Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Romanticisim'

En la teoria i la història de la literatura a Espanya no existia fins ara el concepte ni la consciència del poema digressiu com a forma literària pròpia. La dissertació és una monografia de dita forma literària i afirma rotundament la pertinença a ella de quatre obres seleccionades. Beniowski serveix de referent paradigmàtic. Un corpus consistent en quatre textos permet estendre l’anàlisi simètricament a l’àmbit polonès i espanyol, i equilibrar les seves conclusions. S’aprofiten les constatacions dels investigadors polonesos i es transposen al terreny espanyol, per tal de provar l’analogia que justifica el trasllat del concepte. Al 1840, any al voltant del qual es composen les obres, el romanticisme espanyol no pot anomenar-se tardà. No obstant, Espronceda, a El diablo mundo, accelera la maduració del subjecte romàntic. Contràriament a la consideració de nombrosos crítics, no es tracta de quelcom accidental en el camí del romanticisme espanyol, sinó de la seva enèrgica afirmació en el camp del subjecte i de l’expressió poètica. Al no encarar l’obra com a poema digressiu, la crítica no va valorar el que la dissertació entén com a major fita esproncediana: un subjecte irònic veritablement romàntic, transcendent del subjecte-tipus de la seva creació anterior. A més, El diablo mundo uneix el subjecte al llenguatge, assolint una visió existencial i epistemològica plena. La dissertació defineix i comenta la forma poètica en qüestió, així com altres formes i conceptes (ironia, fragmentarisme, digressió….), necessaris per tal de comprendre el seu caràcter policèntric, el seu estil, la posició del narrador i el constant repte al lector i a la convenció. El paper de la digressió és altament paradoxal, al convertir la ruptura en fonament de la construcció del text. La tesi dedica un ampli espai a les instàncies textuals del subjecte, el narrador i el lector, i a l’eix metaliterari del poema. El poema digressiu representa els aspectes vitals del romanticisme, a l’abastar la totalitat de l’evolució del subjecte romàntic, així com la de la lírica i l’èpica romàntiques. El poema i el seu narrador constitueixen un catàleg i un emblema de la transformació romàntica en els camps mencionats. La personalitat irònica no és gens menys característica que el tòpic del poeta-vat, el rebel, l’amant, etc. El significat del poema en el mapa literari excedeix el d’una forma d’escriptura. Consisteix en una unió extraordinària de la capacitat creadora i crítica. Gràcies a això, representa la dinàmica de la creació literària, la dialèctica del pensament i el concepte existencial romàntic. Per la seva doble trajectòria creadora-crítica, instaura solucions atrevides i les anul·la, sense mai minvar la posició dominant del narrador. El poema digressiu és la forma més radical de l’escriptura romàntica, sent el seu context i el seu punt de partida la maduresa del romanticisme. També és portador del postulat de l’autenticitat de la literatura, avançat pels primers romàntics. A saber, la tradició literària no es basa en reprendre elements o conceptes del passat, sinó en reprendre el seu significat en el seu propi temps. Aquest enteniment de la tradició fomenta el concepte de la modernitat de la literatura en totes les èpoques. Allò original sempre està vinculat a allò autèntic; i un art autèntic sempre és modern, sempre és testimoni del seu propi temps. Aquesta és la gran lliçó dels romàntics: una idea que van pressentir i verbalitzar des de les primeres albors de l’època i que, en la maduresa de la mateixa, es va articular en el poema digressiu. Per altra banda, el romanticisme mostra clarament que el moment culminant és el crític. El potencial creatiu excepcional del romanticisme es fonamenta en un pensament lúcid i això es trasllada al discurs irònic. El poema digressiu, emblema de la ironia romàntica, constitueix així mateix un compendi poètic de l’època.
En la teoría y la historia de la literatura en España no existía hasta ahora el concepto ni la conciencia del poema digresivo como forma literaria aparte. La disertación es una monografía de dicha forma literaria y afirma rotundamente la pertenencia a ella de cuatro obras seleccionadas. Beniowski sirve de referente paradigmático. Un corpus consistente de cuatro textos permite extender el análisis simétricamente al ámbito polaco y español, y equilibrar sus conclusiones. Se aprovechan las constataciones de los investigadores polacos y se transponen al terreno español, para probar la analogía que justifica el traslado del concepto. En 1840, año alrededor del cual se componen las obras, el romanticismo español no puede llamarse tardío. No obstante, Espronceda, en El diablo mundo, acelera la maduración del sujeto romántico. Contrariamente a la consideración de numerosos críticos, no se trata de un accidente en el camino del romanticismo español, sino de su enérgica afirmación en el campo del sujeto y de la expresión poética. Al no abordar la obra como poema digresivo, la crítica no valoró lo que la disertación entiende como el mayor logro esproncediano: un sujeto irónico verdaderamente romántico, trascendente del sujeto-tipo de su creación anterior. Además, El diablo mundo une al sujeto al lenguaje, logrando una visión existencial y epistemológica plena. La disertación define y comenta la forma poética en cuestión, así como otras formas y conceptos (ironía, fragmentarismo, digresión...), necesarios para comprender su carácter policéntrico, su estilo, la posición del narrador y el constante reto al lector y a la convención. El papel de la digresión es altamente paradójico, al convertir la ruptura en fundamento de la construcción del texto. La tesis dedica mucho espacio a las instancias textuales del sujeto, el narrador y el lector, y al eje metaliterario del poema. El poema digresivo representa los aspectos vitales del romanticismo, al abarcar la totalidad de la evolución del sujeto romántico, así como la de la lírica y la épica románticas. El poema y su narrador constituyen un catálogo y un emblema de la transformación romántica en dichos campos. La personalidad irónica es nada menos característica que el tópico del poeta-vate, el rebelde, el amante etc. El significado del poema en el mapa literario excede el de una forma de escritura. Consiste en una unión extraordinaria de la capacidad creadora y crítica. Gracias a ello, representa la dinámica de la creación literaria, la dialéctica del pensamiento y el concepto existencial romántico. Por su doble trayectoria creadora-crítica, instaura soluciones atrevidas y las anula, sin mermar nunca la posición dominante del narrador. El poema digresivo es la forma más radical de la escritura romántica, siendo su contexto y su punto de partida la madurez del romanticismo. También es portador del postulado de la autenticidad de la literatura, adelantado por los primeros románticos. A saber, la tradición literaria no se basa en retomar elementos o conceptos del pasado, sino en retomar su significado en sus tiempos. Tal entendimiento de la tradición fomenta el concepto de la modernidad de la literatura en todas las épocas. Lo original siempre está vinculado a lo auténtico; y un arte auténtico siempre es moderno, siempre es testigo de sus tiempos. Esta es la gran lección de los románticos: una idea que presintieron y verbalizaron desde los albores de la época y que, en la madurez de la misma, se articuló en el poema digresivo. Por otra parte, el romanticismo muestra claramente que el momento culminante es el crítico. El potencial creativo excepcional del romanticismo se fundamenta en un pensamiento lúcido y ello se traslada al discurso irónico. El poema digresivo, emblema de la ironía romántica, constituye asimismo un compendio poético de la época.
One of the major aims of this project has been to propose the term poema digresivo for Spanish Romantic poetry. Poema digresivo, based on the Polish poemat dygresyjny, seems more accurate than the English ironic poem, since it indicates one of the most important features, digression. This dissertation focusses on this form, and it concludes that the selected Spanish texts exemplify it. Beniowski serves as a paradigmatic point of departure. The choice of the four texts enables symmetry and balanced conclusions as regards Polish and Spanish literature. The thesis draws on the achievements of Polish researchers and transfers them to the Spanish domain, demonstrating the analogy that legitimates the transfer of the term poema digresivo. Spanish romanticism of around 1840, when all four poems were written, cannot be called late, but Espronceda accelerates the maturing of the Romantic subject. El diablo mundo, though, is not an accident in the history of Spanish romanticism, as many critics have considered, but its energetic affirmation, through which the subject and the revolution of poetical expression are confirmed. Given that the text was not considered a digressive poem, many critics disregarded what the dissertation indicates as Espronceda’s major achievement: the representation of the genuine Romantic ironic subject. Besides, El diablo mundo binds the subject to the language; by operating on these two planes, it reaches a full existential and epistemological vision. This dissertation defines concepts (irony, fragmentarism, digression) necessary to understand such aspects of the digressive poem as its polycentric character, its style, the position of the narrator and the permanent challenge to the reader. The role of the digression proves paradoxical, making rupture a fundamental element of the text’s construction. The poem’s dialectic shows the richness of contradiction in this literary form. Considerable space is devoted to the textual instances of the subject, the narrator and the reader, and to the metaliterary aspects of the poem. The digressive poem shows perfectly the vital aspects of romanticism, illustrating all the transformations of the Romantic subject and the evolution of Romantic lyrical and epic poetry. The poem and its narrator constitute the catalogue and the emblem of Romantic mutations of the aforementioned components. The ironic personality turns out to be as specifically Romantic as the topos of the bard, rebel or lover. The significance of the digressive poem for Romantic literature goes beyond the importance of a single literary form, being a brilliant union of creative and critical skills. In this way, it reproduces the dynamics of Romantic literary creation, the dialectics of thinking and the Romantic concept of human existence. Thanks to the double creative–critical trajectory, the ironic poem creates bold solutions and questions them, without reducing the narrator’s dominating position. The ironic poem is the most radical form of Romantic writing, contextualized in the mature phase of romanticism. It also articulates the postulate of the authenticity of literature advanced by the first Romantics, for whom literary tradition was not about taking motifs or ideas from the past, but about reconstructing and reintroducing the meaning those elements had in their time. Such an understanding of tradition allows the literature of all periods to be perceived as modern. The great lesson of the Romantics is that originality is always linked to authenticity and authentic art is always contemporary; it is always a participant and a testimony of its time. Also, romanticism clearly shows that the moment of climax is one of crisis. Its exceptional creative potential is based on lucid thought; these aspects are translated within the ironic discourse. Thus the digressive poem, the emblem of Romantic irony, constitutes a poetic compendium of romanticism.

