Henry David Thoreau

Lore & Background

Thoreau was born David Henry Thoreau in Concord, Massachusetts, into a modest New England family. His father was a pencil maker of French Protestant descent, and his maternal grandfather led Harvard's 1766 student 'Butter rebellion'. He studied at Harvard College between 1833 and 1837, living in Hollis Hall and taking courses in rhetoric, classics, philosophy, mathematics, and science. After graduating, he taught briefly but resigned rather than administer corporal punishment, then opened the Concord Academy with his brother John, introducing progressive concepts like nature walks. The school closed when John died of tetanus in 1842.

Thoreau returned to Concord and met Ralph Waldo Emerson, who took a paternal interest in him and introduced him to a circle of local writers and thinkers. Emerson urged Thoreau to contribute to The Dial, and his first essay there was 'Aulus Persius Flaccus' in July 1840. Thoreau moved in with the Emersons from 1841 to 1844, serving as tutor, editorial assistant, and gardener. He later worked in his family's pencil factory, improving pencil-making by using clay as a binder, and converted the factory to produce plumbago for electrotyping. In April 1844, he and a friend accidentally set a fire that consumed 300 acres.

Reader's Guide

Thoreau's significance lies in his dual legacy as a literary naturalist and a political philosopher. His book Walden, reflecting on simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay 'Civil Disobedience', arguing for citizen disobedience against an unjust state, have had enduring influence. His philosophy of civil disobedience later shaped the political thoughts of Leo Tolstoy, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr. Thoreau's writings interweave close observation of nature, personal experience, pointed rhetoric, and historical lore, anticipating modern ecology and environmental history. He advocated abandoning waste and illusion to discover life's true essential needs. Sometimes retrospectively called an anarchist, he is more properly regarded as a proto-anarchist. His literary output exceeds 20 volumes, including journals and poetry. His distinctive appearance included an aquiline nose and deep-set blue or gray eyes. The pronunciation of his name has been disputed: contemporaries said it rhymed with 'thorough' (THURR-oh or THAWR-oh), but modern American English speakers commonly mispronounce it thə-ROH.

Did You Know?

• Thoreau refused to pay the five-dollar fee for a Harvard master's diploma, saying 'Let every sheep keep its own skin.'
• He accidentally set a fire in April 1844 that consumed 300 acres.
• None of Thoreau's siblings married; all four died of tuberculosis except John Jr., who died of tetanus.
• His name was originally David Henry Thoreau; he began calling himself Henry David after college.

Notable Quotes (Wikiquote)

"I am a parcel of vain strivings tiedBy a chance bond together,Dangling this way and that, their linksWere made so loose and wide,Methinks,For milder weather." — Henry David Thoreau "But now I see I was not plucked for naught,And after in life's vaseOf glass set while I might survive,But by a kind hand broughtAliveTo a strange place." — Henry David Thoreau "Let us not underrate the value of a fact; it will one day flower in a truth." — Henry David Thoreau "Great God, I ask thee for no meaner pelfThan that I may not disappoint myself,That in my action I may soar as highAs I can now discern with this clear eye." — Henry David Thoreau