The Compositional, Lecture, and Publication Histories of Henry David Thoreau’S “Walking” Read Ecocritically

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Beyond the Book: The Compositional, Lecture, and Publication Histories of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walking” Read Ecocritically

By Jennie Lynn Walker

B. A. May, 1997, Salisbury State University

M. A. May, 2001, Salisbury State University

A Dissertation submitted to

The Faculty of The Columbian College of Arts and Sciences Of The George Washington University In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

January 31, 2010

Dissertation directed by

Christopher Sten Professor of English

The Columbian College of Arts and Sciences of The George Washington University certifies that Jennie Lynn Walker has passed the final examination for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy as of 4 September 2009. This is the final and approved form of the dissertation.

Beyond the Book: The Compositional, Lecture, and Publication Histories of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walking” Read Ecocritically Jennie Lynn Walker

Dissertation Research Committee:

Christopher Sten, Professor of English, Dissertation Director

Ann Romines, Professor of English, Committee Member

Sandra Petrulionis, Professor of English, Pennsylvania State University, Committee Member

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Dedication

The author wishes to dedicate her work to Joseph Gilbert who has taught me to follow my bliss, and who, in Thoreau’s spirit, embraces the sauntering life from his little mountain top home each day, and in memoriam of Bradley P. Dean, a true Thoreau scholar and friend.

The author also wishes to dedicate her work to her family for their continual support of her academic pursuits: for my parents who gave me every educational opportunity; for baby Ellie whose refusal to let me put her down kept me grounded in front of my computer while she slept blissfully on my lap through the writing of much of this work; for big sister Livi whose daily reminder complete with hugs that “after mommy is a doctor, we can go to the beach” was often the encouragement I needed to keep plugging away; and finally to my husband, Chad Wollenweber, for his unwavering patience and faith in me every step of the way, without whom this project never would have been written.

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to acknowledge the generosity of her dissertation committee. To her director, Professor Christopher Sten: I could not have asked for a more supportive, encouraging, and dedicated director. No detail was too small for your thought-provoking comments that served to enhance the project. To committee member Professor Sandra

Petrulionis: your research and revisionary suggestions and enthusiasm for the project were always welcome rewards of my work with you. To committee member Ann

Romines: your positive remarks coupled with questioning seemed to strike just the right balance on my drafts. Thank you all for creating such a positive final step in my pursuit of the Doctorate of Philosophy, and for helping to make that pursuit a success.

Abstract of Dissertation

Beyond the Book: The Compositional, Lecture, and Publication Histories of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walking” Read Ecocritically

This dissertation offers an analysis of Thoreau’s lecture career that ultimately establishes

his success in that role; provides a detailed ecocritical reading of “Walking’s”

compositional and lecture histories; and analytically synthesizes all known extant

information regarding the publication history of “Walking.”

Chapter one provides an overview of the project and explains the need for an

examination of pertinent biographical elements that impacted the development of

Thoreau’s lecturing and writing. This chapter evidences the need for an ecocritical

analysis of the seemingly extra-textual events that arguably served as the crux of the

evolution of his work. Chapter two’s comprehensive examination of Thoreau’s lecturing

career calls into question previous scholarship that overwhelmingly considers Thoreau’s

lecturing career to be quite unsuccessful. Rather, historical and biographical evidence

proves that Thoreau achieved more than a modicum of platform success, not the least of

which is the literary legacy of his lecture-essays. Chapter three considers the

development of his “Walking” lecture-essay, giving particular attention to its

environmental significance. An ecocritical, biographical analysis of the compositional

and lecture histories of “Walking” evidences the development of Thoreau’s ecocentric

paradigm. Extant correspondence and Journal passages reveal the symbiotic relationship

between Thoreau’s writing and lecturing that are the outgrowth of his excursions in

nature. Chapter four examines “Walking” beyond Thoreau’s lecturing by providing textual publication history from the initial 1862 Atlantic Monthly printing to editions of printed as recently as 2008. In particular, substantive textual emendations that were likely unauthorized, yet still printed in many contemporary editions, are here explored.

Through its examination of Thoreau’s lecture career, ecocritical reading of the compositional and lecture histories of “Walking,” and detailed study of the publication of the essay, this dissertation provides an analysis of heretofore unexplored avenues of

Thoreau research that reveal a great deal about the author and his writing. Ecocritically examining Thoreau’s world beyond the text evidences biographical elements that impacted the composing, revising, and publication of the essay, and ultimately help to explain the philosophical development of Thoreau’s ideas that led to the ecocentric paradigm he outlines in “Walking.”

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Table of Contents

Dedication iv

Acknowledgments v

Abstract of Dissertation vi

Table of Contents vii

Chapter 1: Introduction: Thoreau’s Creating Imagination 1

Chapter 2: An Uncommon Success: Thoreau’s Lecturing Career 20

Chapter 3: The Flowering of a Work: An Ecocritical Examination of the Compositional

and Lecture Histories of Thoreau’s “Walking” 100

Chapter 4: Heretic of Concord: The Publication History of Thoreau’s “Walking” 208

Works Cited 282

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Thoreau’s “Creating Imagination”

Henry David Thoreau’s environmental legacy is often mentioned in literary

scholarship about the writer and his works, yet even with the recent surge of reading texts with nature in mind, there is much left to explore regarding the writings of this most famous author. In particular, while a good deal of ecocritical 1 analysis has been done

regarding Thoreau’s “Walking,” this essay remains fertile ground for scholars. Though

not as famous as Walden , and perhaps not as politically fiery as “Civil Disobedience” or

“A Plea for Captain John Brown,” Thoreau’s “Walking” is a radical text that can be

considered the heart of his contribution to the environmental movement; it is the crux of

Thoreau’s environmental thought, his ecocentric manifesto. Thoreau himself believed

this work to be a defining moment in his life, writing across the top of a lecture draft, “I

regard this as a sort of introduction to all that I might write hereafter” (Dean, “A Sort of

Introduction” 1). 2 The essay was refined over a span of more than ten years, yet how

Thoreau grew the work from journal entries, to lyceum lectures, to the published text has

been little studied. The extended genesis of “Walking” took even longer than the seven-

1 Cheryll Glotfelty writes that “ecocriticism is the study of the relationship between literature and the physical environment” (xviii). In the following study, I take that definition one step further by considering how the physical environment was elemental in the very shaping of Thoreau’s literary pursuits – in particular, “Walking.”

2 See Bradley P. Dean, “A Sort of Introduction.” Thoreau Research Newsletter 1 (January 1990): 1-2. This text is difficult to locate in libraries, but it is available via the World Wide Web at the Thoreau Reader where it has been reprinted with permission from the author: www.thoreau.eserver.org\sortof.html.

year span in which he wrote Walden , the development of which has been finely explored in J. Lyndon Shanley’s The Making of Walden . In some respects the following study of

“Walking” parallels Shanley’s work on Walden ; both consider the compositional, lecture,

and publication histories of their respective texts. Shanley, however, examines the

manuscript pages of Walden and provides an early version of that text. My work with the

genesis of “Walking” led me in a different direction – specifically, to an examination of

the two most significant biographical influences on the text: Thoreau’s lecturing career

and his pursuits in nature. In particular, understanding the development of “Walking”

reveals the importance of the text on the formation of Thoreau’s environmental

philosophy. In other words, while the final published text has received much study,

almost nothing has been written concerning the seminal process of Thoreau’s writing of

the essay that was deeply rooted in his public self (Thoreau as lecturer) and his personal

experiences (Thoreau as explorer of nature). Further, the author’s correspondence with

friends provides significant information concerning his lecture career, his works, and his

writing process. Moreover, an examination of the voluminous journal evidences

passages incorporated into his essays. Less explicitly, Thoreau’s journal reveals the

study, observations, and experiences that influenced his writing, many of which were

recollections, notes, and philosophical ponderings regarding Nature. Most significantly,

examining Thoreau’s study of and excursions in nature demonstrates the crucial influence

his natural pursuits had on his writing of “Walking.” Examining Thoreau’s lecture career

and experiences in nature during the more than ten year period in which he developed

this essay so essential to his life’s work reveals just how closely related these

biographical aspects truly are to his writing.

This new scholarship on Thoreau with particular reference to his lecturing, nature study, and excursions is a version of the kind of study that goes beyond a critical examination of the text, the scholarship that Hershel Parker argues is very much needed since it can potentially reveal much more about the author and the text than is currently known. This more comprehensive study “makes the facts about composition and revision a part of the proper study of texts and . . . takes relevant biographical and textual evidence fully into account” (Adams and Ross 5). As Stephen Adams and Donald Ross, Jr. write,

Parker urges us to see literary works in this broader and dynamic context, rather

than focusing all of our interpretive energies on a fixed, authorized, and

determined product. Our interpretations can thus point to writings whose

meanings have changed as they were being composed, and whose meanings are

liable to further change as they are read by later generations. Parker invites us to

consider literary texts as manifestations of the creating imagination, rather than as

final Works that somehow got bound into matched sets at the ends of the creators’

lives. A romantic view of a world of becoming rather than being is thus quite

appropriate, especially for writers like Thoreau . . . , whose ideas were in flux. (5-

With Parker’s recommendation in mind, the following study of “Walking” offers an examination of the most pertinent biographical influences on the essay’s writing:

Thoreau’s lecturing career and his relationship with nature. Following a comprehensive examination of Thoreau’s lecturing career, an ecocritical examination of the compositional and lecture histories of “Walking” answers Parker’s call for a study that takes “relevant biographical and textual evidence fully into account” (5).

In particular, in an ecocritical analysis of the textual composition and lecture histories of “Walking,” the present study considers what Thoreau was doing and where he was during his writing, revising, and lecturing of this essay. Given that “Walking” may be considered Thoreau’s environmental manifesto, place-oriented biographical evidence is particularly significant for a more complete study of the lecture-essay than has previously been written. For example, the essay’s opening discussion about the

“saunterer” can be traced to Thoreau’s 10 January 1851 Journal reflection regarding his own sauntering in the snowy hills and woods of his beloved Concord. As with the transitory nature of the walk itself, the writing of “Walking” was a continually evolving work in progress for more than ten years. Particularly, the composing and lecturing elements of the textual development of “Walking” are conjointly considered in this study since his lecture was concurrently written and revised during the years in which Thoreau publicly presented the work.

Rounding out the study is a final chapter on the publication history of “Walking.”

While much new critical thought is offered in chapters two and three, this final section is primarily a synthesis of all known extant information about the essay’s publication as gleaned from a variety of sources. Making this information available in one place will serve for further scholarly research. Additionally, the chapter offers more information than has heretofore been explored regarding the publication of “Walking.” Substantive textual emendations that were made after Thoreau’s submission of the copy-text but before publication of the essay are here noted and examined ecocritically. In other words, I argue that the text as Thoreau wrote it is essential for understanding his ecocentric paradigm. The overall scope of the present study, then, is to offer an analysis

of Thoreau-as-lecturer that ultimately establishes his success in that role; to provide a

detailed ecocritical reading of “Walking’s” compositional and lecture histories; and to

analytically synthesize all known extant information regarding the publication history of

“Walking.”

Begun in 1826 after the publication of Josiah Holbrook’s seminal work,

“Associations of Adults for Mutual Education,” in which he called for an organization for

social and individual improvement, the American Lyceum quickly became the place for the dissemination of public knowledge. Although established with the idea of mutual education and a sense of harmony among all participants, lyceums in many towns soon became the vehicle for exploring radical thought. As entertaining as some lyceums may have been, the educational intent of the association as determined by Holbrook remained a fundamental principle of most individual lyceums throughout their existence.

Undoubtedly, it was the educative mission of the organization that so attracted Thoreau.

For him, the lyceum offered a place to learn as a participatory audience member and, later, to share his study as a lyceum lecturer. Ordinarily not a man to involve himself in public affairs, Thoreau’s active participation in the lyceum was a highly influential experience that demonstrably impacted the development of his life and writings.

As with his sometimes discordant scientific and philosophic natural history studies, Thoreau also felt torn between two worlds as a lecturer. At times he anxiously prepared to delve into making his living as a professional lecturer, but more often

Thoreau harshly criticized the very audience on which his lecturing depended. Yet this public venue offered Thoreau a new medium for refining his thoughts as he pored over journal passages and lecture drafts to find the words that would best illustrate his

ecocentric understanding of the world. Unlike some on the lecture circuit, Thoreau did

not write entertaining essays simply to please his audience, but rather he spoke about

what he knew best – his experiences. At times this meant his lectures contained material

that offered a critique of the very social fabric of which his audience was made, such as

he does in “Life Without Principle,” and more often than not this meant that his lectures

revealed what he learned from his experiences in nature, as he tells the “moose story” in

his Maine Woods lectures. Regardless of his lecture topic, Thoreau was more comfortable in the woods and fields than in the public sphere of the lyceum lecturer.

Ultimately, then, Thoreau’s acceptance of himself as a lecturer was always somewhat

tenuous.

Most extant scholarship concerning Thoreau’s lecture career claims that he

attained very little success on the lecture platform, yet a detailed examination of his

involvement in the lyceum movement demonstrates otherwise. For example, from 1854

until 1860, his last year on the lecture circuit, Thoreau was advertised as a lecturer as part

of Horace Greeley’s selective and very popular New York Tribune list. Those who find

Thoreau’s lecturing career to be less than stellar often base their claims on the dollars

Thoreau earned (usually ten to twenty dollars per lecture, when he was paid at all), the number of lectures he presented (seventy-four in twenty-two years), and the handful of negative comments he received from a few of his auditors. Early biographers such as F.

B. Sanborn and Henry Salt record Thoreau’s apparently less than enthusiastic presentation of “dry details,” while Walter Harding writes that Thoreau’s ideas must be read rather than heard to be understood. Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag mention that he only earned a few hundred dollars during his twenty-two years of

7 lecturing, and that during some years he presented no lectures at all. With respect to historical data regarding lyceum lecturers, however, Thoreau’s earnings and the number of readings he presented are not as paltry as critics claim. Indeed, while his success may not be as lucrative in dollars earned or lectures presented as a handful of other popular lecturers, Thoreau presented at least a moderate number of lectures and earned a better than average sum. In addition, comments from those who heard Thoreau lecture were, in the main, quite positive. Moreover, measured beyond dollars earned and numbers of lectures given, his career on the platform may indeed be considered quite the success.

