Characteristics of Romanticism.ppt

* Characteristics of? ROMANTICISM? Fascination by the unknown - mystery - power of evil, struggle against evil mystical powers - Frankenstein Fascinated by long ago and far away - heroic – “Aida” Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 1797-1851 When Mary is sixteen she meets the young poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, a devotee of her fathers teachings. Together with Marys stepsister, they run off to continental Europe several times, not hindered by the fact that Shelley was already married. In 1816, they go abroad again, this time spending time with Byron and his friend Polidori in Geneva. There Byron suggests that they should all write a ghost story. Mary writes Frankenstein, the only story of the four that was ever to be published as a novel. Later that same year, Percys wife drowns herself: Percy and Mary marry in December 1816. 1820 – Ampere wrote “Laws of the Electrodynamic Action” 1821 – Faraday discovers fundamentals of electromagnetic rotation Wheatstone demonstrates sound reproduction Referred to by Mary Shelley: Paracelsus aka Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim 1493-1541 Paracelsus was a German physician and chemist who claimed diseases are caused by agents that were external to the body and that they could be countered by chemical substances. He defied the belief of the so-called Scolastics, that diseases were caused by an imbalance of bodily humors or fluids, and that they would be cured by bloodletting and purging.  “She has replaced the heavenly fire of the Prometheus myth with the spark of newly discovered electricity. The concepts of electricity and warmth led to the discovery of the galvanisation process, which was said to be the key to the animation of life. Indeed, it is this process which animates Frankensteins monster.” http://home-1.worldonline.nl/~hamberg/ For good reason, the novelist chose not to begin her story with the chilling event of the dreary night in November. Who, in 1818, would have read such an improbable story? Instead of t