Consciousness and Culture: Emerson and Thoreau Reviewed
Joel Porte
Abstract
Ralp Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau are the most celebrated odd couple of nineteenth-century American literature. Appearing to play the roles of benign mentor and eager disciple, they can also be seen as bitter rivals: America's foremost literary statesman, protective of his reputation, and an ambitious and sometimes refractory protege. The truth, this book maintains, is that Emerson and Thoreau were complementary literary geniuses, mutually inspiring and inspired. This book focuses on Emerson and Thoreau as writers. It traces their individual achievements and their points of intersecti ... More
Keywords: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, nineteenth-century American literature, self-culture, New England, readership, international culture, literary geniuses
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2004 | Print ISBN-13: 9780300104462 |
| Published to Yale Scholarship Online: October 2013 | DOI:10.12987/yale/9780300104462.001.0001 |
