Similar to literary minimalism/ maximalism I’m not sure what Romanticism means to substack and I don’t really read the essays on it, only random notes. Someone (maybe Inigo?) pointed out that historical Romanticism was rooted in reverence for the Sublime and I think that they’re right to point out that a real Romantic movement needs to actually embrace something it adores. Hating the internet is something people do reflexively. My bias would be that we should spend more time in nature. It’s what the Romantics did and as far as countercultures go I think hippies really had the nature part right. I won’t get too political but I don’t think you can have a genuine Romantic movement without confronting the structure of society itself. The Shelley’s were abolitionists and anarchists who boycotted sugar because it was made with slave labor.
thanks for your insightful comment as always helen. reverence for the sublime is very much what i am after here: it is, in fact irreverent to post things on the internet
Very much so. I talked of this in another reply. These names are seldom ones the artist would call their own work. Sometimes it’s tongue-in-cheek, sometimes it’s about one random thing a pop DJ said once.
As far as on Substack, I can’t say. I’m not privy to that. In fact, this is the first time I’ve seen an article about “New Romantics.”
My immediate thought was “Duran Duran!” And “Adam Ant!” “Soft Cell!”
This genre played an important role in the evolution of music. I mean, with New Romantics, no David Bowie!! That’s something I’d not wish on my most despised. The Cure.
Without this pulling real Rock through the shit 80s, Alternative Rock might’ve never been a sound.
I googled bc I can never member what movements were named retroactively (a few weren’t) and apparently there were even previous movements that called themselves Neo romanticism
Yeah, there’s no real logic to it. Bands from 1970-1995ish hit the sweet spot in this case, although ‘New Wave Technically should’ve come in in 79 with the Cure, but they’d spend a few more years making genius level LPs before anyone would much care.
I like the rock angle as part of the legacy of literary romanticism because there’s definitely some influence there. I like the individualism and spiritual connection to nature of the original romanticism
Totally. Of course, those guys brought in a lot on their own, but they’d been deeply shaped by the Rock of the 60s & 70s.
Rock plays into the development and dissolution of every genre that came after Alan Freed’s “Rock and Roll!” He coined the term on air, in 1951 to describe what, at that time was Rhythm and Blues.
This is why I say Rock has been a part of everything since. The Blues, being the first really new genre, Elvis Presley stole as much as he could(songs, slang, dance moves) from black Blues, Jazz, and Rhythm & Blues.
So, blues becomes your real progenitor for everything that followed. Rock was more digested, by the pre-civil liberties movement US, and then it rebelled and most artists in the 60s and 70s tried to give credit where it was due. The ones that weren’t pieces of shit anyway.
Well put. "New Romantics", "re-enchantment" - I feel like all these movements, while so well intentioned, are still just circling the same drain as the cottagecore girlies from a few years back. Authentic living can't be mined for content, it can only be lived. Thank you for the timely reminder!
When it comes to a genre, of movement in music, it’s an entirely different animal. Its accepted name, often well after it had started hitting pop, wasn’t something the bands would call themselves. This happens over and over again the timeline of music. It crosses genres, bleeds into new genres, while paying homage to those who’d influenced them.
As a deeply weird, romantic realist myself, I think you just cracked the code. We’ve been dragged through the eye of the internet needle for a couple of decades. I didn’t feel there was a choice. And I wanted to explore the potential. Now with AI and what’s to come, it may be time for us to choose how to be or not to be. I will continue to pop in and out—but driven more by desire than demand. Romantically so.
This is a good essay, you have chops. I also don't really know what the solution is re living the 'values' of Romanticism in a world which is increasingly online.
I do react against the faux-aesthetes who are performative in their rejection of technology, and more a fan of seeing the internet as only a tool and nothing more. There are other tools that can be useful to achieve the same aims, whether that be the postage system or physical meetings, etc.
I wrote an essay exploring the hypocrisy of the New Romantics and the trade for Mere Orthodoxy, maybe a more religious lens than you would be comfortable with, but you may enjoy it too.
thanks AA! i've read your non fiction so that means a lot. couldn't agree more about faux aesthetes and using as a tool. i don't mind a religious lens -- but I think humanism has been totally corrupted by internet influences, which is really my lament here i think.
Isn’t the key enjoying it? And by that I mean also the challenges of truth (/ beauty). And in a way that you have agency over — that isn’t thrown at you or wrapped around you. This is in the creating and the reading, I think. It’s impossible to know someone else’s motivations and if posting something is vanity or ego or simply their truth and play of language which helps them enjoy life or gain clarity and possibly help another person do this, too.
But also — it conflicts me all the time, too. I guess swallowing the paradox whole and embracing it is what I’m trying to do.
I like the chutzpah in this post, CS. Very DFW of you.
I came upon this from a restack. Educative thoughts, thanks. I appreciate your desire for anonymity and would add that another form of distancing is to not take the online experience, or even oneself, too seriously. I’m not downplaying the importance, just recalling the big helpful paradox that each of us is simultaneously irreplaceable and insignificant.
I'm completely in agreement with you here. I've actually gotten to the point where any time I see a New Romanticism essay my eyes actually kind of glaze over, and I end up not even reading most of them. Then my brain is like, if I'm not paying attention to this stuff, how can I be part of the culture? And yet, the things I write about (especially my poetry) are those random bits and pieces of the mundane. The people who read my work seem to enjoy it, but not that many people read me because they don't know I exist. The way to rememdy that is to be more online than I currently am, but being that online takes away from actually living in the real world.
That was all a bit rambly. Hopefully it made sense lol.
same. the glazing over sort of inspired this essay.
"but being that online takes away from actually living in the real world" -- which then detracts from your poetry because you aren't experiencing the mundane!
that's the struggle. for me, it's about being online, but not intermixing the real me with the online me. it's sort of a self sabotage, but it works.
Really enjoyed this. That tension you're describing - wanting to reject the internet while still needing it to be heard- is something I think about constantly. Not sure I have a solution either, but it's comforting to see someone else wrestling with it honestly. Solid read.
While I see the merits of limiting online time, I don’t think living offline is something I care to do full time. Most of the people I interact with IRL are fine but for the most part uninteresting. I’ve enjoyed my time here on Substack. I’ve treated it like an intellectual buffet, exploring the feeds of various interesting people, exercising my mind in ways I’ve long neglected. I’m not an intellectual so I don’t know if there is a term for this but I try to live my life according to a single principle: balance. I feel that too many people lead a binary existence. Yes/no. Good/bad. Us/them. But really everything exists on a spectrum and I constantly adjust various aspects of my life to find the right ‘settings’. Your piece was well written. You did an excellent job pointing out the shortcomings of the New Romantic movement. And I agree with a lot of your points. But for me there is no right or wrong. Only the spectrum in between.
wise advice Matt. and actually I can't agree more. I think what I was trying to say here is that i like being online, but for me it only works to sort of hold it at arms length by not ingratiating it with my actual self. that way the "real" parts of me stay real.
So you feel the need to keep your online presence at arms length from your real self for fear of the performative aspects of social media altering that real self? I can certainly understand that.
Enjoyed reading this, Clancy. I think you've really gotten to the easy allure of adopting a Romantic/analog-aesthetic online, for more clicks and shares and likes, and you went the extra step of positing some good ideas to try and manage the complication of being online without being "online." I don't think there is any way to truly be offline if you have an online presence. But certainly managing it, enacting boundaries and protecting your "real" life, is a mature response to it. As with most complicated things, it is likely a balance that evolves and shifts as you go. Thanks for this essay! Lots to think about.
thanks for reading stephanie! "But certainly managing it, enacting boundaries and protecting your "real" life, is a mature response to it"-- i think you have articulated my main point here better than anyone else in this thread, so thank you.
I agree with 90% of this, but my one conversation point would be in your assertion that your psudonym allows you to separate from being "online." True, yes, but I think one of the detriments of online presence is that it also detracts from time spent not online. Separating then is still short of true analog existence.
thanks Evan. non fiction is tough for me structurally. it took me forever to write this, far longer than any fiction piece. the prose itself is actually "easier", it's more piecing ideas into a coherent structure that gives me trouble; contrast that with storytelling, a wholly different muscle, which comes easily to me.
it allows my "self" not to be online. in my view, this preserves the romance in my reality much better. it's definitely not an analog existence but that's what I mean I suppose.
