“So Many Books” Emerson Reader

Posted by Jack on 01.12.2009 at 11:31 am

Stefanie over at “So Many Books” wrote a great little paragraph about the book she’s currently reading, A Year with Emerson

“I will leave you with the Emerson quote for today from A Year With Emerson. It is a letter of recommendation to the Secretary of State, William H. Seward, on behalf of one Mr. Walt Whitman:

‘Dear Sir,

Mr. Walt Whitman, of New York, writes me, that he wishes to obtain employment in the public service in Washington, & has made, or is about making some application to yourself.

Permit me to say that he is known to me as a man of strong original genius, combining, with marked eccentricities, great powers and valuable traits of character; a self-relying, large-hearted man, much beloved by his friends; entirely patriotic & benevolent in his theory, tastes, & practice. If his writings are in certain points to criticism, they yet show extraordinary power, and are more deeply American, democratic & in the interests of political liberty, than those of any other poet. He is indeed a child of the people, & their champion.