The Romantic Movement and
Romantic Literature
浪漫運動 與 浪漫文學
董崇選
中山醫大應用外語系 教授
「懂更懂 學習英文網站」負責人
網址：http://dgdel.nchu.edu.tw
I. What is “romantic”?
– F. L. Lucas: 11, 396 definitions.
(Decline and Fall of the Romantic Ideal)
– Jacques Barzun: attractive, bombastic,
conservative, emotional, exuberant,
fanciful, formless, futile, heroic, irrational,
materialistic, mysterious, Nordic, ornamental,
realistic, stupid, unreal, and unselfish.
+ adventurous, daring, extraordinary, gallant,
melodramatic, passionate, and wild.
(Classic, Romantic and Modern)
I. What is “romantic”?
– A. O. Lovejoy: It means so many
things that, by itself, it means nothing
at all. He suggested using
“romanticisms.”
(On the Discrimination of Romanticisms)
– Walter Raleigh & Arthur QuillerCouch suggested abandoning the
terms “romantic” and “classic.”
II. The Romantic Movement
浪漫運動
A. Its spheres: 範圍
in literature, art, music,
philosophy, religion,
politics, education,
architecture, gardening,
landscape,etc.
II. The Romantic Movement
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B. Its characteristics: 特徵
The use of autobiographical material.用自傳性材料
An exaltation of the primitive and the common.
喜原始與平常
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An appreciation of external nature, esp.,
untamed disorderly scenery. 要野性自然
An interest in the remote, esp., the medieval.
好遠古
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A predilection for melancholy. 喜憂傷
B. Its characteristics:
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A preoccupation with death and decay.講死亡腐朽
A tendency towards pantheism, animism,
mysticism, transcendentalism. 傾向 泛神論、有靈論、
神秘論、超越論
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Love of freedom & hate for restraint. 好自由
A rebellious or revolting spirit & a revolutionary
attitude. 反叛與革命精神
A belief in the natural goodness of man. 性善論
A fondness of the extraordinary, the Gothic, the
supernatural. 愛非凡、怪異、超自然
B. Its characteristics:
• A view of the individual as the center. 講個人
• An emphasis on emotions, feelings, sentiment or
passion. 重情緒、情感、情懷、情愛
• The extolment of the imagination. 贊想像
• Valuing the expressive theory of art
(genius, soul, originality, spontaneity, sincerity,
loose open form, organic form, the fragmentary
and incomplete, experimental, etc.) 表現才華、心
靈、原創、自發、真誠、鬆開、有機、片斷、試驗 等
• Reacting against neo-classicism in numerous
aspects. 反 諸多新古典特徵
C. Its periods:
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England:
the pre-romantic period & the “Romantic Triumph”
(late 18th C.—1798—1832)
Germany: Early Romantics & High Romantics
(late 1790s—early 19th C.—middle 19th C.)
Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) 狂飆運動
France: after middle 19th C.
America: 1830-65
*H. J. C. Grierson:
1. the times of Euripides & Plato. 2. the 12th and 13th centuries when
chivalry was in vogue. (Classic and Romantic: A Point of View )
D. Its manifestos: 宣言
• Preface to Lyrical Ballads 《抒情歌謠》前言
by Wordsworth & Coleridge.
(1800, 1802) 平常話、平常事：自然
• Preface to Cromwell 《克隆威爾》前言
by Hugo. 不要規則，只要自然規律
(1827)
• Preface to Leaves of Grass 《草葉集》前言
by Whitman. 自我、自由
(1855)
E. Its major authors:
• England: Blake, Burns, Wordsworth,
Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, Keats, Scott,
Lamb, Hazlitt, De Quincey, etc.
• Germany: Goethe, Schlegel, Tieck,
Schelling, Novalis, HÖlderlin, Hoffmann,
Heine, etc.
• France: Rousseau, Lamartine, Nodier,
Chateaubriand, Madame de Staël, Hugo,
etc.
E. Its major authors:
America: Irving, Cooper, Hawthorne,
Melville, Poe, Longfellow, Whitman,
Thoreau, Emerson, etc.
Italy: Leopardi, Manzoni, Foscolo, etc.
Spain: Espronceda.
Poland: Slowacki. Hungary: PetrÖfi.
Denmark: Oehenschläger.
Russia: Pushkin, Lermontov.
III. Romantic Literature
A. Chief genres:
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Poetry: lyric (love lyric, reflective lyric, nature
lyric, lyric of morbid melancholy, etc.), the
ballad, ode, dirge, folk song, conversation
piece, vision, (supernatural) narrative poem,
etc.
Fiction: sentimental novel, historical novel,
Gothic novel, fairy tales, romance, etc.
Prose: familiar essay, confession,
autobiography, letters, etc.
B. Some famous works:
• England:
布雷克 ： Songs of Innocence and of Experience,
渥玆華斯： Lyrical Ballads, The Prelude, etc.
柯立基： The Ancient Mariner, Christabel,
拜倫： Don Juan, Manfred,etc.
雪萊： Prometheus Unbound, “Ode to the West
Wind,” etc.
濟慈： “Ode to the Nightingale,” Lamia, etc.
• Germany:
• 歌德：The Sorrows of Young Werther, Faust I, etc.
• 海涅：Book of Songs, etc.
• 霍夫曼：“A New Year’s Eve Adventure,” etc.
B. Some famous works:
• France:盧梭 Confessions, 沙妥布里昂Renè, 雨
果The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The
Miserable Ones, etc.
• America: 艾爾文 Rip van Winkle, The Legend of
Sleepy Hollow, 庫柏 The Leatherstocking Tales,
梅爾維爾 Moby Dick, 惠特曼 Leaves of Grass
(Song of Myself), 愛倫波 “The Raven,” The Fall
of the House of Usher, 愛默生 Nature, 梭羅
Walden, 霍桑 The Scarlet Letter, etc.
C. Some major subjects or themes:
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The man of feeling, the fatal woman.
The Noble Savage, the natural man.
Children, idiots, rustic people, borderers.
Wanderers, lonely figurers, social outcasts.
The metaphysical quester, supernatural
beings.
• Historical or mythological figurers.
C. Some major subjects or themes:
• Birds, beasts, flowers, plants.
• Moon, star, cloud, wind.
• River, fountain, lake, sea, waterfall.
• Rock, hill, vale, landscape.
• Seasons, evening, night, dawn.
C. Some major subjects or themes:
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Voyage, adventure, quest, tour.
Good past, bad present, nostalgia.
Love, aspiration, dream, vision.
Impulse, inspiration, imagination.
Soul, death, immortality.
Change, eternity, revolution.
Marriage, apocalypse.
D. Some typical heroes:
• Prometheus, Satan
• Werther, Renè
• Faust, Napoleon
• Don Juan, Eugene Onegin, Byron
• Natty Bumpo, Thoreau, Rousseau
IV. Questions to Be Considered
– What is the central idea of romanticism?
– Is there any purely romantic author, work,
culture, or period?
– How is romanticism related to neoclassicism, realism, symbolism, modernism,
postmodernism, etc.?
– Can we say the romantic movement is a
democratic revolution in art and literature?
– What are our Chinese representative
romantic authors and works?