Monday

American Romantic Painting and the Hudson River School of Art

Journal Entry- “Who has not found the heaven below
Will fail of it above.” - Emily Dickinson

The Wilderness and the West- Keynote Presentation

                        “Kindred Spirits”- Asher Durand 1849

“…in gazing on the pure creations of the Almighty, he feels a calm religious tone steal through

his mind, and when he has turned to mingle with his fellow men, the chords which have been

struck in the sweet communion cease not to vibrate.”

— Essay on American Scenery[10]

Durand was inspired by this John Keats’ sonnet. Read through it carefully, and find lines that apply to specific parts of the painting.

O Solitude! if I must with thee dwell 
John Keats

O Solitude! if I must with thee dwell,
Let it not be among the jumbled heap
Of murky buildings; climb with me the steep,—
Nature’s observatory—whence the dell,
Its flowery slopes, its river’s crystal swell,
May seem a span; let me thy vigils keep
’Mongst boughs pavillion’d, where the deer’s swift leap
Startles the wild bee from the fox-glove bell.
But though I’ll gladly trace these scenes with thee,
Yet the sweet converse of an innocent mind,
Whose words are images of thoughts refin’d,
Is my soul’s pleasure; and it sure must be
Almost the highest bliss of human-kind,
When to thy haunts two kindred spirits flee.

Durand included the names of these kindred spirits within the landscape itself by carving in paint their names into the birch tree on the left side of the painting.

By painting Cole and Bryant together in Kindred Spirits, Durand created a visual record of the relationship between the art and literary circles of the early nineteenth century, as well as their common beliefs toward the American landscape and Nature. Today, Kindred Spirits has come to symbolize both the Hudson River School and its era's culture (art, literature,etc...). Conceived as a memory piece for Cole, Kindred Spirits may now be said to be a visual memory of the era in which it was created.”

Discuss Homework:

Your Task:

1. Select Three Examples of Hudson River School Paintings:

2.  List Artists (include years lived):

3. Cut and paste 3 Examples: 

4. Describe the painting:  What is the overall subject? What specific elements do you notice? What are the artistic techniques? What is the perspective?

  - How does it adhere to the traits and characteristics of Romanticism? What specific details about the style and subject matter lead us to catagorize it in Romanticism?

  - What does it say about the artist’s views and the time in which it was created? How does it view nature and progress?

Use Excel to create annotations and a breakdown of Cole’s “Oxbow” painting. Then, select another Romantic landscape painting of your choice and do the same. Submit these into Schoology, and be prepared to explain in class on Monday.

"Thanatopsis," - William Cullen Bryant

Questions:

• “Thanatopsis” is notable for its use of syntactical inversions, which can at first make understanding difficult. What is the subject of the first sentence, which runs through line 8?
• Why is nature’s voice “various” (l. 3)? What is the speaker’s attitude toward nature as expressed in lines 1-17?
• In this poem, William Cullen Bryant develops several stunning metaphors. What is the meaning of the “last bitter hour” (l. 9), the “narrow house” (l. 12), the “Couch more magnificent” (l. 33), and “innumerable caravan” (l.74)? How do these metaphors contribute to the poem? How do they connect to the title of the poem?
• What are the antecedents of the pronouns of their (l. 8) and his (l. 19)? How does identifying them aid your understanding of the poem?
• Identify three examples of personification in the poem. What are their effects?
• This poem employs several contrasts. Identify three prominent ones. What is their effect?
• What is the meaning of lines 22-30? Is the circumstance they recount still true today?
• What is the primary implication of lines 48-50?
• How would you describe Bryant’s tone in this poem?
• The poem’s title takes its meaning from the Greek thanatos, death, and opis, vision or sight, and is often called “A Meditation on Death”. The poem is indeed about death and mortality. Is it gloomy? Depressing? How would you describe the mood of the poem?

Homework-  Read pages 277-287 in the textbook. Also, read about Pat Lyon. 

Tuesday and Wednesday

Jacksonian Democracy - What is Jacksonian Democracy? Chart it with a partner, and be ready to explain.

Journal Entry- How does John Mellancamp  define “America”?

Pink Houses lyrics

There's a black man with a black cat livin' in a black neighborhood

He's got an interstate runnin' through his front yard

You know he thinks that he's got it so good

And there's a woman in the kitchen cleanin' up the evenin' slop

And he looks at her and says, "Hey darlin', I can remember when 

   you could stop a clock."

CHORUS:

Oh but ain't that America for you and me

Ain't that America somethin' to see baby 

Ain't that America home of the free

Little pink houses for you and me

There's a young man in a t-shirt

Listenin' to a rockin' rollin' station

He's got greasy hair, greasy smile

He says, "Lord this must be my destination."

'Cause they told me when I was younger

"Boy you're gonna be president."

But just like everything else those old crazy dreams

Just kinda came and went

:|| CHORUS

Well there's people and more people

What do they know know know

Go to work in some high rise

And vacation down at the Gulf of Mexico

Ooh yeah

And ther's winners and there's losers

But they ain't no big deal

'Cause the simple man baby pays for the thrills, the bills, 

     the pills that kill

:|| CHORUS

Jacksonian Democracy and the Rise of the Common Man

Pat Lyon at the Forge - John Neagle 1829

Even Pat Lyon recognized the change in society’s perception of the laborer’s status. When commissioning his portrait, he entreated Neagle:

    “I wish you, sir, to paint me at full length, the size of life, representing me at the                 smithery, with my bellows blower, hammers, and all the etceteras of the shop around me.... I wish you to understand clearly, Mr. Neagle, that I do not desire to be represented in the picture as a gentleman—to which character I have no pretension. I want you to paint me at work at my anvil, with my sleeves rolled up and a leather apron on.”

