A scene, or a character, or an idea, or an emotion, strikes
the mind as being salient, beautiful, strange, wonderful, and the
mind desires to record it, to depict it, to isolate it, to
emphasize it. The process becomes gradually, as the life of the
world continues, more and more complex. It seemed enough at first
just to record; but then there follows the desire to contrast, to
heighten effects, to construct elaborate backgrounds; then the
process grows still more refined, and it becomes essential to lay
out materials in due proportion, and to clear away all that is
otiose or confusing, so that the central idea, whatever it is,
shall stand out in absolute clarity and distinctness. Gradually a
great deal of art becomes traditional and conventional; certain
forms stereotype themselves, and it becomes more and more difficult
to invent a new form of any kind. When art is very much bound by
tradition, it becomes what is called classical, and makes its
appeal to a cultured circle; and then there is a revolutionary
outburst of what is called a romantic type, which means on the one
hand a weariness of the old traditions and longing for freedom, and
on the other hand a corresponding desire, on the part of an
extended and less cultured circle, for art of a more elastic kind.
Literature has this cyclic ebb and flow; but what is romantic in
one age tends to become classical in the next, as the new departure
becomes in its turn traditional.
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