Romantic Poets Wordsworth and Leopardi: A Comparative Analysis and Dickens' Oliver Twist, Dispense di Inglese

Scarica Romantic Poets Wordsworth and Leopardi: A Comparative Analysis and Dickens' Oliver Twist e più Dispense in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! WILLIAM WORDSWORTH He was born in Cumbria and he studied at Cambridge University. Then he met Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the two became friends and this freindship would prove to be crucial for the development of English Romantic Poetry. The two men worked together on the Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poems mostly by Wordsworth with just four by Coleridge. Then a second edition including a Preface, in which Wordworth clarified the two poets' conception of the principles of poetry. This Preface is considered to be the Manifesto of English Romantic Poetry. Wordsworth wrote an impressive number of poems, including short works based on nature, narrative poetry and longer, meditative works. The vast Prelude, 13 books, is an autobiographical work, describing the development of his ideas and his poetry as well as his changing political attitudes. Wordsworth is considered one of the first English Romantics as he emphasises the importance of feelings. He believed that poetry should be written in the natural language of common speech and rejected the elaborate and refined forms. His focus was on simple country people and natural scenes, that man could truly find himself in communion with nature. Wordsworth saw Nature as an uncontrollable force that dominated the life of man. In Wordsworth's vision of the poetic process of creation, the poet is inseparable from Nature, to which he belongs and represents his main source of inspiration, joy and emotions. Wordsworth's style is plain and easy to understand. His contents focused on the subjects of childhood, of the memory of childhood in adults. His images and metaphors mixed natural scenery and religious sentiments. I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD This poem is a perfect example of Wordsworth's theory that poetry is a recollection in tranquillity, and the work of the poet is to transform the commonplace into the extraordinary. The speaker was walking "as lonely as a cloud" when suddenly he saw a group of daffodils beside a lake and under the trees. The poet was overjoyed with the scene but didn't realise the profound implication of the experience. Use the power of imagination to change a seemingly commonplace event into an extraordinary one. LA GINESTRA O IL FIORE DEL DESERTO Nature is at the heart of the work of both poets (Wordsworth and Leopardi), their views on the subject are totally different. Leopardi is pessimistic: Nature is Mount Vesuvius (the exterminator) and men are its victims. The two poets had many ideas in common: both of them had Nature as the central theme of their work; while Wordsworth saw nature as an example to follow (he think that living in harmony with Nature helps men to live in harmony with others), Leopardi saw nature as the worst enemy of man. SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE He was born in Devon and he studied at Cambridge University in Jesus College. He married Sarah Fricker and they moved to a cottage in the countryside near Bristol. This became a meeting place for friends like William Wordsworth. The two men published the Lyrical Ballads with the very important contribution of Coleridge's masterpiece "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner". In the same year he moved to London and he also published "Christabel" and "kubla Khan." All three poems are based on a fantastic vision of the mysterious, supernatural and exotic. "Christabel" offers a nightmare situation with a remote medieval setting, full of mistery and force of evil. "Kubla Khan" takes poetry into a distant oriental setting with all the magic of Coleridge's imagination. "The Ancient Mariner" presents the Mariner with visions after he kills the albatross, composed with the style and meter of old ballads. THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER An ancient Mariner stopped a wedding-guest and starts to tell him the history of the killing of the albatross. The annoyed wedding-guest try to go away but the ancient Mariner, with a sort of hypnotism by his eyes, doesn't allowed him to do it and starts with the narration: "the ship was sailing to line when a storm hit it and the wind took it away from the sea lane to the South-Pole. The mariners were worried about the stormy sea, until they saw an albatross flying in the sky. They considered him such as a sign of God. The natural elements begin to help the crew who returned to the sea lane, but the ancient Mariner killed the albatross. The crew hang the albatross around his neck as a punishment; then a skeleton ship appears with a ghostly crew. The Mariner will be punished but will not die while the crew die around him. He blesses water creatures and the albatross falls from his neck, and the ship, with ghostly crew, returns to home port." The Mariner is saved but he must stopped a person and he will recount him his tale. The wedding-guest misses the wedding ceremony but he is changed by listening the Mariner's tale. This is a narrative poem, in archaic ballad form. It is divided into seven parts introduced by a short summary of the story. Coleridge uses the ballad form to reflect the Romantics' interest in the Medieval past and the traditional theme of supernatural events. The stanzas vary in lenght, usually four or six lines; the meter is an alternation of ABAB. The poem is rich in sound effects, internal rhyme, alliterations, archaic words, similes and personification. There is a constant combination of ordinary experience and supernatural events in an alternation of the real and the unreal. The poem is a study of guilt, suffering and expiation. On a religious level, we can see the killing of the albatross as a sign against Nature and God. On an artistic level, the Mariner is an artist who moves beyond the world of everyday experience into a terrifying reality of the fantastic and supernatural. ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON He was born in Edinburgh and he studied at Edinburgh University to become an engineer because his father wanted that but he understood that this wasn't his future. He spent four years travelling in Europe and wrote essays about his experiences; then he continued to write and produced some of his most famous works: Treasure Island, A Child's Garden of Verses and The Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. THE STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE Good and evil are presented in the story's protagonist, a man with two identities. His name is Dr Jekyll, who escapes from his moral identity with a potion that transforms him into the irrational, evil Mr Hyde. Hyde is responsible for a series of crimes but escapes detection as a second dose of the potion transforms jekyll's monstrous other self back into the doctor. This horror story ends with the suicide of Hyde, who can no longer escape justice, and with the discovery of a letter written by Dr Jekyll to his friend Utterson, which finally reveals the mistery of the double identity. Dr Jekyll appears to be the embodiment of the respectable Victorian gentleman: he is reserved, formal and physically is a pleasant man. Hyde, on the other hand, is the embodiment of the uncivilised part of humanity: he is small and so ugly. Taken alone, the two characters don't appear very interesting, but the two are one single character; in fact, Hyde is Jekyll's secret alter ego. It is Jekyll who 'creates' Mr Hyde, who is his secret nature and in the end, it is Hyde who take over. The character's duality can be considered as a critique of Victorian morals. The dual relationship between Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde seems to be a refernce to the literary theory called "doppelganger". It's a German term, literally meaning "look alike", refers to the protagonist's 'alter ego', who can be good or evil and negative. The story takes inspiration from aspects of the Gothic tradition; Stevenson offers an accurate analysis of man's psychological and moral nature. The setting is London and most of the action occurs at night because that is the time when Hyde operates. Night and fog are symbols of obscurity, symbolising Dr Jekyll's dark side. Dr Jekyll's house has a symbolic meaning, representing the duality of his owner. The passageway leading to jekyll's laboratory is a passage between two worlds: the world of respctability and the world of evil. OSCAR WILDE Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin,Ireland. He was immediately recognised as a brilliant student. He left for London where he composed poetry and he left for a tour in America. In 1888 he published The Happy Prince and Other Tales. Two years later he published his olny novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. PLOT It tells the story of a rich, beautiful young man who has his portrait, considered a masterpiece. At painter's studio Dorian meets Lord Henry Wotton. Lord Henry talks bout the importance of youth and beauty. Under Lord Henry's influence, Dorian leads a life of pleasure, crime e corruption. His scandalous lifestyle is hidden by the fact that he remains young and beautiful, while the image in the portrait becomes old, with all the signs of Dorian's sins. At the end of the story, Dorian stabs the portrait. Dorian is found dead, now trasformed into a horrible old man beside the portrait, which has returned to its original beuty. THEME The novel proclaimed beauty as the unique purpose of art and life. It does teach a moral lesson in the end, as Dorian's sins lead to his destruction. His appearence remains beautiful and innocent, but he is not beutiful inside. Dorian's double life is only a sign of his hypocrisy and he uses his appearence to be accepted in society. The novel is like a mix of supernatural elements of the Gothic novel with French decadent fiction. The main symbolic element is the portrait, which represents Dorian's real self. ALL ART IS QUITE USELESS The point he was trying to make is that art, on its own, has no value. Art has value because we give it value, and we give it value because of what it does to us. Art is a reflection of the artist, which is why the artist creates the art, but we like looking at it because what we see in it is something that reflects ourselves in some way. Art is useless because its aim is simply to create a mood. It is not meant to instruct, or to influence action in any way. DORIAN GRAY KILLS DORIAN GRAY In this passage the character's mood is quite bad. He is thinking about his mistakes and his sins. He doesn't blame himself for killing the painter but he blames his beauty. Perhaps a redemption would have made the picture look stunning again, so he decides to check it out. When he finds out