1.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets, and is regarded by some as among the finest lyric, as well as most influential, poets in the English language. A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not see fame during his lifetime, but recognition for his poetry grew steadily following his death. Shelley was a key member of a circle of visionary poets and writers that included Lord Byron, Leigh Hunt, Thomas Love Peacock, and his own second wife, Mary Shelley. Shelley is perhaps best known for such poems as Ozymandias, Ode to the West Wind, To a Skylark, Music, When Soft Voices Die, The Cloud. Shelleys close circle of friends included some of the most important progressive thinkers of the day, including his father-in-law, the philosopher William Godwin and Leigh Hunt. Though Shelleys poetry and prose output remained steady throughout his life, most publishers, Shelley became a lodestone to the subsequent three or four generations of poets, including important Victorian and Pre-Raphaelite poets such as Robert Browning and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. He was admired by Oscar Wilde, Thomas Hardy, George Bernard Shaw, Bertrand Russell, yeats, Upton Sinclair and Isadora Duncan. Henry David Thoreaus civil disobedience was apparently influenced by Shelleys non-violence in protest, Shelleys popularity and influence has continued to grow in contemporary poetry circles. Shelley was born on 4 August 1792 at Field Place, Broadbridge Heath, near Horsham, West Sussex, England. He was the eldest legitimate son of Sir Timothy Shelley, a Whig Member of Parliament for Horsham from 1790–92 and he had four younger sisters and one much younger brother. He received his education at home, tutored by the Reverend Evan Edwards of nearby Warnham. His cousin and lifelong friend Thomas Medwin, who lived nearby and it was a happy and contented childhood spent largely in country pursuits such as fishing and hunting. In 1802, he entered the Syon House Academy of Brentford, in 1804, Shelley entered Eton College, where he fared poorly, and was subjected to an almost daily mob torment at around noon by older boys, who aptly called these incidents Shelley-baits. Surrounded, the young Shelley would have his books torn from his hands and his clothes pulled at and this daily misery could be attributed to Shelleys refusal to take part in fagging and his indifference towards games and other youthful activities. Because of these peculiarities he acquired the nickname Mad Shelley, Shelley possessed a keen interest in science at Eton, which he would often apply to cause a surprising amount of mischief for a boy considered to be so sensible. Shelley would often use an electric machine to charge the door handle of his room. His friends were particularly amused when his tutor, Mr Bethell, in attempting to enter his room, was alarmed at the noise of the electric shocks. His mischievous side was again demonstrated by his last bit of naughtiness at school, despite these jocular incidents, a contemporary of Shelley, W. H. Merie, recalled that Shelley made no friends at Eton, although he did seek a kindred spirit without success
2.
Mary Shelley
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Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was an English novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer, best known for her Gothic novel Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus. She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and her father was the political philosopher William Godwin, and her mother was the philosopher and feminist Mary Wollstonecraft. When Mary was four, her father married a neighbour, with whom, as her stepmother, in 1814, Mary began a romance with one of her fathers political followers, Percy Bysshe Shelley, whom she eventually married. Together with Marys stepsister Claire Clairmont, Mary and Shelley left for France, upon their return to England, Mary was pregnant with Percys child. Over the next two years, she and Percy faced ostracism, constant debt, and the death of their prematurely born daughter and they married in late 1816, after the suicide of Percy Shelleys first wife, Harriet. In 1816, the couple spent a summer with Lord Byron, John William Polidori, and Claire Clairmont near Geneva, Switzerland. The Shelleys left Britain in 1818 for Italy, where their second and third died before Mary Shelley gave birth to her last and only surviving child. In 1822, her husband drowned when his boat sank during a storm near Viareggio. A year later, Mary Shelley returned to England and from then on devoted herself to the upbringing of her son, the last decade of her life was dogged by illness, probably caused by the brain tumour that was to kill her at the age of 53. Recent scholarship has yielded a comprehensive view of Mary Shelley’s achievements. Mary Shelleys works often argue that cooperation and sympathy, particularly as practised by women in the family, were the ways to reform civil society. This view was a challenge to the individualistic Romantic ethos promoted by Percy Shelley. Mary Shelley was born as Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin in Somers Town, London and she was the second child of the feminist philosopher, educator, and writer Mary Wollstonecraft, and the first child of the philosopher, novelist, and journalist William Godwin. Wollstonecraft died of fever shortly after Mary was born. Godwin was left to bring up Mary, along with her older half-sister, Fanny Imlay, a year after Wollstonecrafts death, Godwin published his Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, which he intended as a sincere and compassionate tribute. However, because the Memoirs revealed Wollstonecrafts affairs and her illegitimate child, Mary Godwin read these memoirs and her mothers books, and was brought up to cherish her mothers memory. Marys earliest years were happy ones, judging from the letters of William Godwins housekeeper and nurse, but Godwin was often deeply in debt, feeling that he could not raise the children by himself, he cast about for a second wife. In December 1801, he married Mary Jane Clairmont, a woman with two young children of her own—Charles and Claire
3.
