Walden Chapters

In Where I Lived and What I Lived For Walden does just that: discuss ideas of living, how he came to live where he lived in the woods, and why his life led him there. If I'm not mistaken, this chapter of Walden is one of the most well known, and most quoted. And I believe this is one of the more well known lines from this chapter, but I love it: "Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life of equal simplicity, and I may say innocence, with Nature herself." There are a few things I love about that sentence. The first being his capitalization of Nature, which he tends to do. The reverence he holds for it is refreshing, especially in light of what we talked about with Ishmael last class; We're brought up with the attitude that the Earth, and Nature, is ours for the taking. Walden, obviously, takes quite a different stance.

There's something so lovely and inspiring about Thoreau's life in the woods. It's easy to get lost in the fantasy of it all. But, while full of wonder, I always find myself simultaneously hopeless. Because his attitude toward life and living is so deliberate and worth striving for, yet also so unattainable. Realistically, even the most passionate nature-lovers among us still have many ties to modern society, and an extreme dependence on it for the things we want in life (education, careers, social lives, etc.) This chapter and his lifestyle are very much embodied in a 2016 Oscar nominated film, Captain Fantastic. I highly recommend this film if this particular chapter interests you the way it interests me.

In Sounds, Walden explores silence, and lack of silence. Particularly in regards to truly listening to nature, and meditating with the sounds of it. And in The Bean-Field he discusses his field in great detail. What it is like to care for it, how nature surrounds it and serves it, what it was like to reap the benefits of his own sowing. And this of course reminds me of the TED talk we watched in class about growing your own food. One line I remember particularly well from that video was "Growing your own food is like printing your own money."

Last but not least, in The Village he analyzes the village that his home in the woods is closest to. He describes the village as being his source of gossip and news. He talks about how dark the woods is at night, and what it was like to walk home from the village late at night. The way he describes the darkness made me realize that it's been quite some time since I've been outside in a darkness like that. He makes it sound so limiting but also so freeing, and I like the duality of that.

Overall, these chapters of Walden provided me with a refreshed sense of purpose, and a renewed appreciation for why nature and the Earth are so vital to our health and sanity.