A Political Companion to Ralph Waldo Emerson

Alan Levine

Sep 2011 · University Press of Kentucky

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From before the Civil War until his death in 1882, Ralph Waldo Emerson was renownedÑand renouncedÑas one of the United StatesÕ most prominent abolitionists and as a leading visionary of the nationÕs liberal democratic future. Following his death, however, both EmersonÕs political activism and his political thought faded from public memory, replaced by the myth of the genteel man of letters and the detached sage of individualism. In the 1990s, scholars rediscovered EmersonÕs antislavery writings and began reviving his legacy as a political activist. A Political Companion to Ralph Waldo Emerson is the first collection to evaluate EmersonÕs political thought in light of his recently rediscovered political activism. What were EmersonÕs politics? A Political Companion to Ralph Waldo Emerson authoritatively answers this question with seminal essays by some of the most prominent thinkers ever to write about EmersonÑStanley Cavell, George Kateb, Judith N. Shklar, and Wilson Carey McWilliamsÑas well as many of todayÕs leading Emerson scholars. With an introduction that effectively destroys the Òpernicious myth about EmersonÕs apolitical individualismÓ by editors Alan M. Levine and Daniel S. Malachuk, A Political Companion to Emerson reassesses EmersonÕs famous theory of self-reliance in light of his antislavery politics, demonstrates the importance of transcendentalism to his politics, and explores the enduring significance of his thought for liberal democracy. Including a substantial bibliography of work on EmersonÕs politics over the last century, A Political Companion to Ralph Waldo Emerson is an indispensable resource for students of Emerson, American literature, and American political thought, as well as for those who wrestle with the fundamental challenges of democracy and liberalism.

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Alan M. Levine, associate professor of political theory at American University, is the author of Sensual Philosophy: Toleration, Skepticism, and Montaigne’s Politics of the Self. He lives in Washington, D.C. Daniel S. Malachuk, associate professor of English at Western Illinois University, is the author of Perfection, the State, and Victorian Liberalism. He lives in Bettendorf, Iowa.