Bruce sent us a Henry David Thoreau book that included his well known writing about his stay at Walden Pond. At first I was grateful that he sent me this classic since it might have relevance to the simplifications we have done in our lives.
Once I started reading this book, any joy about possibly connecting with a kindred spirit was dashed. I am forced to agree with some of his contemporaries. Thoreau was not a good writer and many things he presents are not as pure as he would have us think.
Some will argue that he was good writer. Yet his first book, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, was published in 1849 at his own expense. It took 4 years to sell all 1000 copies and there was not a reprint. I struggled to get through the abridged version in this book and understand why it was never reprinted in his lifetime. His ramblings left me dumbfounded as to what he was actually talking about.
Do you think I may all be wrong? I would suggest reading a few paragraphs here. I would describe it as hard to read and mind numbing. There were a number of positive reviews of this and Walden on line. That might suggest that it is I that is just an uneducated reader….Nah that ain’t it.
On the second point, Emerson lost patience with his friend’s seemingly complete lack of ambition. Robert Louis Stevenson thought him an “indulgent skulker” and an “escapist.” James Lowell labeled him as “indolent”.
Reading Walden was only slightly better than his first work. It contained many of the rambling paragraphs that made his first work a struggle. Some of his wisdom is suspect such as , “The old have no advice for the young.” As an old guy I disagree. I suspect anyone under the age of 30 would agree with him.
He was no fan of patriotism calling it a “maggot in the head” and thought we should be cultivating poverty like a garden. From what I read on-line, some socialist running for office would like to implement his advice.
Other advice is just weird. Things like “a live dog is better than a dead lion” and “Let us not play at kittlybenders.”
His journey to Walden did not seem entirely pure either. He had been seeking a town position that he did not receive and may have thought leaving town was a good choice.
Despite the torturous nature of his writing and possibly his “indolent” nature, there are some kernels of wisdom. Asking how much of anything you really need is something each of us should consider. Even in his time people were “keeping up with the Jones’s.” Now that syndrome seems even worse.
From his accounting his small house built with his own money on someone else’s land with a borrowed axe makes him the grandfather of the tiny house phenomenon. His housing cost of $28 would be only $917 in 2018. He lived debt free unlike many of the people in town.
His advice is to be the “Lewis and Clark” of yourlife and that is probably the best tak away from this book. Do not worry about what the “Jones’s” are doing. Do not drift with the currents. Choose your own path and go.
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It seems appropriate that my blog review app, Yoast, gave this post a poorer reading score than usual. I guess reading Thoreau’s work made more impact than I thought.
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With a little work I have the reading score up to OK.