The Rhodora Summary
Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Rhodora Summary

"The Rhodora" was published in 1847 in Poems, the first of Emerson's two volumes of poetry. In this response to a question, Emerson finds an opportunity to celebrate a flower simply for "being." A deeper look, however, reveals that the poem is in keeping with Emerson's transcendentalist beliefs about the mystical unity of God's love throughout all nature. He comes to an appreciation of the Rhodora, a relatively common New England flowering shrub, by...

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