Back to the Basics

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Back to the Basics An Introduction to
Transcendentalism
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Things to ponder

1. How are you affected by nature? Do you find
   comfort in it?
2. Do you reflect the moods of nature?
3. What is the role of nature in your life?
4. What is meant by an individuals spiritual side?
   How do you define it?
5. Is there a connection between the individuals
   spirit and nature? If so, what is that
   connection?
6. What does it mean to know something intuitively?
   For example, has a parent or a sibling ever known
   something was wrong with you without having
   talked with or seen you?
7. What do we mean when we say I just know it?
8. How do you demonstrate that you are an
   individual? Do you think independently of others
   or do you follow the crowd?

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Transcendentalism

• First truly distinctive American literature
• Transcendentalists were a group of poets and
  philosophers club formed in 1835
• Followers wanted to go beyond the limitations
  of the senses and discover higher truths and
  insights by using their intuition

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Transcendentalists

• Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 1882) - Harvard
  graduate, had a brief stint as a Unitarian
  minister (like his father), wrote Self Reliance
• Henry David Thoreau (1818 1862) Graduated
  Harvard at age 20, a dedicated nonconformist
  tried to live by his own values instead of
  societys, wrote Walden

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1800-1850

• President Thomas Jefferson 1801
• Louisiana Purchase - 1803
• Lewis Clark headed west 1804
• Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo 1815
• Beethoven completed the Ninth Symphony 1823
• Websters first dictionary 1828
• Population of America grew from five million in
  1800 to over 23 million in 1850
• California Gold Rush started 1848

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The Transcendentalists
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Life on Walden Pond
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Thoreaus Legacy
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A Time of Change
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The Civil Rights Movement
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The Woodstock Generation
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Simplicity, Simplicity, Simplicity