Clancy, you bastard, you've done it again. This is exactly how I feel about the whole New Romanticism thing. Will be quoting you in an essay I hope to post soon about self promotion
thanks Brandon. to clarify, i'm not exactly against self promotion--i do it all the time. it just depends what you mean by "self" I suppose. i see it differently to many, and that's what I think this essay is about: identity. to be "offline", you need an identity online that is not "you".
I got that. I just think your way of doing self promotion delimits itself by not being about more than just sharing your work, rather than turning you personally into some Genius that a scene can be built around. I don't think you have to post pseudonymously to not do this, but it is an effective way to keep yourself from getting too big of a head and pronouncing you're part of some movement like neo-romanticism that will lead to the salvation of art or whatever
I love a good paradox and this essay sure delivered on a concept I have thought much about but never had the skill or ideas to articulate it. I appreciated this essay and the call to maintain a healthy relationship with the online world and how contradictory it is to promote the beauty of life in an online space and claiming that using social media for counterculture trends like going offline is absurdly hypocritical. I may be rereading this essay when I find myself caught up in those points you made while I strive to keep a healthier connection to Substack and other platforms.
I also appreciated reading your take on the use of your pseudonym that answered a question I had about this practice earlier today. It seemed almost prophetic from my experience.
Similar to literary minimalism/ maximalism I’m not sure what Romanticism means to substack and I don’t really read the essays on it, only random notes. Someone (maybe Inigo?) pointed out that historical Romanticism was rooted in reverence for the Sublime and I think that they’re right to point out that a real Romantic movement needs to actually embrace something it adores. Hating the internet is something people do reflexively. My bias would be that we should spend more time in nature. It’s what the Romantics did and as far as countercultures go I think hippies really had the nature part right. I won’t get too political but I don’t think you can have a genuine Romantic movement without confronting the structure of society itself. The Shelley’s were abolitionists and anarchists who boycotted sugar because it was made with slave labor.
thanks for your insightful comment as always helen. reverence for the sublime is very much what i am after here: it is, in fact irreverent to post things on the internet
Very much so. I talked of this in another reply. These names are seldom ones the artist would call their own work. Sometimes it’s tongue-in-cheek, sometimes it’s about one random thing a pop DJ said once.
As far as on Substack, I can’t say. I’m not privy to that. In fact, this is the first time I’ve seen an article about “New Romantics.”
My immediate thought was “Duran Duran!” And “Adam Ant!” “Soft Cell!”
This genre played an important role in the evolution of music. I mean, with New Romantics, no David Bowie!! That’s something I’d not wish on my most despised. The Cure.
Without this pulling real Rock through the shit 80s, Alternative Rock might’ve never been a sound.
I googled bc I can never member what movements were named retroactively (a few weren’t) and apparently there were even previous movements that called themselves Neo romanticism
Yeah, there’s no real logic to it. Bands from 1970-1995ish hit the sweet spot in this case, although ‘New Wave Technically should’ve come in in 79 with the Cure, but they’d spend a few more years making genius level LPs before anyone would much care.
I like the rock angle as part of the legacy of literary romanticism because there’s definitely some influence there. I like the individualism and spiritual connection to nature of the original romanticism
Totally. Of course, those guys brought in a lot on their own, but they’d been deeply shaped by the Rock of the 60s & 70s.
Rock plays into the development and dissolution of every genre that came after Alan Freed’s “Rock and Roll!” He coined the term on air, in 1951 to describe what, at that time was Rhythm and Blues.
This is why I say Rock has been a part of everything since. The Blues, being the first really new genre, Elvis Presley stole as much as he could(songs, slang, dance moves) from black Blues, Jazz, and Rhythm & Blues.
So, blues becomes your real progenitor for everything that followed. Rock was more digested, by the pre-civil liberties movement US, and then it rebelled and most artists in the 60s and 70s tried to give credit where it was due. The ones that weren’t pieces of shit anyway.
Well put. "New Romantics", "re-enchantment" - I feel like all these movements, while so well intentioned, are still just circling the same drain as the cottagecore girlies from a few years back. Authentic living can't be mined for content, it can only be lived. Thank you for the timely reminder!
