Emerson’s Proleptic Eloquence

Abstract

Offers a reading of Emerson’s essay “Eloquence” from Society and Solitude that challenges the perceptions of Emerson as “the genius of American democracy” and as the sentimental, genteel, mystical Concord Sage. Uses Leo Strauss’ theories of “esoteric” writing and his statements on pedagogy and persuasion in “German Nihilism” to clarify aspects of Emerson’s political philosophy that have long been ignored, dismissed, or unread. Compares Emerson’s work with Edward T. Channing’s “The Orator and His Times” to demonstrate that Emerson’s ideas concerning the potential political effects of eloquence seem to anticipate Nietzsche’s rhetoric of nihilism and its vulgarization in the Nazi regime.