LITR 4328: American Renaissance

Model Assignments Final Exam Essays 2018 (final exam assignment) Sample answers for A1. learning about American Renaissance

Kyle W. Abshire

12/12/2018

American Renaissance: The importance of Romantic Themes

            Before this semester began, I had no inkling of an idea what the American Renaissance period of literature entailed. However, throughout the semester I have come to learn and appreciate quite a lot about the period and genre of literature. In the mid-term paper we discussed themes such as gothic, sublime, correspondence, and transcendence and how they construct romantic narratives. In this paper we will take this discussion farther and analyze how important these themes are not only to the literature but to us, in a modern world. Through close inspection of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil, Fredrick Douglas’ A Narrative of the Life, and Henry David Thoreau’s Resistance to Civil Government, we will discuss how we have learned from these texts over the past semester. The romantic period’s Hawthorne, Thoreau, and Douglas created important literature that can give powerful insight to modern times.

            Douglass’s A Narrative of the Life depicts Fredrick Douglass’s life as a slave and his journey to freedom. The story uses particular scenarios and language to force the reader to not only accept the brutal way of life that slaves lived but to also feel something about it: “Our food was coarse corn meal boiled. This was called MUSH. It was put into a large wooden tray or trough, and set down upon the ground. The children were then called, like so many pigs, and like so many pigs they would come and devour the mush” (Douglas 5.3). Douglas uses zoomorphism to describe the slave children when eating. This type of language shows us how children raised in slave scenarios were treated. It takes the perspective of the reader beyond their preconceived knowledge of unfair treatment of slaves and shows them how this unfairness actually manifests. Brutal beatings and long work days is enough for the modern person to accept that something was wrong but for a person living in the 1800s zoomorphism seems to be just powerful enough to grab their attention. Through the study of this text I have come to the realization that whether it be good or bad, people’s priorities were particularly different from those that live today and small passages like this one can help us decipher where those differences lie.

            Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil is another renaissance text that uses the tools of romanticism that we can learn from. Religion plays a heavy role in this text as we follow the dealings of a minister who chooses to cover his face; however, the reason why is never un-veiled. However, near the end of the story the minister does give us a glimpse of why he might be wearing the cover: “When the friend shows his inmost heart to his friend; the lover to his best beloved; when man does not vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely treasuring up the secret of his sin; then deem me a monster, for the symbol beneath which I have lived, and die!” (Hawthorne 67). Hawthorne’s minister firmly grasps to his veil and defies all pleads to remove it giving us the feeling as though his has committed a serious wrong. However, this passage seems to suggest that all people have committed enough wrongs to hide their faces. The religious tone in this text seems to depict a Christian sentiment that all sins are equal and the minister is simply a person.

Throughout the past and present religious leaders are often raised to high statuses in their communities and congregations almost as if they are closer to God. This pressure might cause them to live their lives in secretive manors. The text shows us how people may have placed un-realistic expectations on their leaders and there is a lot for us to learn from that. We often expect our leaders whether they are religious or secular to be perfect moral examples. Hawthorne’s use of religion is important because religion was important to society in that time but almost helps it lose some of its steam in the modern world. However, the message remains clear, people are people and we shouldn’t expect more from them than humanly possible.

            Henry David Thoreau’s Resistance to Civil Government takes a frim look at the role of government in the lives of the common man to establish its power over an individual.

 “The authority of government, even such as I am willing to submit to—for I will cheerfully obey those who know and can do better than I, and in many things even those who neither know nor can do so well—is still an impure one: to be strictly just, it  must have the sanction and consent of the governed. It can have no pure right over my person and property but what I concede to it” (Thoreau 44).

In short Thoreau suggest that the Government can only have as much power over him that he allows. Individualism is a common theme throughout the text which Thoreau uses to establish his freedom from oppression. Thoreau’s text is interesting because it is almost a societal update to the enlightenment period’s establishment of the American government. Thoreau seems to be responding to the reasoned and rationalized constitution with highly emotional responses. This text is highly important to us today because it can remind us of the priorities of the common man when the U.S. government was established, and at least one of the popular ways that it was interpreted.

The romantic period’s Hawthorne, Thoreau, and Douglas created important literature that can give powerful insight to modern times. Douglas’ A Narrative of the Life uses zoomorphism to show just how horribly slaves were treated. We also can learn how the understanding of humanity has changed since the 1800’s. Douglas’ text describes scenarios that were viewed as simple realities of life that would be seen as horrendous by today’s measures. Even more, it shows us how much farther he had to go to reach people’s emotions in that time than he would have had to today. Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil takes a religious tone to remind us that all men are equal and no one should be placed on a pedestal. The story can give us insight to the unrealistic measures that we use to weigh candidates and warns us against unfair judgment of those that we chose to lead. Lastly Thoreau’s Resistance to Civil Government shows us how people of the 1800’s viewed governments role in their lives and can serve as an important document as to how people at the time intended the government to operate. It can serve as a source of study for modern times as we struggle to move forward with a growing government body. The renaissance period’s use of romantic tools not only makes it a strong narrative form but also shows us how important certain themes were in the past.