Particularly, Thoreau’s moderate number of lecture engagements afforded him the time he required to pursue his interests in Nature. In turn, what Thoreau gleaned from his natural explorations was then woven into his writings and lectures. For example, many of

Thoreau’s published writings, such as his most famous Walden , his travel narratives Cape

Cod and the Maine Woods , and his environmental manifesto “Walking,” are derivative of his lectures and are in turn rooted in his natural study and exploration. Both the popularity and the canonization of Thoreau’s lecture-writings are thus cause for considering him a successful lecturer.

Thoreau’s success as a lecturer is owed mainly to the considerable attention he devoted to his writing and study. Examining the compositional and lecture histories of just one of Thoreau’s essays, “Walking,” for example, demonstrates the many dimensions of his “creating imagination.” The writing of the lecture-essay was certainly a labor of love for Thoreau, for its very language is often gleaned from his personal journal thoughts, the essay reflects his passion for nature, and the development of the essay spanned more than ten years. Initial excerpts from his journal as far back as his 1842-44

Journal 3 provide the springboard for thoughts included in his first lecture draft, which was most likely written between late fall 1850 and early 1851. Further examination of the Journals reveals that the genesis for the composition of “Walking” may be identified in Journal passages as late as February of 1852. These excerpted and refined Journal passages account for upwards of one-fourth of “Walking, and so whether presented as a lecture or read as an essay, the work contains a deeply personal quality. While scholars have long known that Thoreau gleaned passages from his Journal to write his lectures and essays, and despite the number of identified parallel passages between his Journal and his finished writings, no comprehensive study of the Journal passages that comprise the published text of “Walking” as yet exists. As such, one element of the chapter on the compositional and lecture histories of “Walking” (chapter three) will be the identification of these Journal passages. These selections reveal that Thoreau developed his essay over slightly more than ten years. During most of these years, he also presented it in lecture form. In fact, a compositional and historical study of the essay reveals that he most likely wrote the original essay as a lecture in anticipation of a lecture tour to the West. 4

From journal passages and early lecture drafts, Thoreau continued to refine his work on this text until he had so much material he split the lecture in two sometime between his 31 May 1851 presentation and his 23 May 1852 lectures. He also subsequently began culling material from the two lectures for his essays on “Moonlight” and “What Shall it Profit?” By May of 1854, “Walking” and “The Wild” were two fully

3 The exact date of some of Thoreau’s early Journal passages that appear in “Walking” cannot be definitively determined.

4 The “West” of the nineteenth century meant the “Old North West,” or the “Mid-West” today. Thoreau’s lecturing plans also included travel to Ontario, or “Canada West,” as it was known in his day.

9 developed, closely related texts that served him well on the lyceum lecture circuit; on a number of occasions he read one essay in the morning and the other in the evening to the same audience. Thoreau continued over the next six years to refine his now two companion lectures and to share them with audiences in diverse locations, from nearby

Worcester, Massachusetts to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In fact, Thoreau’s lecturing and composing appear to have gone hand-in-hand. Although Thoreau’s Journal and correspondence are filled with his retorts to his audience, that very audience served him well by indirectly assisting in his revision processes. The audience provided Thoreau with a venue where he could share his ideas, and how he was received by his auditors certainly influenced his subsequent composing and revising.

Given the interdependent nature of the concurrent composition and lecture processes in which he engaged, the specific lecture history of “Walking” is also here examined. All known extant factual details about Thoreau’s lecture presentations of

“Walking,” such as the locations, dates, and times of each presentation, are noted.

Additional information includes all known extant reviews, journal comments, and related correspondence. In addition, as evidence in chapter three attests, Thoreau’s proposed lecture tour to the West may not have been only a driving force in the composition of the essay, but also an influential element in shaping the actual subject matter of “Walking.”

Consider, for example, that the “West” is itself a major element of the text and a favorably portrayed one at that-- both literally and symbolically. In addition to the biographical element of Thoreau’s proposed tour to the West, other places in nature, such as fields, forests, and brooks, are briefly mentioned in the lecture-essay. Significantly, for a work that has long been considered one of Thoreau’s late natural history writings, it

carries very little of the detailed observations of specific places, plants, or animals that

are elemental in his natural history writings. As such, while nature figures predominantly

in the text, the lecture-essay is not a work about concrete locations or elements in nature

so much as it is about Nature in the abstract – the idea of Nature, or, more particularly,

Wildness. The most significant “places” in “Walking,” then, are not the glosses Thoreau

gives to forests and brooks, but rather the discussion he provides about the “Wild,”

“Wildness,” the “West,” and the place of “walking” itself – an always, already transitory

act in the making. These abstract conceptions of place are crucial for the ecocentric

philosophical understanding of the lecture-essay.

Further analysis beyond what Thoreau mentions in the text reveals how his place-

based experiences outside of the lecture hall may have impacted the writing and revising

of his work. Explorations of places during his lecture travels certainly influenced his

writing, as did the various natural pursuits that he undertook throughout the more than

ten-year development of “Walking.” Commenting in his Journal about a walk with Ellery

Channing in November 1851, for example, Thoreau contrasts his and his companion’s

“roughness of character” with that of those who “stay . . . in the house,” a contemplation that finds its way into the lecture-essay. 5 Significantly, as revealed in chapter three, the

life he lived during the time he wrote and presented “Walking” was itself an example of

the emphatic witness for Wildness that Thoreau espoused in his lecture-essay. Thoreau’s

very personal, intimate relationship with the natural world is evident through the recorded

study of his excursions in his Journal and in letters to friends. Whether exploring the

5 The walking companion to whom Thoreau refers in the text, although never named, is undoubtedly Channing. As biographical evidence makes clear, Channing was Thoreau’s most faithful and favored walking companion. See Walter Harding, The Days of Henry Thoreau: A Biography (Princeton: Princeton University press, 1982) 233-34, 270-72, 279-82, 292-95, 360-61, 431-33.

11 local woods and swamps of his hometown or climbing mountains in New Hampshire and

Maine, Thoreau’s sauntering experiences reveal the pull of nature on his life. In fact, walking in nature was so important to him that he wrote in “Walking” itself, “I think that

I cannot preserve my health and spirits, unless I spend four hours a day at least-- and it is commonly more than that-- sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields, absolutely free from all worldly engagements” (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 187).

Already most often a very private soul, Thoreau entered a place of solitude in his mind during his natural excursions-- even when in the company of others. In point of fact,

Thoreau was most often willing to undertake natural excursions with only a handful of men, in the presence of whom he could continue his rather solitary course of study. More often than not, however, Thoreau sauntered alone. This solitude gave him the requisite freedom to step outside of conventional thought and explore the human place in nature.

These private understandings gleaned from his thoughts in nature were the fodder for his sometimes philosophical, sometimes critical, and even at times comical writings.

In addition, his work as a surveyor served an important role for the development of his thought. For example, Thoreau uses surveying and the surveyor both literally and metaphorically in Journal passages that find their way into “Walking,” one time even situating the surveyor as the “Prince of Darkness” (191). On occasion, surveying also provided a means for securing lecture engagements. For example, after having been hired to survey the grounds of Marcus Spring in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, he was able to present three lectures, one of which was “Walking,” before the Eagleswood community that Spring directed. Monetarily, combining his two occupations made perfect sense, but surveying offered something more to Thoreau than dollars. It also gave

12 him a new way of thinking about the world of nature. In a sense, surveying grounded a man apt to build his “castles in the air” and kept him involved in the affairs of men while concurrently serving as fodder for his writing. Yet surveying also linked him to the commoditization of nature that he often despised. Textual examination of “Walking” with

Thoreau’s surveying in mind demonstrates the extensive impact this line of work had on his writing of the lecturer-essay. Most notably, given the importance of specific locations to surveying, this work might be considered ecocritically. 6 Whether through surveying swamps, walking in fields, or observing forest trees from the train window as he travelled to lecture, the study of nature was undoubtedly Thoreau’s greatest passion, a passion that he transcribed into his Journal, lectures, and essays. After surveying swamps, for example, Thoreau uses this experience as an occasion for philosophical pondering in his

Journal as he considers the real worth of swamps and the sacred aspect of the Wild.

Thoreau’s Journal passages about surveying, the swamp, and sacred Wildness are not only central ideas in “Walking,” but the very passages he includes in his Journal concerning these issues are incorporated into his lecture-essay. As this example makes evident, it is through such experiences and writing that Thoreau’s nature-minded philosophical thoughts were thus developed. In particular, Thoreau’s rather radical philosophical ponderings on nature as revealed in “Walking” are evidence of his ecocentric paradigm.

Given Thoreau’s attention to ecocentrism in the lecture-essay as well as his influential nature study, chapter three is primarily ecocritical in scope. In particular, an

6 In the near future, I hope to study the role of Thoreau’s surveying as it pertains to “Walking” in greater detail than the present study allows. For example, I plan to examine Thoreau’s survey records that are housed in Special Collections in the Concord Free Public Library and to consider the particular surveying ventures that may have influenced Thoreau’s writing and lectures of “Walking.”

ecocritical examination of the historical situatedness of the lecture-essay reveals that the

formation of American environmentalism is deeply rooted in nineteenth-century ideas

about nature that were manifest in artistic endeavors of the time. Considered within the

scope of nineteenth-century environmental history, the significance of Thoreau’s

ecocentric essay is made all the more evident. Study reveals that Thoreau’s ideas about

nature were more radical than most of his contemporaries’. While James Fenimore

Cooper lamented the unavoidable passing era of America’s frontier and celebrated the

inevitable demise of the “noble savage” in his Leatherstocking Tales, for example,

Thoreau wrote that man is “ part and parcel ” of the very nature he is destroying.

Emerson’s seminal work, “Nature,” proclaimed an important place in his philosophy for nature, but the essay remained utilitarian; for Emerson, nature was most important as a symbol and source of higher knowledge. Thoreau, on the other hand, challenged the anthropocentric existence of humans presumed by most people, telling his lyceum audience that the preservation of the world depended upon Wildness (Moldenhauer, ed.,

Excursions 202). While Margaret Fuller and William Bartram travelled west and recorded their findings in excursion narratives and natural history works, Thoreau remained in the east, yet it is his work that goes beyond mere descriptions of plants and birds, landscapes and prairies to define the west metaphorically as “another name for the

Wild.” While other authors lamented the end of the great western frontier and the subsequent demise of the Indian 7 and the buffalo, Thoreau noted the necessity of the

Wild for both the physical and spiritual sustenance of all beingness – from that of plants and animals and humans to the existence of culture. Although nature itself was

7 The term “Indian” is here used given the nineteenth-century context.

14 increasingly featured as a popular element and sometimes character in nineteenth-century writing and art, as in the work of Thomas Cole, for example, Thoreau’s ideas remained on the fringes of thought; that the Wild as opposed to humans is the center of things was indeed a radical position to take, especially in Protestant New England.

But to be a radical in nineteenth-century New England had its benefits. The

United States was seeking a unique identity about which it could be proud--one that would distinguish it from the Old World, and so its populace was willing to entertain the notions of radical thinkers. There were anti-slavery reformers, temperance advocates, and suffragettes, for example. By the middle and into the late 1800s, the reform subculture had become so popular that it reached mainstream audiences – often through the popular American institution, the lyceum. While the “radical” ideas about “Wildness”

Thoreau shared on the lecture platform were not those of a typical nineteenth-century reformer, such as the teetotaling John B. Gough or abolitionist Wendell Phillips, that he presented ideas that were outside of the norm is evident even in the opening of

“Walking.” As Thoreau writes,

I wish to speak a word for Nature, for absolute Freedom and Wildness, as

contrasted with a freedom and Culture merely civil, - to regard man as an

inhabitant, or a part and parcel of nature, rather than a member of society. I wish

to make an extreme statement, if so I may make an emphatic one, for there are

enough champions of civilization . . . (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 185)

Thoreau must have felt he had something important to share, given that he presented

“Walking” more often than any other single lecture. Included in chapter three, then, are all known extant factual information regarding the compositional and lecture histories of

“Walking”; nature study and experiences that may have influenced Thoreau’s writing and presentation of the lecture-essay; historical elements that influenced the author’s thoughts, writing, and readings of the work; and an ecocritical reading of the textual development of “Walking.”

Finally, the fourth chapter of the present study provides a comprehensive, detailed record of the publication history of “Walking.” From philosophical ponderings developed through natural experiences, to journal passages, letters, and conversations shared with friends, to writings and rewritings of lectures, to a refined essay for publication, Thoreau ruminated over his ideas until final publication. The published form gave the text a sort of finality; no longer was the lecture in a fluid state of perpetual revision and rewriting. Although Thoreau most likely wrote “Walking” specifically for the lecture circuit, once his impending death was certain, he was eager to see the work into print. On the lecture platform, Thoreau was face to face with an audience of whom he often did not approve, but the published text offered Thoreau a way to distance himself from the reader. Still, the published form provided Thoreau with a medium through which to reveal his most deeply considered and intimately felt thoughts. The publication of “Walking,” then, may be understood as the culmination of everything that came before it. The essay retained the conversational tone of the public lecture, inviting the invested reader to embark on a “walk” with him, yet the published form did not leave behind the often deeply personal quality that carried over from experiences in nature,

Journal reflections, and subsequent philosophical ponderings that are central elements of the published text.

It was at the request of James T. Fields, editor of the Atlantic Monthly , that

Thoreau ultimately prepared “Walking” for publication. When Thoreau was not able to

do the work himself due to his final illness in the months before he died, his sister Sophia

would serve as his amanuensis, transcribing his words, often as he read them to her. The

essay was prepared rather hastily, given that Thoreau knew his time was indeed short.

He began final preparations in late February of 1862, submitting the essay to Fields

shortly thereafter on 11 March 1862. It was published posthumously in the June Atlantic

Monthly 1862 issue, only a few short weeks after Thoreau’s death on 6 May 1862.