La presente tesis consta de seis capítulos, cuyo contenido se estructura del siguiente modo. En el primer capítulo se realiza un breve repaso del origen de la palabra “romanticismo” y de los inicios del citado movimiento. Tras analizar brevemente lo que supuso el Romanticismo en países como Alemania, Inglaterra, Francia o Italia, se establecen cuáles fueron las fuentes inspiradoras del mismo en nuestro país. En el segundo capítulo se somete a un contraste temático el Romanticismo español con respecto a otros, como el anglo-germano o el francés, por lo que éste supuso de puente para el español. Dado que el objeto de estudio de esta tesis es el de la proyección romántica en la poesía de fuera de su espacio cronólogico, en el tercer capítulo se hace un recorrido (pasando por el Simbolismo francés, los Paranasianos, los Modernistas y, ya en España, la Generación del 98) por las figuras más significativas que asimilaron y evolucionaron los temas del Romanticismo original. Destaca Baudelaire, y ciertos poetas modernistas como Lugones o López Velarde. También se consideran como importantes las obras de Campoamor, los hermanos Machado, Moreno Villa o Unamuno. Finaliza el capítulo destacando la relación entre Baudelaire y Luis Cernuda. Precisamente el cuarto capítulo se adentra en profundidad sobre la obra de Cernuda, que puede considerarse la más alta expresión romántica de la poesía española; aunque pueda parecer rezagado, su afán por repescar aquello que en su tiempo no pudo darse y la recuperación de los grandes románticos, como Hölderlin, Goethe o Wordsworth es un fenómeno destacable. En el capítulo quinto, tras repasar la “Generación del 36” o la poesía social –sin que en ninguna de las dos aparezca ningún poeta que destaque por su enfoque romántico–, llegamos a la Generación del 50, donde destacan tres creadores: Brines, Biedma y Valente. Si el primero conecta temporalmente con Cernuda, de modo que revitaliza y encarna una parte de los más grandes presupuestos románticos, el caso de Biedma es distinto: admira la obra de Cernuda pero al mismo tiempo asimila la teoría y la poesía de Eliot y su más o menos discutible antirromanticismo. Por último, Valente es importante por su desmarque con respecto a los restantes poetas de su generación. El último capítulo incluye un repaso a las obras de Colinas y Leopoldo María Panero, ambos dentro del movimiento de los “Novísimos”, pero en los cuales pueden presentirse trazas de la influencia romántica. Con ello se concluye que el Romanticismo seguirá apareciendo, de una u otra manera, a lo largo de futuras generaciones, aunque no sea ya dentro de la línea de reivindicación ética.

Joaquim Rubió i Ors és un poeta molt present a les històries de la literatura catalana però la seva poesia és totalment desconeguda, fora dels cercles acadèmics i erudits, havent gaudit d’una popularitat insòlita que després li ha estat negada, fins a caure quasi la totalitat de la seva obra en l’oblit més absolut, com la immensa majoria de la poesia del vuit-cents fins a Jacint Verdaguer, a causa d’un cúmul de prejudicis estètics que s’han anat creant tot al llarg del segle XX. Aquesta tesi representa el primer estudi biogràfic a fons del poeta i la primera edició completa de la seva poesia en català des de la seva mort. Des del 1902, data d’aparició del quart volum de la tercera edició de Lo Gaiter del Llobregat començada en vida i acabada pòstumament pel fill Antoni Rubió i Lluch, la seva poesia només ha estat publicada en antologies, i sempre la mateixa mitja dotzena de poemes, si exceptuem l’edició que vaig fer jo mateix el 2006 per a Edicions 62 amb els poemes del primer Gaiter. La tesi proposa i justifica un text a partir de l'estudi dels diferents manuscrits i les les diferents edicions fetes en vida del poeta.
Joaquim Rubió i Ors es un poeta muy presente en las historias de la literatura catalana pero su poesía es totalmente desconocida, fuera de los círculos académicos y eruditos, habiendo disfrutado de una popularidad insólita que luego le ha sido negada, hasta caer casi la totalidad de su obra en el olvido más absoluto, como la inmensa mayoría de la poesía del ochocientos hasta Jacint Verdaguer, debido a un cúmulo de prejuicios estéticos que se han ido creando a lo largo del siglo XX. Esta tesis representa el primer estudio biográfico a fondo del poeta y la primera edición completa de su poesía en catalán desde su muerte. Desde el 1902, fecha de aparición del cuarto volumen de la tercera edición de Lo Gaiter del Llobregat comenzada en vida y acabada póstumamente por su hijo Antoni Rubio i Lluch , su poesía solo ha sido publicada en antologías, y siempre la misma media docena de poemas, si exceptuamos la edición que hice yo mismo en 2006 para Edicions 62 con los poemas del primer Gaiter. La tesis propone y justifica un texto a partir del estudio de los diferentes manuscritos y las diferentes ediciones hechas en vida del poeta.
Joaquim Rubió i Ors is a poet very present in the histories of Catalan literature but his poetry is totally unknown, outside the academic and scholarly circles, having enjoyed an unusual popularity that later has been denied to him, until falling almost the totality of his work in the most absolute oblivion, like the vast majority of the poetry of the 19th Century until Jacint Verdaguer, due to an accumulation of aesthetic prejudices that have been created throughout the 20th Century. This thesis represents the first in-depth biographical study of the poet and the first complete edition of his poetry in Catalan since his death. Since 1902, the date of publication of the fourth volume of the third edition of Lo Gaiter del Llobregat, begun in life and finished posthumously by his son Antoni Rubió i Lluch, his poetry has only been published in anthologies, and always the same half a dozen poems, except for the edition I made myself in 2006 for Edicions 62 with the poems of the first Gaiter. The thesis proposes and justifies a text based on the study of the different manuscripts and the different editions made during the poet's lifetime.

