The marvel of human transcendentalism in Emerson’s work, “The American Scholar”, is challenged by the real catastrophe of the Essex, as themes of contention and circumstances that are out of man’s control is tested by nature. Melville’s accounts of Pallard’s biography and general real life occurrences are what he argues to be the major instigator for what and who has the reigns of freewill and power in society. It is not as easy as it seems to be in align with one’s morals when tribulations such as starvation and isolation mode enter the human survival phase. An article by Smithsonian gives light to the causes of the Essex event, indicating that the madness ensued made men lose their morals: “Humanity must shudder at the dreadful recital” of what came next, … They then roasted the man’s organs on a flat stone and ate them.”(King) This sorrowful account experienced by the vulnerable men on the ship alludes to how men cannot fully triumph over nature or predict the future in an immediate notice. The sad reality is that we as humans are inevitably subject to this defeat of vulnerability that has plagued many minority group’s conditional state in light of general corrupt leadership. As Emerson believes us to be able to rise above the past, we are still fated to the past; in a larger sense, we are still fated to become mere machines to capitalism that tears down our sense of individuality.
In addition, I find it fascinating that the connection of a hunger for knowledge outside being a machine in capitalism can overlap with the physical, literal senses of hunger as accounted during the Essex event. Emerson states that, “…when the intervals of darkness come, as come they must,–when the sun is hid, and the stars withdraw their shining, –we repair to the lamps which were kindled by their ray, to guide our steps to the East again, where the dawn is…. The Arabian proverb says, “A fig tree, looking on a fig tree, becometh fruitful.”(Emerson) Here, Emerson explains that, because we should become advocates for our individuality in light of capitalism and collective thinking, we can learn from our close relational peers towards a utopian society. However, Melville’s novel alludes to how this educational feat can become a danger when outside circumstances and factors arise. While Emerson strives lifting each other up in, there is a grotesque underlying of “feeding” that literally eats one’s individuality away into the subjectivity of human pleasure. It might be a reach, but I feel that this imagery of eating has some great part(and potential) in the discussion regarding human transcendentalism in concern with dealing with our fleshly desires.