"Authentic living can't be mined for content, it can only be lived" -- absolutely well put! thanks for reading jenever!
When it comes to a genre, of movement in music, it’s an entirely different animal. Its accepted name, often well after it had started hitting pop, wasn’t something the bands would call themselves. This happens over and over again the timeline of music. It crosses genres, bleeds into new genres, while paying homage to those who’d influenced them.
As a deeply weird, romantic realist myself, I think you just cracked the code. We’ve been dragged through the eye of the internet needle for a couple of decades. I didn’t feel there was a choice. And I wanted to explore the potential. Now with AI and what’s to come, it may be time for us to choose how to be or not to be. I will continue to pop in and out—but driven more by desire than demand. Romantically so.
thanks for reading Debra, sounds like as good a path as any to me.
This is a good essay, you have chops. I also don't really know what the solution is re living the 'values' of Romanticism in a world which is increasingly online.
I do react against the faux-aesthetes who are performative in their rejection of technology, and more a fan of seeing the internet as only a tool and nothing more. There are other tools that can be useful to achieve the same aims, whether that be the postage system or physical meetings, etc.
I wrote an essay exploring the hypocrisy of the New Romantics and the trade for Mere Orthodoxy, maybe a more religious lens than you would be comfortable with, but you may enjoy it too.
thanks AA! i've read your non fiction so that means a lot. couldn't agree more about faux aesthetes and using as a tool. i don't mind a religious lens -- but I think humanism has been totally corrupted by internet influences, which is really my lament here i think.
thanks man, well see what you think of this when you get a chance. religious views aside, I think there will be some food for thought there for you: https://mereorthodoxy.substack.com/p/tramping-out-of-dantes-hell
Isn’t the key enjoying it? And by that I mean also the challenges of truth (/ beauty). And in a way that you have agency over — that isn’t thrown at you or wrapped around you. This is in the creating and the reading, I think. It’s impossible to know someone else’s motivations and if posting something is vanity or ego or simply their truth and play of language which helps them enjoy life or gain clarity and possibly help another person do this, too.
But also — it conflicts me all the time, too. I guess swallowing the paradox whole and embracing it is what I’m trying to do.
I like the chutzpah in this post, CS. Very DFW of you.
you're totally right. in the spirit of DFW, I even had an "And so..." to start a sentence in this one, haha whoops. thanks for reading Kate!
I came upon this from a restack. Educative thoughts, thanks. I appreciate your desire for anonymity and would add that another form of distancing is to not take the online experience, or even oneself, too seriously. I’m not downplaying the importance, just recalling the big helpful paradox that each of us is simultaneously irreplaceable and insignificant.
hey thanks for reading mr. bunk! i totally agree especially with:
online experience, or even oneself, too seriously
i regard the internet with a mild incredulity at all times. and i think you’ll find my presence here is often humorous!
I'm completely in agreement with you here. I've actually gotten to the point where any time I see a New Romanticism essay my eyes actually kind of glaze over, and I end up not even reading most of them. Then my brain is like, if I'm not paying attention to this stuff, how can I be part of the culture? And yet, the things I write about (especially my poetry) are those random bits and pieces of the mundane. The people who read my work seem to enjoy it, but not that many people read me because they don't know I exist. The way to rememdy that is to be more online than I currently am, but being that online takes away from actually living in the real world.
That was all a bit rambly. Hopefully it made sense lol.
same. the glazing over sort of inspired this essay.
"but being that online takes away from actually living in the real world" -- which then detracts from your poetry because you aren't experiencing the mundane!
that's the struggle. for me, it's about being online, but not intermixing the real me with the online me. it's sort of a self sabotage, but it works.
Really enjoyed this. That tension you're describing - wanting to reject the internet while still needing it to be heard- is something I think about constantly. Not sure I have a solution either, but it's comforting to see someone else wrestling with it honestly. Solid read.
Thanks Himanshi -- the best I can do is separate the "me" from the "me on online".
