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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What did Emerson's philosophy ultimately propose?

2. What did Daniel Webster believe the railroad would do for America?

3. What was Daniel Webster's feeling about pastoralism?

4. How did Emerson describe the relationship between the east and the west?

5. What thinkers does Marx say followed Carlyle's critique of industrialism?

Short Essay Questions

1. How did the pastoral ideal redeem the horrors of industrialism?

2. How did Henry Adam's reconcile pastoralism and industrialism?

3. What view does Marx ascribe to Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, Tocqueville and Twain in common?

4. What was John Orvis' reaction to industrialism?

5. What is complex pastoral ideology, and where does Marx see it in evidence?

6. What was the context in which Marx was writing the epilogue?

7. What was the dark side of industrialism, in most writers' eyes?

8. How did Emerson reconcile machines and nature?

9. How did Ralph Waldo Emerson see nature?

10. What were the roles of men of understanding and men of reason in Emerson's vision?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Read the dialogue between Tityrus and Meliboeus in Virgil's Eclogues, and describe what makes American pastoralism uniquely American. Is pastoralism really an eternal theme in civilized culture, or is there a uniquely American strain to it?

Essay Topic 2

Do you think that there was ever a 'good place in nature' or is this concept itself a nostalgic imposition on the experience of loss, and the acquisition of civilization?

Essay Topic 3

Is pastoralism a state of tension between nature and family on one hand and civilization on the other--is it something open-ended and eternal--or is it a goal, a way of life that can be lived if the right balances can be struck? What forces tend toward that balance? What forces tend to disturb or prevent it?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 706 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample