Critically analyse Ralph Waldo Emerson's life and work.
Ans.Ralph Waldo Emerson-essayist, poet, lecturer, philosopher, Unitarian minister and central figure among the American Transcendentalists-was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on May 25, 1803. He was the fourth of eight children born to the Reverend William Emerson (1769-1811), pastor of the First Church in Boston and Ruth Haskins Emerson (1768-1853). Emerson's roots in both Concord and in the ministry were deep. On his father's side, his ancestry extended back to early colonial Massachusetts, to the Reverend Peter Bulkeley (1583- 1659), a Puritan who had come from England and, in 1635, became a founder and the first minister of Concord. Bulkeley's
granddaughter had married the Reverend Joseph Emerson, son of Thomas, a settler in coastal Ipswich, Massachusetts. Joseph's grandson Joseph, also a minister, was the father of William Emerson, Ralph Waldo's grandfather. William Emerson (1743-1776), minister of the First Parish in Concord, had gone to Fort Ticonderoga in New York to serve as chaplain of the Revolutionary army, became ill and died before he could return to Concord. Ralph Waldo Emerson's maternal grandfather was successful Boston merchant John Haskins (1729-1814), a cooper and distiller. From childhood, Emerson was close to his brothérs William, Edward Bliss and Charles Chauncy. Robert Bulkeley (called Bulkeley) was mentally retarded. His condition and care concerned his brothers until his death, in 1859. Ralph Waldo Emerson's world was radically alteréd in 1811, when his father died, leaving Mrs. Emerson to support and raise the young family on her own. Although she managed to care for and to educate her sons, financial insecurity quickly became a fact of life. The First Church granted her a stipend for a time, as well as the use of the'parish house. Mary Moody Emerson (1774-1863), William Emerson's unmarried sister, stayed with the family for several months after her brother's death and returned again later. In 1812, Emcrson entered the Boston Public Latin School, where his studies included Latin and Greek. He simultaneously attended a separate writing school. Ralph Waldo Emerson entered Harvard College in 1817 as president's freshman, or orderly, a position that helped pay his way through college and that required him to serve as messenger for Harvard's president,. John Kirkland. After his graduation in 1821, he began teaching school while preparing for part-time study at the Harvard Divinity School to which he was admitted in 1825. In 1826, he was licenced to preach in the Unitarian community but his strenuous regine and incipient lung disease necessitated his stay in the warm south-and he was ordained three years later in the Unitarian ministry of the Second Church of Boston- the Church of Increase (1639-1723) and Cotton Mather (1663-1728) fame, in 1829. In September of 1829, he got married to Ellen Louisa Tucker and had the most vital emotional experience of his life. Emerson's wife, Ellen Tucker Emeison, died on February 8, 1831, at the age of nineteen.
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