Classicism

The literary trend of classicism is very broad. In Europe, it emerged as the imitation of the old ancient style of Greece and Rome. It contains a lot of art forms and styles. The very term comes from a more generalized French notion "classicism", i.e. a period of French history that lasted for the 18th century and was an apogee of the French royal power. In this chapter we shall speak about classicism in literature.

Originally, it formed in the eighteenth century in the creations of Goethe and Schiller primarily. They were the first European writers that formed the basic principles of potential literary trend.

It was initially used by the Thomas Carlyle in 1831 in his "Essay on Schiller" in which he expressed own concern in respect to the similarity between romanticism and classicism. Nevertheless, the "classical" attributes are to be found in literary pieces starting with the middle of the 19th century.

Still, it wasn't revealed either in France or in Italy until the nineteenth century. Among British writers the classicism features are to be traced in the works of E. Barret, J. Ruskin and M. Arnold.

In present Europe, the classicism came to mean European Renaissance that started in the 15th century and was a turning point for the whole European culture.