The Idea of Children in Romantic Literature

It was first in the Romantic Era that the stage of childhood was introduced. Before this time, there was only infancy which moved straight into the young adult stage; quite a large jump. When childhood was introduced, no one knew what was expected during this stage of life. The invention of childhood was something that needed to be understood. Writers then took the challenge and began publishing works of instruction and poetry to help the people understand just what childhood should' look like.

They also expressed ideas such as children are innocent, and childhood is fragile. Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a tutor who wrote Emile by drawing on how he taught his own pupils. He argued that the best way to teach children is to not teach them, but let them go out into nature to learn for themselves. Nature was seen to be a representation of childhood, untainted by the reason of more 'experienced' adults.

Rousseau says that children should be kept as far from reason as possible.

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Rousseau states, "If children understood reason they would not need education, but by talking to them from their earliest age in a language they do not understand you accustom them to be satisfied with words, to question all that is said to them, to think themselves as wise as their teachers; you train them to be argumentative and rebellious." (3) He suggests that children be allowed to form their own ideas and opinions about practical matters - without adult interference - in the natural world.

Rousseau did not want to impose other's ideas on the then innocent child mind. Rousseau also emphasized the idea that children should spend as much time in nature as possible, because the closer to nature the child is the happier he will be. He says, "Let them run, jump, and shout to their heart's content. All their own activities are instincts of the body for its growth in strength." (3) Before the Romantic time, children were supposed to be quiet and not be too rowdy.

Now, however, Rousseau says the exact opposite. Children should be allowed to be as active as they want. This activity would strengthen their bodies as well as their minds due to the imagination. Nature also represents the mortality that is the human life. In William Blake's poems, children are shown to be innocent and, in many cases, fragile creatures. Similar to nature, they are pure and the embodiment of hope. Like nature too, they quickly wither away. Their joyfulness turns to pessimism, and their singing to weeping. Blake demonstrates this contrast extremely well in his two groups of poems: Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. A couple of the poems pairs that show this contrast the best are Nurse's Song, and Infant Joy/ Infant Sorrow. First, in the Innocence version of Nurse's Song, Blake shows the nurse as happy and content to watch and listen as the children run and play in the field. She lets them stay out past their allotted time to run and laugh.

In Experience, however, her "face turns green and pale" (Wolfson et. al. 194 In 4) as she remembers her own childhood days. She is very gloomy, and won't let the children play longer even though they want to. This shows that her experience with childhood was not happy because playing was not a 'natural' thing to do. Now the children are happy because they get to express themselves in nature and romp around for hours. In the second set of poems, Infant Joy and Infant Sorrow, Blake illustrates just how fragile young life is. Joy is about a two-day-old infant that is so happy to be alive. The babe smiles and is with parents who want it to be there with them, while in Sorrow the opposite is occurring. The mother and father both are weeping and the babe is wailing. The child knows it will not lead a happy life so, "Bound and weary I thought best/ to sulk upon my mother's breast." (Wolfson et. al. 200 In 7-8)

It decided to choose death over living a life where exploitation and non-natural things were. Both of these writers, in effect, showed the people what childhood could be, both for better and worse. Childhood could either be a happy time in one's life with singing and beauty, or it could be a cheerless time with weeping and grime. Though the authors were writing different genres and they had different views on some childhood aspects, they both agree that childhood is something that should be protected. Nurture and care for children because they are too young to know the difference between what is safe and what is harmful. Do not allow children to be taken advantage of as in the context of Blake's poems of Experience. The goodness of innocence should be kept until they become young adults, and children should be taken care of until then because of their fragility.