Title: Romanticism, lyricism, and history
Description: Arguing against a persistent view of Romantic lyricism as an inherently introspective mode, this book examines how Charlotte Smith, William Wordsworth, and John Clare recognized end employed the mode's immense capacity for engaging reading audiences in reflections both personal and social.

Zimmerman focuses new attention on the Romantic lyric's audiences - not the silent, passive auditor of canonical paradigms, but historical readers and critics who can tell us more than we have asked about the mode's rhetorical possibilities.

She situates poems within the specific circumstances of their production and consumption, including the aftermath in England of the French Revolution, rural poverty, the processes of parliamentary enclosure, the biographical contours of poet's careers, and the myriad exchanges among poets, patrons, publishers, critics, and readers in the literary marketplace.
Subjects: Criticism and interpretation, English poetry, History, History and criticism, Literature and history, Poetic works, Romanticism, Romantisme, Littérature et histoire, Critique et interprétation, POETRY, English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, Œuvres poétiques, Poésie anglaise, Histoire, Histoire et critique, Poetry, history and criticism, Wordsworth, william, 1770-1850, Wordsworth, dorothy, 1771-1855, Clare, john, 1793-1864
Places: Great Britain
People: Charlotte Turner Smith (1749-1806), Dorothy Wordsworth (1771-1855), John Clare (1793-1864), William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
Time periods: 18th century, 19th century