James Perrin Warren – Författare

Americans of the early Republic valued the art of eloquence, upholding the ideal that an impassioned, intelligent, and moral speaker will provide essential truths to a democratic audience. Drawing on nonfiction prose of the 1830s–1850s—especially orations, lectures, and addresses—James Perrin Warren sketches a cultural history of the reforming power of language.Antebellum America truly defined itself as a culture of eloquence. This disposition could be seen in the creation of new cultural spaces, such as the lyceum and popular lecture system, for speakers who were then measured against the ideals of eloquence held by their listeners. Defining eloquence as "powerful, moving speech," Warren engages a host of writers/orators to develop his argument, beginning with Ralph Waldo Emerson's philosophy of language in the 1830s and expanding his discussion to include the theories and practices of Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, Elizabeth Peabody, Frederick Douglass, William Gilmore Simms, and Walt Whitman. From this list he outlines practices that crossed the boundaries of gender, race, and class, ultimately showing that diverse sectors of society valued the word as a means toward reform.Powerful words move people to action, and Warren clearly delineates the authority accorded oratory in antebellum America. This book will appeal to a wide audience, including those interested in antebellum American culture, American literature and cultural history, literary criticism, and rhetoric.

Thoreau’s last years have been the subject of debate for decades, but only recently have scholars and critics begun to appreciate the posthumous publications, unfinished manuscripts, and Journal entries that occupied the writer after Walden (1854). Until now, no critical reader has delved deeply enough into botany to see how Thoreau’s plant studies impact his thinking and writing. Thoreau’s Botany moves beyond general literary appreciation for the botanical works to apply Thoreau’s extensive studies of botany--from 1850 to his death in 1862--to readings of his published and unpublished works in fresh, interdisciplinary ways. Bringing together critical plant studies, ecocriticism, and environmental humanities, James Perrin Warren argues that Thoreau’s botanical excursions establish a meeting ground of science and the humanities that is only now ready to be recognized by readers of American literature and environmental literature.

Thoreau’s last years have been the subject of debate for decades, but only recently have scholars and critics begun to appreciate the posthumous publications, unfinished manuscripts, and Journal entries that occupied the writer after Walden (1854). Until now, no critical reader has delved deeply enough into botany to see how Thoreau’s plant studies impact his thinking and writing. Thoreau’s Botany moves beyond general literary appreciation for the botanical works to apply Thoreau’s extensive studies of botany--from 1850 to his death in 1862--to readings of his published and unpublished works in fresh, interdisciplinary ways. Bringing together critical plant studies, ecocriticism, and environmental humanities, James Perrin Warren argues that Thoreau’s botanical excursions establish a meeting ground of science and the humanities that is only now ready to be recognized by readers of American literature and environmental literature.

The Road to the Spring is the first book publication of Mary Austin's (1868-1934) poems. Best known for her prose book The Land of Little Rain (1903), Austin was in fact a poet from the beginning of her career to the end, even though she never published a volume dedicated to her own original poetry. Instead, Austin's work came to light in collections of poetry and in prestigious journals such as Poetry, the Nation, the Forum, Harper's, and Saturday Review of Literature, among many others. The Road to the Spring contains more than 200 poems, most of which can only be found in out-of-print books, magazines, and periodicals, and her unpublished manuscripts archived at the Huntington Library. This singular publication includes her original work, poems she claimed to have written with her grammar school pupils at the end of the nineteenth century, and her translations and ""re-expressions"" of Native American songs, which often diverge greatly from any other known sources. Warren includes an introduction, laying out Austin's place in American literature and situating her writings in feminist, environmentalist, regionalist, and Native American contexts. He also includes notes for those new to Austin's work, glossing Native terms, geographical names, and the ethnological sources of the Native songs she re-creates.