Introduction to Romanticism

Romanticism (also the Romantic era or the Romantic period) was an artistic,
literary, musical and intellectual movement that originated in Europe toward the
end of the 18th century.
Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism
as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather
than the classical.
By the middle of the 18th century the word "romantic" in English
and romantique in French were both in common use as adjectives of praise for
natural phenomena such as views and sunsets, in a sense close to modern English
usage.

Historical Considerations

The Romantic Movement started in England and Germany. The Romantic

period, beginning in 1798, the year of the first edition of Lyrical Ballads by
Wordsworth and Coleridge, and ending in 1832, the year which marked the deaths
of both Sir Walter Scott and Goethe.

The early Romantic period coincides with what is often called the "age
of revolutions"--including, of course, the American (1776) and the French
(1789) revolutions--an age of change in political, economic, and social
traditions, the age which witnessed the initial transformations of the Industrial
Revolution.

Aspects and Topics of the Romantic Poetry:

1\Nature:

"Nature" meant many things to the Romantics. It was often presented as itself a
work of art, constructed by imagination.
Nature was considered a healing power, a source of subject and image, a refuge
from the artificial constructs of civilization, including artificial language.
Romantic nature poetry is essentially a poetry of meditation.

2\Imagination:

The imagination was elevated to a position as the supreme faculty of the mind.
This contrasted distinctly with the traditional arguments for the supremacy of
reason.
The Romantics tended to define and to present the imagination as our ultimate
"shaping" or creative power.
It is dynamic, an active, rather than passive power, with many functions.
Imagination is the primary faculty for creating all art. On a broader scale, it is also
the faculty that helps humans to create reality, for (as Wordsworth suggested), we
not only perceive the world around us, but also in part create it.

3\The marginalized and oppressed:

William Wordsworth maintained that poetry should be democratic; that it should

be composed in ‘the language really spoken by men’ (Preface to Lyrical
Ballads [1802]). For this reason, he tried to give a voice to those who tended to be
marginalized and oppressed by society: the rural poor; discharged soldiers; ‘fallen’
women; the insane; and children.
William Blake was radical in his political views, frequently addressing social
issues in his poems and expressing his concerns about the monarchy and the
church. His poem ‘London’ draws attention to the suffering of chimney-sweeps,
and soldiers.

4\Children:

The Romantics believed that it was necessary to start all over again with a
childlike perspective. They believed that children were special because they were
innocent and uncorrupted, enjoying a precious affinity with nature.

5\ The Middle Ages:

The Romantic Movement possessed an idealized vision of the Medieval Period. The
Middle Ages could be seen as the defining element of the Romantic character.
Romantics such as Keats, Coleridge and Novalis looked back to the Middle Ages as
the last great age for two reasons. The first being that it could be seen as the last
great Christian period, with England and the rest of western Europe untiled under
one Church collectively known as Christendom. This gives the impression of not
only a united world but also a younger, more pure, noble and idyllic place.
 The second reason was that the medieval period could also be seen as having a strong
element of superstition and magic. Even though Christianity blanketed the land as
the age progressed, tiny pockets of paganism and old magic were believed to linger.
It was believed that the forests and the wild woods were savage, evil places which
were inhabited with fairies, sprites and demons. And therefore, these wild places
should be avoided at all costs. The supernatural fascinated and influenced the
Romantic poets and the Middle Ages were seen as being filled with magic and other
worldly beings.

6\Other Concepts: Emotion, Lyric Poetry, and the Self:

The romantic emphasis on the activity of the imagination was accompanied by

greater emphasis on the importance of instincts, and feelings, and Romantics
generally called for greater attention to the emotions.
In Romantic theory, art was valuable not so much as a mirror of the external
world, but as a source of illumination of the world within. Among other things, this
led to a prominence for first-person lyric poetry. The "poetic speaker" became the
direct person of the poet.

