Poetry as “Republican Speech”: The Fragment, the Individual, and Republicanism in The Prelude
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This paper explores the possibility of constructing a correspondence between individual and republic as an autonomous unity in terms of Friedrich Schlegel’s formulation of the fragment. An individual is an organic unity that is living, while a republic is an artificial organization that is constituted by individuals. Schlegel’s notion of the fragment presupposes the individuality (part) and at the same time totality (whole) of the fragment, which is complete in its incompleteness, thus suggesting the Romantic poetry’s essential feature as the perpetual state of becoming. In addition to the fragment, Schlegel’s definition of poetry as republican speech makes it possible to connect poetry to politics particularly regarding the liberty of parts and citizens independently of the whole and the republican state. In this sense, republican that qualifies poetry can be understood through Immanuel Kant’s notion of republicanism as the only political constitution that guarantees the natural rights of man. William Wordsworth’s struggles with the French Revolution in Books 9, 10, and 11 of The Prelude can be read as a link between the republican patriot and his autobiographical poetry on juvenile errors and the radicalization of the Revolution. Despite differences, Schlegel, Kant and Wordsworth all account for the French Revolution as the realization of a perfect ideal polity and yet a disappointment with the catastrophic consequences that disorganize the conditions of life. Above all, they concur on the potency of nature in bringing the universal progress of humankind. Both Schlegel and Wordsworth would agree with Kant in considering the French Revolution not as a phenomenon of revolution, but that of the evolution of a constitution governed by natural right.
Abstract
This paper explores the possibility of constructing a correspondence between individual and republic as an autonomous unity in terms of Friedrich Schlegel’s formulation of the fragment. An individual is an organic unity that is living, while a republic is an artificial organization that is constituted by individuals. Schlegel’s notion of the fragment presupposes the individuality (part) and at the same time totality (whole) of the fragment, which is complete in its incompleteness, thus suggesting the Romantic poetry’s essential feature as the perpetual state of becoming. In addition to the fragment, Schlegel’s definition of poetry as republican speech makes it possible to connect poetry to politics particularly regarding the liberty of parts and citizens independently of the whole and the republican state. In this sense, republican that qualifies poetry can be understood through Immanuel Kant’s notion of republicanism as the only political constitution that guarantees the natural rights of man. William Wordsworth’s struggles with the French Revolution in Books 9, 10, and 11 of The Prelude can be read as a link between the republican patriot and his autobiographical poetry on juvenile errors and the radicalization of the Revolution. Despite differences, Schlegel, Kant and Wordsworth all account for the French Revolution as the realization of a perfect ideal polity and yet a disappointment with the catastrophic consequences that disorganize the conditions of life. Above all, they concur on the potency of nature in bringing the universal progress of humankind. Both Schlegel and Wordsworth would agree with Kant in considering the French Revolution not as a phenomenon of revolution, but that of the evolution of a constitution governed by natural right.
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