[CITATION][C] Poetry and Machinery in Shelley's “Letter to Maria Gisborne”
BT Allen - Nineteenth Century Studies, 1988 - scholarlypublishingcollective.org
When we think of industrialism and romanticism, we tend to imagine irreconcilable
opposition between enemies. Despite our expectations, romantic responses to
industrialization were by no means universally hostile. William Godwin, for example, always
suspicious of the uneducated masses, looked to machine labor to free the working classes
from the drudgery which prevented their reading and meditation. In Enquiry Concerning
Political Justice he wrote that the inventions of mills, weaving machines, and steam engines …
opposition between enemies. Despite our expectations, romantic responses to
industrialization were by no means universally hostile. William Godwin, for example, always
suspicious of the uneducated masses, looked to machine labor to free the working classes
from the drudgery which prevented their reading and meditation. In Enquiry Concerning
Political Justice he wrote that the inventions of mills, weaving machines, and steam engines …