The Relationship With Nature By Ralph W. Emerson And Jack London

Nature by Ralph Waldo Emerson has a lot to teach about how to respect the earth because it is a mighty force but Nature also teaches what it means to be connected with nature and the feelings that are associated with connection. During my close read of Nature I faced challenges, successes, and a greater appreciation for the writing from a world that is drastically different from the one I live in. One of my biggest struggles while annotating the piece was looking at the big picture and what the paragraph as a whole was telling me. While I am annotating I tend to focus more on the smaller pieces such as the meaning of words and decoding what a sentence is saying. It’s hard to pull back from that and connect the bigger pieces to find what the

“Nature” is an essay written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, and published by James Munroe and Company in 1836. [1] “Nature” has a total of 41 pages. The essay consists of eight parts: Nature, Commodity, Beauty, Language, Discipline, Idealism, Spirit and Prospects. Each part takes a different perspective on the relationship between humans and nature. In this essay, Emerson emphasizes the foundation of transcendentalism, “a religious and philosophical movement that developed during the late 1820s and 30s in the Eastern region of the United States as protest against the general state of spirituality and, in particular, the state of intellectualism.” [2] “Transcendentalism suggests that the divine, or God, suffuses nature, and suggests that reality can be understood by studying nature.” [3] “Transcendentalism is closely related to Unitarianism, the dominant religious movement in Boston at the early nineteenth century. Transcendentalism evolved as an organic consequence of the Unitarian emphasis on free conscience and the value of intellectual reason.” [4] Emerson divides nature into four stages: commodity, beauty, language, and discipline. These define the ways by which humans use nature for their basic needs. The historical significance of “Nature” was that transcendentalism club led the celebration of the American experiment as one of the individualism and self-reliance. [5]

Transcendentalism was a literary movement in the 19th century that deliberately pushed forth the exploration to define spirituality and nature in a new context. So much as it is to explore, the movement had an undertone of rebellion against current societal circumstances in which writers during this time sought to change not only their environment, but also the reinvention of oneself. Also simultaneously, the Industrial Revolution took place during this time and glorified the economic growth, which sparked an era of new human thinking.

When the man was trying desperately to re-light the fire he removed his gloves and lost all feeling in his hands. If he had remained calm and thought about his situation he might have had a chance to survive. Nature showed no mercy when the man attempted to re-light the fire using only his palms, and he failed. "He was losing his battle with the frost. It was creeping into his body from all sides."(1754) The man's unfortunate mistakes cost him his life and nature felt no sympathy for him. He was just another man who failed to defeat nature for one more day. If the man had brought along a companion for the journey like the old man in the town had suggested he would still be alive. However, his stubbornness would not submit to that. "The old-timer on Sulfur Creek was right, he thought in the moment of controlled despair that ensued: after fifty below, a man should travel with a partner."(1752). Instead the man brought a wolf dog with him to keep him company. The only thing that the dog was good for was as an outlet for the man's jealously when he realized all the mistakes he had made. The man envied how the dog could just sit in the snow and his warm fur would protect him from the elements. The mistakes that the man made reflect everyday life by showing how just one accident or miscalculation can cost you your life. Naturalism utilized the environment to show how fierce and apathetic the world can be. In the opening scene of "To Build a Fire" London used a bleak

The short story "To build a Fire" by Jack London, tells about the relationship between man and nature. The story takes place in the Yukon during one of the long night. The main character who is unnamed travels with a dog along a small trail to a mining camp. The man leaves against the advice of a local and after a short time realizes that he should have waited. The temperature is extremely cold because the mans spit freezes before it hits the ground. The main obstacle of his journey is the many covered springs that mean death to whoever falls into them. The man sends his dog in front of him to make sure that the trail is safe. Eventually the dog falls into one of the springs and gets his paws wet.

In the beginning of creation of humans, nature has always been there as a friend. Nature is the phenomena of the physical world that includes plants, animals, the landscape, and other features that are on earth. Nature has all of the wild and domestic living things. Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American poet that led the transcendentalist movement and influenced other through his ideas and thinking. Ralph wrote “Nature,” and he describes his true feelings toward nature and God and how they have taken part of what has been created and also the relationship to humans. Ralph Waldo Emerson writes the passage “Nature” and he uses comparison between humans and nature and also uses figurative language to convey his appreciation and gratitude for nature.

Nature is a major transcendental value which both Emerson and Thoreau thrive off of. Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau was very close author who wrote towards same points by criticizing the corrupted government because people were treated very badly and they were not given individual rights. They were good author who brought people together and made them understand about the system of the Transcendentalist movement in America. The governor and government itself was very poor to control the people and society due to corrupted leaders and government. Due to economic progress and poor system of government Emerson started criticizing government indirectly and wrote the poem about nature and society because maximum people could not enjoy the same facilities and freedom. But his intension was very clear and he wants to

"The Transcendentalist adopts the whole connection of spiritual doctrine. He believes in miracle, in the perpetual openness of the human mind to new influx of light and power; he believes in inspiration, and in ecstasy."(Emerson 196). These two lines written by Ralph Waldo Emerson exemplify the whole movement of transcendentalist writers and what they believed in. Though to the writers, transcendentalism was a fight for a belief, unknown to them they could have been fighting for the betterment of human health. The transcendentalist writings of Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson have directly affected the health of modern society through the idea of transcendental meditation.

The sad injustice to nature is that man has forgotten the biotic connection between the natural world and humanity. Whether protecting nature is a spiritual experience or simply a means for survival, nature is as much a part of human life as the human themselves. The separation created by modern environmentalism between human and non-human entities can only be reunited if people learn to view life as a part of nature. The scary part about that thought, however, is will that be enough now? Only time can

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, the man who started the Transcendentalism movement, was an American poet and essayist. Transcendentalism was a literary and philosophical movement in the 1820’s and 1830’s that was considered an opposition to the previous age of Romanticism. Transcendentalism emphasized the importance of the individual, nature, and the Oversoul, among other things. The founder, Emerson, wrote many essays in a Transcendentalist style. In one of those essays, Self-Reliance, he wrote, “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”

Nature and wilderness were very important ideas to some extant for St. John de Crevecoeur and Ralph Waldo Emerson, each had their own opinions and ideas that contrasted against each other and were somewhat similar to each other. Emerson who valued it and looked at the nature as something to proud of had used it many times in his works as examples and that we are part of nature as well and make whatever choices from it as it can from us. While Crevecoeur believes that in every land it has its own form of culture as it does its own kind of nature, and describes how the land and nature was then and how it will be giving details of it in his pieces of work. How they use and see nature is described equally important in both their works “the American Scholar” and “What is an American” but shows how different their views really are in them.

In American Literature many authors write about nature and how nature affects man's lives. In life, nature is an important part of people. Many people live, work, or partake in revelry in nature. Nature has received attention from authors spanning several centuries. Their attitudes vary over time and also reflect the different outlooks of the authors who chose to discuss this important historical movement. A further examination of this movement, reveals prevalence of nature's influence on man and how it affects their lives.