1. American Romanticism

2. Romanticism Reaction to Rationalism Feeling & Intuition > Reason
Transcendentalists and Dark Romantics

3. Transcendentalists

4. Henry David Thoreau

5. Thoreau: “To Be Great is to be Misunderstood…?”
Failures (?)
Fired from job as teacher
Rejected marriage proposal
Apparent lack of ambition
Variety of odd jobs
Surveyor
Handyman for Mrs. Emerson
Pencil Maker
Early writings not popular
Accidentally set fire to 300 acres of forest
Successes (?)
Attended Harvard, though not distinguished
Very well read
Put beliefs into action at Walden
Walden hugely successful
In his lifetime
Even more after his death
Protestor, “Resistance to Civil Government” (Ghandi and MLK)
Peaceful at death, tuberculosis

6. “I did not know we had ever quarreled”
Death
“I did not know we had ever quarreled”
[A response to his aunt when she asked if he had made his peace with God]

7. Ralph Waldo Emerson

8. Thoreau & Emerson
Emerson was most significant friend and influence in Thoreau’s life
They met in Concord, 1836
Emerson 14 years older
“New England Transcendentalists” hosted by Emerson
“[Thoreau] applied Emerson’s theoretical transcendentalism to daily life…” (Norton).
Thoreau stayed on Emerson’s land on Walden pond

9. American “Bromanticism”?
H.D.T. +
R.W.E.
American “Bromanticism”?

10. Walden, the place
Thoreau’s “experiment in living well” (Thoreau Reader)
Moved to Walden in 1845, stayed for 2 years
Stayed on Emerson’s land
Went there to find “ essential facts of life”... but also to WRITE a lot
Thoreau was influenced by Shaker communities
Religious, Christian sect
Emphasis on simplicity
Many authors went to live on farms, movement to SIMPLIFY
Did not believe in procreation … hard to keep going

11. Walden, the book
“2 years of living in Walden & 9 years of reflection compressed into 1 year of story” (Lundin)
Published in 1854
18 Chapters… we focus on 3
“Economy”
“Where I Lived, & What I Lived For”,
“Conclusion”