Description
About the Author
Lawrence Buell is Powell M. Cabot Professor of American Literature Emeritus at Harvard University. Considered one of the founders of the ecocriticism movement, he has written and lectured worldwide on Transcendentalism, American studies, and the environmental humanities. He is the author of many books, including Literary Transcendentalism, The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Invention of American Culture, Writing for an Endangered World, and Emerson.
Reviews
Lawrence Buell's Henry David Thoreau: Thinking Disobediently is the essential guide to the essential Thoreau. Distilling a career's worth of study and thought, Buell deftly situates Thoreau, the 'confessed misfit,' at the center of 'the Transcendentalist centrifuge,' and proceeds to reveal how, in one too-short lifetime, this man of many gifts succeeded in leaving behind for us treasures of his own: a hybrid style of creative writing, a biocentric conception of life on our planet, a road map for political action, and perhaps the greatest of all, his 'vision of human infinitude.' * Megan Marshall, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Margaret Fuller: A New American Life, The Peabody Sisters, and Elizabeth Bishop: A Miracle for Breakfast *
A scintillating distillation of Buell's career-long engagement with Thoreau's life and times, this volume stands as the best introduction to this iconic figure in American culture. Buell captures the essence of Thoreau's compelling personality as he details his remarkably varied contributions to antebellum intellectual life. This book is yet another gem in Buell's scholarly diadem. * Philip F. Gura, William S. Newman Distinguished Professor of American Literature and Culture, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill *
Mr. Buell's book powerfully motivates us to treat Thoreau 'not as an oracle but as a stimulus to see and be beyond the ordinary.' * Christopher Irmscher, The Wall Street Journal *
The best brief introduction to Thoreau we now have... His book is a schoolroom. Enroll in this class. * Todd Shy, Los Angeles Review of Books *
Henry David Thoreau: Thinking Disobediently by Lawrence Buell, meanwhile, seeks to make some broader sense of the complex figure behind the work. * Costica Bradatan, TLS *
Thinking Disobediently by Lawrence Buella|seeks to make some broader sense of the complex figure behind the work... For all the disconcerting variety, Buell finds a sense of unity and harmony in Thoreau. * Times Literary Supplement *
Book Information
ISBN 9780197684269
Author Lawrence Buell
Format Hardback
Page Count 152
Imprint Oxford University Press Inc
Publisher Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions(mm) 146mm * 216mm * 17mm