Romanticism to Modernism in Poetry

In the wake of the French Revolution, Wordsworth and Coleridge invented a new kind of autobiographical poem that largely internalized the myths that they inherited. We will trace the impact of their innovation on a sequence of poets from the second generation of Romantics to modernists such as T. S. Eliot, who loudly rejected their Romantic legacy. In doing so, we will attempt to make some sense (at least in relation to poetic tradition) of the terms “Romanticism” and “modernism.” But our most important goal will be to appreciate each poet’s—indeed, each poem’s—unique contribution to the language. Our understanding of literary influence and historical trends will emerge from our close, imaginative reading of texts. Authors will include: Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, P. B. Shelley, Keats, Whitman, Dickinson, Hardy, Yeats, and T. S. Eliot, among others.