Lord Byron
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George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, FRS, commonly known simply as Lord Byron, was a British poet, peer, politician, and a leading figure in the Romantic movement. Among his best-known works are the narrative poems, Don Juan and Childe Harolds Pilgrimage. Byron is regarded as one of the greatest British poets and remains widely read and influential and he travelled extensively across Europe, especially in Italy, where he lived for seven years with the struggling poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. Later in his life, Byron joined the Greek War of Independence fighting the Ottoman Empire. He died in 1824 at the age of 36 from a fever contracted while in Missolonghi, ethel Colburn Mayne states that George Gordon Byron was born on 22 January 1788 in a house on 24 Holles Street in London. However, Robert Charles Dallas in his Recollections states that Byron was born in Dover and he was the son of Captain John Mad Jack Byron and his second wife, the former Catherine Gordon, a descendant of Cardinal Beaton and heiress of the Gight estate in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Byrons father had seduced the married Marchioness of Carmarthen and, after she divorced her husband. His treatment of her was described as brutal and vicious, in order to claim his second wifes estate in Scotland, Byrons father took the additional surname Gordon, becoming John Byron Gordon, and he was occasionally styled John Byron Gordon of Gight. Byron himself used this surname for a time and was registered at school in Aberdeen as George Byron Gordon, at the age of 10, he inherited the English Barony of Byron of Rochdale, becoming Lord Byron, and eventually dropped the double surname. Byrons paternal grandparents were Vice-Admiral the Hon. John Foulweather Jack Byron, vice Admiral John Byron had circumnavigated the globe, and was the younger brother of the 5th Baron Byron, known as the Wicked Lord. He was christened, at St Marylebone Parish Church, George Gordon Byron after his maternal grandfather George Gordon of Gight, a descendant of James I of Scotland, Mad Jack Byron married his second wife for the same reason that he married his first, her fortune. In a move to avoid his creditors, Catherine accompanied her husband to France in 1786. He was born on 22 January in lodgings at Holles Street in London, Catherine moved back to Aberdeenshire in 1790, where Byron spent his childhood. His father soon joined them in their lodgings in Queen Street, Catherine regularly experienced mood swings and bouts of melancholy, which could be partly explained by her husbands continuing to borrow money from her. As a result, she fell even further into debt to support his demands and it was one of these importunate loans that allowed him to travel to Valenciennes, France, where he died in 1791. When Byrons great-uncle, the wicked Lord Byron, died on 21 May 1798, described as a woman without judgment or self-command, Catherine either spoiled and indulged her son or vexed him with her capricious stubbornness. Her drinking disgusted him, and he often mocked her for being short and corpulent and she once retaliated and, in a fit of temper, referred to him as a lame brat. Langley-Moore questions the Galt claim that she over-indulged in alcohol, upon the death of Byrons mother-in-law Judith Noel, the Hon
4.
