Imagine a life in the 18th century when a revolution is taking place that exercises freedom, emotional liberty and importance of oneself. When the Romantic Era hit many individuals were becoming aware of a movement of intense emotion and became interested in unfamiliar and exotic experiences. Many of these experiences in which, brought to light a whole new world of darkness and strong emotions such as apprehension and terror. Romanticism in the 18th century sparked imagination; Imagination that was perceived as the “ultimate power” (see reference). Fast forwarding to contemporary culture, many of these examples of romanticism are seen in shows such as True Blood, American Horror Story, and Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas.
There are important scenes in each episode of True Blood that emerge characteristics of Romanticism. Sookie is not-your-average waitress at Merlotte’s, she hears everyone thoughts all the time. When she meets Bill (vampire) and touches his hand for the first time, everyone’s thoughts disappear and she hears silence for the first time. This is one of the main reasons that attracted Sookie to Bill; Sookie finds peace and freedom when she is with him even though he is a blood thirsty vampire. True Blood is a perfect example of the ideas behind Romanticism because any human that is intimate with a vampire in the show experience intense and unfamiliar emotions that keep them hooked and desperate to come back for more. There is a scene when Eric (vampire) is worried about his maker, Godric. Sookie then says, “You have a lot a love for him” and Eric replies “Don’t use words I don’t understand”. This dialogue is particularly interesting because vampires are creatures of death and darkness lurkin...
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...ight, he flies into the fog like a vulture in the sky!! And they call him Sandy Claws.” What better way to catch the monsters’ attention in Halloween town, because they certainly do not know anything about the joy that Christmas is supposed to bring.
While there are many more shows and movies in which Romanticism is noticed, most is also found in writings and literature. I believe the three contemporary examples given in the essay are unique but definitely describe the freedom, emotional liberty and importance of oneself that sparked in the 18th century. True Blood with the idea of freedom, American Horror Story with emotional liberty and Tim Burton expressing his imagination into his work that was so different from the norm. There is a certain type of beauty behind all the darkness and that is what grasps peoples’ attentions while viewing this works of film.
Frankenstein in a Historical Sense Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was published in 1818 during the Romantic era. Romanticism describes the period of time from the late 18th century to the mid 19th century. This period was seen as a response to the Enlightenment; overall there was an increase in the desire to understand the world in an objective matter (lecture). Though Romanticism is commonly viewed as a literary and artistic movement, Mary Shelley gives evidence on the development of Europe in a historical sense through her novel, Frankenstein. Through the motifs and personal experiences of her characters, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein gives insight on scientific development, emerging roles of women, and how the individual is viewed as the lower class during the early 19th century.
Not a single individual is able to watch a Burton film without noticing the lighting effects and how it significantly contributes to the tone and mood of the entire film. In the movie Edward Scissorhands, one might be overwhelmed with the burst of extravagant colors in the scenery. Indeed this cinematic technique, high key, wholly influences the viewers perception and impression of the town. One can conclude that even though flamboyancy pervades the town, iniquity lurks in all directions and hypocrisy governs the minds of its inhabitants. Irony is harnessed in this film. How can an effulgent town harbor wickedness and Edward with a chilling and gothic complexion radiate innocence and righteousness? Burton uses these opposing conceptions brought about by the contrast of lighting to convey the message that materialism has been ingrained in the mentality of society (at least in the neighborhood in which Burton lived in the past), thus yearning for th...
