Imagination and the Individual:
American Romanticism 1800–1860
By the beginning of the nineteenth century, Americans had forged an independent nation, but they had
not yet created their own cultural identity. A new generation of writers, who called themselves Romantics
and Transcendentalists, created a new kind of literature that emphasized imagination, feeling,
individualism, and enthusiasm for nature. In many ways this literature reflected the optimism of American
society at the time and defined the way we still view ourselves today.
KEY CONCEPTS
The Nation Expands
New Ideas Take Root
History of the Times The United
States rapidly expanded westward
after the Louisiana Purchase in
1803. A spirit of nationalism took
hold as America grew and
prospered. Industrialization and
new waves of immigration caused
cities to become overcrowded and
polluted as conditions worsened.
History of the Times Inspired by an
awakening of intellectual and religious
fervor, American reformers worked to
improve society. They fought for better
education, humane prisons, women's
rights, the abolition of slavery, improved
factory conditions, and other social
reforms.
Literature of the Times During the
Romantic period, a new national
literature developed. Romanticism,
unlike rationalism, valued feelings
over reason and logic, the power of
imagination and the individual
spirit, and the beauty of the natural
world.
Literature of the Times An idealistic
form of Romanticism, called
Transcendentalism, sought to
transcend, or go beyond, ordinary life
through spiritual experiences in nature.
Transcendentalists believed that to
discover truth, one must transcend or
see beyond the physical world and seek
out the ideal world.
Differences Threaten National
Unity
History of the Times Despite
progress and prosperity, the United
States felt the pull of conflicts over
slavery, sectional differences, and
economics. These struggles laid
the groundwork for the Civil War.
Friction with Native Americans also
became a troubling issue as white
settlers encroached on native
lands.
Literature of the Times Another
group of writers, known as Dark
Romantics, explored the conflict
between good and evil, the effects
of guilt, and the dark underside of
appearances. Unlike other
Romantics, these writers did not
believe that the spiritual truths
found in nature are all harmless
and good.
KEY CONCEPT
The Nation Expands
History of the Times
The size of the United States doubled at the beginning of the nineteenth century. When the Louisiana
Purchase in 1803 added land between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains, a new era of
westward expansion began. Routes such as the Santa Fe Trail and the Oregon Trail brought a flood of
settlers to the West—a mass migration that intensified with the Gold Rush of 1849. Thousands of
Americans picked up and headed west, lured by dreams of wealth after gold was discovered at Sutter's
Mill in California.
At the same time, a nationalist1 spirit flourished in America, reflecting an optimistic belief in the
nation's progress. The Industrial Revolution was changing the way people worked and lived. Americans
saw what they could produce with the help of machines such as steam engines and mills. Transportation,
communication, and commerce would never be the same. America was on the move.
With the rise of industry, cities became grimy, and the arrival of new immigrants caused overcrowding.
By 1840, the U.S. population had grown to 17.1 million, up from 5.3 million in 1800. In New York alone,
the population doubled between 1820 and 1840. In large eastern cities like New York, Boston, and
Philadelphia, teeming tenements sprang up, while disease and crime made survival difficult.
Literature of the Times
The Romantic movement was in large part a reaction to rationalism. Romanticism provided expression for
the discontent arising from the Industrial Revolution, which sought progress at all costs.
To rationalists, such as Benjamin Franklin, cities represented progress, economic success, and selfrealization. To Romantic writers, the city was often a place of immorality, corruption, and death. The
characteristic Romantic journey was to the countryside, which Romantics associated with independence,
moral clarity, and healthful living. Romanticism was in many ways an appropriate vision for a nation
expanding quickly toward new frontiers.
Comprehension Check
How did the United States expand both geographically and culturally during the early nineteenth century?
Fast Facts
Political and Social Highlights
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Rapid growth of industrialization, education, transportation, and cities transforms society.
Numerous reform movements, centered in New England, seek to improve social conditions.
Discontent over slavery intensifies as the abolitionist movement gains momentum.
Literary Highlights
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Romantic writings, such as Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book (1820), look to feeling and
imagination to reveal higher truths.
Ralph Waldo Emerson’s first collection of essays (1841) discusses Transcendentalist thought.
Edgar Allan Poe, an influential Gothic writer, publishes The Raven and Other Poems in 1845.
