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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