitory state of childhood. He is pained to see a child’s close proximity to nature being replaced by a foolish acting game in which the child pretends to be an adult before he actually is. Instead, Wordsworth wants the child to hold onto the glory of nature that only a person in the flush of youth can appreciate.

In the ninth, tenth and eleventh stanzas Wordsworth manages to reconcile the emotions and questions he has explored throughout the poem. He realizes that even though he has lost his awareness of the glory of nature, he had it once, and can still remember it. The memory of nature’s glory will have to be enough to sustain him, and he ultimately decides that it is. Anything that we have, for however short a time, can never be taken away completely, because it will forever be held in our memory.

Form

Wordsworth’s Immortality Ode, as it is often called, is written in eleven variable ode stanzas with variable rhyme schemes, in iambic lines with anything from two to five stressed syllables. The rhymes occasionally alternate lines, occasionally fall in couplets, and occasionally occur within a single line.

John Keats and Ode to Grecian

                             

John Keats’ “Ode on a Grecian Urn, is a ode where the author is speaking about and describing the images depicted on a Grecian Urn. Both the tone and language of the ode suggest the writer of this work to be somewhat envious of the images before him, which makes sense once learning about Keats and what he was going through during the time he comprised this poem. Therefore, with extensive knowledge of Keats’ personal life, it would be reasonable to conclude that he wrote this poem under the influence of his personal life and own experiences. This paper is going to explore “Ode on a Grecian Urn” by reviewing Keats’ background to help make connections to the poem itself, as well as look at the poems language and identify the meaning behind the particular words chosen.

Author’s own experiences influencing text, and for this particular poem one can believe reviewing the author’s background to be necessary. Obviously, if someone has come across any of Keats’ work before, they would know many of them centered on death and despair, particularly because of the incurable tuberculosis which he was suffering from. It is much easier to see Keats’ implications in other works, when he writes about the fear he has of parting this earth and then being forgotten. However, in “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, the implications are far more subtle, and an examining of the text is necessary in order to determine what Keats is indicating.

Each of the stanzas of the poem describes a specific picture that is part of the Urn which is totally related to his life. For example in the beginning of the poem in the second and third stanza the author describes two young lovers laying beneath a tree, a young man playing a pipe and a young woman with him. He tells the young man, that because the piper’s music is not mortal, it is more beautiful. He continues that although the lovers cannot share a kiss the piper should be happy because of the fact that the woman’s beauty will never fade like that of a mortal.

Like most poems, “Ode on a Grecian Urn” contains many forms of figurative language including alliteration and personification. Keats’ poem is broken up into five stanzas, each one describing a different scene on the urn.

Researching Keats’ life prior to analysing the poem made it easier to understand, and therefore a more enjoyable read, and gave the poem new meaning. Also, because this poem incorporates the usual characteristics found in typical poetry, it is a great poem to use to practice those poetic elements as well. The Grecian Urn and the images sculpted on it is a symbolic representation of something Keats will never achieve because of his condition, static immobility and immortality. Keats then comprised this poem when fantasizing of a false reality, while his true feelings reflect sorrow and regret. Therefore, until the reader has a sufficient amount of knowledge regarding Keats and his life, they cannot fully appreciate it in the manner that it was intended. For Keats, death was a relevant factor; death was coming for him. There are so many things in this world that he has yet to achieve, yet to see, because of this on setting illness. The Urn does not age and does not die. In the imaginary life of the Grecian Urn life is still, and does not end. Ultimately, there are strong implications that “Ode on a Grecian Urn” was a reflection of the author John Keats’ attitude towards his thoughts on his own death. If the reader of this poem is made aware of Keats’ ordeal involving his fatal illness it is much easier to see beyond the poem itself and understand where his jealousy of these characters on the Urn and longing to be like them is coming from. Once the reader is knowledgeable of Keats and his life, the vivid depictions used in this poem can be better examined along with the figurative language used such as alliteration, metaphor and overall makeup of the poem in order to explicate it properly. This in affect will help the reader envision the Grecian Urn and enhance the reader’s interest and apprehension of the poem.  

