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Rousseau, Douglass, both prose writers; Whitman, Tennyson and Wordsworth, all three, poets. What bind them together, what is their common denominator? Nationalism, democracy, love for the common man, singing praises for the ordinary man on the street, fighting for the rights of the poor, seeking the liberation of the downtrodden from oppression, glorifying the human being - man! These are elements that are common to them.
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Consider Jean-Jacques Rousseau who according to Lillian Hornstein of New York University. (The Reader's Companion to World Literature. New York: Dryden Press, 1956), was not even a thinker nor a writer at the beginning but ending up writing words that inspired worlds. It is bandied around, that the totality of the theme of his writing is man and his role in society. Many ideas about modern democracy came from his writings. He powered the Romantic Movement. He could and did express certain hidden feelings about man and society which were a reflection of the feelings of his fellowmen, their well-kept secret longings and their desire to improve their lives.
In essence, Rousseau argued that the "natural man is good and happy but it is humankind that abuses and depraves him. He advocated the acceptance of man's true nature and he decried society's indifference to human suffering and misery.
Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass, the second prose writer in the group of five is an American Visionary, the foremost leader of the Abolitionist Movement. Brilliant, he was the voice which helped propel the American Civil War.
Unknown to many, he was an adviser to President Abraham Lincoln. He worked for civil liberties, he rebelled against racial injustice, he delivered lectures from one end of the nation to the other end. He was one of the first great black speakers. A very brilliant man, he always had the plight, the suffering of the black people at the back of his mind. He fought for...
He was very strong in anti-slavery law; he wanted his people to enjoy equal rights with everybody in his country - they were all American in spirit - they were human beings at heart - they were men.
This is the area common to all in the Group of Five in the movement - they were romanticists in their love for the common man - the aggrieved, the beleaguered, the down-trodden.
What made Frederick Douglas different from the other four? The fact that he was black. He was a black slave who escaped to the north and who because of the cause he was fighting for won the heart of Lincoln, the Great Emancipator and became the latter's adviser. The thing that made him unique was his brilliance behind his black skin, surmounting his slavery. (Sandra Thomas, a Biography of Frederick Douglas.)
Walt Whitman, Poet
The poet who "sees eternity in man and woman." He was extremely nationalistic; he was an advocate for democracy; he is popular for his identification with the common man. This close affinity for the ordinary man of the street has led to an appearance of conceit - "I celebrate myself and sing myself." But "I" here is everyone, for every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
Whitman has that remarkable power of empathy by which he looks upon: "I was man, I suffered, I was there" He did not allow himself to be pushed into unrealistic idealization of the people but he put his final trust in them because he saw that they had not only the "cruel, beastly, hoggish qualities but also the admirable and spiritual. As he told Horace Traubel, his disciple in his old age, "everything comes out of the people... not university people, not F.F.V people: people, people, just people.
Whitman's range of subject matter is remarkable yet intentional. He desires to be transcendent and new. The theme of the psalm of the Republic and that I think, is The…
The Dryden Press, 1956.
Van Nostrand, Albert D. "A Preface to Leaves of Grass." Literary Criticism in America.
NewYork: The Liberal Arts Press. 1957.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau Section From Confessions The primary confession that Jean Jacques Rousseau makes in this excerpt from his work of literature entitled Confessions is the fact that he was inadvertently responsible for the death of his mother. Evidently, his mother died during or shortly thereafter giving birth to him, because the author writes, "I was born, a poor and sickly child, and cost my mother her life. So my birth was
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Jean-Jacques Rousseau is one of the European theorists who has been cited as an inspiration for the Founding Fathers as they wrote the U.S. Constitution and created the American form of government. In some ways, however, they were using what Rousseau wrote as a beginning point and then finding a governmental form to refute some of Rousseau's concerns for what representative government might become if not controlled. The authors of
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