Ralph Waldo Emerson : An American Poet

"In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life, - no disgrace, no calamity (leaving me my eyes), which nature cannot repair. Standing on the bare ground, - my head bathed by the blithe air and uplifted into infinite space, - all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyeball. I am nothing. I see all. The currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or particle of God."

While taking an English Composition course, my class discussed several ideas behind the American Dream and what influenced its fruition. One day, my professor hands us a stapled copy of Self Reliance, a piece written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, and I shout out “he’s a Transcendentalist!” because that’s all I knew of him (something I remembered from high school). As the year went on we were told to write a research paper with a variety of topics. Since I was very interested in knowing a little more about him, I took on the task to learn more about Ralph Waldo Emerson. As I went through article after article, book after book, I became very enlightened, yet very confused. I learned how his whole life was a tragedy- from one family member to the next, they all kept passing away. His story moved me and taught me that anyone can become great after going through darkness if he has a sense of perseverance. Emerson kept on working, no matter the crisis at hand, and pushed his way to becoming one of the most talked about writers of all time. Yet, I was stunned to find that many people don’t enjoy his work and criticize his beliefs that he preached, as he was a minister for quite some time of his life. Some say that his writings should stop being read in classrooms because they are not understandable. My goal in this paper is to recognize whether Ralph Waldo Emerson is considered to be the first great American thinker or not.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emerson is a firm believer of maintaining self-reliance and values rather than following the crowd. He also explains that in order to be truly successful in life, a person must make decisions and trust in his or her judgment. In today’s society, teenagers are more likely to not be self-reliant because the teens feel they will be judged for having different beliefs. People today need to realize that they should not conform to be like the rest of the world, they must not depend on the judgment and criticism of others, and people must refuse to travel somewhere in order to forget their personal problems. Through Emerson’s piece, readers are able to

This was the battle started with the “shot heard ‘round the world” as Ralph Waldo Emerson observed.

Transcendentalism was an age of revolution. Not only did this age bring about changes in literature, but it brought about reform in ideals, religion, and people. Movements were all the rage---with abolitionism, feminism, sectarianism, communitarianism, and temperance beginning to flourish. With shifting ideals, literature evolved. Perhaps one of the best known authors of the transcendentalism period would be Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson acted as a mentor to many individuals, with his infamous Divinity School Address. However, one author in particular Emerson guided by introducing her to Goethe and encouraging her to borrow books, and that author would be Louisa May Alcott. Being from the same literary time period, Louisa May Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson have similar affinities displaying Transcendentalist ideals in their professional works.

In the mid-1830s, Ralph Waldo Emerson created a belief called Transcendentalism. He wrote the essay, “Self Reliance” and Henry David Thoreau, another Transcendentalist wrote an essay called, “Walden.” Both works of literature focus on the Transcendentalism belief. In “The Minister’s Black Veil” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hawthorne reveals both Transcendentalism and Anti-Transcendentalism through the attitudes of the characters. Therefore, “The Minister’s Black Veil” can be compared and contrasted with both “Self Reliance” and “Walden.”

Emerson was born in 1803, into a family of ministers. He went to Harvard where he

Emerson was known as America’s Intellectual Declaration of Independence. He encouraged Americans to look inward and find power and inspiration within. He used the spiritual resource of nature to promote the nation politically and morally. He influenced many of his peers by his transcendental ideas about nature’s unity, distinctive soul, and deep belief in God. He also was known as a prophet of faith and unconditional optimism during a struggling historical

Transcendentalism was an early philosophical, intellectual, and literary movement that thrived in New England in the nineteenth century. Transcendentalism was a collection of new ideas about literature, religion, and philosophy. It began as a squabble in the Unitarian church when intellectuals began questioning and reacting against many of the church’s orthodoxy ways regarding all of the aforementioned subjects: religion, culture, literature, social reform, and philosophy. They in turn developed their own faith focusing on the divinity of humanity and the innate world. Many of the Transcendentalists ideas were expressed heavily by Ralph Waldo Emerson, in his essays such as “Nature”, “Self Reliance”, and also in his poems such as “The

In the early mid-nineteenth century, a philosophical movement known as transcendentalism took root and flourished in America. It evolved into a predominantly literary expression which placed an emphasis on the corruptions of organized religion, political parties, and societal involvement; above all, the movement promoted the wonders of “nature” and its deep connection to the divine. The adherents through transcendentalism believed that knowledge could be arrived through intuition and contemplation of the internal spirit rather than by the means of the senses. As the two most prominent figures in the transcendentalist movement, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau whole-heartedly embrace the principles of nature

Ralph Waldo Emerson							I am writing this essay on the beliefs and thoughts of Ralph Waldo Emerson on the subjects of individuality, society, government, technology, and spirituality.

Born in Boston, Massachusetts on May 25, 1803 as the fourth child in a family of eight, Ralph Waldo Emerson was

Early Life. Elizabeth Blackwell was born on February 3, 1821 in England, and she grew up with eight brothers and sisters. When she was eleven, she moved with her family from England to New York City, after they had lost their families sugar refinery in a fire. Throughout her childhood, she was educated by private tutors, and her father made sure that all of

In Concord Hymn, Ralph Waldo Emerson says, “Spirit, that made those heroes dare To die, and leave their children free, Bid Time and Nature gently spare The shaft we raise to them and thee.” (Emerson n.p.) This quote perfectly explains Emerson because he loved to refer to nature and spirit in many of his famous writings. Emerson is part of the well-known literacy movement known as transcendentalism. This is when authors often referenced nature and focused on intuition and imagination. This movement showed that people knew about themselves and others more than what they could taste, touch, hear, or feel. Many tragedies throughout his life, and his love for the transcendentalism movement helped shape one of the greatest writers in history.

The theme of individualism is present in several of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s works. It was also his philosophical views on how to live life. He believed that human beings had remarkable capabilities, more than they can possibly identify. With these capabilities a person should govern themselves, not be governed by a society. Emerson also believed that nature played a large role in how man should act and to follow nature’s actions of growing without obstruction (“Nature”). This is why he lead the Transcendentalism movement in the nineteenth century, along with Theodore Parker, Frederic Henry Hedge, Amos Bronson Alcott, Margaret Fuller and Henry David Thoreau (Lewis). This philosophy was not only significant then, it was imperative throughout times in history.