The development of a new sensibility at the end of
the eighteenth century as a reaction to the
rationalistic outlook of the Enlightment
The age of Classicism is followed by a
transitional period known as the Pre-Romantic
Age, which coincides with the last thirty years
of the eighteenth century.
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AUGUSTAN
 Importance of reason
and order
 Control of emotion
and imagination
 Society placed before
the individual
 Poetry seen as the
aesthetic expression
of social order
 Artificial language.
Poetic diction
 Classical themes
ROMANTIC
 Importance of feeling
and intuition
 Free play of imagination
Poetic vision
 More consideration
given to the poet’s
inner life
 Poetry seen as the
expression of the soul
 Language rich in
common words
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The main themes of Pre-romantic literature:
 a return to nature expressed through an
interest in the wild, the lonely, the desolate.
Nature was no more considered just as the
background of human actions, but as a living
force.
 the cult of sensibility and melancholy
leading to a love of ruins and graveyards.
graveyard poetry
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the cult of the primitive which involves a
sort of diffidence as regards civilization and a
longing for a lost earthly paradise
the myth of the noble savage by
Rousseau.
 a re-evaluation of the Middle Ages as an
epoch of high spiritual significance.
the Gothic
 interest in humble and everyday life.
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On the sublime
The sublime arises from
the feelings of fear and
horror created by what is
infinite and terrible.
Burke associated the
sublime with obscurity,
vastness, solitude
The gothic novel
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New Trends in Literature
 The Graveyard School : a group of poets who
set their poems in cemeteries, ruins.
Melancholy tone
Thomas Gray
 Ossianic Poetry : a cycle of poems by a
legendary Irish warrior (Ossian) who lived in
the third century. James Macpherson collected
and published some of his poems. Even if we
don’t know if he really existed, these verses
had great success all over Europe.
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Rural poetry: the augustan culture had
considered the city as the only place worth
living in. As a reaction to it, the preromantic re-evaluated the countryside and
the rural life
ROBERT BURNS

The Gothic Novel: its success
was due to the need to escape
from reality.
Main features:
 Ancient settings:castles,
abbeys, dungeons.

Complex plots with mysterious elements
 Great importance given to terror and horror.
The night as the most important setting
because darkness is a powerful element to
create an atmosphere of gloom and mistery
 Use of supernatural beings, like vampires,
monsters, ghosts and witches.
 Heroines dominated by strong passions and
fears
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