Question

Emerson and Thoreau both adhere to Transcendentalist ideas and address the shared topic of one’s relationship with society. Yet, despite their shared experiences and information, they come to different conclusions. Compare the development of the arguments Emerson and Thoreau make about solitude. Evaluate the validity and effectiveness of their claims, and their use of reasoning. How does each use the same Transcendentalist philosophies to develop their differing arguments? Which argument is more persuasive, and why? Be sure to cite evidence from both texts to justify your reasoning. Organize your essay into five paragraphs with 1000-1200 words.

Answer 1

Transcendentalism

First published Thu Feb 6, 2003; substantive revision Fri Aug 30, 2019

Transcendentalism is an American literary, philosophical, religious, and political movement of the early nineteenth century, centered around Ralph Waldo Emerson. Other important transcendentalists were Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, Lydia Maria Child, Amos Bronson Alcott, Frederic Henry Hedge, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, and Theodore Parker. Stimulated by English and German Romanticism, the Biblical criticism of Herder and Schleiermacher, and the skepticism of Hume, the transcendentalists operated with the sense that a new era was at hand. They were critics of their contemporary society for its unthinking conformity, and urged that each person find, in Emerson’s words, “an original relation to the universe” (O, 3). Emerson and Thoreau sought this relation in solitude amidst nature, and in their writing. By the 1840s they, along with other transcendentalists, were engaged in the social experiments of Brook Farm, Fruitlands, and Walden; and, by the 1850s in an increasingly urgent critique of American slavery.