AMERICAN RENAISSANCE

Shirley Middleton

University of Phoenix

January 13, 2013

AMERICAN RENAISSANCE

INTRODUCTION

The American Renaissance is a period in American history from

the 1830’s through the end of the American Civil War. This

movement was characterized by a revitalization of a national identity

and self-confidence. It was the burgeoning of artistic creativity of all

time. Impacted by great, European literary works, many American

authors forged their writings through poems, novellas, and novels.

AMERICAN LITERATURE

Freedom from British rule

Creation of American philosophy, poetry, and other writing

Freedom from European literature

AMERICAN LITERATURE

Transcendentalism

• Creation of American literature in the form of new

philosophy, poetry, essays, and novels, uniquely

different from European literature.

HISTORY OF AMERICAN

LITERATURE

Transcendentalists

• Attempt to define spirituality and religion

• Romantic way of thinking

• Using the senses and nature

TRANSCENDENTAL

AUTHORS

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

“We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our

own hands; we will speak our own minds…A nation

of of men will for the first time exist because each

believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which

also inspires all men.”

EMERSON (CONT’D)

Nature published in 1836

The Dial magazine began its publication in 1840

Essays First and Second Series, 1841 & 1844

• Self-Reliance- Relationship with Nature and God

Poems (1847)

The Conduct of Life (1860)

TRANSCENDENTAL

AUTHORS

Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)

“I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that

if one advances confidently in the direction

of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life

which he has imagined, he will meet with a

success unexpected in common hours.”

THOREAU (CONT’D)

A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)

Walden (1854)

Civil Disobedience (1849)

TRANSCENDENTAL

AUTHORS

Margaret Fuller (1810-1850)

“What woman needs is not as a women to act

or rule, but as a nature to grow, as an intellect

to discern, as a soul to live freely, and unimpeded

to unfold such powers as were given her

when we left our common home.”

FULLER (CONT’D)

Conversations (1839)

The Great Lawsuit: Man versus Men, Woman versus Women

(1843)

• Renamed Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845)

Papers on Literature and Art (1846)

CONCLUSION

There were many writers during the American Renaissance Period

that paved the way of our literature. The authors discussed earlier

shaped the way literature was henceforth written. Free from

European influence, American writers created a new identity so

desperately sought after. It was this time that Americans felt their

voice could be heard. The American nation expressed itself with a

uniqueness that Americans could finally identify with.

REFERENCES

Baym, N., Franklin, W., Gura, P., Klinkowitz, J., Krupat, A., Levine,

R.S., Loeffelholz, M., Reesman, J.C., Wallace, P. B., (2008). The Norton

Anthology of American Literature: Shorter (7th ed.). W. W. Norton &

Company: New York.

Margaret fuller.biography. (2012). Retrieved from

http://www.biography.com/people/margaret-fuller-9303889

Woodlief, A. (2004). American transcendentalism web. Retrieved from

http://transcendentalism.tamu.edu/authors/emerson/