Subsequently, Fields published three other essays that Thoreau prepared for publication

before his death. The first time the essay appeared in book form it was included in a

collection of Thoreau’s essays entitled Excursions . Thoreau certainly would have

approved of a collection of his essays, once writing that he would rather write books than

lectures (Torrey, ed., Journal 7 :79; 6 December 1854). It first appeared singly in book form in the early 1900s, and since that time has frequently been anthologized, excerpted, condensed, and quoted. Examination of published versions reveals a variety of uses and interpretations of the essay. For example, in some cases, excerpts from the essay simply made for pretty books of quotations about nature, while in others the text has been used to tout environmental causes. In addition, a survey of publications of the essay reveals the increasing popularity of the text. As a lecturer Thoreau may be said to have achieved a sort of local celebrity status, given that more than sixty of his seventy-four lectures were presented in Massachusetts, but the published form of “Walking” demonstrates Thoreau’s posthumous success that extends far beyond his home state. It has been widely printed throughout the United States, and its popularity beyond those bounds continues to

increase. For example, the year 2007 saw at least five United States publications of

“Walking,” either singly or in collections of Thoreau’s works. Moreover, the essay is

now available in at least ten languages.

Presently the most authoritative edition of the essay is found in the scholarly

Princeton University Press edition of the Writings of Henry D. Thoreau . This edition

corrects a number of significant, probably unauthorized editorial changes that were

heretofore included in all previous publications of the essay. Although he claimed

otherwise, as editor of the Atlantic Monthly , Fields was most likely responsible for the

substantive changes made to “Walking” sometime between Thoreau’s March 1862

submission of the copy-text and the June 1862 publication. Significantly, these apparent

liberties were taken with Thoreau’s essay in spite of his insistence in letters to Fields that

no changes be made without his express permission. Given Thoreau’s insistence, his past

dealings with obtrusive editors, and his passion for what was written in “Walking,”

unapproved changes to his work certainly would have riled him. What Fields edited out

were references to heterodox Christianity and nature, such as his dropping “both of

heaven and earth” from a passage about man going beyond the laws of God and nature

(Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 216). The changes Fields here made are similar to those made by previous editors who had altered Thoreau’s works without his consent. The passages in “Walking” were most likely emended so as not to offend the Atlantic Monthly readership who may have considered Thoreau a heretic and pantheist. Compounding the impact of the changes Fields made is that these changes were, at least until the 2007 publication of Princeton’s edition of “Walking,” never corrected in the published text.

For over one-hundred and forty-five years, what readers of Thoreau’s “Walking” have

18 considered Thoreau’s own words have been Fields’ edited version of the author’s text, unapproved by Thoreau. From an ecocritical standpoint, some of these changes may have significant implications for how one reads Thoreau’s essay and comes to understand

Thoreau’s spiritual development. As discussed in chapter four, for example, “both heaven and earth” is a crucial phrase as it provides context for Thoreau’s spirituality. In sum, the final chapter is a compilation of previously scattered facts regarding the publication of Thoreau’s “Walking”; it goes beyond what has heretofore been examined by considering the trajectory of the publication history of the essay since its early days; and it offers an ecocritical interpretation of the unauthorized substantive textual changes that have recently been corrected in the 2007 Princeton University Press edition of The

Writings of Henry D. Thoreau .

The present examination of Thoreau’s lecture career, ecocritical reading of the compositional and lecture history of “Walking,” and detailed study of the publication history of the essay reveal a great deal about the author and his writing. To return to the view of Hershel Parker, this study provides a window into Thoreau’s “creating imagination” that includes the composing and revising processes of writing which are integral though not always immediately evident when examining a writer’s craft. In particular, given the time and attention Thoreau gave to composing and revising

“Walking,” a study of the essay may be rendered incomplete without such consideration.

The biographical evidence considered in the present examination also contributes to a more complete study of “Walking.” Specifically, examining such biographical information from an ecocritical standpoint offers a relevant dynamic context for the evolution of the text given that during the time of its making, Thoreau’s travel, studies,

19 lecturing, and writing point to nature as his central concern more often than to any other subject. Ecocritically examining Thoreau’s world beyond the text ultimately reveals a number of significant elements that figure prominently in the composing, revising, and publication of the essay, and ultimately help to explain the philosophical development of

Thoreau’s mind that led to the ecocentric paradigm he outlines in “Walking.”

An Uncommon Success: Henry David Thoreau’s Career as Lecturer

Of all of the misconceptions about Henry David Thoreau, one of the most prominent must be that he was a hermit who lived deep in the woods, far from civilized life. Quite the contrary, Thoreau spent many of his years living within the town limits of

Concord where he also worked at times in a variety of fields – pencil manufacturing, teaching, and surveying, to name just a few. Even when living outside of town and during his two year sojourn in Walden Woods, Thoreau made almost daily forays into

Concord to visit with friends and family, or to transact some sort of business. In other words, Thoreau was by no means the hermit he is often mischaracterized as. Rather, in some of Thoreau’s pursuits, he may be viewed more as a man deeply involved in nineteenth-century popular culture than as someone who tried to escape from it. Most significantly, Thoreau’s involvement in the lyceum movement and on the lecture platform speaks to his social engagement in the world of public culture that drew him beyond the ponds and woods of Concord.

Surprisingly very little has been written about Thoreau’s lecture career – almost nothing until Walter Harding published his 1948 “A Check List of Thoreau’s Lectures” in the Bulletin of the New York Public Library . In 1995 and 1996 respectively, Bradley

P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag published “Thoreau’s Lectures Before Walden: An

Annotated Calendar,” and “Thoreau’s Lectures After Walden: An Annotated Calendar.”

Together, Dean and Hoag’s two essays provide the majority of what is now known about

Thoreau’s lecture career. In addition, there are a handful of very brief articles about

Thoreau on the lecture platform and a couple of scant mentions of Thoreau’s lecturing by

21 his biographers: Canby, Salt, and Harding, for example. In this modicum of scholarship exists a common thread; the authors are all of the same mind that Thoreau’s lecturing was not very successful. Based on journal entries, letters, and critical responses, these writers agree that Thoreau ultimately did not lecture enough times, earn enough money, or please enough people with his orations to be a successful lecturer. For example, F. B. Sanborn wrote that Thoreau lectured with “no marked success” (382). Walter Harding allows that

Thoreau’s audience may have liked some of his humorous passages well enough, but on the whole notes that “Thoreau was not a particularly effective speaker,” and that “his more profound writings were probably too concentrated to be appreciated by the ear alone. They needed to be read slowly and carefully to be completely understood”

(“Lecture Platform” 372). Hubert Hoeltje writes that Thoreau probably “enjoyed no great financial success as a lecturer” (493). Dean and Hoag break furthest from the critical pack by allowing that while Thoreau’s lecture career may not have amounted to much in numbers or in dollars, a significant number of his listeners approved of what they heard. Still, Dean and Hoag ultimately judge Thoreau’s lecture career to be quite paltry. Certainly he did not achieve such high notoriety as his friend and neighbor, Ralph

Waldo Emerson, who lectured throughout the United States and even traveled abroad

(Bode, American Lyceum 221-23). No doubt he did not earn as much as the likes of

Henry Ward Beecher, who in ten years earned some $30,000 (213-14). Nor did he present as many lectures as John B. Gough, who reportedly lectured about three hundred times a year between 1842 until about the start of the American Civil War (211-12).

Yet Thoreau’s time in the lecturing world may indeed be judged a grand success.

The notoriety he achieved, the dollars he earned, and the duration of his career as

examined below challenge the notion that he was not a successful platform lecturer.

With respect to historical data, Thoreau can certainly be said to have found more than a

modicum of platform success. Also, Thoreau’s involvement in the lyceum movement

itself greatly influenced his life and subsequently his writings, many of which he first

shared on the lecture platform. Thus, examining Thoreau’s role within the lyceum

movement can help the reader better understand the development of Thoreau’s thoughts

and writings. Judged today, the works Thoreau was prompted to write that he might go

a-lecturing are themselves evidence of his lecture success. In addition to the resultant

lecture writings at our disposal today and his conventional success behind the podium,

Thoreau achieved a rather unconventional success as a lecturer. Examined from

Thoreau’s vantage point, this sort of success was of the greatest value, for despite the

promptings of others, he was unwilling to give more of himself than the lecture platform

demanded him to give, allowing him time to pursue studies and experiences outside of

the lecture hall. Most specifically, Thoreau’s somewhat limited lecture demands provided

the time he needed for his natural exploration and study. Ultimately, Thoreau’s lecture

success may be examined on three levels: studied as part of the lyceum movement,

judged by conventional standards of dollars earned and lectures given, and considered in

concert with Thoreau’s rather unconventional ideas such as the freedom his “limited”

lecture engagements allowed - all demonstrating that he may be said to have achieved a

good deal of success as a platform lecturer.

As history would have it, the American lyceum was in its heyday during the years

that Thoreau offered his services as a lecturer (1838-1860). 8 Begun in Millbury,

8 Dean and Hoag note Thoreau’s first lecture as his reading during his Harvard College commencement exercise in 1837. Here I have indicated 1838 as the year that began Thoreau’s lecture career because it was

Massachusetts shortly after the October 1826 publication of Josiah Holbrook’s

“Associations of Adults for Mutual Education” in the American Journal of Education , the

American lyceum quickly came to be the instrument for the dissemination of public

knowledge. In Holbrook’s essay he describes his plan for the establishment of a system

of lyceums throughout the country. In addition, he provides the following justification

for his proposed organization:

It seems to me that if associations for mutual instruction in the sciences and other

branches of useful knowledge, could once be started in our villages, and upon a

general plan, they would increase with great rapidity, and do more for the general

diffusion of knowledge, and for raising the moral and intellectual taste of our

countrymen, than any other expedient which can possibly be devised. (qtd. in Ray

193-4)

Holbrook’s hope was for all American people to share their knowledge with one another

for self improvement and social betterment through an organized network of associations

that he called lyceums. Town lyceums would encourage shared, useful knowledge that

would foster moral and economic development. Educational topics, most particularly

the year of his first appearance before the lyceum – the institution through which he made his name known as a lecturer, and because in his Journal Thoreau notes his 1838 lecture before the Concord Lyceum as his first. This is the only exception I make to Dean and Hoag’s definition of the lecture: “. . . a lecture is Thoreau’s (or, in one instance, a representative’s) continuous and public delivery of a text that Thoreau himself composed in advance of delivery. We do not regard as lectures, then, Thoreau’s unscheduled and apparently frequent private readings to small groups of friends or family members. And we regard as two separate lectures Thoreau’s deliveries of what were apparently single lecture texts that he split for particular occasions, reading half in the morning, for instance, and the other half later in the day.” See Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “Thoreau’s Lectures Before Walden : An Annotated Calendar,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1995): 127. See also Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “Thoreau’s Lectures After Walden : An Annotated Calendar,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1996): 241-242.

scientific-- but almost all of a useful nature-- were to be geared to the masses rather than

to elite scholars. But Holbrook’s associations were also not intended only for laymen,9 as

were most of the British mechanics’ institutes. 10 Rather, Holbrook had in mind a

congregation of people not divided by class.

However, despite Holbrook’s claim that the lyceum would be inclusive of all, its

very naming speaks of its exclusivity since it references a knowledge shared by

predominately college educated Americans – most often upper-class, Protestant white

men. Holbrook’s grand notion of the American lyceum harkened back to the Athenian

Lyceum, “the garden with covered walkways adjacent to the temple of Apollo Lyceus

where Aristotle taught his pupils in the fourth century B.C.E.” (3). Another indication of

its recherché meaning, “lyceum” is “a Latin word derived from a Greek epithet for the

god of the sun” (3). Other associations with the term include the eighteenth-century

Lyce’e in Paris that promoted natural sciences, and the early nineteenth-century Lyceum

of Natural History in New York (Bode, American Lyceum ix-xii; Ray 3-4). Nonetheless,

Holbrook had an immense faith in his vision of the lyceum-for-everyman and vigorously

promoted its growth, even publishing and distributing pamphlets to encourage the

establishment of his planned organizations. In spite of the lyceum’s naming and

sometimes exclusivity, Holbrook’s enthusiastic promotional efforts paid off so much that

by the late 1820s and throughout the 1830s there was a burgeoning of lyceums in towns

9 Bode seems to suggest that Holbrook had in mind primarily the education of mechanics, farmers, and other lay-workers. But the actual making of the American lyceum was much more of a melding of people from a variety of backgrounds. Each lyceum followed its own course, but many certainly counted chief among its members well educated, high-minded men. This point is discussed further in the present chapter.

10 For details relating the influence of the mechanics institutes on the American Lyceum, see Carl Bode, The American Lyceum: Town Meeting of the Mind. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1956) 3-10.

throughout New England. 11 One of those towns was Concord, Massachusetts, the site of

the pivotal organization that served as the introduction into and the mainstay of

Thoreau’s lecture career.

The Concord Lyceum was established 28 January 1829 with the well respected

Dr. Ezra Ripley elected as president. Its first season the Lyceum boasted fifty-seven

members (Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 111). Some three hundred people attended the initial public lecture, “Popular Superstitions,” presented by Reverend

Bernard Whitman on 28 January 1829 (Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum 112). Just three years later, the Concord Lyceum had almost doubled its membership, as is noted in the

Yeoman’s Gazette of 11 February 1832:

The Concord Lyceum was organized Jan. 7, 1829; -- holds its meetings from the

third Wednesday in September to April – conditions of membership: $1.00 per

annum, which allows the admission of three ladies, or a family of children. –

Persons under 21 years of age and others living without the limits of the Centre

School District, for half price. Number of members about 100. Exercises consist

in Lectures, Discussions, and Instrumental Music. (101) 12

11 For more on the formation, growth, and impact of the lyceum on American society – especially as it relates to New England, see Carl Bode, The American Lyceum . See also Angela Ray, The Lyceum and Public Culture in the Nineteenth-Century United States (East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 2005).

