The Implications of Intuition and Reason for the Concept of the Self in Ralph Waldo Emerson's Essay 'Self-Reliance'

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Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1,3, Bielefeld University (Fakultät für Linguistik und Literaturwissenschaft), course: Emancipation Discourses in 19th Century American Culture: Aesthetics, Race and Gender, language: English, abstract: The essay Self-Reliance occupies a central place not only in Ralph Waldo Emersons collection Essays, First Series, but in all of his writings and his thinking. On account of that it is often the first (or only) work by Emerson which many readers encounter. Having published Nature before, he himself described it as an entering wedge () for something more worthy and significant (cf. Porte, p.106). With his Essays, First Series then, Ralph Waldo Emerson once and for all established himself as a writer. Moreover, he found his most important subjects and style of writing as well as putting down his basic philosophical assumptions (cf. Van Leer, p.100 f).Even without prior knowledge of most of Emersons other writings, Self-Reliance might offer a key to his thinking in general. The concept of the Self that Emerson outlines in this essay seems to be the pivot around which his view of Man revolves. Therefore, I would like to investigate this concept and its underlying attitude towards intuition and reason as far as it becomes apparent in Self-Reliance.

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