Background
Bronson Alcott was born near Wolcott, Conn. , on November 29, 1799.
(This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)
This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.
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(Notes of Conversations, 1848-1875 is a volume of transcri...)
Notes of Conversations, 1848-1875 is a volume of transcripts of conversations conducted by the nineteenth-century American philosopher and educator A. Bronson Alcott at various locations in New England and the Midwest. The transcripts have been created from unpublished manuscripts in the Alcott collection at Harvard University and Concord Free Library, as well as published contemporary articles in ""The Radical"", ""New York Daily Tribune"", and ""The Chicago Tribune"". Gathered in this volume, Alcott's transcripts vividly reflect American intellectual concerns from the years preceding the Civil War through the beginning of the Gilded Age.
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(American philosopher essayist and Transcendentalist Amos ...)
American philosopher essayist and Transcendentalist Amos Bronson Alcott s Concord Dayswas originally published in 1872 Concord Dayswas one of Alcott s most popular works and is one of the most important books about the community of Transcendentalists in Concord The book marks the passing of the seasons in rural New England during a single year from spring to summer to fall Written at Orchard House the Alcott home in Concord Massachusetts the writings were drawn from his diaries and dwelt largely on the personalities of Alcott s famous friends Emerson Hawthorne Thoreau introducing these great American writers to a wider American audience This important book reveals Alcott s own belief that mankind can achieve perfection Man becomes godlike as he strives for divinity and divinity ever stoops to put on humanity and deify mankind
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(Cowley, as that one which I have had always that I might ...)
Cowley, as that one which I have had always that I might be master at last of a small house and ample garden, with very moderate conveniences joined to them, and there to dedicate the remainder of my life to the culture of them and the study of nature. Virgil sfirst wish was to be a wise man, the second to be a good husbandman. But since nature denies to most men the capacity or appetite, and fortune allows but to very few the opportunities or possibility of applying themselves wholly to wisdom, the best mixture of human affairs we can make, are the employments of a country life. It is, as Columella calls it, the nearest neighbor or next in kindred to philosophy. (Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.) About the Publisher Forgotten Books is a publisher of historical writings, such as: Philosophy, Classics, Science, Religion, History, Folklore and Mythology. Forgotten Books' Classic Reprint Series utilizes the latest technology to regenerate facsimiles of historically important writings. Careful attention has been made to accurately preserve the original format of each page whilst digitally enhancing the aged text. Read books online for free at www.forgottenbooks.org
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(Originally published in 1830, Observations on the Princip...)
Originally published in 1830, Observations on the Principles and Methods of Infant Instruction was written for the United States Gazette's education essay contest, the piece outlines Alcott's method of education, which stresses conversation and play and the teacher's role in a child's morality. Although it did not win the contest, it received acclaim from Philadelphia readers.
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(Ttbv nqoaslovieg yovoiy 01) igiol Xjfovg otfrw jto-telvwv...)
Ttbv nqoaslovieg yovoiy 01) igiol Xjfovg otfrw jto-telvwv iv pifilloig ny is %A xxi%v qulve ne Qi6-8iy xauav xai ono ytx Xkoos fiot Xrj. Plato, Phcedr. p. 230 D. For as men lead hungry creatures by holding out a green bough or an apple, so you, it would seem, might lead me about all Attica and wherever else you please, by holding toward me discourses out of your books. Plato. (Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.) About the Publisher Forgotten Books is a publisher of historical writings, such as: Philosophy, Classics, Science, Religion, History, Folklore and Mythology. Forgotten Books' Classic Reprint Series utilizes the latest technology to regenerate facsimiles of historically important writings. Careful attention has been made to accurately preserve the original format of each page whilst digitally enhancing the aged text. Read books online for free at www.forgottenbooks.org
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philosopher reformer teacher writer
Bronson Alcott was born near Wolcott, Conn. , on November 29, 1799.
He was an old New England family which had fallen on hard times, with the result that Alcott received only scanty schooling. However, he educated himself through much of his long life.
He early discovered that he wanted to educate others, and he traveled as far away as Virginia to seek a post. Unsuccessful there as elsewhere, he turned to peddling in Virginia and the Carolinas. After his return to New England in 1823, he spent the next decade in a variety of teaching positions and seldom stayed long in any one place.
The school system in the United States at this time was marked by narrowness and rigidity, stressing memorization and discipline. Alcott felt that the basic impulses in the human being were noble ones and that education should consist in freeing the child from restrictions and giving full rein to his imagination. Education should encourage the child mentally, morally, spiritually, esthetically, and physically. For Alcott the body was as important as the mind, so he introduced into his classes such innovations as organized play and gymnastics; he also tried to introduce the study of human physiology. Alcott treated the children as adults through such devices as the honor system, and he led them to discover their personal views through constant use of the Socratic dialogue. But the picture of Alcott gently questioning a 6-year-old about infinity or punishing himself when a child misbehaved was enough to startle any school board, and it is no wonder he became an educational nomad.