Lake Geneva
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Lake Geneva is a lake on the north side of the Alps, shared between Switzerland and France. It is one of the largest lakes in Western Europe and the largest on the course of the Rhône,59. 53% of it comes under the jurisdiction of Switzerland, and 40. 47% under France. Lake Geneva has been explored by four submarines, the Auguste Piccard, forel, both built by Jacques Piccard, and the two Mir submersibles. Following the rise of Geneva it became Lac de Genève, in the 18th century, Lac Léman was revived in French and is the customary name in that language. In contemporary English, the name Lake Geneva is predominant, a note on pronunciation, English, Lake Geneva /ˌleɪk dʒᵻˈniːvə/ French, le lac Léman, le Léman or le lac de Genève German, Genfersee or Genfer See Italian, Lago Lemano, Lago di Ginevra. The Chablais Alps border is its southern shore, the western Bernese Alps lie over its eastern side, the high summits of Grand Combin and Mont Blanc are visible from some places. Compagnie Générale de Navigation sur le lac Léman operates boats on the lake, the lake lies on the course of the Rhône. Other tributaries are La Dranse, LAubonne, La Morges, La Venoge, La Vuachère, Lake Geneva is the largest body of water in Switzerland, and greatly exceeds in size all others that are connected with the main valleys of the Alps. It is in the shape of a crescent, with the horns pointing south, the northern shore being 95 km, the crescent form was more regular in a recent geological period, when the lake extended to Bex, about 18 km south of Villeneuve. The lakes surface is the lowest point of the cantons of Valais, the culminating point of the lakes drainage basin is Monte Rosa at 4,634 metres above sea level. The beauty of the shores of the lake and of the sites of many of the places near its banks has long been celebrated, however, it is only from the eastern end of the lake, between Vevey and Villeneuve, that the scenery assumes an Alpine character. The shore between Nyon and Lausanne is called La Côte because it is flatter, between Lausanne and Vevey it is called Lavaux and is famous for its hilly vineyards. The average surface elevation of 372 m above sea level is controlled by the Seujet Dam in Geneva, simulations indicate that the Tauredunum event was most likely caused by a massive landslide near the Rhône delta, which caused a wave eight meters high to reach Geneva within 70 minutes. In 888 the town was part of the new Kingdom of Burgundy, in the late 1960s, pollution made it dangerous to swim at some beaches of the lake, indeed, visibility under water was near zero. By the 1980s, intense environmental pollution had almost wiped out all the fish, today, pollution levels have been dramatically cut back, and it is again considered safe to swim in the lake. Major leisure activities practiced include sailing, wind surfing, boating, rowing, on a scientific footnote, in 1827, Lake Geneva was the site for the first measurement of the speed of sound in water. The loud airborne sound coupled into the lake, establishing an underwater sound that could be measured at a distance. The flash of the exploding gunpowder provided the starting cue for the timepiece
5.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Francophone Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of the 18th century. His political philosophy influenced the Enlightenment in France and across Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolution, Rousseaus novel Emile, or On Education is a treatise on the education of the whole person for citizenship. His sentimental novel Julie, or the New Heloise was of importance to the development of pre-romanticism and romanticism in fiction and his Discourse on Inequality and The Social Contract are cornerstones in modern political and social thought. During the period of the French Revolution, Rousseau was the most popular of the philosophes among members of the Jacobin Club and he was interred as a national hero in the Panthéon in Paris, in 1794,16 years after his death. Rousseau was born in Geneva, which was at the time a city-state, since 1536, Geneva had been a Huguenot republic and the seat of Calvinism. Rousseau was proud that his family, of the order, had voting rights in the city. Throughout his life, he signed his books Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Geneva, in theory, was governed democratically by its male voting citizens, the citizens were a minority of the population when compared to the immigrants, referred to as inhabitants, whose descendants were called natives and continued to lack suffrage. There