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Emerson, Romanticism, and Intuitive Reason by Patrick J. Keane
The Transatlantic "Light of All Our Day"
A comparative study in transatlantic Romanticism, focusing on Emerson's part in the American dialogue with British Romanticism and, as filtered through Coleridge, German Idealist philosophy. The book's guiding theme is the concept of intuitive Reason, which Emerson derived from Coleridge's distinction between Understanding and Reason."Emerson, Romanticism, and Intuitive Reason" is a comparative study in transatlantic Romanticism, focusing on Emerson's part in the American dialogue with British Romanticism and, as filtered through Coleridge, German Idealist philosophy. The book's guiding theme is the concept of intuitive Reason, which Emerson derived from Coleridge's distinction between Understanding and Reason and which Emerson associated with that "light of all our day" in his favorite stanza of Wordsworth's "Ode: Intimations of Immortality." Intuitive Reason became the intellectual and emotional foundation of American Transcendentalism. That light radiated to illuminate Emerson's life and work, as well as the complex and often covert relationship of a writer who, however fiercely "self-reliant" and "original," was deeply indebted to his transatlantic precursors. The debt is intellectual and personal. Emerson's supposed indifference to, or triumph over, repeated familial tragedy is often attributed to his Idealism - a complacent optimism that blinded him to any vision of the tragic. His "art of losing" may be better understood as a tribute to the "healing power," the consolation in distress, which Emerson considered Wordsworth's principal value. The second part of this book traces Emerson's struggle - with the help of the "benignant influence" shed by that "light of all our day" - to confront and overcome personal tragedy, to attain the equilibrium epitomized in Wordsworth's "Elegiac Stanzas": "Not without hope we suffer and we mourn." |
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| Author(s) : Patrick J. Keane | Format : Hardback Book |
| ISBN-10 : 0826216021 | ISBN-13 : 9780826216021 |
| RRP : £35.50 | Best available price : £ / $ |
| Prices as of : BST check live prices | |
Product Details:
Country Publication : United States
Publication Date : 31/10/2005
Publisher : University of Missouri Press
Page Length : 568mm
Page Size : 260mm