L’objectiu primordial de la tesi és l’anàlisi de la representació de la música en la obra de l’artista Joan Carandell. S’estudia Carandell i la seva obra com a paradigma contemporani a per establir correspondències entre el món interdisciplinari de les arts i la iconografia de la representació musical. S’investiga i s’estudia la col•lecció “Història de la Música” de Carandell per la seva dimensió musical. La tesi consta de dos volums. Així mateix, el primer volum està dividit en dos capítols, apèndix I i apèndix II. I el segon volum és un annex amb la selecció de la documentació recopilada de catàlegs de les exposicions individuals, conferències, il•lustracions de llibres i revistes, i de la recopilació de premsa escrita sobre Carandell. En l’apèndix I es recopilen i es seleccionen representacions de diversos artistes, per obtenir la informació complementària i per deixar constància de les línies principals de la iconografia musical des del Romanticisme fins a la pintura contemporània. S’observen les constants iconogràfiques i les variades línies estètiques de la representació dels aspectes musicals. A l’apèndix II s’inclou un complement bibliogràfic sobre l’artista. Es parteix de l’estudi de la iconografia i de la representació de la música per establir unes línies formals de representació i es proposa la hipòtesi: Carandell s’aparta, sens dubte, de les línies establertes en la història de la representació musical i la seva “Història de la Música” s’escapa als paràmetres convencionals per la seva extensió i perquè conté un factor didàctic i filosòfic. Primera conclusió, la proposta de Carandell és innovadora perquè té sentit d’unitat pictòrica vers la vibració musical, hi ha una representació coherent de l’evolució de la música des dels grecs fins als compositors contemporanis i és un resum de la història de la música de manera pictòrica. Segona, les obres de l’artista parteixen de la vibració musical que es transforma en les seves personals i innovadores manifestacions pictòriques de línia i color. Tercera, es refereix a la intencionalitat didàctica del seu projecte “Història de la Música” que és progressista i innovador. Quarta, és sobre el suggeriment de Carandell de real però inventat que determina un surrealisme i també una metafísica que convida a imaginar una dimensió pictòrica oberta a l’espectador, a la seva pròpia experiència i sensibilitat i li descobreix expectatives de reflexió filosòfica. La cinquena conclusió refereix l’assoliment de les qüestions proposades a la hipòtesi i amb el resultat d’un treball d’investigació innovador i necessari per a la historiografia de l’art.
The main objective of the thesis is to analyse the representation of music in Joan Carandell’s work which is studied as the contemporary paradigm to establish links between the interdisciplinary world of arts and the iconography of musical representation. Carandell’s History of Music collection is researched and studied for its musical dimension. The thesis includes two volumes, the first is divided into two chapters, appendixes I and II, and the second is an annex. Appendix I gathers and selects representations of various artists to obtain complementary information and to record the main features of musical iconography, from Romanticism to contemporary painting. The iconographic constants and varied aesthetic features of representation of the musical aspects are observed. Appendix II includes a biographical complement about the artist. The starting point is the study of the iconography and musical representation to establish formal representation lines and the proposal of the following hypothesis: Carandell no doubt moves away from the established lines in the history of musical representation, his History of Music slipping away from conventional parameters due to its extension and educational and philosophical factors. First conclusion: Carandell’s proposal is innovative because of its sense of pictural unit towards musical vibration, with a consistent representation of musical evolution from the Greeks to contemporary composers, and being a summary of the history of music in a pictural fashion. Second: the artist’s works are based on the musical vibration which is transformed into his personal and innovative pictural manifestations of line and colour. Third: it refers to the educational intention of his project History of Music which is both progressive and innovative. Fourth: it deals about Carandells’s suggestion of real but invented which determines a surrealism and metaphysics leading to imagine a pictural dimension open to the eye of the beholder, to his own experience and sensitivity, uncovering to him expectations of philosophical reflection. The fifth conclusion refers to the achievement of the issues proposed in the hypothesis, with the result of a research work that is both innovative and necessary for the historiography of art.

During the Romantic period, England, which then led the world in slave exports, abolished both the African slave trade and West Indian slavery, setting a trend that the Portuguese, Danish, French, Germans, and Americans would follow. Abolition, a powerful moral engine, barreled through England on the tracks of pamphlets, poetry, engravings, speeches and sermons. Abolition was clearly the moral (as well as economic and social) issue of the age. My dissertation investigates the ways in which Romantic writing emerged from and responded to the issues brought on by the slavery question. Through primary and archival research, I reconstruct not only the voices of abolition, but also of various contributing discourses such as medicine, travel, cartography, labor, and iconography. This range of sources provides the basis from which I read major Romantic poems, advancing interpretations that make clear seemingly discordant relationships, like that between Keats, slavery and voodoo; between cartography, slavery and sonnets; and between Wordsworth, slavery, and abortion. The way Romanticism is haunted by the slavery question, I argue, needs to be recovered within literary history as much as within Romantic poetry itself. My dissertation thus combines three kinds of projects: a contribution to historical reconstructions based on primary research; a contribution to knowledge of specific literary works; and a contribution to ongoing arguments about critical method.

