Romantic Timeline Lecture Notes

Romanticism: a movement in the arts and literature that originated in the late 18th and 19th century, emphasizing inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual

1. Timeline overview
1. 1850-1920
2. Ends in 1920 because of the post-war era
3. Before the Romantic, we have the Classical era
4. What is going on at the same time in music?
1. Nationalism
2. Development of American music

1. Modernism come next
1. Ideas of the time
1. Reaction to the new social norms of the Industrial revolution
2. Reaction against the ideas of the Age of Enlightenment and against the scientific rationalization of Nature
3. The Expression of emotions is the preeminent ideal of all romantic composers and literary figures
4. Searching for completeness and coherence in a quickly shifting world
5. Student Revolutions in France
6. At the very end of it, the Great War, WW I
2. Romanticism
1. Literature
1. E.T.A. Hoffman’s tales of heroism and idealized stories from the medieval era combined with his fascination with magic and sorcery
2. Art
1. Liberty Leading the People by Eugene Delacroix
3. Philosophy
1. Idealized the heroic individual
2. Morals come from within, from the human soul
3. History is seen as being shaped by a Zeitgeist
4. Henry David Thoreau -
1. American philosopher and naturalist who emphasized the role of Nature and the importance of the individual
5. Immanuel Kant
1. German philosopher who argued that all moral direction and experiences are shaped by the rationalizations of the subjective human mind