The American Scholar

I visited the grave of Ralph Waldo Emerson today, but not for the first time. I've tried numerous times to get a decent photo, but his gravestone is a big granite boulder with a plaque that's difficult to read under the dappled forest light. The past couple of times I've been there, I've found the items others have left behind to be more interesting than the actual grave marker. So, I headed over today, wondering what I'd find at Emerson's grave.

Today, along with the usual rocks, pennies, and acorns, there was a rain-soaked copy of Emerson's speech, "The American Scholar," delivered to the Phi Beta Kappa Society in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1837. Referred to as America's "Intellectual Declaration of Independence" by Oliver Wendell Holmes, this speech is considered (by American scholars, of course) to be one of the speeches that shaped American history. The title of the speech is also the name of Phi Beta Kappa's quarterly journal, which "aspires to Emerson?s ideals of independent thinking, self-knowledge, and a commitment to the affairs of the world as well as to books, history, and science."

To be honest, I almost didn't post this photo because technically it's kind of crappy. But when I was mucking about with it in post-processing, I zoomed in and saw some of the text, was able to discern the title on the pages, and then did a little googling. I decided to post it because it was such an interesting (to me, anyway) thing to leave at Emerson's grave. Posting this makes me both sad and grateful. Sad because I studied American literature for four years in college and used to love reading and analyzing the texts of speeches like this. Now, I can only muster up the time and enthusiasm to read the key points in Wikipedia. I'm grateful, however, that I'm surrounded (as my blip friend Pocho has pointed out to me) by so much history and that I can visit the haunts of some great American literary figures. Even if I no longer can find the time to read their works.

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"Action....Without it thought can never ripen into truth."

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson in "An American Scholar"


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Other "famous grave" blips here.