Peirce's melancholy

New article in the Pocono Record about C.S. Peirce (HT Jason immanent transcendence, a wonder how he found this).  I think the tragic aspects of Peirce's life are often over looked.  Alot of people just don't "get" Peirce, because his work is so difficult and it requires alot of background to comprehend.  But he was an American genius, a prolific writer, and anticipated (perhaps along with Whitehead as his closest ally) what today we would call "speculative" metaphysical philosophy.

Nevertheless, the details of Peirce's life are just as fascinating as his philosophy.  I've been to the Peirce house at least twice, as far as I can remember.  I'd like to go again.

Link to the article HERE.

Charles seemed capable of undermining his interests himself," said Samuels. "He had nerve pain in his face and bipolar disorder, which may also explain why he wanted opium. He was an ingenious, difficult man, sometimes violent, who couldn't keep a job. No one understood his mania. But for 20 years after he died, Juliette tried to get his work published.

See also:

"Peirce the Melancholy Prestidigitator," review essay on Charles Sanders Peirce: A Life, by Joseph Brent, Semiotica, Vol. 94, Nos. 1 & 2, 1993, pp. 85-101. [download]

and

"Peirce's Melancholy," Semiotics 1991, ed. Deely & Prewitt, (Lanham, MD: The University Press of America, 1992), pp. 332-340. [download]