Transatlantic Transcendentalism: Coleridge, Emerson, and Nature

As Samantha C. Harvey demonstrates, Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s thought galvanized Emerson at a pivotal moment in his intellectual development in the years 1826-1836, giving him new ways to harmonize the Romantic triad of nature, spirit, and humanity. Emerson did not think about Coleridge: he thought with Coleridge, resulting in a unique case of assimilative influence. In addition to examining his specific literary, philosophical, and theological influences on Emerson, this book reveals Coleridge’s centrality for Boston Transcendentalism and Vermont Transcendentalism, a movement which profoundly affected the development of modern higher education, the national press, and the emergence of Pragmatism.

• Illuminates how the emerging field of transatlantic studies has opened new circulatory spaces to reconsider the relationship between Coleridge and Emerson
• Asserts Coleridge as the single most important influence on Emerson’s early essays
• Examines the centrality of nature in the dynamic context of Transatlantic Romanticism
• Highlights the essential but overlooked legacy of Coleridge’s dynamic principles of method for Emerson and for Boston and Vermont Transcendentalism