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    Elements of Transcendentalism With Emerson

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    jahirul Islam
    Ralph Waldo Emerson was a key figure in the Transcendentalism movement and wrote influential works like "Self-Reliance" and "Nature" that explored transcendentalist ideas. Emerson embodied transcendentalist principles of individualism, self-reliance, optimism, and intuition in his writings. He believed that people should not conform to society or rely on others, but rather trust their own inner sense of truth and ability to achieve things through their own efforts. Emerson found examples of these principles in nature and emphasized finding meaning and inspiration from within rather than without.

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    Elements of Transcendentalism With Emerson

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    jahirul Islam
    87 views3 pages
    Ralph Waldo Emerson was a key figure in the Transcendentalism movement and wrote influential works like "Self-Reliance" and "Nature" that explored transcendentalist ideas. Emerson embodied transcendentalist principles of individualism, self-reliance, optimism, and intuition in his writings. He believed that people should not conform to society or rely on others, but rather trust their own inner sense of truth and ability to achieve things through their own efforts. Emerson found examples of these principles in nature and emphasized finding meaning and inspiration from within rather than without.

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    American literature

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    Elements of Transcendentalism with Emerson

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    Ralph Waldo Emerson was a key figure in the Transcendentalism movement and wrote influential works like "Self-Reliance" and "Nature" that explored transcendentalist ideas. Emerson embodied transcendentalist principles of individualism, self-reliance, optimism, and intuition in his writings. He believed that people should not conform to society or rely on others, but rather trust their own inner sense of truth and ability to achieve things through their own efforts. Emerson found examples of these principles in nature and emphasized finding meaning and inspiration from within rather than without.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    87 views3 pages

    Elements of Transcendentalism With Emerson

    Uploaded by

    jahirul Islam
    Ralph Waldo Emerson was a key figure in the Transcendentalism movement and wrote influential works like "Self-Reliance" and "Nature" that explored transcendentalist ideas. Emerson embodied transcendentalist principles of individualism, self-reliance, optimism, and intuition in his writings. He believed that people should not conform to society or rely on others, but rather trust their own inner sense of truth and ability to achieve things through their own efforts. Emerson found examples of these principles in nature and emphasized finding meaning and inspiration from within rather than without.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    Elements of Transcendentalism with Emerson

    Ralph Waldo Emerson was one of the most important people within the Transcendentalism
    movement. He had influential writings, such as "Self-Reliance" and "Nature" that served as
    building blocks for future transcendentalists. Emerson's ideas surrounding transcendentalism
    echos the fundamental ideas of transcendentalism with the many examples found in his works
    reflecting individualism, self-reliance, optimism, intuition.

    Individualism is defined as the ability and attribute of someone who longs and is different from
    everyone around them. Someone who is an individual is independent from everyone else and
    attempts to stay that way, as that is the lifestyle they promote and enjoy. Emerson shows
    individualism in his work "Self Reliance," saying "There is a time in every man’s education when
    he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take
    himself for better, for worse, as his portion (Emerson 183)." This quote represents
    transcendentalism because it shows that every man must be a man for himself and no one else,
    that imitation and envy are worthless.

    Self-reliance is defined as the reliance on one's own abilities rather than the powers and abilities
    of others. Self-reliance is needed by most transcendentalists because it helps supports the idea
    that truth comes from within, rather than from the people around us. In his writing "Self-
    Reliance," Emerson says, "...That though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of
    nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is
    given to him to till (Emerson 183)." He is saying that a man can not rely on any one else in the
    world except for himself, and he will get nothing good out of life if it not from his own hands,
    which follows transcendentalism because one can not go beyond society and also be a part of
    it.

    Optimism is defined as the philosophy that any situation or event has good and that nothing is
    all bad. There is good in everything, and there is always a second chance. In the "glass half
    filled" scenario, optimists believe that the glass is half full. Emerson is an optimist in "Nature"
    when he says, "Nature is a setting that fits equally well a comic or a mourning piece. In good
    health, the air is a cordial of incredible virtue. Crossing a bare common, in snow puddles, at
    twilight, under a clouded sky, without having in my thoughts any occurrence of special good
    fortune, I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration (Emerson 181)." In all of these scenarios,
    Emerson finds the good in any aspect of nature, which is a very important element. There is
    nothing that disappoints Emerson in the woods.

    Intuition is defined as the knowing of something that comes from within, rather than from
    experience. Intuition comes from the conscience and from instincts, and transcendentalists
    believe that society and reality inhibit those internal moral compasses, and that escape is an
    excellent way to develop your own intuition. In "Nature" Emerson says, "The lover of nature is
    he whose inward and outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other; who has retained the
    spirit of infancy even into the era of manhood (Emerson 180)." This is a representation because
    it talks about the senses being adjusted to each other as a result of being close to nature and
    understanding nature. The spirit of infancy is the essence of pure intuition because it has not yet
    been corrupted by society

    Who is the narrator, can she or he read minds, and, more


    importantly, can we trust her or him?
    First Person (Central Narrator) and Third Person (Omniscient)
    First Person (Central Narrator)
    Claudia provides the bulk of the narration in the book. This is convenient because she
    actually witnessed what happened to Pecola as well as the way the town spoke about
    her, and she makes sure to include snatches of these conversations in her narration.

    Claudia narrates her story from two different perspectives. In the Prologue and final
    chapter, the adult Claudia uses the past tense to describe events that happened back in
    1941 in Lorain. But for the bulk of her narration, Claudia uses the present tense to
    describe these events, which has the effect of showing us things through her 9-year-old
    eyes.

    Occasionally Claudia will move between the two modes, allowing us to see how she is
    reflecting on her own experience and highlighting the act of narration. Claudia is a
    highly empathetic narrator, and while she doesn't have access to the minds of the
    people she describes, she does her best to try to understand them, especially Pecola.

    Third Person (Omniscient)


    In the chapters that deal with the Breedloves and the one featuring Soaphead Church,
    the narrator isn't Claudia, but rather a third-person omniscient narrator. This speaker is
    capable of moving through extreme distances of space and time. This is the voice that
    tells us the long history of the Breedloves' storefront, details Cholly's early sexual
    humiliation, and recounts Soaphead's journey from the West Indies to America.

    The third-person style is useful in a book with so many complex characters. It allows us
    to watch their lives unfold over time, in ways we could never do if Claudia were the sole
    narrator.

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