The Romantic period coincides with a fundamental shift in Western attitudes toward death and dying. This dissertation examines how Romantic poets engage this shift. It argues that "Romantic mortal consciousness" - a form of mortal reflection characteristic of English Romantic poetry - is fundamentally social and political in its outlook and strikingly similar to what one might now call a liberal social consciousness. During the Romantic period, mortally conscious individuals, less able or willing to depend on old spiritual consolations, began to regard Death not as the Great Leveler of society but rather as a force that sealed social inequality into the records of history. Intimations of mortality forced one to look beyond the self and, to quote Keats, "think of the Earth." This dissertation considersthe development of Romantic mortal consciousness. Death’s transformation from the Great Leveler of social inequality into its crystallizing agent is evident in the Romantic response to Graveyard School poetry. This is the subject of my first chapter, which focuses on Gray’s "Elegy" and Wordsworth’s "The Ruined Cottage." Chapter Two examines Lord Byron’s Cain, where mortal consciousness transforms Cain’s personal lament about mortality into a protest on behalf of a doomed race. Cain anticipates death studies by dramatizing the shift from what Ariès calls the "death of the self" to the "death of the other" and by recognizing that mortality is essentially a cultural construct. However, the other idea of mortality as a solitary reckoning with death does not disappear entirely. Poems by Hemans and Keats, the subjects of my third and fourth chapters, show how the "death of the self" flourishes as the other side of Romantic mortal consciousness. Romantic mortal consciousness has centripetal and centrifugal aspects. It exhorts the ruminative soul to engage sympathetically with the suffering of others. At the same time, it turns the soul inwards, bringing the fate of the self into focus. One aim of this dissertation is to unify these aspects through an analysis of the sublime. In Chapter Five, which focuses on Byron and Smith, I illustrate the connection between mortal consciousnesses, social or political consciousness, and aesthetic awareness.

Thesis (MFineArt)--University of Melbourne, Victorian College of the Arts, [2003]., VCA Art, Faculty of the Victorian College of the Arts and Music, 2009.
Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 34-36)

Includes bibliographical references.
The purpose of this thesis is to examine the relationship between Mary Shelley's first novel Frankenstein and her own understanding of Romanticism. The overarching theme is to illustrate how Mary Shelley navigates her criticism of Romanticism through the medium of Victor Frankenstein as a character. With the inspection of Victor Frankenstein some autobiographical similarities are drawn between the protagonist and Percy Bysshe Shelley. Another aim and extension of this autobiographical project is to examine how Percy Shelley's editing of the original manuscript of Frankenstein added or detracted from the plot. Finally, the genre implications of Frankenstein are examined in this thesis. In the first chapter, Romanticism is examined in relation to how the Romantics themselves envisioned their ideology so as to ascertain which aspects Mary Shelley draws particular attention to. The Romantic theorists used in this section specifically, Abercrombie and Schueller, are used to highlight the fact that Romanticism can be defined as a unified system of belief. Certain tenets of this ideology are then shown to be the main points that Mary Shelley criticises. In the second chapter, the autobiographical element of Mary Shelley's relationship with Percy Shelley is examined. The parallels between Victor Frankenstein and Percy Shelley are made apparent through the use of biographers Hoobler and Seymour. From that, the precise changes that Percy Shelley made to the original manuscript of Frankenstein are scrutinised with Mellor's insightful explication of the original that exists in the Bodleian Library. The conclusion of this chapter solidifies the argument of the first chapter, and as close attention is paid throughout both chapters to the novel as a primary source of confirmation, the complex navigations and articulations of Romanticism throughout Frankenstein are made apparent. In the third chapter, attention is given specifically to the genre implications of Frankenstein, and the relationship and consistent oscillation between Romanticism and the Gothic is traced. The theorists used in this part of the thesis vary widely and include Botting, Golinski and Alwes. It is argued that in her destabilisation of Romanticism, Mary Shelley invariably incorporates the Gothic into her text. It is this complex weaving of genres which is particularly interesting in relation to how Mary Shelley's disillusionment with Romanticism produces a text that has such a vast array of genre possibilities. Finally, this thesis looks at the negative interpretation of Romanticism specifically in relation to Mary Shelley's critical expressions of its ideology in Frankenstein. As a cautionary tale, the consequences of Romantic principles unchecked by a societal conscience, Mary Shelley seems to have used Frankenstein as a way of expressing her disillusionment. The repercussions of what ultimately is an original story of a scientist who unleashes his creation without concern for its welfare are still present in the common consciousness of modern society.

La tesi contrasta les conseqüències filosòfiques i la constel·lació temàtica de la Crítica del Judici, amb les manifestacions poeticofilosòfiques de F. Hölderlin i S.T. Coleridge. La font principal de recerca són aquelles tesis de la Crítica del Judici rellevants per comprendre l'esclat de l'idealisme allà on aquest nou sistema involucra significativament art i experiència estètica. Hölderlin s'instal·la de manera genuïna en la tensió entre l'idealisme i la filosofia crítica. Per la radicalitat dels seus plantejaments podrem presentar-lo també com a poeta romàntic o precedent del romanticisme. Pel que fa a Coleridge estudiem la recepció immediata de la filosofia Kantiana en el medi cultural britànic per contrastar el paper del poeta en la importació de la ideologia romàntica alemanya. L'objectiu és presentar Coleridge com a poeta que assumeix els postulats del romanticisme alemany i investigar si aquests postulats poden relacionar-se amb el balanç de la filosofia kantiana expressat a Crítica del Judici.
The thesis compares the philosophical consequences of Critique of Judgement to the poetic and philosophical productions of F.Höldelrin and S.T. Colerige. The main source of research are those aspects of Critique of Judgement relevant to understand the outbreak of idealism particularly where this new system deals significantly with art and aesthetic experience. Hölderlin stands in a genuine position beneath the tensions of idealism and kantian criticism, and his radical aproach to poetry allows to present him as a romantic poet or forerunner of romanticism. For S.T. Coleridge we study the immediate reception of kantian philosophy in british soil in order to highlight his role as a mediator of the german romantic ideology. The aim is to portrait Coleridge as a poet who assumed the main postulates of german idealism and to investigate how far those postulates can be connected to the final conclusions of kantian philosophy as formulated in Critique of Judgement.

Esta tesis considera la subjetividad romántica como elemento crucial y fundamental en el nacimiento de la imagen fotográfica. El redescubrimiento de la mirada por parte de artistas y poetas del romanticismo se une de forma decisiva con los trabajos de óptica y fotoquímica de los científicos e inventores de principios del s. XX. La figura de William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877) que realizó las primeras fotografías junto a Daguerre, muestra de manera muy clara que la fotografía supone además de la conquista de una imagen técnica la aventura para la conquista de un espacio íntimo. El estudio comienza con el análisis de las pinturas románticas nocturnas alemanas, especialmente de C. D. Friedrich (1774-1840) y C. G. Carus para pasar luego al análisis de fenómenos cómo las sombras, los dioramas y panoramas, la linterna mágica…, inventos a medio camino entre la ciencia y el arte, donde la experiencia de la luz y la oscuridad son cruciales para llegar hasta la mirada fotográfica con las primeras fotografías de Niépce, Daguerre y Talbot y luego retornar hacía el concepto de la noche en el arte contemporáneo con artistas como Christian Boltaski(1944), Kara Walker(1969), o Vija Celmins(1938). En la fotografía tiene lugar los principios fundamentales de los románticos según los cuales el conocimiento se produce por una combinación de arte y ciencia. En el ojo de la cámara es donde coinciden la mirada científica y la artística.