was much debate within Geneva, extending down to the tradespeople. Much discussion was over the idea of the sovereignty of the people, in 1707, a democratic reformer named Pierre Fatio protested this situation, saying a sovereign that never performs an act of sovereignty is an imaginary being. He was shot by order of the Little Council, Jean-Jacques Rousseaus father, Isaac, was not in the city at this time, but Jean-Jacquess grandfather supported Fatio and was penalized for it. The trade of watchmaking had become a tradition by the time of Rousseaus father. Isaac followed his grandfather, father and brothers into the business, Isaac, notwithstanding his artisan status, was well educated and a lover of music. A Genevan watchmaker, Rousseau wrote, is a man who can be introduced anywhere, in 1699, Isaac ran into political difficulty by entering a quarrel with visiting English officers, who in response drew their swords and threatened him. After local officials stepped in, it was Isaac who was punished, Rousseaus mother, Suzanne Bernard Rousseau, was from an upper-class family. She was raised by her uncle Samuel Bernard, a Calvinist preacher and he cared for Suzanne after her father Jacques died in his early thirties. In 1695, Suzanne had to answer charges that she had attended a street theater disguised as a peasant woman so she could gaze upon M. Vincent Sarrasin, after a hearing, she was ordered by the Genevan Consistory to never interact with him again. She married Rousseaus father at the age of 31, isaacs sister had married Suzannes brother eight years earlier, after she had become pregnant and they had been chastised by the Consistory
6.
William Wordsworth
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William Wordsworth was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication Lyrical Ballads. Wordsworths magnum opus is generally considered to be The Prelude, a poem of his early years that he revised and expanded a number of times. It was posthumously titled and published, before which it was known as the poem to Coleridge. Wordsworth was Britains Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death from pleurisy on 23 April 1850 and his sister, the poet and diarist Dorothy Wordsworth, to whom he was close all his life, was born the following year, and the two were baptised together. Wordsworths father was a representative of James Lowther, 1st Earl of Lonsdale and, through his connections. He was frequently away from home on business, so the young William and his siblings had little involvement with him and remained distant from him until his death in 1783. However, he did encourage William in his reading, and in particular set him to commit to memory large portions of verse, including works by Milton, Shakespeare, William was also allowed to use his fathers library. William also spent time at his mothers house in Penrith, Cumberland, where he was exposed to the moors, but did not get along with his grandparents or his uncle. His hostile interactions with them distressed him to the point of contemplating suicide, Wordsworth was taught both the Bible and the Spectator, but little else. It was at the school in Penrith that he met the Hutchinsons, including Mary, after the death of his mother, in 1778, Wordsworths father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School in Lancashire and sent Dorothy to live with relatives in Yorkshire. She and William did not meet again for nine years. Wordsworth made his debut as a writer in 1787 when he published a sonnet in The European Magazine and that same year he began attending St Johns College, Cambridge. He received his BA degree in 1791 and he returned to Hawkshead for the first two summers of his time at Cambridge, and often spent later holidays on walking tours, visiting places famous for the beauty of their landscape. In 1790 he went on a tour of Europe, during which he toured the Alps extensively, and visited nearby areas of France, Switzerland. In November 1791, Wordsworth visited Revolutionary France and became enchanted with the Republican movement and he fell in love with a French woman, Annette Vallon, who in 1792 gave birth to their daughter Caroline. Financial problems and Britains tense relations with France forced him to return to England alone the following year. The circumstances of his return and his subsequent behaviour raised doubts as to his wish to marry Annette. With the Peace of Amiens again allowing travel to France, in 1802 Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy visited Annette, the purpose of the visit was to prepare Annette for the fact of his forthcoming marriage to Mary Hutchinson
7.
