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Lowell (Massachusetts, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
ys, of nearly nine hundred volumes, over seven hundred of which I wrote myself. In the late volume giving memorials of one of the last of the Transcendentalists, Daniel Ricketson, of New Bedford, there are interesting glimpses of the time when Lowell's article on Thoreau was supposed to have wellnigh suppressed him as an author. Thoreau's sister wrote to Ricketson, it seems, I have too much respect for Mr. Lowell's powers of discrimination to account at all for ris blundering and most unfriendly attack upon Henry's book, and Ricketson himself adds, Lowell's nature is wholly inadequate to take in Thoreau. Lowell thought Thoreau was posing for effect. I am satisfied that Thoreau could not possibly play a part. He then winds up with one of those seemingly daring combinations with which the Transcendentalists innocently startled more decorous ears: I rank Christ Jesus, Socrates, and Thoreau as the sincerest souls that ever walked the earth. In literature nothing counts but geniu
Haverhill (Massachusetts, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
bove himself, was Amos Bronson Alcott, in one respect a more characteristic New England product than any of the others, inasmuch as he rose from a very humble source to be one of the leading influences of the time, in spite of all whims and oddities. Regarding himself as a foreordained teacher and always assuming that attitude to all, he yet left on record utterances which show an entire lack of vanity at heart. For instance, he wrote thus from Concord in 1865: Have been also at Lynn and Haverhill speaking lately. Certainly men need teaching badly enough when any words of mine can help them. Yet I would fain believe that not I, but the Spirit, the Person, sometimes speaks to revive and spare. In the children's stories of his daughter he took a father's satisfaction, however far her sphere seemed from his own. There were one or two occasions when he showed himself brave where others had flinched. One of the heroic pictures yet waiting to be painted in New England history is that
Puritan (Ohio, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
pon it and the pistols of the marshal's men showing themselves above the inner stairway. Outside were the vacant steps and the crowd of lookers-on. Quietly there penetrated the mob the figure of a white-haired man, like the ghost of an ancient Puritan; he mounted the steps tranquilly, cane in hand, and pausing near the top said to one of the ringleaders of the attack, pointing placidly forward, Why are we not within? Because, said the person addressed, these people will not stand by us. He as, in fact, the product of two principal impulses: a reaching toward the moral intensity of old New England Puritanism, and toward the spiritual subtlety of modern New England Transcendentalism. But he is not finally to be classified either as Puritan or Transcendentalist, for all the elements of his nature were fused as they can be only in the great artist; and it is as an artist in the largest sense of the word that Hawthorne is likely to be known. One of the most characteristic of his l
Salem (Massachusetts, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
, whose details seemed as much dwarfed by his presence as if he had been a statue of Olympian Zeus. The events of his life may be briefly given. He was born in Salem, July 4, 1804, of an old Salem family. One of his ancestors was a judge in some of the famous witch trials, and had, according to tradition, brought a curse upon Salem family. One of his ancestors was a judge in some of the famous witch trials, and had, according to tradition, brought a curse upon his descendants by his severity. Born of such stock, and bred in such surroundings, it is no wonder that Hawthorne became early the romantic interpreter of that sombre code and mode of living which we call Puritanism. His boyhood was given more to general reading. than to study. He graduated from Bowdoin, with Longfellow, in 1825, and spent twelve quiet years at Salem writing and rewriting; publishing little, and that through the most inconspicuous channels: becoming, in short, as he said, the obscurest man of letters in America. Not until the publication of Twice-told tales (1837) did he obtain recognition. A brief residence in the Brook Farm communit
Concord (Massachusetts, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
t Emerson retired to his father's birthplace, Concord, and became a dweller for the rest of his lif If Cambridge was small compared to Boston, Concord was still smaller compared to Cambridge; and,ead. From this time he was identified with Concord, and his house was for many years what Lord Carker. There were grouped about Emerson in Concord, or frequently visiting it, several persons y at heart. For instance, he wrote thus from Concord in 1865: Have been also at Lynn and Haverhilliter. I first met him on a summer morning in Concord, as he was walking along the road near the Ol was married, and settled in the Old Manse at Concord, which, some years later, he made famous in We pass now to the youngest of the wellknown Concord authors of that circle, and one who, unlike the had published but two books, A week on the Concord and Merrimack rivers and Walden. Nine more hanearly the whole edition — of his Week on the Concord and Merrimack rivers, and of his carrying the[2 more...]
