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The influence of transcendentalism
The influence of transcendentalism
The influence of transcendentalism
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More handpicked essays just for you.
The influence of transcendentalism
The influence of transcendentalism
The influence of transcendentalism
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: The influence of transcendentalism
If there is one person in the past or present that lived a truly transcendental life, many would say it was Alexander Supertramp, otherwise known as Chris McCandless. Throughout the 1990s, this man took transcendentalism to a new level that not many people in this day and age had seen before. In different points in his life, he exhibited all 8 of the main keys of transcendentalism. This paper will touch on just three of those, starting with reducing dependence on property. This is probably the number one key that is seen the most from McCandless in Into The Wild.
Into the Wild is a book about a young adventurer named Chris McCandless. He is the main character of the book and usually goes by the pseudonym Alex Supertramp. The author also includes other stories about people who had similar experiences to Chris McCandless. McCandless was a very smart, independent person who hitch hikes around the United States.
They will follow the steps of Emerson in “Self-Reliance”, Thoreau in “Civil Disobedience”, and the theme of the film Dead Poets Society. Within the writings of these authors there are both benefits and consequences of living self-reliant and “sucking the marrow out of life”. One of the main ideas for Transcendentalism is “Self-Reliance” a step by step writing by Ralph Emerson. Emerson explains having trust and confidence in yourself, he explains controlling your emotions and speaking your voice.
Transcendentalism is the idea of striving to live a life of independence, simplicity, and coherence with nature. An element of transcendentalism is having the euphoria of one life over society. A modern example of a song that supports transcendentalism is “Try” by Colbie Caillat. Transcendentalism is when someone does not meet society’s expectations and they are their own individuals. This song relates to transcendentalism because the singer, Colbie Caillat is singing about how women do not have to change so much to meet society standards of beauty.
The key to transcendentalism is confidence in a person’s own beliefs, but one more could be
I agree with all five keys of transcendentalism, except for the key that states to reduce your dependence on property. To me, you have to be the right type of person to be able to reduce your dependence on property. If you go to a big city and ask homeless people if they enjoy living on the streets, you most likely will not get an optimistic answer. A person like Chris McCandless enjoys his reduced dependence on property because he likes adventure and living simply. Other people like to feel secure and in my opinion that is definitely okay.
In my opinion, Chris McCandless is an example of a modern-day transcendentalist -- someone who believes in nature, confidence, free thinking, self-reliance, and non-conformity. Because transcendentalists are typically people who live in the wilderness with no contact with society, transcendentalism usually relies on a more spiritual thinking rather than a certain scientific-like thinking based on materialistic things. This way of life can prove fatal if carried to an extent exceeding the person’s capabilities, knowledge, and/or experience. “There are no fixtures in nature. The universe is fluid and volatile.
“So many people live in unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation” (57). Chris McCandless was determined to not be one of those men, he strived for a life in solitude, away from the demands of society. For that reason he went on an epic transcendental experience that took him from Mexico to Alaska. Along the way, he met and made an impact on peoples’ lives, people like Wayne Westenberg and Ronald Franz. Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild discusses Chris’s journey, and makes the reader question Chris’s reasons for going out into the wild.
Into the Wild Chris McCandless. Who is he? I guess you could say he is the pure definition of a “transcendentalist”. A transcendentalist is a person who lives a completely different type of lifestyle than your average person, they believe in self reliance, they will always have a strong connection with mother nature, they’re individualists, and always searching for the meaning of life. McCandless went on a journey that no normal american would have thought was sane.
There are many common themes that run through transcendentalism literature. In the book Into the Wild, written by Jon Krakauer, Chris McCandless goes on a journey any transcendentalist author would be proud of. The theme threaded throughout the book is that of following an individual's heart to make decisions. McCandless lived his life in an unusual way that veered away from society norms, and surprised most of the people he encountered. One such person was Gallien, “This [the Stampede Trail], Alex announced to Gallien, was where he intended to go.
The ideas behind Transcendentalism have been shown to have had many negative effects on the mental health of the individual, the physical health of the individual, and the idea of government overthrow. To begin, a
Kevin Sun Mrs. Cohen English 2CP --D February 22, 2018 Another Perspective The film Into the Wild is based on the life of Chris McCandless, a young man who rejected the consumerist society of America in order to live a more simple life. Through his travels, Chris carried essays by Transcendentalist philosophers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, suggesting that McCandless is impacted by Transcendentalist ideals. Two key tenets of Transcendentalism that clearly influenced McCandless’ choices are the value of simplicity and the importance of self-reliance.
Is Chris McCandless a Transcendentalist? What is transcendentalism? It is a very fancy word for a very simple idea. Transcendentalism is a philosophy where a person’s reality is built off intuition instead of logic.
Was Chris McCandless a true transcendentalist? Transcendentalism is a system developed by Immanuel Kant, based on the idea that, in order to understand the nature of reality, one must first examine and analyze the reasoning process that governs the nature of experience. Influenced by romanticism, Platonism, and Kantian philosophy, it taught that divinity pervades all nature and humanity, and its members held progressive views on feminism and communal living. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau were central figures. In Jon Krakauer’s novel, Into the Wild, McCandless is viewed as a transcendentalist.
William Golding uses the many conflicts in the novel to represent and support his theme of inner evil being present in us all especially when society is not there to restrict us. Golding uses the conflict of Simon’s death as an ideal portrayal of inner evil. All of the boy’s evils are on clear display when Simon’s death occurs. Their inner evil takes over when they start attack Simon thinking that he is the Beast, when in reality he was the one obstructing the Beast in the first place. The boys start to chant “Kill the beast!