Romanticism and the Anglican Newman

Abstract

Goslee s study maintains that Newman s Anglican writing, although widely considered irrelevant to the main currents of the post-Enlightenment, in fact reinterprets Romantic transcendence within a uniquely dialogic paradigm. It is this paradigm, he argues, that critics need to explore as a link between sacred and secular domains within Victorian culture. Goslee s own exploration is accomplished in three parts. First he describes Newman s early renunciation of modern thought, then analyzes the dialogic Romanticism that informs New man s Anglican works, particularly its power to expand his conception of personal identity, spiritual election, militant purpose, self-criticism, and cultural critique. Finally, he follows the collapse of this Romantic synthesis under the burden of its own success: natural and preternatural presences break into Newman s dialogue with his God, and then his God becomes transformed into a threat that must be constrained within an institutional church. Throughout this study, Goslee follows a hermeneutic strategy suggested by Newman s own descriptions of his compositional practice examining thematically related passages from different times and contexts to see just how far Newman s ideas might take him. Goslee concludes that this leading nineteenth-century religious writer, who rejected Romanticism for its decadent modern subjectivity, nevertheless clearly participated in the secular Romanticism of his day.