12 A number of meetings were held before the first public lecture on 28 January 1829, including an initial meeting of Concord residents to agree upon the establishment of the lyceum on 3 December 1828. For further information on this and other information about the Concord Lyceum, see Kenneth Walter Cameron, ed., The Massachusetts Lyceum During the American Renaissance: Materials for the Study of the Oral Tradition in American Letters: Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne and Other New-England Lecturers (Hartford: Transcendental Books, 1969). See also Kenneth Walter Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau Speak: Lecturing in Concord and Lincoln During the American Renaissance: Chapters from The Massachusetts Lyceum. (Hartford: Transcendental Books, 1972). With permission, those interested may

While each lyceum developed its own constitution and determined the trajectory of its

meetings, Holbrook’s influence was undoubtedly evident in many of the Concord

Lyceum’s early lectures. As minutes noting lecturers and topics indicate, many –

especially the early lectures - were of a scientific nature. For example, in the first season

some of the topics were: “On Raising an Orchard,” “On Optics,” “Botany,” “On

Chemistry,” “On Astronomy,” and “On Natural History” (Cameron, ed., Emerson and

Thoreau 113-16). Too, the ‘useful” quality of readings that Holbrook believed was an

essential element of lyceum lectures was an integral component of the early Concord

Lyceum. As Lyceum records indicate, even the very first lecture was described in the

minutes as an “interesting and useful [my italics] lecture” (112). That same evening

Ripley gifted Holbrook’s “American Lyceum” pamphlet to the organization. Further evidence of Holbrook’s influence on the Concord Lyceum is that in the first season a goodly portion of its funds was used to procure a number of scientific instruments, to purchase a cabinet of minerals for geologic study, and to buy the first installments of the

Lyceum’s library (Bode, American Lyceum 189; Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau

110). These basic materials were both practically and symbolically signs of the course of

the Lyceum’s study.

Each season since its January 1829 establishment, Concord Lyceum officials

would meet annually in September or October to prepare for the lecture season, and after

about one-hundred dollars were raised, the lecture schedule would be arranged.

Concord’s Lyceum had no building to call its home; meetings were held in “a local

academy building, the more centrally located Centre Brick School House, the vestry of

also view the original two volumes of the Concord Lyceum Record Books that are housed in the Concord Free Public Library, Concord, Massachusetts.

the Orthodox Meeting House, and the vestry of the First Parish” (Ray 22) until 1851, at

which time and thereafter meetings were held in Concord’s Town Hall (Walcott 18). At

times it also met in the Masonic Hall, the location in which Thoreau shared his first

Concord Lyceum lecture. As described in the Record Books of that organization, the

Masonic Hall ‘“may be so arranged as to seat 165 persons comfortably and conveniently,

with elbow room & leg room in sufficiency. By diminishing the elbow room a little,

about 200 persons can be seated, with room for others to stand, should this ever be

necessary’” (Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum 142).

As the aforementioned advertisement indicates, cost for lyceum membership was one dollar annually for men who lived within Concord’s center school district, and one dollar for those who lived beyond that area. Boys under the age of eighteen could become nonvoting members by paying half of the membership fee. A life membership could be purchased for ten dollars. Although some lyceums were restricted to men only, Concord’s lyceum allowed up to two women and children to attend lectures as guests of paying men, a practice that was continued until 1837 when women without a male to admit them were permitted gratuitous attendance (Petrulionis 174, fn 59). Despite the elitist air that some lyceums had, many lyceums saw the attendance of domestic workers and farmers, and

Concord was no exception. The likes of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathaniel

Hawthorne would be seen in the Concord Lyceum, but so too would house servants and mechanics. In 1830, a Judge Cummins noted that in Worcester, Concord, and

Northampton people brought their hired help so that all might benefit from the lectures

(Ray 25-26). Of Emerson’s lectures a farmer remarked that he could understand them

quite well, while one young woman noted that she did not understand much of what he

had to say, but she liked to listen to him talk anyway (Bode, American Lyceum 222-23).

A varied audience was enriched by the quality of lectures offered. While most

lyceum lectures were based on Holbrook’s idea of mutual instruction at least until about

1840, Concord Lyceum records indicate that the public lecture was an integral part of the organization from its inception (Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum & Emerson and Thoreau ;

Ray 33; Bode, American Lyceum 40, 189). Drawing from its own learned townsfolk as well as those in nearby Cambridge and Boston, Concord Lyceum officials had high standards from the start. As Carl Bode points out,

[Concord] had a remarkably intellectual community to draw on, and the result

was that it enjoyed better than average lectures at a lower than average cost.

Emerson, who tried out most of his lectures on his fellow townsmen, did so gratis

and – since he was Emerson – gave his hearers far more than most of them would

have gotten from other lecturers even by paying generously. ( American Lyceum

189)

While the Concord Lyceum may have turned to the public lecture earlier than most, it remained traditional by holding strong to its educational focus for a longer period than many of the other lyceums. For example, when other lyceums turned to entertaining, vaudeville style lectures, the Concord Lyceum offered lectures on “Geology and

Chemistry as Applied to Agriculture” (8 Nov. 1843), the “Rights of Woman” (31 January

1849), and “Old England and Young America” (19 December 1855), which was described as “a very elaborate & valuable lecture, delivered in [a] most scholarly style”

(Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 158; 163; 170). That is not to say that Concord’s

Lyceum lectures were without entertainment value or void of a popular influence. Even

in its early days records indicate that there was room for less serious, more popular

lectures: In its first season, for example, Nehemiah Ball presented a very entertaining yet

still scientific lecture, “On Natural History,” “accompanied with splendid representations

from the Phantasmagoria Lantern” (115). So entertaining did Concord’s audience find

Ball’s lecture that he was asked to repeat it twice. As Carl Bode writes,

The truth is . . . that despite the fame which Concord has acquired as the result of

a considerable number of philosophers and literary lights living in its midst and in

its general vicinity, the citizens of Concord were like the people of any other

village of the time. For the most part they were practical, hard-working Yankees, .

. . . [and] the average Yankee mind had little use for . . . [transcendental]

‘nonsense.’ ( American Lyceum 189)

Rather than be presented with a high-minded, transcendental lecture, at times the

Concord audience longed for a “more popular style of lectures” (Low 34) than Lyceum officials and local “celebrity” lecturers were likely to provide, and so the overall interest of the audience members may have, on occasion, waned. At least one attempt was made to address the often highly intellectual offerings of the Concord Lyceum as early as 1842.

Perhaps taking their cue from other local, more popular-minded lyceums, Bronson Alcott and Edward Jarvis proposed that the Concord Lyceum should have ‘“a more social character,’” but others argued the change would ‘“detract[t] somewhat from the dignity of the association to introduce soft talk and courting times”’ (qtd. in Walcott 22;

Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum 156). Interestingly, Thoreau was one such audience member who longed for the high-minded tenor of the Lyceum; some visiting lecturers, he

30 felt, were simply men of great elocution who really had very little worth saying. As he wrote, “‘Mr. Chapin lectured this evening, and so rhetorically that I forgot my duty and heard very little’” (qtd. in Low 32). On another occasion he wrote to Emerson,

We have had Whipple on Genius, - too weighty a subject for him, with his

antithetical definitions new-vamped, - what it is , what it is not , but altogether

what it is not; cuffing it this way and cuffing it that, as if it were an India-rubber

ball. Really, it is a subject which should expand, expand, accumulate itself before

the speaker’s eyes as he goes on, like the snowballs which the boys roll in the

street; and when it stops, it should be so large that he cannot start it, but most

leave it there. Hudson, too, has been here, with a dark shadow in the core of him,

and his desperate wit, so much indebted to the surface of him, - wringing out his

words and snapping them off like a dishcloth; very remarkable, but not

memorable. Singular that these two best lecturers should have so much ‘wave’ in

their timber, - their solid parts to be made and kept solid by shrinkage and

contraction of the whole, with consequent checks and fissures. (Harding and

Bode, eds., Correspondence 199)

Apparently Thoreau preferred substance to soliloquy, education to entertainment. His opinion, however, was increasingly not in the mainstream of lyceum goers, as the latter examination of his own lecture career proves. Certainly Concord Lyceum audience members were varied in their opinions of just what the substance of lectures should be, for in truth, they attended lectures for a variety of reasons; “Some [were] urged by a pure love of knowledge and literature, others simply [came] for amusement, some perhaps to escape for an hour the sad memories of the days that are dead” (Walcott 28). In some

instances, audience members amused themselves at the expense of others. Concord

Lyceum records indicate a handful of occasions on which committees were formed for

the express purpose of squashing the antics of unruly boys (24-5). In the main, though,

the audience was at least a well behaved crowd.

Thoreau undoubtedly participated in the Concord Lyceum as an audience member

well before he penned his remarks about lecturers who had “so much ‘wave’ in their

timber,” but just when he became a member of the Lyceum is unknown. Canby writes

that he probably joined when he was twelve, but he may have attended meetings from the

time of the Lyceum’s establishment a year earlier in 1829 (Harding, “Lyceum” 2). That

children aged eight and older were permitted to attend public meetings of the Lyceum

(Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 111), and that Thoreau’s mother greatly

encouraged educational opportunities for herself and her children only increases the

likelihood of Thoreau’s early attendance (Harding, Days 29 & “Lyceum” 2).

It was through Thoreau’s involvement in the Concord Academic Debating

Society, however, established in 1822, that Thoreau was given his first opportunity to

undertake a sort of lyceum-like endeavor, yet he did not leave a very positive mark there.

George Moore, the Society’s secretary, noted Thoreau’s poor preparedness for one

debate, commenting that acting as secretary in Moore’s absence, Thoreau neglected to

keep the records. On 9 October 1829, Thoreau debated Rockwood Hoar on the following

question: “Does it require more talents to make a good writer than a good

extemporaneous speaker?” Arguing the affirmative, Thoreau lost (Harding, Days 28).

Little else is known of Thoreau’s involvement in the short-lived Debating Society, which took its fourteen active members and merged with the Lyceum on 11 March 1829

(Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 114 & Mass. Lyceum 29). Notably, neither

Thoreau nor his brother, John attended this decisive meeting. The merger of the two

organizations was logical given that debating was a major part of the Concord Lyceum,

particularly in its early days, as the Record Books indicate (Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum

& Emerson and Thoreau Speak ).

Despite his earlier poor showing in the Debating Society, a bit older, more learned

Thoreau participated in Lyceum debates upon his return home from Harvard. On a

Wednesday night in late January of 1841, together with his brother John, Henry debated the affirmative to the question, ‘“Is it Ever Proper to Offer Forcible Resistance?’”

Arguing the negative was Bronson Alcott. The debate was undecided and resumed 5

February; still, there was no vote (Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 155). Given the tenor of the day regarding the issue of slavery, surely this was a very controversial issue for the Lyceum to consider, and one that was soon to be of further concern within the

Lyceum. Too, the event may be said to foreshadow the few non-lyceum lectures Thoreau was to share almost twenty years later with his fellow townsfolk regarding John Brown.

In any case, Thoreau must have argued his position here somewhat more convincingly than he had done as a debater in the now defunct Concord Academic Debating Society, given that this Lyceum debate was at least left unresolved. Or perhaps Alcott was not as worthy an opponent as Rockwood Hoar. Unsuccessful as it was, Thoreau’s involvement in the Concord Academic Debating Society gave him the opportunity to try his debating skills and may have provided a road to his early days as part of the Concord Lyceum.

Given the merger of the two organizations, it is likely that he was a member of the

Lyceum from the year of its inception and, less the years he lived away from Concord,

was an active member for the rest of his life. Surely the many lectures Thoreau heard

there influenced his own path as a public speaker. As Walter Harding speculates, likely

“the numerous lectures he heard on geology, botany, and ornithology . . . were an

important factor in developing just such interests in Thoreau himself” (Harding, Days 29)

– interests that would lead him to write his own natural history lectures.

While Thoreau took nature for a subject of many of his lectures, in his first foray

into the lyceum he presented a lecture of a more public scope. At the age of twenty,

Thoreau delivered “Society” before the Concord Lyceum on 11 April 1838 in the

Masonic building located in the center of town. The essay’s roots are in his 14 March

1838 journal entry in which he has quite a bit to say about his fellow men (Harding, Days

72 and “Lyceum” 2-3). Little record of this event is left; his first lecture is quite simply

noted as number nineteen in a course of twenty-six that season in the Concord Lyceum

Record Books. In fact, Emerson’s proposed course of lectures gets more of a mention

than does Thoreau’s actual lecture that evening:

Concord Lyceum, April 11 1838 Rev. Mr. Frost informed the Society that Rev.

R. Waldo Emerson had kindly and generously volunteered to deliver his course of

Lectures before the Lyceum. Whereupon, on motion of Hon. Daniel Shattuck, it

was Voted – That the Lyceum thankfully accept Rev. Mr. Emerson’s offer. After

which Mr. David Henry Thoreau 13 of Concord delivered a Lecture on Society .

Adjourned. H.B. Dennis, Secretary. (Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum 148).

13 Despite reversing the order of his name from “David Henry” to “Henry David,” Thoreau’s fellow townspeople continued to call him David Henry Thoreau - or D.H. Thoreau, as he is often noted in the Concord Lyceum Record Books. See Kenneth Walter Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum & Emerson and Thoreau Speak .

The only other known record of this first lecture is in Thoreau’s journal for 27 December

1855 in which he notes, “Wrote a lecture (my first) on Society, March 14 th , 1838, and read it before the Lyceum in the Masons’ Hall, April 11 th , 1838” (Torrey, ed., Journal 8 :

66) 14 Thoreau would subsequently deliver many more lectures before his hometown

Lyceum over the next twenty-two years, but his involvement in the Concord Lyceum was to be much more of a part of Thoreau’s life than the two dozen hours he spent on his hometown lecture platform might indicate.

Just one year after his college graduation and the same year he presented

“Society” to his fellow townspeople, Thoreau was elected secretary and curator of the

Concord Lyceum (1838). As curator, Thoreau was responsible for “prepar[ing] the winter’s program, obtain[ing] the lecturers, and provid[ing] a heated and lighted hall to hear them” (Harding, “Lyceum” 2). Throughout the remainder of the 1830s and throughout the 1840s, Thoreau took a very active role in the Concord Lyceum both as an officer and as a lecturer. He served as secretary from 18 October 1838 through 15

December 1840. Only one month after beginning his secretarial position, in November of 1838 he was elected to serve his first term as curator. Nominated to serve another term as both secretary and curator on 20 November 1840, he declined both roles, but he was again asked to serve as a Concord Lyceum officer 18 November 1842. Although officially Thoreau declined this election as curator, Concord Lyceum Record Books indicate that he served (Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden” 129; Hoeltje 490, fn 9;

Harding, “Lyceum” 2). Thoreau’s journal also indicates his role as curator for the 1842-

14 The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau Princeton University Press edition is the preferred scholarly source for Thoreau’s writings. Some volumes of his Journals have yet to be released. When such is the case, the 1906 edition is thus cited, Bradford Torrey, ed.

