The Romantic Period and Robert Burns

The Romantic Period and Robert Burns

At the end of the eighteenth century a new literature arose

in England. It was called, Romanticism, and it opposed most of

the ideas held earlier in the century. Romanticism had its roots

in a changed attitude toward mankind.The forerunners

of the Romanticists argued that men are naturally good; society

makes them bad. If the social world could be changed, all men

might be happier. Many reforms were suggested: better treatment

of people in prisons and almshouses; fewer death penalties for

minor crimes; and an increase in charitable institutions.

Romanticism was a powerful reaction against Neoclassicism in

liberation of the imagination and rediscovery of nature. English

romantic writers tended to turn their backs upon cities and

centers of culture for their inspiration, and to seek subjects

and settings for their poems in mountains and valleys, forests,

meadows and brooks. Romanticism made much of freedom and

imagination. Some ideas that came with the romantic movement are

that humble life is best, and another was that people should live

close to nature. Thus the Romantic movement was essentially

anti-progress, if progress meant industrialization. Because of

this concern for nature and the simple folk, authors began to

take an interest in old legends, folk ballads, and rustic

characters. Many writers started to give more play to their

senses and to their imagination. Their pictures of nature became

livelier and more realistic. They loved to describe rural scenes,

graveyards, majestic mountains and roaring waterfalls.

With this Romanticism grew, but it can not be accurately

defined. It was a group of ideas, a web of beliefs. No one

Rom...

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...'My Jean', 'A Red,Red Rose' and 'The Banks o'

Doon'. The last years of Burns' life were dedicated to his

greatest works such as 'The Lea Rig', 'Tam O'Shanter' and 'A

Red,Red Rose'. He died when he was thirty seven years old on July

21,1796 the same day Jean gave birth to his last son, Maxwell.

Robert Burns was a man before his time. His style of writing

had distinct characteristics of the Romantic Period, though he

was twenty years early. It showed emotions instead of reason,

imagination instead of logic and creativity rather than

intuition. Burns paved the way for future Romanticists, showing

them that individualism rather than conformity can be accepted.

It would be okay if their imagination longed to dwell on far-off,

exotic lands. Unlike the Neoclassicists who had been interested

exclusively in their own times and contemporary society.