Ode: Intimations of Immortality
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Ode, Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood is a poem by William Wordsworth, completed in 1804 and published in Poems, in Two Volumes. The poem was completed in two parts, with the first four stanzas written among a series of poems composed in 1802 about childhood. The fourth stanza of the ode ends with a question, and it was first printed as Ode in 1807, and it was not until 1815 that it was edited and reworked to the version that is currently known, Ode, Intimations of Immortality. The poem relies on the concept of Pre-existence, the idea that the soul existed before the body, Wordsworths praise of the child as the best philosopher was criticised by Coleridge and became the source of later critical discussion. Modern critics sometimes have referred to Wordsworths poem as the Great Ode and ranked it among his best poems, Contemporary reviews of the poem were mixed, with many reviewers attacking the work or, like Lord Byron, dismissing the work without analysis. The critics felt that Wordsworths subject matter was too low and some felt that the emphasis on childhood was misplaced, among the Romantic poets, most praised various aspects of the poem however. By the Victorian period, most reviews of the ode were positive with only John Ruskin taking a negative stance against the poem. The poem continued to be received into the 20th-century, with few exceptions. The majority ranked it as one of Wordsworths greatest poems, in 1802, Wordsworth wrote many poems that dealt with his youth. These poems were inspired by his conversations with his sister, Dorothy. The poems, beginning with The Butterfly and ending with To the Cuckoo, were all based on Wordsworths recalling both the sensory and emotional experience of his childhood. From To the Cuckoo, he moved onto The Rainbow, both written on 26 March 1802, and then on to Ode, Intimation of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood, while sitting at breakfast on 27 March, he began to compose the ode. He was able to write four stanzas that put forth the question about the image and ended, Where is it now, the glory. The poem would remain in its smaller, four-stanza version until 1804, the short version of the ode was possibly finished in one day because Wordsworth left the next day to spend time with Samuel Taylor Coleridge in Keswick. Close to the time Wordsworth and Coleridge climbed the Skiddaw mountain,3 April 1802, the poem impressed Coleridge, and, while with Wordsworth, he was able to provide his response to the odes question within an early draft of his poem, Dejection, an Ode. In early 1804, Wordsworth was able to return his attention to working on the ode and it was a busy beginning of the year with Wordsworth having to help Dorothy recover from an illness in addition to writing his poems. The exact time of composition is unknown, but it followed his work on The Prelude. Many of the lines of the ode are similar to the lines of The Prelude Book V, the poem was first printed in full for Wordsworths 1807 collection of poems, Poems, in Two Volumes, under the title Ode
8.
Plato
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Plato was a philosopher in Classical Greece and the founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. He is widely considered the most pivotal figure in the development of philosophy, unlike nearly all of his philosophical contemporaries, Platos entire work is believed to have survived intact for over 2,400 years. Along with his teacher, Socrates, and his most famous student, Aristotle, Plato laid the foundations of Western philosophy. Alfred North Whitehead once noted, the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. In addition to being a figure for Western science, philosophy. Friedrich Nietzsche, amongst other scholars, called Christianity, Platonism for the people, Plato was the innovator of the written dialogue and dialectic forms in philosophy, which originate with him. He was not the first thinker or writer to whom the word “philosopher” should be applied, few other authors in the history of Western philosophy approximate him in depth and range, perhaps only Aristotle, Aquinas and Kant would be generally agreed to be of the same rank. Due to a lack of surviving accounts, little is known about Platos early life, the philosopher came from one of the wealthiest and most politically active families in Athens. Ancient sources describe him as a bright though modest boy who excelled in his studies, the exact time and place of Platos birth are unknown, but it is certain that he belonged to an aristocratic and influential family. Based on ancient sources, most modern scholars believe that he was born in Athens or Aegina between 429 and 423 BCE. According to a tradition, reported by Diogenes Laertius, Ariston traced his descent from the king of Athens, Codrus. Platos mother was Perictione, whose family boasted of a relationship with the famous Athenian lawmaker, besides Plato himself, Ariston and Perictione had three other children, these were two sons, Adeimantus and Glaucon, and a daughter Potone, the mother of Speusippus. The brothers Adeimantus and Glaucon are mentioned in the Republic as sons of Ariston, and presumably brothers of Plato, but in a scenario in the Memorabilia, Xenophon confused the issue by presenting a Glaucon much younger than Plato. Then, at twenty-eight, Hermodorus says, went to Euclides in Megara, as Debra Nails argues, The text itself gives no reason to infer that Plato left immediately for Megara and implies the very opposite. Thus, Nails dates Platos birth to 424/423, another legend related that, when Plato was an infant, bees settled on his lips while he was sleeping, an augury of the sweetness of style in which he would discourse about philosophy. Ariston appears to have died in Platos childhood, although the dating of his death is difficult. Perictione then married Pyrilampes, her mothers brother, who had served many times as an ambassador to the Persian court and was a friend of Pericles, Pyrilampes had a son from a previous marriage, Demus, who was famous for his beauty. Perictione gave birth to Pyrilampes second son, Antiphon, the half-brother of Plato and these and other references suggest a considerable amount of family pride and enable us to reconstruct Platos family tree
9.
