The Mind of the European Romantics

by H.G. Schenk

'Ideas can be, and are, cosmopolitan,' Chateubriand observed; and certainly the scope of the nighteenth-century Romantic Movement was the widest imaginable: it not only affected all parts of Europe but even, to a lesser extent, the Americas. This book provides a comprehensive study of this Movement - in literature, painting, music, philosophy, religion, and other fields - and a detailed interpretation of all its main issues: intellectual, emotional, social and historical.
The initial revolt against the ideas of the eighteenth century is first seen in the larger context of history, and particular Romantic ideas and sentiments are then illustrated and anatomized in pen portraits of individual Romantics. In this way the successive phases of the beliefs of such key figures as Schelling, Coleridge and Lammenais - indispensable to any acount of the Movement - are carefully documented.

Genres: History, Philosophy, Romanticism

303 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1979

Reviews

[Mike]

An older book that I first read for an intellectual history course in college which I still pick up periodically to get an overview of some of the key thinkers and actors in the Romantic movement. These were some crazy dudes back then reacting to the ideas of the enlightenment. Does anyone still concern themselves with romanticism nowadays? There are traces of it still alive I suppose but who thinks back to the source.

[Mark Lisac]

Perhaps too much concentration on selected trees and not enough on the forest. Besides, Schenk may have invested too much in the notion of Romanticism as a response to a crisis of religious faith, as Isaiah Berlin noted in his preface. Would not call Schenk's book comprehensive, either as a study of 19th-century Romanticism or as a survey of broad trends of 19th-century thought and art. Still, it's an interesting and deeply researched view of a major movement in European intellectual history and one that illuminates corners otherwise generally ignored.
Schenk could not have anticipated in 1966 the extent to which the intellectual currents he was studying seem to be reflected in a broad stream of 21st-century politics: a revolt against reason, science, broad authority, and the notions of equality and progress, all summarized in what Schenk calls "the eruption of the irrational." In that respect, Romanticism would seem to be one outburst of a more fundamental and permanent impulse.
A couple of references to women apparently did not clank as loudly in academic and publishing offices as they would today. At one point, Schenk cites the passionate nature of Wagner's music and comments: "Naturally, young people and women were particularly susceptible."
The 1969 Doubleday/Anchor edition that I read had better cover art than the only edition now shown in Goodreads.

[Jacob Birken]

Useful if you want to read a rather condensed, witty overview of euro Romanticism, less useful if you're looking for any theoretical insight / historical analysis beyond the author's interpretation of the Romantics being depressed because they didn't find God / found God in the wrong way

[Marc Lamot]

Very beautiful introduction into the Romantic period. The author has done his home work very profoundly. Perhaps a bit outdated now.