The comparison can be less a scope than it seems, because there is an intellectual line of the shadow, given the imprint of the hands of Emerson – and that of transcendentalists in general – on the great anonymous book of alcoholics, that Gilbert, a sponge for spiritual wisdom, recently plunged and quoting several times. The emphasis placed by the great book on an individual concept of the divine (“God as we understood”) and a spiritual awakening through experience rather than the Scriptures or the Churches, is decidedly Émersonian. The godson of Emerson, the philosopher-psychologist William James, also had a major influence on the co-founder of AA Bill Wilson in writing the big book.
Clergy of Boston before separating from the church on its religious non-ortodoxies, Emerson, like Gilbert, seduced abroad, also spending several months in Italy. On his return, he hit the road, making hundreds of talks across the country. Like Gilbert, he was inspired by oriental mysticism, in particular the Bhagavad Gita. The two deviate from traditional Christianity to knit an eclectic and new spirituality – Gilbert’s last update offers a mixture of ideas in 12 stages, certain occult and soul trips, as well as neuroscience and the theory of trauma. The two locate a personal god who resides inside and which can be conferred directly. Gilbert even responds in return, but when she asks if she should start going out with someone new after Rayya, frustrating, he continues to answer “lol no”.
Despite the windy tone, Gilbert often seems quite similar to Emerson: “What if the land is nothing other than a school for souls?” Gilbert asks. Emerson puts it longer in “The Over-Soul”: “The soul gives itself, alone, original and pure, in the solitary, original and pure, which, on this condition, lives with pleasure, directs and speaks through … Here, it is said, I was born in the great, the universal spirit.”
