Romanticism embraces love and sensuality, but it includes much more. The romantic movement powerfully affected all forms of literature and the arts, and even science. In this seminar we investigate several texts in historical, political, philosophical, literary, musical, artistic, and scientific contexts. A particularly interesting component of German romanticism is that women opened salons, which expanded the circulation of romantic ideals and practices in the public sphere. In music Schumann, Schubert, the later Beethoven, and Richard Wagner wrote powerful compositions that have lastingly shaped not only German cultural history but numerous cultures worldwide. Unfortunately, romanticism’s search for origins, fascination with the Middle Ages, and emphasis on the German Volk were appropriated by the Nazis. Fortunately, the creative energy of the most salient aspects of German Romanticism has been sustained and rightly admired. 

Registration Opens Online: Monday, August 12, 2019 at 8AM (AZ Time)