ISSN: 2347-7474 International Journal Advances in Social Science and Humanities Available online at: www.ijassh.com CASE STUDY Roshni Duhan | February 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 2 |31-36 31 Romanticism in Europe -A Study of Romantic Poets with Special Reference to William Wordsworth’s the Lyrical Ballads Roshni Duhan* Teaching Assistant, IGNOU, Study Centre, Rohtak, India. Introduction Romanticism was an artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe toward the end of the 18th century. Various dates are given for the Romantic period in British literature, but here the publishing of Lyrical Ballads in 1798 is taken as the beginning, and the crowning of Queen Victoria in 1837 as its end, even though, for example, William Wordsworth lived until 1850 and both Robert Burns and William Blake published before 1798. The writers of this period, however, "did not think of themselves as 'Romantics'" and the term was first used by critics of the Victorian period. Romanticism arrived later in other parts of the English-speaking world. William Blake is considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. The Romantic Movement at the end of the 18 th century and the beginning of the 19 th century was a deliberate and sweeping revolt against the literacy principles of the Age of Reason. Just as Dryden and Pope had rejected the romantic tradition of the Elizabethans as crude and irregular and had adopted classical or more correctly neo-classical principles of French literature in their writings, so now Wordsworth and Coleridge, in their turn, rejected the neo- classical principles in favour of the romantic. In doing so they were simply reverting to the Elizabethan or the first romantic age in English literature. Now what is it that distinguishes Classic from Romantic? Simply put classical writing is characterized by reason or commonsense in matter, expressed in a restrained style-style, that is to say, which has order, proportion, and finish. Romantic writing, on the other hand, is characterized by Imagination in matter, expressed in a style more or less free of restraint-a style, that is to say, which may be simple or grand, picturesque or passionate, depending on the mood or temperament of the writer. In other words, classicism subordinates matter to form; romanticism subordinates form of matter. Classicism stands for regimentation, regulation, authority; Romanticism for individuality, informality, freedom. Nature of Romanticism Defining the nature of Romanticism may be approached from the starting point of 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 that "the artist's feeling is his law". To 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 mould into art [1]. In order to express these feelings, it was considered that the content of the art needed 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 which the imagination, at least of a good creative artist, would unconsciously follow through artistic inspiration if left alone to do so. As well as rules, the influence of models from other works was considered to impede the creator's own imagination, so that originality was essential. The concept of the genius, or artist who was able to produce his own original work through this process of "creation from nothingness", is key to Romanticism, and to be derivative was the worst sin.[2-3] This idea is often called "romantic originality"[4]. Not essential to Romanticism, but so widespread as to be normative, was a strong belief and interest in the importance of nature. However, this is particularly in the effect of nature upon the artist when he is surrounded by it, preferably alone. In contrast to the usually