Module Information

This module complements and deepens the study of texts from the Romantic period on the Nineteenth-Century Literature Core module. It introduces students to significant canonical works and to some of the less well known literary productions of the age. Its focus raises central questions regarding the nature of literary responses to the social, political and scientific developments of a revolutionary era.

This module explores the dramatic visionary nature of the Romantic Imagination, focusing on a series of highly charged canonical and non-canonical texts (poetry, prose and verse-drama) and on visual images. It highlights the mythic, monstrous, violent, apocalyptic, hallucinatory and prophetic forms adopted by Romantic writers as they sought to represent the self, revolution, history, the end of history, evil, redemption and scientific discovery. The module asks students to consider such issues as: What constitutes the 'visionary' and the visionary tradition? How is this mode enlisted to 'reimagine' history? Is it private or public, transgressive or reactionary? What compelled the Romantics to construct new heavens and new hells? How did these authors articulate utopian dreams and terrifying nightmares? How do narcotics energise the Romantic Imagination? This module combines close attention to literary form, language and modes/models of representation with socio-political contextualisation in order to access the surreal and dangerous worlds of the Romantics.