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Henry Salt abandoned his mastership at Eton in the 1880s to devote
himself to causes including vegetarianism, socialism, animals'
rights, conservation and prison reform. In 1890 he published the
initial version of Thoreau's "Life". With the help of American
friends, he revised the book and published it anew in 1896. This
third version is Salt's final reading of Thoreau based on works
published up to 1908, including Thoreau's complete "Journal".
Combining a narrative of Thoreau's life with a treatment of his
ideas and writings, it is a penetrating study of Thoreau, which
stresses his distinctive individuality. Through analysis of the
text and a concise biography, the editors illustrate Salt's growth
as a scholar and his changing views on Thoreau and Thoreau's
philosophy. The introduction details Salt's stylistic improvements
to the 1908 edition as well as the inclusion of anecdotes and facts
gathered from Samuel Arthur Jones, F.B. Sanborn, Ernest W. Vickers,
Raymond Adams, Fred Hosmer and Gandhi. This book is suitable for
scholars of Thoreau and readers interested in Thoreau, American
Transcendentalism or American literature.
Description: Procreative Ethics addresses questions at the
beginning of life from a point of view that is alternatively
philosophical and Christian. The author seeks to defend
philosophically some positions taken partly on Christian grounds
while also trying to make the implications of Christian convictions
intelligible to those who do not necessarily share those
convictions. The author positions himself neither as a ""moral
friend"" nor ""moral stranger,"" preferring instead the role of
""moral acquaintance"" to his audience. From that position, the
goal is to find areas of fruitful agreement while clarifying
differences that may lead to truer reconciliations further on in
the conversation. The book opens with an attempted natural law
defense of artificial contraception; devotes four chapters to
criticism of current defenses of abortion; and then takes up, in
six remaining chapters, such matters as genetic enhancement of
children, the justice or injustice of genetic revision, the harm
conundrum or non-identity problem, designing for disability, and
reproductive cloning. Endorsements: ""Fritz Oehlschlaeger has
written a remarkable book that needs to be read by everyone with a
stake in moral questions at life's beginning. Displaying
theological and philosophical sophistication as well as a profound
wisdom, these arguments must be taken seriously by those who agree
with Oeschlaeger as well as those who do not."" --Joel James Shuman
King's College ""Writing with a modesty that betrays the depth of
argument that characterizes Procreative Ethics, Fritz Oehlschlaeger
has written the most important book in bioethics in recent memory.
Bioethics has long suffered from a stale imagination.
Oehlschlaeger, an acknowledged outsider to the eld, brings to his
work a fresh imagination shaped by literary texts and a profound
humanity. Hopefully many will want to emulate his work in other
areas of bioethics."" --Stanley Hauerwas Duke University ""In this
new book Fritz Oehlschlaeger has made masterful and persuasive
arguments about the moral challenges looming at the beginning of
human life. And he does this as a highly informed
non-specialist--an English professor no less "" --Robert Benne
Roanoke College About the Contributor(s): Fritz Oehlschlaeger is
Professor of English at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State
University. He is co-author of Articulating the Elephant Man:
Joseph Merrick and His Interpreters (1992) and Love and Good
Reasons: Postliberal Approaches to Christian Ethics and Literature
(2003).
Arguably one of the most important American writers working today,
Wendell Berry is the author of more than fifty books, including
novels and collections of poems, short stories, and essays. A
prominent spokesman for agrarian values, Berry frequently defends
such practices and ideas as sustainable agriculture, healthy rural
communities, connection to place, the pleasures of work, and the
interconnectedness of life. In The Achievement of Wendell Berry:
The Hard History of Love, Fritz Oehlschlaeger provides a sweeping
engagement with Berry's entire corpus. The book introduces the
reader to Berry's general philosophy and aesthetic through careful
consideration of his essays. Oehlschlaeger pays particular
attention to Berry as an agrarian, citizen, and patriot, and also
examines the influence of Christianity on Berry's writings. Much of
the book is devoted to lively close readings of Berry's short
stories, novels, and poetry. The Achievement of Wendell Berry is a
comprehensive introduction to the philosophical and creative world
of Wendell Berry, one that offers new critical insights into the
writing of this celebrated Kentucky author.
Insisting on the vital, productive relationship between ethics and
the study of literature, "Love and Good Reasons" demonstrates ways
of reading novels and stories from a Christian perspective. Fritz
Oehlschlaeger argues for the study of literature as a training
ground for the kinds of thinking on which moral reasoning depends.
He challenges methods of doing ethics that attempt to specify
universally binding principles or rules and argues for the need to
bring literature back into conversation with the most basic
questions about how we should live.
"Love and Good Reasons "combines postliberal narrative
theology--especially Stanley Hauerwas's Christian ethics and
Alasdair MacIntyre's idea of traditional inquiry--with recent
scholarship in literature and ethics including the work of Martha
Nussbaum, J. Hillis Miller, Wayne Booth, Jeffrey Stout, and Richard
Rorty. Oehlschlaeger offers detailed readings of literature by five
major authors--Herman Melville, Jane Austen, Anthony Trollope,
Henry James, and Stephen Crane. He examines their works in light of
biblical scripture and the grand narratives of Israel, Jesus, and
the Church. Discussing the role of religion in contemporary higher
education, Oehlschlaeger shares his own experiences of teaching
literature from a religious perspective at a state
university.
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