Title: Romanticism - Wikipedia
Headings: Romanticism
Romanticism
Contents
Defining Romanticism
Basic characteristics
Etymology
Period
Context and place in history
Literature
Germany
Great Britain
Scotland
France
Poland
Russia
Spain
Portugal
Italy
South America
United States
Influence of European Romanticism on American writers
Architecture
Visual arts
Music
Outside the arts
Sciences
Historiography
Theology
Chess
Romantic nationalism
Polish nationalism and messianism
Gallery
Emerging Romanticism in the 18th century
French Romantic painting
Other
Romantic authors
Scholars of Romanticism
See also
References
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links

Content: Romanticism assigned a high value to the achievements of "heroic" individualists and artists, whose examples, it maintained, would raise the quality of society. It also promoted the individual imagination as a critical authority allowed of freedom from classical notions of form in art. There was a strong recourse to historical and natural inevitability, a Zeitgeist, in the representation of its ideas. In the second half of the 19th century, Realism was offered as a polar opposite to Romanticism. The decline of Romanticism during this time was associated with multiple processes, including social and political changes. Contents
1 Defining Romanticism
1.1 Basic characteristics
1.2 Etymology
1.3 Period
1.4 Context and place in history
2 Literature
2.1 Germany
2.2 Great Britain
2.2.1 Scotland
2.3 France
2.4 Poland
2.5 Russia
2.6 Spain
2.7 Portugal
2.8 Italy
2.9 South America
2.10 United States
2.10.1 Influence of European Romanticism on American writers
3 Architecture
4 Visual arts
5 Music
6 Outside the arts
6.1 Sciences
6.2 Historiography
6.3 Theology
6.4 Chess
7 Romantic nationalism
7.1 Polish nationalism and messianism
8 Gallery
9 Romantic authors
10 Scholars of Romanticism
11 See also
11.1 Related terms
11.2 Opposing terms
11.3 Related subjects
11.4 Related movements
12 References
12.1 Citations
12.2 Sources
13 Further reading
14 External links
Defining Romanticism
Basic characteristics
The nature of Romanticism may be approached from the primary importance of the free expression of the feelings of the artist. The importance the Romantics placed on emotion is summed up in the remark of the German painter Caspar David Friedrich, "the artist's feeling is his law". For William Wordsworth, poetry should begin as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings", which the poet then "recollect [s] in tranquility", evoking a new but corresponding emotion the poet can then mold into art. To express these feelings, it was considered that content of art had to come from the imagination of the artist, with as little interference as possible from "artificial" rules dictating what a work should consist of. Samuel Taylor Coleridge and others believed there were natural laws the imagination—at least of a good creative artist—would unconsciously follow through artistic inspiration if left alone.