Dark Romanticism

Nathaniel Hawthorne- I have read a part of his life and what he felt about his grandfather the minister and judge. I have read this and Nathaniel felt that the Transcendental philosophy was totally wrong. He felt this because just like the transcendentalism believed that everyone was absolutely pure and a part of God, and in his eyes that was wrong. This was a wrong believe to him because he seen his grandfather killing people just because people would say they were evil. He felt that god wasn’t telling his grandfather to do so. So how was his grandfather a part of god, when he was doing these horrible things, especially being a minister?

Herman Melville- Ahab sacrificed all the men on board with him, while he was the leading one. Was he pure of mind and a part of God? No, he was not. He was selfish and did not care whether the men with him would pay for his mistake. He thought more of himself then the other men. He was not a part of god and most definitely a good man. So this is why they disagreed with the transcendentalism philosophy. Now a man who witnessed people eating human flesh wouldn’t agree that everyone was good and pure. He wouldn’t agree with that transcendental philosophy because a man eating another human must be sick in the head or not a good person at all. If you kill someone else just to eat them, God wouldn’t agree that is right.

Edgar Allen Poe’s- Wow, not this guy had a rough life. Do you really think now that everyone is a part of God, and that everyone always does the right things? All of the transcendental philosophy was nothing but plain wrong to Poe. To him everyone’s thoughts weren’t the voice of god, because if they were he wouldn’t have turned out to be what he was. He felt bad that everyone he loved dies, and how he turned out to be a alcoholic and a serious druggy. If God was in everyone’s thought, why would he gone that far. When he wrote his poems and stories he was talking about characters who were evil and ended up having the evil take over. Transcendental philosophy said that everyone was good and pure, so why did he think like that? He thought like this because he had been through so many rough things that he ended up seeing that things weren’t perfect and pretty, he believe everything had a bad or evil side to it.

I am closer to being a Dark Romantic. I feel this way because just like these three men, I have experienced a lot in my life. Not necessarily me, but have had friends who been through rough stuff and have seen things that weren’t quite right. If everyone was pure and good and always did the right things, then the world would be so much better and safer. The Transcendentalist were much different people who thought that God made their every move and that God was the one who would tell them what was right. You see things don’t work that way. I would sure be amazed of things were really like that. This world has so many evil, nasty, cruel people that we all know about. God didn’t want this to be how things were, but people themselves turned out like this by themselves with their own mind and thoughts. So that’s why I fall under the Dark Romanticism.

The Black Cat-
I have read this story and Poe is telling this story and also saying how he totally disagrees with the Transcendentalism. I feel this story is a good example of why they disagree with the Transcendentalism beliefs. I really liked his story because it really shows and explains what can really happen to some one and how their intuition is not always a good thought. This shows also how alcohol, drugs, even a mad mood can get you acting like. A demon can always get into your thoughts and control what you do; even you don’t want to do it. The dark Romantic philosophy explains and feels that bad things can happen and that bad things and spirits exist. Not only God but demons too, just like in this story.
This story talks about how the transcendentalism philosophy is wrong. This story is about a man who gets possessed and at one point no longer knows himself, and acts in an evil and demolishes way, towards a cat. He had been drinking one night and once he gets home he feels something taking over his whole body and murders the cat in a cruel way. One example of what he said was, “The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body.” This was an evidence of what I have explained. He says that God didn’t get into his intuition and make him do that. What he is trying to get out of this story is that the transcendentalism philosophy was wrong by saying everyone does good things and God is the one who leads them to the right things. This is what can really happen and even if it is so un real it can most definitely happen.

The Raven is a very complicated and at the same time meaningful poem. This a poem that Poe wrote while his wife was dying and he feels like he is going insane. He talks about a raven in the story and the way I see it he is describing the raven of being a symbol of fear and death. He keeps hearing knocks and things at the door, but no one or anything is ever there. He feels he is going crazy and just imagining things. Until at last the raven shows up through the window and in it goes.
The line that got to me the most was, “Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before." This got to me because it is like saying he had then got more scared and wondering who that thing on the door was, he most likely feels like it the demon or something of that source of matter. He is completely confused knowing his wife is dying and then there are these noises where he can’t figure out where it is coming from. The next phrase that got to me was, “And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore?” This I whispered and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!"—this is saying like know he is getting me worried because he is saying Lenore and whispers from no where reply back in a much louder voice. He is going crazy, and he knows or feels something was out there.

This has to do with Dark Romanticism because he is going trough a stage where everything is not perfect. Not only is his wife dying, but then again he sees this raven which in his mind means demolish and fear. He is seeing and feeling the saintly evil around him and he is thinking that someone is out there when in reality it is just his thought and mind. It also relates to Dark Romanticism because he feels something is out calling for him and it is not God, he feels is something bad, so he becomes scared and fearful.

More about Edgar Allen Poe was that his father abandoned their family in 1810, and his mother died a year later from consumption. Poe was then taken into the home of John Allan, a successful Scottish merchant in ichmond, Virginia, who dealt in a variety of goods including tobacco, cloth, wheat, tombstones, and slaves. The Allan’s served as a foster family but never formally adopted Poe, though they gave him the name "Edgar Allan Poe".
Later then he joined the military although using the name "Edgar A. Perry", he claimed he was 22 years old even though he was 18. He first served at Fort Independence in Boston Harbor for five dollars a month. That same year, he released his first book, a 40-page collection of poetry, Tamerlane and Other Poems, attributed with the byline "by a Bostonian". Only 50 copies were printed, and the book received virtually no attention.
I would say that some of this influenced his writings because he has had a rough life and has been fearful of many things because of things he had seen and experienced. The death of his mother, the abandon of his father, the adoption, the death of all his wives, and his career of becoming a good writer. This is all enough to become such a dedicated writer like he was.