The Romantic Period
The romantic period of American literature took place from 1830 to 1870 and emphasized nature, symbolism, transcendentalism, and individualism. Key authors of this period include Emily Dickinson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edgar Allan Poe, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Walt Whitman. This guide highlights key figures and provides links for further research.
The authors listed here are a sampling of key American writers of the time period. Additional writers can be researched using the database links provided on this guide.
Databases
- American National Biography This link opens in a new window
American National Biography includes portraits of 18,700 men and women -- from all eras and walks of life -- whose lives have shaped the nation.
- Gale Literature: LitFinder This link opens in a new window
Gale Literature: LitFinder provides access to literary works and authors throughout history and includes more than 130,000 full-text poems and 650,000+ poetry citations, as well as short stories, speeches, and plays. The database also includes secondary materials like biographies, images, and more. - Humanities Source Ultimate This link opens in a new window
Humanities Source Ultimate offers access to key content covering literary, scholarly, and creative thought. It also includes hundreds of scholarly full-text journals cited in leading subject indexes to round out student research.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new window
JSTOR includes journal content, primary sources, images, and more across the humanities, social sciences, and sciences.
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new window
MLA International Bibliography is a detailed bibliography of journal articles, books, and dissertations from the Modern Language Association.
Streaming Media
- American RomanticismFrom the 1820s, Americans embraced the appeal of Romanticism. In literature, it was manifested in the work of Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Transcendentalists, Margaret Fuller, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Herman Melville; in religion, it was illustrated by the Mercersburg theology; and in politics, it was reflected in the rhetoric of Whigs and Democrats and the argument over passion.
- History of Ideas: RomanticismRomanticism is a historical movement that still hugely colours how we tend to feel and look at the world: it’s responsible for the way we approach love, nature, business and children. This is its history.
Perspectives
Romantic Naturalists, Early Environmentalists
In his study of Romantic naturalists and early environmentalists, Dewey W. Hall asserts that William Wordsworth and Ralph Waldo Emerson were transatlantic literary figures who were both influenced by the English naturalist Gilbert White. In Part 1, Hall examines evidence that as Romantic naturalists interested in meteorology, Wordsworth and Emerson engaged in proto-environmental activity that drew attention to the potential consequences of the locomotive's incursion into Windermere and Concord. In Part 2, Hall suggests that Wordsworth and Emerson shaped the early environmental movement through their work as poets-turned-naturalists, arguing that Wordsworth influenced Octavia Hill's contribution to the founding of the United Kingdom's National Trust in 1895, while Emerson inspired John Muir to spearhead the United States' National Parks movement in 1890. Hall's book traces the connection from White as a naturalist-turned-poet to Muir as the quintessential early environmental activist who camped in Yosemite with President Theodore Roosevelt. Throughout, Hall raises concerns about the growth of industrialization to make a persuasive case for literature's importance to the rise of environmentalism.
