Romantic literature in the context of "Sensibility"

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⭐ Core Definition: Romantic literature

In literature, Romanticism found recurrent themes in the evocation or criticism of the past, the cult of "sensibility" with its emphasis on women and children, the isolation of the artist or narrator, and respect for nature. Furthermore, several romantic authors, such as Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Maturin and Nathaniel Hawthorne, based their writings on the supernatural/occult and human psychology. Romanticism tended to regard satire as something unworthy of serious attention, a view still influential today. The Romantic movement in literature was preceded by the Enlightenment and succeeded by Realism.

Some authors cite 16th-century poet Isabella di Morra as an early precursor of Romantic literature. Her lyrics covering themes of isolation and loneliness, which reflected the tragic events of her life, are considered "an impressive prefigurement of Romanticism", differing from the Petrarchist fashion of the time based on the philosophy of love.

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Romantic literature in the context of Romantic music

Romantic music is a stylistic movement in Western Classical music associated with the period of the 19th century commonly referred to as the Romantic era (or Romantic period). It is closely related to the broader concept of Romanticism—the intellectual, artistic, and literary movement that became prominent in Western culture from about 1798 until 1837.

Romantic composers sought to create music that was individualistic, emotional, dramatic, and often programmatic; reflecting broader trends within the movements of Romantic literature, poetry, art, and philosophy. Romantic music was often ostensibly inspired by (or else sought to evoke) non-musical stimuli, such as nature, literature, poetry, super-natural elements, or the fine arts. It included features such as increased chromaticism and moved away from traditional forms.

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Romantic literature in the context of Russian literature

Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia, its émigrés, and to Russian-language literature. Major contributors to Russian literature, as well as English for instance, are authors of different ethnic origins, including bilingual writers, such as Kyrgyz novelist Chinghiz Aitmatov. At the same time, Russian-language literature does not include works by authors from the Russian Federation who write exclusively or primarily in the native languages of the indigenous non-Russian ethnic groups in Russia, thus the famous Dagestani poet Rasul Gamzatov is omitted.

The roots of Russian literature can be traced to the Early Middle Ages when Old Church Slavonic was introduced as a liturgical language and became used as a literary language. The native Russian vernacular remained the use within oral literature as well as written for decrees, laws, messages, chronicles, military tales, and so on. By the Age of Enlightenment, literature had grown in importance, and from the early 1830s, Russian literature underwent an astounding "Golden Age" in poetry, prose and drama. The Romantic movement contributed to a flowering of literary talent: poet Vasily Zhukovsky and later his protégé Alexander Pushkin came to the fore. Mikhail Lermontov was one of the most important poets and novelists. Nikolai Gogol and Ivan Turgenev wrote masterful short stories and novels. Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy became internationally renowned. Other important figures were Ivan Goncharov, Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin and Nikolai Leskov. In the second half of the century Anton Chekhov excelled in short stories and became a leading dramatist. The end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century is sometimes called the Silver Age of Russian poetry. The poets most often associated with the "Silver Age" are Konstantin Balmont, Valery Bryusov, Alexander Blok, Anna Akhmatova, Nikolay Gumilyov, Sergei Yesenin, Vladimir Mayakovsky, and Marina Tsvetaeva. This era produced novelists and short-story writers, such as Aleksandr Kuprin, Nobel Prize winner Ivan Bunin, Leonid Andreyev, Fyodor Sologub, Yevgeny Zamyatin, Alexander Belyaev, Andrei Bely and Maxim Gorky.

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Romantic literature in the context of Leopardi

Count Giacomo Taldegardo Francesco di Sales Saverio Pietro Leopardi (29 June 1798 – 14 June 1837) was an Italian philosopher, poet, essayist, and philologist. Considered the greatest Italian poet of the 19th century and one of the greatest authors of his time worldwide, as well as one of the principals of literary Romanticism, his constant reflection on existence and on the human condition—of sensuous and materialist inspiration—has also earned him a reputation as a deep philosopher. He is widely seen as one of the most radical and challenging thinkers of the 19th century, and one of the crowns of Italian Romanticism together with Alessandro Manzoni, even if he expressed different and sometimes opposing positions compared to the latter. Although he lived in a secluded town in the conservative Papal States, he came into contact with the main ideas of the Enlightenment, and, through his own literary evolution, created a remarkable and renowned poetic work, related to the Romantic era. The strongly lyrical quality of his poetry made him a central figure on the European and international literary and cultural landscape.

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Romantic literature in the context of Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann (/ˈʃmɑːn/; German: [ˈʁoːbɛʁt ˈʃuːman]; 8 June 1810 – 29 July 1856) was a German composer, pianist, and music critic of the early Romantic era. He composed in all the main musical genres of the time, writing for solo piano, voice and piano, chamber groups, orchestra, choir and the opera. His works typify the spirit of the Romantic era in German music.

Schumann was born in Zwickau, Saxony, to an affluent middle-class family with no musical connections, and was initially unsure whether to pursue a career as a lawyer or to make a living as a pianist-composer. He studied law at the universities of Leipzig and Heidelberg but his main interests were music and Romantic literature. From 1829 he was a student of the piano teacher Friedrich Wieck, but his hopes for a career as a virtuoso pianist were frustrated by a worsening problem with his right hand, and he concentrated on composition. His early works were mainly piano pieces, including the large-scale Carnaval, Davidsbündlertänze (Dances of the League of David), Fantasiestücke (Fantasy Pieces), Kreisleriana and Kinderszenen (Scenes from Childhood) (1834–1838). He was a co-founder of the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (New Musical Journal) in 1834 and edited it for ten years. In his writing for the journal and in his music he distinguished between two contrasting aspects of his personality, dubbing these alter egos "Florestan" for his impetuous self and "Eusebius" for his gentle poetic side.

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