Analysis of Walden by Thoreau

I think Thoreau is mainly discussing how material goods, and the work it takes to achieve the possession of these goods, takes up most of the time that a natural societal man would have to contemplate his own mental improvement. He's saying that for all the work they've done, they can't enjoy the fruits of their labor because they are always working, and once they do have time to reflect, the toiling men are too exhausted to really investigate their mental faculties. He also says that it would be "better if they had been born in the open pasture and suckled by a wolf, that they might have seen with clearer eyes what field they were called to labor in", considering someone that has not had something is more appreciative because they are aware of their life in the absence of it than someone who "inherits" or is given something.

Thoreau started off with just an Axe, and bought a shed from a man to use the wood for his shack. He reads the paper and he lives a life of solitude and reflection. He also is helped by a few acquaintances, but does most of the labor and work of his dwelling in the woods all by himself. He believes that reform starts with the individual, because that is the smallest increment of change in a society. One must start small to really begin the change, and get at the root of the issue of dependence within a society. When he says, "some show their kindness to the poor by employing them in their kitchens. Would they not be kinder if they employed themselves there? You boast of spending a tenth part of your income in charity; may be you should spend the nine tenths so, and be done with it" he is implying that it is better to do things for yourself and save what you have left for the future, rather than paying someone out of charity and essentially wasting both of your time on something neither of you is prospering from.

He describes his cabin in a tone of affection for all of its pieces of furniture, and cleans it adoringly early in the morning before any of the townspeople have woken up. As he lays his furniture out on the lawn while the floor is being cleaned he reminisces that he, "was sometimes tempted to stretch an awning over them and take my seat there. It was worth the while to see the sun shine on these things, and hear the free wind blow on them.

Thoreau seems at first in awe of the locomotive and the commerce it brings to the area from far away places. He even says, "and their whistle can be heard so far, that the farmers set their clocks by them, and thus one well conducted institution regulates a whole country." to emphasize how the locomotive has industrialized almost all aspects of human life. The train reminds him that he is still connected to the world even though he is isolated in the woods. Its whistle pierces through the woods where he lives, and for a brief moment reconnects him to the world around him by reminding him there is almost no land untouched by man. He seems nostalgic for the world he used to know, and regretful that such technology can traverse even the broadest of wildernesses, and how it seems to corrupt the harmony that is the silent natural environment only filled by the sounds of the animals around it.

He interprets the owl's songs as voices joining together in the night in mourning. He describes their sounds as, "the mutual consolations of suicide lovers remembering the pangs and the delights of the supernal love in the infernal groves", and gives the impression of a very melancholy tune. It reminds him of the mournful dark side of nature and describes it as, "a sound admirably suited to swamps and twilight woods which no day illustrates" giving off a very foreboding nature to the hoot of the owl. Its as if they are mourning the impending death of something cherished.

The first visitor to Thoreau is the Canadian, a "wood chopper and a post maker, who can hole fifty posts in a day, who made his last supper on a woodchuck which his dog caught" and appears to be very hardy and naturalistic. Thoreau's impression of him is less than stellar as he describes, "he had been instructed only in that innocent and ineffectual way in which the catholic priest teach the aborigines, by which the pupil is never educated to the degree of consciousness, but only to the degree of trust and reverence, and a child is not made a man, but kept a child." as to imply that this man was used or worked only for his brawn, neglecting his intellect entirely. He represents the beauty of simplicity, and the effortlessness of just doing without observing any higher social consequences
The second visitor is the pauper who freely admits that he is, "deficient in intellect...never had much mind...weak in the head", and thereby freely admitting his faults, sets up for a natural and easy conversation. In a sense that introduction was similar to a lets-just-get-this-out-of-the-way conversation. This type of person seems not to put on any façade in order to impress his fellow man, and therefore any type of discourse that follows has nothing left but honesty. He represents the ease of life one can observe if societal pressures to appear or act a certain way are just ignored. Then there were plenty of townspeople that simply came to investigate. To me this represents the insatiable natural curiosity of people encountering one person doing something completely different than themselves.