The genre of horror films is one that is vast and continually growing. So many different elements have been known to appear in horror films that it is often times difficult to define what is explicitly a horror film and what is not. Due to this ambiguous definition of horror the genre is often times divided into subgenres. Each subgenre of horror has a more readily identifiable list of classifications that make it easier to cast a film to a subgenre, rather than the entire horror genre. One such subgenre that is particularly interesting is that of the stalker film. The stalker film can be categorized as a member of the horror genre in two ways. First, the stalker film can be identified within the horror genre due to its connection with the easily recognizable subgenre of horror, the slasher film. Though many elements of the stalker film differ from those of the slasher film, the use of non-mechanical weapons and obvious sexual plot points can be used to categorize the stalker film as a subgenre of the slasher film. Secondly, the stalker film can be considered a member of the horror genre using Robin Wood’s discussion regarding horror as that which society represses. The films Fatal Attraction, The Fan, and The Crush will be discussed in support of this argument. (Need some connector sentence here to finish out the intro)
Romanticism is the movement in the arts and literature that originated in the late 18th century, emphasizing inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual. This idea of Romanticism gave power to the individual that they never once had; people believed that others are inherently good. This time of dynamic and radical changes led to many writers who voiced their opinion on different matters of various concern. People were able to voice their opinion much more than they have in the past giving more power to the individual. It was this attitude that writers had that criticized many institutions. Among these writers is Robert Burns, in the texts To a Mouse and To a Louse, they contain three important messages of different attitudes, irony, and being thankful for what you have.
The Romantic period at its height extended over just a bit more than a century, from the latter half of the eighteenth century through to nearly the end of the nineteenth century. During this period, a new school of poetry was forged, and with it, a new moral philosophy. But, as the nineteenth century wound down, the Romantic movement seemed to be proving itself far more dependent on the specific cultural events it spanned than many believed; that is, the movement was beginning to wind down in time with the ebbing of the industrial and urban boom in much the same way that the movement grew out of the initial period of industrial and urban growth. Thus, it would be easy to classify the Romantic movement as inherently tied to its cultural context. The difficulty, then, comes when poets and authors outside of this time period-and indeed in contexts quite different then those of the original Romantic poets-begin to label themselves as Romantics.
For many, saying or hearing the word romanticism evokes numerous stereotypical and prejudged definitions and emotions. The biggest reason this probably happens is because of how closely romanticism sounds like romance. The similarity of the sounds and spelling of the two words can lead to some thinking that the two words mean the same thing or are closely related. Although romanticism and romance do share some similarities in their spelling and pronunciation they couldn’t be more different. In the Merriam Webster Dictionary romance is defined as, “a love story”. The Romantic Period was not necessarily a time of true romance and love stories, although love was written about, but was instead a time of extreme emotion expressed in many different ways. One of the many ways emotion was expressed was through the use of supernatural and gothic literature and a lot of it contained horrific subject matter for the time it was written, making it anything but romantic. Expressions of thought and emotion were shown through horror and the supernatural just as much as emotion was expressed through love and romance. Many of the authors during the Romantic period submitted works, “dealing with the supernatural, the weird, and the horrible” (Britannica Online Encyclopedia). In many ways, gothic tales of horror and suspense defined the Romantic period just as much as any other type of literature at the time.
On August 25, 1958, Timothy Walter Burton was born (“Biography”). Burton had a painful childhood in which the relationship with his parents and brother was nonexistent (Morgenstern). Through his intense feeling of isolation, his visual talent began to develop. The comfort found in hobbies such as writing and drawing led him to attend the California Institute of the Arts which led him to his first job in any artistic field at the Disney Animation Studios (“Biography”). Burton has since been referred to as one of the most visually gifted writers, artists, and filmmakers that America has seen (Hanke). His short stories, poems, and film scripts are centered on an inner darkness which he has been slowly acquiring since his childhood. He throws himself into everything he writes and makes even the simplest characters have a deep, complex meaning. His famous darkness and symbolism is shown in his book The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories. The book contains a collection of his short stories, poems, and illustrations about a variety of fictional characters that can be compared to Burton and his life. Tim Burton’s home life and previous hardships have made a significant impact on his work. In my paper, I will draw parallels to his life and work as well as prove that there is reasoning and beauty in the way he is.
Romanticism has been described as a “‘Protestantism in the arts and letters’, an ideological shift on the grand scale from conservative to liberal ideas”. (Keenan, 2005) It was a movement into the era of imagination and feelings instead of objective reasoning.
