Age of Sensibility / Pre-Romantic Age (1745–1798)

 

🌿 Age of Sensibility / Pre-Romantic Age (1745–1798)

The Age of Sensibility, also called the Pre-Romantic Age, acts as a bridge between Neo-Classicism and Romanticism. This period marks a shift from reason to emotion, rules to imagination, and urban life to nature.

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🔹 Historical Background

• Time Period: 1745–1798

• Transitional phase between:

  • Age of Pope (Neo-Classical)

  • Age of Romanticism

• Rise of individual feeling, emotion, sympathy, and nature

• The Age of Sensibility (1745–1798), also known as the Pre-Romantic Age, developed as a reaction against the excessive emphasis on reason, order, and classical rules of the Neo-Classical Age. By the mid-eighteenth century, writers began to feel that strict rationalism suppressed human emotions, imagination, and individual experience. This period largely unfolded during the reigns of King George II (1727–1760) and King George III (1760–1820), a time marked by political unrest such as the Jacobite Rebellion (1745), the American War of Independence, and the ideological impact of the French Revolution. These events weakened faith in authority and encouraged sympathy for the common man, humanitarian concern, and sentimental philosophy, which emphasized moral feeling over cold logic. The Industrial Revolution further shaped this age by creating urban alienation and a deep nostalgia for rural life and nature, leading writers to idealize simplicity and the countryside. Simultaneously, there was a revival of interest in the medieval past, folklore, and Gothic elements, along with the emergence of Graveyard poetry that explored themes of death, melancholy, and introspection. Altogether, the Age of Sensibility functioned as a transitional phase, preparing the ground for full-fledged Romanticism, which formally began with the publication of Lyrical Ballads in 1798.

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🔹 Key Characteristics

• Emphasis on sensibility (deep emotions & feelings)

• Interest in nature, rural life, and simplicity

• Growth of melancholy, nostalgia, and personal sorrow

• Focus on common man instead of aristocracy

• Early form of Romantic imagination

• Preference for lyrical and emotional poetry

• Decline of strict classical rules

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🔹 Major Themes

• Nature and landscape

• Human emotions & sympathy

• Death, graveyard imagery

• Solitude and introspection

• Childhood innocence

• Primitive and medieval past

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🔹 Thomas Gray (1716–1771)

Most important poet of the age

• Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard (1751) ⭐

• Ode on the Spring

• Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College

• The Bard

• The Progress of Poesy

📌 Focus: death, common man, melancholy, nature

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🔹 William Collins (1721–1759)

• Odes (1746)

  • Ode to Evening

  • Ode on the Passions

  • Ode to Simplicity

📌 Known for emotional depth and imagination

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🔹 James Thomson (1700–1748)

• The Seasons ⭐

  • Winter

  • Spring

  • Summer

  • Autumn

• The Castle of Indolence

📌 Nature poetry; bridge between Neo-Classicism and Romanticism

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🔹 Edward Young (1683–1765)

• Night Thoughts ⭐

• The Love of Fame

📌 Graveyard poetry; death, immortality, melancholy

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🔹 Robert Blair (1699–1746)

• The Grave ⭐

📌 Early Graveyard poet; meditation on death

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🔹 Thomas Warton (1728–1790)

• The Pleasures of Melancholy

• Observations on the Faerie Queene of Spenser

📌 Revival of medievalism; literary history

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🔹 Joseph Warton (1722–1800)

• The Enthusiast, or the Lover of Nature

• Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope

📌 Advocated imagination over reason

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🔹 Oliver Goldsmith (1728–1774)

• The Deserted Village ⭐

• The Traveller

• The Hermit

📌 Rural nostalgia; social criticism

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🔹 William Cowper (1731–1800)

• The Task ⭐

• The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk

• On the Receipt of My Mother’s Picture

📌 Nature, personal emotion, simplicity

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🔹 Thomas Percy (1729–1811)

• Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) ⭐

📌 Revival of ballads and folk tradition

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🌑 Graveyard School of Poetry 

Poets:

• Thomas Gray

• Edward Young

• Robert Blair

Themes:

• Death

• Night

• Grave

• Melancholy

• Human mortality

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🔹 Difference from Neo-Classic Age

Neo-Classic Age	Age of Sensibility
Reason & logic	Emotion & feeling
Rules & form	Freedom & imagination
City life	Nature & village
Aristocracy	Common man

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🔹 Why It Is Important

• Prepared the ground for Romantic poets like:

  • Wordsworth

  • Coleridge

  • Keats

• Introduced emotional depth in English poetry

• Shifted focus from head to heart

📘 UGC NET MCQs

Age of Sensibility / Pre-Romantic Age (1745–1798)

1. The Age of Sensibility is also called the:
A. Augustan Age
B. Neo-Classical Age
C. Pre-Romantic Age
D. Victorian Age
✅ Answer: C