1843 lecture season. Having arranged a very admirable list of presenters- and that for a

very economical rate- Thoreau bragged in his journal, “How much might be done for a

town with $100: I myself have provided a select course of twenty-five lectures for a

winter, together with room, fuel, and lights, for that sum, -- which was no inconsiderable

benefit to every inhabitant” (qtd. in Harding, “Lyceum 2” & Days 142-3). Ever frugal,

Thoreau’s pride in having arranged such a handsome list of lyceum lecturers for such a

low rate was warranted, yet it might be noted that Concord had an unusual wealth of local

talent on which to draw, which meant that on many occasions lecturers would provide

their services at no cost. Emerson, for example, provided ninety-eight lectures before the

Lyceum over fifty years, and for none of these did he accept any remuneration (Hoar 7).

Nonetheless, as early as 1831 the Concord Lyceum was at least reimbursing travel

expenses, and by the mid 1840s it was paying a standard ten dollars for expenses and

lecture services. The 1850s saw an increase from ten to between twelve and twenty

dollars to cover the cost of lecture services and travel expenses, and costs only increased

in the decades that followed. Yet these amounts were a bit lower than what other town

lyceums might pay; 15 because of the centrality of Concord itself, the town was well

situated to receive the rich diversity of local area lecturers whose expenses getting to and

from Concord remained quite low, and so Concord curators had an easier time keeping

expenses reasonably minimal than did those in many, less well located towns (Bode,

American Lyceum 190-91). In addition, the opportunity to spend time conversing with

Concord’s local celebrities may have been a draw to out of town lecturers who may have

15 New England lyceums typically paid about twenty to thirty-five dollars for lecturers in the 1850s, but sometimes fees as high as one hundred dollars could be collected by the most popular of lecturers. See Carl Bode, The American Lyceum , 190-191.

36 otherwise charged more substantial rates. Whether due to outstanding management, its central location, or Concord’s local celebrity status, some years the Lyceum had a surplus of funds (Low 41). Still, some seasons were not so successful, possibly owing to an overall United States economic downturn as the country drew ever closer to the Civil

War. In 1856 Thoreau wrote to his good friend, Daniel Ricketson, “. . . our Lyceum has been a failure this winter for want of funds. It ceased some weeks since, with a debt, they tell me, to be carried over to the next year’s account” (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondence 414). As Concord Lyceum records indicate, through much of the 1850s and into the 1860s, it was regularly voted not to proceed with securing lecturers until substantial funds had been raised so as to avoid a funding shortfall. Still, some years a deficit remained (Cameron, ed., Mass. Lyceum 164-74). Fortunately, Thoreau did not meet with such troubles during his terms as curator in the 1830s and 40s, for he always managed to provide an admirable list of speakers for a relatively low cost. Maybe it was

Thoreau’s stretching of the Lyceum dollar that so pleased members with his performance as curator, for he was asked to assume the curatorial position numerous times.

One special circumstance under which Thoreau was elected was amidst Lyceum controversy that had been brewing for the past few years. In 1842 abolitionist Wendell

Phillips was asked by Thoreau to speak before the Concord Lyceum. When he read his lecture, Phillips presented an open and direct presentation on slavery before the Concord

Lyceum. Phillips was again to read before the Concord Lyceum, except when his impending lecture was announced, a number of members felt the topic of slavery was not in keeping with the purposes of the lyceum. A resolution was later put forth and debated:

“Resolved that as this Lyceum is established for Social and Mutual improvement the

introduction of the vexed and disorganizing question of Abolitionism or Slavery should

be kept out of it” (Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 156; Ray 28). The resolution was

likely prompted by Phillips’ earlier controversial lecture. Considered on at least two

occasions, the resolution was defeated (Harding, Days 176). In his biography on

Thoreau, Sanborn wrote that Thoreau notified Phillips that some Concord residents were then gathering to discuss Phillips’ censure, but as Sandra Harbert Petrulionis points out in her study of the antislavery movement in Thoreau’s Concord, no evidence exists to support Sanborn’s claim (175, fn 3). What is certain is that Concord conservatives must have been defeated since Phillips spoke as scheduled. Still, the Concord Lyceum was divided over the issue so that the following year when the question of inviting Phillips back for a third lyceum appearance was put to a vote (21-15 in favor of Phillips’ return), two curators resigned in protest of extending another invitation to him (Cameron, ed.,

Emerson and Thoreau 160). In The Lyceum and Public Culture in the Nineteenth-

Century United States , Angela Ray posits that “According to some members of the

Concord Lyceum, ‘improvement’ connoted personal inculcation of received ‘facts,’ not knowledge of political agitation or efforts to improve the lives of others” (Ray 29). Yet lest one be too hard on those in Concord who felt slavery was an inappropriate topic for the lyceum, we should remember that one of Holbrook’s original intents was to bring people together for mutual education. Holbrook did not find a place for politics or religion in the lyceum given that these topics were of a controversial nature, and slavery was certainly a quite controversial, divisive political issue of the day. Arguably, some considered slavery to be a religious issue as well – especially Concord women, including

Thoreau’s family and friends. That the Concord Lyceum even approved of Phillips’

participation in its proceedings on at least three occasions demonstrates the liberal,

Concordian mind; the resolution that did not pass in Concord, Bode explains, would have

easily passed in most, less forward-thinking lyceums ( American Lyceum 32). Perhaps

Concord Lyceum members recognized that while slavery was in fact a discordant political and probably religious issue, it was of even bigger moral concern.

To answer the resignation of Keyes and Frost on 5 March 1845, Thoreau, along with Emerson and Samuel Barrett, became curators of the Concord Lyceum (Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau 160; Harding, Days 176). There is no doubt that Thoreau supported the abolitionists’ participation in each of the Concord Lyceum seasons in which he lectured; he initially invited Phillips to offer his first lecture before the Concord

Lyceum, and he assumed the curatorial role when conservative officials resigned rather than consent to allow Phillips to lecture before the Lyceum for a third time. Thoreau’s

1845 co-curatorship was to be the last Lyceum office he held, for although he was again sought as curator on 2 November 1853, he declined reelection. Likely, Thoreau would not have even accepted his 1845 position had it not been for the firestorm that put him there. In other words, Thoreau most likely agreed to assume his curatorial role in 1845 simply because he felt so strongly about what Phillips stood for: abolition of slavery.

Thoreau’s assumption of the curatorial role was itself a form of protest against slavery and a vote of support for the abolitionist cause espoused by Phillips. Thoreau’s lectures on “Resistance to Civil Government,” 16 “A Plea for Captain John Brown,” and “The Last

Days of John Brown” are a further testament of his support for the abolition of slavery.

16 The text was later titled “Civil Disobedience”

Despite sometimes declining re-election, Thoreau was elected as a Concord

Lyceum officer no less than five times. Even Emerson, in his fifty year involvement in

the organization was curator only three times (Cameron, ed., Emerson and Thoreau &

Mass. Lyceum ). Remembered today as a man who did not join institutions, Thoreau’s dedication to this particular society is quite sure. The lyceum proved to be the rare kind of organization of which Thoreau approved; it was dedicated to learning and it was a unique American enterprise. As Thomas Wentworth Higginson wrote in 1868, the lyceum lecture was one of the ‘“signs and appliances of American social order,’” “a means by which ‘the measured footstep of advancing civilization’ was treading across the

North American continent” (48). The Lyceum was a uniquely American enterprise, ‘“a living shuttle, to weave together this new web of national civilization”’ (49). A town like

Concord felt established with the presence of the lyceum; its existence made it part of the

“national civilization” (Ray 174). That Thoreau thought highly not only of his hometown lyceum but of the lyceum itself is evident in a statement he writes in Walden : “The one

hundred and twenty-five dollars annually subscribed for a lyceum in the winter is better

spent than any other equal sum raised in the town. . . New England can hire all the wise

men in the world to come and teach her” (qtd. in Harding, “Lyceum” 3).

Even after Thoreau’s stints as a Lyceum official, his involvement in the institution

never waned. From his first appearance before the Concord Lyceum in 1838 until his last

in 1860, Thoreau presented twenty-three known lectures. In addition, he presented three

non-lyceum lectures in Concord, two regarding John Brown in 1859, 17 and “The

17 Thoreau’s lectures presented in Concord regarding John Brown are as follows: 30 October 1859 in the Vestry, First Parish Meeting House: “The Character and Actions of Capt. John Brown” & 2 December 1859 in the Town Hall: “The Martrydom of John Brown.”

Succession of Forest Trees” in Concord’s Town Hall on 20 September 1860 at the

Middlesex Cattle Show (Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 309, 325, 339). Together,

Thoreau’s twenty-three lyceum lectures and three non-lyceum lectures add up to an average of more than one lecture each year for a twenty-two year period before his

Concord audience.

Of his audiences, Thoreau undoubtedly felt most at home with his Concord neighbors, for while he turned down a handful of lecture opportunities, no evidence exists to suggest that Thoreau ever missed an opportunity to lecture before his fellow townspeople – notably, a service for which he never accepted pay. Although he was not reimbursed for his Concord Lyceum lectures, his townsmen gave him a critical audience where he could hone his public speaking skills and test his lectures before offering them beyond his hometown. Apparently his reception before his Concord audience was quite good, simply based upon the number of lectures he presented before them. In addition, on at least one occasion Thoreau was asked to repeat a lecture (Harding, Days 187-88;

Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 150). 18 Significantly, Thoreau spoke only three times outside of his hometown between 1838 and 1848: once in neighboring Lincoln and twice in Boston where he presented his two-part “Conservatives and Reformers”; during the same time period he presented ten lectures in Concord. Yet Thoreau did not always think his Concord audiences appreciated his lectures; “he complained in his journal about the perceived unwillingness of his townspeople to recognize him as a professional lecturer”

(Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 130).

18 Dean and Hoag speculate that Thoreau actually did not repeat the lecture, but offered the second part of his “A History of Myself”: “Before Walden,” 150.

Still, some of his most respected fellow town members thought a professional

lecture career was exactly what Thoreau should pursue. In a letter to her husband on 10

February 1843 Lydian Emerson wrote,

‘Henry ought to be known as a man who can give a Lecture. You must advertise

him to the extent of your power. A few Lyceum fees would satisfy his moderate

wants – to say nothing of the improvements and happiness it would give both him

& his fellow creatures if he could utter what is ‘most within him’ – and be heard.’

(qtd. in Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 141)

While the sentiments from his wife may have prodded him along, Emerson undoubtedly encouraged Thoreau to go a-lecturing from the start (Cameron, Lynn 162-3). In addition,

Emerson was not the only influential person who helped Thoreau with his lecture career.

Nathaniel Hawthorne may be held responsible for Thoreau’s first foray into the lecture world in Salem, Massachusetts, for it was through Hawthorne’s assistance that Thoreau presented his “Student Life in New England, Its Economy” in that seaside town. 19

Bronson Alcott also touted Thoreau’s superb readings, writing of Thoreau’s lectures in his journal and encouraging friends that they might invite Thoreau before their communities. For example, Thoreau’s three October 1856 lectures before the

Eagleswood Community were the result of Alcott’s encouragement.

Measured conventionally, however, Thoreau’s success as a lecturer may not appear to have been very great. In twenty-two years, he presented seventy-four public lectures, just under half of which he offered at no cost. Thoreau’s busiest calendar

19 Walter Harding notes Thoreau’s first Salem reading to be his first out-of-Concord lecture, but Dean and Hoag have since determined that Thoreau presented lectures in both Boston and Lincoln prior to his 22 November 1848 Salem reading. See Walter Harding, “Lyceum,” 3; Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden,” 139-45 & 148.

lecture year (1859) yielded only 10 engagements. His busiest lecture seasons were 1848-

9 and 1851-2; in each of which he presented only nine lectures (Dean and Hoag, “Before

Walden ” 128). 20 On average, Thoreau presented just over three lectures per year, “a

paltry figure for someone who aspired to be a professional lecturer in an age when many

men made a substantial income from lecturing,” Dean and Hoag claim (128). Again they

assert, “Ultimately, even if we allow for other undocumented invitations rejected for

reasons of health, work, schedule conflicts, or other contingencies, Thoreau’s career as a

lecturer was simply far less sizable than that of many other lecturers of his time, most of

whom presumably turned down their share of invitations too” (Dean and Hoag, “After

Walden ” 243). Horace Greeley’s enthusiastic advertisement for the 1854-55 lecture season seems to confirm Dean and Hoag’s claim. In Greeley’s 20 September 1854 New-

York Daily Tribune notice he writes,

the Lecture Season of 1854-5 will be more brilliant than any of its predecessors . .

. – there will be more Popular Lectures delivered, and to larger audiences, than

during any preceding autumn and winter. Nearly every City in the Free States,

with many of the Southern, will have its regular Course or Courses; some of them

as many as three; while at least half the considerable villages throughout the

North and West will have at least one Course. The most acceptable lecturers are

overrun with invitations, and are proffered compensation at much higher rates

than were current a few years ago. The largely increased attendance last winter

over that of any former season justified this advance; and, even at the highest rate,

20 The lecture season usually ran from late November until about the middle of April.

two or three of those most in request will be unable to answer all the demands

upon their time” (qtd. in Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 253).

The quite prominent lecture career at this time of Bayard Taylor, for example, also appears to support Dean and Hoag’s claim of Thoreau’s at best fair status as a lecturer.

Taylor could quite profitably fill his calendar despite turning down a number of requests, earning five thousand dollars for a single season (Bode, American Lyceum 217-19). Yet

Bayard Taylor is really the exception rather than the rule when it comes to measuring a lecturer’s success; most lecturers earned far less and certainly had fewer engagements.

Furthermore, Greeley’s enthusiastic advertisement was probably overdone, exaggerated to promote the lecture season itself. Still, even if one considers Greeley’s remarks about the 1854-55 lecture season to be accurate, his notice allows that only “ two or three ” [my italics] of those most in request will be unable to answer all the demands upon their time.”

