试论美国浪漫主义作家爱默生,爱伦坡以及霍桑自然观的多样性

蚌埠学院

美国文学论文

题目:试论美国浪漫主义作家:爱默生,爱伦坡以及霍桑自然观的多样性

院系专业: 外语系英语专业

学生姓名：吕召许

学号：51107011019

指导老师：赵丽莉老师

定稿日期:2013年12月25日

DIVERSITY OF VIEWS ON NATURE IN AMERICAN ROMANTIC WRITERS: EMERSON, POE AND HA WTHORNE

By Lv Zhaoxu

A Thesis Submitted to

the School of English Department of Bengbu College in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Final Exam

Supervised by

Zhao Lili

December 25, 2013

Diversity of views on nature in American Romantic writers: Emerson, Poe and Hawthorne

Introduction：The Romantic Period in the history of American literature stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War, during which time, the subject “nature”has been an indispensible element expressed and perceived by many writers in more than one way and aspect. This essay mainly focuses on the different views on nature of Emerson, Poe and Hawthorne according to their works. I.Emerson’s views on nature

As the leader of New England Transcendentalism, Emerson’s thoughts and ideas are mainly summarized in the views of Transcendentalism whose basic starting points are against the authority, to advocate intuition, and to argue that human beings can directly know the truth beyond sense and reason, namely, obtain the truth and the true meaning of life directly from the nature.

In Emerson’s opinion, nature is beautiful and mysterious. Nature has an unknown aspect that cannot be manipulated. Only when human holds a sincere respect for nature. The nature which is totally known by man apart from the elements of beauty will arouse man’s disrespect and plunder to nature. It is not planned as clearly as civilized society in which there are distinctions between good and bad. Therefore people should have the entrepreneurial to explore the nature

In the eyes of bourgeois colonists, nature, such as the vast primeval forest in United States, only has a certain practical value for the development of objects, and resources, as seen in The Pioneers of Cooper. While Emerson asks people to look at nature, regardless of use value, actually to capture its spirit with new, romantic eyes. In a word, Nature is the symbol of spirit. He thinks that the whole of human nature itself is a revelation.In the book of Nature, he said: “nature is the embodiment of ideas, then turning into thoughts... And each kind of existence educated people, because all the words in the form of injected with wisdom.” That is to say, people just consult nature to get the truth of guiding their actions.

Another meaning of Emerson’s “Nature”is the real life. He maintained that

any thinker and artist should be deep in the real life and never “through their eyes to face up to God and nature” In his views, nature is a doze of panacea given to human. It not only heals the flesh and spirit of those who are restrained by agonizing work but also saves the soul of human beings, and makes people out of bondage and rejects all desire. This is a kind of natural beauty. Here “People saw some good things like his nature.”

II.Ha wthorne’s views on nature

Hawthorne’s masterpiece, The Scarlet Letter,not only reflects the impact of romanticism and its peak-the transcendentalism, but also highlights his own unique ideas and understandings of nature. In Emerson’s eyes, nature is a symbol of spirit or God, and he claims that only back to nature, human beings are integrity in spirit. Nevertheless, in The Scarlet letter, the nature in Hawthorne’s opinions is more than that referred by Emerson. “N ature”in this book mainly involves three aspects: the material world of nature, the natural humanity and the essence of natural life, all of which have always been pursued and yearned for in his life.

The material world of nature: By force of living, Hawthorne had to find a job like Customs to support his family but this period of life contacted with the civilized society was described in the preface of The Scarlet Letter “nature in the evolution of the nature between sky and ground was trying to avoid me in a sense: all imagined happiness and the unworldly happiness as a result quietly escaped from my mind.”Although the rich material civilized society brought could satisfy some requirements in people’s life, it also made people lose the previous harmonious happiness. Hawthorne thinks that nature is created by God, and the so-called civilization human have changed nature into would bring unfortunate consequences to human beings.

The natural humanity: In Hawthorne’s eye, the natural man is the free man who owned natural humanity. The critics he made on civilized society perform more in the thing itself. He insists that the so-called society is making human beings losing their natural humanity and causing people’s spirit distortion and loss of morality. In his works, Hawthorne represents that the puritan destroyed and poisoned people’s

mind, and all the behavioral standards the church set turn people into inanimate bodies. It’s really ridiculous that relatively high levels of civilization develop ing human’s intelligence make people’s morality low and destroyed human’s nature.

The essence of natural life: Hawthorne was fairly close to nature in his adolescence, while when he grew up, his dissatisfaction with real society made his work inevitably embody the romantic views at that time, such as cherishing the memory of the past leisure, relaxing and free pastoral life and longing for the primitive nature without the depression of materials. However, the constraint of the religion and law and the science’s interference in human life turn people into deformed ones. Hawthorne considers that human’s so close to nature that the wound caused by civilization could be cured. Thus, in his book, warm and harmonious family could heal people’s psychological trauma, let them back to normal and have a natural human nature.

The little elfin, Pearl, is the embodiment of nature Hawthorne has always pursued. The natural world, the natural humanity, and the natural life are the romantic ideas of Hawthorne in The Scarlet Letter.

III.Poe’s views on nature

Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is generally considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre. Many people think that his works and thoughts have nothing to do with romanticism, let alone with nature. Conversely, almost all his works are filled with his views on nature. From his gothic stories, it’s not hard to find that the mysteries of nature we wouldn’t see in life penetrate in the plots and the process of the stories.

His most recurring themes deal with questions of death, including its physical signs, the effects of decomposition, concerns of premature burial, the reanimation of the dead, and mourning, all of which are the reflection and reaction to the supernatural phenomena in a way. In his famous works,The Fall of the House of Usher, The presence of a capacious, disintegrating house symbolizing the destruction of the

human body is a characteristic element in supernatural way. Supernatural horror solves a problem in the interpretation of Poe by arguing that “Roderick Usher, his sister Madeline, and the house all shared one common soul”. Poe sees the house of Usher as an environment or a place to add atmosphere for the unnamed disease and the story happened.

Poe’s narrative poem, The Raven, is often noted for its musicality, stylized language, and supernatural atmosphere. It tells of a talking raven's mysterious visit to a distraught lover, tracing the man's slow fall into madness. The use of the raven – the "devil bird" –suggests the forces of darkness. This devil image is emphasized by the narrator's belief that the raven is "from the Night's Plutonian shore", or a messenger from the afterlife. To put it another way, the raven represents not only a natural phenomenon but also a supernatural image. Under his extreme individual language style, he depicts a non-physical environment atmosphere of supernatural. From the point of a certain degree, the raven is more likely to listen to a person’s inner monologue. The words express the hero of the story and Poe himself the infinite sadness at the bottom of their hearts.

IV.Conclusion

The three writers’ views on nature have something and some associations in common. They all believe that nature is a good thing to some extent, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies. However, Emerson emphasizes that nature is the emblematic of the spiritual world, alive with God’s overwhelming presence, and nature is truth so that we should go back to nature for perfecting and purifying ourselves. Hawthorne stresses that nature is good for good man and bad for bad man, with an eye to the striking contrast between civilized society and simple life and humanity. Poe underlines that nature is mysterious and unknown and supernatural horror constructs the abnormal air as a steppingstone to the scenes, figures and accidents in the stories.