While I see the merits of limiting online time, I don’t think living offline is something I care to do full time. Most of the people I interact with IRL are fine but for the most part uninteresting. I’ve enjoyed my time here on Substack. I’ve treated it like an intellectual buffet, exploring the feeds of various interesting people, exercising my mind in ways I’ve long neglected. I’m not an intellectual so I don’t know if there is a term for this but I try to live my life according to a single principle: balance. I feel that too many people lead a binary existence. Yes/no. Good/bad. Us/them. But really everything exists on a spectrum and I constantly adjust various aspects of my life to find the right ‘settings’. Your piece was well written. You did an excellent job pointing out the shortcomings of the New Romantic movement. And I agree with a lot of your points. But for me there is no right or wrong. Only the spectrum in between.
wise advice Matt. and actually I can't agree more. I think what I was trying to say here is that i like being online, but for me it only works to sort of hold it at arms length by not ingratiating it with my actual self. that way the "real" parts of me stay real.
So you feel the need to keep your online presence at arms length from your real self for fear of the performative aspects of social media altering that real self? I can certainly understand that.
absolutely. at what point am i living for me vs at what point am i doing stuff in real life so i can post it on the internet.
and at what point do i start doing EVERYTHING so i can post it on the internet — even the stuff that actually DOES matter?
That’s an easy trap to fall into. I know I do. I need to keep my culinary pics to myself 😂
Enjoyed reading this, Clancy. I think you've really gotten to the easy allure of adopting a Romantic/analog-aesthetic online, for more clicks and shares and likes, and you went the extra step of positing some good ideas to try and manage the complication of being online without being "online." I don't think there is any way to truly be offline if you have an online presence. But certainly managing it, enacting boundaries and protecting your "real" life, is a mature response to it. As with most complicated things, it is likely a balance that evolves and shifts as you go. Thanks for this essay! Lots to think about.
thanks for reading stephanie! "But certainly managing it, enacting boundaries and protecting your "real" life, is a mature response to it"-- i think you have articulated my main point here better than anyone else in this thread, so thank you.
The Psychedelic Furs are one of my favorite bands, so I'll gladly take the "New Romantics" moniker if they had too.
hahaha thanks for reading Gary. for the Neo-Romantic sentiments, check out guys like Ted Gioia on here.
Great stuff. Really enjoy your nonfic prose.
I agree with 90% of this, but my one conversation point would be in your assertion that your psudonym allows you to separate from being "online." True, yes, but I think one of the detriments of online presence is that it also detracts from time spent not online. Separating then is still short of true analog existence.
thanks Evan. non fiction is tough for me structurally. it took me forever to write this, far longer than any fiction piece. the prose itself is actually "easier", it's more piecing ideas into a coherent structure that gives me trouble; contrast that with storytelling, a wholly different muscle, which comes easily to me.
it allows my "self" not to be online. in my view, this preserves the romance in my reality much better. it's definitely not an analog existence but that's what I mean I suppose.
Clancy, you bastard, you've done it again. This is exactly how I feel about the whole New Romanticism thing. Will be quoting you in an essay I hope to post soon about self promotion
thanks Brandon. to clarify, i'm not exactly against self promotion--i do it all the time. it just depends what you mean by "self" I suppose. i see it differently to many, and that's what I think this essay is about: identity. to be "offline", you need an identity online that is not "you".
I got that. I just think your way of doing self promotion delimits itself by not being about more than just sharing your work, rather than turning you personally into some Genius that a scene can be built around. I don't think you have to post pseudonymously to not do this, but it is an effective way to keep yourself from getting too big of a head and pronouncing you're part of some movement like neo-romanticism that will lead to the salvation of art or whatever
that’s a great comment because that’s what i’m going for!! thank you for realizing this brandon
The New Romantic movement was all that lovey.
I love a good paradox and this essay sure delivered on a concept I have thought much about but never had the skill or ideas to articulate it. I appreciated this essay and the call to maintain a healthy relationship with the online world and how contradictory it is to promote the beauty of life in an online space and claiming that using social media for counterculture trends like going offline is absurdly hypocritical. I may be rereading this essay when I find myself caught up in those points you made while I strive to keep a healthier connection to Substack and other platforms.
I also appreciated reading your take on the use of your pseudonym that answered a question I had about this practice earlier today. It seemed almost prophetic from my experience.