A01=Aren Lerner Craig
abolitionism
agency
Author_Aren Lerner Craig
Category=NHK
Category=QDHR
Category=QDTQ
character
Common Sense
death
divine
emigration
Emily Dickinson
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equality
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German Idealism
Henry David Thoreau
Herman Melville
individual agency
intellectual history
James Russell Lowell
John Greenleaf Whittier
literary magazines
Louisa May Alcott
Margaret Fuller
metaphysical identity
Nathaniel Hawthorne
New England
newspaper editorials
northern United States
optimism
pamphlets
personal diaries
philosophy
poetry
political impact
political theory
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Scottish Realism
self-sanctification
social responsibility
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truth
Unitarian church
universal spiritualization
virtue
Walt Whitman
Product details
- ISBN 9781625348906
- Weight: 454g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 28 Nov 2025
- Publisher: University of Massachusetts Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
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Tracing the impact of transcendental philosophy on Union soldiers and their loved ones during the American Civil War
Scholars of the American Civil War have long wondered about the seemingly earnest and sincere sentimental commitment that most Northern soldiers had to their nation and the North's cause. Unlike many others in other wars, Union soldiers appeared to embrace the war with an unusual conviction and sacrificed their lives with a rare nobility. Their grieving relatives were also buoyed up by their steadfast beliefs in the righteousness of the cause. What was so different about this war, and this period of American history, and what encouraged such an outlook?
In Every Revolution was First a Thought, Aren Lerner Craig argues that in the Civil War era the American Transcendentalist movement provided a coherent worldview that fostered powerful idealism around issues of character, gender, race, and nationhood, even in the worst of times. Through an exploration of diaries, newspaper editorials, popular songs, and more, Craig demonstrates how Transcendentalist thought moved from elite intellectual circles to the public, providing people a firm belief in the power of individual agency to shape the world and a view of spirituality in which each person was divine, and thus beyond death and destruction. Transcendentalist tenets proved strong enough to withstand the devastation of war and inspired high levels of faith and optimism in soldiers and civilians alike throughout the conflict.
Craig traces the origins of Transcendentalism across the Atlantic, to ideas from Scottish Realism and German Idealism, and connects these philosophies to writings and speeches of major figures like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Margaret Fuller. This intellectual history offers a new interpretation of Transcendental thought and its role in the Civil War.
Scholars of the American Civil War have long wondered about the seemingly earnest and sincere sentimental commitment that most Northern soldiers had to their nation and the North's cause. Unlike many others in other wars, Union soldiers appeared to embrace the war with an unusual conviction and sacrificed their lives with a rare nobility. Their grieving relatives were also buoyed up by their steadfast beliefs in the righteousness of the cause. What was so different about this war, and this period of American history, and what encouraged such an outlook?
In Every Revolution was First a Thought, Aren Lerner Craig argues that in the Civil War era the American Transcendentalist movement provided a coherent worldview that fostered powerful idealism around issues of character, gender, race, and nationhood, even in the worst of times. Through an exploration of diaries, newspaper editorials, popular songs, and more, Craig demonstrates how Transcendentalist thought moved from elite intellectual circles to the public, providing people a firm belief in the power of individual agency to shape the world and a view of spirituality in which each person was divine, and thus beyond death and destruction. Transcendentalist tenets proved strong enough to withstand the devastation of war and inspired high levels of faith and optimism in soldiers and civilians alike throughout the conflict.
Craig traces the origins of Transcendentalism across the Atlantic, to ideas from Scottish Realism and German Idealism, and connects these philosophies to writings and speeches of major figures like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Margaret Fuller. This intellectual history offers a new interpretation of Transcendental thought and its role in the Civil War.
Aren Lerner Craig's work has appeared in the New England Journal of History and The World of Antebellum America: A Daily Life Encyclopedia.She has also published several books of historical fiction that involved detailed research into the daily life and culture of the Civil War era.
