ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -A leading transcendentalist, he is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay “Civil Disobedience” (originally published as “Resistance to Civil Government"), an argument for disobedience to an unjust state.

Detailed explanation-2: -The philosopher Henry David Thoreau is best known for his nature writing and his support of small government. He was a well-known advocate of transcendentalism, or the belief in the inherent goodness of people and nature, making a virtue of self-reliance.

Detailed explanation-3: -Transcendentalism attracted such diverse and highly individualistic figures as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, Orestes Brownson, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, and James Freeman Clarke, as well as George Ripley, Bronson Alcott, the younger W.E. Channing, and W.H. Channing.

Detailed explanation-4: -Thoreau’s importance as a philosophical writer was little appreciated during his lifetime, but his two most noted works, Walden; or, Life in the Woods (1854) and “Civil Disobedience” (1849), gradually developed a following, and by the latter half of the 20th century, had become classic texts in American thought.

Detailed explanation-5: -Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau were two of the most famous and influential transcendentalists. Some influential transcendentalists, such as Margaret Fuller, were early pioneers of feminism.