Great Expectations Theme Analysis

                 

If you think that a piece of literature as great as Dickens’ Great Expectations is sure to have many themes, then you are indeed correct. Great Expectations explores many of the universal fundamental ideas that remain an inquisitive mystery to us. Even the themes shown in different analysis or criticism will be different which is because everyone has different thoughts and angles of viewing a particular work. Dickens has chosen the life of Pip to show us the mixture of the different acquaintances and experiences that influence him in his ambitions. For introduction let me start off with a small narration of Great Expectation’s story outline. Great Expectations is a coming of age story that revolves around the life of one man Pip.  From the time he was seven years old until he was in his mid-thirties, Pip shows us the important events in his life that shaped who he became.  Along the way, he acquires different acquaintances and friends with different characters that influence him in his decisions and goals for his life.

The story has one main stream point with which the story is based on: no matter what happens to a person in their life, a person cannot change who they are inside.  Pip does not realize this at first however from the time he met Estella and Miss Havisham, Pip tried to change himself that he thought they desired.  He began simply, learning to read and write.  As time went on, and his circumstances changed, Pip pulled farther and farther away from where he came from and in doing that, who he was.  Through his story, people see that this type of change brings him no joy, and in Pip's case, exactly the opposite.

Pip's story is not about living happily ever after with Estella.  Dickens never tells us what happens, if anything, between them in the end.  He leaves it only that they remain friends.  There is a purpose for this.  Dickens novel is about Pip's quest for Estella's love and what he is willing to do to gain it.  The story is never about the love itself.  We can see this because in the majority of the story, Estella is only present in Pip's heart and thoughts.  The actual interaction between the characters Dickens keeps at a minimum.

Great Expectations is a story that the public can relate to because at some point, everyone goes through the struggles that Pip must battle.  It shows that possessions and wealth do not change who people are inside, and that finding one's self can be a long tedious process until finally the mists rise and everything becomes clear. So some of the main themes that can be found in many criticism, analysis, etc.  are:

We Are Who We Are

Great Expectations has one fundamental point stating that no matter what, a person cannot change who they are. The character of Pip demonstrates this theme throughout the events of his life. Pip is a very ambitious young man who tries to better himself at every opportunity he has both for himself but mainly to be worthy of his beloved Estella. He discards his job as a blacksmith to receive his fortune in London where he pursues an education and a job. Further on, he distances himself from all those who he once loved to become a wealthy gentleman. He pulls farther apart from where he came from and also who he once was. Through the life of Pip, Dickens demonstrates that one can find no happiness in changing who they are, and perhaps even the opposite.

Social Standings

Throughout the life of Pip, he is constantly exposed to characters that vary greatly in both characters and social class. Magwitch, Joe and Bitty are the low end while Miss Havisham, Compeyson and Drummle represent the high class. In the end, however, Pip realizes that one’s social standing has no correlation to their true characters. The lower class seems to be depicted as worse off, despite their honest and loyal qualities. Dickens’ portrays most of the characters with one without the other, showing a vivid contrast between the two and demonstrating which one of these two qualities are truly the most important.

The Process of Growing and Maturing

Great Expectations takes us through the life of Pip as a young child of seven years old to a man in his mid-thirties. This is a story that everyone can relate to because everyone has gone through the struggles of growing up and finding one’s self. Growing up is a universal experience where one crosses between childhood and adulthood and Dickens shows this by demonstrating the battles Pip fight to find his own values and morals. For Pip, he faced many difficulties in realizing who he was and one of the main ones was to part from those he loved and to achieve the goals he once thought were important. The novel ends with Pip perhaps not accomplishing his initial objectives but instead learning something much more valuable.

Suffering

Many of the characters in Great Expectation all face suffering in their lives at some point or another, making it an exceptionally important theme. It is depicted mainly by Pip as he tries to win over Estella’s love but finds it impossible, as she is “heartless”. Pip also causes both himself and Joe to suffer when he leaves Joe to pursue materialistic things that he once thought was more important. In this period of time, Joe never complains even though it is clear to him that Pip is ashamed and embarrassed of Joe, showing a silent but deadly sad type of suffering. Miss Havisham also suffers but mainly as a result of herself when she tries to take revenge on all men for Compeyson left her on their wedding day. Miss Havisham trains Estella to be her beautiful ward to “break men’s hearts” and practices this on poor Pip. Estella also suffers in a way, not because she cannot have what she wants but because she has been brought up in such a way that almost diminishes her as a human being. Lastly, Orlick suffers internally because of his secret jealousy of Pip and this also causes Mrs.Joe to suffer because he takes this out on her.

Parenthood

Dickens demonstrates very few positive parental figures in his novel, perhaps trying to demonstrate that parenting is a very important theme otherwise resulting in dysfunctional relationships later on in life. The best example of this is from the character of Estella where Miss Havisham has raised her in the most evil way possible, taking away her ability to feel and love. Pip’s parents are also lacking from the story although Joe seems to be a good father figure while Mrs. Joe does not seem very motherly. However, there does seem to be some good parenting as Matthew Pocket is depicted as both a good tutor and father to his son Herbert. In addition, we cannot forget about the loving way that Wemmick takes care of his father, the Aged Parent, as it shows how he might have been treated in previous years.

Revenge

Revenge is one of the major themes as without it, the character of Estella would not have been created, making the entire plot of the novel completely different or even non-existent. Miss Havisham raises Estella the way she does because she tries to take revenge on all men for being stood up. Compeyson and Magwitch have this never ending need for revenge until one of them finally dies. Dickens’ demonstrates that revenge only continues to harm oneself and others and can bring any real happiness.

Motivation to Better Oneself

This underlying theme is the reason behind this novel’s title of Great Expectations. It is Pip’s ambition’s for self-improvement that encourages most of the events in Pip’s life. Pip is very motivated and whenever he discovers something better than what he already has, he desires to obtain it and believes in his possibility for advancement. The will to believe in great expectations for oneself is extremely important, believing in ourselves and allowing ourselves to constantly improve for the better.

As I said at the start themes in a work can be numerous but there is always a main theme with which the whole work flows or  centralized, so in Great Expectations it would be “We are who we are”. 

Mary Shelly & Frankenstein’s themes

                      

Born in August 30, 1797, in London, England, Mary Shelley came from a rich literary heritage. She was the daughter of William Godwin, a political theorist, novelist, and publisher who introduced her to eminent intellectuals and encouraged her youthful efforts as a writer. One among them, Mary Wollstonecraft, a writer and early feminist thinker became very close with Mary.

In her childhood, Mary Shelley educated herself amongst her father's intellectual circle, which included critic William Hazlitt, essayist Charles Lamb and poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Another prominent intellectual in Godwin's circle was poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. Mary met Percy Shelley in 1812, when she was fifteen. Shelley was married at the time, but the two spent the summer of 1814 traveling together. A baby girl was born prematurely to the couple in February, 1815, and died twelve days later. In her journal of March 19, 1815, Mary recorded the following dream, a possible inspiration for Frankenstein: "Dream that my little baby came to life again - that it had only been cold & that we rubbed it before the fire & it lived." Later a son, William, was born to the couple in January, 1816.

Mary and Percy Shelley were married December 30, 1816, just weeks after Shelley's first wife, Harriet, drowned. Mary gave birth to another daughter, Clara, in 1817, but she only lived for a year.

Following the death of 3-year-old William, Mary suffered a nervous breakdown. Of the Shelley’s' children, only one, Percy Florence, survived past childhood. Further tragedy struck Mary, when her husband Percy Shelley drowned during a heavy storm in the Gulf of Spezia near Livorna.

Mary, only 25 years old and a widow, returned to England with her son, determined not to marry again. She devoted herself to her son's welfare and education, and continued her career as a professional writer. Shelley gave up writing long fiction when realism started to gain popularity, exemplified by the works of Charles Dickens.

Mary Shelley lived in England until her death from a brain tumour in Bournemouth. She was 54 years old.

In the summer of 1816, Percy Shelley and 19-year-old Mary visited the poet Lord Byron at his villa beside Lake Geneva in Switzerland. Stormy weather frequently forced them indoors, where they and Byron's other guests sometimes read from a volume of ghost stories. One evening, Byron challenged his guests to write one themselves. Mary's story became Frankenstein later.

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was published in 1818, when Mary was 21, and became a huge success. The first edition of the book had an unsigned preface by Percy Shelley. Many, disbelieving that a 19-year-old woman could have written such a horror story, thought that it was her husband’s novel.

Firstly, a short description of the novel Frankenstein: Victor Frankenstein experiences an idyllic childhood in Switzerland, surrounded by a loving family and accompanied by his adored cousin Elizabeth. After the death of his mother, his first unhappy experience, he attends University in Germany where he applies his new-found knowledge of science to manufacture a human being of enormous size and strength.

When his creation comes to life, Frankenstein is so horrified by his own bizarre accomplishment that he falls into a delirious illness which last months. Meanwhile, the creature flees into the woods and disappears.

Two years later, Frankenstein returns home upon learning that his brother has been mysteriously murdered. Justine, a friend of Frankenstein, is falsely convicted and executed.

Having been hated, rejected and feared by every human encountered, the creature considers all of humanity to be his enemy. He demands that Frankenstein create a female companion for him so that he will not be lonely, and promises that with his companion he will flee to a remote corner of South America and never come into contact with humans again.

Frankenstein cannot forgive the creature for the death of his brother and Justine; he refuses to build the female companion. In desperation and rage, the creature promises to make his creator as miserable as himself. In his vengeance, the creature murders Frankenstein's friends and family one by one, including his beloved cousin Elizabeth who he married.

When the creator and his creature are at last equally alone and family-less, Frankenstein seeks his own revenge and pursues his enemy into the Arctic northern wastes where together they meet their climatic fate. Another main character, Robert Walton is only seen in glimpses throughout the novel sending the letters to his sister about his experience. He's on this expedition with a ship because he wants to do new things and discover different places. He is far from friendly, complains of loneliness, wishes for a 'male' friend, many believe that he was homosexual, maybe that's one of the reasons he wants to be away from England (theme of gender and discrimination take place here). From the novel’s description one can clearly say that, the main theme revolving around the story was loneliness. All the three main characters suffer loneliness and they desire to be with someone. 

Emotional isolation in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is the most significant and prevailing theme throughout the entire novel. This theme of loneliness originates from Shelley's personal life and problems with her husband and father, which carry over into the novel and make it more realistic. During the time Shelley was writing Frankenstein, she was experiencing the emotional pangs of her new-born’s death and her half-sister's suicide. These events undoubtedly affected the novel's course and perhaps are a reflection of the person who was really lonely - Shelley herself. Referring her past personal experiences in the characters of Robert Walton, the Creature, and Victor Frankenstein, Shelley takes her readers on a tumultuous journey that shows how loneliness can end in catastrophe.

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Robert Walton is the first character introduced that is lonely.   “I desire the company of a man who could sympathize with me, whose eyes would reply to mine.”    Walton tries to mend his loneliness by writing letters to his sister, but it is just not enough.   Communicating by reading and writing letters is just not as good as communicating with a person to face. Another way Shelley created the feeling of loneliness is the setting.   No place on earth is more desolate and abandoned then the North Pole.   Walton’s loneliness indirectly fuels his passion to pursue the passage to the North Pole, no matter how many lives he must risk to do it.   The friendship that forms with Walton and Victor ultimately saves the lives of the crew and Walton himself.

There are also several other themes that seem to run through Shelley's Frankenstein. The most widely heralded theme is the idea that ignorance is bliss. In Shelley's time, the power of human reason, through science and technology, challenged many traditional precepts about the world and man's relationship with his creator. Yet at the same time, many questioned these humanist notions, stressing the limits of human capacity. Shelley details this theme in her book, making an allusion to the counter-humanist idea in chapters. Indeed, to Shelley and many others of her time, some riddles of nature should never be discovered by man. Even the alternate title, The Modern Prometheus, undeniably relates this point. Prometheus, a figure in Greek mythology, took fire from the gods in order to give it to man and consequently suffered eternal punishment. Clearly, Victor Frankenstein is this modern Prometheus-in a way, he stole the idea of creation from God and used it for his own ill-advised purposes.

A second theme stresses the idea of human injustice towards outsiders. Throughout his narrative, the monster laments over man's cruelty to those who are different. Indeed, Frankenstein's monster is an outcast-he doesn't belong in human society. Yet the monster's alienation from society, his unfulfilled desire for a companion with whom to share his life, and his on-going struggle for revenge, are all shared by his creator. As the story develops, Victor becomes increasingly like his creation. Both live in isolation from society, both hate their own miserable lives, and both know suffering. Shelley, through this theme, paints a very bleak portrait of man and his relationship with outsiders, as well as the cruel vengeance of society.

A third theme, directs society for its sexist viewpoints. Throughout his narrative, Victor portrays women as weak, suffering, subservient beings who live for and depend on the men in their lives. Surely Shelley experienced this in her own life, though she may or may not have agreed with it. Ironically, the monster-the one who Victor calls a barbarian-has a very progressive notion of the opposite sex. He believes that men and women are largely equal, not being brought up in Frankenstein's pre-feminist culture. The monster's desire for a female companion does not convey a desire to rule over a woman or a belief that a woman should be dependent on him, but it simply shows his need for an equal companion with whom to share his sufferings.

Literature in Romantic period

                       

History:

The period which started with the French Revolution or the publication of lyrical ballads is known as the Romantic Movement; some says “liberalism in literature” where one can freely express their imagination. Lord Byron called it the age of oddities. Certainly, I think, that is a good way to look at the British Romantic Period. Besides Byron, the other primary writers of the time are William Blake, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Wordsworth, Sir Walter Scott, Robert Southey, Charles Lamb, Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, John Keats, William Godwin, Lee Hunt, Jane Austen and many others. The five pillars of romantic period were Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelly and Keats whose poems always had spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings with imagination. This was the period when new waves of dramas, poems, poetic dramas which can be read and enjoyed by the reader came.

The romantic age, if we could put it together, we can call it the age of transition. A lot of political unrest, a lot of radical ideas are being thought about and expressed, and of course, wars are happening. There's a focus on the foreign, the exotic, on being frivolous, and, of course, that comes down from the leadership in England. The poets see this as an opportunity for a new order; for a new way to express ideas, and certainly, the Romantic period does reflect those ideas.

Novelists of the Romantic Age:

The great novelists of the Romantic period are Jane Austen and Scott, but before them there appeared some novelists who came under the spell of medievalism and wrote novels of ‘terror’ or the ‘Gothic novels’. The origin of this type of fiction can be ascribed to Horace Walpole’s “The Castle of Otranto”. There were a number of imitators of such a type of novel during the eighteenth century as well as in the Romantic period for example Frankenstein written by Mary Shelly. Jane Austin’s works like Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park and Emma or The Great Expectations by Charles Dickens were the biggest romantic novels from this age.

Theory of Poetry:

Poetry had the most important change in literature from common sense to expression of imagination overflowing with imagination in this period. One can say “Poetry is the thought and the words in which emotion spontaneously embodies itself”. As for Wordsworth he says “all good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings,” to this statement, however Wordsworth has added that, “It takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquillity”. At first glance, these two are quite opposite to each other, the one coming on a sudden, and the other deliberately called to memory, but Wordsworth makes no difference between two and tries to explain one by the other. For Wordsworth, a poet writes only when he is inspired because only then his ideas spontaneously flow out of his mind and he creates poetry of high order. According to Wordsworth, deep emotion is the basic condition of poetry that can be written on any subject which is of human interest; this stress on spontaneity is clear disavowal of neo-classical tents. Wordsworth theory of poetry can hardly be over-estimated or over-praised, thus through the breathless efforts, Wordsworth gives a new trend to poetry, which was in 18^th century considered as “a hopeless product of intelligence playing upon the surface of life”. Wordsworth’s definitions of poetry, adds that poets are unique. He maintains that poetry is more philosophical than any other branch of knowledge. He likes the poet to a prophet who is endowed with a greater knowledge of life and nature.

Woman writers of the Age:

Aphra Ben was the first English woman who earned through her pen and the most inventive and versatile authors of the restoration age, wrote poems and 15 successful plays. It was during this period that woman assumed for the first time, an important place in English literature, the most important ones were Jane Austin and Anne Radcliffe.

