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Romanticism has characterized many works of painting, criticism, historiography, and literature in the Western civilization. The period from the eighteenth century to the middle of the nineteenth century suggests that romanticism was actually a rejection of other perceptions. During these times, romanticism was associated with harmony, balance, and idealization. This romanticism, before the eighteenth century, was classified as classism and neoclassicism. Eighteenth-century romanticism rejected the idea of physical materialism and rationalism. From the start of the eighteenth century to the middle of the nineteenth century, romanticism started emphasizing on individuals, subjectivity, emotions, and visions. A deepening appreciation of the beauties of nature was also the part of romanticism from those times.
Coleridge rose to popularity after his literary critic titled “Biographic Literaria”. In his works, romanticism is related more to visions. He has never based his argument on the material belongings which exists on Earth. He used to call poetry as the lava of imagination. Romanticism for him existed in natural beings. This contrast of his ideas from the poetry of that time suggests that Coleridge lack the sense of expression used to write about romanticism. For example, he writes “See! See! She tacks no more! Without a breeze, without a tide” ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"g0KF7m04","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Coleridge and Lowell)","plainCitation":"(Coleridge and Lowell)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1320,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/TW36IXQU"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/TW36IXQU"],"itemData":{"id":1320,"type":"book","title":"The rime of the ancient mariner","publisher":"Priory Press, Exeter College of Art","source":"Google Scholar","author":[{"family":"Coleridge","given":"Samuel Taylor"},{"family":"Lowell","given":"James Russell"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["1969"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Coleridge and Lowell), this suggests that either nature or a beautiful lady is the subject of his thoughts.
The conventions of that time suggest that Coleridge was among the few poets of those times, who thought that nature is actually, what romance is. Different to many other poets from that time like William Wordsworth, William Blake, Rousseau, and Samuel Johnson who wrote about love and spirits, Coleridge wrote about nature and love. For him, love originated from a motherly being. His such views kept his readers thinking about what the exact audience of him was. While describing an ancient mariner, in his poem The Rise of an Ancient Mariner, Coleridge writes about a wedding. He says that the sun came up on the left, Out of the sea came he ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"5gD48lse","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Coleridge)","plainCitation":"(Coleridge)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1322,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/NXN2HJT6"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/NXN2HJT6"],"itemData":{"id":1322,"type":"article-journal","title":"The rime of the ancient mariner","container-title":"Medicine and Literature: The Doctor's Companion to the Classics","page":"207","volume":"1","source":"Google Scholar","author":[{"family":"Coleridge","given":"Samuel Taylor"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2002"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Coleridge). He has linked a romantic relationship of a wife and her husband with that of the relation between the sun and nature.
Coleridge has also written about romance and what exactly it is among human beings. Coleridge's ideas of romanticism in his poem Kublai Khan are different from his other collections. In this poem, he had attributed his ideas with that to the presence of monuments. For example, Coleridge writes that from the fountain and the cave, A sunny pleasure- doom with caves of ice ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"AH9tyvOa","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Schneider and Coleridge)","plainCitation":"(Schneider and Coleridge)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1325,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/MKBUVDZD"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/MKBUVDZD"],"itemData":{"id":1325,"type":"book","title":"Kubla Khan","publisher":"The University of Chicago Press, Chicago","source":"Google Scholar","author":[{"family":"Schneider","given":"Elisabeth"},{"family":"Coleridge","given":"Opium"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["1953"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Schneider and Coleridge). This suggests that Coleridge has not limited his thoughts to some aspects of human existence, rather it shows his quantification and reflection of things. He has also used many metaphors in describing what romanticism is.
Different to the writings of that time, Coleridge seems standing at distant scholarly position. He has expanded the ideas about romanticism in such a way, that it reflects the image of each of its readers. Whelan, who categorizes Coleridge and Edwards as the same poets write that these two have linked romance with how religion constructs things. The use of the word religion is actually to make the readers understand about the level of pureness these two have attributed to romance ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"odIBVf7A","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Whelan)","plainCitation":"(Whelan)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1327,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/6YV7CMIF"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/6YV7CMIF"],"itemData":{"id":1327,"type":"article-journal","title":"Coleridge, Jonathan Edwards, and the ‘edifice of Fatalism’","container-title":"Romanticism","page":"280–300","volume":"21","issue":"3","source":"Google Scholar","author":[{"family":"Whelan","given":"Timothy"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2015"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Whelan). Whelan has not limited the ideas just to the purity of thoughts or the manner they have written about love, but he has also expanded their ideas to find similarities. He argues that romance for these two poets has remained a feeling unconquered by the rest poets from their times.
Wienen finally argues in his review that romanticism remained attached to materialism before the advent Coleridge. He argues that what he wants to reflect is what everyone already witnesses. He also argues that something different has been presented by Coleridge in speaking about romance ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"9EfgiQ5E","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Van Wienen)","plainCitation":"(Van Wienen)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1329,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/SCD9YILG"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/SCD9YILG"],"itemData":{"id":1329,"type":"book","title":"American Socialist Triptych: The Literary-Political Work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Upton Sinclair, and WEB Du Bois","publisher":"University of Michigan Press","source":"Google Scholar","title-short":"American Socialist Triptych","author":[{"family":"Van Wienen","given":"Mark"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2011"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Van Wienen). He writes that pre-war times have remained attached to materialism. He actually praises Coleridge for being so beautiful in writing about a feeling which is everlasting.
Works Cited:
ADDIN ZOTERO_BIBL {"uncited":[],"omitted":[],"custom":[]} CSL_BIBLIOGRAPHY Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” Medicine and Literature: The Doctor’s Companion to the Classics, vol. 1, 2002, p. 207.
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, and James Russell Lowell. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Priory Press, Exeter College of Art, 1969.
Schneider, Elisabeth, and Opium Coleridge. Kubla Khan. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1953.
Van Wienen, Mark. American Socialist Triptych: The Literary-Political Work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Upton Sinclair, and WEB Du Bois. University of Michigan Press, 2011.
Whelan, Timothy. “Coleridge, Jonathan Edwards, and the ‘Edifice of Fatalism.’” Romanticism, vol. 21, no. 3, 2015, pp. 280–300.
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