If school boards found him shocking, the members of the emerging transcendentalist movement found him admirable though at times exasperating. His philosophy was eclectic. To the Quaker idea of inner vision, he added the idea of intuitive knowledge; he adopted the notion of preexistence; he believed that spirit was the only reality and that man's everyday world was merely an emanation of it; and he permeated this mystic philosophy with a feeling that was close to the ecstatic. He proved to be more Emersonian than even Ralph Waldo Emerson (the leading transcendentalist). The transcendentalists as a group were often accused of being visionary and impractical; Alcott was the personification of those qualities.
But it was not till he was an elderly man that his family's financial plight was relieved, when his daughter Louisa May Alcott published Little Women, a best seller.
Alcott established the first "progressive school" in America, in Boston's Masonic Temple. The Record of a School, Exemplifying the General Principles of Spiritual Culture (1835) consists of his observations there as edited by his assistant, Elizabeth Peabody. The school lasted till 1839 despite Alcott's notoriously unorthodox methods. The blow that killed the school was his enrollment of a Negro girl.
In 1859 Alcott's friends got him appointed superintendent of the public schools of Concord, Mass. , the native home of transcendentalism. Though he remained as innovative as ever, Concord had become tolerant and allowed him to do a good job. In 1879 he started the Concord Summer School of Philosophy and Literature for adults, which carried on until his death. Besides writing on education, he contributed mystical "Orphic Sayings" to the transcendentalist magazine, the Dial, and published poetry and reflective essays.
He died on March 4, 1888.
(American philosopher essayist and Transcendentalist Amos ...)
(Originally published in 1830, Observations on the Princip...)
(Cowley, as that one which I have had always that I might ...)
(Notes of Conversations, 1848-1875 is a volume of transcri...)
(Ttbv nqoaslovieg yovoiy 01) igiol Xjfovg otfrw jto-telvwv...)
(This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)
(LettersReligion/Philosophy/Transcendental)
(Book by Alcott, Bronson, Shepard, Odell)
Alcott was fundamentally and philosophically opposed to corporal punishment as a means of disciplining his students. Instead, beginning at the Temple School, he would appoint a daily student superintendent. When that student observed an infraction, he or she reported it to the rest of the class and, as a whole, they deliberated on punishment. At times, Alcott offered his own hand for an offending student to strike, saying that any failing was the teacher's responsibility. The shame and guilt this method induced, he believed, was far superior to the fear instilled by corporal punishment; when he used physical "correction" he required that the students be unanimously in support of its application, even including the student to be punished.
The most detailed discussion of his theories on education is in an essay, "Observations on the Principles and Methods of Infant Instruction". Alcott believed that early education must draw out "unpremeditated thoughts and feelings of the child" and emphasized that infancy should primarily focus on enjoyment. He noted that learning was not about the acquisition of facts but the development of a reflective state of mind.
Alcott's ideas as an educator were controversial. Writer Harriet Martineau, for example, wrote dubiously that, "the master presupposes his little pupils possessed of all truth; and that his business is to bring it out into expression". Even so, his ideas helped to found one of the first adult education centers in America, and provided the foundation for future generations of liberal education. Many of Alcott's educational principles are still used in classrooms today, including "teach by encouragement", art education, music education, acting exercises, learning through experience, risk-taking in the classroom, tolerance in schools, physical education/recess, and early childhood education. The teachings of William Ellery Channing a few years earlier had also laid the groundwork for the work of most of the Concord Transcendentalists.
While many of Alcott's ideas continue to be perceived as being on the liberal/radical edge, they are still common themes in society, including vegetarian/veganism, sustainable living, and temperance/self-control. Alcott described his sustenance as a "Pythagorean diet": meat, eggs, butter, cheese, and milk were excluded and drinking was confined to well water. Alcott believed that diet held the key to human perfection and connected physical well-being to mental improvement. He further viewed a perfection of nature to the spirit and, in a sense, predicted modern environmentalism by condemning pollution and encouraging humankind's role in sustaining ecology.
Beginning in 1836, Alcott's membership in the Transcendental Club put him in such company as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Orestes Brownson and Theodore Parker.
Quotes from others about the person
Thomas Carlyle caught the flavor of Alcott's unique personality: "The good Alcott; with his long, lean face and figure, with his worn gray temples and mild, radiant eyes; all bent on saving the world by a return to acorns and the golden age; he comes before one like a venerable Don Quixote, whom nobody can laugh at without loving. "
Besides school teaching, he attempted a bit of farming, a brief stint in communal living at Fruitlands (a cooperative community which he helped found near Harvard, Mass. ), itinerant lecturing in the guise of paid "conversations" in the Socratic mode, and some writing.
Alcott married Abby May in 1830 and they eventually had four surviving children, all daughters. Their second was Louisa May, who fictionalized her experience with the family in her novel Little Women in 1868.