Swiss Alps
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The Swiss Alps extend over both the Western Alps and the Eastern Alps, encompassing an area sometimes called Central Alps. The Swiss Alps comprise almost all the highest mountains of the Alps, such as Dufourspitze, the Dom, the Liskamm, the Weisshorn, the other following major summits can be found in this list of mountains of Switzerland. Since the Middle Ages, transit across the Alps played an important role in history, the region north of St Gotthard Pass became the nucleus of the Swiss Confederacy in the early 14th century. The Alps cover 65% of Switzerlands total 41,285 square kilometres surface area, making it one of the most alpine countries. The glaciers of the Swiss Alps cover an area of 1,220 square kilometres — 3% of the Swiss territory, the Swiss Alps are situated south of the Swiss Plateau and north of the national border. The limit between the Alps and the runs from Vevey on the shores of Lake Geneva to Rorschach on the shores of Lake Constance, passing close to the cities of Thun. The not well defined regions in Switzerland that lie on the margin of the Alps, the Swiss Prealps are mainly made of limestone and they generally do not exceed 2,500 metres. The Alpine cantons are Valais, Bern, Graubünden, Uri, Glarus, Ticino, St. Gallen, Vaud, Obwalden, Nidwalden, Schwyz, Appenzell Innerrhoden, Appenzell Ausserrhoden, Fribourg, Lucerne and Zug. The countries with which Switzerland shares mountain ranges of the Alps are, France, Italy, Austria, the Alps are usually divided into two main parts, the Western Alps and Eastern Alps, whose division is along the Rhine from Lake Constance to the Splügen Pass. The western ranges occupy the greatest part of Switzerland while the more numerous eastern ranges are smaller and are all situated in the canton of Graubünden. The latter are part of the Central Eastern Alps, except the Ortler Alps which belong to the Southern Limestone Alps, the Pennine, Bernese and Bernina Range are the highest ranges of the country, they contain respectively 38,9 and 1 summit over 4000 metres. The lowest range is the Appenzell Alps culminating at 2,500 metres, Western Alps Eastern Alps The north side of the Swiss Alps is drained by the Rhône, Rhine and Inn while the south side is mainly drained by the Ticino. The rivers on the empty into the Mediterranean, North and Black Sea. The major triple watersheds in the Alps are located within the country, they are, Piz Lunghin, Witenwasserenstock, between the Witenwasserenstock and Piz Lunghin runs the European Watershed separating the basin of the Atlantic and the Mediterranean Sea. The European watershed lies in fact only partially on the main chain, Switzerland possesses 6% of Europes fresh water, and is sometimes referred to as the water tower of Europe. Since the highest dams are located in Alpine regions, many mountain lakes are artificial and are used as hydroelectric reservoirs. Some large artificial lakes can be found above 2,300 m, the melting of low-altitude glaciers can generate new lakes, such as the 0.25 km² large Triftsee which formed between 2002–2003. The following table gives the area above 2000 m and 3000 m
10.
