Romanticism

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7032908]

>But even the arts of a small minority in society can still echo the thunder of the earthquakes which shake all humanity. The literature and arts of our period* did so, and the result was 'Romanticism'.

>As a style, a school, an era in the arts, nothing is harder to define or even to describe in terms of formal analysis; not even 'classicism' against which 'romanticism' claimed to raise the banner of revolt. The romantics themselves hardly help us, for though their own descriptions of what they were after were firm and decided, they were also often quite devoid of rational content.
>For Victor Hugo romanticism 'set out to do what nature does, to blend with nature's creations, while at the same time not mixing them all together: shadow and light, the gro- tesque and the sublime—in other words the body and the soul, the animal with the spiritual'. For Charles Nodier 'this last resort of the human heart, tired of ordinary feelings, is what is called the romantic genre: strange poetry, quite appropriate to the moral condition of society, to the needs of surfeited generations who cry for sensation at any cost . . .' Novalis thought romanticism meant giving 'a higher meaning to what is customary, an infinite look to the finite'. Hegel held that 'the essence of Romantic art lies in the artistic object's being free, concrete, and the spiritual idea in its very essence—all this revealed to the inner rather than the outer eye'.
>Little illumination is to be derived from such statements, which is to be expected, for the romantics preferred dim and flickering or diffused lights to clear ones.

*1789-1848

[Calypso !DabWKAVCOE No.7032935]

I wonder if we will ever see a revival.

I've been putting off reading Goethe for ages. I wish I could just watch the Faust play instead

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7033269]

>>7032935
Only with a large enough portion of the world interested in changing the status quo could we get an arts movement with the same/similar drive/urgency. As it is now it's all fractured and commercial. There's been a lot of wasted typing around here about the evil post modernism, but they secretly love it, or more they love to whine about it. The whiner never talk about the continuation of the revolutionary age. As if they're scared of it. So sad.

[Anonymous No.7033375]

>>7033269
Actually the Romantic 'movement' was a handful of people, who didn't even label themselves as such.


Furthermore, the ideas they had about art describe dynamics that can be seen in almost any act of creation, and elements of Romanticism were strongly prevalent through works and mythologies of the 20th Century and continuing into our period. Just about the entire development of popular and subcultural music was Romantic, for instance. Academics since poststructuralism have attempted to diffuse these ideas and currents, but they ascribe their readings to works after the fact. Some writers and artists now do pander to academics and try to build their art on their political ideas and 'linguistic' foundations, but most of those works won't last.


Also... Romantic art doesn't necessarily have to be, say, nature paintings or a certain style of poetry... it's not a style but a metaphysics. It has more to do with a certain belief in the role of the artist and his/her ability to read the zeitgeist, but also in inspiration and creation not only engaging with the exterior but developing inwardly, creating - or more accurately, discovering - a synthesis of exterior and interior. The material and themes can be just about anything... it's more that it's grounded in a belief in the validity/truth of an experience of gnosis/knowledge that informs this inspiration and materialization of the work. The reason some artist and writers can't approach this directly right now is because they're uncertain about accepting metaphysics, which is key (this is why 'head' drugs have been a big factor in making 'romantic'/'visionary'/'ecstatic' waves in the arts).

[Anonymous No.7033384]

>>7032935
We need a more aristocratic society to produce good art.

>>7033269
The masses are nothing but a bludgeon.

[Anonymous No.7033392]

>>7033269
>There's been a lot of wasted typing around here about the evil post modernism, but they secretly love it, or more they love to whine about it.

Ironic detachment and so on and so on *sniff*, *pulls shirt*

[Anonymous No.7033409]

>>7033384
When people post stuff like this, I always wonder if they think they're a part of the aristocracy, or if they think they would've been 200 years ago. Do you?

[Anonymous No.7033478]

>>7033409
*shrugs*

(not that poster)

Also, a more aristocratic 'society'? Aristocrats are necessarily a small minority. If one wants to see this ideal realized, then there's nothing stopping them from living it themselves (bohemians were poor aristocrats after all).

But I think I would actually kind of agree with him about some aristocratic values... I would argue that artists are kidding themselves if they say they aren't engaging in some approximation of an aristocratic scene/mode... and I actually think this is fine... even necessary. It's just, posters here complaining about our era don't realize that inspired people are going to be a small minority; the people creating great works, even if popular, are going to be a very select few. Take the Romantic era since we're on that subject; these figures actually chafed against their time... that they presumed to be voices for the era wasn't that they agreed with the masses or even with academia (they criticized intellectuals), but rather that they were better able to diagnose its problems, express its truths.

[Anonymous No.7033494]

>>7033409
Not who you're responding to, but no. I envision a mechanical working of humanity and that banishing the aristocrat in favor of the merchant was a mistake. It is better that they both exist at odds with each other (among being at odds with other entities).

[Anonymous No.7033495]

>>7033384
What if we made the masses the new "aristocracy"?

[Anonymous No.7033502]

>>7033495
Then art would be homogenised for the lowest common denominator. The masses are already the artistic 'new aristocracy' that you are looking for. Happy about our art?

[Anonymous No.7033528]

>there are those on this board who think romanticism isn't about the Romans
smh

[Anonymous No.7033536]

The Age of Romanticism was when that style was popular, that's all. Romantic paintings have been actively improved upon in the past century and will continue to do so for future centuries.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7033547]

>>7033502
Art is flouring fractured as it is. And I certainly don't think we can recreate that age, simply because of the numbers, but any given period of, lets say a year, has a somewhat small group of artists. I just think the next (last?) chance for anything approaching this kind of "movement" has got to be tied to some societal changing events.
I just like the way that movement tied into its age and I like to imagine what could be.

