Sunday, May 16, 2004
NOT QUITE A "JUST FINISHED", but I did manage to make it through Ralph Waldo Emerson's Nature, folded into Viking's Portable Emerson. The editor's introduction warns us that it's one of Emerson's most difficult works, and mmmmboy, but he nailed that one. I had to reread much of it several times, just to be sure I was getting the gist of it.
If the verbiage seems a bit thick in places, at least I can take comfort in the idea that some of Emerson's contemporary critics felt the same way, although I'm skeptical of a counterpoint that uses the word "perspicuity" in an argument for simplicity of phrase.
What Emerson was driving at in this work was that we should pay more attention to nature, that the natural world contained lessons for us if we could really learn how to perceive it. That's a thought I could agree with, although his definition of "nature" wouldn't satisfy anyone who currently calls themselves a naturalist. To Emerson, nature wasn't just what industry would call "raw material", but the end results of what was done with it. I could be wrong, but I'm assuming he thinks just as highly of a cedar tree and a cedar chest. Nature-related art also figures into the grand equation.
Anyway, this is the one with the classic "transparent eyeball" imagery, and like any philosophy, it is worth digging into even if you don't agree because of the questions it raises. Also, as I mentioned, it's only the beginning; this is the most formative phase of the Transcendental school of thought that swept through the pre-Civil War American literary community, especially in Emerson's New England home base. I'll need a bit of time to catch my breath before moving into the next phase, "The American Scholar". Light a candle for me, just in case.
If the verbiage seems a bit thick in places, at least I can take comfort in the idea that some of Emerson's contemporary critics felt the same way, although I'm skeptical of a counterpoint that uses the word "perspicuity" in an argument for simplicity of phrase.
What Emerson was driving at in this work was that we should pay more attention to nature, that the natural world contained lessons for us if we could really learn how to perceive it. That's a thought I could agree with, although his definition of "nature" wouldn't satisfy anyone who currently calls themselves a naturalist. To Emerson, nature wasn't just what industry would call "raw material", but the end results of what was done with it. I could be wrong, but I'm assuming he thinks just as highly of a cedar tree and a cedar chest. Nature-related art also figures into the grand equation.
Anyway, this is the one with the classic "transparent eyeball" imagery, and like any philosophy, it is worth digging into even if you don't agree because of the questions it raises. Also, as I mentioned, it's only the beginning; this is the most formative phase of the Transcendental school of thought that swept through the pre-Civil War American literary community, especially in Emerson's New England home base. I'll need a bit of time to catch my breath before moving into the next phase, "The American Scholar". Light a candle for me, just in case.
|| Eric 10:28 PM#
