| Date: 28 April 2011, 05:42
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Emerson
By Lawrence Buell
* Publisher: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
* Number Of Pages: 416
* Publication Date: 2003-05-25
* ISBN-10 / ASIN: 0674011392
* ISBN-13 / EAN: 9780674011397
Product Description:
Hear Lawrence Buell, Michael Sandel, Stanley Cavell, and Wai Chee Dimock speak at the Bicentennial Emerson Forum to be held April 3, 2003 at Harvard University. Read more...
"An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man," Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote--and in this book, the leading scholar of New England literary culture looks at the long shadow Emerson himself has cast, and at his role and significance as a truly American institution. On the occasion of Emerson's 200th birthday, Lawrence Buell revisits the life of the nation's first public intellectual and discovers how he became a "representative man."
Born into the age of inspired amateurism that emerged from the ruins of pre-revolutionary political, religious, and cultural institutions, Emerson took up the challenge of thinking about the role of the United States alone and in the world. With characteristic authority and grace, Buell conveys both the style and substance of Emerson's accomplishment--in his conception of America as the transplantation of Englishness into the new world, and in his prodigious work as writer, religious thinker, and philosopher. Here we see clearly the paradoxical key to his success, the fierce insistence on independence that acted so magnetically upon all around him. Steeped in Emerson's writings, and in the life and lore of the America of his day, Buell's book is as individual--and as compelling--as its subject. At a time when Americans and non-Americans alike are struggling to understand what this country is, and what it is about, Emerson gives us an answer in the figure of this representative American, an American for all, and for all times.
Summary: Perhaps not for the general public
Rating: 3
The general reader may well be overwhelmed by the many references to philosophers from Plato to John Dewey and William James. The author, a professor of English at Harvard University, writes in a highly academic style that the general reader must slog through with a collegiate dictionary, but the chapter "Social Thought and Reform: Emerson and Abolition" should appeal to a broad audience, as well as the first chapter, "The Making of a Public Intellecual", and the material covering Emerson's relationship with Henry Thoreau in "Emerson as Anti-mentor" is quite interesting. The general reader may feel gratified to have read the entire book, but may struggle to comprehend much of it. If you are an erudite academic with degrees in philosophy and Western literature, you might even enjoy it.
In contrast to the obtuse style of writing in "Emerson" by Professor Buell, I would point the interested reader to "Understanding Emerson" by Kenneth Sacks, professor of History at Brown University. Professor Sacks writes with a clarity that would be appreciated by any reader, and I highly recommend "Understanding Emerson" for both general readers and the more specialized student of American thought and literature.
Summary: The Anti-Tribal Emerson
Rating: 5
Lawrence Buell has written a capacious, sensitive, insightful, and vigorous book on the many facets of the thinker, poet, and activist, who most clearly showed North Americans a way past our provincialisms and a path toward a deeper alignment with the depth-powers of nature. I have studied and walked with Emerson for decades, and have, of course, read a number of biographies and critical studies of his endless multi-chambered mind. Like many I came up through those interpretations that focused on the real or alleged transformation that overtook Emerson with the untimely death of his son. After reading Buell's account of Emerson's trajectory, I have changed my views on just what Emerson was trying to tell us in his later essays like "Experience" and "Fate." These essays point more toward a seasoning of self-consciousness than toward a downward sinking into an eclipse of sacred energies. They augment and reshape the essays of the 1830s rather than force an abjection upon them.
In particular, Buell carefully works through the potential and actual correlations between Emerson and nineteenth and twentieth century philosophy, especially the pragmatism of James and Dewey (but less so Peirce) and the later thought of Wittgenstein. He is, of course, aware of the writings of his colleague Stanley Cavell who highlights the, for him, fruitful interaction of Emerson and Wittgenstein. My own approach would stress the correlation between Emerson and a radicalized neo-Platonism (also discussed by Buell). Further, he goes into some detail about Nietzsche's multi-layered appropriation of Emerson's "Essays: First and Second Series." There has been much buzz about the Emerson/Nietzsche link and it is refreshing to see how Buell brings some precision to this rather astonishing historical nexus. Of special note are the detailed analyses of Emerson's political statements (and actions) during the 1840s and 1850s. Buell gives us an Emerson who was braver than often realized, yet who was at the same time often reticent to plunge full throttle into the battles around him. Both are true and both sides get ample treatment in this book.
Finally, I want to say a word about the writing style of this book. I am a philosopher, not a literary critic, and thus am used to stylistic expressions that can be, in turns, limpid, crystalline, or gnomic by comparison. I can report that Buell's literary style, and careful use of framing metaphors, is highly compelling and adds immensly to the verve and moving architecture of the book. I now have a revivified Emerson after reading this book--and that is as Emersonian a gift as one could wish for.
Summary: What they say about Emerson
Rating: 4
For biography, try Robert Richardson's "The Mind on Fire." If you wish to know more about the literary dance that goes on in the minds of authors, philosophers, theologians, and psychologists about Ralph Waldo Emerson, this is the book..His popularity has fluctuated since his death in 1882, but unless someone can inform this reviewer otherwise, Emerson is still the most quoted of all American authors..Since he was born in 1803 (May 25th), this is the year of his bicentennial..The book informs us that he reached the peak of admiration around the time of his centennial, 100 years ago.After that,it diminished quite a lot,and these days he may be making a comeback..The last word in the last chapter tells us that Emerson "inspires." And a previous chapter tells us that he was concerned with "values that stand the test of time and unite the world."
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