After I read some responses to the French Revolution, I think an enlightened view means that people change their mind and have their own reason. Throughout the readings from the French Revolution, French Revolution change the status of the entire society. For example, in the Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizens, it said that: “Men are born and remain free and equal in rights” this illustrates that all men have equal rights to do what they want to do. After that, in The Rights of Women, De Gouges question the deficiency of the Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizens, and he pointed out that women is born free and remain equal to man in rights and people should remove the social distinction. Compared to these two works, I felt the progress during the society because people have different point of views due to the enlightened view. In both works, authors use language and words to convey and express their opinion and let others recognized the importance of equality.
In my opinion, I believe that poetry have the same purpose as the other literature works which is to express and convey their own ideas or opinions, but poetry is more difficult than other types of literature works because poets should use limit words to express their ideas. Shelley is one of the most famous poets in the world, his ” Defense for Poetry” express clearly about the purpose of poetry. In Shelley’s view, he writes: ” Poetry thus makes immortal all that is best and most beautiful….” The task of poetry for Shelley is to record the most important moment to remind people that what was happening. Shelley believes that the poetry not only can arouse people’s strong felling, but also it can put people into the scene that the poem depicts. In addition, Shelley mentions, ” the most unfailing herald, companion , and follower of the awakening of a great people to work a beneficial in opinion or institution, is poetry.” This describes the function of poetry during the revolution. People can depicts the situation of the society by poem to convey their feelings and let people recognized the unfair or darkness of the society and thus to make change. On the whole, in Shelley’s view, poetry is the most important works and poetry has the supreme power comparing to other types of works.