#CfP for the #conference "The Veneto region in European #Romanticism: places, #images, sounds and #narratives", which will take place at the University of Verona on November 6-8, 2024.
Byron’s poem ☝️ borrows from the Scottish song “The Jolly Beggar”—often attributed to King James V (who reputedly liked to disguise himself as “the Gudeman of Ballangeich” to enjoy amorous adventures)
“No Englishman of Byron’s age, character, and history would have had patience for long theological discussions on the way to fight for Greece; but the daft Gordon blood and the Aberdonian school-days kept their influence to the end.”
—Robert Louis Stevenson, MEMORIES & PORTRAITS – available on @gutenberg_org
I believe in Americanity,
sacred religion of democracy
sung by mad troubadours of city streets
who lounge in the grass on the river shore
and ride with Death in the carriage of faith
sea to shining sea in the
The traveler who maps the signless road
across the wilderness of windy hope
lifts up their eyes to know the world is wide
with beauty of the ideal scene through hype
because they know no land is theirs to claim,
#CfP for the 2024 #GSA (#TheGSA) #panel “War, #Romanticism, and the End of the Nation State ('Germany Must Perish!' pt. 2)”, which will take place in Atlanta on September 26-29, 2024.
"The Interior of the Palm House," Carl Blechen, 1832/33.
Blechen (1798-1840) was a noted painter of Romantic landscapes. This painting was a special commission by Frederick William III of Prussia, and the setting is a real one, the Palm House at the royal retreat of Pfaueninsel, an island near Potsdam. The Palm House was a lavish conservatory (burned down in 1880) that was quite a sight to see, if this is any indication.
Blechen did two versions; another view, hanging in the Art Institute of Chicago, was given to Frederick's daughter, who had married Nichola I of Russia.
This is a lavish example of Romantic Orientalism, with the palms, the architecture, even the harem girls lounging on the floor.
"[My anger] grew both day and night,
Till it bore an apple bright.
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine.
And into my garden stole,
When the night had veild the pole;
In the morning glad I see
My foe outstretched beneath the tree."
Looking back on his early life in Aberdeen, Byron declared that he was ‘half a Scot by birth, & bred/A whole one’. To what extent should we privilege such a claim? In what ways did Byron engage with a Scottish poetic heritage, if at all?
—Dr Daniel Cook, “Byron’s Scottish Poetry”, The Byron Journal 50/1, 2022 (subscription/institutional access required)
2/3
"But first, on earth as vampire sent,
Thy corpse shall from its tomb be rent,
Then ghastly haunt thy native place,
And suck the blood of all thy race...."
The University of Glasgow’s Centre for Robert Burns Studies presents two virtual gatherings of experts, enthusiasts, & curious minds to explore the life & works of Robert Burns
Both events will be identical to accommodate participants from multiple timezones
#Socialism#Romanticism#Ecosocialism#WilliamMorris: "DANIEL FINN: Morris might well be seen in today’s political terminology as a pioneer of ecosocialism. How did his understanding of the processes of urbanization and industrialization that were transforming Britain and the wider world in the late nineteenth century differ from the view that was held by many of his Marxist contemporaries?
MATTHEW BEAUMONT: I think the key thing in this regard is Morris’s Romanticism. He was very much a Romantic, and he remained one. There’s a sense in which Marx himself was a Romantic, having grown up in an earlier generation in Germany that was influenced by the Romantics and written Romantic poetry in his youth. Unlike Marx, however, Morris had very little handle on economics.
He was rather baffled and intimidated by economic language and analysis, and he cleaved very closely to his Romantic affiliations, which came down from the Romantic poets through Carlyle, Ruskin, and others. This formed a kind of anti-capitalist critique that in some cases, such as that of Carlyle, took a reactionary form, though not in the case of Morris. In that entire tradition, there is an identification of nature with the precapitalist past and with some kind of alternative to capitalism." https://jacobin.com/2023/10/william-morris-ecosocialism-romanticism-labor-news-from-nowhere
New!
POEMS BY A LADY
by Helen Craik
Ed. by Rachel Mann & Patrick Scott
The #poetry of Helen Craik (1751–1825), #Gothic novelist & friend of #RobertBurns, was long thought lost. The rediscovery of her 1790 #manuscript “Poems by a Lady”, transcribed here for the first time, invites a fresh evaluation of her life & work, & adds to the critical reassessment of poetry by #Scottish women in the #Romantic era
“My interest was sparked by the circumstances – the discovery of a manuscript that had long been thought lost. Add to that the very questionable rumours surrounding Craik’s abrupt departure from Arbigland, and you’ve got yourself a plot that seems to jump out of the pages of academic fiction.”
—Rachel Mann & Patrick Scott discuss their co-edited edition of Helen Craik’s POEMS BY A LADY
My blind mother, who walks on flowing stream,
lost her eyes when she gambled with the sun
in vain attempt to save my soul from pain,
but I can only see her now in dream
holding fabric of my being she had spun
from