Gothic fiction
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Gothic fiction, which is largely known by the subgenre of Gothic horror, is a genre or mode of literature and film that combines fiction and horror, death, and at times romance. Its origin is attributed to English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, the effect of Gothic fiction feeds on a pleasing sort of terror, an extension of Romantic literary pleasures that were relatively new at the time of Walpoles novel. It originated in England in the half of the 18th century and had much success in the 19th, as witnessed by Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Another well known novel in this genre, dating from the late Victorian era, is Bram Stoker’s Dracula, the name Gothic refers to the -medieval buildings, emulating Gothic architecture, in which many of these stories take place. This extreme form of romanticism was very popular in England and Germany, the English Gothic novel also led to new novel types such as the German Schauerroman and the French Georgia. The novel usually regarded as the first Gothic novel is Horace Walpoles The Castle of Otranto, Horace Walpoles declared aim was to combine elements of the medieval romance, which he deemed too fanciful, and the modern novel, which he considered to be too confined to strict realism. Walpole published the first edition disguised as a romance from Italy discovered and republished by a fictitious translator. When Walpole admitted to his authorship in the edition, its originally favourable reception by literary reviewers changed into rejection. A romance with elements, and moreover void of didactical intention, was considered a setback. Walpoles forgery, together with the blend of history and fiction, contravened the principles of the Enlightenment and associated the Gothic novel with fake documentation. Clara Reeve, best known for her work The Old English Baron, set out to take Walpoles plot, the question now arose whether supernatural events that were not as evidently absurd as Walpoles would not lead the simpler minds to believe them possible. Ann Radcliffe developed the technique of the supernatural in which every seemingly supernatural intrusion is eventually traced back to natural causes. Among other elements, Ann Radcliffe introduced the figure of the Gothic villain. Radcliffes novels, above all The Mysteries of Udolpho, were best-sellers, however, along with most novels at the time, they were looked down upon by many well-educated people as sensationalist nonsense. Radcliffe also provided an aesthetic for the genre in an influential article On the Supernatural in Poetry, Romantic literary movements developed in continental Europe concurrent with the development of the Gothic novel. The roman noir appeared in France, by writers as François Guillaume Ducray-Duminil, Baculard dArnaud. In Germany, the Schauerroman gained traction with writers as Friedrich Schiller, with novels like The Ghost-Seer and these works were often more horrific and violent than the English Gothic novel. Matthew Gregory Lewiss lurid tale of debauchery, black magic
11.
History of a Six Weeks' Tour
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Published in 1817, it describes two trips taken by Mary, Percy, and Marys stepsister, Claire Clairmont, one across Europe in 1814, and one to Lake Geneva in 1816. Divided into three sections, the text consists of a journal, four letters, and Percy Shelleys poem Mont Blanc, apart from the poem, the text was primarily written and organised by Mary Shelley. In 1840 she revised the journal and the letters, republishing them in a collection of Percy Shelleys writings, the romantic elements of the work would have hinted at the texts radical politics to nineteenth-century readers. Although it sold poorly, History of a Six Weeks Tour received favourable reviews, in proposing another travel narrative to her publisher in 1843, Mary Shelley claimed my 6 weeks tour brought me many compliments. Mary Godwin and Percy Shelley met and fell in love in 1814, Percy Shelley initially visited the Godwin household because he was interested in meeting his philosophical hero, Marys father, William Godwin. However, Mary and Percy soon began having secret rendezvous, despite the fact that Percy was already married, to Marys dismay, her father disapproved of their extramarital affair and tried to thwart the relationship. On 28 July 1814, Mary and Percy secretly left for France, taking Marys stepsister, Claire Clairmont, in May 1816, Mary Godwin, Percy Shelley, and their second child travelled to Geneva with Claire Clairmont. The group spent their time writing, boating on Lake Geneva, sitting around a log fire at Byrons villa, the company also amused