Romanticism
There are a great many different definitions of romanticism,
understandably so, since it is supposed to be a common characteristic of the
works of hundreds of poets
and writers throughout Europe and America during most of the 1800Õs. Still, there is general
agreement on important common characteristics, at least in the works of the
major poets during the first half of the 19th century. Whereas neoclassicism
and enlightenment tend
towards the general, traditional and easily understood, the Romantics celebrate
variety, and uniqueness. Therefore Romantic works often defy definition, genres
blend, but a common foundation is to be found in fantasy, symbols, myths and living nature.
This is seen as an endeavor to build a bridge between the subjective and the
objective, between the self and the world, the conscious and the unconscious.
Even at the lowest level of literature this unity is found, in horror-stories
and fantasy, in interest for the middle ages and for folklore. Nothing in these
definitions excludes objective descriptions of persons and circumstances, that
the readers could see as convincing, in other words "realistic"
descriptions, and indeed they are prominent in many romantic works. But realism
as a literary current abandons the romantic celebration of subjectivism, its
interest in fantasy, myth and living nature, use of symbols.
This study of the Icelandic Romantics shows a common ground in their
conception on how Romantic poetry should be. This is especially prominent in
their early work, in their years of formation. Later, they of course became
more individual. This study is of most poems of the
major Icelandic poets of the 19th century:
Bjarni Thorarensen (1786- 1841, his poems were divided before and after
1820).
Jînas Hallgrimsson (1807- 1845, his poems were divided before and after 1839).
Gr’mur Thomsen (1820-1896, his poems could not be divided).
Benedikt Gršndal (1826-1907 his poems were divided before and after
1860).
Steingr’mur Thorsteinsson (1831-1913 his poems were divided before and
after 1881).
Matthias Jochumsson (1835-1920, his poems were divided at 1884 and
1900),
- as well as large number of worksof minor poets.
Regrouping their poems thematically will naturally be rather coarse
according to
number of
titles, not words, let alone literary value. Nationalistic exhortations are
most prominent in Steing’mur, a fourth of his titles, but a sixth part of J—nas
and Benedikt, one tenth in Bjarni and Matthias, rather less in the latter
period of the three last named. Love poems naturally also decrease as the poets
grow older, they were a fourth of Bjarni and Benedikt in their first period,
one sixth of Steingr’mur then. J—nas is the exception, he has twice as many
love poems in his latter period than in his first, but then he was only 32
years old at the division, and died at 38. Epitaphs increase of course, as the
poets grow older, from one tenth to half the poems in Bjarni, who was the
undisputed master of that genre. They are one tenth of J—nas in both periods,
similarly common in Gr’mur at all times, go from a fifteenth part to one eight
of Steingr’m's poems, but are a third of Matthias', also increasing with time.
In order to compare the frequency of certain key words, I made a
concordance of the poems, and counted words for praise, seasons, god, sounds,
colors, etc, as a percentage of the number of words in each collection of
poems. Their frequency was then compared with a great study of the frequency of
words in 100 different prose texts from the 20th century ('Islensk
orðt’ðnib—k, 1991). . Half of those words are ''system" words,
with a similar function as declension endings. Unfortunately, there is no
comparable study of word frequency in the 19th century, but still, this should give some
idea of the poets' preferences.
It turned out, that the frequency of key words was not to be explained by
necessities of rhyme and such considerations.. Although all these poets were
religious, words
about god steadily decrease, words about the time of day are doubly as frequent
(or more) than words of season, morning and day dominate generally, as do
spring and summer. Quiet and low sounds is twice more frequent than loudness (Bjarni
is the sole exception, as well as preferring winter). Words for gold, silver
and suchlike, are much used for decoration, many times more frequent than in
the 20th century dictionary of frequency). The same goes for words of praise.
