transcendal movement
Paper instructions:
Write Must have a Norton Anthology American Literature Volume B book to complete this paper. It is Literature must have a good understanding of the following readings: Emersons’s The American Scholar, and Nature. pages 211 & 243. Must also read intro to Emerson. Thanks

Starting in Book B of our course, your goal in this essay is to look at the authors in the Romantic and Transcendental eras and note which one you believe to most add to our national identity of American literature. Choose Emerson on our reading list and note that writer’s application of American Transcendental characteristics in order to help you define how this author has added to our literary national identity. Then choose one representative work of that author to help you illustrate the application of Transcendental writing by that author. Biographical details are unimportant. All works should come from Volume B of our text.

Things not to do: plot summary; Wikipedia; masterplots/spark notes, askyahoo; plagiarize.

So for instance, I might want to prove that Hawthorne’s ideal of Romanticism rests more wholly on the use of the building of the vernacular than the I-persona, the culmination of science and reason over blind belief, the understanding of language as a goal unto itself, and the need to show strong women as central to the emerging society. I’d use “The Minister’s Black Veil” and The Scarlet Letter to help build my details, and I’d stick closely to the texts to analyze the Romantic elements in use rather than building plot summary.

The essay needs to adhere to the academic form: intro, thesis, body, conclusion, with textual support from the readings and at least 4 outside, academic, peer-review sources to back your claims. Explicate the texts you choose as fully as you can, showing your understanding of how to read closely a literary text. MLA format for the essay, including intext citations and Works Cited page.

Grading:
60% content: the ability to create and create your position and defend it
20% structure: application of the academic essay form
20% mechanics: soundness of ideas presented in logically grammatical sentences, varied patterns, with attention to the audience’s need for clarity