El objeto de estudio de esta Tesis Doctoral es el sevillano Gabriel García y Tassara (1817- 1875), poeta que propongo perteneciente al Segundo Romanticismo, impulsado por Víctor Hugo y simbiótico con Lord Byron, que expresó en sus versos las inquietudes y desengaños del proceso de implantación del liberalismo, revolucionario en la época social e individualmente. El hecho de no haber publicado sus Poesías hasta 1872 ha confundido a la crítica considerándolo un romántico tardío o pionero del realismo. En este trabajo se ofrece una exhaustiva biografía del autor que aclara no pocos aspectos de su vida, entre ellos su pertenencia al movimiento romántico desde 1835 y la publicación de sus poemas en la prensa, por lo que se le valoró desde 1841 como uno de los poetas más relevantes de la época. Al mismo tiempo, ejercía como colaborador periodístico con artículos que se presentan como obra en prosa, antes de ser redactor y más tarde director de varios periódicos moderados. Diputado en dos legislaturas (1847-50 y 1854-57), diplomático en Washington (1857-67) con el proyecto personal de formar una confederación de estados hispanoamericanos, incluida España, y en Londres (1869) como representante del Gobierno Provisional, solo al cesar en su actividad pública se aplicó en la edición de su libro. En cuanto a su poesía, se aportan en el Apéndice las primeras versiones de 24 poemas de su libro y 21 no incluidos en él, junto a la recomposición del poema extenso Un diablo más, con dos epístolas desconocidas. Se han fechado todas sus composiciones y propuesto sus etapas poéticas, cuyos contenidos, algunos anfibológicos, se analizan. También se transcriben en el Apéndice sus artículos de crítica literaria, los muy interesantes costumbristas y otros político-sociales, cuyos temas y estilo se analizan en el texto, además de sus discursos en las Cortes, estos últimos aclaratorios de su personal visión del momento histórico y, en especial, de no pocos de los contenidos de Un diablo más.
The target of this Doctoral Thesis is the Sevillian Gabriel García y Tassara (1817-1875), a poet that belongs to the Second Romanticism, led by Victor Hugo and symbiotic with Lord Byron. He expressed the concerns and disappointments in his lines of the process of implementation of liberalism, as revolutionary socially and individually. Critics wrongly considered him a late romantic or a pioneer of realism because his Poesías weren’t published until 1872. This paper provides an exhaustive biography of the author that clarifies many aspects of his life, such as his joint to the Romantic movement since 1835 and the publication of his poems in the press, therefore he was considered since 1841 as one of the most important poets of that moment. At the same time, he worked as a journalist assistant and wrote articles that are presented as prose work, before that he became a editor and later a director of several moderate newspapers. He was Deputy in two legislatures (1847-50 and 1854-57), diplomat in Washington (1857-67) he had a personal project of forming a confederation of Spanish-American states, including Spain, and in London (1869) as a representative of the Provisional Government. Only when his public activity ceased, he devoted to the edition of his book. As it concerns to his poetry, the early versions of 24 poems in his book and 21 not included in it, also the recomposition of the extended poem Un diablo más, with two unknown epistles, are added in the Appendix. All his compositions have been dated and his poetic stages proposed, whose contents, some amphibological, are analyzed. In the Appendix I have also transcribed his articles of literary criticism, the very interesting sketchs of manners ones and other political and social, its topics and style are analyzed in the text, in addition to his speeches in the Parliament, the latter clarifying his personal vision of the historical moment and, in particular, several of the contents of Un diablo más.

This thesis is an examination of the philosophy of John Stuart Mill and its relation to the romantic movement. The Introduction outlines reasons to believe that such an inquiry is sensible: Mill's readings of the British and German romantics are outlined. I proceed to offer an argument for the application of an historical term such as ‘romanticism' in philosophy and suggest that the space opened up by the revisionist view of romanticism as an extension, rather than a denial, of the Enlightenment project creates room to take seriously Mill's relation to the romantic movement. Chapters 1-4 are concerned with Mill's metanormative theory. For Mill, the norms of acting and believing are founded on the assent given to our primitive dispositions under critical scrutiny. I investigate this foundation in the context of Mill's denial of normative validity to intuitions. The relation of Mill's metanormative theory to romanticism is taken up during the process of interpretation. The movement shows broad endorsement of what I term ‘romantic-cognitivism' – the post-Kantian view that we can arrive at truth through the process of ‘creative-discovery'. I hold that Mill's metanormative theory is not so far away from romantic-cognitivism in orientation as might be thought. I turn to Mill's macro-epistemology and conception of mind in Chapter 5. Mill's view of how we come to know, I suggest, moves towards a Coleridgean position – Mill sees the mind as active, and holds that we come to possess a deeper state of knowledge by engaging with propositions actively. In Chapter 6, I consider Mill's philosophy of history. Many have noted that Mill endorses a directional theory of historical progress. I argue that he also adopts ‘hermeneutical historicism' in his discussions of history. In Chapter 7, I consider Mill's theory of human nature. Mill believes that human nature is malleable: it is subject to change and emendation.

This thesis explores various modalities of gendered surveillance in the Romantic period between 1780 and 1836. I am interested in the ways in which surveillance was explicitly gendered, in the range of situations in which women experienced surveillance, emotionally, psychologically and physically, as different to men. This thesis asks what kinds of resilience did women develop to surveillant mechanisms? How did art and literature process and reflect on surveillance? I also consider continuities between gendered forms of surveillance in the Romantic period and women's experiences of asymmetric inspection today. These questions are pursued across a broad range of material, including plays; newspaper adverts; letters; diaries; poems; novels; medical treatises; cartoons; paintings; Old Bailey transcripts; architectural plans; and government reports. I examine once popular but now neglected texts such as Sophia Lee's 'The Chapter of Accidents', Charlotte Smith's 'What Is She'? and Joanna Baillie's 'The Alienated Manor, alongside more familiar works such as Samuel Taylor Coleridge's 'Christabel'', Jane Austen's 'Mansfield Park' and Thomas De Quincey's 'Confessions of An English Opium-Eater', as well as Percy Shelley's 'The Witch of Atlas', Byron's 'Sardanapalus' and Pierce Egan's 'Life in London'.

This study examines British Romantic responses to Italian Renaissance art and argues that Italian art was a key force in shaping Romantic-period culture and aesthetic thought. Italian Renaissance art, which was at once familiar and unknown, provided an avenue through which Romantic writers could explore a wide range of issues. Napoleon’s looting of Italy made this art central to contemporary politics, but it also provided the British with their first real chance to own Italian Old Master art. The period’s interest in biography and genius led to the development of an aesthetic vocabulary that might be applied equally to literature and visual art. Chapter One discusses the place of Italian art in Post-Waterloo Britain and how the influx of Old Master art impacted on Britain’s exhibition and print culture. While Italian art was appropriated as a symbol of British national prestige, Catholic iconography could be difficult to reconcile with Protestant taste. Furthermore, Old Master art challenged both eighteenth-century aesthetic philosophy and the Royal Academy’s standing, while simultaneously creating opportunities for new viewers and new patrons to participate in the cultural discourse. Chapter Two builds on these ideas by exploring the idea of connoisseurship in the period. As art became increasingly democratized, a cacophony of voices competed to claim aesthetic authority. While the chapter examines a range of competing discourses, it culminates in a discussion of what I have termed the ‘Poetic Connoisseur’. Through a discussion of the work of Lord Byron, Percy Shelley and William Hazlitt, I argue that Romantic writers created an exclusive aristocracy of taste which demanded that the viewer be able to read the ‘poetry of painting’. Chapter Three focuses on the ways in which Romantic writers used art to produce literature rather than criticism. In this chapter, I argue that writers such as Byron, Shelley, Lady Morgan, Anna Jameson and Madame de Staël, created an imaginative vocabulary which lent itself equally to literature and visual art. Chapter Four uses Samuel Rogers’s Italy as a case study. It traces how the themes discussed in the previous chapters shaped the production of one of the nineteenth century’s most popular illustrated books, how British art began to appropriate Italian subjects and how deeply intertwined visual and literary culture were in the period. Finally, this discussion of Italy demonstrates how Romantic values were passed to a Victorian readership. Through an appreciation of how the Romantics understood Italian Renaissance art we can better understand their experience and understanding of Italy, British and European visual culture and the Imagination.

