Transcendentalism

Please tell me you know whereNew England is

• Massachusetts– Boston– Concord– Salem

What’s happening in America?

• Scientific advances– New agricultural machines– New roads, canals, and railroads– Telegraph lines

Led to OPTIMISM

Characteristics of Transcendentalism

• Idealists• Universal soul – all forms

of being are spirituallyunited

• Anti-materialism• Values feelings over reason

The opposite of Paris Hilton

Nature

• Nature is divine• Nature holds the truths

of life• To communicate and be

one with nature is true goodness

• Nature is innocence and an escape from the evils of society

Individualism

• Rejection of standard societal beliefs• Inner truth is the only thing that matters• Fulfillment comes from knowing one’s self,

not wealth, gender, or education

Opposite of

Ralph Waldo Emerson

• Unitarian pastor• Transcendental Club –

intellectuals gathered to discuss philosophy, religion, and literature

• Famous for Nature

Henry David Thoreau

• Emerson’s student• Understand philosophy

through experience• Lived alone at Walden

Pond for 2 years• Famous for Walden• The Thoreau Society

Anti-Transcendentalists

• Dark vision of the world• Truths of existence are vague and disturbing• Limitations and potential

destructiveness of thehuman spirit

• Nathaniel Hawthorne– “The Scarlet Letter”

• Herman Melville– Moby Dick