Cont. Romantic and Victorian Period

Romantic
Many poets did not mean love with the word romantic. The poets use the romantic meaning to exercise their thoughts. For example showing trust and showing our sense of will and identity. These poets meant more than love when writing in the romantic period. In reading an romantic poem you have to look deeper than love. I believe it’s something more deep within yourself.

Imagination and Nature
When reading poems from the Romantic period having imagination helps. Many poems have nature symbolizing feelings persons, ect. Most poems have imaginative experience as a very powerful or moving, meaning what you read may not mean what it seems. In Romantic poems imagination and nature can move the mind in mysterious ways.

Romantic Lyric
I see it as someone speaking aloud to themselves. Their imagination and emotions flow. The poets speak passionately from their hearts. Many call Romantic Lyric " True Voice". The poets create an artful illusion. The poets have be convincing in order to get their point across. This is based on the relationship between the mind and what the poet is relating to.

Thought
When reading on Romantic Poetry you have to read and think carefully about what you are reading. You have to think outside the box. Everything you read is not always what it seems. Poets were more of teachers of inspiration. These poems was a way for many poets to express themselves to others in a very expressive way.
The Victorian Period

History During this Time
During this time the Civil war was going on bring many families into starvation and pain over loosing family members. This was time that many men had to leave their families to go fight in the war no matter what the outcome. Many women had to leave their families to find jobs to support their homes leaving the children to their duty to take care of their land. This was time of hardship and pain for families. Many men did not come back home. Even after the ending of the Civil war families were still under pressure because of their lost ones.
In 1863 Abraham Lincoln Emancipation Proclamation declared slavery illegal. This was bad and good. This meant that African American’s were free. Many stayed because they were loyal to their master. Even yet many of the slaves moved from the south and migrated to the North to find jobs to try to support their families. Yet, Lincoln had abolished slavery many people did not agree and still hassled the African Americas. So it was still hard on the African Americans to make a life during this time.

The difference between Romantic and Victorian period was that the Romantic period was about allowing you imagination to flow. It was about thinking more outside of the box and allowing yourself to take control of you imagination. The Romantic Period was just not about that it was it was also about using nature to show how they felt. Many times they used certain colors to explain themselves. Any idea that the Romantic poet had they used it to their advantage to express themselves. The Victorian Period was more on the realistic point. Poets expressed any opinion that they had in poetry. At this time more people knew how to read so many would take advantage of this to prove a point to get more publicity. Also at this time the poets expressed many questions about political and materialist needs. Yet, each period expressed themselves greatly.


Authority
Many Victorians brought authority into their writing because of the Central Government trying to take control. With this authority poetry grew into more showing opinion about how the world was turning. This was change for the social order and the political world of the eighteenth century.


Intellectual
At this time many people were learning how to read and write. Over half of the population was able to express themselves in wording. This allowed poets to able to write more in depth because they had a bigger audience to please.


Opinions
During this time poets question the world. They used this to their advantage in their poetry. They question the exploiting earth and human comfort to achieve. Not only this but they question reality and the worlds unknown.


Skepticism and Denial
Many people at this time had a hard time believing any the things that surrounded them. In poetry, poets focus many of the non-believable infinite power and human existence. This was a major topic of the eighteenth century that poets used to their advantage.



To a Mouse by: Robert Burns
To summarize this poem I think that Burns was relating to Men that work very hard to labor their land and the mice would feed off their harvest. I believe that this upset the hard working men because they were not making a profit off their harvest; " Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!" These mice would take advantage of the hard work that the men pursued to make a living; An lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain For promis’d joy. That means to me that the mice brought them hard times but the mice could leap for joy from not starving. I see this as a good Romantic poetry because as he describes the way the men worked and how disappointed they were by the mice taking advantage of their harvest. You can feel the pain of how the men felt as they saw their hard work not pay off.


The Tiger by: William Blake
When I read this poem it makes me feel like I’m reading from someone’s point of view from fight. You can read by his descriptive words that this was fight ‘til death. Yet, this point of view was sad one. It seems as thought this person did not want this fight to continue by continually asking questions; Could twist the sinews of thy heart? It’s as though he saw the fight in secret; Did he smile his work to see? Last but least what really makes me think is the this; Dare frame thy fearful symmetry? ; This really makes me wonder if the person he saw was someone he knew and they were after him next. I see this as a good Romantic poetry because he uses the tiger ( an aggressive animal) as the person who is doing bodily harm to another. He uses parts of the body to describe his ways and harmful instruments which can be harmful.