Among the various outcomes of the Romantic period, an interest in the relationship of the arts remains a widely recognized yet rarely examined field of study. Music and literature seemed to develop a particular kinship, yet to identify the exact relationship is as difficult as defining Romanticism itself. In this study, I attempt to do both. In exploring the concept of Romanticism, its paradoxical development from Classicism is examined through the comparison of six great composers and poets of the period. By tracing the similarities and differences in style of Beethoven/Wordsworth, Schumann/Keats, and Brahms/Tennyson, hopefully a clearer understanding of the evolution of Romanticism is achieved. These artists, although creating through different mediums, address the apparent rejection of Neoclassicism, the apex of Romanticism, and the realization of its limitations. The result is the revelation of the paradox of Romanticism. For each artist, the realization of the Romantic spirit presents contrasts. Ultimately, the rejection of Neoclassic thought becomes as important to Romanticism as its dependence on Neoclassic form. These six artists achieved success not only because of their talents but also because of their acknowledgement of this fact. In this study, I trace their development through the rise and fall of Romanticism as more than instances of shared techniques or borrowed texts; the similarities in thought, poetic vision, and style shared by these artists are explored as well. The paradox of Romanticism is revealed through the interrelationship of poetry and music.

This thesis argues that the technical and aesthetic appropriation of light in American Romantic literature draws on a network of relations between time, space and subjectivity that is specifically linked to the invention of photography. It argues that, after the Enlightenment, after its advances in the scientific comprehension of light and colour, there followed a comprehensive philosophical and artistic re-evaluation of light and its properties. The appropriation and mediation of light by art in this period is informed by new understandings of its reflective and colouring properties, and directed by new constructions of the relation of light to darkness. Most significantly, the thesis describes a relocation of the creative power of light from God to the artist and the individual, and an incumbent transformation of its association with omniscience towards new notions of individualism, subjectivity and perspectivism. It argues for the historical and the technical specificity of photographic processes, and so for photographies over photography. Part of the exploration of this specificity entails an enquiry into the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth picturesque mode, and the specific dynamics that it initiated between the observer and the observed across several arts. Similarly, the thesis argues that Daguerreotypy, when properly understood as a medium of art, has a critical role in the reconfiguration of relations between the arts specifically related to a new, intermediary idea of light. It concludes that the American picturesque mode is fundamental to the appropriation of `photographic' techniques in the visual writing of the period and, more specifically, shows that Daguerreotypy actuates the American Romantic way of seeing and describing

PONTIFÍCIA UNIVERSIDADE CATÓLICA DO RIO DE JANEIRO
Para além dos limites temporais que o restringem ao período entre o final do século XVIII a meados do século XIX, o Romantismo é uma visão de mundo que perdura em várias manifestações culturais, políticas e sociais de forma indireta ou explícita, mas sempre com a marca da ambiguidade que permite a compreensão do fenômeno tanto como uma rejeição à sociedade burguesa, quanto como uma forma de ajuste ao sistema capitalista por meio da fuga do real e do individualismo. Levando em conta este aspecto conflitivo da sensibilidade romântica, o objetivo da dissertação é investigar sua permanência na cultura de massa, tomando como objeto a telenovela de Gilberto Braga com ênfase no tema do dinheiro como agente de dissolução dos valores. Parte-se das imbricações do fenômeno romântico com o melodrama e o folhetim em seu contexto de origem, para pensar como se dá a recuperação de seus traços na modernidade periférica, destacando-se como o novelista atualiza as matrizes europeias em diálogo com os modelos de construção folhetinesca de José de Alencar e também com outros autores de radionovelas e telenovelas, sobretudo, Janete Clair. Como corpus para análise foram selecionadas as novelas Senhora (1975), Vale Tudo (1988) e Celebridade (2003).
Beyond the time limits that restrict the period between the late eighteenth century to the mid-nineteenth century, Romanticism is a worldview that remains in many cultural, political and social forms in a indirect or explicit way, but always with a ambiguity sign that allows the understanding of the phenomenon both as a rejection of the bourgeois society, and as a way to adjust to the capitalist system through the scape from reality and individualism. Considering this conflicted aspect of the romantic sensibility, the objective of this work is to investigate its stay in mass culture, taking as its object the TV novel of Gilberto Braga with an emphasis on money as an agent of the dissolution of values. The work starts from the connections between the romantic phenomenon of melodrama and the feuilleton in its original context, to think how is the recovery of their traces in the peripheral modernity, highlighting how the novelist updates the European patterns in dialogue with the José de Alencar’s writing feuilletonistic models and also with other authors of radio novels and tv novels, especially Janete Clair. As corpus for the analysis were selected the novels Senhora (1975), Vale Tudo (1988) and Celebridade (2003).

Thesis advisor: Penelope Ismay
This thesis examines how the railways created a new experiential world for ordinary British people by forcing them to confront the new realities of industrialized society. The railways quickly became a part of nearly every person’s daily life and experience, which heralded a fundamental change in the way people interacted with each other and understood themselves in the context of their world. This thesis uses a theory of “cultural language” within society to explore the ramifications of that change as seen in literature. The rise of the railways and the change in experience can be linked to the end of Romanticism in Britain and the rise of Victorian Realism. The new literature was reflective of the new post-railway industrialized world
Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2014
Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences
Discipline: Departmental Honors
Discipline: History

In this dissertation I challenge the 'standard' reading of early German romanticism, according to which the movement is most fundamentally characterized by unfulfilled longing, infinite approximation and nostalgic despair. Against this 'defeatist reading' I put forward a 'conciliatory reading' according to which the romantics advocate a harmonious relationship between ourselves and the world. The reading I offer is centred on the idea of 'good infinity', an idea long associated with Hegel but one which I argue the romantics (especially Schlegel) anticipated. A good infinity is united with, rather than opposed to, finitude. This dissertation sets out to show how this romantic conception of infinity underlies major aspects of romanticism such as 'incomprehensibility', 'irony', and the method of 'Wechselerweis'. In chapter 1, I argue that the romantics are neither pre-critical idealists continuing the Spinozistic heritage (the view of Frederick Beiser), nor Kantian skeptics replacing the 'thing-in-itself' with the Absolute (the view of Manfred Frank). On the reading I advance, the romantics are forbears to the phenomenological tradition. In chapter 2, I argue that Schlegel's recurring references to 'incomprehensibility', or Novalis' appraisal of 'the night' in his Hymns, are intended as 'positive' contributions in that they ask us to acknowledge and accept, rather than commiserate and reject, an incomprehensible dimension to the world. In chapter 3, I argue that 'good infinity' is implied in the method of 'Wechselerweis' because of its emphasis on a reciprocal relationship. I survey various philosophical attempts to classify romanticism and show how I take my reading to preserve the various truths contained in each. In chapter 4, I distinguish the romantics' version of 'good infinity' from that of Hegel. I use various examples to motivate and describe a first personal sense of commitment that romantic irony, understood as feeling at the same time 'finite and infinite', makes available. Together these chapters support my claim that interpreting infinity to entail unreachability amounts to a limited and ultimately unfaithful reading of the early German romanticist project. With 'good infinity' I offer a way out of those limitations.

