Nam's Final Assessment
Emerson and Thoreau
Emerson and Thoreau
Transcendentalists, in their ideology, contributed to anti-hegemony. Theirs views and concerns are centered on what at the time considered obscured and non-consenting to the fundamentalist view. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau wrote down their views, ideals and critique their society which seems quite littered with imperfections. Works such as Emerson’s “Self Reliance” and Thoreau’s thoughts on economy in “Walden” are such thoughts and critiques that give readers and different outlook upon their world in which they live; a sort of enlightenment. Both were renowned writers of the transcendentalist era. Each had similar thoughts and ideas but develops them in slightly different ways.
Called a sage, an “apostle of progress and optimism, Emerson was vigilant in his promotion of self reliance and individualism. He was, beforehand a church minister but soon left his contemporaries to pursue the ideals and thoughts of transcendentalism. His stances and insightful wisdom towards social ideology gave him leadership of the transcendentalist progressivism through his writings. One ideal that was greatly emphasized was that of individualism. Emerson expressed his thought on virtue and nonconformity through his most prominent essay on individualism; “Self Reliance”.
“Self Reliance” explored the individualistic concern of morals and virtue. Emerson described a plethora of needs that comes with true individuality. Ideals such as nonconformity and the sacred self were addressed and conveyed to the readers with analytical response on observation of life’s daily recourse. He denounces the envy of others and relays the need for nonconformity. “There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till” (1127). The metaphor here with toiling ones own land is referred to how one should make the best out of what they’ve gained and given to them; what they can do through their own mind instead of emulating the actions of others. He also says how doing causes ones integrity to decay for “imitation is suicide”. True virtue as well also comes from ones will to be a nonconformist, to be unconsenting to the wills of others, and follow one own individual beliefs. “ Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness” (1128) Here, it could be said that nonconformity is the reinterpretation of morals. Hegemony in its truest term is the act of conforming to the wills of others; the others being the majority who share the same wills and ideals. Hegemony is “the spontaneous consent given by the great masses of the population to the general direction imposed on social life by the dominant fundamental group” and it is also “the apparatus of state coercive power which “legally” enforces discipline on those groups who do not “consent” either actively or passively” (Gramsci). In this case, promoting nonconformity would make Emerson, of course, anti-hegemonic.
Thoreau and Emerson ideas of life were slightly different. Emerson is the more traditional intellectual for he uses words and reasons in the confines of society to prove his points. Thoreau actually acted upon the ideals in which he preached in a different manner rather than just behaving in a certain way. He truly believed he had to show the world what it is truly like to be an individual. Thoreau went to live in solitude inside a cabin in the woods so he could spend time, in nature, for he is a naturalist, promoting the organic intellectual. He thought in doing so would truly prove his individuality. For two years all he did was write and seldom went into town, associating with non-individuals as little as possible. Thoreau took transcendentalism to the next level, going as far as to become a hermit in his punditry. Doing so, however, also prove a level of obnoxiousness and dissatisfaction with his fellow countrymen quite discernable from that of Emerson.
Thoreau’s essay, “Economy”, unlike Emerson’s “Self Reliance” is a critique on how the people’s “spontaneous consent”. He writes about how hegemony has a caustic affect on their economic fortitude. He obnoxiously reveres his own situation as quite superior due to his living arrangements, individuality and acts of nonconformity. He shows his disdain for those who live frivolously and act whimsically according to the thoughts and actions of their peers. “The childish and savage taste of men and women for new patterns keeps how many shaking and squinting through kaleidoscopes that they may discover the particular figure which this generation requires to-day./ Of two patterns which differ only by a few threads more or less of a particular color, the one will be sold readily , the other lie on the shelf, though it frequently happens that after a lapse of a season the latter becomes the most fashionable” (1781). The generation then is no different from the generation of today. People still go after what’s fashionable as the trend changes from season to season. No matter how impractical or illogical. On another note, “Economy” emphasizes the social state of economic reliability. People seek home and property for shelter yet in owning one their freedom becomes somewhat hindered. “And when the farmer has got his house, he may not the richer but the poorer for it, and it be the house that has got [him] for our houses are such unwieldy property that we are often imprisoned rather than housed in them[.]” (1785).The management of life in such a troublesome hegemony seems to be quite matter of concern and many suffer from it, especially the poor. Thoreau saw this and his retort was a stinging blow. So much so that the dwellers in that hegemonic society neglects his thoughts.
In the 1800’s the abolitionist movement was a very large part of progressivism. Emerson embraced this himself, as an abolitionist, also a sanctioned act of anti-hegemony for many consent to act of slavery. In Emerson’s “Last of the Anti-Slavery Lectures”, again does Emerson show that he is a dedicated transcendentalist and nonconformist. “[This] want of manly rest in their own and foolish acceptance of others watchwords, comes imbecility and fatigue” (1175). As an abolitionist, his speech inflames the wills and mind of those who fight for the freedom of slaves. Not only does he preach self reliance, but also the freedom of self reliance for those who does not yet have it. Emerson is a sage, a transcendentalist, a true intellectual in his superior punditry.
The transcendentalist movement is one of anti-hegemony. The enlightening thoughts and ideas and reformist views were all to change the fundamentalist consent of their time. Emerson and Thoreau both used words to spread their ideaological reform to to all corners of the country promoting the self thought, nonconformity, ones own interpretation of what’s right and wrong, though Through was a bit more critical. Transcendentalism, however, remained unrecognized as enhancement of intellect. “As a moral philosophy, transcendentalism was neither logical nor systematized. It exalted feeling over reason, individual expression over the restraints of law and custom” (The Ideals of Romanticism). This analysis denounces transcendentalist as somewhat barbaric. Despite that have Emerson and Thoreau as well as other likeminded individuals continued in their pursuit of social change hoping that one day the individual mind and self will remain strong over that of the fundamental majority.