2. The period of the Age of Sensibility is:
A. 1700–1740
B. 1745–1798
C. 1798–1832
D. 1660–1700
✅ Answer: B

3. The Age of Sensibility mainly reacted against:
A. Medieval romance
B. Romantic excess
C. Neo-Classical rationalism
D. Victorian morality
✅ Answer: C

4. The dominant quality of this age is:
A. Satire
B. Reason
C. Emotion
D. Wit
✅ Answer: C

5. This age emphasizes sympathy for the:
A. Aristocracy
B. Court
C. Common man
D. Nobility
✅ Answer: C

6. Which event marks the beginning of Romanticism?
A. French Revolution
B. Jacobite Rebellion
C. Lyrical Ballads (1798)
D. American War
✅ Answer: C

7. The Age of Sensibility flourished mainly during the reign of:
A. Elizabeth I
B. Charles II
C. George III
D. Victoria
✅ Answer: C

8. Graveyard poetry focuses on:
A. Love and beauty
B. Death and melancholy
C. Heroism
D. Satire
✅ Answer: B

9. Industrial Revolution influenced this age by creating:
A. Urban pride
B. Court culture
C. Nostalgia for rural life
D. Scientific poetry
✅ Answer: C

10. Sentimental philosophy stressed:
A. Logic
B. Reason
C. Moral feeling
D. Satire
✅ Answer: C

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🔹 Poets & Major Works

11. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard was written by:
A. Cowper
B. Goldsmith
C. Gray
D. Collins
✅ Answer: C

12. The most representative poet of this age is:
A. James Thomson
B. William Cowper
C. Thomas Gray
D. Edward Young
✅ Answer: C

13. The Seasons was written by:
A. Collins
B. Thomson
C. Cowper
D. Gray
✅ Answer: B

14. Which poet is associated with Graveyard poetry?
A. Goldsmith
B. Gray
C. Young
D. Both B and C
✅ Answer: D

15. Night Thoughts is written by:
A. Robert Blair
B. Edward Young
C. Gray
D. Cowper
✅ Answer: B

16. The Grave was written by:
A. Thomas Gray
B. Edward Young
C. Robert Blair
D. Collins
✅ Answer: C

17. Ode to Evening is written by:
A. Gray
B. Collins
C. Thomson
D. Cowper
✅ Answer: B

18. The Deserted Village is written by:
A. Cowper
B. Goldsmith
C. Gray
D. Warton
✅ Answer: B

19. The Task is written by:
A. Collins
B. Goldsmith
C. Cowper
D. Young
✅ Answer: C

20. Reliques of Ancient English Poetry was compiled by:
A. Thomas Warton
B. Joseph Warton
C. Thomas Percy
D. Gray
✅ Answer: C

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🔹 Criticism & Literary Views

21. Joseph Warton criticized Pope mainly for lack of:
A. Style
B. Satire
C. Imagination
D. Morality
✅ Answer: C

22. The Wartons emphasized:
A. Classical rules
B. Imitation
C. Imagination and feeling
D. Satire
✅ Answer: C

23. Pre-Romantic poets preferred:
A. Epic
B. Tragedy
C. Lyric poetry
D. Mock-epic
✅ Answer: C

24. Graveyard poetry is important because it:
A. Revived epic
B. Anticipated Romantic melancholy
C. Followed Aristotle
D. Supported satire
✅ Answer: B

25. Which element shows Pre-Romantic influence?
A. Heroic couplet
B. Urban wit
C. Love of nature
D. Classical imitation
✅ Answer: C

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🔹 Advanced NET-Level MCQs

26. Thomas Gray’s poetry is a blend of:
A. Satire and realism
B. Classicism and Romanticism
C. Drama and epic
D. Realism and naturalism
✅ Answer: B

27. The Castle of Indolence is written by:
A. Cowper
B. Collins
C. Thomson
D. Goldsmith
✅ Answer: C

28. William Cowper’s poetry is known for:
A. Political satire
B. Personal emotion and nature
C. Mock-heroic tone
D. Classical discipline
✅ Answer: B

29. Which poet revived interest in medievalism?
A. Cowper
B. Thomas Warton
C. Collins
D. Young
✅ Answer: B

30. Oliver Goldsmith is best known for:
A. Graveyard poetry
B. Gothic themes
C. Rural nostalgia
D. Ballad revival
✅ Answer: C

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🔹 NET Trap Questions

31. Graveyard poets were concerned mainly with:
A. Social realism
B. Human mortality
C. Politics
D. Satire
✅ Answer: B

32. Which age prepared the ground for Romanticism?
A. Victorian Age
B. Age of Pope
C. Age of Sensibility
D. Elizabethan Age
✅ Answer: C

33. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard focuses on:
A. Kings and heroes
B. Court life
C. Common villagers
D. Mythology
✅ Answer: C

34. The Pre-Romantic Age shifted focus from:
A. Emotion to reason
B. Reason to emotion
C. Nature to city
D. Romance to satire
✅ Answer: B

35. Which poet emphasized imagination over rules?
A. Joseph Warton
B. Pope
C. Dryden
D. Johnson
✅ Answer: A