A special characteristic of these poems is their use of the special
vocabulary of the ancient poetry (Edda and Scaldic). Still, they only
constitute 1-2% of the whole! This elevated language is more prominent in the
first period of the poets, later they turn more to everyday language, also the
first two poets, from the first part of the century. These words are more
frequent after their day. 4/5 of these words are nouns, regrouped on few
domains, most prominent are words about people (one fourth), then about tools,
land and sea (a seventh of each).
Another thing these poets take from the ancient poetry and develop much
is the creation og«f words
of strong imagery, mostly visual, but occasionally auditory. Most used are the components blue,
silver and gold. Blue is of course mainly used to describe heaven, sea and
mountains, silver for rivers, snow and suchlike, gold for sunshine. Again, this
is most prominent in the first period of the poets, especially Bjarni and
Steingnrnur.
Colors are especially prominent in the poems of J—nas, Benedikt and
Steingr’mur, again more in their earlier poems than the latter (in the case of
the two last-named). Colors are three to eight times more frequent in the poems
here studied than in the frequency dictionary of Modern Icelandic, where black
is the most common color.
The words for black and dark are only one sixth of our collection, the
words for white, light etc, are twice more frequent, and blue is one fifth.
Naturally blue is used for heaven, sea, lakes and rivers, whereas white and
suchlike are used of the sun, stars, etc. Black and dark are used for
threatening clouds and heaven, night and shadows. This may seem self-evident,
but is of course used to create an atmosphere. Other colors are far less
frequent, green is of course mostly used of vegetation, grey is the opposite,
used to describe stones, mountains, fog and suchlike. There are almost no
examples of mixed colors. The few colors that are selected are mostly taken
from Icelandic nature, and their use remains quite traditional throughout the
19th century and longer.
As to metaphors, a quarter of the whole corpus of them are
personifications, but they are much more common in J—nas and Steingr’mur in
their first periods. Most often heavenly phenomena are spoken of as human
beings, the sun, moon, stars and so on. Another quarter of the personifications
are mountains and other earthly things. Rivers, sea, billows and such make a
sixth, abstracts like truth and justice an eighth. The behavior of these
personifications is tender and loving in half the examples, negative and neuter
are a quarter each. The personifications of Jonas, Steingr’mur and Benedikt are
especially tender.
Other metaphors are in half the cases used about abstracts, a sixth is
used of people and their parts, another sixth is of heavenly objects, one tenth
is about man-made things. The rest is very spread.
The targets of metaphors are in two fifths of the cases man-made things,
house and furniture, tools. A fifth of the targets are heavenly objects, river,
sea and suchlike are one eighth, birds and animals constitute one tenth, as
does various vegetation, mostly flowers. So, the function of the metaphors is
to bring abstractions and lifeless things into the human sphere.
A fifth of the metaphors build on a sensory relation between source and
target, mostly visual. Eyes shine like stars, the sun is the eye of god. Much
more common are analogic relations, a man's life is like a day, old age like an
evening, death is night. It is striking how conventional most of the metaphors are,
even though new technology sometimes is used in the last decades of the
century. Also, the poets occasionally show an ability for originality, but they
seem to have preferred to approach the readers through familiar expressions.
Their merit lies more in effectively combining various methods of poetic
expression in a unified whole. When we analyze 6-7 chosen poems of each poet,
they generally excel in poems that combine a description of the country and of
the people in sharp momentary glimpses. This is truly national romanticism.
Also there are memorable portrayals of individuals, Bjarni in particular excels
in showing, explaining and ennobling the flaws of character of his subjects of
epitaphs. As another epitaph-poet, Matthias, he is particularly keen on god and
other abstractions. J—nas and Benedikt exel in descriptions of nature and
humour. Grimur is out of the mainstream with folklore poems, and especially
with many poems with subjects from the old sagas, myths and history. He doesn't
change anything, but makes moments of these old stories come alive.
In general, the Romantic tradition
in Iceland was clearly made by the first two poets, in the first half of the
century, and of course on foreign model. The other poets in general follow
the example of Bjarni and J—nas. They do so in particular in their earlier
periods.