I appreciate this as a work of prose poetry, but it really only says isn’t the natural world so much more relaxing and enjoyable than the capitalist hellscape that we’re creating. Not a word about slavery, not a word about the disproportionate ownership of society, hardly a word about class at all. When in reality it’s not the modern world Emerson is in polemics against but the ordering of that modern world. An order derived from and enforced by the bourgeoisie, Emerson’s own class. The way to escape the hellscape of capitalism isn’t to run off to the country and cosplay peasantry. Emerson was stuck and incapable of perceiving the essence of class struggle that defines the human society.
![Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson [Audiobook] #individualism #freedom #classicliterature](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/F4to8V4j65g/mqdefault.jpg)
I appreciate this as a work of prose poetry, but it really only says isn’t the natural world so much more relaxing and enjoyable than the capitalist hellscape that we’re creating. Not a word about slavery, not a word about the disproportionate ownership of society, hardly a word about class at all. When in reality it’s not the modern world Emerson is in polemics against but the ordering of that modern world. An order derived from and enforced by the bourgeoisie, Emerson’s own class. The way to escape the hellscape of capitalism isn’t to run off to the country and cosplay peasantry. Emerson was stuck and incapable of perceiving the essence of class struggle that defines the human society.
Thank you so much for listening! I’ll have another reading of Emerson coming out in the near future.