The American Adam

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, American
Cover of the book The American Adam by R. W. B. Lewis, University of Chicago Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: R. W. B. Lewis ISBN: 9780226219509
Publisher: University of Chicago Press Publication: September 4, 2009
Imprint: University of Chicago Press Language: English
Author: R. W. B. Lewis
ISBN: 9780226219509
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Publication: September 4, 2009
Imprint: University of Chicago Press
Language: English

Intellectual history is viewed in this book as a series of "great conversations"—dramatic dialogues in which a culture's spokesmen wrestle with the leading questions of their times. In nineteenth-century America the great argument centered about De Crèvecoeur's "new man," the American, an innocent Adam in a bright new world dissociating himself from the historic past. Mr. Lewis reveals this vital preoccupation as a pervasive, transforming ingredient of the American mind, illuminating history and theology as well as art, shaping the consciousness of lesser thinkers as fully as it shaped the giants of the age. He traces the Adamic theme in the writings of Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, Henry James, and others, and in an Epilogue he exposes their continuing spirit in the works of F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Ralph Ellison, J. D. Salinger, and Saul Bellow.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Intellectual history is viewed in this book as a series of "great conversations"—dramatic dialogues in which a culture's spokesmen wrestle with the leading questions of their times. In nineteenth-century America the great argument centered about De Crèvecoeur's "new man," the American, an innocent Adam in a bright new world dissociating himself from the historic past. Mr. Lewis reveals this vital preoccupation as a pervasive, transforming ingredient of the American mind, illuminating history and theology as well as art, shaping the consciousness of lesser thinkers as fully as it shaped the giants of the age. He traces the Adamic theme in the writings of Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, Henry James, and others, and in an Epilogue he exposes their continuing spirit in the works of F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Ralph Ellison, J. D. Salinger, and Saul Bellow.

More books from University of Chicago Press

Cover of the book Write No Matter What by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Curious and Modern Inventions by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book The Economics of Poverty Traps by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book The Great Prince Died by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Vise and Shadow by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Human Predicaments by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Tocqueville in Arabia by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book About the Beginning of the Hermeneutics of the Self by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book A Shared Future by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Interpretation and Social Knowledge by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Across the Bridge by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book The Cholera Years by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Adventure, Mystery, and Romance by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Writing Abroad by R. W. B. Lewis
Cover of the book Africa as a Living Laboratory by R. W. B. Lewis
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy