Romanticism 1800-1860

1
Romanticism1800-1860
2
Historical Highlights

• Westward Expansion Louisiana Purchase (1803)
  area of America doubled
• Gold Rush (1849) Tens of thousands of Americans
  travelled west in search of gold.
• Education and Reform Many push for better
  conditions for the mentally ill, struggles
  started to abolish slavery, and improve womens
  rights

3
Characteristics of American Romanticism

• Values feeling and intuition over reason
• Places faith in inner experience and the power of
  the imagination.
• Shuns the artificiality of civilization and seeks
  unspoiled nature.
• Prefers youthful innocence to educated
  sophistication.

4
Characteristics of American Romanticism cont.

• Champions individual freedom and the worth of the
  individual.
• Reflects on natures beauty as a path to
  spiritual and moral development.
• Looks backward to the wisdom of the past and
  distrusts progress.

5
Characteristics cont

• Finds beauty and truth in exotic locales, the
  supernatural realm, and the inner world of
  imagination.
• Sees poetry as the highest expression of the
  imagination.
• Finds inspiration in myth, legend, and folklore.

6
Reaction against Neo Classicism
7
Romantic Paintings
8
Romantic Paintings
9
Transcendentalism

• Definition in determining the ultimate reality
  of God, the universe, the self and other
  important matters, one must transcend, or go
  beyond, everyday human experience in the physical
  world.
• Principles
• Everything in the world, including human beings,
  is a reflection of the Divine Soul.

10
Transcendentalism

• The physical facts of the natural world are a
  doorway to the spiritual or ideal world.
• People can use their intuition to behold Gods
  spirit revealed in nature or in their own souls.

11
Transcendentalism

• Self-reliance and individualism must outweigh
  external authority and blind conformity to custom
  and tradition.
• Spontaneous feelings and intuition are superior
  to rationality.

12
Romantic Paintings
13
Dark Romantics

• Many thought the ideas of the Transcendentalists
  were too optimistic.
• Hawthorne, Melville, Poe anti- Transcendentalists
• Like Trans, Dark Romantics valued intuition over
  reason and logic.
• But they didnt think nature was harmless.

14
Dark Romantics

• Explored conflicts between good and evil, guilt
  and sin.
• Explored the madness of the human psyche.
• Enjoyed the imaginative escape horror provided.

15
(No Transcript)
16
(No Transcript)