This thesis explores the idea of Surrealism in relation to British films. Films often classified as Realism, Gothic, Satire or Artists’ Film and Video are revealed to contain substantial collective themes and techniques when looked at through the lens of Surrealism, while films that have not previously been associated with Surrealism are found to be significant. Detailed case studies of Neil Jordan’s The Company of Wolves (1984) and Mona Lisa (1986) reveal that these two films embody these themes and techniques and straddle the perceived polarity of realism and fantasy in British film. Central to the discussion is Viktor Schlovsky’s idea of de-familiarization whereby that which is so familiar as to go unquestioned is made shockingly unfamiliar or strange. The thesis challenges the idea of mutually exclusive genres in British cinema, particularly Realism and its perceived opposites, ideas that have long-defined British Cinema studies. Conversely, Surrealism’s ultimate aim is the convergence of reality and fantasy or the imagination, and this thesis demonstrates that convergence within British Cinema. The thesis also builds bridges between British Cinema studies and disciplines such as Literature and Art History, as well as other European Cinemas. A major finding is that Surrealism’s roots in Romanticism are often played out in British films, and subversive narrational techniques are traced from eighteenth and nineteenth century Gothic novels to Lewis Carroll and the films of Luis Buñuel and British Cinema. There is however an important difference between Romanticism and Surrealism: the first is characterised by self-expression, which can often be controversial, without concern for consequences. Surrealism on the other hand is very much concerned with consequences, as in its hands self-expression becomes a means of protest, aimed squarely at shattering oppressive socio-political circumstances.

The early German romantics Hölderlin, Novalis, and Schlegel were united in their attempt to combine idealism and realism. However, contemporary interpretations of early German romanticism have, as far as idealism and realism is concerned, found two major strands of interpretation in Manfred Frank and Frederick C. Beiser that respectively characterise the romantics as epistemological and metaphysical realists and as absolute idealists. Against both of these interpretations I will argue that we both can and should interpret the Frühromantiker as finding some middle path between idealism and realism. In order to motivate this claim I will begin by summarising what I take to be the main features of the positions of the three major early German romantics (Hölderlin, Novalis, and Schlegel) as well as making it apparent that finding some way of combining idealism and realism was in fact their goal. In light of these features I will then critique both Frank and Beiser's one-sided interpretations as well as offer an interpretation that does take into account the romantics' self-proclaimed aim. Having gone through Hölderlin, Novalis, and Schlegel in turn, summarised the major elements of their philosophy, shown how the three can be interpreted as neither idealists nor realists, and rejected any absolute idealist readings, as well as having given a reading of these philosophers consistent with their attempt to combine idealism and realism, I will end by concluding that we both can and should interpret the Frühromantiker as finding a middle path between idealism and realism.

El presente estudio aborda la sátíra poética de tema literario en el siglo XIX español con el análisis monográfico de un autor. Entre las razones por las que Villergas podía constituir materia de tesis:el desconocimiento del autor. Personaje polémico, citado en las historias de la literatura, parecía un desconocido. La labor que le reconoce la crítica de su tiempo, ocasional y parcamente, es su actividad como crítico literario y la de ser un hábil versificador de sátira . Su vinculación con los problemas políticos y sociales de su tiempo, su ideal revolucionario le llevó a hacer la vida imposible al moderantismo secular, y, en consecuencia, su producción literaria, reviste un valioso interes etico e ideológico. El corpus textual supera las poesias satíricas de crítica lingüística y literaria, Poesías jocosas y satíricas, 1842, y Los siete mil pecados capitales, 1846. Su análisis exigía la observación de las relaciones intertextuales que se manifiestan entre las sátiras en verso y sus obras en prosa: novelas y ensayos de crítica literaria, actividad periodistica.
This dissertation undertakes a thorough examination of the political satire of the nineteenth-century Spanish author Juan Martínez Villergas, with a particular attention to the political and literary context in which his works were produced. The principal aim of this study has been to rescue Villergas from critical oblivion: a polemicist and controversial writer in his own time as well as the author of scathing literary reviews, he scarcely features in the histories and monographs of Spanish literature. If he appears at all is in the guise of literary critic and the author of fine satires in verse: this is the only facet of Juan Martínez Villergas that nineteenth and twentieth century critics have recognised. By delving in different archives and retrieving Villergas’ forgotten writing, this thesis, however, argues that his work is more versatile and thought-provoking than what critics have implied. Most suggestive is Villergas’ biting attack on the conformist and complacent attitude Spanish romantic writers displayed in the midst of so much political corruption and laissez-faire that characterised nineteenth-century Spain. As this thesis shows, the corpus of this neglected writer cannot be confined to his satirical verses and his pieces of literary criticism, gathered in Poesías jocosas y satíricas (1842) and Los siete mil pecados capitales (1846). Martínez Villergas also wrote fiction and literary journalism. I related aim of this study, therefore, has been to explore intertextual connections between his satirical poetry and his novels, essays and journalism. Such interrelated analysis of different genres has permitted the exploration of the hitherto unacknowledged influence that French romanticism had on Villergas and to reveal the extent to which his writing was committed to the social problems of his day. Villergas’ critical attitude towards Spanish romantic literature displays his distaste for the traits that marred much of this school in Spain: affectation, verbosity, immorality, plagiarism, compliance with literary institutions, artificiality, proliferation of worthless poets, gratuitous diatribes against the translation of French dramas, endless fascination with the topic of death, abuse of the trope of the nocturnal and of the cliché of the desolate romantic sensibility, and the moralising attitude towards the modern French novel. His works, on the other hand, exhibit his deep appreciation for the French romantic movement, most vividly expressed in his novellas collected in El Cancionero del Pueblo (1844-45) and in his extensive novel Los Misterios de Madrid (1845) as well as in Juicio crítico de los poetas españoles contemporáneos (1854). What he admired most about French novelists, playwrights and poets was their defence of a social humanism, a philosophical stance based on the notions of progress, justice and freedom. By a thorough examination of the ethic and aesthetic preoccupations embedded in Villergas’ writing, this dissertation has endeavoured to throw light on the reasons that triggered his anti-romantic invectives and his satires against leading literary figures of his time. One of the conclusions of the thesis is that Villergas’ negative view of Spanish romanticism was brought about by the limited ability that, in his view, Spanish romantic writers had displayed in adapting and endorsing the essence of the philosophy of liberalism that inspired this international movement.

This thesis seeks to analyse the often contradictory viewpoints concerning the role of the poet and the nature of poetic creation expressed in the writings of the Chilean vanguardista Vicente Huidobro (1893-1948). In particular, it looks to focus on the tension between Huidobro’s doctrine of creacionismo (with its emphasis on the idea of poetry as the product of conscious willpower bringing forth new worlds ex-nihilo from the mind of the poet) and the Neo-Platonist concept, implicit in many of Huidobro’s more lyrical compositions, that the images and metaphors deployed by the poet are no mere arbitrary inventions but instead analogical representations of an inexpressible Infinite (existing a priori to language) which cannot be apprehended through rational modes of thought and expression. This tension is studied in the context of the hybrid discipline known as the “History of Ideas” with attention being paid as much to the philosophical as to the purely literary sources of these clashing aesthetic principles (ranging from Schelling and the German Romantics to Nietzsche and the French Decadents), which the present author contends spring ultimately from a common motivation: namely the desire to rediscover in art that which the discoveries of the Enlightenment had rendered impossible through either religion or systematic philosophy – a road to the Absolute.

