First We Read, Then We Write: Emerson on the Creative Process

Acknowledgments

Nature 87 Thanks first of all to Joe Parsons, whose interest in this project got me to resurrect and finish it. Amanda Gladin-Kramer transcribed illegible notes, ran down innumerable references, and was an enthusiastic and indispensable research assistant. I will always be grateful for the work—and even more for the friendship and support—of the modern extended transcendental club, including Ron Bosco, Larry Buell, Phyllis Cole, Megan Marshall, Joel Myerson, David Robinson, Nancy Simmons, and Laura Walls. Philip Gura, a leading spirit of that group and a friend for more than thirty years, read the whole manuscript; his encouragement was vital. I’m grateful to Richard Geldard and his Neoplatonic emphasis, to Tim Seldes, who believed in the book from the start, and to Jessie Dolch, who made this a better book. Bruce Boehm made an important discovery; without his help the book would have been sadly delayed. An early version of the chapter “Reading ” was published by Sandy McClatchy in The Yale Review, vol. 83, no. 1 (January 1995) and titled “Read Only to Start Your Own Team: Emerson on Creative Reading.” My wife, Annie Dillard, is my light. “Learn from the masters,” she said. I’ve tried. Acknowledgments 88 Nature ...