Lyrical Ballads:

Wordsworth’s Preface to the Lyrical Ballads declares the dawn of English Romantic Movement. Wordsworth and Coleridge, with the publication of the Lyrical Ballads, break away with the neo-classical tendencies in poetry. As the reading people are not familiar with his new type of poetry, Wordsworth puts forward a preface to this book. In this preface, he tells us about the form and contents of this new type of poetry. Wordsworth, in the beginning, states the necessity of bringing about a revolution in the realm of poetry as the Augustan poetry has become cliché. He painfully notices that the Eighteenth century poets have separated poetry from the grasp of common people. He resolves to liberate this poetry from the shackles of so- called classical doctrines. He, in collaboration with his friend Coleridge, begins to write poem for the people of all classes. Wordsworth thinks that the language of the Augustan poetry is highly artificial and sophisticated. That is why he suggests a new language for Romantic poetry. This is why he suggests a new language for Romantic poetry. This is why he suggests a new language for Romantic poetry. These attempt chiefly deals with Wordsworth’s views of poetry. T. S. Eliot, in his The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism, objects to Wordsworth’s view. Eliot tells that a poet should not imitate the language of a particular class because he ought to have a language of his own. Eliot’s view gains ground as Wordsworth in his later poems, fails to use his prescribed language.

Wordsworth rejection of classical doctrines leads to the creation of a new type of poetry which prefers him emotions to reason. As a result a group of talented poet’s has emerged in the province of English poetry. At the same time, he has contributed to the field of literary criticism. If Blake is considered to be the precursor of romantic poetry, Wordsworth and Coleridge are the two early exponents of romantic poetry. And it is wise of Wordsworth to form a ground for this new poetry through the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads.

Ode:

Ode is a type of lyrical verse. A classic ode is structured in three major parts: the strophe, the antistrophe, and the epode. Ode may be defined as “a rimmed lyric, often in form of an address; generally dignified or exalted verse, directed to a fixed purpose, and dealing progressively with dignified theme”. In this age Keats made ode famous through his works like “Ode to a Nightingale" and "Ode on a Grecian Urn”. Ode written by Keats reached the height of perfection and subjectivity. It was primarily under the influence of negative capability. He wanted to attain that perfection in negative capability which Shakespeare had achieved in his dramas. 

Wordsworth and Romanticism: (First generation poet)

Wordsworth's poetry reflects upon the many exciting changes that occurred in society during his era and upon aspects of his own history. He lived in the country side, here Wordsworth experienced a time of intense exploration of the countryside, exploration which provided much of the inspiration for his poetry for example The Nutting and The Prelude. First he began to write poetry and read for pleasure. Through his poetry he attempted to combine the knowledge he gained from books with the emotion and sensitivity to Nature he gained from his early life. Wordsworth lived in an exciting era for poetry, living through the American War of Independence, the French Revolution (of which he was at first strong supporter). Early in the 18th century poets looked to control Nature and sophistically manipulate language, however the excitement of the political revolutions inspired a poetic revolution.

Keats and Romanticism: (Second generation poet)

       Romantic poets, because of their theories of literature and life, were drawn to lyrical poetry; they even developed a new form of ode, often called the romantic meditative ode.  Keats often associated love and pain both in his life and in his poetry. Keats's imagery ranges among all our physical sensations: sight, hearing, taste, touch, smell, temperature, weight, pressure, hunger, thirst, sexuality, and movement. Keats repeatedly combines different senses in one image. Like all romantics, Keats loves nature and its varied charms .He has a vivid sense of colour, and he transfigures everything into beauty .Keats was famous for his odes, "Ode to a Nightingale" and "Ode on a Grecian Urn”. One can say that the typical movement of the romantic ode: The poet, unhappy with the real world, escapes or attempts to escape into the ideal. Disappointed in his mental flight, he returns to the real world. Usually he returns because human beings cannot live in the ideal or because he has not found what he was seeking. But the experience changes his understanding of his situation, of the world.

The brief span of Keats's life fell within, what is known as the age of Romantic age in English Literature. His poetry is a fine example of highly romantic poetry; in fact, it touched almost all the aspects of romantic poetry: love of beauty, love of nature, love of the past, supernaturalism, glow of emotion, and last but not the least in importance, the revealing power of imagination.

Finally one can say that the romantic age made man to imagine with his feelings, thus resulting in making of many poets and authors who gave many famous works of this genre. Even in modern times we can see many authors who use their wild imagination to describe their love, nature, dreams, etc.