Spontaneous feeling has been a cornerstone of Romantic aesthetics since Wordsworth wrote his Preface to Lyrical Ballads. This dissertation unsettles the link between Romantic poetry and the overflow of emotion by arguing that writers from Wordsworth to Emerson persistently turned to Stoicism in reconsidering the role of the passions in both literature and the conduct of life. Drawing on poetry and a broad range of journals, letters, and intellectual prose, I argue that the Romantics were attuned to the way diffuse Stoic attitudes informed the politics and moral psychology of their age. More than a prompt for resignation or acquiescence, Stoicism was a radical and controversial term in a revolutionary age; philosophers like Kant, Spinoza, and Godwin drew on Stoic accounts of the passions in articulating their new ethical systems. In chapters on Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, and Emerson, I argue that the period most polemically invested in emotion as the mainspring of art was also captivated by the idea that aesthetic and ethical judgment demanded a transcendence of emotion. In their poetic search for "confirmed tranquillity," the writers in my transatlantic study transformed Stoicism's austerities as they confronted the limitations of sympathy and redefined their own relations to a cosmopolitan and war-torn world.

The aim of this thesis is to present the fundamental philosophical positions of Early German Romanticism, focusing on the three following writers: J. C. F. Holderlin, Novalis, and F. Schlegel. Chapter 1 begins with an examination of the first-philosophical, or ontological foundations of Romanticism and discusses its appropriation and critique of the work of Fichte, arriving at an elucidation of Romantic ontology as an ontology of differencing and production. The second chapter looks at how epistemology is transformed, in the hands of the Romantics, and due to the attention they paid to language, semiotic theory, and the operations of irony in discourse, into poetology - a theory of knowledge, into a theory of poetic production. In the third chapter a confrontation between the philosophical positions of Romanticism and those of the main currents of German Idealism (Schelling, Hegel) is undertaken; through this confrontation, the essential trait of Romantic thought is arrived at, namely the thought of an incomplete Absolute, as opposed to the absolute as totality in Idealism. The final chapter considers the avenue left open by the notion of the incomplete Absolute, and the Romantics' chief legacy, namely the theory of literature; literature is thus seen as coextensive with philosophy, and analysed under three conceptual categories (the theory of genre, the fragment, criticism) which all betray their provenance from the thought lying at the core of Romanticism: the incomplete Absolute. Finally, in the conclusion a summation of this exposition of romanticism is presented, alongside a brief consideration of the relevance of the Romantic project in contemporary critical/philosophical debates.

The thesis concentrates on the work of fourteen antiquaries active in the period from the French Revolution to the Great Exhibition in England, Scotland and France. I have used a combination of the antiquaries’ published works, which cover, among other subjects, architecture, topography, costume history, Shakespeare and the history of furniture, alongside their private papers to develop an account of that lived engagement with the past which characterised the romantic period. It ends with the growing professionalisation and specialisation of historical studies in the mid-nineteenth century which left little room for the self-generating, essentially romantic antiquarian enterprise. In so far as this subject has been considered at all it has been in the context of what has come to be called ‘the invention of tradition’. It is true that the romantic engagement with history as narrative led to some elaboration of the facts, while the newness of the enterprise laid it open to mistakes. I have not ignored this. The restoration of the Bayeux Tapestry, the forged tartans of the Sobieski Stuarts and the creation of Shakespeare’s Birthplace are all considered. Overall, however, I have been concerned not to debunk but as it were to ‘rebunk’, to see the antiquaries in their historical context and, as far as possible, in their own terms.

This thesis aims to provide a new account of the post-war British author J. G. Ballard (1930-2009) and his work, and in particular of his complex engagement with and critique of Romanticism. As such it represents an original contribution to knowledge in the areas of both J. G. Ballard criticism and in the study of Romantic legacies. Ballard’s ambivalent response to the legacies of Romanticism is seen to form a part of his overall ambivalence and ambiguity as a writer. In addition to the traditional ‘high Romantic’ aesthetic and ideology of Romanticism, Ballard is seen to draw upon Gothic, decadent and symbolist strands of Romanticism. After introducing the key Romantic echoes which I observe in Ballard, and the critical and cultural legacies of Romanticism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries which he is responding to, I trace these elements through selected works covering the breadth of his oeuvre. Rather than offering a survey of the entirety of his work, of which there are several in print, the thesis considers a selection of key texts at different stages of Ballard’s career in order to bring out the evolving Romantic resonances of his work. In chapter 1 I examine the apocalyptic bard figures in a number of Ballard’s short stories published between 1956 and 1964; in chapter 2 I focus upon the marriage between mind and world in The Drowned World (1962); chapter 3 considers The Atrocity Exhibition (1970) and Crash (1973) as the urban and suburban sites of the wounding of a Romantic sensibility; chapter 4 concentrates upon The Unlimited Dream Company (1979) and The Day of Creation (1987) as meditations upon the role of the imagination in a multiply-mediated modernity; and chapter 5 investigates Millennium People (2003) and Kingdom Come (2006) as postmodern detective stories that draw upon the tradition of the visionary urban and suburban wanderer.

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, 1980.
Made available in DSpace on 2013-12-05T19:22:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 321718.pdf: 4242300 bytes, checksum: 5350b6729545bcba520d0fd3936eb4f6 (MD5)

This thesis is a study of the discourse of sensibility in Romantic-period fiction. It suggests that sensibility was not, as has often been assumed, merely a transient and fashionable mode that peaked in the mid eighteenth-century before its association with radicalism and subsequent demise in the 1790s. Instead, it was redirected and refashioned during the first decades of the nineteenth century, functioning in effect as a metanarrative for the Romantic novel. The discourse of sensibility was both a formative influence on and a central ideological component of literary Romanticism and this thesis reads it as a creative, protean and self-conscious force that is capable of challenging many of our assumptions about the Romantic period. Analysing representative fictions by Ann Radcliffe, Charlotte Dacre, William Godwin, Sydney Owenson and Walter Scott, each chapter traces the complex interactions of eighteenth-century discourses of moral philosophy and perception in the sub-genres of the gothic novel, the Jacobin novel, the national tale and historical fiction. In doing so, the evidence of sensibility’s pervasive influence destabilises any notion of discrete and fixed generic categories by suggesting widespread correlations and overlaps. Likewise, this generic assimilation and mutation that operates under the banner of sensibility proposes a challenge to conventional notions of Romantic aesthetic unity and spontaneity, suggesting instead a self-conscious and experimental engagement with genre. Finally, the novels considered depict a hybrid model of sensibility in which Enlightenment formations of feeling and perception as a means of social coherence coexist with Romantic models of alienated selfhood. As a result, the exploration of the discourse of sensibility in the Romantic novel provides an opportunity to reassess the complex and often contradictory relationship between the aesthetics of Enlightenment and Romanticism.