We will walk with our own feet

we will work with our own hands

we will speak our own minds

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

1800 - 1860

Transcendentalism

Transcendentalism

“Great men are they who see that the spiritual is stronger than any material force; that thoughts rule

the world.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Journal

What was transcendentalism?

In short, it was a philosophical/ literary movement of the early nineteenth century, advocated/initiated by literary greats such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and the Fireside Poets, to name a few.

Transcendentalism• Transcendentalists were well educated

people who lived in the decades before the American Civil War.

• These people, mostly residing near Boston, were attempting to create a ‘uniquely American’ body of literature.

• Americans had won independence from England several decades before this time. It was time for literary independence– to create work clearly different from anything European.

Facts…• Believed that everything in the

world was a reflection of the “divine” soul

• The physical world/ environment was a doorway to the spiritual world

• Used intuition as a guide or a roadmap for life

• A person is his/her own best authority

More…

• Believed in human perfection and strived to achieve it by:– Improving own lives and assisting in

others’ lives (reform movements)– Established Utopian communities

(Brook Farm, 1841)– Instigated social change—

abolitionism

Review• Explain the difference between Dark

Romanticism (Gothic Fiction) and Transcendentalism

• Compare to other movements—like Puritanism