KEY CONCEPT
New Ideas Take Root
Girls' Evening School (c. 1840) by
unidentified artist, American. Graphite
pencil and watercolor on paper, 34.3 ×
45.9 cm (13 1/2" × 18 1/16").
Photograph © 2009 Museum of Fine Arts,
Boston.
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History of the Times
An era of reform took hold in the first half of the nineteenth century. In 1826, the Lyceum
movement began in Millbury, Massachusetts. Lyceum organizations pursued a number of goals,
including educating adults, training teachers, establishing museums, and instituting social reforms.
The reform movement was also centered in New England. Horace Mann fought to improve
public education. Dorothea Dix sought to relieve the horrible conditions in institutions for people
with mental illnesses. William Lloyd Garrison and other abolitionists struggled to put an end to
slavery. Feminists such as Elizabeth Peabody, Margaret Fuller, and Emma Willard campaigned for
women's rights.
The abounding interest in social causes stirred up ideas both reasonable and crackpot.
Numerous utopian projects—plans for creating a more perfect society—were developed. In 1840,
Ralph Waldo Emerson wryly remarked that every man who could read had plans in his pocket for a
new community. Emerson was speaking from personal experience, for he was a member of one of
the most influential of these idealistic groups, the Transcendentalists.
Literature of the Times
At the heart of America’s optimism and coming-of-age were a
group of Romantics called the Transcendentalists, led by Ralph
Waldo Emerson. Transcendentalism 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.
For Emerson, Transcendentalism was not a new philosophy but
“the very oldest of thoughts cast into the mold of these new times.”
That “oldest of thoughts” was idealism, which had already been
explained by the Greek philosopher Plato in the fourth
century B.C. Idealists said that true reality was found in ideas rather
than in the world as perceived by the senses. Idealists sought the
permanent reality that underlies physical appearances. The
Americans who called themselves Transcendentalists were idealists but in a broader, more practical
sense. Like many Americans today, they also believed in human perfectibility, and they worked to
achieve this goal.
Though Emerson was skeptical of many of the Transcendentalists’ ideas and projects, he was
the most influential and best-known member of the group, largely because of his lectures and
books. Emerson’s view of the world sprang not from logic but from intuition. Intuition is our
capacity to know things spontaneously and immediately through our emotions rather than our
reasoning abilities. Intuitive thought—the kind that Emerson believed in—contrasts with the
rational thinking of someone like Benjamin Franklin. Franklin did not gaze on nature and feel the
presence of a Divine Soul; Franklin looked at nature and saw something to be examined
scientifically and used to help humanity.
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An intense feeling of optimism was one product of Emerson's belief that we can find God directly in
nature. God is good, and God works through nature, Emerson believed. Therefore, even the events that
seem most tragic—disease, death, disaster—can be explained on a spiritual level. Death is simply part of
the cycle of life. According to Emerson, we are capable of evil because we are separated from a direct,
intuitive knowledge of God. But if we simply trust ourselves—that is, trust in the power each of us has
to know God directly—then we will realize that each of us is also part of the Divine Soul, the source of
all good.
Emerson's sense of optimism and hope appealed to audiences who lived in a period of economic
downturns, regional strife, and conflict over slavery. Your condition today, Emerson seemed to tell his
readers and listeners, may seem dull and hopeless, but it need not be. If you discover God within you, he
suggested, your lives will partake of the grandeur of the universe.
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Comprehension Check
How would reformers and writers in the Romantic Age describe an ideal society?
Link to Today
Factory Girl
She was only ten years old and couldn't even reach the top of the
loom, but Harriet Robinson was already a factory worker in a textile
mill. In 1824, the mills of Lowell, Massachusetts, badly needed
workers, and Harriet was one of many young girls who flocked to the
factory for jobs. She worked there for fourteen years.
Today, laws protect children under the age of fourteen from
employment and entitle them to a free public education. In the early
1800s, however, children did not have these rights and protections.
In the early nineteenth century, child labor was common in New
England mill towns because the mills could hire unskilled children with
the oversight of a supervisor. Like Harriet, some of the girls working in
textile mills were as young as ten, although most were sixteen to
twenty-five. Many were earning money to send a brother to school.
No record exists today of the name
Along with other young girls, Harriet was a "doffer." She doffed, or
of this girl, who worked in a mill
around 1850. Jack Naylor Collection. took off, bobbins full of yarn from the spinning frames and replaced
them with empty bobbins. The girls earned two dollars a week and
worked fourteen-hour days, though the younger girls worked only a portion of every hour.
