Emerson's Sublime Science [Hardcover]

Emerson's Sublime Science explores relationships among Emerson's poetics, theory of the sublime, and engagement with electromagnetism. The book illustrates how Davy's chemistry and Faraday's physics revealed to Emerson a sublime universe in which matter is boundless electrical force. It argues that Emerson translated this discovery into a sublime writing style crafted to galvanize readers with the insight that matter is energy. In illuminating Emerson's project, this study also uncovers connections among British Romanticism, American Romanticism, and nineteenth-century science.Acknowledgements Abbreviations Introduction: Poetry Realized in Nature Sublime Science The Hermetic Current Electric Cosmos Electric Words The Electric Field of Nature Scientific Edification Conclusion: Innocence and Experience Notes Index

'Wilson's book is interesting in the way it combines a close reading of Emerson's Nature (1836) with a wide range of philosophical ideas and a survey of scientific developments from Renaissance hermeticism via electromagnetism to quantum theory.' - Ginette Verstraete, Ambix 49

Eric Wilson is Associate Professor of English at Wake Forest University.