I Celebrate Myself

     This is a term not everyone hears everyday. I never even heard of this or thought about it. I know we have to type something about Transcendentalism, but I am not sure, so I'll just write the background. What is Transcendentalism then?

     Transcendentalism was a religious and philosophical movement that was developed during the late 1820s and 1830s in the Eastern region of the United States as a protest against the general state of culture and society, and in particular, the state of intellectualism at Harvard University and the doctrine of the Unitarian church taught at Harvard Divinity School. Among the transcendentalists' core beliefs was the inherent goodness of both people and nature.

     The Transcendentalists stood at the heart of The American Renaissance; the flowering of the United States thought in literature, poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture, and music in the period. Authors such as Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Margaret Fuller, the Alcotts, Theodore Parker, Jones Very, George Ripley, the Peabody Sisters, and the Channings were involved in this movement. Transcendentalism was far broader than a geographical phenomenon or a select club membership, although Ripley and Emerson had founded the Transcendental Club in 1836. Rather it was a faith shared with diverse minds and diverse places as those of Walt Whitman in Brooklyn or Emily Dickinson in Amherst or the Hudson River School of painters in New York.

     Many of these authors have written poems that were criticized at the time they were written, for not following the conventional methods. However, I disagree. Even though it takes me five minutes to understand one line, they do bring in certain ideas and ways of writing that have lasted into the modern day.