She Walks in Beauty

LORD BYRON
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o’er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express,
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

The Smile
William Blake

There is a Smile of Love

And there is a Smile of Deceit
And there is a Smile of Smiles
In which these two Smiles meet

And there is a Frown of Hate

And there is a Frown of disdain
And there is a Frown of Frowns
Which you strive to forget in vain

For it sticks in the Hearts deep Core

And it sticks in the deep Back bone
And no Smile that ever was smild
But only one Smile alone

That betwixt the Cradle & Grave

It only once Smild can be
But when it once is Smild
Theres an end to all Misery

The Chimney-Sweeper
William Blake
When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry 'Weep! weep! weep! weep!'
 So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.

There's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head,

That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved; so I said,
'Hush, Tom! never mind it, for, when your head's bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair.'

And so he was quiet, and that very night,

As Tom was a-sleeping, he had such a sight! --
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, and Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black.

And by came an angel, who had a bright key,

And he opened the coffins, and let them all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing, they run,
And wash in a river, and shine in the sun.

Then naked and white, all their bags left behind,

They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind;
And the Angel told Tom, if he'd be a good boy,
He'd have God for his father, and never want joy.

And so Tom awoke, and we rose in the dark,

And got with our bags and our brushes to work.
Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy and warm:
So, if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.

Kubla Khan
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1772 - 1834
Or a Vision in a Dream. A Fragment
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail:
And ’mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!
 The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!
A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw;
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight ’twould win me,
That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

Ozymandias

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

"Ode on a Grecian Urn"

John Keats

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared,
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal — yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed

Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unwearied,
Forever piping songs forever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
Forever warm and still to be enjoyed,
Forever panting, and forever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.
 The Solitary Reaper
BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Behold her, single in the field,
Yon solitary Highland Lass!
Reaping and singing by herself;
Stop here, or gently pass!
Alone she cuts and binds the grain,
And sings a melancholy strain;
O listen! for the Vale profound
Is overflowing with the sound.

No Nightingale did ever chaunt

More welcome notes to weary bands
Of travellers in some shady haunt,
Among Arabian sands:
A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard
In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,
Breaking the silence of the seas
Among the farthest Hebrides.

Will no one tell me what she sings?—

Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago:
Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,
That has been, and may be again?

Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sang

As if her song could have no ending;
I saw her singing at her work,
And o'er the sickle bending;—
I listened, motionless and still;
And, as I mounted up the hill,
The music in my heart I bore,
Long after it was heard no more.

"MY HEART LEAPS UP WHEN I BEHOLD"

William Wordsworth

My heart leaps up when I behold

A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

TO A BUTTERFLY
William Wordsworth

STAY near me--do not take thy flight!

A little longer stay in sight!
 Much converse do I find in thee,
Historian of my infancy!
Float near me; do not yet depart!
Dead times revive in thee:
Thou bring'st, gay creature as thou art!
A solemn image to my heart,
My father's family!

Oh! pleasant, pleasant were the days, 10

The time, when, in our childish plays,
My sister Emmeline and I
Together chased the butterfly!
A very hunter did I rush
Upon the prey:--with leaps and springs
I followed on from brake to bush;
But she, God love her, feared to brush
The dust from off its wings.

Epitaph For Joseph Blackett, Late Poet And Shoemaker

LORD BYRON
Stranger! behold, interr'd together,
The souls of learning and of leather.
Poor Joe is gone, but left his all:
You'll find his relics in a stall.
His works were neat, and often found
Well stitch'd, and with morocco bound.
Tread lightly -- where the bard is laid
He cannot mend the shoe he made;
Yet is he happy in his hole,
With verse immortal as his sole.
But still to business he held fast,
And stuck to Phobus to the last.
Then who shall say so good a fellow
Was only 'leather and prunella?'
For character - he did not lack it
And if he did, 'twere shame to 'Black it.
Malta, May 16, 1811.

Apostrophe To The Ocean

LORD BYRON

CLXXVIII.
There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more,
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal.
CLXXIX.
Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean—roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin—his control
Stops with the shore;—upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own,
When for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.
CLXXX.
His steps are not upon thy paths,—thy fields
Are not a spoil for him,—thou dost arise
And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields
For earth's destruction thou dost all despise,
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies,
And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay,
And dashest him again to earth:—there let him lay.
CLXXXI.
The armaments which thunderstrike the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake,
And monarchs tremble in their capitals.
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war;
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar.