In all actuality, relatively few persons achieved marked success as professional lecturers in antebellum America. Even when the lyceum was at its height in the late

1850s and early 1860s - when the popular lecturer reached what might be considered a sort of pop-culture status-- relatively few professed “lecturing” to be a career. For example, as Angela Ray notes, the United States census of 1860 shows only twenty-two people who claimed “lecturer” as a professional occupation-- this very slight number in a population of 31.5 million (37). Further evidence that there were rather few lecturers can be found in print media. The very same newspaper in which Horace Greeley touted the grand lecture season noted above provides a record of the popular lecturer and confirms the argument that relatively few were considered professional lecturers. His New York

Tribune list provides the most complete compilation of names of those who offered their

services as lecturers, a number of whom claimed lecturing only as a subsidiary form of

work. For example, Greeley’s list for one of the most successful lecture seasons, 1859-

60, includes only 202 lecturers (37)-- a list on which Thoreau’s name, it should be noted,

was included. In fact, Thoreau’s name appeared on Greeley’s list each time it was

published from 20 December 1854 through 27 October, 1860, the final year in which

Thoreau offered himself as a lecturer (Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 131 fn 2). That

Thoreau was part of Greeley’s short list of lecturers at all, and for a number of years, demonstrates at least some measure of his success as a lecturer and of his notoriety, given the wide circulation of the New York Tribune .

Many newspapers with a much more localized circulation included Thoreau on their lists of lecturers, especially those in and close to his home state. In five

Massachusetts communities alone, Thoreau presented fifty-one lectures: twenty-six in

Concord, nine in Worcester, seven in Boston, five in Plymouth, and four in Lincoln

(130). While Thoreau never became one of the nation’s most popular travel lecturers, given the moderate number of lectures he presented in Massachusetts, he may be said to have achieved a sort of local celebrity status. Outside of his home state, and particularly outside of New England, his popularity was more limited. He presented only ten lectures outside of Massachusetts, slightly less than one-third of his total number of lectures. Of these ten, he presented only two before 1854, both in Portland, Maine (21 March 1849 and 15 January 1851). Thoreau’s popularity outside of his home state slightly increased during the later part of his lecture career since the other eight readings he presented

outside of Massachusetts occurred between 1854 and 1860, his final lecture year. 21

Despite the small increase, Thoreau’s lecturing beyond Massachusetts was rather

minimal. Still, his success close to home is sure. While Thoreau may not have achieved

a great amount of fame beyond the East, he was certainly known well enough as a

lecturer in and around Massachusetts that he enjoyed some measure of celebrity and

secured at least a moderate number of engagements.

Thoreau never earned large sums for his lecturing. Of his seventy-five lectures,

Thoreau was paid for about forty of them-- usually about ten to twenty dollars, and that

payment was also to cover any travel costs he incurred. On rare occasions, he was paid

slightly more: twenty-five dollars on at least two occasions, and thirty for his final,

Waterbury, Connecticut lecture (Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 130; Clarke 2). Often

he would lecture without receiving a fee at all. When he did charge, his rates were

certainly not as high as some of the more popular lecturers, but one good lecture

engagement might still earn Thoreau more than he could expect in his other occupations:

pencil making and surveying, making each paying lecture engagement that Thoreau was

able to secure at least a modest financial success. In sum, he earned approximately $700

in twenty-two years of lecturing (Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 132, fn 8), netting

him an average of just under thirty-two dollars per year. Despite the seemingly paltry

earnings when compared with the handful of more successful lecturers who might earn

21 Thoreau’s lectures outside of Massachusetts include: one in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on 21 November 1854; one in Providence, Rhode Island on 6 December 1854; three in Perth Amboy, New Jersey on 26 October, 2 November and 16 November 1856; one in Amherst, New Hampshire on 18 December 1856; one in North Elba, New York on 4 July 1860, this “Thoreau lecture” read by abolitionist Richard Hinton rather than by Thoreau himself who did not make the trip to North Elba; and his final lecture in Waterbury, Connecticut on 11 December 1860. For details about these lectures see Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” and “After Walden .”

Thoreau’s total lecture earnings in a single year, the amount was substantial to a man

who professed that he could work one day out of seven to earn his bread. Moreover, the

lecture allowed Thoreau the opportunity to turn his study into a paying vocation. In other

words, Thoreau was able to pursue his writing, reading, and exploring – and earn a few

dollars from it. That he offered lectures at no cost on numerous occasions by no means

indicates Thoreau’s failure as a platform lecturer, for money was not his prime

motivator. 22 True, Thoreau was not paid the high fees received by the most popular

speakers, but he was, on occasion, invited to share his thoughts, provided with travel

expenses, and given moderate compensation besides.

Thoreau’s freedom aside, his never achieving great commercial and popular

success as a lecturer may be attributed to at least four causes: his meager presence behind

the podium and less than stellar elocutionary skills, his not always entertaining delivery

of the material, his lack of self-promotion, and his overall poor enthusiasm to distinguish

himself as a professional lecturer. Thoreau was not one of those men who demanded

attention simply by his very presence behind the podium. His small stature, rather

unassuming nature, and simple dress made him more suited to blend in in the fields and

forests than to draw the attention of his fellow men when he took to the lecture platform.

In addition, Thoreau “had a minor speech defect, a peculiar pronunciation of the letter r –

a sort of burr in it, Channing said” (Harding, Days 346). Perhaps Channing’s comment was a bit too critical, given that Thoreau’s Massachusetts’ audience before which he lectured most often was likely to have a similar accent. Still, criticism of Thoreau’s mannerisms and speech on the platform persisted; “he tended to bury his nose in his

22 What actually did motivate Thoreau to lecture is discussed below in the present examination of his unconventional success.

manuscript rather than keep his eye on his audience and occasionally mumbled his

words” (346). While friend Emerson was full of “genuine charm,” and “his integrity

[and] his love of mankind” were evident when he spoke (Bode, American Lyceum 221),

Thoreau was ‘“not inspiring’ and his voice . . . [was] not specifically musical”’ (Harding,

Days 346). Thoreau’s early biographer, Henry Salt, notes fellow Concord resident

Joseph Hosmer’s opinion of Thoreau on the platform: ‘“He was a poor lecturer. . . . He had no magnetism, and only gave simple dry details, as though he was before a jury to give his evidence under oath. Hence he never succeeded as a platform or lyceum speaker, which I think he desired to be’” (qtd. in Harding, “Lecturer” 172). John Burroughs reportedly remarked of Thoreau’s lecturing that a man who had once heard Thoreau lecture thought ‘“the audience did not know what to make of him. They came out, hardly knowing whether they had been sold or not. His coolness, his paradoxes, his strange and extreme gospel of nature, and evidently his indifference as to whether he pleased them or not, were not in the line of the usual popular lecturer”’ (Salt 150). Another early biographer, Henry S. Canby, called Thoreau a “poor lecturer” (135). Certainly Thoreau

“did not lack for critics and outright detractors, some of whom took exception not only to the alleged foolishness of what he said but also to the allegedly foolish manner in which he said it, to his platform demeanor and speaking voice” (Dean and Hoag, “After

Walden ” 244-45). A particularly colorful, anonymous letter writer in Worcester offered,

Henry D. Thoreau of Concord had better go home and ask his mother if she

‘knows he’s out.’ Doubtless she, (Nature) will say she missed him who is the soul

of Walden. Be satisfied, Thoreau, to be the soul of Walden-wood. To be frank

with you, you are better as a woodsman, or say, a woodpecker, than as a cockney

philosopher, or a city parrot, to mimic the voices of canaries or cat owls, of

Emerson’s, or Carlyle’s – . . . . (Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 183-4)

Clearly the reviewer did not approve of what Thoreau said, nor of how he said it.

Some enjoyed Thoreau’s message enough, but found fault with his demeanor. A reviewer in the Lynn Weekly Reporter for Saturday, 30 April 1859 noted,

‘We wish Mr. Thoreau had communicated some of the enthusiasm of his heart to

his words, for then we think his lecture would have interested many more than it

did. We feel compelled to say that we think he is a far better writer than a reader

or lecturer: and it is to us rather a mystery how a man with so much real fire, so

much wholesome love of the beautiful in nature, can be so tame, so dull, even, in

expressing the thoughts that fill his soul and pervade every part of his being. It is

an anomaly in human nature undoubtedly designed for some good purpose, but

wholly beyond our comprehension.’ (qtd. in Cameron, “Lynn” 162)

And no matter that Thoreau had numerous occasions to perfect his podium presence; a reviewer of his final lecture wrote this of Thoreau: ‘“as a popular lecturer [he] is evidently out of his element. In fact, as Artemus Ward would say, lecturing is not his

‘fort’” (qtd. in Clarke 4). In Waterbury’s ninth lyceum year, the reviewer continues,

Thoreau might just have been the biggest disappointment that the organization had ever faced. It should be noted that this reviewer gave high praise to Thoreau’s writing, so clearly in this case it was not what Thoreau had to say that so disappointed him, but how

he said it. In Thoreau’s defense, he lectured before the lyceum in Waterbury when he

was quite ill, so his platform demeanor may have even been less enthusiastic than usual.

Given such negative reviews, Ray asserts that “judged by all recovered responses,

. . . the truth seems to be that Thoreau was by no means a distinguished public speaker.

In an age of platform eloquence, when most of the lecture engagements went to the most engaging lecturers, he may be said to have suffered from an occupational disability”

(244-45). A distinguished speaker, maybe not, but Thoreau was well aware of the element of platform presence when he took to the lecture podium. As he writes in his

Journal of 6 February 1841,

When one gets up to address briefly a strange audience . . . he will in a few

moments – make that impression – which a series of months and years would but

expand. . . . In a public performer, the simplest actions – which at other times are

left to unconscious nature – as the ascending a few steps in front of an audience –

acquire a fatal importance – and become arduous deeds.” (Witherell, Howarth,

Sattelmeyer, and Blanding, eds., Journal 1 :251-2)

Still, no evidence exists to allow that Thoreau found fault in his public presence or that he

had in mind any plans to alter his platform demeanor. How he appeared before his

audiences was not of concern to him, but rather, what he had to say was his focus.

Probably Thoreau’s negative critics compared him to the great elocutionists of the

day. Primarily entertainers, these lecturers were not always concerned about what they

would say as much as about how they would say it – or even how they would look saying it. Bayard Taylor, for example, walked to the podium “dressed in his colorful Arab costume with a scimitar at his side” and was “a hawk-nosed, handsome world traveler”

(Bode, American Lyceum 217-18). Of Edward Everett, Emerson noted his ‘“radiant beauty of person’ and his ‘voice of such rich tones, such precise and perfect utterance,

50 that, although slightly nasal, it was the most mellow and beautiful and correct of all the instruments of the time’” (220). Substance, it turned out, was only a small or even minor part of what the lecturer was increasingly expected to offer. As Angela Ray explains, the most successful lecturers had a sort of mesmerizing power that, “when unleashed in performance, . . . was supposed to ‘draw in’ audience members, to create a unique experience of losing themselves in the voice and thought and world created by another”

(182). Certainly, then, the “best” lecturers needed to be quite charismatic personalities;

Thoreau undoubtedly was not.

Indeed, those who were apt to criticize Thoreau’s platform presence may have increasingly done so not only for his lack of exuberance, but also because the substance of Thoreau’s lectures left little room for the entertainment value that was so highly demanded by lyceum audiences. Lectures such as Thoreau’s that often required philosophical thought or challenged societal and individual norms were considered boring by some audience members; for these folks, amusement was preferred. In fact, by the mid to late 1850s the entertainment value demanded of the lyceum audience was beginning to supersede the heretofore educational value of Holbrook’s original vision.

That is not to say that the early lectures had lacked any entertainment value, nor that latter lectures were void of any educational elements. Rather, increasingly the focus of the lyceum tended to be weighted more heavily on the side of entertainment at the expense of the educational quality of lectures.

Despite this shift in focus, Thoreau continued to offer lectures that may be considered primarily educational rather than entertaining. As Thoreau writes in his journal, he was not willing to cater to the public and so made no overt attempts to

entertain his audiences. Rather, in his position on the lecture platform, Thoreau wished to

share what he had learned. Still, on 21 May 1856 he wrote to H.G.O. Blake that he had

little to offer an audience, and that he felt himself at present still very much a learner:

Mr. Blake,

I have not for a long time been putting such thoughts together as I should

like to read to the company you speak of. I have enough of that sort to say, or

even read, but not time now to arrange it. Something I have prepared might prove

for their entertainment or refreshment perchance, but I would not like to have a

hat carried round for it. I have just been reading some papers to see if they would

do for your company; but though I thought pretty well of them as long as I read

them to myself, when I got an auditor to try them on, I felt that they would not

answer. How could I let you drum up a company to hear them? – In fine, what I

have is either too scattered or loosely arranged, or too light, or else is too

scientific and matter of fact (I run a good deal into that of late) for so hungry a

company.

I am still a learner, not a teacher, feeding somewhat omnivorously,

browsing both stalk & leaves – but I shall perhaps be enabled to speak with the

more precision & authority by & by – if philosophy and sentiment are not buried

under a multitude of details. . . .

H.D.T.

(Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 423-24)

This letter to Blake also indicates that the kind of lecture that Thoreau thought worthwhile to the listener, and worthwhile for the listener’s dollar as well, should be

more than simply entertaining: “Something I have prepared might prove for their

entertainment or refreshment perchance, but I would not like to have a hat carried round

for it. . . . How could I let you drum up a company to hear them?” What was worthwhile

could not be “too light” or “too scientific and matter of fact.” The lectures Thoreau

himself disdained were full of fluff and entertainment; certainly he was not to share such

a “light” lecture. But given that his writing was increasingly of a factual, scientific

nature, Thoreau realized that it may have been too specific to be of interest to most

lyceum-goers. Thoreau knew that he must strike the middle ground in his lectures. A

worthy reading for the kind of audience Thoreau admired, the kind of audience Blake

would hopefully provide, would be full of “philosophy and sentiment,” “precision and

authority.”

As the following reviewer of one of Thoreau’s lectures indicates, however,

Thoreau judged his audience well in understanding that many listeners often preferred

entertainment to science or philosophy:

‘. . . And here a hint about the genteel lecture going world – come down from

your place of instruction; they gather not before you to be instructed but to be

amused; they come not to hear corroborating voice, urging them to penetrate to

the reality of things; they want no new or better philosophy; but they are willing

to have their sluggish intellects stirred up as with a long pole by some novelty. . .

