The Great American Speculator

Emerson is a difficult subject for a biography; on one hand, a biographer must compete with his journals. And because some of Emerson's most famous and important essays were in the mode of biography–the strange and wonderful “Representative Men” series–Emerson’s portraitist must also compete with Emerson on another front: the extraordinary shape and color of Emerson’s own biographical insights necessarily compete with his erstwhile biographer’s.