The American Scholar

While reading the first half of the American Scholar, although I had trouble comprehending his way of speaking, more so I found that I was having trouble with the message Emerson was conveying. In his paragraphs mainly having to do with books and reading I wasn't sure why he was almost saying that what the reader thought about a piece of writing was more important than what the author was trying to say. I guess I always thought the opposite, that I needed to figure out the message that the author was trying to let out through his words. However, after going on my third time reading this essay, trying to figure out what else Emerson was trying to say, "Inventing," my own thoughts and ideas about this piece of writing didn't sound so bad. In the toss up between going over the writing a fourth time, picking apart every word trying to figure out exactly what Emerson's message was, versus thinking about his words and creating my own thoughts and ideas about the essay, I'm sure you could guess which decision won. My overall difficulty with this essay was made less difficult by listening to the one thing i did understand that Emerson was trying to say, which was to create your own thoughts and ideas about writing, and along with creative reading and creative writing which he refers to in the essay, creative thinking is always vital. "When the mind is braced by labor and invention, the page of whatever book we read becomes luminous with manifold allusion."