Neoclassicism

The article I found is an introduction to the neoclassicism period for the students of City University of New York. The article discusses trends in behaviors and in literary techniques of the time period. It also talks about how people thought and the ideas that emerged from from the age of reason.

The neoclassic period came after the renaissance and is described as "a period of exploration and expansiveness." It is stated that the ideas for the movement originated in France and then later moved to England. New techniques in writing arose, such as simplifying the difficult language of Shakespeare, and standardizing words instead of making up new ones. The structure of plays also took a new turn. Plots were limited to time and space (meaning that they were in real time instead of jumping scenes) and they were simplified.

The period is called neoclassical because of the Influences of the Roman time period (I guess Roman times were considered classical to them at the time). Which lead to a more conservative view of the arts and politics. There was a belief that the future can be controlled by the past because they believed that human nature was constant. This also closed the possibilty for originalty because they though that almost all original ideas were already out there. "neoclassical artists expected people to conform to established social norms." In my opinion this time period would have been stagnant and boring for the fact that people began to conform and lose interest in originalty and invention.