Essays: First Series
Essays: First Series is a series of essays written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, published in 1841, concerning transcendentalism.
Essays
[edit | edit source]The book contains:
- "History"
- "Self-Reliance"
- "Compensation"
- "Spiritual Laws"
- "Love"
- "Friendship"
- "Prudence"
- "Heroism"
- "The Over-Soul"
- "Circles"
- "Intellect"
- "Art"
Reception
[edit | edit source]Many noted the influence of Thomas Carlyle. An anonymous English reviewer voiced the mainstream view when he wrote that the author of the book "out-Carlyles Carlyle himself," "imitat[ing] his inflations, his verbiage, his Germanico-Kantian abstractions, his metaphysics and mysticism."[1] Jane Welsh Carlyle agreed, giving her impression in a letter to John Sterling: "I find him getting affected, stilted, mystical, and in short 'a considerable of a bore' A bad immitation [sic] of Carlyle's most Carlylish translations of Goethes [sic] most Goetheish passages!"[2] For his part, Sterling described them to William Coningham as "the only book of any pith and significance that has dawned here lately . . . which at a glance, seem far ahead in compass and brilliancy of almost everything England has of late years (generations) produced".[3]
Musical setting
[edit | edit source]Three fragments from the essay "Spiritual Laws" form the backbone of composer Kaija Saariaho's True Fire for baritone and orchestra (2014), a piece of music that collages texts from various sources. The piece's title is taken from the essay's final sentence, that concludes also the setting: "We know the authentic effects of the true fire through every one of its million disguises."[4]
See also
[edit | edit source]References
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External links
[edit | edit source]
- Essays (compilation of First and Second Series) at Standard Ebooks
- Essays: First Series at Google Books.
Essays First Series public domain audiobook at LibriVox
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