1. ROMANTICISM:
THE HEART OVER THE HEAD

2. ROMANTIC BELIEFS: INTUITION
Reason, logic, and rationality have shortcomings
They have their place, but they are limited
Imagination, intuition, and emotion can discover deeper, abstract, more significant spiritual truths than reason can discover
Intuition: gut feeling; instinct
i.e.: Heaven; God; Beauty
Idealism: Allegory of the Cave: Plato

3. ROMANTIC VIEW OF GOD Not anthropomorphic: didn’t see God as a person
God is good, loving, merciful and created the universe and us as good
God is a spirit, a presence, a being that pervades all
As such, God can be discovered by anyone at any time through intuitive insight, usually in Nature away from the noise and distractions of society
Greatest good is to become one with God; to lose the self and merge with the Divine.
Very Eastern Idea: Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism
Didn’t care much for organized religion; no need for the Bible, for a minister, for a Church to discover and worship God

4. ROMANTIC BELIEFS: NATURE
Nature is good, pure, and innocent
Civilization is bad and the source of evil
Civilization takes man out of his natural, good state and corrupts him
The more sophisticated and complex our world is, the more disconnected from our natural, good state we become
“Noble Savage”
God, the Divine, is found in Nature
You discover God in Nature intuitively

5. ROMANTIC BELIEFS: TRUTH
Beauty is truth
It is recognized intuitively, from the heart, not rationally through the brain
Truth is located in a “transcendent” reality that is beyond the physical world that can only be discovered through emotion, imagination, intuition
Truth often comes in spontaneous moments of insight: epiphanies
Truth is often found through insights gained in Nature

6. ROMANTIC BELIEFS: THE INDIVIDUAL
Human nature is good and we are born good and pure; society and its forces corrupt
Individual is more important than society
Society usually is in conflict with the individual, restricting his/her independence, uniqueness, and power
Trust your self; YOU are the source of truth since the Divine is found within you
No need to give authority of your life to anyone else: you know best what to do

7. ROMANTIC VALUES Imagination; NOT logic
Intuition; NOT carefully reasoned thought
Spontaneity; NOT careful prudence and
Emotion; NOT detached, dry analysis
The Individual’s power; NOT mindless allegiance to the rules of society
Exploration: of Nature, of the mind, of the far away and distant, of the exotic and extreme
Deeper spiritual truths; NOT logical ones

8. ROMANTIC VALUES
Youthful exuberance and energy over conservative, prudent, thoughtful experience
A nostalgia for the past
The raw, the natural, the unsophisticated over the polished, the refined, the carefully planned

9. THE THREE BRANCHES OF ROMANTICISM

10. DARK ROMANTICS: POE, MELVILLE, AND HAWTHORNE
How they differ from the other branches:
Not optimistic about life, human nature, or nature
The truths they discover beyond the rational are horrific, frightening, and painful
The emotions they tend to emphasize are fear, dread, disgust, etc
How they are similar to the other branches:
They do believe in deeper, irrational truths
Emphasis on imagination and emotion

11. GOTHIC ELEMENTS
The bizarre: live burial; whales that carry a grudge; insanity
The exotic: castles, faraway places, the dreary and the dark
The supernatural: vampires; creating monsters
Classic Examples:
Dracula
Frankenstein
Anything by Poe

12. ROMANTIC LITERATURE
Poetry: imitative of British: Bryant, Longfellow, Holmes
Essays: new unique ideas: Thoreau, Emerson
Short Stories: become a legitimate gnere: Poe, Hawthorne
Adventure Novels: idealizes Nature and frontier life: Cooper

13. OVERALL SIGNIFICANCE
America’s literary, intellectual, cultural “Declaration of Independence”
Now producing unique, authoritative, timeless ideas and literature for the first time
The final escape from British influences other that the political: no more imitating British forms and ideas
We have matured and gained confidence to do our own thing as proven by the great American Romantics