Romantic

Characteristics: cultivation of sensibility, emotion, or passion, a revived interest in and appreciation of Christianity, relish of medievalism, tragic hero, appreciation of nature

Major Themes: evocation or criticism of the past, the cult of "sensibility" with its emphasis on women and children, the heroic isolation of the artist or narrator, and respect for a new, wilder, untrammeled and "pure" nature, nationalism

Style: emphasis on intuition, imagination, feeling

Lit. Devices: motifs, imagery, metaphysical discontent, religious and philosophical allusions

Writers: Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, William Wordsworth, Samuel Coleridge, Lord Byron, John Keats, William Blake

Poem: A Mathematical Problem (in a letter to his brother)

This is now--this was erst,
Proposition the first--and Problem the first.

I

On a given finite Line
Which must no way incline;
To describe an equi--
--lateral Tri--
--A, N, G, L, E.
Now let A. B.
Be the given line
Which must no way incline;
The great Mathematician
Makes this Requisition,
That we describe an Equi--
--lateral Tri--
--angle on it:
Aid us, Reason--aid us, Wit!

II

From the centre A. at the distance A. B.
Describe the circle B. C. D.
At the distance B. A. from B. the centre
The round A. C. E. to describe boldly venture.
(Third Postulate see.)
And from the point C.
In which the circles make a pother
Cutting and slashing one another,
Bid the straight lines a journeying go,
C. A., C. B. those lines will show.
To the points, which by A. B. are reckon'd,
And postulate the second
For Authority ye know.
A. B. C.
Triumphant shall be
An Equilateral Triangle,
Not Peter Pindar carp, not Zoilus can wrangle.

III

Because the point A. is the centre
Of the circular B. C. D.
And because the point B. is the centre
Of the circular A. C. E.
A. C. to A. B. and B. C. to B. A.
Harmoniously equal for ever must stay;
Then C. A. and B. C.
Both extend the kind hand
To the basis, A. B.
Unambitiously join'd in Equality's Band.
But to the same powers, when two powers are equal,
My mind forbodes the sequel;
My mind does some celestial impulse teach,
And equalises each to each.
Thus C. A. with B. C. strikes the same sure alliance,
That C. A. and B. C. had with A. B. before;
And in mutual affiance,
None attempting to soar
Above another,
The unanimous three
C. A. and B. C. and A. B.
All are equal, each to his brother,
Preserving the balance of power so true:
Ah! the like would the proud Autocratorix do!
At taxes impending not Britain would tremble,
Nor Prussia struggle her fear to dissemble;
Nor the Mah'met-sprung Wight,
The great Mussulman
Would stain his Divan
With Urine the soft-flowing daughter of Fright.

IV

But rein your stallion in, too daring Nine!
Should Empires bloat the scientific line?
Or with dishevell'd hair all madly do ye run
For transport that your task is done?
For done it is--the cause is tried!
And Proposition, gentle Maid,
Who soothly ask'd stern Demonstration's aid,
Has prov'd her right, and A. B. C.
Of Angles three
Is shown to be of equal side;
And now our weary steed to rest in fine,
'Tis rais'd upon A. B. the straight, the given line.

Modern

Characteristics: a revolutionary force, questioning what came before, anti-Romantic, subjective meaning, alienation from society, loneliness, procrastination (an inability to act), agonized recollection of the past, fear of death, the appearance of death, inability to feel or express love, world as a wasteland (poor environmental portrayal), man creating his own myths within his mind to fall back upon, sees world as fragmented

Major Themes: technology, violence and alienation, historical discontinuity, decadence and decay, loss and despair, rejection of history, race relations, unavoidable change, sense of place, local color

Styles: relied especially heavily on advances in narrative technique (narration is the essential building block of all literature), riddle/labyrinth-like, poems didn't always have to have a meaning

Lit. Devices: footnotes, allusions (Bible, myth, foreign languages, street life, and personal)

Authors: Wallace Stevens, William Carlos Williams, Hilda Doolittle, T.S. Eliot, Marianne Moore, E. E. Cummings

Poem: Jehovah Buried, Satan Dead

E. E. Cummings

Jehovah buried,Satan dead,
do fearers worship Much and Quick;
badness not being felt as bad,
itself thinks goodness what is meek;
obey says toc, submit says tic,
Eternity's a Five Year Plan:
if Joy with Pain shall hand in hock
who dares to call himself a man?

go dreamless knaves on Shadows fed,
your Harry's Tom,your Tom is Dick;
while Gadgets murder squack and add,
the cult of Same is all the chic;
by instruments,both span and spic,
are justly measured Spic and Span:
to kiss the mike if Jew turn kike
who dares to call himself a man?

loudly for Truth have liars pled,click;
where Boobs are holy,poets mad,
illustrious punks of Progress shriek;
when Souls are outlawed,Hearts are sick,
Hearts being sick,Minds nothing can:
if Hate's a game and Love's a fuck
who dares to call himself a man?

King Christ,this world is all aleak;
and lifepreservers there are none:
and waves which only He may walk
Who dares to call Himself a man.