Calling All Romanticists

J.M.W.Turner

I was delighted to find this wonderful article by Vinod which discusses the differences between Post-Modernists and Romanticists. Up until now, I have considered myself a purely post-modern thinker, however I believe I might relate more with the thoughts generated within the Romantic era – an intellectual movement beginning in the mid-18th century and which grew ever stronger during the Industrial Revolution.

My strong romantic values such as love, honour, courage, purity are at times deconstructed into obscurity (as my post-modern tendencies tend to do). Yet when push comes to shove, I do find myself operating daily on a set of absolutes (whether I like to admit this or not). Of course my set of absolutes may change in terms of my perspective and depth of experience but this is not at the expense of me throwing them all out. For example, my belief in love as an absolute truth is like believing in the existence of a rare and beautiful diamond and more importantly that I am able to come across it. When I do come across it however, I may not be able to take in all sides of the diamond itself, for it is very large and brilliant, but I can be assured I have experienced at least one side of it. Therefore, like a romantic thinker I attempt to live according to certain virtues and keep an openness as how these virtues actually show up in my daily life; a romantic thinker must be looking for virtue in order to see it in the mess of life. A post-modern thinker may not wish to even look for things they may believe to be so dynamic that exerting energy to see them would be a waste of precious time and energy.

In addition, as mentioned in Vinod’s Blog I do cling to virtues which best help me to self-actualize. In short, I believe that the existence of absolute truth does help me to be in a position of optimal performance and therefore serves to be the most pragmatic way of life (for me at least ;).

I wonder if I am alone in my romantic tendencies in this post-modern world? I wonder whether there are other closet Romanticists out there lurking, seeking, and hopefully finding.

Please follow this link to the wonderful article I found very useful:

http://www.vinod.com/blog/News/Romanticismvs.PostModerni.html

The picture above is of one of my all time favourite paintings by J.M.W. Turner, Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway, 1844. Turner was considered to be a Romanticist and helped to usher in the Impressionist Movement.