English Literature Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

English Literature - Essay Example of the creative element inherent in it, but also because of the manifestation of the imagination that could be found within it in the sense that we create what we see, beginning to recognize how the representation of social issues might help to bring about change in these same social issues. The world was full of symbols and signs that would portend future events and actions which were knowable through their relationship to the myths and legends of antiquity. Many of the concepts that emerged as a part of Romanticism were reactions to the social upheaval that was taking place at this time coupled with a shifting economic structure. During the ‘Romantic Period’, the poets took part in a movement against the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment, where they protested (with their poetry) the ideals of those Europeans who sought to bring reason and ‘Enlightenment’ to the world. The Romantics expressed their defiance of the so-called ‘reason’ that both the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment brought to society. Throughout this period, women’s appearances in literature are characterized as dependent upon men for any outward action. Most of the principle female characters are white and invariably subservient to men. While this is often understood as a male-dominated and defined society in which women had no voice at all, the degree of truth in this idea is largely dependent upon the au thor and his background. It has been said of Romantic literature that ‘The tendency to portray women as binary opposites suggests a misogynistic perception of the inadequacy of female character’. While this may be true of much Romantic literature, Lord Byron’s poetry, such as his most famous work ‘The Corsair’, illustrates a more even-handed approach. The three cantos of â€Å"The Corsair† tell the story of a pirate chief named Conrad. The poem opens with Conrad on his pirate island, described in terms that convey the sort of haunted, lonely