Alcmaeon Among the Americans: Emerson’s Embrace of the Sea
摘要
The context of the impact on Ralph Waldo Emerson of his sanative gestational voyages at sea on his conception and writing of his Nature lecture and essay is the topic of this chapter. His prescribed form of recovery from the somatic consequences of grief and acute anxiety suffered prior to his journey to Europe in 1832 is analyzed and the influence and subsequent role of the sea, the entry of its motifs in his works, and their reflection of his new mode of seeing nature’s relation to humans are underlined.