Question

What did the adherents of romanticism object to about the Enlightenment?

Answer 1

Adherents of Romanticism rejected the Enlightenment's focus on rationalism, empiricism, and its classical formalism, emphasizing instead emotion, freedom, and individual imagination.

Step-by-step explanation:

Objections of Romanticism to Enlightenment

The adherents of Romanticism objected to the Enlightenment due to its focus on rationalism, empirical evidence, and classical formalism. Romanticism emerged as a response to the scientific rationalization of nature and aristocratic social norms that were influenced by the Enlightenment. This movement emphasized emotion, freedom, and individual imagination, opposing the Enlightenment's values of logic, reason, and objectivity. Romanticism placed high value on nature, nostalgia for the past, and the achievements of individuals, countering the Enlightenment's deterministic view of the universe with a celebration of the awe-inspiring and uncontrollable forces of nature through art.

Artists like Caspar David Friedrich and writers such as Victor Hugo epitomized the Romantic spirit by focusing on individuality and freedom, as well as promoting a direct, emotional connection to the natural world, which stood in sharp contrast to the Enlightenment's admiration for controlled, classical forms and societal conventions.

Answer 2

Romanticism was a revolt against the aristocratic social and political norms of the Age of Enlightenment and also a reaction against the scientific rationalization of nature. Romanticism legitimized the individual imagination as a critical authority, which permitted freedom from classical notions of form in art.