I keep vacillating between thinking this is great stuff, this is crap. I have talked with two English teachers and one loves Walden and one hates it. So I am not the only one with ambivalent feelings. The first two chapters seemed like it was the Hippie bible. It said in the 1840’s what the Hippies were chanting in the 1960’s. Part of me thought that Thoreau was a prophet in foreshadowing the future. Part of me said the Hippies were not as great as they thought that they were in discovering the “Truth” that Thoreau had known and practiced a hundred years before.
Later in book I thought that Thoreau was selfish and self absorbed. He did what he wanted to do and rather than being the noble independent person, he was just doing his own thing with no contribution to the greater society, and he could not have done it without that greater society around him supporting him by supplying an ax to build his cabin and buying his vegetables.
There is room in our society for all kinds, even the Thoreau’s, but society could not survive and the Thoreau’s could not survive if all were like Thoreau.
What would society be like if we all went to the woods like Thoreau? Could it even be done in our time? I saw something on the news a few months ago about a man that lives outside of Moab in the desert. No job, no commercialism, no consumerism, just living close to the land. BUT, he does take handouts and will reclaim things that others throw out. Would it be possible for him to survive without the kindness of others? I think the world is a healthier place because of those with ambition and desire for "a better life."
ReplyDeleteYour entry made me laugh! I love the analogy of Thoreau and hippies. I found myself wondering if he actually had any real friends. It seems his neighbors. But yes, it does take all kinds, and it keeps the world interesting.
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ReplyDeleteIn a publication in the Atlantic Monthly says that Ralph Waldo Emerson could shake his head at Thoreau's funeral and say. "I so much regret the loss of his rare powers of action, that I cannot help counting it a fault in him that he had no ambition. Wanting this, that is lack ambition, isntead of engineering for all America, he was the captain of a huckleberry party. Pounding beans is good to the end of pounding empires on of these day; but if, at the end of years, it is still only beans!"
ReplyDeleteEmerson overestimatede Thoreau's natural abilites, greatly understimated Thoreau's accomplishments, and failed to see Thoreau's purpose.
I think Walden Pond influenced the national park system, the Brithish labor movement, the creation of India, the civil rights movement, the hippie revolution, the environmental movement, and the wilderness movement. they quoted with feeling by liberals, socialists, anarchists, and conservatives alike.
I think you have a point, but I believe it is all about getting out of the traditional bubble and trying a different perspective, sometimes work, but sometimes it can be totally wrong.