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Gods of the Lower World: Romantic Egoists and Carlylean Heroes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Michael Timko
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Extract

A recent work calls the history of Romanticism “a history of redefinitions” (Rosen 16). I have no intention of attempting to define or redefine that movement; rather, in classifying a figure whose career spans the periods generally categorized under both Romantic and Victorian – Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) – I want to raise some questions about certain of his ideas and look closely at his relationship to some of his contemporaries. Neither Romantic nor Victorian, he resists being neatly categorized. Perhaps this circumstance helps to explain the tremendous influence he had on many writers, some of whom seem at some remove from this enigmatic nineteenth-century figure.

Type
Research Article
Information
Victorian Literature and Culture , Volume 14 , Spring 1986 , pp. 125 - 140
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1986

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References

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