THERE WAS A BOY

William Wordsworth

THERE was a Boy; ye knew him well, ye cliffs

And islands of Winander!--many a time,
At evening, when the earliest stars began
To move along the edges of the hills,
Rising or setting, would he stand alone,
Beneath the trees, or by the glimmering lake;
And there, with fingers interwoven, both hands
Pressed closely palm to palm and to his mouth
Uplifted, he, as through an instrument,
Blew mimic hootings to the silent owls, 10
That they might answer him.--And they would shout
Across the watery vale, and shout again,
Responsive to his call,--with quivering peals,
And long halloos, and screams, and echoes loud
Redoubled and redoubled; concourse wild
Of jocund din! And, when there came a pause
Of silence such as baffled his best skill:
Then, sometimes, in that silence, while he hung
Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprise
Has carried far into his heart the voice 20
Of mountain-torrents; or the visible scene
Would enter unawares into his mind
 With all its solemn imagery, its rocks,
Its woods, and that uncertain heaven received
Into the bosom of the steady lake.
This boy was taken from his mates, and died
In childhood, ere he was full twelve years old.
Pre-eminent in beauty is the vale
Where he was born and bred: the churchyard hangs
Upon a slope above the village-school; 30
And, through that church-yard when my way has led
On summer-evenings, I believe, that there
A long half-hour together I have stood
Mute--looking at the grave in which he lies!

"SHE DWELT AMONG THE UNTRODDEN WAYS"

William Wordsworth

SHE dwelt among the untrodden ways

Beside the springs of Dove,
A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone

Half hidden from the eye!
--Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know

When Lucy ceased to be; 10
But she is in her grave, and, oh,
The difference to me!

"I TRAVELLED AMONG UNKNOWN MEN"

William Wordsworth
I TRAVELLED among unknown men,
 In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

'Tis past, that melancholy dream!

Nor will I quit thy shore
A second time; for still I seem
To love thee more and more.

Among thy mountains did I feel

The joy of my desire; 10
And she I cherished turned her wheel
Beside an English fire.

Thy mornings showed, thy nights concealed

The bowers where Lucy played;
And thine too is the last green field
That Lucy's eyes surveyed.

Ode to the West Wind

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY
I
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,

Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,

Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill

(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!

II
Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,

Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread

On the blue surface of thine aëry surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge

Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge

Of the dying year, to which this closing night

Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might

Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere

Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear!

III
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams,

Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,

And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,

All overgrown with azure moss and flowers

So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers

Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below

The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!

IV
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share

The impulse of thy strength, only less free

Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be

The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,

As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er have striven

As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.

Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!

A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd

One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.

V
Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,

Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe

Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,

Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth

Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

Ode to Autumn
John Keats

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,

Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees, 5
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease; 10
For Summer has o'erbrimm'd their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?

Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; 15
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twinèd flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook; 20
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?

Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barrèd clouds bloom the soft-dying day 25
 And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river-sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; 30
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

The Sigh
Samuel Taylor Coleridge

I.
When youth his fairy reign began,
Ere sorrow had proclaimed me man;
While peace the present hour beguiled,
And all the lovely prospect smiled;
Then, Mary! 'mid my lightsome glee
I heaved the painless sigh for thee.

II.
And when, as tossed on waves of woe,
My harassed heart was doomed to know
The frantic burst, the outrage keen,
And the slow pang that gnaws unseen;
Then shipwrecked on life's stormy sea,
I heaved an anguish'd sigh for thee!

III.
But soon reflection's power imprest
A stiller sadness on my breast;
And sickly hope with waning eye
Was well content to droop and die:
I yielded to the stern decree,
Yet heaved a languid sigh for thee!

IV.
And tho' in distant climes to roam,
A wanderer from my native home,
I feign would soothe the sense of care
And lull to sleep the joys, that were!
Thy image may not banished be--
Still, Mary! still I sigh for thee.

Home-Sick. Written In Germany

Samuel Taylor Coleridge
'Tis sweet to him, who all the week
Through city-crowds must push his way,
To stroll alone through fields and woods,
And hallow thus the Sabbath-day.

And sweet it is, in summer bower,

Sincere, affectionate and gay,
One's own dear children feasting round,
To celebrate one's marriage-day.

