Romanticism Revisited: European Influences in American Poetic Thought

Abstract

This paper explores the profound influence of European Romanticism on the development of American poetic thought, emphasizing the transatlantic exchange of ideas that reshaped conceptions of self, nature, and imagination. Tracing the intellectual lineage from Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Goethe to Emerson, Thoreau, and Whitman, the study examines how American poets reinterpreted Romantic ideals—particularly those of individuality, emotion, and spirituality—within the democratic, expansive context of the New World. It argues that while European Romanticism emphasized moral introspection and the spiritual power of nature, American poets transformed these concepts into a dynamic vision of freedom and collective experience, aligning poetic imagination with national identity and social renewal. By comparing the idealism of European philosophy with the pragmatic optimism of American thought, the paper reveals Romanticism’s enduring role as a creative bridge between continents. Ultimately, it contends that Romanticism was not simply inherited but reborn in America, evolving into the foundation of a distinctly American lyric consciousness grounded in imagination, democracy, and the quest for transcendence.