Fourierism
Charles Fourier was a French Utopian Socialist
who lived from 1772-1837. He was the only son of a cloth dealer,
a business which he inherited and despised. During the French Revolution
he lost his inheritance and his brush with the Terror of 1793 left him
permanently jarred against revolutionary violence. As early as 1803,
he called himself the "Newton of passionate attraction." He believed
that he had discovered the laws of social psychology just as Newton had
the laws of gravity. He devoted his adult life to solving the problems
of the market economy and by the early 1830's, he had attracted a small
group of followers in Paris who published a journal called La Reforme Industrielle.
Fourier believed that the cause of conflict and suffering was the perversion
of natural human goodness by faulty social organization. However,
he was convinced that reason could discover the laws of harmony and create
perfect order by rearranging economic relationships. He went against
claims that men were shaped by their environment and considered civilization
repressive and against man's happiness. He advocated a solution of
small planned communes, and he called then phalansteries. He devised
a blueprint precisely indicating the size, layout, and industrial organization
of each community or "phalanx." Organized as both producers' and consumers'
cooperatives, the communities would escalate economically and fulfill all
man's passions. The result was to create social harmony and unimaginable
bliss. His main hope was to speed man's process from a primitive
"civilization'; to the highest "state of harmony." Fourier believed that
God was a "supreme economist" who had devised a plan for a perfect society
creating human "happiness" and "riches."
In the United States, Fourierism was introduced
to the American public in 1840 when a New Yorker named Albert Brisbane
published a compendium of Fourier's writings entitled The Social Destiny
of Man. Brisbane also reached a wide audience through the
column he posted in The New York Tribune in March of 1842 and it
reached the Transcendentalists in particular with Emerson's essay on "Fourierism
and Socialists" in the Dial. Thus, Fourierism became immediately
popular and eventually laid the foundation for many of the transcendental
communities (Rose,
140-146).
Economy and Finances
Brook Farm began as an experiment in Christian
living and became a center of reform activity to promote the beliefs of
Fourierism. At the beginning, there was a serious purpose behind
the Brook Farm amusements; the members were attempting to work out
an economy that allowed everyone an equal chance for social, intellectual,
and spiritual growth. The members of Brook Farm had an insatiable
desire for pleasure: music, dancing, cardplaying, charades, tableaux vivants,
dramatic readings, plays, costume parties, picnics, sledding and skating.
By offering a solution to economic problems, Fourierism brought the Brook
Farmers in reach of their goals.
The Brook Farmers introduced several changes
in social organization between 1841 and 1844 that involved three aspects
of their economy: the plan for reuniting social classes, the voluntary
system of labor, and the choice of agriculture as the principal industry.
The object of these measures was to promote and able the free development
of the individual. Ripley stated his general
goals for Brook Farm in a letter to Emerson.
Ripley's primary objective was to end the
division of educated and laboring classes. Ripley believed that both
classes shared a common difficulty in that their work no longer met the
standards of a calling. The Brook Farmers intended to share the labor
on the farm in order to achieve economic self-sufficiency and therefore
end wage slavery. "Everyone must labor for the community in a reasonable
degree, or not taste its system in operation," Elizabeth Peabody wrote
in the Dial in 1842 . "By the wide distribution of these labors,"
she continued, "no one has any great weight in any one thing." (Rose,
134) In another article, Peabody refers to seeing the men delay
teaching Greek to nurture fruit trees and women spend the morning doing
the laundry. Because they divided the labor, the members had a great deal
of time to devote to one of their main goals, self-improvement.
While Brook Farm guaranteed equality
in education and labor, membership in the association depended on ownership
of property. Brook Farm was organized as a joint stock company.
The price of a share was $500.00. Upon purchase, a member could then
have the right to vote on community policies. (The second edition
of the Articles of Association, drawn up in 1842, allowed a person to become
a member by the vote of the associates.) The members of Brook Farm
believed that private property was necessary for individual integrity.
Ripley wrote a letter to a reform society in New York explaining this principle.
The voluntary system of labor was
another reform undertaken in the interest of individual freedom.
As Elizabeth Peabody said, "everyone prescribes his own hours of labor,
controlled only by his conscience." She noted also that the free
atmosphere enhanced sociability. A person who did not perform an
acceptable amount of work would find himself isolated and neglected and
would not be able to continue living there. In 1841, the members
voted to have more specific general standards for work: 300 days was considered
the equivalent of one year's labor, and ten hours in the summer and eight
in the winter were considered one day. Several problems arose in
which a new member did not perform an equal amount of work, and due to
these cases, the members agreed to officially record hours of labor.
Understandably, this type of rigidity at Brook Farm was disturbing to members
who set up the community to encourage and facilitate moral growth.
