American Literature Unit #2 (1800 – 1870) Enrichment and Review Opportunities
1.) United States 1850 – a physical look: 1800 US population: 5,308,483
US population: 23,191,876 US population: 39,818,449
2.) Romanticism and transcendentalism are very closely related, because Romanticism influenced the ideas of transcendentalism. Overall, the major differences between romanticism and transcendentalism are their views of nature and the individual. Romanticism viewed nature as perfect and man as flawed, whereas transcendentalist ideas regard nature as symbolic, providing answers about virtue and wisdom. Romantics focused on the self more, but not to the extent of the transcendentalists, for whom the individual as the ultimate spiritual being and something you could derive all truth and knowledge from.
Romanticism Romanticism from the literary perspective is a movement away from the enlightenment ideals of logic towards valuing emotion. Romantic authors wanted a story to be felt and for the reader to be inspired by a story. They considered their art an expression of the self, the self gaining prominence. In their writing, nature was considered perfect and man flawed, nature being a living mystery, and not a clockwork to be understood as it was in the enlightenment era. Their work and ideas also drew from the concepts of Idealism, in which the sublime and the terrifying are both ideal ways to express life as a beacon of raw emotion.
Transcendentalism Transcendentalism was a movement in which the individual was considered the spiritual center of the universe. They viewed God as a compilation of all the individual souls on Earth, which came together in the afterlife as an oversoul, which your spirit transcended to (What Emerson refers to as an oversoul, Whitman refers to as a float). Miracles were not considered in the biblical sense, because miracles were said to happen all around in every human being and in every part of nature. Wisdom and virtue were derived primarily from the individual's self-realization, but nature was also looked at to provide symbols of wisdom and virtue. This desire to explore oneself uniquely and individually created a tension with the desire to connect with nature and become one with the world. Self-realization and individual thought remain the major focus of transcendentalism though, and for this reason, history was strictly regarded as a resource for examples of self-realization, not as something to emulate. Another large belief of transcendentalism is the abhorance of consistency, which Emerson states is the "hobgoblin of little minds", and which Whitman refutes in "Song of Myself". One more miscellaneous belief of transcendentalism is that we are innately good, and that evil is the lack of self-realization and the happiness and good that results, not the presence of Satan as the Puritans formerly believed.
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/trmottle/transcendentalism-introduction-presentation 3.)
ROMANTICISM vs. REALISM
Romanticism Realism 1820-1865 1865 - 1914
Characters may be “larger than life” -- e.g. Rip Characters resemble ordinary people -- e.g. Huck Finn, Van Winkle, Ichabod Crane, Brom Bones, Natty Editha, Frederick Winterbourne, Daisy Miller, Sylvia, Bumppo, Ralph Hepdurn, Bartleby Louisa, Edna Pontellier Plot contains unusual events, mystery, or high Plot is developed with ordinary events and circumstances adventure -- e.g. Poe's stories, Melville’s Typee Ending is often happy Ending might be unhappy The language is often “literary” (inflated, formal, Writer uses ordinary speech and dialect -- common etc.) vernacular (the everyday language spoken by a people) Settings often made up; if actual settings are Settings actually exist or have actual prototypes used, the focus is on the exotic, strange, mysterious -- e.g. Melville’s Marquesas islands (S. Pacific), Cooper’s woods and frontier, Poe's gothic chambers Writer is interested in history or legend -- e.g. Writer is interested in recent or contemporary life Irving, Poe
4.) Minister’s Black Veil: http://www.k-state.edu/english/baker/english251/Symbol_MBV.htm
33 slides on the author and story: http://www.slideshare.net/scedge/the-ministers-black-veil-presentation
5.) Poe http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/edgar-allan-poe/about-edgar-allan-poe/681/ general info: http://people.brandeis.edu/~teuber/poebio.html
8 slide show of Poe and Literary Value: (note other slide shows along right side of page about Poe) http://www.slideshare.net/brianbean/writing-style-of-edgar-allan-poe
General Info http://edgar-allan-poe.com/
Poe’s stories: http://www.webenglishteacher.com/poe.html
6.) Herman Melville: General Info: http://www.melville.org/hmmoby.htm on-line lit: http://www.online-literature.com/melville/mobydick/ 6.) Herman Melville:
Dark Romantic, slideshare - http://www.slideshare.net/ahearnet/antitranscendentalism
7.) Transcendentalism: general info: http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/111879 http://www.americanwriters.org/writers/emerson.asp http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/transcendentalism/criticism/ecotran.html 8.) Dickinson: http://www.online-literature.com/dickinson/
9.) 1800 – 1870: Primary documents: http://www.teacheroz.com/19thcent.htm timeline: http://www.socsdteachers.org/tzenglish/literature_timeline.htm Transcendentalism and the Second Great Awakening
Websites: American Transcendentalism Web /// American Transcendentalism /// Transcendentalism /// New England Transcendentalism /// Transcendentalists.com /// Religion and the New Republic /// Heralds of a Liberal Faith /// New Churches in New York ///
Influences: Immanuel Kant /// GWF Hegel /// Samuel Taylor Coleridge /// English Romantics ///
Key Terms: / Transcendentalism ///
Figures:
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) Biography One /// Biography Two /// Biography Three /// A Website /// Another website. Primary author of transcendentalism, world-class poet, and famous lecturer. Writings: Representative Men, Essays and English Traits, Essays, Poems, Other works Commentary: Emerson's Philosophy of Education
Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894) Biography. Physician, novelist, poet, and orator. Father of Supreme Court judge Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. Writings: Selected Poems
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) Biography /// Another biography /// The Thoreau Project. Emerson's close friend and transcendentalist partner. Prominent anti-slavery activist. Writings: Walden, Works of Thoreau Walt Whitman (1819-1892) Biography /// Bibliography /// Whitman Archive /// Whitman and Slavery /// Whitman and the Civil War. Famous poet inspired by Emerson; later known as America's Bard of Democracy. Writings: Leaves of Grass, Prose, Selected Poetry, Drafts of Song of Myself, Development of Leaves of Grass Commentary: Whitman and Emerson, Whitman and Transcendentalism