Henry David Thoreau Research Paper

By making people ponder on the unjust laws in society Thoreau hopes that it will draw more attention to the matter and convince people to help support the cause. Thoreau utilizes this strategy again to draw people’s attention towards the malfunctioning of the current government. He attended to make people question their attitude towards their government. Thoreau asks “how does it become a man to behave towards this American government today? [He answers], that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it.

As a result, Henry David Thoreau, a transcendentalist of the

In this essay, Thoreau challenges the rules and laws instituted within America and feels that citizens must not simply follow the government blindly. In the eulogy, Emerson places emphasis that Thoreau would not conform to society and the ideologies that he held could not be

Furthermore, his use of tone to exemplify his argument is also effective as he condemns people for living rushed, unfulfilled lives for the sake of prosperity and materialistic possessions. When Thoreau says that ”when we are unhurried and wise, we perceive that only great and worthy things have any permanent and absolute existence, that petty fears and petty pleasures are but the shadow of the reality,”(279) he employs a critical tone by stating that people are blinded by these petty things that misconstrue

Thoreau also writes about routine living and conformity in this quote, “The surface of the earth is soft and impressible by the feet of men; and so with the paths which the mind travels. How worn and dusty, then, must be the highways of the world, how deep the ruts of tradition and conformity!” (Walden) In this quote, readers can see that McCandless and Thoreau have very similar beliefs in regard to the idea of routine living and conformity. It is clear that both men believe that conformity and routine living are detrimental to the human

Thoreau has to utilize material items as a way to evoke a spiritual outcome, meanwhile Franklin is materialistic so that he does not have to have debt to his creditors. Thoreau believes that everyone should live according to their true passions, because by finding ones passions will allow one to have freedom. Another way to acquire freedom is by minimizing ones need, rather than what one wants. Thoreau argues that luxuries not only acquire excess labor, but also oppress humans spiritually because they are infiltrated with worry and constraint. Since people believe that they need excess possessions to be happy, this forces people to work more and lose their inner freedom along the way to social and economic mobility.

Henry David Thoreau was a philosopher, poet, and a very outspoken person about society. He discusses his opinions on how people should live in his essay “Where I Lived and What I Lived For.” Thoreau's philosophy of simplicity and individualism and self-sufficiency poses many dangers for communities as a whole. Although there are many setbacks, his philosophy is, however, still viable today. Thoreau strongly advocates self-sufficiency and individualism in this essay.

Henry David Thoreau was an American essayist, and widely known transcendentalist. He is most known for his compelling essay, Civil Disobedience, and his Memoir, Walden. Thoreau was a lifelong abolitionist, and shared this idea with others, during lectures for example. Throughout 1846 to 1848, Thoreau peacefully protested the unjust Government out of revulsion for slavery and the Mexican-American war, with aspirations that others would join him. Thoreau was briefly jailed for being a staunch supporter of the refusal to pay taxes for things he did not believe in, which in this case was the ongoing Mexican-American war.

By establishing common ground with the reader who are religious by mentioning “god”. The author portrays his journey as sacred. Thoreau’s usage of descriptive language of scenery appeals to the readers as his location is a source of tranquility and sacredness. Furthermore, Thoreau argues that people should take into consideration everything; the details. Human life is clouded and surrounded by thousands of task rather than a

Jon Krakauer, Chris McCandless, and Henry David Thoreau express the aspects of Transcendentalism in their three points of view. Transcendentalism is based on the belief that human beings have self-wisdom and may gain this knowledge or wisdom by how nature flows. It has three common themes: self-wisdom, nature and its meaning, and social reform. Chris McCandless’s life expressed in Krakauer’s Into the Wild is similar to the Transcendental beliefs of Thoreau’s Walden. The first Transcendental point of Chris McCandless’s and Henry David Thoreau’s lives is their dislike of material possessions.

In Walden, written by Henry David Thoreau, the author expresses the immense longing that we, as human beings, need to give up our connection to our ever-growing materialism in order to revert back to self-sufficient happiness. In Walden, the reader is able to infer that Thoreau feels as if we are becoming enslaved by our material possessions, as well as believes that the study of nature should replace and oppose our enslavement, and that we are to “open new channels of thought” by turning our eyes inward and studying ourselves. Thoreau feels that we are becoming enslaved by our material possessions. As stated in the chapter “In the Where I Lived, and What I Lived For”, Thoreau states that “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” (972).

Henry David Thoreau is one of the primary promoters of the transcendentalist movement and has been inspiring people to take on the transcendentalist lifestyle ever since the mid 1800’s. Mccandless was an admirer of Henry’s philosophy but he wasn’t as fully immersed in his work and ideals as Thoreau was to his own. His intentions were not as closely aligned to the movement as Thoreau’s and the difference between these icons are clearly visible. Self reliance is one of the most significant components of the transcendentalism movement that Henry David Thoreau contributed to in his literary career. “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” - (taken from Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden”).

This quote is representative of Thoreau’s beliefs on how money and luxury can ruin a simplistic life or in a more current definition if there is more money and luxury, there will be more problems with living an easy and simplistic life. In this day and age, this quote is slightly controversial in the matters of more luxury being worse on the easiness of life since in this age luxury people have been made to simplify life.

He does not disdain human companionship; in fact he values it when it comes on his own terms, as when his philosopher or poet friends come to call. Thoreau calls for people to be givers rather than takers in the economic game of life by “living deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life” (410). Thoreau claims that by reducing the unnecessary excess in our life, one can then contribute to society and give more than they take. Thoreau suggests on how to embark upon how to reduce the unnecessary items in our life by “[letting our] affairs be two or three, [and] instead of three meals a day, [eat] but one” (410). Thoreau also introduces the concept that self-reliance can be spiritual as well as economic, and explores the higher dimensions of individualism.

Thoreau studied Greek, Latin and German at Harvard college form 1833 to 1837, after his refusal to pay the fee to obtain his diploma he took a leave of absence where he became acquainted with his mentor and life long friend Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson, who was 14 years older than thoreau took a “paternal and at times patronizing interest in thoreau” (bio 1), While Thoreau worked for emerson he was exposed to a “school of thought that emphasized the importance of empirical thinking and of spiritual matters over the physical world” (bio 1) that is known today as transcendentalism. Grasping hold of these beliefs and openly implementing them into his daily life thoreau became known as “the father of transcendentalism” The speaker of this poem who I believe to be Henry david thoreau himself, is highly intelligent and extremely thoughtful. throughout this poem thoreau continuously makes insightful connections between nature and love. Thoreau is very passionate about love and friendship.