the picture is still horrible, he reacts desperately and tries to identify the causes which brought him to that life; then, he stabs it and dies. Suddenly, the picture looks as perfect as it was when the painter painted it and Dorian looks like the man who was in the picture before he stabbed it. The character needs to be punished for his sins; he didn't do anything to change his life, so the picture doesn't change as well. Dorian kills himself in the picture just to eliminate all the evidences which reminded him his life. The portrait symbolizes the physical aspect of Dorian's soul. THE AGE OF ANXIETY HISTORICAL AND SOCIAL BACKGROUND The death of Queen Victoria marked the end of a long era of stability. The first half of the 20th century would see internal social, economic and poltical tensions in Ireland. Edward VII succeeded his mother Victoria. During his mother's long reign he had been excluded from political power and had enjoyed a life of leisure. As king he modernised the fleet and the army and became a popular public figure. His short reignis known as the Edwardian Age and saw significant changes in society, including the rise of socialism. THE SUFFRAGETTES The general elections in 1906 see victory of the Liberal Party. Only 60% of adult men had the right to vote and no women could vote. A woman's destiny was still to marry young, stay at home and have children. The Women's Social and Political Union was formed in Manchester by a small group of women, known as "suffragettes". Women demanded the right to vote and to take part i the democratic process. Women finally escaped from their domestic confines and started to work in agriculture, transport and industry to support the war. After the war, The Representation of the People Act of 1918 finally granted voting rights to all women over 30 who were property owners. Ten years later to all women over 21. THE GREAT DEPRESSION AND CRISIS After the First World War Britain fell into economic and industrial decline. The owners of the mines tried to solve the problem by reducing the worker's pay and increasing their working hours, but Britain and the rest of Europe were also hit by the Great Depression which followed the Wall Street Crash. The United States reacted to the Depression by putting up barriers to stop imports of foreign goods. About 3 million men in Britain were unemployed, mainly where the industry had not modernised after the war. THE SECOND WORLD WAR In Britain the Prime Minister, Chamberlain, was reluctant to involve the nation in another war and didn't react to the German annexation of Austria. The German invasion of Poland finally pushed the Prime Minister into action and Britain declared war on Germany. The war saw the allied powers(France and Britain) vs the Axis powers(Germany, Italy and Japan). Germany invaded Norway and Denmark and then the Prime Minister Chamberlain was replaced by Winston Churchill. France surrended to Germany and Britain alone faced Axis powers. British cities were subjected to regular night-time bombing. After another long war, the Allies finally take victoy in Europe in 1945, followed by victory in Japan with the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. More than 60,000 people were killed in the "Blitz"(German bombing raids on Britain). Then the Nazis decided to rid Europe of all Jews. The Shoah, also termed Holocaust, was the systematic killing of 6 million Jewish men. There was the creation of death camps, where gas were used to exterminate large groups of victims at a time. THE WAR POETS They wrote poems in which the war is described as a terrible experience about death, suffering and alienation. The key figures war poetry were Rupert Brooke, Siegfried Sassoon. RUPERT BROOKE Brooke didn't have a long experience of war. In fact, his poetry hasn't the elements of tragedy: the soldier's experience was seen by Brooke as a sacrifice for the nation and war is glorified as a triumph of patriotism and heroism. Critics have underline the fact that his poetry is sometimes too sentimental and superficial. THE SOLDIER The poet is a soldier speaking to a person from his family. The poem presents the themes of war and patriotism. The poet will be proud to die for England, his mother country. The poem was written at the beginning of the war(I). Brooke die beacuse of poisoning: he didn't die at war and so didn't have time to see the horrors of fighting in the trenches. The use of alliterations and enjambements makes the rhythm of the poem flowing. The tone is patriotic and nostalgic. SIEGFRIED SASSOON His war poems used simple language but were always characterised by the perfect control of meter and rhyme. Many criticised him for his absence of patriotism and violence of his poems, while others bought his books because they saw that Sassoon captured the true feelings of soldiers. SUICIDE IN THE TRENCHES Protagonist of this poem is a young boy who decides to suicide by shooting himself in the head. The work is composed of three stanzas of four lines each. The mood of the soldier is described as cowed and glum, in fact the boy was unhappy and desperate, in very bad hygienic conditions. Then, the poet underlines the lack of rum and describes as rum was the "best friend" of soldiers; it is a sort of instrument very important for soldiers to forget the horrible moments and images of the war. The last stanza is a criticism of who was happy to see the soldiers go to war to defend the homeland. JOSEPH CONRAD He was born in