The bean field in a sense represents his creative nature as well as his ability to create anything at all. Thoreau expresses his wonder at the work of his own hands in the very poetic phrase, "making the earth say beans instead of grass,--- this was my daily work.". He is proud of his work and rejoices in the ability to toil in the sand and then produce something so worthwhile to sustain his own life, and possibly sell for more money. He also uncovers the remnants of previous civilizations while upturning the soil for his crops. He found "their small implements of war and hunting" in his peaceful bean field with its creation and artful nurturing of the earth to produce them, which is in such contrast to war and weapons. He likens the toil he takes with the beans to what he believes could be spent putting effort into growing and nurturing young men. He is speaking of planting seeds of virtue in young men to have them be grown inside their minds and producing quality people in a society. Thoreau chastises the way modern man practices selfishness by planting and harvesting large farms without the sentimentality that comes from nurturing the soil and seeds into a personal harvest. He doesn't agree with, "regarding the soil as property, or the means of acquiring property chiefly, the landscape is deformed, the husbandry is degraded with us, and the farmer leads the meanest of lives.". So basically the bean fields represents Thoreau's desire to see man cherish the earth around him, and harvest for his own wealth of knowledge and strength of character, rather than for profit.

Well at first it appears that the Hermit is Thoreau sitting and asking himself questions about the village he has segregated himself from by building a house by Walden pond. Then "the poet" arrives to exclaim about the beauty of the land and suggest that they go fishing. Then Thoreau wishes to continue his 'meditation' so he sends his friend the poet off to gather worms for their fishing trip, as he finishes they later rejoin to go fish in the Concord.

I think they represent polar opposites in that the poet has to be so conscious of society and appeal to the masses considering they are his livelihood, and he must write what they wish to buy. While the hermit is dependent on no one but himself, yet in this case Thoreau wishes to be somewhat connected to society due to his out-loud wonderings of how things are keeping up in the village. The poet, in this case, wants to escape, and go fishing without thinking of the irony in their wanting to switch places briefly. One could also surmise that the Hermit represents the ID part of the psyche which is dedicated only to primal desires: eating, sleeping, and possibly fornication (who knows!), while the poet seems to be the Super Ego strictly concerned with things that bring the world, and himself, pleasure and enjoyment.

Walden was an enormous spiritual journey! Thoreau, armed with his Harvard education and his innate determinism, sets out to live off some property of a friend near Walden Pond isolated from the surrounding society. Not only has he completely changed his mode of daily life, but he has set out to be completely self reliant, and his only source of income appears to be his meager bean field, which is all he needed since most everything he acquired was used or borrowed. He set out to completely dedicate his 2 year project to thinking and postulating upon the current condition of his fellow man, and not only wrote about it, but preached of ways to revitalize life at the time. He felt that men too often sought validation in the things they owned and became focused on their daily tasks instead of asking bigger questions and enriching their mental faculties through philosophical thought/debate. He often felt as though more men should go through this type of mental and philosophical journey as a right of passage rather than inheriting the land from their families and thereby being forced to farm it simply for the fees the inheritance incurred. He is in a sense outraged at the lack of (what we would call) existentialist thought, and the questioning of identity within a society rather than the blind adoption of some inherited role.

Thoreau is constantly telling people in the last chapter to, "sell your clothes and keep your thoughts" in some form or another. I take this to mean that he wishes all men to seek philosophical superiority rather than comparing themselves to the men around them, or seeking their honor in achievements of the most banal and unthinking nature. He seeks his own independence from society in the quite (despite the railroads) of the woods in which he takes time to ponder his own situation and the situation of his peers as well as the youth growing up to eventually take his place. He's calling for a revolution in thinking and wishes that more men around him could understand and adopt his philosophy of independence and self reliance. He lastly acknowledges that not everyone will understand his desperate need to impart this idea of independence and self reliance, and thusly not everyone will even understand the concepts, but that he can rest in knowing his words and philosophies will at least reach a few, and will live on after his death.