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 High Plains Chautauqua |
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During his lifetime, many of Thoreau’s neighbors in his native town of Concord, Massachusetts, saw him as an eccentric Harvard graduate who had not lived up to his potential. During the past century, however, Thoreau has been increasingly recognized as one of the most incisive and prophetic American voices from the nineteenth century. Within his finely crafted pages, we encounter a profound critique of the conformity and overly materialistic values of most Americans, a compelling argument urging individual American citizens to engage in conscientious political dissent when they are convinced that their government is guilty of perpetuating injustice, and an impassioned plea for all Americans to realize the value of our wild lands. Thoreau’s Walden, now widely acknowledged as one of the greatest books ever written by an American, contains a radically individualistic narrative voice that seriously questions the value of technological progress and capitalistic enterprise. In warning his readers of the “quiet desperation” that can result from a life dedicated to securing material wealth only, Thoreau espouses a life of simplicity, dedicated to the cultivation of the soul. In short, Thoreau was much more interested in the contemplation of the world – both within us and around us – than in the consumption of its resources. As for America’s technological and industrial progress, he wryly asserts that the inventions inundating the market in the 1840s and 1850s were “but improved means to an unimproved end,” and he identifies the railroad with the mechanistic outlook that has assigned his neighbors to a life of unending, routine toil. “We do not ride upon the railroad,” warns Thoreau, “it rides upon us.” Because Thoreau believed that the individual conscience is a more reliable purveyor of truth than the voice of the majority, his essay titled “Civil Disobedience” urged the reader to follow his conscience rather than the law when he is convinced that the law is unjust. His powerful argument championing action based upon moral principle and individual nonviolent resistance against the state has inspired such great reformers in this past century as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” puts forth his now-famous argument for nonviolent resistance, but his later political essays, including those in support of John Brown’s violent actions at Harper’s Ferry, reveal that he came to condone violent action against the government as a means to end social and political injustice. In the dozen years leading up the Civil War, his moral outrage with the evil institution of slavery became increasingly pronounced. In Thoreau’s writings, we find the ideological underpinnings of contemporary environmentalism and the wilderness preservation movement. His enthusiasm for the wild can be found throughout his writings, but it was stated most succinctly in his essay “Walking,” where he boldly proclaims, “In Wildness is the preservation of the World.” With these eight words, he announces his faith in the redemptive power of the wilderness and the wildness inherent there. By investing the natural world with metaphorical and spiritual significance, Thoreau’s writings present nature and its wild processes as a sanctum sanctorum, a sacred place.
KEVIN RADAKER Chair of the English Department at Anderson University in Anderson, Indiana, Kevin Radaker has presented his portrayal of Thoreau over 300 times throughout the United States since 1991. He has offered his “Thoreau” at universities, colleges, libraries, state and national parks, and as a part of summer Chautauqua programs in the Great Plains states (’91, ’92, ’93), Missouri and Illinois (’97 and ’98), Massachusetts (’98), the Carolinas and New Hampshire (2001), Oklahoma (2003), Maryland (2004), and Ohio (2008). In addition, he has published academic articles on Thoreau, Herman Melville, Annie Dillard, and Wendell Berry. For more information on his portrayal of Thoreau, see his website at www.thoreaulive.com. SIGNIFICANT POINTS ABOUT HENRY DAVID THOREAU
HENRY DAVID THOREAU QUOTES
RECOMMENDED READING Cramer, Jeffrey S., ed. Thoreau on Freedom. Fulcrum Publishing, 2003. A marvelous collection of Thoreau’s thoughts on freedom. Richardson, Robert D. Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind. University of California Press, 1986. The best intellectual biography of Thoreau. Thoreau, Henry David. A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers / Walden / The Maine Woods / Cape Cod. The Library of America, 1985. The best one-volume collection of Thoreau’s book-length writings. Thoreau, Henry David. The Essays of Henry D. Thoreau. Selected and Edited by Lewis Hyde. North Point Press, 2002. Thoreau, Henry David. Walden and Civil Disobedience. Signet, 2004. HENRY DAVID THOREAU TIMELINE 1817: Born on July 12 in Concord, Massachusetts 1833-37: Attends and graduates from Harvard College 1838: Opens a private school, where he teaches with his brother, John 1839: Two-week excursion with John on Concord and Merrimack rivers 1842: On January 11, his brother, John, dies of lockjaw 1845: On July 4, moves into cabin at Walden Pond 1846: Arrested for nonpayment of the poll tax; first of three trips to the Maine Woods (other two trips in 1853 and 1857) 1847: Leaves the Walden cabin in September 1849: Publishes A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and "Resistance to Civil Government" (better known as "Civil Disobedience"); first of four trips to Cape Cod (other trips in 1850, '55, and '57) 1854: Publishes Walden on August 9 1856: Meets Walt Whitman in Brooklyn 1857: Meets John Brown, the radical abolitionist 1859: Delivers an impassioned defense of John Brown and his violent actions at Harpers Ferry in "A Plea for Captain John Brown" 1861: Visits Minnesota, primarily for the sake of his failing health 1862: Dies of tuberculosis on May 6 |
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