American Literature: 1840-1860

TRANSCENDENTALISM

American History

Tension leading to Civil WarWestward expansion—railroads, telegraph

Mexican War (1848)Industrialization

American Mind-Set

Dissatisfaction with present time, optimism about future

Technology and science will bring better times

American Mindset

Loss of American values—cheap labor, mill towns, child labor

American individualism

Transcendentalism was in response to the American mindset at the time

First major American philosophical movement

Publication of Emerson’s Nature is considered the watershed (defining) moment

Transcendentalism

Belief that humans can intuitively transcend the limits of the senses and of logic to a plane of “higher truths.”

Valued spirituality (direct access to a benevolent God, not organized religion or ritual)

Basic Principles of Transcendentalism

1) The fundamental truths of being and the universe lie beyond the senses and can only be understood through intuition.

2) The focus is on the human spirit and the spiritual relationship between humanity and nature.

3) Nature is a manifestation of the human spirit. The meaning of existence can be found through exploring nature.

4) All forms of being – God, nature, man – are spiritually united under a shared universal soul – the Over-Soul.

Ralph Waldo Emerson coined this term.

To Review…Transcendentalists…

A deep faith in human potentialBelieved that all forms of being are

spiritually united through a shared universal soul

Popular themes in their writing include love and nature

Known for their essays expressing their ideas and beliefs

Similar to Romanticism

Nature is the key to self-awarenessIf you open yourself up to nature, you man

receive its gifts: a deeper, more mystical experience of life

Nature offers a kind of “grace” – “salvation” from mundane evils of everyday life.

Both T & R came to prominence around the same time. (Remember, TSL was published in 1850).