Eichendorffs Kritik romantischer Fehlentwicklungen

Abstract

Romanticism as a broad movement of thought developed as a reaction against rationalism and empiricism in the period of Enlightenment. In his critical evaluation of Getman literature Eichendorff as a historian exammes the excessiveness of esoteric theories in the work of the young intellectuals of the early romantic period in Getmany. The romanticists' idealist celebration of the self, and their tendency to overestimate the power of the imagination and the supreme value of art led to self-adulation and subjectivism which was unacceptable to Eichendorff s understanding of art and religion. The "romantic" attempt at creating a new mythology usmg art as a new kind of religion and thereby making the poet an omnipotent creator could only be rejected by Eichendorff whose moral convictions were strongly based on Christian Catholic beliefs. The young romanticists replaced ethics with aesthetics. Eichendorffs judgement of this development is devastating. He describes the early romantic movement as a "premature abortion".