American Romanticism

Washington Irving was a straight-up pimp. Just look at him. If there was MTV then, he would have been on Cribs. He crashed parties at the White House, and he rolled the tightest whips. Most of this is true.

Irving was probably The United States’ first home-grown celebrity, and you are probably familiar with some of his stories like "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow". These stories are some of the best examples of American Romanticism, a style of writing that required people to use their imaginations.

Irving was so famous that some of the stories he created are still accepted as fact today. Have you heard the story about Christopher Columbus proving the earth was round? That is fact, right? Have you heard the one about Abner Doubleday inventing the game of baseball? That’s a fact, right?

Neither one of these “facts” are true. These myths were created from Washington Irving’s stories. Irving wrote a children’s book about Columbus in which the explorer wanted to prove the world was round. The fact is that everybody already knew it was round at the time. In fact, globes were a popular thing with which people decorated their homes. Abner Doubleday probably did not invent baseball, either. He more than likely developed it from an English game called ‘rounders’. Doubleday was a friend of Irving’s, and when the time came to write a story about the invention of baseball, guess who got the credit?

It is not hard to believe that so many people would take Irving’s stories for fact. People needed a little fiction and imagination to get away from their lives because living in the United States during this time (the 1820s-40s) was not the most enjoyable. Most people lived in large cities like Boston, New York (which quadrupled in population in twenty years), and Philadelphia. These places were nasty. People threw their trash and sewage in the street; horse droppings were everywhere; if a horse dropped dead, it would stay in the street to rot; thousands of children and adults were homeless; pirates would come ashore and rob people in the cities; gangs controlled sections of many these cities, and a cholera epidemic killed up to one hundred people a day.

Romanticism is the school of thought that emphasizes intuition over logic, and feeling over reason. You should immediately recognize how this is different from the Rationalist school of thought. Romantics felt that reason and logic can only go so far for someone who is homeless and starving, or suffering the side-effects of the Industrial Revolution like pollution and being injured in large factories.

Be careful not to confuse Romanticism with what we commonly call "romantic" today. They are a little bit different. We call lovey-dovey movies and stories romantic today because it is a kind of Romanticism in that they depict relationships in the way we would imagine them, and not the way they actually are.

The Romantics believed there were higher truths than reason and logic, and they felt this could be accomplished by listening to one’s heart, or using one’s imagination to reach better places than where they were physically.

Many people around the world thought Americans were unsophisticated and stupid, and the Rationalists tried very hard to prove that this was unfair and untrue. Romantics, on the other hand, told stories of ordinary people, like Rip Van Winkle or Natty Bumppo who were unsophisticated and were able to rise to the level of hero. They wanted to prove that Americans were more innocent than Europeans, and that true knowledge was not found in libraries, but in adventures.

Romantics also focused on nature in their writing since they thought it was a way to escape from the loud city, as well as a way to hear ones intuition.

Your tasks:
Read either Rip Van Winkle or The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and then post the following to your weblog:

Better yet, listen to Rip Van Winkle as you read it. Please take the time to open the text file since reading and listening together will be the most useful, especially since you will need to find textual evidence later.
Rip Van Winkle Audio:








2. What about the story did you find particularly Romantic? You may want to reread the section on Romanticism again to refresh your memory. Give at least two examples with direct evidence for each.

3.

You can also find this video in my assignments folder in my drop box. If you view it there, you will be able to watch it full-screen. You can also view it here.

Read “Thanatopsis” here. Then write a summary of what you think this poem is saying. What is Romantic about this poem?

4. Read “The Ropewalk” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow here. What is the point of this poem? What images stand out to you? How is “The Ropewalk” a good example of Romanticism?

5. Look at this painting. How could a piece of visual art like this be considered Romanticism? When you are through responding, upload an image to your post that you consider a good example of Romanticism, and then explain why you chose it. HINT: don’t fall into the present-day definition of “romantic”. You may also choose to compose an original poem in the Romantic fashion. Be sure to explain how your poetry fits the mold.

ELAALRL1 The student demonstrates comprehension by identifying evidence (i.e., examples of diction, imagery, point of view, figurative language, symbolism, plot events and main ideas) in a variety of texts representative of different genres (i.e., poetry, prose [short story, novel, essay, editorial, biography], and drama) and using this evidence as the basis for interpretation.

ELAALRL2 The student identifies, analyzes, and applies knowledge of theme in a work of American literature and provides evidence from the work to support understanding.

ELAALRL3 The student deepens understanding of literary works by relating them to their contemporary context or historical background, as well as to works from other time periods.

ELAALRL4 The student employs a variety of writing genres to demonstrate a comprehensive grasp of significant ideas in selected literary works. The student composes essays, narratives, poems, or technical documents.

ELAALRL5 The student understands and acquires new vocabulary and uses it correctly in reading and writing.

ELAALRC2 The student participates in discussions related to curricular learning in all subject areas.

ELAALRC4 The student establishes a context for information acquired by reading across subject areas.