Transcendental
refers to the idea that in determining the ultimate reality of God, the
universe, the self, and other important matters, one must transcend, or go
beyond, everyday human experience in the physical world (Beers and Odell 171). Transcendalists
believed all men were born with the capacity for good; which acted
as a an**hesis to the Puritanistic
thought that man was evil from the womb, and rather achieved
goodness in the eyes of God through years of moral studies and discipline.
The transcendentalist movement is often used to define an American literary
"revolution" during the early 1800s that honed transcendental ideals,
and created a counter-culture to the established American Romantic novelists.
The roots of this movement were first initiated by authors such as Ralph Waldo
Emerson and Walt Whitman. Their works were highly controversial at the time and
not widely accepted by the conservative literary community. In fact, upon
delivering his "Divinity School Address" at Harvard University in
1838, the reception was so negative that Emerson was not invited back for
the next thirty years (Updike, "Big Dead White Male").
Perhaps the most influencial
product of this "back-to-nature" movement is the masterpieces Walden and
Civil Disobedience penned by Henry David Thoreau. Walden,in fact,
is the embodiement of transcendalist ideals and beliefs. Thoreau actually got
the inspiration to write Walden aften spending three years in a cabin near
Walden Pond in Massachusetts. "The search for ultimate reality begins with
simplification and the dispelling of the superfluities of life, and with the
desire for clarity of vision and spiritual alertness ("Henry David
Thoreau"1)."
Bibliography
Helm, Thomas. "Henry David Thoreau ."Great
Thinkers of the Western World. 1999.
Updike, John. "Big Dead White Male."The
New Yorker 04 08 2003 13 Aug 2008
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2003/08/04/030804crbo_books.
Beers , and Odell. Elements of Literature:
Essentials of American Literature. Austin, Texas: Holt, Rhinehart, and
Winston, 1997.