The Brook Farm Institute for Agriculture
and Education was the name the Brook Farmers chose for their community
in 1841. It referred to the way they chose to unite labor and culture
and to the way that they chose to earn their living. The transcendentalists
perceived farming to be the occupation most favorable to personal growth
because of its distance from the market, proximity to nature, and promise
of a subsistence to protect moral independence. The Brook Farmers,
unlike the member of Fruitlands, did however sell their milk, vegetables,
and hay and kept their stock dividends low in order to keep enough capital
to expand production. In one sense, the Brook Farmers operated
something like a boarding school where the students paid in cash unless
they worked on the farm. Furthermore, when the Brook Farmers admitted Lewis
Ryckman, he initiated a new thriving business of shoemaking in the community.
Thus, they were making money on culture, and this act demonstrates the
Brook Farmers interest in practical economics as a means to social justice
in the year before their allegiance to Fourierism (Rose,
130-140).
Lifestyles
In the mornings everyone in the community
would wake at approximately 6:00 am, eat breakfast, and then work for ten
hours in the summer or eight hours in the winter. Even so, enjoyment
was the first pursuit of Brook Farm. After the work was done and
after dinner had been served, there was plenty of time for personal enjoyment
and leisure. The members of Brook Farm had an insatiable desire for
pleasure: music, dancing, cardplaying, charades, tableaux vivants, dramatic
readings, plays, costume parties, picnics, sledding and skating.
Even in stormy weather, impromptu discussions were started in the Hive.
Literary societies and reading clubs were very popular at Brook Farm, as
were the readings and performances of Shakespeare's plays. Musical
visitors were common, and some members also sang. Anti-slavery gatherings
in Boston and Dedham were attended by many members. But perhaps the
most important and symbolizing custom at the Farm was "The symbol of Universal
Unity." This ritual was performed by the entire company rising and
joining hands in a circle and then "vowing truth to the cause of God and
Humanity."
Sources:
Brook Farm Site of Jamie Hamilton, University of Louisville (no longer on-line)
Dwight, Mary Ann. Letters From Brook
Farm 1844-1847. Poughkeepsie, New York: Vassar College, 1928.
Mary Ann, or Marianne, Dwight
was a member of the Brook Farm Community. She is the only member who wrote
a considerable number of letters with the intention of describing in detail
the life of the place. This book compiles her letters, which date from
1844 – 1847, and concludes with notes on the text from the editor Amy Reed.
Reed also introduces the work thoroughly and includes a ten page appendix
about the characters described in Dwight's letters.
Francis, Richard. Transcendental Utopias:
Individual and Community at Brook Farm, Fruitlands, and Walden. Ithaca,
New York: Cornell University Press, 1997.
The book focuses mainly on the Brook Farm with three out of its seven chapters
devoted to it. Francis mainly concerns himself with the philosophical view
points of the farm discussing its faults and enlightenments. He also illustrates
the views of individuals, and their philosophies, in the Brook Farm. He
considers the psychology of it in a philosophical way that other books
of the subject do not begin to attempt. He also compares these ideologies
to those found in Thoreau's Walden and other respected philosophies.
Sams, J. Autobiography of the Brook
Farm. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc.,1958.
The Autobiography of the Brook
Farm is a collection of articles published from the Farm in chronological
order from 1840- 1947. The book includes maps of the Brook Farm along with
a short index. The book has a slight textbook feel to it, since it has
questions at the end of the book on each chapter. The last chapter serves
as a type of summary of the life of the Farm and reviews its history briefly
from 1847- 1928.
Sears, John Van Der Zee. My Friends at
Brook Farm. New York, New York: AMS Press, 1975.
This book provides an inside look
at Brook Farm and makes vivid and clear remarks of the beliefs held there.
He also briefly traces its history from beginning to end, commenting on
its productive ideals and highlighting the mistakes in the management of
the Brook Farm. In addition, he discusses the entertainment, school, and
life in the furriers of the Farm. The Farm seems to have a personal relationship
for the author, considering the heart-felt style of the author, it pulls
the reader into almost hoping the Farm had gone on.
Swift, Lindsay. Brook Farm: Its Members,
Scholars, and Visitors. Sacaucus, New Jersey: The Citadel Press, 1961.
Swift describes every facet of
the Brook Farm from beginning to end starting with the Transcendental Club.
He illustrates the organization, building grounds, industries, household
work, amusements, and customs of the residences. He goes on to discuss
the school and its scholars, which include a chapter on Isaac Thomas Hecker
and another on William Curtis and James Burrill Curtis. Following the emphasis
on the school he begins to tell of its members and visitors including chapters
on Hawthorne, member and Emerson, visitor. He ends the book with what he
calls a "closing period," a time of decline at the Farm. He includes a
bibliography and an index.
Related Sites:
The Brook Farm Community.
"Brook Farm." Article in The Dial, 1844.
"Brook Farm." A first-hand account by Georgiana Bruce Kirby, from Years of Experience, 1887.
