incorporating romanticism and romance in writing

When one thinks of romance, their minds often wander to tales of love and war, instances of unrequited love, the consummation of life, or the occasional sacrifice in the pursuit of true love’s kiss. While romanticism falls along these lines, it is not only centered in our traditional view of love. Romanticism describes the late 18th century artistic and literary movement that sought to romance or emphasize the beauty in individualism and everyday life. In literature, writers and poets reached far into the depths of nature and seclusion itself, to expose the majesty of spirituality, nature, and human emotion. Its most profound effect was its focus on love and imagination. Arriving hotly on the coattails of the Neoclassism, Romanticism established itself in opposition to the ordinary. Though we are far ahead of the 1850s, romance and the personification of the divine remain prevalent in today’s time.

Though there is debate on the components of romanticism, they focus mainly on celebrating nature, individuality and spirituality, and a focus on melancholy and isolation 

Romanticism through nature is based heavily on imagery and personification. When nature is romanticized, the everything from the way leaves break from branches and fall to the soil, to the beaming rays of the sun, are lauded as if they were living, breathing beings. A great interpretation of this can be seen Percy Shelley’s “Ode to the West Wind”:

“O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, 

Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead 

Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing”

Here, nature is seen as a living unit, where life can be sourced just as it is lost. Successful romanticism can not only elevate a story but add nuance to the description of the everyday thing. 

Edgar Allen Poe is famous for playing along the components of spirituality and melancholy. The idea of spirituality existing not only in heaven but also in the mind, made his interpretation of romanticism provocative and unsettling at its core. Romanticism can be used to express a varying degree of emotions and can be successfully incorporated by sensationalizing the feeling of being in a particular moment. His most famous poem, “The Raven” switches between the protagonist’s beauty of a personal experience and mental health, to the loveliness of being alone in his mental illness:

“Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,”

Sensationalization lies in the inclusion of anguish. When a character seeks to reach an idealized version of something, whether light or wind or leaves, they are thrown into despair, almost like the feeling of destitution after losing a loved one. A great way to look at romanticism is to romanticize the object of your focus. Describe the subject of your piece like you would a lover and personify the aspects of said thing with the intent of reaching its love. In the passage above, the darkness is the object of his love, and when the protagonist projects its feelings upon it, they are met with silence. While love is not the only emotion you can project, it is the most common one.

Romance is in the air. It is in the leaves and the trees. It can even be in the rain that falls from the sky. Capture it, hold it in your grasp, and write on the way it makes you feel.

Juliana Anuakpado is a Spring 2022 Editorial Intern.