She dwelt among the Untrodden Ways William Wordsworth
As I read this poem I see that she was among others that were not wanted in the town where she stayed; "She dwelt among the in untrodden ways". In a way it seems as though she did things that were not taken well by the town. It was as though she was an outcast by other except for one; "Fair as a star, when only one is shinning in the sky." This would be a good Romantic Poem because he never uses a name…. She was something more to him if you read in between the lines. He says that when she died it made all the difference to him; "But she is in her grave and oh, The difference to me!" I can imagine him writing in anger because the one that was not accepted by any that she knew of. It was him all along that had felt something strong.


The Destruction of Sennacherib by: George Gordon, Lord Byron
This was a poem of battle of death. It describes how came and died at the field. Their wives became widows and crying because they lost their husbands; "and the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail." It seems as though just one had survived the battle that had fought; "and there lay the rider distorted and pale" I assume that everyone passed except this one yet he lies on the cold ground with nothing to pursue forward to. So he lays there with his soldiers not knowing what to do. This poem is in fact a sad one no victory and no defeat. I see this is as good Romantic poem because of the way he used nature and his imagination as way to describe the way the battle field remained after this battle; "For the angle of death spread his wings on blast"; " And cold as spray of the rock-beating surf". By describing how the battle field looked with colors you know that it was gloomy and not a victorious time. This poet seems as though he used his imagination to take him back during the gruesome battle days.


Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelly
In this poem it seems as though a dead body lies and traveler came up on this horrible sight. In a way it seems as though this dead man had done something to Ozymandias and he punished him with death to warn others not to go down that path with him. The travelers seemed frighten by the actions of this King Ozymandias. This King Ozymandias has the attitude that this was his land and if walked upon you better beware; " My name in Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my work, ye mighty and despair" This poem is an example of Romantic poetry by the way Shelly used his words in very descriptive words to emphasize his meaning in the way the king was protective of his land. He wanted his respect because this was his land. As I read I can see the king’s angry face because the travelers have came onto his land not knowing that had trampled upon his land showing disrespect by not honoring him and his land.


On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer by John Keats
I’m guessing that this was man that traveled near and far and had never been to this Chapman. He heard many good things and he finally saw it for himself for the very first time. This was place that was unexplainable; "Yet I never breathe its pure screne". It’s as though this was heaven; "Then felt I like some watcher of the skies". This is a good example of Romantic Poetry because of the way the words are in order to describe how the man felt by being in a place of royalty.


Tears, Idle Tears by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
This is a poem about a woman that has lost someone she loved about. She is not sad nor upset it’s just apart of life in her mind. She thinks about the good things in life and the bad; "In looking on the happy autumn fields. And thinking on the days that are no more." She thinks of the one she loved in good memory. Then it seems as though she has no regret of her first love; Deep as first love, and wild with all regret. To me this poem was not about looking down on death and being sad it was more of thinking of the good and the bad time you had with your love and letting everything go. This was a good Victorian poem because this person allowed their opinion about death out in such demanding way. He was not aggressive with it. It was more at ease. He was not angry yet; he showed his passion in revealing reality.


Porphyria’s Lover by Robert Browning
This is a sinful poem. It’s seems to me that this was a women messing with a married man. This man had no will to have her so he dealt with her by strangling her; "In one long yellow string I wound. Three times her little throat around. And strangled her. No pain she felt. He did not seem ashamed of what he did it more of getting justice because if her actions." And thus we sit together now". I don’t know if I like this poem so much because of the actions this man took instead of walking away. It seems more of a hate crime rather than getting justice. This is a good Victorian poem because he questions himself before taking her life. He thought about it carefully before making his move. He admired her beauty manly way. In this poem you see the poet mood swings erupt in a violent way.


Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
As this poets describes the world in his eyes you see that he sees beautiful world filled with life. Later on in this poem you see that his mood changes and he sees the world as a place with no love, no joy, and no light; hath really neither joy, nor peace, nor help for pain. What I think that he meant by this is that he saw that our world was becoming a struggle for our people. This was a good Victorian poem because he brought reality to the eyes of his audience. He did not hold back at all. He just allowed his feeling to flow about the world that we lived in.


Ah, Are you digging on my Grave? By Thomas Hardy
This seems as though this poet had someone had a grudge against him. Then he finds out that it was his own mistress. In his poem he seemed upset once he found out that it was his poet; "O it is I, my mistress dear, Your little do, who still lives near". This is a Victorian poem because he is questioning himself on who is digging his grave; My enemy?- prodding sly? He is showing his authority over his life. This is no laughing matter to him. He puts his foot down and shows his mistress who is on top; Mistress, I dug upon your grave."