Individuals and Society

Romanticism was not only a literary movement that emphasized tragedy but it was the one that praised the misfits and gave them the cult status that we may associate with people like Marilyn Mason today. In those days, being a social misfit was in vogue or so it appeared from some very well-known novels including the Sorrows of Young Werther, Frankenstein and Black Elk Speaks. All these books explore the intricate connection of individual with the society and depict the 'outcast-ness' of the central Romantic characters. While not all the leading characters of this era exhibited negativity that surrounded Frankenstein still most of them displayed abhorrence for the normal social order which resulted in their expulsion from the mainstream social circles. In this connection, Werther, the central character from The Sorrows of Young Werther serves as an adequate example of a classic Romantic misfit. He was madly...
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