Traditional and Revolutionary Romanticism
Romanticism is thought of as complex and confusing, with great contradictions that range from rebellion and revolutionary ideas to the return of the Catholic and monarchial tradition. With respect to political liberty, some understood it merely as the restoration of the ideological, patriotic, and religious values that the 18th century rationalists had tried to suppress. They exalted Christianity, throne, and country as supreme values. In this "traditional Romanticism" camp one would place Walter Scott in Scotland, Chateaubriand in France, and the Duke of Rivas and José Zorrilla in Spain. It was based on the ideology of the restoration of absolute monarchy in Spain, which originated after the fall of Napoleon Bonaparte, and defended the traditional values represented by Church and State. On the other hand, other Romantics, as free citizens, fought the entire established order in religion, art, and politics. They proclaimed the rights of the individual over and against society and the law. They represented "revolutionary" or "liberal" Romanticism, and their most notable members were Lord Byron, in England, Victor Hugo, in France, and José de Espronceda, in Spain. The movement's three underlying ideas were: the quest for and justification of "irrational" understanding, which reason denies, Hegelian dialectic, and historicism.
Read more about this topic: Romanticism In Spanish Literature
Famous quotes containing the words traditional and/or romanticism:
“If the technology cannot shoulder the entire burden of strategic change, it nevertheless can set into motion a series of dynamics that present an important challenge to imperative control and the industrial division of labor. The more blurred the distinction between what workers know and what managers know, the more fragile and pointless any traditional relationships of domination and subordination between them will become.”
—Shoshana Zuboff (b. 1951)
“You begin saving the world by saving one man at a time; all else is grandiose romanticism or politics.”
—Charles Bukowski (1920–1994)