American Romanticism

TASK ONE/TWO:

+--Rip Van Winkle--+

1) In Rip Van Winkle there are dozens of evident examples of Romanticism. The first one I came across was the landscape itself; the peaceful, quiet, farming village, the vividly colorful mountains beyond the village, and even the forests around the village. These are all very pure and nature-oriented, a big difference from when America was being industrialized; when pollution and machinery were swallowing the land and blinding the sky.

"Every change of season, every change of weather, indeed every hour of the day, produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains..."

2) Every character in the story provides me with some evidence of Romanticism. The most prominent example I noticed was that of the Innkeeper, who was described as being silent but perfectly understood by his comrades.

"It was true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however, (for every great man has his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his opinions." (Then Irving describes how he smokes his pipe differently to convey different emotions.)

3) When Rip leaves his house (to escape from his demanding wife) he enters the forest to calm his nerves. This is a perfect example of Romanticism because the main character leaves all his troubles behind and escapes to a pure nature setting.

"...his only alternative, to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his wife, was to take gun in hand and stroll away into the woods. Here he would sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree..."

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TASK THREE:

+--Thanatopsis--+

The foremost Romantic aspect of the poem that I noticed was how Bryant personifies nature and death as living entities, giving them humanistic qualities such as voices. This is the first suggestion he gives in his attempt to convince the reader not to fear death or nature but to hold them in appreciation.
From here, Bryant focuses mostly on the concept of death, as the title of the poem suggests he would. He describes a person's life as being nurtured by the Earth. Once the person dies, they would then be absorbed back into the Earth and become Earth itself. Nature, then, is our grave marker.

"The vernal woods--rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and pour'd round all,
Old ocean's grey and melancholy waste,--
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man."

Lastly, Bryant puts much detail into expressing how you should feel comforted in nature and in death. He describes how death is not a lone, toiling journey into darkness but a relaxing slumber in which you wake surrounded by many people.

"Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but sustain'd and sooth'd
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."

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TASK FOUR:

+--The Ropewalk--+

The Ropewalk is a perfect example of Romanticism because it carries out a scenario in which a worker is escaping to his thoughts as he works. He uses his imagination to guide him in his daydreams. In the quote below, the worker is comparing his composition of thought to the wheel spinning in the rope factory.

"While within this brain of mine
Cobwebs brighter and more fine
By the busy wheel are spun."

In the rest of the poem, he describes scenes in his head of people performing tasks or having fun. He uses descriptive and clever words in order to maintain the charm and magic of the poem. This is exactly what Romantics would call Romantic.

"And a woman with bare arms
Drawing water from a well;
As the bucket mounts apace,
With it mounts her own fair face,
As at some magician's spell."

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TASK FIVE:

+--Romantic Art--+

Well, most obviously Romantic in the painting are the colors and nature. The lavender mountains in the backdrop, the deep reds and oranges of the vast, swirling sky, The red of the river reflected by the sky, and the trees scattered in the foreground. This painting leaves it up to your imagination to interpret its meaning, which is a Romantic quality. Simply the fact that it's pure nature with no sort of industry involved is a Romantic aspect.
I chose this piece (which I obtained from Google Images) because I feel that forests are part of the epitome of Romanticism. Being in nature is very important to them. I especially like this painting because it depicts a man-made path (but notice not a cement or tar one) leading off to a brighter part of the forest. This, to me, symbolizes growth, or moving on, to better times.