>>7033528
>There are people who don't think the Romans are about the Greeks

[Anonymous No.7033550]

>>7033495
how can you not see the inherent contradiction there?

as he points out >>7033502 , it leads to a kind of focus-grouped 'information economy' of American Idol-tallied homogenisation. aka more superhero films.

think of it this way: when you have a medical issue, you want the most qualified person to help you. art isn't something that can be certified in that way (and it shouldn't be), but some people have more talent and inspiration than others. I would rather the gifted and inspired inform developments in cultural expression than just some mass vote of people who don't even really know what they want. there's not really a nice way of saying that people don't always know what's best... but let's just say that everyone has their strengths and weaknesses.

[Anonymous No.7033586]

>>7032935
>watch the Faust play
The play is ridiculously long. (Complete staging of the both parts is around 15 hours long, without breaks.) Goethe himself said that part two can't be performed as a real play.

Just read it.

[Anonymous No.7033597]

>>7033550
I think this is thinking in a more capitalistic way. Democratically, yes a mass of people will decide what's popular (by region, language, etc.) but what is it to make one 'aristocratic' but to refine their tastes?

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7033600]

>>7033586
>Goethe himself said that part two can't be performed as a real play.
Couldn't it be filmed?

[Anonymous No.7034036]

>>7033600
Sokurov has a film adaptation of Faust I've been meaning to see - not sure what he does with it though.

Besides von Trier he's probably the Romantic director out there at the moment.

[Anonymous No.7034053]

>>7034036
*most Romantic

[Anonymous No.7034071]

>>7033269
Socio-cultural movements have become obsolete not because of the trend towards marketable mediocrity, but because the educated have taken it for granted that without bravado and recognition they cannot achieve change.
Nothing is stopping any individual or grouo of individuals from developing a new literary style; certainly not a restricted access to information from which to draw from - nor is there a barrier to entry in the form of social standard or censure.
People could write whatever type of literature they wish to. It is a failure on the mass individual level that we have settled into comfortable amateurity, not the fault or machinations of an industry that swoops in after the fact.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7034112]

>>7034036
I'll have to look into that

>>7034071
>It is a failure on the mass individual level that we have settled into comfortable amateurity, not the fault or machinations of an industry that swoops in after the fact.
I disagree. Any possibility of a mass artistic movement would have to hinge on a similar socio-cultural one, but it would still go alongside the multifaceted pomo stuff. I like a lot of arts today, it's all about diversity. –The worst of it being obviously over commercialized tripe.– But it is all just a continuation.

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7035805]

>>7032908
Bump

Have a nice day

[Anonymous No.7035813]

>>7033547
>>7034112
where are these pics from? looks deliciously retrofuturistic.

[Anonymous No.7035845]

Yes I also like being a reactionary, OP!!

[Anonymous No.7035894]

People who have sex for pleasure should be shot.

[Anonymous No.7035916]

>>7034112
>>7035813
That image was so compelling I had to check into it:
- John Harris, 'The Welcome' (1989)
- used as cover image for The Best of Trek #15

[Anonymous No.7036500]

>>7035845
the revolutionary/reactionary dichotomy is meaningless. I disregard anyone who uses it.

[Anonymous No.7037149]

>>7032908
What are some good essays on the romantic writings? I am thinking of checking out De Man's rhetoric of romanticism but would like more as we are covering the era currently in my lit class.

[Anonymous No.7037327]

>>7035805
I'm imagining this 42 year old woman thinking of a zany caption for a picture then saving it so she can post it to the literature section of a peruvian donkey show board.

[Anonymous No.7037338]

>>7035894
/r9k/ pls

[Anonymous No.7037365]

Do people of the Anglosphere differentiate between classicism and romanticism?

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7038783]

>>7035845
>>7036500
There was polarization that came out of it though. Reactionaries, sure, but most of the comparatively small band of artists in that era were pro-revolution.
And they're hailed as in the right by the vast majority. Nobody takes serious the idea of returning to feudalism do they?
The Green movement isn't quit the same thing, but isn't it a interesting parallel?
The pro-revolutionary artists message was of course co-opted by the liberal winners of the world, but the artistic community continued to resurface on the left, as if to clarify the original message of democracy.

>>7037365
I think Classicism was just the arts before the revolution. It's almost as difficult to pin down this so-called movement as postmodernism, so I'm sure someone wants to correct me

>>7037149
>What are some good essays on the romantic writings?
This I want to know too.

[Anonymous No.7038959]

i like you butters pls dont leave us

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » No.7040565]

>However, though it is by no means clear what romanticism stood for, it is quite evident what it was against: the middle. Whatever its content, it was an extremist creed. Romantic artists or thinkers in the narrower sense are found on the extreme left, like the poet Shelley, on the extreme right, like Chateaubriand and Novalis, leaping from left to right like Wordsworth, Coleridge and numerous disappointed supporters of the French Revolution, leaping from royalism to the extreme left like Victor Hugo, but hardly ever among the moderates or whig-liberals in the rationalist centre, which indeed was the strong- hold of 'classicism'. 'I have no respect for the Whigs,' said the old Tory Wordsworth, 'but I have a great deal of the Chartist in me'.6 It would be too much to call it an anti-bourgeois creed, for the revolutionary and conquistador element in young classes still about to storm heaven fascinated the romantics also. Napoleon became one of their myth- heroes, like Satan, Shakespeare, the Wandering Jew and other tres- passers beyond the ordinary limits of life. The demonic element in capitalist accumulation, the limitless and uninterrupted pursuit ofmore, beyond the calculation of rationality or purpose, need or the extremes of luxury, haunted them. Some of their most characteristic heroes, Faustus and Don Juan, share this unappeasable greed with the business buccaneers of Balzac's novels.

Quotes from Hobsbawm's Age of Revolution btw

>>7038959
>Hugs