Consider the origins of the Romantic movement for a research topic. The mid-18th century interest in folklore in Germany, for example, demonstrated by the popular fairy tales of Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm. Another idea is to the examine the rise and spread of William Shakespeare in influencing the movement. As his works were translated and spread around Europe, his disregard for the Classical idea that a drama should always be split into five acts was, in many ways, considered revolutionary.
Interest in distant and faraway places, known as exoticism, is a hallmark of the Romantic movement and can be used as a basic for a research paper. Explore the French Romantic fascination with Spain or the representation of North Africa and the Middle East in Romantic art and literature. Alternatively, consider the influence of colonialism on the Romantic movement through the treatment of natives in art and literature, for example, in the poetry of Lord Byron.
The rise and spread of Romanticism coincided with and was heavily influenced by the American and French revolutions. Explore the manifestation of revolution and violence in the paintings of Antoine-Jean Gros and Jacques-Louis David or the poetry of Charlotte Smith and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Also consider the Industrial Revolution, which began in Britain in the 1770s, and the Romantic belief that it destroyed nature in the works of William Blake and William Wordsworth.
Another interesting topic for a research paper is the role and position of the Romantic in society. Often involved in social and political life, Romantics reacted strongly to oppression and injustice in the world. Consider, for example, Romantic involvement in the movement for women's rights or the abolition of slavery. Romantics also tended to distance themselves from the ideas and pursuits of the middle class, preferring to assert their individuality, as demonstrated in the private lives of Oscar Wilde or Emily Dickinson.