themselves by reading German ghost stories, prompting Byron to suggest they each write their own supernatural tale. Mary, Percy, and Claire returned to England in September and on 30 December 1816 Percy and Mary married, in March 1817, the Shelleys and Claire moved to Marlow, Buckinghamshire. At Marlow, they entertained friends, worked hard at their writing, Early in the summer of 1817, Mary Shelley finished Frankenstein, which was published anonymously in January 1818. She also began work on History of a Six Weeks Tour, in the summer of 1817, Mary Shelley started to assemble the couples joint diary from their 1814 journey into a travel book. At what point she decided to include the letters from the 1816 Geneva trip and Percy Shelleys poem Mont Blanc is unclear, but by 28 September the journal and the letters were a single text. By the middle of October she was making copies for the press. Percy probably corrected and copyedited the journal section while Mary did the same for his letters, advertisements for the work appeared on 30 October in the Morning Chronicle and on 1 November in The Times, promising a 6 November release. However, the work was not actually published until 12 and 13 November and it was Mary Shelleys first published work. History of a Six Weeks Tour begins with a Preface, written by Percy Shelley, the journal consists of edited entries from the joint diary that Percy and Mary Shelley kept during their 1814 trip to the Continent, specifically those from 28 July to 13 September 1814. Of the 8,500 words in the section,1,150 are from Percys entries. She even included sections of Claire Clairmonts journal, the second section of the text consists of four Letters written during a Residence of Three Months in the Environs of Geneva, in the Summer of the Year 1816
12.
Symposium (Plato)
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The Symposium is a philosophical text by Plato dated c. It concerns itself at one level with the genesis, purpose and nature of love, Love is examined in a sequence of speeches by men attending a symposium, or drinking party. Each man must deliver an encomium, a speech in praise of Love, the party takes place at the house of the tragedian Agathon in Athens. Socrates in his speech asserts that the highest purpose of love is to become a philosopher or, literally, the Symposium was written as a dramatic dialogue – a form used by Plato in more than thirty works – and is regarded as one of his best. Set in Athenian social life, it develops the themes of love, there is little doubt that the content of the dialogue is fictitious, although Plato has built a very realistic atmosphere. Andrew Dalby considers the opening pages of the Symposium the best description in any ancient Greek source of the ramifications of an oral tradition. Plato has set up a multitude of layers between the original symposium and his narrative, he heard it fourth-hand, so it comes to the written text fifth-hand. In addition, the story Socrates narrates was told to Socrates by Diotima, nevertheless, Dalby is eager to add that he does not think the rendering of the discussion by Plato is historically accurate, and considers that the content is in great part his invention. Other scholars, like Walter Hamilton, agree with this view, the disastrous expedition to Syracuse, of which Alcibiades was a commander, took place the following year, after which Alcibiades deserted to Sparta, Athens archenemy. Hamilton remarks that Plato takes care to portray Alcibiades and Socrates, Plato does this to free his teacher from the guilt of corrupting the minds of prominent youths, which had in fact earned Socrates the death sentence in 399 BC. Plato sets the action at a party hosted by the poet Agathon to celebrate his first victory in a dramatic competition, there a discussion develops between the guests on the theme of love. Aristodemus, who was present, reported the conversation to Phoinix, Phoinix told it to another, unnamed person, meanwhile Apollodorus checked it with Socrates, who was present. The unnamed person has told it to Glaucon, but has him a unreliable version and has left him uncertain how long ago the discussion took place. Glaucon has now obtained a version from Apollodorus, who is thus primed to tell the story again to a friend. From this point on, he will be quoting Aristodemus, the dramatic date of the frame conversation, in which Apollodorus speaks to his unnamed friend, is estimated to be between 401 BCE and the time when Socrates was tried and executed in 399 BCE. Plato uses the dialogue to various theories of love. The love to which the participants refer is mostly homosexual love between men, reflecting a reality in classical Greece. Beauty belongs to category of Forms