One of the first labor strikes in America occurred at Lowell in 1836. The strike, which protested a wage
cut, was unsuccessful, but it marked the rise of a labor movement that led to better working conditions
and wages for all. Over a century later, in 1938, a federal law was passed to limit child labor.
Ask Yourself
For most people, how is today's workplace different than it was in Harriet's time?
KEY CONCEPT
Differences Threaten National Unity
History of the Times
Despite the progress and optimism that marked the first half of the nineteenth century, the United States
faced a number of challenges. In the forefront was the issue of slavery. Though most Northern states had
abolished slavery by the early 1800s, the number of slaves in the South increased as cotton plantations
spread throughout the region. After working for abolition in their own states, many antislavery activists in
the North wanted to put an end to slavery everywhere.
By 1840, abolitionists had recruited some 200,000 supporters to their cause. In addition, many free
African Americans began organizing to free their "brothers in chains." As Southern slaveholders felt
increasingly threatened, violence against abolitionists rose. Discord over this issue eventually erupted into
an armed conflict: the Civil War.
Another challenge to peace and stability involved the treatment of Native Americans. In the early
1800s, many U.S. officials hoped that Native Americans would become farmers and blend into American
society. Many Native Americans, particularly the Cherokee people, were forced to give up their way of life
to take up farming and other livelihoods considered acceptable by the dominant white culture.
However, these efforts to adopt the lifestyle of their white neighbors did not ease the prejudice that
Native Americans encountered. Those who switched to farming found themselves viewed as competition
for valuable land. In 1830, Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, relocating Native Americans to
territories now known as Oklahoma. The Cherokee were forcibly removed from their land. An estimated
4,000 Cherokee died on the 800-mile journey west that came to be known as the Trail of Tears.
Comprehension Check
What reaction did the Cherokee experience after making the transition to farming?
Link to Today
Environmental Pioneers
When you hear the words "going green," you might not think of the
nineteenth-century writers Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo
Emerson, yet their deep respect for nature is at the very core of
today's environmental movement. For Thoreau and Emerson, it all
began with concerns about the impact of industrialization on the
nature and society.
Thoreau and Emerson continue to inspire today's conservation
leaders and activists who seek to preserve a healthy environment,
both for its own sake and for its part in the survival of humankind.
As a result, you might see quotes like these from Thoreau or
Emerson on a nature poster or brochure for a conservation group:
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"Behind nature, throughout nature, spirit is present."
—Emerson
"In wildness is the preservation of the world."
—Thoreau
Emerson and Thoreau may not have been out marching on behalf
of endangered species, but their writings were among the earliest to
call attention to the necessity of protecting America's natural
treasures.
Ask Yourself
Explain in your own words what you think Emerson and Thoreau are saying in the quotations
above. Do you think people today would find these slogans persuasive enough to change their
attitudes? Why or why not?
Literature of the Times
Emerson's idealism was exciting for his audiences, but not all the
writers and thinkers of the time agreed with Transcendentalist
thought. "To one who has weathered Cape Horn as a common
sailor," Herman Melville wrote scornfully of Emerson's ideas, "what
stuff all this is."
Some think of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, and Edgar
Allan Poe as anti-Transcendentalists, because their views of the
world seem so profoundly opposed to the optimistic views of
The Trail of Tears (1838) by Robert
Emerson and his followers. But these Dark Romantics, as they are
Lindneux.
known, had much in common with the Transcendentalists. Both
The Granger Collection, New York.
groups valued intuition over logic and reason. Both groups, like the
Puritans before them, saw signs and symbols in all events.
The Dark Romantics felt that Emerson had taken the ecstatic, mystical2 elements of Puritan thought
and ignored Puritanism's dark side—its emphasis on Original Sin, its sense of the innate wickedness of
human beings, and its notions of predestination.3The Dark Romantics came along to correct the balance.
In their works they explored the conflict between good and evil, the psychological effects of guilt and sin,
and madness in the human psyche.
Wrap Up
Talk About . . .
With a partner, list conflicts that developed as the United States expanded in the nineteenth century. Are
there similar conflicts in this country today? Explain. Try to use each Academic Vocabulary word listed on
the next page at least once in your discussion.