Difference Between Realism And Romanticism

Throughout history, literature has evolved with each passing era bringing new ideas and ideals to the literary world. Two eras which hold importance to the literature of today, are the Romantic and the Realist eras. With the changing and values of these times, literature took new turns which had not, or at the very least rarely had been, seen in prior years. It was thanks to these eras and poets, like John Keats and Charles Baudelaire, that the literature created today can be as expressive and imaginative as possible or even mirror real life.

Like many eras, the Romantic Era was born in rebellion to an era that took place before the emergence of change. The era that had influenced the birth of Romanticism was The Age of Enlightenment. During

Society, to the romantics, was what caused immorality and took away man’s inherent goodness. From this came the creation of the ‘noble savage’, people not yet tainted by the ways of society, and envied them for their simplistic life, which connected them to nature. To the Romantics, the noble savage, usually of a native tribal decent, was good by nature. Society was deemed the source of corruption, the thing that would make uncivilized men become soiled and no longer goodly. The use of the noble savage in Romantic literature was often used to highlight this ideal, along with the immorality and exploitive disposition of society (Caffrey). Imagination was a way in which many poets, like John Keats, escaped the society that left many feeling

As a child, Keats lost his father, who worked as a horse groomer, in a riding accident. A year later, his mother remarried in desperation. His mother’s new husband, William Rawlings, took control of all the Keats assets, and the children were left in the care of Frances’s parents, John and Alice Jennings, before the two wed. The children did not see their mother for years before she returned ill with consumption, or tuberculosis as it is now called. Not only were the children abandoned and destined to never see the money their father left behind, but also the money left behind from their grandmother, which had been mishandled by a trustee named Richard Abbey. What little money Abbey gave to Keats, his legal guardian after his mother and grandmother passed away, was only a small portion of what rightfully belonged to him. Through this the Keats siblings remained close, their bond kept through regular visits after the household was broken apart (O