The American Renaissance: A Literary Coming of Age (1840 - 1860)

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Who are some of the true American literary giants that emerged during the American Renaissance?

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Herman Melville, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Edgar Allan Poe.

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What period is known for producing more literary masterpieces than any other time in American literature?

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The period from 1840 to 1860.

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What role did New England play during the American Renaissance?

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New England became known for intellectual inquiry and was the center of reform movements in education, abolition, and women’s rights.

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What were Lyceums and what purpose did they serve?

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Lyceums provided knowledge, teaching, discourse, and debate.

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What is the main belief of American Transcendentalism?

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Transcendentalism believes that ultimate truth is found by transcending normal human experience through intuitive thought.

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Who introduced the philosophy of Transcendentalism to Americans?

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Ralph Waldo Emerson.

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What concept did Emerson refer to as the Divine Soul?

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The idea that everything, including humans, is part of the Divine Soul.

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What is the significance of intuition in Emerson's Transcendentalism?

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Intuition is our ability to know things spontaneously through emotions, rather than through an intellectual process.

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What did the Anti-Transcendentalists, such as Melville and Hawthorne, explore in their works?

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They explored the guilt associated with Puritan ancestry, the conflicts between good and evil in humans, and the psychological effects of sin, guilt, and madness.

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How did the Anti-Transcendentalists view nature?

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They believed in the symbolism in nature but did not see nature as necessarily good.