Question

Which poetic movement did Lyrical Ballads help initiate?

• A. Victorian poetry
• B. Neoclassicism
• C. Romanticism
• D. Modernism

Answer 1

Answer:

C. Romanticism

Lyrical Ballads (1798) by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge is widely considered the starting point of the Romantic movement in English literature.

How Lyrical Ballads Initiated Romanticism:

• It rejected the artificial, intellectual style of Neoclassicism.

• It emphasized emotion, imagination, and individual experience.

• It focused on nature, rural life, and common people as poetic subjects.

• It introduced simple, natural language instead of elevated diction.

• It encouraged spiritual and philosophical reflection in poetry.

Wordsworth’s Preface to Lyrical Ballads (1800) became the manifesto of Romanticism, shaping poetry for generations.