.’ (qtd. in Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 183-4)

Still, as if he were a preacher of the gospel, Thoreau persisted on lecturing in the same vein, even defending his lecturing in his journal:

Many will complain of my lectures that they are transcendental. ‘Can’t

understand them. Would you have us return to the savage state?’ A criticism true

enough, it may be, from their point of view. . . . If you wish to know how I think,

you must endeavor to put yourself in my place. If you wish me to speak as if I

were you, that is another affair. (Torrey, ed. Journal 7 : 197; 17 February 1855)

Thoreau was inclined to share his thoughts with his auditors rather than to appease them with what they may have wanted to hear. At least two reviewers of his “Life Without

Principle” lecture noted that Thoreau promised to provide a goodly portion of his thoughts since he had been hired to do so: The Boston Daily Courier of 10 October 1859 reads,

‘Mr. Thoreau commenced by saying that when he was called upon to deliver an

address, he always supposed the audience wanted to hear what he thought, and

not merely things which might please the listeners; he should therefore give them

a strong dose of himself, . . . ’ [and Thoreau told his audience that he] ‘found that

the applicant and his clique expected seven-eighths of the lecture to be theirs, and

one-eighth to be his; so he declined He was resolved to give them a strong dose of

himself; and, since the Committee had sent for him, and engaged to pay for him,

he was bound that they should have him, though he should bore them intolerably.’

(qtd. in Dean, “Thoreau’s Sermon” 3-4)

Thoreau’s tongue-in-cheek humor allowed him the opportunity to tell his audience that he knew he might not be the most entertaining lecturer, but that he would share the best of himself that he had to offer – a sort of “you get what you paid for – and that, without apology” preface to what he would read. As Walter Harding explains, “Thoreau . .

.made no attempt to soothe his audience, but delivered his words in bombshell phrases

and hoped that he ‘helped to undermine’ their beliefs” (“Platform” 372).

In contrast, more popular lecturers enticed their audience with entertainment in a

variety of ways. The free-lance lecturer Dr. Boynton filled his presentations with

scientific props, and E. P. Whipple was a “verbal acrobat” (Bode, American Lyceum 204-

5 & 214-16). Oliver Wendell Holmes admittedly offered lectures of pure entertainment

value. Full of humor, Holmes’ lectures gave the audience what it preferred, and in so

doing, he could offer readings more than seventy times in one year (216-17). But turning to primarily entertaining lectures had its price. Although lecturers might secure full schedules by reading the most popular subjects in the most popular way, some, such as

Bayard Taylor and Oliver Wendell Holmes, lamented their cheapening to suit the public’s (sometimes poor) taste (216-19), Holmes going so far as to have reportedly told

Herman Melville that as he saw it, the lecturer had become ‘“. . . a literary strumpet, subject for a greater than whore’s fee to prostitute himself’” (201). Although Thoreau was not willing to sell himself to the lyceum as were a number of the more popular lecturers, providing the kind of lectures he wished to share may also be said to have had a commercial price: less demand, which subsequently meant fewer lecture engagements and little pay.

Thoreau engaged in only marginal self-promotion, a fact which may also account for his limited success as a lecturer. When some lecturers would travel from town to town promoting themselves and posting notices of their readings, others sent letters to curators and secretaries of various organizations attempting to secure engagements. Curators would also solicit lecturers, often those who were recommended by friends or who were

55 discovered through lists such as those appearing in Greeley’s New York Tribune . By the

1850s and 60s, complex lecture systems had developed, and many lecturers turned to agents whose job it was to secure engagements and arrange lecture tours. Although

Thoreau sometimes secured readings from recommendations of friends, any publicity he did on his own behalf was through his correspondence to secretaries and curators of various organizations, yet from all known extant records, it appears Thoreau’s efforts were scant. Even the handful of extant letters detail little effort to encourage his securing lecture engagements.

On the contrary, when others sought him, Thoreau’s replies were sometimes so little engaged in self-promotion, or even so offensive to the sender that his letters may have been cause for his not obtaining speaking engagements. For example, when Charles

C. Morse asked Thoreau if he could offer a number of lectures upon some “scientific view of nature” Thoreau replied,

I am in the lecture field – but my subjects are not scientific – rather

[Transcendentalist & aesthetic. I devote myself to the absorption of nature

generally.] Such as “Walking or the Wild ” “Autumnal tints” &c- [Even if the

utterances were scientific, the treatment would hardly bear that sense] less in a

popular vein if you think that your audience will incline or erect [?] their ears to

such themes as these. I shall be happy to read to them. (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondence 583; brackets are Harding and Bode’s)

No additional correspondence is known to exist between Thoreau and Morse, and no lecture before the Atheneum & Mechanics Association of Rochester, N.Y. was given.

Subsequently, in a reply to a letter from Benjamin H. Austin, Jr. of the Young Men’s

Association of Buffalo on 16 July 1860, Thoreau wrote,

I shall be very happy to read to your association three lectures on the evenings

named, but the question is about their character. They will not be scientific in the

common, nor, perhaps, in any sense. They will be such as you might infer from

reading my books. As I have just told Mr. Morse, they will be transcendental , that

is, to the mass of hearers, probably moonshine . Do you think that this will do? Or

does your audience prefer lamplight, or total darkness these nights? I dare say,

however, that they would interest those who are most interested in what is called

nature. (584)

Here ends Thoreau’s correspondence with Austin as well as his chance for three lectures in Buffalo. A bit more cordial, but still not self-promoting are Thoreau’s letters to

Thomas Wentworth Higginson:

Concord April 2 nd 52

Dear Sir,

I do not see that I can refuse to read another lecture, but what makes me

hesitate is the fear that I have not another available which will entertain a large

audience, though I have thoughts to offer which I think will be quite as worthy of

their attention. However I will try, for the prospect of earning a few dollars is

alluring. As far as I can forsee, my subject would be Reality rather

transcendentally treated. It lies still in ‘Walden or Life in the Woods.’ Since you

are kind enough to undertake the arrangements, I will leave it to you to name an

evening of next week – decide on the most suitable room – and advertise (?) – if

this is not taking you too literally at your word

If you still think it worth the while to attend to this, will you let me know

soon as may be what evening will be most convenient

Yrs with thanks

Henry D. Thoreau

(278-9)

And in a second letter to Higginson he writes,

Concord, 2 pm Ap. 3d/52

I certainly do not feel prepared to offer myself as a lecturer to the Boston

public, and hardly know whether more to dread a small audience or a large one.

Nevertheless I will repress this squeamishness, and propose no alterations in your

arrangements. I shall be glad to accept of your invitation to tea.

Henry D. Thoreau

(280)

Although Thoreau wrote to Higginson of his ill-preparedness and squeamishness in these letters, he ultimately secured the lecture at the Mechanics Apprentices Library in Boston.

Thoreau’s efforts to arrange his Western tour appear to have been a bit more enthusiastic. By the summer of 1850, Thoreau thought he might like to go on the lecture circuit, and so that year he began writing a number of essays in anticipation of going

West to lecture. A few years later, Thoreau began preparing for his lecture travels in earnest as he attempted to arrange a circuit of lecture engagements that was to take him to the Middle West and Canada. Dean and Hoag speculate that he settled on late December

of 1854 and January of 1855 as the best time of year for his travels since he anticipated a

successful lecture career following the publication of Walden, or Life in the Woods

(“Before Walden ” 128). Given that he had seen Walden through to its publication,

Thoreau was also free to pursue new experiences. He shared his plans with his good friend H.G.O. Blake on 21 September, 1854 when he wrote,

I have just read your letter, but I do not mean now to answer it, solely for want of

time to say what I wish. . . . As for the excursion you speak of, I should like it

right well, -- indeed I thought of proposing the same thing to you and [Theo]

Brown, some months ago. Perhaps it would have been better if I had done so

then; for in that case I should have been able to enter into it with that infinite

margin to my views, - spotless of all engagements, -- which I think so necessary.

As it is, I have agreed to go a-lecturing to Plymouth, Sunday after next (October

1) and to Philadelphia in November, and thereafter to the West, if they shall want

me ; and, as I have prepared nothing in that shape, I feel as if my hours were

spoken for. However, I think that after having been to Plymouth, I may take a

day or two – if that date will suit you and Brown. At any rate I will write you

then. (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 339)

The proposal that Blake made to Thoreau in an earlier letter was that Thoreau,

Blake, and Brown make an excursion to Mount Wachusett. Given Thoreau’s passion for nature exploration, he would not likely have turned down such an opportunity had he not been dedicated to his lecture plans. Although Thoreau’s phrase, “ if they shall want me ” introduces a bit of doubt that his Western plans would in fact materialize, he certainly had enough faith in his proposed course that he took to writing his new essays. Furthermore,

59 from this letter Thoreau’s eagerness to “go a-lecturing” is clear. By 20 November 1854

Thoreau was evidently still planning his lecture tour, for he wrote to C. B. Bernard, Esq. of Akron, Ohio’s Library Association of his tentative plans to undertake his tour in early

1855:

Dear Sir,

I expect to lecture in Hamilton C[anada] W[est], once or twice during the

first week of January. In that case, how soon after (or before) that week will you

hear me in Akron? My subject will (rest of letter torn off and existence unknown).

(352; parentheticals are Harding and Bode’s)

Bernard sought Thoreau to lecture before his association after having seen Thoreau’s name listed as a lecturer. Significantly, in his 26 October 1854 letter to Thoreau, Bernard noted that his association would be willing to pay fifty dollars for Thoreau’s lecture offering (347), more than Thoreau had ever been paid to lecture in the East. In a letter draft of the same day on which Thoreau wrote to Bernard, he wrote to another prospective recipient about one of his Western lectures:

I shall probably lecture the coming winter as near Hamilton as Akron Ohio – & I

shall be happy to read one or two lectures before your institute. My subjects are

‘The Wild’ & ‘moosehunting.’ I will read one lecture for fifty dollars – or 2

within one week for seventy-five dollars – The nearer together the better – If my

terms are agreeable to you, [s]hall you be at liberty to hear me [d]uring the first

week of January? If not then will you please [state] [w]hat evenings nearest to

that date [are] [u]nengaged. (Dean, “Reconstructions” 293; brackets are Dean’s)

Perhaps the West was not ready for Thoreau, however, for he never lectured in Akron,

Ohio, Canada West, or in any other Midwest location. Possibly he was not able to secure enough lecture engagements to make his trip worthwhile (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondence 352, 422), for by early December 1854 he had apparently abandoned his Western travel plans, given that he had begun accepting lecture offers in

Massachusetts and nearby states (Dean, “Reconstructions” 293). Still, other than the aforementioned letters, little evidence suggests that Thoreau made a truly concerted effort to lecture in the West. Certainly little evidence suggests that he publicized his services very much.

Why the half-hearted attempt to seek lecture engagements? Perhaps the answer may be the most significant reason for Thoreau’s moderate lecturer career; he was ambivalent about assuming the role of lecturer, and especially that of lecture circuiteer.

Thoreau’s journal and letters contain a number of examples of his sometime desire to fill his calendar with lecture engagements, but his entries also reveal his happiness and relief at not being called to lecture more. In fact, single entries at times contain both sentiments.

In the following statement from Thoreau’ Journal of 19 September 1854, he rejoices in his paltry lecture career because it affords him the leisure to live as he desires, yet a hint of his wish to lecture more is also here:

Thinking this afternoon of the prospect of my writing lectures and going abroad to

read them the next winter, I realized how incomparably great the advantages of

obscurity and poverty which I have enjoyed so long (and may still perhaps enjoy).

I thought with what more than princely, with what poetical, leisure I had spent my

years hitherto, without care or engagement, fancy-free. I have given myself up to

nature; I have lived so many springs and summers and autumns and winters as if I

had nothing else to do but live them, and imbibe whatever nutriment they had for

me; I have spent a couple of years, for instance, with the flowers chiefly, having

none other so binding engagement as to observe when they opened; I could have

afforded to spend a whole fall observing the changing tints of the foliage. Ah,

how I have thriven on solitude and poverty! I cannot overstate this advantage. I do

not see how I could have enjoyed it, if the public had been expecting as much of

me as there is danger now that they will. If I go abroad lecturing, how shall I ever

recover the lost winter? (Torrey, ed., Journal 7 :46)

This journal entry is filled with praise of his simple life, yet expecting that he will soon lecture more, he prematurely expresses a sort of nostalgia for having to leave that life behind. Although he mentions that an increased lecture schedule is a “danger,” his anticipation of a more complete lecture calendar and his thoughts of going abroad indicate at least some desire to follow that path. Again Thoreau’s sentiments in his journal note his exuberance about having to lecture only occasionally. Few lecture engagements, Thoreau wrote, provided him with the kind of wealth for which he was fit – time and experience:

for some years past I have partially offered myself as a lecturer, have been

advertised as such several years. Yet I have had but two or three invitations to

lecture in a year, and some years none at all. I congratulate myself on having

been permitted to stay at home thus, I am so much richer for it. I do not see what

I should have got of much value, but money, by going about, but I do see what I

should have lost. It seems to me that I have a longer and more liberal lease of life

thus. I cannot afford to be telling my experience, especially to those who perhaps

will take no interest in it. I wish to be getting experience.” (Torrey, ed., Journal

9:214; 11 January 1857)

Of his on-again-off-again plans to lecture in the West, Thoreau was certainly ambivalent. As he writes in a letter to one of his admirers, Calvin Green, on 13 March

1856, lecturing had become simply a way for Thoreau to make money that might support other pursuits:

I thank you heartily for your kind intentions respecting me. The West has many

attractions for me, particularly the lake country & the Indians. Yet I do not foresee

what my engagements may be in the fall. I have once or twice come near going

West a-lecturing, and perhaps some winter may bring me into your neighborhood,

in which case I should probably see you. Yet lecturing has commonly proved so

foreign and irksome to me, that I think I could only use it to acquire the means

with which to make an independent tour another time. (Harding and Bode, eds.

