I've always loved Thoreau's words, though I'll be damned if I can quote many of them to you...I don't seem to have a mind that's good at quotations. But Thoreau is a great American thinker and I love his words, sometimes because I'm sure I know what he means and sometimes because I wonder if he's messing with me.
I generally take the things he says about his walks around Concord at face value; they're sometimes tedious but there's always something fresh in them that makes me think he meant it the way I hear it in my mind.
Other times (like happens with the quote you quote above) I'm not sure what he was getting at. I'm not sure what Thoreau would consider a "slight moral tinge"-then again, I don't find him to be the stick-in-the-mud a lot of people who knew him in life seem to; I find a sense of humor in him. "Beware of enterprises requiring new clothes" is true, but also funny. There are a bunch more of them in Walden and in his journals; don't ask me page numbers. :)
We're dealing with a guy who professed that if friendship had to be discussed it wasn't friendship of the highest order...and I won't even try to figure out that whole "jailed for failure to pay poll-tax" story, though if I could it'd sure be interesting, not least in light of the quotation you offer.
Thoreau is an interesting person and a true American. I'm not sure what that means, but I'm sure it means something.
I've always loved Thoreau's words, though I'll be damned if I can quote many of them to you...I don't seem to have a mind that's good at quotations. But Thoreau is a great American thinker and I love his words, sometimes because I'm sure I know what he means and sometimes because I wonder if he's messing with me.
ReplyDeleteI generally take the things he says about his walks around Concord at face value; they're sometimes tedious but there's always something fresh in them that makes me think he meant it the way I hear it in my mind.
Other times (like happens with the quote you quote above) I'm not sure what he was getting at. I'm not sure what Thoreau would consider a "slight moral tinge"-then again, I don't find him to be the stick-in-the-mud a lot of people who knew him in life seem to; I find a sense of humor in him. "Beware of enterprises requiring new clothes" is true, but also funny. There are a bunch more of them in Walden and in his journals; don't ask me page numbers. :)
We're dealing with a guy who professed that if friendship had to be discussed it wasn't friendship of the highest order...and I won't even try to figure out that whole "jailed for failure to pay poll-tax" story, though if I could it'd sure be interesting, not least in light of the quotation you offer.
Thoreau is an interesting person and a true American. I'm not sure what that means, but I'm sure it means something.
Thanks for the post, JR!