Romantic&Victorian Poetry

The French Revolution opened up the Romantic period in Britain. This revolution was what any monarch would have feared, being overthrown by commoners. The French Revolution also brought into use the guillotine. During the revolution a man named Napoleon Bonaparte took over France.

The Industrial Revolution was a massive change for life in the 19th century. People started losing their claims on their land, and moving into cities to find factory work. Laissez-faire economic policies contributed to the undermining of the working class.

Life at this time would have been very full of turmoil, and strife. The people living in this time probably had most of the same problems we have now though.

Romantic poets wanted to express our relationship with nature, and how it shows us everything we could ask for. They also wanted to express the concept of imagination.


In The Poison Tree by William Blake A man holds in his hate so long that it grow into a tree in his garden, his enemy sees it and wants to steal it, and tries, and dies. The Symbolism shows that it is romantic poetry, in that the hate expressed by the first man is manifested in the form of a tree. The two qualities of romantic literature that I stated earlier can be found in this poem, it has all of the imagination and natural beauty.

In The Sun Has Long Been Set by William Wordsworth a setting is described. Wordsworth asks a question though, "Who would "go parading" In London, "and masquerading," On such a night of June With that beautiful soft half-moon, And all these innocent blisses? On such a night as this is!". I do have to agree with Wordsworth, nights are better spent outdoors.

I read Inscription on the Monument of a Newfoundland Dog by Lord Byron. it was very passionately written. This poem spoke more of the society of man than of nature.
Inscription on the Monument of a Newfoundland Dog, 1808
When some proud son of man returns to
earth,
Unknown to glory, but upheld by birth,
The sculptor's art exhausts the pomp of
woe,
And storied urns record who rest below:
When all is done, upon the tomb is seen,
Not what he was, but what he should have
been:
But the poor dog, in life the firmest friend,
The first to welcome, foremost to defend,
Whose honest heart is still his master's
own,
Who labors, fights, lives, breathes for him
alone,
Unhonored falls, unnoticed all his worth,
Denied in heaven the soul he held on
earth:
While man, vain insect! hopes to be for-
given,
And claims himself a sole exclusive heaven.
Oh man! thou feeble tenant of an hour,
Debased by slavery, or corrupt by power,
Who knows thee well must quit thee with
disgust,
Degraded mass of animated dust!
Thy love is lust, thy friendship is all a cheat,
Thy smiles hypocrisy, thy words deceit!
By nature vile, ennobled but by name,
Each kindred brute might bid thee blush
for shame.
Ye! who perchance behold this simple urn,
Pass on - it honors none you wish to mourn:
To mark a friend's remains these stones
arise;
I never knew but one, - and here he lies.

In To The Moon by Percy Bysshe Shelley, I read a question to the moon about what it cared about. It didn't answer. the element of nature comes into play in this short poem.

"To the Moon"
by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Art thou pale for weariness
Of climbing Heaven, and gazing on the earth,
Wandering companionless
Among the stars that have a different birth,--
And ever changing, like a joyless eye
That finds no object worth its constancy?

In Bright Star by John Keats, a star is spoken of in relation to human life. Nature also comes heavily into play in this poem, however i think that the imagination of this writer took the cake.

Victorian Era

The potato blight of 1845 created a huge economic problem for England's occupants. Those who emigrated to England from Ireland lived in cramped and unclean situations.
The Reforms of the 1840-1900 era did so much for the world of today, they created child labor laws, and suffrage laws, and public schooling to improve literacy.

To live in this time must have been incredible, to live amongst so many people, and in such squalor, but still be able to have a political voice. It must have been tough though to live in a place that was so unfair to the lower class.

The biggest difference between the Romantic period, and the Victorian period is the wastefulness of the latter. The Victorians thought that they were evolving into a more refined being, but they weren't, they were just eating the earth. It is bad that we have carried on that tradition of destruction.

The Victorian period's poetry doesn't really interest me because it uses the same form as Romantic poetry. There isn't any change! They just complain about how bad things are getting, but they don't do any thing but talk.

In reading the work of Alfred, Lord Tennyson i found a good poem that he wrote, A Farewell. In this poem he speaks of a creek flowing, and telling the water that goes by that he will never see it again. He may have meant it in a way that would reflect on the industry that was polluting their waters.

Robert Browning wrote My Star, in his poem he explained that he had a beautiful star, and it shined red and blue, then he found out that it wasn't a star. Yet he didn't care, and said he still loved it. I think that Browning wants the reader to think that, "No matter what something truly is, you can still love it for what you see".

Matthew Arnold speaks of Human arrogance, and folly in Dover Beach. In his poem he writes of the sound of the ocean being a sad thing. He says that we think that the earth is full of love and opportunity for expansion, but that is wrong. he uses the sound of the surf to emulate the clash of armies at night.

Channel Firing was written by Thomas Hardy. in this poem guns fire and wake the dead in a church yard. the skeletons think it is judgment day, but as it turns out its just stupid war hungry humans. this poem was written 4 months before WWI.