Modern day horror films are very different from the first horror films which date back to the late nineteenth century, but the goal of shocking the audience is still the same. Over the course of its existence, the horror industry has had to innovate new ways to keep its viewers on the edge of their seats. Horror films are frightening films created solely to ignite anxiety and panic within the viewers. Dread and alarm summon deep fears by captivating the audience with a shocking, terrifying, and unpredictable finale that leaves the viewer stunned. (Horror Films)
Romanticism is a movement that dominated the literary, visual, and musical arts from the late eighteenth century until about the 1870s. Romanticism is in no way related to the concept of romantic love: rather, it reflects the movement’s focus on “. “Masque of the Red Death” shows a good example of romanticism. The story focuses on death that is coming to a mean and wealthy man and he does not see it coming. The story is something
The connection between Romanticism and nature was said by Marjorie McAtee, to have strengthened with the idealism of folk cultures and customs. Many romantic artists, writers, and philosophers believed in the natural world as a source of strong emotions and philosophies. The artists and philosophers of the romantic period also accentuated the magnificence and loveliness of nature and the power of the natural world (McAtee, Marjorie, and W. Everett. WiseGeek. Conjecture, 03 Mar. 2014. Web. 05 Apr. 2014.) . Mary Shelly and many other writers like William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge were romantic writers who were apprehensive toward nature, human feelings, compassion for mankind, and rebellious against society. Romanticism, which originated in the 18th century, is something that emphasized motivation as well as imagination (Adjective Clause). In Frankenstein, Shelley cautions that the initiation of science and natural rational searching is not only ineffectual, but unsafe. In endeavoring to discover the mysteries of life, Frankenstein assumes that he ...
Romanticism was a movement in art and literature in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in revolt against the Neoclassicism of the previous centuries. The romanticism movement in literature consists of a few of the following characteristics: intuition over fact, imagination over fact, and the stretch and alteration of the truth. The death of a protagonist may be prolonged and/or exaggerated, but the main point was to signify the struggle of the individual trying to break free, which was shown in “The Fall of the House Usher” (Prentice Hall Literature 322).
Romantic literature, as Kathy Prendergast further claims, highlighted things like splendor, greatness, vividness, expressiveness, intense feelings of passion, and stunning beauty. The Romantic literary genre favored “parts” over “whole” and “content” over “form”. The writer argues that though both the Romantic literary genre and the Gothic art mode were medieval in nature, they came to clash with what was called classical conventions. That’s why, preoccupations with such things as the supernatural, the awful, the dreadful, the repulsive and the grotesque were the exclusive focus of the nineteenth century Gothic novel. While some critics perceived the Gothic as a sub-genre of Romanticism, some others saw it as a genre in its own right (Prendergast).
The appeal of horror film is effective due to the traits of the human mind. Filmgoers of horror leave theaters with a positive train of thought, yet the negative nature of the content presented points to psychological factors which cause their enjoyment. Answers are found by looking at the psychological factors, how an individual processes emotional arousal, identifies with issues that they consider relevant, and perceives reality, help to explain why films presenting such horrific imagery excites many people. Many horror franchises create a level of violence and gore that is offensive to most, yet viewers continue to swarm theaters, making the horror film industry extremely profitable. Graphic horror cinema relies on shocking imagery as much as storytelling to create an effective type of entertainment. The subject matter, alone, does not provide enough attraction to bring back viewers. When looking at the psychological drivers behind the films, it can be seen that the composition addresses a level much deeper than the entertainment that makes horror
French poet Charles Baudelaire once said, “To say the word Romanticism is to say modern art- that is, intimacy, spirituality, color, aspiration towards the infinite, expressed by every means available to the arts.” Being an influential romantic writer himself, Baudelaire had a strong sense and understanding of the true meaning of Romanticism. Romanticism was a literary period that valued intuition, emotion, and imagination over logic. The Romantic period was clearly defined by its divergence from the concepts and styles of the literary period that preceded it, which was more scientific and realistic in nature. Romantic writings, such as Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, include specific traits, such as imagery, description, and supernatural