Wal-Dumb: A Review of Henry David Thoreau's Walden

When asked to review Henry David Thoreau's story Walden, one must take the word "story" in the loosest of all possible meanings, for, while Thoreau lays down pure fiction, he neglects to add such useful elements as plot, characters, and point.

Thoreau begins his treatise on nature and the rustic life with a particularly tiresome and mystifying paragraph regarding property deeds and ten cents:

Now, to speak the truth, I had but ten cents in the world, and it surpassed my arithmetic to tell, if I was that man who had but ten cents, or who had a farm, or ten dollars, or all together. However, I let him keep the ten dollars and the farm too, for I had carried it far enough; or rather, to be generous, I sold him the farm for just what I gave for it, and, as he was not a rich man, made him a present of ten dollars, and still had my ten cents, and seeds, and materials for a wheelbarrow left. (5)

Positively scintillating!

One would think that after this sort of beginning, things could only get better. One would, however, be wrong. Thoreau proves as eager to disappoint as he is to baffle and bore, continuing to describe only the most important details of his surroundings: "I heard the house-dog bark," and, "The upright hewn studs and freshly paned door and window casings [emphasis mine]" being terrific examples.

Thoreau, who seems to spend the majority of his time sculling around Walden Pond, would, in this writer's humble opinion, be out of his depth in a teacup. Furthermore, Thoreau's uncanny ability to restate the obvious appears to be rivaled only by a rather obtuse parrot. And statements like, "I was reminded that this on which I dwelt was but dry [emphasis not mine] land," seem to suggest that Thoreau, above all else, is depriving a somewhat large village of their idiot.

And while the reader would assume, most carelessly, that these initial sections are rock bottom, Thoreau, as if out of spite, continues to dig. In a vexing tirade in support of simplicity, he hazards the line, "Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!" A child still burbling in the cradle could, of course, call attention to the irony of this exclamation. Thoreau, completely unaware of man's evolution to thought, continues downward. "To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face." This, of course, begs the question "Who, after 85 pages of this clap-trap, would be awake?" Certainly not I.

The only other question that Walden appears to beg is whether to store it on my bedside table to fight indomitable bouts of insomnia, or in my water closet for handy disposal (pun intended). However, in my humble opinion, the worst disappointment of Walden was, in fact, the middle section, when I neglected to find a noose with which to hang myself.

There is, of course, a silver lining in everything, so I did indeed find parts of this treatise useful. And that purpose was swatting flies that have surreptitiously invaded my bungalow (although I have the sneaking suspicion that this rotten manuscript is the sole cause of their arrival). To conclude, I find that Henry David Thoreau should have left Walden as blank as his mind must have been during its composition, for right now, it is little more than a semi-controlled ink stain. To wit, Walden could bore a well…or perhaps a pond.