Poland. As a seaman he travelled a lot and this nomadic life on the sea was his main source of inspiration for his books. His stories about colonialist adventure present philosophical depth in their reflections on truth and falsehood. His use of multiple narrators and points of view reflected the complexity of human experience and the difficulty of judging men's actions. HEART OF DARKNESS It’s a story in which the main character is Marlow, a sailor that works for a British company that involve the ivory trade with Africa. The novel opens in London, where Marlow starts telling the other men on the boat about the journey in the Belgian Congo in search of a man called Kurtz. The journey is an occasion for Marlow to see the brutality of European imperialism in Africa. When Marlow reaches Kurtz he discovers he is seriously ill, but doesn't want to go back to Europe to be cured; Kurtz became an idol for the native and became also a cannibal. When finally Marlow take him on board, he died and in that moment he said “The horror! The horror!”, simbolising Marlow and more generally, the European imperialism. This novel is a representation of the brutality of European colonisation in Africa. Set in the Belgian Congo, the novel describes the cruelty of the colonisers. The novel makes it so clear that colonisation has a double effect: it affects the natives, dehumanised by the colonisers, and the colonisers, whose are corrupted by the desire to use their power to submitt the others. Heart of Darkness is based on the contrast between "darkness" and "whiteness". "Darkness" can refer to Africa and its regions, to the obscurity of the 'heart' of Western colonisers and to the mistery of the human soul. "Whiteness" refers to Europe and to its civility, and to the colour of ivory, which represents the main object of desire of white men in Africa. The novel can be read as a moral story or as an allegory of colonisation; but it is criticised for reflecting the dominant image of Africa in the western imagination. The story has two narrators: one is an anonymous passenger on the ship where Marlow starts telling his story: this narrator is called "frame narrator" because his narration includes the total story. The other one is Marlow himself, who tells the story from his personal point of view. JAMES JOYCE He was born in Dublin; he studied at University College, where he also started writing literary articles. For Joyce Ireland was his main source of inspiration: in all of his works Joyce draw inspiration from Irish people and places, which he portrayed with realism and attention. DUBLINERS Dubliners is a collection of 15 short stories, which revolve around the lives of 15 typical inhabitants of the city of Dublin and represent an ideal of that. The stories can be divided into three main groups: The first three stories treat the theme of chilhood with a sense of failure. Second group treats the theme of adulthood: Eveline is the first story about this sub-section and treats the impossibility to escape from suffering and the passivity of Irish people. The last group of stories portrays the relationship between Irish individuals and collective institutions, such as politics. The last story is entitled The Dead and it is a portrait of the Irish middle class. The protagonist is Gabriel Conroy, the classic protoype of Irish middle-class man, so he is an individual who lives his life like a dead person. One of the major themes is the city of Dublin. The city is a static and provincial town and its inhabitants are represented as being imprisoned in a city that does not give them the chance to grow. All the characters have a desire: they try to get to them ambitions overcoming all the obstacles, but they will surrend because they don' t have the power to transform their desire into action. This condition is defined "paralysis", that it means spiritual and physical death. The only potential way to escape is epiphany, that it means "revelation" and manifestation. The stories are based on the rejection of the Victorian idea of the third-person omniscent narrator and each of the stories is narrrated from the point of view of one of the characters. ULYSSES This is a long and complex novel set in Dublin on one single day. Its 18 episodes narrate the actions of three characters: Stephen Dedalus is the protagonist of the first three episodes, grouped as part I: "The Telemachiad". The next main section is called "The Odyssey" and the protagonist is Leopold Bloom. Finally, the third section, called "Nostos", brings Leopold back home to his loving wife Molly. The section ends with Molly's monologue, saying with the affirmation of love. Ulysses is an epic novel which offers different visions of daily life, political discussion and reflection on the human condition. One of the most features is its narrative style, which represents the triumph of one of the most interesting techinques of Modernist writing: the "stream of consciousness". The "stream of conscoiusness" was used by Modernist writers using direct interior monologue or indirect interior monologue, which differ from each other because they use a different kind of narrator. The first use the 1st-person point of view and here the punctation is abolished beacuse it represents a way to control and organise the characters' thoughts. The second shows the workings of the mind of a character using 3rd-person omniscent narrator, who controls the flux of thoughts and uses punctation to organise the story in a