Introduction
Writings of Benjamin Franklin are marvelous that covers a variety of genres, starting from his ethical philosophy presented to journalism, satire, scientific reports, and autobiography. His letters to Polly Hewson, who was the daughter of his landlady, explain a lot about his life. The skilled, emotive, and humorous writing of Benjamin Franklin – a great work of literature – portrays his character and his understanding of man.
Franklin accomplished his scholarly and fictitious expertise in a period that was famous due to its philosophical development. The eighteenth century is most often referred to as the initiation of the supposed modern era in philosophy. This was the considered as the century of Enlightenment or the Age of Reason, a perfect ideal likewise available in the writing of that age, regardless of whether British, Colonial, or Continental. Franklin has reported that he has taken his idea of Enlightenment a step further as compared to the scholars of his age. The philosophers of his time were busy and contented in arguing among themselves about human nature; where Franklin was much interested in bringing these scientific ideas to common people. His wittiness and intelligence combined and provided an instant appeal to his readers. The maxims and aphorisms, he wrote in Poor Richard’s Almanack, were a masterpiece as no doubt they made the colonists of his era laugh but also exposed their weaknesses. Memoirs de la vie privée ecrits par lui-même of Benjamin Franklin (1791) is primarily a story showing the applicability of rationalism, wise frugality, and practicality to daily life. The writings of Franklin also confirm the belief and faith that man is free by nature and everybody has right to pursue one’s destiny.
Numerous twentieth-century savvy people have protested what they see as Franklin’s realism. Marxist interpretation of Max Weber disagrees with the points of Franklin’s reasoning: “It [earning money] is believed to be absolutely as an end in itself . . . [I]t shows up altogether totally unreasonable and transcendental. Man is overwhelmed by the profiting, by procurement as a definitive reason for his life.”
Such feedback has advanced not as much from Franklin and his work as from assumptions or understanding of his readers who trust Franklin’s logic legitimizes miserable realism. Benjamin Franklin in his autobiography uncovers a man concerns about the world and iand how this society is dealing wth his people. He has concerns for the safety of general public, health, and education of common man by making Philadelphia the most present-day city, and not in the settlements only nevertheless the whole Western world. He additionally declined to apply for the patent for a large number of his interventions, in this manner making them more open to general society. In this way, his rational viewpoint not only characterized the American ideal but also described the whole idea of social development (Wood, p. 46).
The Great American Writer
Franklin was the great American writer of his age as he alone understood that the passion with the philosophy might be used against itself for higher literary effect. He was in favor that perspectives have the power to generate interests and ideas along with controlling them. Majority of his popular bagatelles re-form an accustomed perspective in an inexplicable or perplexed context. A Petition of the Left Hand (1785), The Ephemera (1778), The Sale of the Hessians (1777), An Edict by the King of Prussia (1773), and Rules by which a Great Empire may be reduced to a Small One (1773) are all cases in point. In all the writings, Franklin portrays a game of realization between different perspectives (Erkkila, p. 720).
Major Themes in Franklin’s Writing
Franklin had a view that great writings are smooth, short, and concise. It is an entertaining discourse on the lesser talents of those who were criticizing him that they have required such a significant number of words like “basic,” “simple,” “brief,” “clear,” “conventional,” “natural,” and so forth — to state that Franklin’s composition met his criteria. The straightforwardness of his style in American literature is so overwhelming a trademark, in fact, that the real endeavors of a few critics are spent bringing up particular cases to the rule.
Franklin, a co-founding Father of US, was famous for having democratic views. There are not much books or novels published by his name, but he establishes a long list of essays and short stories that were dedicated to the independent land. After 1776, Franklin became more confident and optimistic and focused mainly on how to utilize economic assistance and escape the oppression of governmental regimes.
Franklin’s involvement in the formation of an American national identity is maybe the most critical theme that should be highlighted in his work. Franklin’s surrender of Puritanism for the rationalism of enlightenment mirrors a focal move in American culture in the eighteenth century (Wood, p. 50).
Furthermore, his writings focus on the developing consciousness of America as a nation with qualities and interests entirely different from those of England – a movement that, apparently, discovers its peak during Enlightenment. Franklin’s cooperation in the developing confidence of the eighteenth century that humankind could, through individual exertion and social change, examine and manage social issues, uncovers the positive thinking and self-assurance of his era, as do his a vast quantity of scientific accomplishments. He was having a firm belief that one should test the theory by experience rather than logic, this also showed the belief of his era that reason ought to be confirmed pragmatically.
Maybe most vital, in his biography, he presented not just the great story of an independent man. Moreover, he endeavors to reform himself and his profession as the classic American success story. Although some of the writers like Mark Twain, Herman Melville, Thoreau, Dean Howells, and Scott Fitzgerald reacted to the myth created by Franklin,; whereas the Autobiography is such a remarkable piece that one can utilize it to look at the topic of being an American and what the predominant American traditions are. Given the present open deliberation over multiculturalism, a dialog of Franklin’s profession as statesman and essayist as an endeavor to make a bound together American identity – and accordingly to restrict the multicultural components in the developing country – ought to demonstrate provocative.
At the point when put in together with the writings of Crèvecoeur and Jefferson, the essays and other writings of Franklin should enable its readers to comprehend why, in the eighteenth century, the detaching of cultural and religious values and the grasping in their place of a national character in light of shared thoughts are seen by numerous dynamic, educated people as approaches to free the person from the contracting hand of the severe past (Stallybrass, p. 554).
Conclusion
Franklin was fundamentally a writer of eighteenth-century. This century has vast literature in it, and there was a need for Franklin to become acquainted with the political conversation and other convincing writings, scientific writings, letters, and, especially, with the autobiography in his era. His work differs from the romantic and post-romantic writings of his time while highlighting the issues of that time. He preferred rationality, fairness, common sense, practice and experience over speculation, assumptions, and emotions. Franklin through his writings showed his obligation to the scientists, researchers, inventors, and all of the English writers of the early eighteenth century.
Works Cited
Wood, John J. Benjamin Franklin, the Ends of Writing, and the Founding of American Literature. State University of New York at Buffalo, 2016. Retrieved on 19 Apr. 2018.
Erkkila, B. Franklin, and the Revolutionary Body. ELH, vol. 67 no. 3, 2000, pp. 717-741. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/elh.2000.0023
Stallybrass, P. Benjamin Franklin: Printed Corrections and Erasable Writing. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 150, no. 4, Dec. 2006, pp. 553-567.
