A Brief Introduction to Aesthetics, Characters and Shelley in Foreign Literature

A Brief Introduction to Aesthetics, Characters and Shelley in Foreign Literature

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792— 1822) is a famous positive romantic poet and literary critic in 19th century England. 18 1 1 was expelled from Oxford University for publishing the paper The Necessity of Atheism. Later, he was attacked and slandered by the British rulers for publishing the famous long poem Queen Mabel, and was forced to leave the motherland and live in Italy for several years. Shelley's poems praised revolution and criticized tradition, which was called "socialist depth bomb" by Marx. He was one of the earliest poets who praised utopian socialism. He has written poetic drama Prometheus Liberated, Chyi Chin, narrative poem Queen Mabu, Islamic Uprising and so on. His literary and artistic thoughts are mainly reflected in the long paper "Defending Poetry" and some prefaces he wrote for his works. Among them, Defending Poetry is called the program of English positive romanticism in the history of foreign literary theory.

In Defending Poetry, Shelley focuses on the social function, essence, characteristics and evaluation of poets. Shelley's definition of poetry is; The image of life is expressed in eternal truth. He affirmed the role of poets and thought that "poets are the interpreters of those who can't solve their inspiration;" The future reveals to the present that the poet is a mirror, "the poet blew the horn of attack" and "the poet is a legislator". The social function of poetry is to safeguard human rights and ideals and punish evil "lightning sword". In the preface of the long poem "Islamic Uprising", he clearly pointed out that the purpose of this poem is to "ignite the moral enthusiasm for the principles of freedom and justice, as well as the faith and hope for goodness in my readers". The function of poetry also lies in arousing * * * and beauty: "It turns the distorted object into beauty" and "produces and guarantees this supreme happiness" in the hearts of others. He emphasized that art is a special form reflecting life, and pointed out that only the main and most important tendency in real development is the object of poetry. Poetry is a reflection of the image of real life. The task of poetry is to help people understand the truth of things, understand the spirit of events, and reveal the great beauty, "inner truth" and "potential beauty" in life. He also emphasized the role of imagination, thinking that poetry is "the expression of imagination" and "imagination is a great tool to achieve moral perfection". In his view, imagination can make up for the lack of rational knowledge, imagination and rational thinking are unified, and rational knowledge is the foundation of poetry. He particularly emphasized the role of inspiration, talent and intuition.

Although Shelley's theory is full of idealism and mysticism, he affirmed the role of poets and the historical contributions of contemporary poets, affirmed the progressive view of history, and gently criticized the role of poetry as inferior to the previous view, which is still very meaningful in the low tide of the French Revolution and the unusually dull period of European ideological circles.