Trancendentalism was a 19th century American literary and philosophical movement that developed in New England, centered in Concord, Massachusetts. It reacted against orthodox Protestant religion and developed its own faith centered on the divinity of humanity and nature. Transcendentalism drew from German idealist philosophy, notably the works of Immanuel Kant. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau were the most prominent figures of the Transcendentalist movement.

1. Trancendentalism
[trancendere Lat., = to overpass]
American literary and philosophical movement that
flourished in New England (chiefly in Concord,
Massachusetts) from about 1836 to 1860. It originated
among a small group of intellectuals who were
reacting against the strong orthodoxy of Protestant
religion developing instead their own faith centering on
the divinity of humanity and the natural world.
Transcendentalism took some of its basic concepts
from romantic German philosophy, notably that of
Immanuel Kant, 1724–1804.
Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau are
the most prominent figures of the movement.

2. Henry David Thoreau
(1817-1862)

3. A Short Biography
• Born in Concord, Massachusetts, center of the
Trancendentalist movement
• Studied rhetoric, philosophy and mathematics
at Harvard (1833 – 1837)
• Resigned from teaching – did not want to
inflict corporal punishment.
• 1845 – 1847 – lived by Walden Pond
• Various jobs, travels and writing
• Died from tuberculosis at 44

4. Walden
• On July 4, 1845, Thoreau moved into
woods owned by Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Thoreau maintains that the date was “by
accident”

6. Thoreau’s Journal
• Thoreau kept a journal while he lived in
the woods; this journal became the basis
of Walden
• After two years, two months, and two
days, Thoreau left the woods, returning to
care for Emerson’s household

7. Approaches to Walden
• A book about nature--birds, plants, and
animals
– The book is about the life available to people
living close to nature, living in harmony with
nature
• A satire on contemporary civilization
– Thoreau laughs at what the common man
takes seriously and vice-versa

8. • "I went to the woods because I wished to live
deliberately, to front only the essential facts of
life, and see if I could not learn what it had to
teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that
I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not
life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice
resignation, unless it was quite necessary, I
wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow
of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to
put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad
swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner,
and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved
to be mean, why then to get the whole and
genuine meanness of it, and publish its
meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to
know it by experience, and be able to give a true
account of it in my next excursion."

9. A Lifestyle Experiment
• “What happens if one withdraws from
routine to see what life is about?”
• Habit<------------------------->Deliberation
• Inauthentic<----------------------->Authentic
• Death<----------------------------->Life
• “Simplify, simplify, simplify!”
• Thoreau’s purpose is ultimately
philosophical and religious

10. Influence of “Civil Disobedience”
(1849)
• Thoreau’s writing about the incident has
been of lasting social and political
importance
• In 1906, Mahatma Gandhi, in his African
exile, read it and made it a major document
in his struggle for Indian independence
• In the United States, civil rights leaders
such as Martin Luther King, Jr. tested his
tactics of Civil Disobedience

11. Thoreau’s Lasting Influence
• Civil Disobedience--Ghandi and Martin
Luther King, Jr.
• 1960’s and 1970’s countercultural
concerns for experiments in living
• The general American concern for
ecological sanity