Difference between revisions of "Percy Bysshe Shelley"
(Shelley was not an atheist, if anything he was closer to today's "agnostic." And I have no idea what a "religion of the imagination means".) |
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'''Percy Bysshe Shelley''' was born August 4, 1792 in [[Sussex]], [[England]]. He drowned in a storm while traveling from Livorno to Lerici in his schooner on July 8, 1822. Shelley was one of six great early nineteenth century British poets later dubbed the High Romantics (the others being [[William Blake|Blake]], [[William Wordsworth|Wordsworth]], [[Samuel Taylor Coleridge|Coleridge]], [[George Gordon, Lord Byron|Byron]] and [[John Keats|Keats]].) | '''Percy Bysshe Shelley''' was born August 4, 1792 in [[Sussex]], [[England]]. He drowned in a storm while traveling from Livorno to Lerici in his schooner on July 8, 1822. Shelley was one of six great early nineteenth century British poets later dubbed the High Romantics (the others being [[William Blake|Blake]], [[William Wordsworth|Wordsworth]], [[Samuel Taylor Coleridge|Coleridge]], [[George Gordon, Lord Byron|Byron]] and [[John Keats|Keats]].) | ||
| − | Shelley was anti-religious and a skeptic his whole life and promoted a poetic program where--like [[William | + | Shelley was anti-religious and a skeptic his whole life and promoted a poetic program where--like [[William|Blake]]--the individual imagination is the sole authority on matters of truth. His play ''Prometheus Unbound'' explores his interest in a renewed imagination/creative life in the story of Prometheus. In critic Harold Bloom's reading, the plays characters Prometheus, Asia, Jupiter and Demogorgon bear resemblances to the psychic constructs of other writers including Blake, [[William Butler Yeats|Yeats]] and [[Sigmund Freud|Freud]]. <ref>(Harold Bloom, The Visionary Company: A Reading of English Romantic Poetry, Cornell University, New York 1971, p. 90-91)</ref> |
Shelley's major poems include: ''Alastor'', ''Hymn to Intellectual Beauty'', ''Mont Blanc'', ''Ode to the West Wind'', ''Prometheus Unbound'', ''The Witch of Atlas'', ''Epipsychidion'', ''Adonais'', and the ''Triumph of Life''. | Shelley's major poems include: ''Alastor'', ''Hymn to Intellectual Beauty'', ''Mont Blanc'', ''Ode to the West Wind'', ''Prometheus Unbound'', ''The Witch of Atlas'', ''Epipsychidion'', ''Adonais'', and the ''Triumph of Life''. | ||
Revision as of 12:01, December 17, 2007
Percy Bysshe Shelley was born August 4, 1792 in Sussex, England. He drowned in a storm while traveling from Livorno to Lerici in his schooner on July 8, 1822. Shelley was one of six great early nineteenth century British poets later dubbed the High Romantics (the others being Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron and Keats.)
Shelley was anti-religious and a skeptic his whole life and promoted a poetic program where--like Blake--the individual imagination is the sole authority on matters of truth. His play Prometheus Unbound explores his interest in a renewed imagination/creative life in the story of Prometheus. In critic Harold Bloom's reading, the plays characters Prometheus, Asia, Jupiter and Demogorgon bear resemblances to the psychic constructs of other writers including Blake, Yeats and Freud. [1]
Shelley's major poems include: Alastor, Hymn to Intellectual Beauty, Mont Blanc, Ode to the West Wind, Prometheus Unbound, The Witch of Atlas, Epipsychidion, Adonais, and the Triumph of Life.
He also wrote an "Essay on Christianity" which attempts to read Jesus as an ethic philosopher whose great teachings have been corrupted by the institutional religion called Christianity.
References
- ↑ (Harold Bloom, The Visionary Company: A Reading of English Romantic Poetry, Cornell University, New York 1971, p. 90-91)