How Students Can Remember the Transcendentalists: Use a Skit

Name_______________________________ Period __________________

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Instructions: If you were picked for a role, please come up to the front of the class. If not, please listen carefully to the skit and fill in the correct names below.

Characters
Ralph Waldo Emerson: Philosopher and writer
Josiah Holbrook: Founder of Lyceum movement
John Brown: Abolitionist militant
Henry David Thoreau: Philosopher and writer
Margaret Fuller: News reporter and intellectual
Walt Whitman: Poet
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Setting: Emerson’s home, Concord, Massachusetts, 1854

Holbrook: Americans love to learn. Look how well they attend Lyceum lectures! I noticed that in addition to Emerson, Margaret Fuller was an especially popular speaker. I’ve never seen a woman make a living as an intellectual before.
Whitman: Emerson lit an intellectual fire under all of us, and we all changed American culture in some way. It’s too bad that Margaret died so young. Look, here’s an unopened letter from her.

Fuller: “My father educated me in Greek and Latin even though I was a girl. To overcome the odds against my sex, I worked so hard in learning languages that I became ill. I am living proof that women are the intellectual equal to men.”

Emerson: I am honored that Margaret was in my intellectual circle. Our movement, transcendentalism, was built on the idea that every individual, by searching within, can encounter the truth. I am sure that Henry and Walt would agree.

Brown: There are limits to your glorification of the individual, Emerson. In times of national crisis, we need to work as one. Today, we need to destroy the evil institution of slavery. Radical measures are needed. Who is with me?

Emerson: We all are. I have modified my views on radical individualism and have become less eager for the individual to stand apart from society. We all need to cooperate in this time of national urgency.

Thoreau: I went to jail rather than support the Mexican War. I knew that a consequence of that war would be the expansion of slavery. I will break the law now to oppose the evil institution of slavery on our shores. It is time for civil disobedience!


Which character espouses the following policy or idea? Pick the one best answer.
1. Civil disobedience:____________________
2. Amazed by American lecture attendance:___________________________
3. Men and women are intellectually equal:_______________________________
4. No longer interested in radical individualism.:_____________________________
5. Grateful for Emerson’s inspiration:__________________________________
6. Radical abolitionist:_____________________
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7. What ended up happening to John Brown? What was Emerson’s reaction?
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8. What was the significance of Brook Farm?

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9. Would you have preferred to be educated in Margaret Fuller’s day or today? Why?
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10. Should the State be subservient to the wishes of the individual or should the individual be subservient to the State? Why?
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