LITR 4232 American Renaissance

2008 Midterm Samples

Sample Essay: Formal / literary option

(Excerpt)

 . . . Thoreau takes the idea of nature and instead of looking at the nature around oneself, explores the nature inside oneself.  “Resistance to Civil Government” compels readers to look inside themselves, see where they stand on issues, and not only say something about it, but do something about it.  Thoreau asks the reader to bring their natural self, “Let every man make know what kind of government would command his respect,” (1793).  Thoreau took Cooper’s Romantic Indian and put a more introspective twist on it; Thoreau demands the reader to find the Indian inside himself.  Government seems to be Thoreau’s Romantic idea of the city: it is unfortunate that it exists, and men have created this unnecessary, burdening evil. Thoreau quotes the Democratic Review, “That government is best which governs least,” (1792).  Thoreau wants to take the simplistic life of nature and open it to a political and social context.  He takes the Romantic ideas of nature and purity within oneself and takes it one more step to determine how those now-enlightened people would interact socially in a nation. . . . [AA]