1. Early 1800s to 1865

2.  Despite the name of the literary period, Romanticism does not deal with sappy love stories. THIS IS NOT THE KIND OF LITERATURE THAT WE ARE GOING TO STUDY!

3. We will walk with our own feet. We will work with our own hands. We will speak our own minds -Ralph Waldo Emerson In your guided notes, speculate what you believe Americans during the Romantic era valued based on the above picture and quote.

4.  Romanticism is the name for the literary period that followed the Age of Reason (The Revolutionary Period) in America.  Due to the fact that the country was now established, writers moved their focus away from political matters and revolutionary governmental ideas and began to focus on other aspects of life (emotions, possibilities, imagination etc…)

5.  Values feeling and intuition over reason  Places faith in inner experience and the power of the imagination  Shuns the artificiality of civilization and seeks unspoiled nature  Prefers youthful innocence to educated sophistication  Champions individual freedom and the worth of the individual  Contemplates nature’s beauty as a path to spiritual and moral development

6.  Looks backward to the wisdom of the past and distrusts progress  Finds beauty and truth in exotic locals (the frontier/woods), the supernatural realm, and the inner world of the imagination

7. A sample of American Romantic art- note the wild landscape and ominous clouds; there is no hint of civilization.

8.  Short stories  Novels  Poetry  Essays

9.  Frontier: vast expanse, freedom, no geographic limitations.  Optimism: greater than in Europe because of the presence of frontier.  Experimentation: in science, in institutions.  Mingling of races: immigrants in large numbers arrive to the US.  Growth of industrialization: polarization of north and south; north becomes industrialized, south remains agricultural.

10.  The quest for beauty  Romantic literature does not tell people how to live their lives  Escapism - from American problems through use of the far-away and exotic  Interest in external nature - for itself, for beauty:  Nature as source for the knowledge of the primitive.  Nature as refuge.  Nature as revelation of God to the individual.

11.  Remoteness of settings in time and space.  Improbable plots.  Inadequate or unlikely characterization.  Socially "harmful morality;" a world of "lies."  Organic principle in writing: form rises out of content, non-formal.

12.  William Cullen Bryant – “To a Waterfowl,” “Thanatopsis”  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow – “The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls”  Washington Irving -- “The Devil and Tom Walker,” “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”  Oliver Wendell Holmes – “Old Ironsides,” “The Chambered Nautilus”

13.  Romantic VIEW OF MAN: Focus on the individual and his inner world (imagination and emotions).

14.  Romantic VIEW OF NATURE: Nature is beautiful, mysterious, and symbolic. God can be seen in nature.

15.  Romantic GUIDE TO TRUTH: Intuition (inner voice or gut feeling) and imagination guides each individual to understanding.

16.  Edgar Allen Poe (“The Raven,” “The Pit and the Pendulum”) Nathaniel Hawthorne (The Scarlet Letter, “The Minister’s Black Veil”) and Herman Melville (Moby Dick) are known as anti- Transcendentalists or Dark Romantics  Explored conflicts between good and evil, the psychological effects of guilt and sin, and madness

17. Dark Romantics Nathaniel Hawthorne Herman Melville Edgar Allan Poe

18.  In his writing, Hawthorne explored issues of moral and social responsibility in Puritan New England.  Hawthorne felt personal guilt because one of his ancestors persecuted Quakers and was one of the judges who condemned the 19 Salem “witches” to death in 1692.  Hawthorne explored the issues of intolerance and hypocrisy in stories he called “allegories of the heart” – stories that teach a moral principle.

19. Transcendentalism 1830-1860

20. “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind” “The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.” --Ralph Waldo Emerson “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.” -- Henry David Thoreau

21.  to go beyond a limit or range, for example, of thought or belief  So, TRANSCENDENTALISM, at its core is about “moving beyond” common experience and understanding in order to understand a greater truth.

22.  A 19 th -century philosophical and literary movement  Lasted from approximately 1830-1860 but has had a long lasting influence on American thought  Inspired by Romantic ideas in art, literature, and music  Believed in the unity of all creation  Believed that human nature contained something God-like that went beyond everyday experience.  Believed that every person is divine, so we should rely on ourselves and trust the God within us

23.  People should search for truths in nature and within themselves  Relied on intuition and imagination  Thought life should be simple and not complicated by material possessions  Loved nature and rejected industrialization  Urged people to think for themselves rather than follow rules and laws that had been handed down for generations.  Believed in nonviolent protest as an acceptable response to unjust laws

24.  Ralph Waldo Emerson (former Unitarian minister from Massachusetts who became the most well known Transcendentalist.)  Henry David Thoreau (his pupil, the son of pencil maker, who dropped out of society to live a solitary and transcendent life).

25. Transcendentalists Ralph Waldo EmersonHenry David Thoreau

26.  As with Romanticism, Americans liked Transcendentalism because they felt that there must be more to life than logical, rational experience.  The Transcendentalists sought to regain a spirituality that they thought was missing from current thought and philosophy.  People were tired of working in factories and living busy lives in the city and wanted to return to a more simplistic, less cluttered, life

27.  Based on the above notes, can you think of any examples of how Transcendentalism is manifested in 21 st century American society?  Think about religion, popular culture, politics, education, or just your daily life in general.