New England Renaissance

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New England Renaissance
The First Major Literary Period in America
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• New England Renaissance
• 1830s - 1850s
• Called the American Renaissance if including Poe
  and others
• Northeasterners include Emerson, Thoreau,
  Hawthorne, Melville, Fireside poets, and Whitman

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• Transcendentalism
• A philosophical movement in New England
• 1840s
• Philosophy, literature, reform movement

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Transcendentalist Philosophy
They believed a spiritual reality pervaded
everything, like the Force in Star Wars.
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• Transcendentalism
• The Oversoul pervades all of nature
• The Oversoul is within every human being, like a
  spark of divinity
• A person can experience oneness with the Oversoul
  through intuition

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• Transcendentalism
• Such an experience is a Transcendental moment
• A person alone in nature may experience a
  Transcendental moment
• Note the influence of Hinduism and Platonic
  idealism

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Transcendentalism as Literature
Henry David Thoreau
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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• Emerson and Thoreau
• Friends, colleagues, teacher and student
• Harvard graduates
• Fellow citizens of Concord, Massachusetts
• Transcendental Club
• Optimistic, individualistic, non-materialistic

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• Emerson and Thoreau
• Both were poets, but not good ones
• Famous mainly for essays, non-fiction books, and
  lectures

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• Transcendentalism as literature
• The Dial, a magazine that published their essays,
  poetry, etc.

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• Transcendentalism as Reform Movement
• Strongly anti-slavery
• Strongly for feminism
• Margaret Fuller
• Brook Farm, a commune