The Poetry Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Published here in full are Ralph Waldo Emerson's nine poetry notebooks, the single greatest source of information about his creative habits in poetry.  Emerson kept rough drafts, revised versions, and fair copies of hundreds of poems in these notebooks, so that the genesis and development of poems both famous and obscure can be traced closely.  The notebooks have been remarkably little consulted, primarily because their unedited textual condition makes them difficult to use.  This edition makes them accessible to scholars by presenting a faithful transcription of each notebook, a detailed analysis of the history of each poem, an introduction, and a cross-referenced index.

For this edition, the editors have followed the high standards of textual practice developed for Harvard University Press's edition of The Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson.  That editorial approach makes possible a logical, clear presentation of material that Emerson often jotted down in segments or with multiple erasures and insertions.

 Because it will allow scholars to examine as never before the many facets of Emerson the poet, The Poetry Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson will be a major impetus to study of the man considered by many to be America's greates thinker.

About the Editors

Ralph H. Orth, Professor of English at the University of Vermont, edited three volumes of The Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Harvard University Press, 1960-1982) and is the general editor for a forthcoming edition of Emerson's topical notebooks, to be published by the University of Missouri Press.

Albert J. von Frank, Associate Professor at Washington State University, is the author of The Sacred Games: Provincialism and Frontier Consciousness in American Literature, 1630-1860 (Cambridge University Press, 1985) and is the general editor for a forthcoming complete edition of Emerson's sermons, also to be published by the University of Missouri Press.

Linda Allardt, Assistant Professor English at the University of Rochester, edited volume 12 and was the senior editor for volume 15 of the Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks and is also the author of two books of poetry.

David W. Hill, Associate Professor of SUNY-Oswego, coedited volume 15 of the Journals of Miscellaneous Notebooks and has pubished several articles, including one in Emerson Centenary Essays, edited by Joel Myerson (Southern Illinois University Press, 1982).