Emerson's Antislavery Writings
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Ralph Waldo Emerson; Edited by Len Gougeon and Joel Myerson
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Format: ClothPrice: $42.00
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Although Ralph Waldo Emerson is commonly recognized as one of the most radical thinkers and important reformers of his age, little has been said regarding his thoughts on the most critical reform of his period—the abolition movement. This book presents, for the first time, a comprehensive and authoritative collection of Emerson's writings against slavery and the subjugation of American Indians, writings that reveal Emerson's deep commitment to this reform movement.
Len Gougeon and Joel Myerson introduce the collection with a substantial historical overview that puts Emerson's contribution to the abolition movement in its social and political context, shows existing historical treatments of Emerson and the transcendentalists, and provides a wealth of references to secondary reading on the subjects. The book then presents fourteen speeches and four letters by Emerson. Four of his speeches have been recovered from contemporary newspaper accounts and have never been collected in any edition of Emerson's writings. Nine were published posthumously in corrupted form in either the 1884 or the 1904 edition of Miscellanies, and five of these nine are edited from manuscript here. Emerson's 1855 "Lecture on Slavery," one of his most comprehensive and philosophical statements on the subject, is now published for the first time. The letters include Emerson's famous correspondence with President Van Buren about the Cherokees.
"Taken together, this group of writings constitutes a critical mass of evidence that demonstrates Emerson's continuous involvement in protest against slavery and other forms of social oppression much more dramatically than has been done before."—Lawrence Buell
"The items collected are often difficult to come by, and they deserve considerable attention; their significance extends beyond the merely scholarly. This attractive volume helps tell how American thought extricated itself morally from the brutality, degradation, and dishonor of slavery."—H. G. Callaway, A Quarterly Journal in American Philosophy
"This collection of Emerson's essays on race and reform represents a welcome addition to his canonical writings of the 1840s."—Martin Halliwell, American Studies
"Emerson's Antislavery Writings offers for the first time a comprehensive collection of Emerson's work; it contains four letters and fourteen speeches. Notably, the text includes a useful overview of the era during which Emerson wrote. This allows newcomers to Emerson to contextualize easily his abolitionism historically. The import of his lectures are more lucid in light, of the events that inspired them."—Mark Heineke, American Studies International
"This valuable collection contains eighteen works by Emerson on the subject of slavery written between 1838 and 1863. . . . The texts are well annotated, and a historical introduction rightly demonstrates Emerson's important participation in the abolition movement."—Nineteenth-Century Literature
"The importance of this book is that it allows the reader to see the collection of these texts as a cohesive unit."—Michael Strysick, South Atlantic Review
"This new volume . . . seeks to put Emerson's views on abolitionism in a clearer light while fitting the writings into the larger frame of his philosophy of social reform. The 18 documents that comprise the study . . . successfully chart Emerson's growth as a fervent supporter of the movement to abolish slavery. Gougeon and Myerson's skillfully edited volume contains plenty of scholarly apparatus (textual commentary, notes, etc.), all of which add to a deeper understanding of Emerson's thought."—Charles Sermon, The State
Publication Date: December 28, 1994
