German Romanticism

Caspar David Friedrich, (1774–1840)
Moonrise Over The Sea, 1822, 55x71 cm

German Romanticism was the dominant intellectual movement in the philosophy, the arts, and the culture of German-speaking countries in the late-18th and early 19th centuries. Compared to English Romanticism, German Romanticism developed relatively late, and, in the early years, coincided with Weimar Classicism (1772–1805); in contrast to the seriousness of English Romanticism, the German variety of Romanticism notably valued wit, humour, and beauty.

The early German romantics strove to create a new synthesis of art, philosophy, and science, by viewing the Middle Ages (5th–15th c.) as a simpler period of integrated culture; however, the German romantics became aware of the tenuousness of the cultural unity they sought.^[1] Late-stage German Romanticism emphasized the tension between the daily world and the irrational and supernatural projections of creative genius. In particular, the critic Heinrich Heine criticized the tendency of the early German romantics for looking to the medieval past for a model of unity in art and society.^[1]

Literary and philosophical figures

Angelica Kauffman, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1787

Moritz Daniel Oppenheim Heinrich Heine, 1831, Kunsthalle Hamburg

Joseph von Eichendorff

Key figures of German romanticism include:

Composers

Richard Wagner, 1860

Ludwig van Beethoven. In his earlier works, Beethoven was a Classicist in the traditions of Mozart and Haydn (his tutor), but his Middle Period, beginning with his third symphony (the 'Eroica'), bridges the worlds of Classical and Romantic music. Because Beethoven wrote some of his greatest music after he became totally deaf, he embodies the Romantic ideal of the tragic artist who defies all odds to conquer his own fate. His later works portray the triumph of the human spirit, most notably his 'Choral' Symphony No. 9; the stirring 'Ode to Joy' from this symphony has been adopted as the anthem of the European Union.
Johannes Brahms. His works are cast in the formal moulds of Classicism; he had a profound reverence for Beethoven. Brahms was also attracted to the exoticism of Hungarian folk music, and used it in such pieces as his famous 'Hungarian Dances', the final movement of his Violin Concerto, and the 'Rondo alla zingarese' from his Piano Quartet No. 1, op. 25, in G minor.
Franz Liszt. Liszt was by nationality a Hungarian, but nevertheless he spent many years in Germany, and his first language was German. Credited as the inventor of the tone poem. In his old age, Liszt adopted a more dissonant, ominous flavour, characteristic works being 'la Lugubre Gondola' and 'Die Zelle in Nonnenwerth'—predating Impressionism and 20th-century atonality.
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. A composer of the Early Romantic period, together with such figures as Schumann, Chopin and Liszt. One of the persons responsible for reviving interest in the almost-forgotten music of Johann Sebastian Bach.
Franz Schubert. His body of work consists mainly of song cycles and German Lieder set to poems by his contemporaries, many of which are among the most common repertoire in those categories performed today.
Robert Schumann. His works recall the nostalgia of lost childhood innocence, first love, and the magnificence of the German countryside. As an influential critic, he played a major role in discovering new talents, among them Chopin and Brahms.
Richard Wagner. The greatest composer of German opera; was an exponent of Leitmotif. One of the main figures in the so-called War of the Romantics.
Carl Maria von Weber. Perhaps the very first of Romantic musicians, if we exclude Beethoven, in the sense that Weber was the first major composer to emerge wholly as a product of the Romantic school, as contrasted with Beethoven, who had started off as a Classicist. The emotional intensity and supernatural, folklore-based themes in his operas presented a radical break from the Neoclassical traditions of that time.

Visual artists

Philipp Otto Runge, Self Portrait, 1802-1803, Kunsthalle, Hamburg

Architecture

Karl Friedrich Schinkel. Project for church in Oranienburger Vorstadt, Berlin

Karl Friedrich Schinkel

References

1 2 "German literature - Encyclopedia Britannica". Britannica.com. 2012-12-07. Retrieved 2014-01-13.
↑ Vaughan (2004), 7.

External links

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Romanticism

Countries	Denmark England (literature) France (literature) Germany Norway Poland Russia (literature) Scotland

Movements	Bohemianism Counter-Enlightenment Dark romanticism Düsseldorf School Gesamtkunstwerk Gothic fiction Gothic Revival (architecture) Hudson River School Indianism Nazarene movement Ossian Romantic hero Romanticism in science Romantic nationalism Opium and Romanticism Transcendentalism Ultra-Romanticism Wallenrodism

Writers	Alencar Alfieri Andersen A. v. Arnim B. v. Arnim Azevedo Baratashvili Barbauld (Aikin) Batyushkov Baudelaire Beer Bertrand Blake Botev Brentano Bryant Burns Byron Castelo Branco Castilho Cazotte Chateaubriand Chavchavadze Clare Coleridge Cooper De Quincey Dias Dumas Eichendorff Emerson Eminescu Espronceda Fouqué Foscolo Garrett Gautier Goethe Grimm Brothers Gutzkow Hauff Hawthorne Heine Heliade Herculano Hoffmann Hölderlin Hugo Ilić Irving Jakšić Jean Paul Karadžić Karamzin Keats Kleist Krasiński Lamartine Larra Leopardi Lermontov Mácha Magalhães Malczewski Manzoni Maturin Mickiewicz Musset Nerval Nodier Norwid Novalis Oehlenschläger Orbeliani Poe Polidori Potocki Prešeren Pushkin Schiller Schwab Scott Seward M. Shelley P. B. Shelley Shevchenko Słowacki De Staël Stendhal Tieck Uhland Vörösmarty Wordsworth Zhukovsky Zorrilla

Music	Adam Alkan Auber Beethoven Bellini Bennett Berlioz Bertin Berwald Chopin Félicien David Ferdinand David Donizetti Field Franck Franz Glinka Gomis Halévy Kalkbrenner Liszt Loewe Marschner Masarnau Méhul Fanny Mendelssohn Felix Mendelssohn Méreaux Meyerbeer Moniuszko Moscheles Niedermeyer Onslow Paganini Prudent Reicha Rossini Rubinstein Schubert Clara Schumann Robert Schumann Smetana Sor Spohr Spontini Thalberg Verdi Voříšek Wagner Weber

Theologians and philosophers	Chaadayev Coleridge Feuerbach Fichte Goethe Hegel Müller Ritschl Rousseau Schiller A. Schlegel F. Schlegel Schopenhauer Schleiermacher Tieck Wackenroder

Visual artists	Aivazovsky Bierstadt Blake Bonington Bryullov Chassériau Church Constable Cole Corot Dahl David d'Angers Delacroix Friedrich Fuseli Géricault Girodet Głowacki Goya Gude Hayez Janmot Jones Kiprensky Koch Lampi Leutze Loutherbourg Maison Martin Michałowski Palmer Porto-Alegre Préault Révoil Richard Rude Runge Saleh Scheffer Stattler Stroj Tidemand Tropinin Turner Veit Ward Wiertz

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