Nature in Romanticism
The Romantics had a huge crush on nature. These guys (and sometimes gals) loved trees, flowers, mountains, clouds, crags, birds…you name it. As long as it was outdoors, they loved it.
In nature, the Romantics found inspiration for their poetry, wisdom, and straight-up happiness. If we went to the Romantics with a diagnosis of depression, they'd tell us: "Forget meds; take a walk in the park. Hug a tree. Talk to a bird. All you need is a little green."
Part of the Romantics' obsession with nature had to do with the fact that they were living and writing at the time of the Industrial Revolution. In the big cities, there were factories springing up everywhere, and mechanized manufacturing processes were changing society. People were moving further and further away from nature.
So the Romantics took it upon themselves to remind everyone of the importance of nature. And how.
Chew on This
Want to see a Romantic poet waxing lyrical about the sun, the leaves, and water? Look no further than these quotations from Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison."
And here's the speaker of Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem "Ode to the West Wind" imagining himself as a leaf carried by the wind.