But what is all, to his delight,

Who having long been dommed to roam,
Throws off the bundle from his back,
Before the door of his own home?

Home-sickness is a wasting pang;

This feel I hourly more and more:
There's healing only in thy wings,
Thou Breeze that play'st on Albion's shore!

Sonnet To The Nile

John Keats
Son of the old Moon-mountains African!
Chief of the Pyramid and Crocodile!
We call thee fruitful, and that very while
A desert fills our seeing's inward span:
Nurse of swart nations since the world began,
Art thou so fruitful? or dost thou beguile
Such men to honour thee, who, worn with toil,
Rest for a space 'twixt Cairo and Decan?
O may dark fancies err! They surely do;
'Tis ignorance that makes a barren waste
Of all beyond itself. Thou dost bedew
Green rushes like our rivers, and dost taste
The pleasant sunrise. Green isles hast thou too,
And to the sea as happily dost haste.

Lines -- Far, Far Away, O Ye

Percy Bysshe Shelley
I.
Far, far away, O ye
Halcyons of Memory,
Seek some far calmer nest
Than this abandoned breast!
No news of your false spring
To my heart’s winter bring,
Once having gone, in vain
Ye come again.

II.
Vultures, who build your bowers
High in the Future’s towers,
Withered hopes on hopes are spread!
Dying joys, choked by the dead,
Will serve your beaks for prey
Many a day.
To A Star
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Sweet star, which gleaming o'er the darksome scene
Through fleecy clouds of silvery radiance fliest,
Spanglet of light on evening's shadowy veil,
Which shrouds the day-beam from the waveless lake,
Lighting the hour of sacred love; more sweet
Than the expiring morn-star’s paly fires:--
Sweet star! When wearied Nature sinks to sleep,
And all is hushed,--all, save the voice of Love,
Whose broken murmurings swell the balmy blast
Of soft Favonius, which at intervals
Sighs in the ear of stillness, art thou aught but
Lulling the slaves of interest to repose
With that mild, pitying gaze? Oh, I would look
In thy dear beam till every bond of sense
Became enamoured--

Biography of important romantic poets:

William Wordsworth:

The English poet William Wordsworth is considered to be one of the most

important literary figures in modern history, as well as one of the leading
purveyors of the Romantic Movement. He was born in 1770, in Cumbria, and was
one of four children. Over the course of his life, he continued to return to the Lake
District, and eventually passed away in Cumbria, in 1850.

The influence of William Wordsworth should not be underestimated, as he not

only helped to kick-start the Romantic Age, he also formed half of one of the most
famous literary partnerships in history. The friendship that he shared with fellow
poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge is now the stuff of legend, as is the subsequent
fallout after the friendship fell apart.

William Blake
William Blake was born on November 28, 1757 in London's West End. Along with
being a visual artist, painter, and printmaker, William Blake was one of the
greatest poets of the Romantic era. His body of work wasn't widely known while
he was alive, but in the year's since his passing, Blake's literary and artistic talents
have received positive critical acclaim around the world.

John Keats
John Keats was an English poet who is now regarded as being one of the greatest
lyric poets of his time and one of the principal poets of the English Romantic
movement. He was born in London on October 31, 1795 and in his short lifetime
had 54 poems published in various magazines and in three volumes of poetry.
Recognition of his achievements as one of the leading poets of his time only came
after his death in Rome on February 23, 1821.

Lord Byron
Lord Byron, (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), was an English poet and a leading
figure in the Romantic movement. Among Byron's best-known works are the
lengthy narrative poems Don Juan and Childe Harold's Pilgrimage and the short
lyric " She Walks in Beauty ." He is regarded as one of the greatest British poets
and remains widely read and influential.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, (1772 –1834) English romantic poet and member of
the “Lakes Poets”. Coleridge’s famous poems included The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner, Christabel and Kubla Khan. Coleridge helped to bring to England the
concept of German idealism (an important strand of Romanticism).
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 –1822) English romantic poet, and friend to John
Keats. Famous works include Queen Mab, Prometheus Unbound and Adonais – his
tribute to Keats. Shelley was also an atheist and radical political writer.