Romanticism (6)

Romanticism

The word “Romantic” was adopted in the 18^th century. When speaking of a “Romantic age”, we identify a period in which certain ideas and attitudes arose in reaction to the 18^th-century Enlightenment and became dominant in most intellectual areas.

English Romanticism: between the French Revolution and the coronation of Queen Victoria in 1837.

Romanticism valued the subjective and irrational parts of human nature: emotion, imagination, introspection and relationship with nature. That was expressed in various ways. There was a growing interest in humble and everyday life and great attention for the countryside as a place where there could still be a relationship with nature.

The Romantics thought that the universe was expanding, that it was organic and alive. They saw the individual essentially in a solitary state; they exalted the atypical, the outcast, and the rebel. In English literature, there were two great generations of poets: Wordsworth and Coleridge in the first; Byron, Shelley and Keats in the second.

William Wordsworth

Was born in Cumberland in 1770. He was educated in Cambridge. His experience in Revolutionary France filled him with enthusiasm for democratic ideals. The despair and disillusionment of these years were healed by contact with nature.

In 1795, he went to leave with his sister in Dorset and he moved to Somerset to be near Coleridge. They produced a collection of poems called Lyrical Ballads, which appeared anonymously in 1798.

In 1802 William married masterpiece “The Prelude”, a long autobiographical poem in 14 books, subtitled “Growth of a Poet’s Mind”, published only after his death.

Wordsworth was interested in the relationship between the natural world and human consciousness. His poetry offers complex interaction between man and nature. One of the most consistent concepts in Wordsworth’s work is the idea that man and nature are inseparable.

He becomes a teacher who shows men how to understand their feelings and improve their moral being. Drawing attention to the ordinary things of life where the deepest emotions and truths are to be found. Died in 1850.

Daffodils

He vividly conveys his love for nature. Written in 1804, it was published in 1807.

English — Italian

I wandered lonely as a cloud — Vagavo solo come una nuvola

That floats on high o’er vales and hills, — che nuota su alte valli e colline

When all at once I saw a crowd, — quando tutt’intorno io vidi una folla,

A host, of golden daffodils; — una moltitudine di narcisi dorati

Beside the lake, beneath the trees, — vicino al lago, sotto i fiori

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. — fluttuando e danzando nel prato.

Continuous as the stars that shine — Continuando come le stelle che brillano

And twinkle on the milky way, — e splendono nella Via Lattea

They stretched in never-ending line — loro si stendevano in una linea senza fine

Along the margin of a bay: — lungo il margine della baia

Ten thousand saw I at a glance, — io ne vidi 10 mila in un colpo d’occhio

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. — muovevano le loro teste in una danza allegra.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: — Le onde accanto a loro danzavano; ma loro

A poet could not but be gay, — superavano le spumeggianti onde in gioia:

In such a jocund company: — un poeta non poteva non essere allegro,

I gazed--and gazed--but little thought — in così allegra compagnia:

What wealth the show to me had brought: — io guardavo e guardavo ma pensai subito quale benessere la visione mi aveva portato:

For oft, when on my couch I lie — Poiché quando mi stendo sul mio divano

In vacant or in pensive mood, — apatico o di cattivo umore

They flash upon that inward eye — loro brillano sulla memoria

Which is the bliss of solitude; — che è la felicità della solitudine

And then my heart with pleasure fills, — e così il mio cuore si riempie di piacere

And dances with the daffodils. — e balla con i narcisi.

Struttura delle stanze

• Stanza 1 → Setting and “shock” at the scene
• Stanza 2: Description of the flowers
• Stanza 3: Relationship between the flowers and the poet, the emotions of the poet
• (In the moment of the vision)
• Stanza 4: Recollected in tranquility, consequences of the experience
• → Emotion

Canto notturno di un pastore errante dell’Asia

(Leopardi). La lirica consiste in un lungo monologo di un essere umano (il pastore) che si rivolge direttamente alla luna. Nel canto il pastore errante pone diverse domande alla luna sulla vita e sull’esistenza dell’essere umano.

È la confidente del pastore, raccoglie i suoi dubbi e le sue preoccupazioni, sembra essere una presenza consolatrice anche se non può (o non vuole) dare risposte alle domande che le vengono rivolte. Questo canto mette in risalto la teoria del pessimismo cosmico.

My heart leaps up

English — Italian

MY heart leaps up when I behold — Il mio cuore sussulta quando contemplo

A rainbow in the sky: — un arcobaleno nel cielo:

So was it when my life began, — così era quando la mia vita è cominciata,

So is it now I am a man, — così è ora che sono un uomo,

So be it when I shall grow old, — così sarà quando crescerò (quando sarò vecchio).

Or let me die! — O lasciami morire!

The child is father of the man: — Il bambino è il padre dell’uomo:

And I could wish my days to be — e desidererei che i miei giorni siano legati

Bound each to each by natural piety. — l’un l’altro da una naturale pietà

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Was born in Devonshire in 1772. He was influenced by French Revolutionary ideals. After the disillusionment with the French Revolution, he planned to establish a utopian community in Pennsylvania (“Pantisocracy”).

In 1797 he met the poet Wordsworth; together they published the collection “Lyrical Ballads”. He died in 1834.

He stressed the role of the imagination. He distinguished between “primary” and “secondary” imagination. Primary imagination as a fusion of perception and the human individual power to produce images. Secondary imagination was something more.

His contemplation of nature was always accompanied by the awareness of the presence of the ideal in the real. Did not identify nature with the divine.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1798): the ballad is made up of seven parts and is set in a boundless sea with days of pitiless sun and night lit by the moon.

The atmosphere is mysterious because of the combination of the supernatural and the real. The Mariner are hardly character. He does not speak as a moral agent; he is passive in guilt and remorse.

This poem contains the combination of dialogue and narration, the four-line stanza; the theme of travel and wandering; and supernatural elements.

The killing of the albatross

English — Italian

It is an ancient Mariner, — È un vecchio marinaio, e ferma uno dei

And he stoppeth one of three. — tre convitati: «Per la tua lunga barba

“By thy long grey beard and glittering — grigia e il tuo occhio scintillante, e

eye, — perché ora mi fermi?

Now wherefore stopp’st thou me?

The Bridegroom’s doors are opened — Le porte del Fidanzato son già tutte