超验主义文学英文版介绍

He was very critical of modern civilization: “Civilized man is the slave of matter.” “Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind.” — Thoreau
Major Works
Nature 1836 Collections: Essays: First Series 1841 Essays: Second Series Representative Men 1850 English Traits 1856 The Conduct of Life 1860
Journal: The Dial Influence Weakness
6. Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)
philosopher, poet and essayist prose, poetry, speech spokesman of New England Transcendentalism Life (Calvinism, Unitarianism(唯一神教 派）, trip to Europe and back with European Romanticism)
“We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; Divine Soul which also inspires all men.” — “The American Scholar”
“So shall we come to look at the world with new eyes. It shall answer the endless inquiry of the intellect, — What is truth? and of the affections, — What is good? by yielding itself passive to the educated Will. ... Build, therefore, your own world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution in things will attend the influx of the spirit.” — “The American Scholar”
Part III
The Literature of Romanticism
Transcendentalism
C.1830s-1850s
Nature (1836) as manifesto The summit of American romanticism and the first renaissance in the American literary history The term was derived from the Latin verb transcendere: to rise above , to pass beyond the limits
In the intellectual history, he embodies a new nation’s desire and struggle to assert its own identity in its formative period.
During his lifetime he was considered one of the two or three best writers in America, and certainly the most influential among his contemporaries. His reputation has fallen somewhat in the present century.
Emerson’s aesthetics
His essay “The Poet” (Essays, Second Series 1844) marked the birth of true American poetry and true American poets such as Whitman and Emily Dickinson. He places emphasis on ideas, symbols, and imaginative words. Form is important when fused well with content. In theme, poems are to celebrate America and the life of today. True poetry should serve as a moral purification and a passage toward organic unity and higher reality.
has been regarded (first by Oliver Wendell Holmes) as “America’s Declaration of Intellectual Independence” Idea: Americans should write about here and now instead of imitating and importing from other lands.
Major Works
“Resistance to Civil Government”, (or “Civil Disobedience”) 1849 A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers 1849 Walden, or Life in the Woods 1854 Slavery in Massachusetts 1854 A Plea for Captain John Brown 1859 “Life Without Principle” 1863 The Maine Woods 1864 Cape Cod 1865
It is a great Transcendentalist work with “regeneration” as a major thematic concern. It earned him the name of “nullifier（废 弃者，取消者） of civilization”. It is a book of self-culture（自修） and human perfectibility.
Walden is a record of Thoreau's two year experiment of living at Walden Pond.

Essays: “The American Scholar” 1837 “The Over-Soul” 1841 “Self-Reliance” 1841 “The Transcendentalist” 1842 “The Poet” (1841-1843)
“The American Scholar”(1837)
Thoreau not only embraced Emerson’s Transcendentalist philosophy, but went further to illustrate the pantheistical （泛 神论）quality of nature. He holds that the most important thing for men to do with their lives is to be self-sufficient and strive to achieve personal spiritual perfection.
3. Nature as symbol of the Spirit or God
link between God and man
Leaders: Emerson and Thoreau Club: Transcendentalist Club
(Cambridge, Massachusetts, on September 8, 1836)
Believe in a higher individualism; the spiritual nature of reality; the importance of self-reliance; the obedience to instinct; independence of mind; the obligation of optimism and hope; the existence of a unifying Oversoul seemingly unqualified acceptance of life and cheerful optimism
Historical Introduction (Rise of Transcendentalism)
A protest against the general state of culture and society The product of combination of foreign influence and American native Puritan tradition
Walden, or Life in the Woods (1854)
The book compresses that time into a single calendar year, using the passage of four seasons to symbolize human development. It is about his experience in a cabin on Walden Pond for two years and two months. “Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!” It concludes on a clear note of optimism and hope.
Romantic idealism, Philosophical romanticism
1. Spirit or Oversoul 2. Individualism
the most important element in society the divinity of individual ideal type of man: self-reliant individual
7. Henry David Thoreau(1817-
1862)
essayist and poet truest disciple of Emerson Leader of American Transcendentalism Life (1845-1847) His statue was placed in the hall of Fame in New York in 1969.