Natural Supernaturalism: Tradition and Revolution in Romantic LiteratureIn this remarkable new book, M. H. Abrams definitively studies the Romantic Age (1789–1835)—the age in which Shelley claimed that "the literature of England has arisen as it were from a new birth." Abrams shows that the major poets of the age had in common important themes, modes of expression, and ways of feeling and imagining; that the writings of these poets were an integral part of a comprehensive intellectual tendency which manifested itself in philosophy as well as poetry, in England and in Germany; and that this tendency was causally related to drastic political and social changes of the age. But Abrams offers more than a work of scholarship, for he ranges before and after, to place the age in Western culture. he reveals what is traditional and what is revolutionary in the period, providing insights into those same two forces in the ideas of today. He shows that central Romantic ideas and forms of imagination were secularized versions of traditional theological concepts, imagery, and design, and that modern literature participates in the same process. Our comprehension of this age and of our own time is deepened by a work astonishing in its learning, vision, and humane understanding. |
What people are saying - Write a review
LibraryThing Review
User Review - dmsteyn - LibraryThingAfter reading Abrams’s The Mirror and the Lamp, I was eager to read more works by him. As our library had Natural Supernaturalism available, I borrowed the book a few months ago, but only got around ... Read full review
Contents
ONE This Is Our High Argument | 17 |
TWO Wordsworths Prelude and | 71 |
Pilgrims | 141 |
Through | 197 |
From Blake | 253 |
SIX Revelation Revolution Imagination | 255 |
Eliot Lawrence | 313 |
The New Earth and | 373 |
Moments | 385 |
Some Parallels in Spiritual | 399 |
Romantic | 409 |
In the Preface to The Excursion | 465 |
Common terms and phrases
achieved alien beauty become beginning Biblical Blake Book of Revelation called Christian Coleridge common complete concept condition consciousness course creation death describes divided divine division earlier early earth educational eternal evil existence experience fact fall feel figure freedom heart heaven Hegel higher hope human idea imagination individual journey knowledge later Letters lines living London look lost man's mankind marriage means Milton mind moral moves nature object once opening opposition original paradise passage perfect philosophy poem poet poetic poetry Prelude present progress Prospectus reason relation represented Revelation Romantic says sense separate Shelley Shelley's soul spirit stage suffering things thou thought tion traditional truth turn union unity universal vision vols whole Wordsworth writings York