BOOK-MAN ECO-BOOK #1: Walden, by Henry David Thoreau

When/Where Was It Written?:

In a cabin, by a pond, somewhere in Massachusetts.... all the way back in 1854!  (didn't I say it was classic?)

So, What's the Point (In Exactly 137 Words or Less)?:

Basically: Ole Henry D. gets ticked off at 19th century aristocratic society and decides to isolate himself in a crude cabin in the woods on Walden Pond for ‘two years and two months’ (never mind that the cabin was only a short walk from town and he had relatively frequent visitors...).  While living as a semi-hermit Thoreau has a lot of time on his hands to contemplate life and comes up with some pretty heavy critiques of Western culture’s materialist and consumer attitudes, and subsequent destruction of nature.  He also puts up some pretty gnarly ideas on ‘transcending’ our socially dictated lot in life through self-reliance, solitude, self-driven learning, and a life lived closer to nature.  Oh yeah, and he occasionally bathes naked in the pond (hot!).  

So, Why Should I Care:

Ok, Ok, look, so let me make some apologies first: Granted, Walden is thoroughly dated, dry as a sack o' rye, and, for the most part, equally as readable as a dry sack o' rye is edible.  Actually, truth be told, I've never read much more beyond the first three chapters. WAIT, WAIT, WAIT!  Don't run off yet!  You must be asking yourself, 'why would the BOOK-MAN kick off his 'very best of eco-literature' blog with a crusty old paper weight...?  Right?WELL, simply, Walden is the great-grand-poombah of ALL modern ecoliterature.  Thoreau was green back when green was..... well, just another color.  In those first three chapters Thoreau is tossing harpoons into the underbelly of society that strike just as true now as they did then.  Thoreau was a true, original Transition-eer (that is a term that I have just crafted meaning  a Transition-Town-Pioneer).  The point wasn't just to escape and criticize society... he wanted to change it- through empowerment, independence and interdependence, expansion of our sense of community, and development of a radical self-awareness and sense of wonder-- of our spiritual journey on this planet. READ IT!  Read it even though its dated.  It is defiant, beautiful, challenging and poignant.  It was the first eco-classic that I ever read (I was about 15 at the time) and as I was reading it I would stop after every paragraph and say to myself 'wow, 150 years ago this guy is saying what I have been thinking... even though I didn't know that I was thinking it yet."  It made me want to run off in the woods, take off my clothes and go bathing with the beavers.  Above all else, I solely credit this book with instilling in me an unshakeable dream to grow a 'nest-worthy' beard (a still as yet unfulfilled dream).Read it!  (the first 3 chapters anyway...)

Fave Quotes:

"But lo! men have become the tools of their tools"

"A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone."

"If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them."

"A lake is the landscape's most beautiful and expressive feature. It is Earth's eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature."

"As for the pyramids, there is nothing to wonder at in them so much as the fact that so many men could be found degraded enough to spend their lives constructing a tomb for some ambitious booby, whom it would have been wiser and manlier to have drowned in the Nile, and then given his body to the dogs."

"I had three pieces of limestone on my desk, but I was terrified to find that they required to be dusted daily, when the furniture of my mind was all undusted still, and threw them out the window in disgust."

"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. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion."

READ, ACT, REPEAT!

Comment by Michele Hipwell (27 July 2009):

Waldon is one of my favourite books, Mike. Thoreau was a very wise man.   I would like to add another of my favourite author, Roger Deakin - One of his last books 'Wildwood: A Journey through trees' is truly memorable.  Each chapter is self contained and I like to dip in and out of the book, chapter by chapter. Deakin tells us of his own experiences and observations, his house, sleeping in the open air but also effortlessly includes writings and comments from botanists, biologists, naturalists, film makers, writers, philosophers, local farmers and many more into his tales. He adds his deep thoughts and wisdom to his tales - Just a wonderful book   Michele