LITERARY MOVEMENTS - NEOCLASSICAL

 

Preamble

 

    In the literature of England, there are basically two trends to reckon with. These are classicism and romanticism. The established pattern is that in every epoch of English literary history, one of these two trends emerges as a dominant force by which the literature of that age comes to be defined. The difference between the two trends could be understood in the most basic terms as follows. Classicism as a trend can be said to uphold ideals such as order, norms, and critical sensibility as the seminal characteristics to be sought for, while romanticism as promoting ideals such as freedom, unconventionality and imagination. During the renaissance in England, it was the romantic trend that dominated as the major force in the writing of literature. This situation however changed after the renaissance came to its formal conclusion, with classicism taking over as the dominant trend. This change over from romanticism to classicism as the main trend in the literature of England, is commonly referred to as the neoclassical movement. Neoclassical movement thus denotes a literary movement in which classicism emerged as the dominant force in English literature, which completely redefined the literary terrain of England for nearly one and a half centuries. 1660, the year in which Charles II acceded the throne of England, is usually identified as signaling the starting point of the neoclassical movement. The publication of the anthology Lyrical Ballads in 1798 by Wordsworth and Coleridge is widely recognized as the formal end point.

 

Causes

     Many factors could be cited as probable causes for the neoclassical movement, the most fundamental of which is perhaps nature itself. No matter how celebrated, any phenomenon tends to exhaust its fascination over a period of time. This is exactly what happened to romanticism which had reigned as the dominant trend in English literature throughout the renaissance for over two centuries. The obvious alternative when this happened was of course classicism, which subsequently replaced it as the dominant trend. There are however other important factors that must be considered in order to arrive at a fuller understanding of how the change came about. There are three in this regard that demand our attention.

 

(I)           The first of these relates to the English civil war. In 1642 England witnessed a civil war in which two factions went head-to-head. The one which supported the king at the time Charles I was known as the royalists, the other that supported the parliament was simply referred to as the parliamentarians. During the war Charles I was captured and executed by the parliamentarians, and his son Charles II naturally fearing for his own life, escaped to France and took refuge. During his residence there, he assimilated the classical spirit that dominated French literature at the time, and cultivated a taste for classicism in literature. He brought this acquired taste for classicism to England, when in 1660 he was invited back from France by the parliament to be crowned as the English king. As the royal court was the epicenter of literary activities at the time, classicism quickly gained momentum to become the dominant trend in English literature.

 

(II)          The second factor which is perhaps more literary than political has to do with the very essence of the movement that neoclassicism replaced namely the renaissance. All through the renaissance it was the texts by Greek and Roman authors that provided the men of letters their much needed source of inspiration and ideas. This pattern persisted during the neoclassical movement too, but with one telling difference. While the content and spirit of the classical texts motivated the renaissance writers, it was the aspect of form or style encoded in them that inspired the neoclassical writers. Thus we find that unlike in the renaissance, when emphasis was placed on such facets as individualism and enterprise, during the neoclassical era it was more attributes such as order, precision and symmetry that emerged as dominant.

 

(III)         The third factor which is social in scope comes down to the influence exerted on public opinion by the so called coffee houses. During the later part of the 17th and the ensuing 18th century, London came under the spell of coffee. Many coffee houses were set up throughout the city in which important people of the time congregated and discussed the burning issues pertaining to various fields of interest. These discussions were subsequently published in the newspapers that came out, mobilizing there by a critical bent of mind as opposed to an imaginative one.

 

Literary Ramifications

 

   The literatures produced during the neoclassical movement exhibited  certain distinct features that set it apart from those fashioned during the renaissance. Of these there are probably three that are most paramount in significance.

 

(I)           The first is an emphasis on imitation as the essence of literary composition. The word imitation in the context of neoclassical literature carries two meanings. These are that a literary work of art must try to depict a faithful representation of life which affords a verisimilitude of reality, and that literary works must be written in keeping with the norms laid down by the classical scholars of Greek and Roman times. During the neoclassical era, the scholars of ancient Greece and Rome were looked up to as the masters in the art of literary craftsmanship, and the ideal of literature being a reflection of life was considered the essential motto to be adhered.

 

(II)          The second important feature of the neoclassical movement in literature is an insistence on decorum as the most vital attribute to be upheld in the manner of writing. The neoclassicists staunchly believed that style in a work must strictly suit the subject, which is to say, it must correspond to the theme, the age/mood/background of the characters involved, and the overall situation or context in question. They felt that upholding decorum would ensure that a work would appeal to be more credible than it might otherwise do so.

 

(III)         The third feature of neoclassical literature is a reinforcement of morality as the ultimate goal in the creation of literary texts. The neoclassical writers advocated that the eventual objective of producing literature should be to make better individuals of the people who read them, both ethically and intellectually. This perhaps explains why the dominant form of poetry during this time happened to be satire, a poetic form specifically oriented towards attacking follies and affecting reforms. In most cases, particularly as it relates to dramatic plots, the neoclassicists insistence on morality essentially came down to upholding poetic justice. Poetic justice is a concept which argues that rewards and punishment must be proportionately distributed according to the relative goodness or viciousness of a character. Simply put, noble characters in a work must be rewarded, bad characters ought to be punished. The justification was that when readers partake of such a logic, they would be tempted to emulate the principal in real life. This is to say, they would be encouraged to be good in the hope that they would be ultimately rewarded, while concurrently thinking of themselves as likely to be punished if they are evil.