Sentimentalism is the practice of being
sentimental, or the tendency to base actions and reactions from emotions and feelings as opposed to reason. As a
literary mode, sentimentalism has been a recurring aspect of world literature, and is important to the traditions of
India,
China, and
Vietnam. Sentimentalism may refer to a variety of aspects in literature, such as sentimental poetry, the sentimental novel, or the German sentimentalist music movement, Empfindsamkeit.