Despite his own membership in the gentlemanly class, Lyon realized that the laborer had become both a token of moral uprightness and a symbol of the ideals of the new nation; his depiction in Neagle’s painting as a blacksmith would forever immortalize him as the victim of an unjust persecution from those “gentlemen” with whom he so earnestly avoided association. The contemporary editor, Chandler, described the portrayal of Lyon as having “that peculiar right forward look of self complacency, that denotes all well within, and that generous glow of countenance that tells of self dependence, and consciousness of right.”6He was not the only one to note this facet of the painting; it was the quite obvious and deliberate intent of the artist and his subject.

American society’s increasingly positive opinion of the laborer, the blacksmith in particular, was further evident in the numerous honors personally accorded to Lyon during and after his life. The simple fact that a mere blacksmith would be so highly esteemed was in itself an extraordinary circumstance that would later be accompanied by additional recognition.

The Story of Jackson Entering the White House

A Second Jacksonian Era

Read and explore The County Vote on this EDSITEment website- George Caleb Bingham 1854        The County Vote 

For each image, before answering the content-specific questions listed below, we recommend that you conduct a general analysis using the following four-step procedure.

1. Visual Inventory: Describe the image, beginning with the largest, most obvious features and proceed toward more particular details. Describe fully, without making evaluations. What do you see? What is the setting? What is the time of day, the season of the year, the region of the country? 

2. Documentation: Note what you know about the work. Who made it? When? Where? What is its title? How was it made? What were the circumstances of its creation? How was it received? 

3. Associations: Begin to make evaluations and draw conclusions using observations and prior knowledge. How does this image relate to its historical and cultural framework? Does it invite comparison or correlation with historical or literary texts? Do you detect a point of view or a mood conveyed by the image? Does it present any unexplained or difficult aspects? Does it trigger an emotional response in you as a viewer? What associations (historical, literary, cultural, artistic) enrich your viewing of this image?

4. Interpretation: Develop an interpretation of the work which both recognizes its specific features and also places it in a larger historical or thematic context.

What is an American?

In Letters From An American Farmer, J. Hector St. John De Crevecoeur  asked:

What then is the American, this new man?...He is an American, who, leaving behind him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new mode of life he has embraced, the new government he obeys, and the new rank he holds. He has become an American by being received in the broad lap of our great Alma Mater. Here individuals of all races are melted into a new race of man, whose labors and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world. Americans are the western pilgrims. (from "Letter III," 1782) 

How did De Tocqueville answer this questions years later?

"America is a land of wonders, in which everything is in constant motion and every change seems an improvement. … No natural boundary seems to be set to the efforts of man; and in his eyes what is not yet done is only what he has not yet attempted to do."
—Alexis de Tocqueville

Reading:  Excerpts from Democracy in America, by Alexis De Tocqueville, and look at the following websites: De Tocqueville and Democracy in America.  Consider: Who was Alexis De Tocqueville and what did he think was distinctive about America?

(Compare to Crevecoeur)

"The American is a new man, who acts upon new principles; he must therefore entertain new ideas, and form new opinions. . . . Here individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of men, whose labours and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world. . . . An [immigrant] when he first arrives . . . no sooner breathes our air than he forms new schemes, and embarks in designs he never would have thought of in his own country. . . . He begins to feel the effects of a sort of resurrection; hitherto he had not lived, but simply vegetated; he now feels himself a man . . . Judge what an alteration there must arise in the mind and thoughts of this man; . . . his heart involuntarily swells and glows; this first swell inspires him with those new thoughts which constitute an American.”-Crevecoeur

Homework- Read pages 287-297 in the textbook.

Thursday

End of the Neoclassical Republic, Jackson as Caesar - Keynote Presentation

HT Discussion: Is Jackson a tyrant?

Bank Crisis

Nullification Crisis

Indian Removal Act

Homework- Read “Self-Reliance” and answer the questions. 

Friday

Transcendentalism - Keynote

The Politics of “Self-Reliance"

“While “Self-Reliance” deals extensively with theological matters, we cannot overlook its political significance. It appeared in 1841, just four years after President Andrew Jackson left office. In the election of 1828 Jackson forged an alliance among the woodsmen and farmers of the western frontier and the laborers of eastern cities. (See the America in Class® lesson “The Expansion of Democracy during the Jacksonian Era.”) Emerson opposed the Jacksonians over specific policies, chiefly their defense of slavery and their support for the expulsion of Indians from their territories. But he objected to them on broader grounds as well. Many people like Emerson, who despite his noncomformist thought still held many of the political views of the old New England elite from which he sprang, feared that the rise of the Jacksonian electorate would turn American democracy into mob rule. In fact, at one point in “Self-Reliance” he proclaims “now we are a mob.” When you see the word “mob” here, do not picture a large, threatening crowd. Instead, think of what we today would call mass society, a society whose culture and politics are shaped not by the tastes and opinions of a small, narrow elite but rather by those of a broad, diverse population.”

Introduction to “Self-Reliance"

"There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preestablished harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. We but half express ourselves, and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may be safely trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest by cowards. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise, shall give him no peace. It is a deliverance which does not deliver. In the attempt his genius deserts him; no muse befriends; no invention, no hope."

Review answers to questions and discuss excerpts. 

Homework- Read excerpts from Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” and answer the questions in the packet. I will check these tomorrow.