Ralph Waldo Emerson : Essays and Lectures (Library of America)

Rating:
Summary: Emerson's prose are pure poetry and brilliance
Review: Emerson is to the literary world in America as Lincoln was to the political world in the 1860's. His stature as a thinker, writer and public figure to admire brought American literature to new heights.


I think Thoreau has more relevance to us in the year 2004, and had profounder insights, but Emerson, more the academic and intellectual, wrote with the elegance and intelligence of the gods. He was much superior to Thoreau in style and breadth of subject matter, he was more well-rounded and able to connect with his peers, both personally and as an author. And through this intimate friendship and association shared by Emerson and Thoreau, and any literary and intellectual comparison made between these two men, only serves to enhance and expand the other's significance and genius. For me there was an integration and balance, a synergy, almost a partnership, in how they contributed to American literature and the intellectual community.


This collection is a beautiful addition to my library. It contains Emerson's major essays e.g. 'Nature,' 'Beauty,' 'Compensation,' 'Self-Reliance,' and 'The Poet' and his public addresses e.g. 'The American Scholar,' (a big favorite of mine.)


This is a quality collection at a reasonable price. I was actually concerned that the quality might suffer because I thought the price so low. But it was not compromised. Both Emerson and this collection should be in your library. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: "Theologian of the American Religion"
Review: I go about the process of reading with a pencil or a pen, underlining now and then when I'm struck by something. Opening this very generous volume of Emerson's writings, I found myself underlining every sentence, every word, so that by the second or third page, I just gave up and made a mental note from then on to consider everything in the book as being underlined. Whoever you are and wherever you are (yes, even if you're from the south), you're sure to find something in Emerson's work--many things probably--that will stay with you indefinitely. The Emerson of "Self-Reliance"--genius as he is--is trying to alert each of us to our own genius. It is the ultimate "self-help" book. "A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages." If this seems somewhat contradictory coming from Emerson, you need only read a few pages further and Emerson will set you straight on contrariety.
Along with all these wonderful essays and lectures, this 1,300-page Library of America hardbound edition also has his astonishing book "The Conduct of Life" and assorted uncollected prose. Emerson also left behind a lifetime's worth of journals, which I've heard are equally great, and I very much look forward to poring over them in the future.

Rating:
Summary: Essential for reference
Review: This book certainly has moments of great insight. Emerson's passion is quite clear and often well-articulated. But this is a very lengthy book, and many of the essays no longer have as much to offer as they perhaps once did. There are several that are invaluable, of course, but many of them have simply become too obtuse and arcane to be really relevant anymore. I read the book all the way through, but my recommendation would be that people purchase it simply for reference, and maybe to read the more famous essays now and again. In the end, many of the essays have disturbing undercurrents of racism or anti-democratic sentiment and Emerson's inability to see nature as a dark force, as it can sometimes be, sinks large portions of the book. We must bear in mind that Emerson was writing in a different time and that his comments that are now unacceptable were not always that way. Clearly this book is historically important, and it is obviously a worthwhile one to have sitting on the shelf to quote or occasionally reference, but it is certainly not the bulletproof guide to living that many have made it out to be.

Rating:
Summary: Emerson: the medium is the message
Review: This book is the complete essays and lectures of ralph waldo emerson. It contains everything you could want from emerson, save his journals. His writing is beauty in it's truest form. What he speaks is what you have forever felt to be true. When he warns against self-distrust in self-reliance you feel that he is not only speaking to you, but speaking for you. Reading this book is not only seeing what he has written, but is a demonstration of what he has written. When he writes in "self-reliance" of the reoccuring situation where people have to take their truth from another, the medium becomes the message. Emerson's work as presented in this volume has been under rated by philisophical circles for years. Here you will see that not only is he a great essayist, but that (while unconventional)he is a great philosopher.