Merrimack (United States) (search for this): chapter 8
arently unsuccessful. There is no fame really more permanent than that which begins its actual growth after the death of an author; and such is the fame of Thoreau. Before his death he had published but two books, A week on the Concord and Merrimack rivers and Walden. Nine more have since been printed, besides two volumes of selected extracts and two biographies, making fifteen in all. Such things are not accidental or the result of whim, and they indicate that the literary fame of Thoreau is is career was nothing less than heroic. There is nothing finer in literary history than his description, in his unpublished diary, of receiving from his publisher the unsold copies — nearly the whole edition — of his Week on the Concord and Merrimack rivers, and of his carrying the melancholy burden upstairs on his shoulders to his study. I have now a library, he says, of nearly nine hundred volumes, over seven hundred of which I wrote myself. In the late volume giving memorials of one of t
Menotomy (Massachusetts, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
ompanied by a child; and it subsequently turns out that he really left Boston about the time of the Boston massacre, before the Revolution (1770), and has been traveling ever since,--the explanation being that he was once overtaken by a storm at Menotomy, now Arlington, a few miles from Boston, and that being a man of violent temper he swore to get home that night or never see home again. Thenceforth he is always traveling; a cloud and a storm always follow him, and every horse that sees his aArlington, a few miles from Boston, and that being a man of violent temper he swore to get home that night or never see home again. Thenceforth he is always traveling; a cloud and a storm always follow him, and every horse that sees his approach feels abject terror. The conception is essentially Hawthornelike; and so are the scene and the accessories. The time to which Rugg's career dates back is that border land of which Hawthorne was so fond, between the colonial and the modern period; and the old localities, dates, costumes, and even coins are all introduced in a way to remind us of the greater artist. But what is most striking in the tale is what may be called the penumbra,--a word defined in astronomy as that portion of
New England (United States) (search for this): chapter 8
ought and feeling which for a few years past has led many sincere persons in New England to make new demands on literature. In Emerson's paper in the second number above himself, was Amos Bronson Alcott, in one respect a more characteristic New England product than any of the others, inasmuch as he rose from a very humble sourchers had flinched. One of the heroic pictures yet waiting to be painted in New England history is that of the tranquil and high-minded philosopher at the time duriduct of two principal impulses: a reaching toward the moral intensity of old New England Puritanism, and toward the spiritual subtlety of modern New England TranscenNew England Transcendentalism. But he is not finally to be classified either as Puritan or Transcendentalist, for all the elements of his nature were fused as they can be only in the gight influence over Hawthorne. This tale was first printed in Buckingham's New England Galaxy for Sept. 10, 1824; and that editor says of it: This article was repr
Oriental (Oklahoma, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
these, it will by and by be discovered that Thoreau's whole attitude has been needlessly distorted. Lowell says that his shanty-life was mere impossibility, so far as his own conception of it goes, as an entire independency of mankind. The tub of Diogenes had a sounder bottom. But what a man of straw is this that Lowell is constructing! What is this shanty-life? A young man living in a country village, and having a passion for the minute observation of nature, and a love for Greek and Oriental reading, takes it into his head to build himself a study, not in the garden or the orchard, but in the woods, by the side of a lake. Happening to be poor, and to live in a time when social experiments are in vogue at Brook Farm and elsewhere, he takes a whimsical satisfaction in seeing how cheaply he can erect his hut, and afterwards support himself by the labor of his hands. He is not really banished from the world, nor does he seek or profess banishment: indeed, his house is not two mil
California (California, United States) (search for this): chapter 8
from the weight and beauty of his elocution. It was in the year 1834 that Emerson retired to his father's birthplace, Concord, and became a dweller for the rest of his life in what was at first a small rural village. If Cambridge was small compared to Boston, Concord was still smaller compared to Cambridge; and, like Cambridge, it held, then or soon after, an unusual proportion of cultivated people. It is said to have been remarked by Bret Harte, when he first came to Cambridge from California, that the town was so full of authors you could not fire a revolver from your front door without bringing down a two-volumer. The same state of things soon presented itself at Concord, although the front doors were fewer, and the dwellers rarely limited themselves to two volumes. Emerson soon sent forth from this new retreat his first thin book, entitled Nature. From the beginning to the end of this first volume, the fact is clear that it was consciously and deliberately a new departure
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