Correspondence 426)

In a subsequent letter to Greene on 13 March 1856, Thoreau noted that he was “very little of a traveler,” so lecturing in the West may have lost its initial appeal once he considered the travel among men that he would be required to undertake (485). Too, despite the seemingly little effort he gave to secure his previously proposed lecture tour of December

1854 and January 1855, Thoreau may have been somewhat bitter about it not coming to fruition; he at least put a good deal of time and thought into preparing his lectures for that anticipated tour. Thoreau’s frustration with lecturing that season is also evident in a letter he wrote to Blake. Thoreau appears not only to be discouraged that he has not heard back

about a particular engagement, but he also seems disheartened about his communion with the lecture-going crowd.

. . . I have not heard from Harrisburg since offering to go there, and have not been

invited to lecture anywhere else the past winter. So you see I am fast growing

rich. This is quite right, for such is my relation to the lecture-goers. I should be

surprised and alarmed if there were any great call for me. I confess that I am

considerably alarmed even when I hear that an individual wishes to meet me, for

my experience teaches me that we shall thus only be made certain of mutual

strangeness, which otherwise we might never have been aware of. . . . (420)

Still, Thoreau believed he had something worthy to share, adding in the same letter, “. . .

Say to the farmer, - There is your crop, - Here is mine. Mine is sugar to sweeten sugar with. If you will listen to me, I will sweeten your whole load, - your whole life. . . .”

(421). Clearly Thoreau had mixed feelings about his auditors, and that was at least partial cause for his ambivalence about lecturing.

Most succinctly and completely, Thoreau’s 31 December 1856 letter to Blake may provide some of the most telling reasons for his ambivalence about lecturing:

Concord, December 31, 1856

Mr. Blake,-

I think it will not be worth the while for me to come to Worcester to

lecture at all this year. It will be better to wait till I am – perhaps unfortunately –

more in that line. My writing has not taken the shape of lectures, and therefore I

should be obliged to read one of three or four old lectures, and therefore, the best

of which I have read to some of your auditors before. I carried that one which I

call “Walking, or the Wild,” to Amherst, N.H., the evening of that cold Thursday,

and I am to read another at Fitchburg, February 3. I am simply their hired man.

This will probably be the extent of my lecturing hereabouts. . . .

Perhaps it always costs me more than it comes to to lecture before a

promiscuous audience. It is an irreparable injury done to my modesty even, - I

become so indurated.

O solitude! Obscurity! Meanness! I never triumph so as when I have the least

success in my neighbor’s eyes. The lecturer gets fifty dollars a night; but what

becomes of his winter? What consolation will it be hereafter to have fifty

thousand dollars for living in the world? I should like not to exchange any of my

life for money.

These, you may think, are reasons for not lecturing, when you have no great

opportunity. It is even so, perhaps. I could lecture on dry oak leaves; I could, but

who could hear me? If I were to try it on any large audience, I fear it would be no

gain to them, and a positive loss to me. I should have behaved rudely toward my

rustling friends. (461)

Answering Blake’s inquiry to lecture, Thoreau gives him three reasons that he should not come: he has not been writing lectures and so would have to share one of his old readings; he does not wish to lecture before a “promiscuous audience”; and his life is of more value than the money he would receive for lecturing. These reasons for Thoreau’s ambivalence about lecturing, when examined closely, are also worth considering as causes for Thoreau’s rather unconventional success. His writings had “not taken the shape of lectures” for good cause. His thoughts were increasingly not concerned with the

65 affairs of lecturing, for although he continued to revise already drafted lectures, writing new works for the lecture platform dwindled and then stopped altogether because his work was pulling him in a new direction. In fact, more and more since the fall of 1851,

Thoreau had begun making field observations of a scientific nature and recording them in his Journal, and this natural history work was demanding his time more and more. As he wrote, he was rather “drawing a long bow,” recording his numerous detailed observations of nature rather than writing lectures or essays (426). In truth, given the demands on his time that this study involved, Thoreau did not have the leisure for lecturing or lecture writing, and he especially did not have the time that a professional lecture career certainly would have demanded.

In truth, his sometimes-lecturing was the kind of lecture “career” best suited for

Thoreau. As Walter Harding writes, “To Thoreau’s way of thinking, lecturing was probably an ideal occupation. It gave a broad margin of leisure to his life” (“Lyceum” 2).

Yet even the limited lecturing he was doing seemed to get in the way of his truer pursuit: the study of nature. His observations on lecture journeys tell of his ambivalence toward, or even lack of interest in, lecturing. In Journal passages Thoreau often makes little to no mention of the lecture, but at times he goes into great detail about the animals and fields he observed during his travels. Representative field observations from his Plymouth lecture travels include notations of chickweed, celandine, and horse-chestnut; a snake he noticed when on his way to observe Great South Pond; and the sounds of doves and owls he hears (O’Connell, ed., Journal 5 :70-72; 22-24 May 1852). His late October and early

November 1856 lectures in New Jersey get very little mention in his Journal, despite his having been received well by the Eagleswood Community. Yet for days he records

66 numerous botanical observations (Torrey, ed., Journal 9 :136-139; 25 October – 24

November 1857). Sometimes on his lecture travels he would even make sketches of his natural observations, as he did of calabash and snake spots on 24 May 1852 (O’Connell, ed., 5:5:71-72). Of his 18 December 1856 lecture he notes that it is a very cold day and remarks upon the increasing depth of the snow (Torrey, ed., Journal 9 : 186-87). His entry for the following day is typical of his nature observations on his lecture travels:

Knew the road by some yellow birch trees in a swamp and some rails set

on end around a white oak in a pasture. These it seems were the objects I had

noticed in Nashua observed, as I thought, some elms in the distance which had

been whitewashed. It turned out that they were covered from top to bottom, on

one side, with the frozen vapor from a fall on the canal. Walked a little way on the

bank of the Merrimack, which was frozen over, and was agreeably reminded of

my voyage up it. The night previous, in Amherst, I had been awakened by the

loud cracking of the ground, which shook the house like the explosion of a

powder-mill. In the morning there was to be seen a long crack across the road in

front. I saw several of these here in Nashua, and ran a bit of stubble into them but

in no place more than five inches. This is a sound peculiar to the coldest nights.

Observed that the Nashua in Pepperell was frozen over to the very edge of the

fall, and even further in some places.

Got home at 1.30 P.M. 23 (Journal 9 : 188-89)

23 Thoreau continued his observations of nature that day once home. He writes in his Journal, “To Walden,” followed by a lengthy description of his observations there. See Bradford Torrey, ed., The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau; Journal 9 . (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1906) 189-92.

Clearly Thoreau’s mind was often busy with his study of nature rather than his lectures.

As Dean and Hoag write, Thoreau had a “greater interest, during trips, in experiences outside the lecture hall than in it” (“After Walden ” 248). So much greater was his concern for nature than for the lecture hall that at times he laments the natural observations he could be making if only he did not have to prepare for lecture engagements. In his Journal of 6 December 1854 he notes that while travelling to

Providence by train to lecture, “I see thick ice and boys skating all the way to Providence, but know not when it froze, I have been so busy writing my lecture” ( Journal 7 :79). Two days later he writes,

Winter has come unnoticed by me, I have been so busy writing. This is the life

most lead in respect to nature. How different from my habitual one! It is hasty,

course, and trivial, as if you were a spindle in a factory. The other is leisurely,

fine, and glorious, like a flower. In the first case you are merely getting your

living; in the second you live as you go along. (7:80; Journal 8 ; December 1854)

Lecture preparations were also cause for his missing nature explorations with his friends.

In addition to the previously noted missed opportunity to climb Mt. Wachusett with

H.G.O. Blake and Theo Brown, Thoreau noted in a letter of 19 December 1854 to Daniel

Ricketson that as much as he wanted to, he could not visit the Middleborough ponds with

Ricketson because of his lecturing: “I should like right well to see your ponds, but that is hardly to be thought of at present. I fear that it is impossible for me to combine such things with the business of lecturing. You cannot serve God and Mammon” (Harding and

Bode, eds., Correspondence 356). Yet despite Thoreau’s claim to Ricketson that he could

not “serve God and Mammon,” his Journal suggests that even during travels to reach

lyceum audiences Thoreau appeared to have found a way to pursue nature.

So fruitful were Thoreau’s natural explorations during his lecture travels that they

may be considered one of the great successes of his lecturing. The value Thoreau found

in his natural history pursuits went far beyond any he could have found within the lecture hall. As Dean and Hoag write, “indeed, one could easily argue that without these manifold excursions into natural and human history, his true life that he so prized would have been a diminished thing” (“After Walden ” 247). In addition to natural and human

history, Thoreau found philosophical and spiritual insight in nature. Lecturing as far

north as Maine and as far south as Pennsylvania gave Thoreau opportunities to explore

the natural world outside of Concord that he may not otherwise have had the opportunity

to see, for outside of his lecture excursions, Thoreau had only a handful of opportunities

to explore the natural world beyond his hometown. True, Thoreau’s natural pursuits even

in Concord were of a great variety and recorded with tremendous detail, yet getting

beyond his hometown at times opened even grander avenues of exploration that led to

some of Thoreau’s finest writings – The Maine Woods and Cape Cod , for example. That

the number of Thoreau’s lecture travels was not too abundant meant that he had the

necessary time to record his natural observations. The lecture engagements he was able

to secure could thus be appropriately balanced with his natural pursuits. If Thoreau had

had a more conventionally successful lecture career, his natural history accomplishments

certainly would have been diminished.

In addition to his interests in areas outside of the lecture hall, Thoreau’s audience

was certainly a significant reason for his ambivalence about lecturing. Thoreau was quite

critical of his lecture goers, often criticizing them in letters and his Journal. His sarcastic

humor about his audience can be discerned in one particular letter he wrote to his British

friend Thomas Cholmondeley. In it, Thoreau focuses on his ironic “triumph” of “want of

success,” then continues to sarcastically explain that he is not likely to be asked to

provide additional lectures, and so has once again escaped that “danger.”

I am from time to time congratulating myself on my general want of success as a

lecturer – apparent want of success, but is it not a real triumph? I do my work

clean as I go along, and they will not be likely to want me anywhere again. So

there is no danger of my repeating myself and getting to a barrel of sermons

which you must upset & begin again with. (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondenc e 372)

Additional derogatory references to his audience are much more blatant. For example, on

21 December 1854 he writes,

What a groveling appetite for profitless jest and amusement our

countrymen have! Next to a good dinner, at least, they love a good joke, - to have

their sides tickled, to laugh sociably, as in the East they bathe and are shampooed.

Curators of lyceums write to me:

DEAR SIR, - I hear that you have a lecture of some humor. Will you do us

the favor to read it before the Bungtown Institute? (Torrey, ed., Journal 7 :89)

Thoreau’s lectures certainly contained humor, but not the simple kind many audiences demanded, full of amusement but without much substance. Thoreau preferred to cultivate thought that, he wrote, many ‘listeners’ were not apt to hear:

Always you have to contend with the stupidity of men. It is like a stiff soil, a

hardpan. If you go deeper than usual, you are sure to meet with a pan made harder

even by the superficial cultivation. The stupid you have always with you. . . .

Read to them a lecture on ‘Education,’ . . . and they will think that they have

heard something important, but call it ‘Transcendentalism,’ and they will think it

moon-shine. ( Journal 13 :135)

Obviously Thoreau’s impression of his audience was not -at least in the main - favorable, and Thoreau believed his audience did not favor him as a lecturer either. As he writes, he believed that many did not even care enough to give him a serious listen:

Sometimes when, in a conversation or a lecture, I have been grasping at, or even

standing and reclining upon, the serene and everlasting truths . . ., I have seen my

auditors standing on their terra firma, . . . watching my motions as if they were the

antics of a rope-dancer or mountebank pretending to walk on air. . . .” ( Journal

9:237-38; 4 February 1857)

As Thoreau’s Journal entry makes clear, he believed his auditors simply wanted entertainment, but he was not to give such a performance. No matter that the expressions on the faces of his auditors told Thoreau that he was not a crowd pleaser. That was a criticism he was willing to accept if he could continue to grasp at “serene and everlasting truths.” In looking out upon the crowd before him, Thoreau sometimes concluded that his audience wished not to have invited him at all. On 16 November 1858 he penned the following in his Journal:

I have been into town, being invited to speak to the inhabitants, not valuing, not

having read even, the Assembly’s Catechism, and I try to stimulate them by

reporting the best of my experience. I see the craven priest looking round for a

hole to escape at, alarmed because it was he that invited me thither, and an awful

silence pervades the audience. They think they will never get me there again.

(Journal 11 :326-27)

Certainly Thoreau was disappointed in his audience, for to read his lectures with success, Thoreau explained, he needed an apt crowd rather than “The stupidity [he found in] most country towns” ( Journal 9 :188; 18 December 1856). Given the nature of the lecture itself, Thoreau realized the reciprocal relationship between the hearer and the lecturer; to call a lecture a success, Thoreau needed an audience who was willing to actively participate in the lecture process, one willing to yield its undivided attention and a desire for knowledge. While Thoreau subscribed to Holbrook’s early idea of lecture goers as participatory members in a learning community, most audience members with whom Thoreau came into contact, he believed, increasingly preferred a lazy spectator approach to the lecture. Such auditors, Thoreau believed, were not going to get anything worthwhile out of his lectures because they were not willing to work for it. Thoreau’s frustration with a mostly indolent audience is evident in the following:

Read well! Did you ever know a full well that did not yield of its refreshing

waters to those who put their hands to the windlass or the well-sweep? Did you

ever suck cider through a straw? Did you ever know the cider to push out of the

straw when you were not sucking, -- unless it chanced to be in a complete

ferment? An audience will draw out of a lecture, or enable a lecturer to read, only

such parts of his lecture as they like. A lecture is like a barrel half full of some

palatable liquor. You may tap it at various levels, -- in the sweet liquor or in the

froth or in fixed air above. If it is pronounced good, it is partly to the credit of the

hearers; if bad, it is partly their fault. Sometimes a lazy audience refuses to

cooperate and pull on the ropes with a will, simply because the hogshead is full

and therefore heavy, when if it were empty, or had only a little sugar adhering to

it, they would whisk it up the slope in a jiffy. The lecturer, therefore, desires of his

audience a long pull, a strong pull, and all pull together. I have seen a sturdy

truckman, or lecturer, who had nearly broken his back with shoving his lecture up

such an inclined plane while the audience were laughing at him, at length, as with

a last effort, set it a-rolling in amid the audience and upon their toes, scattering

them like sheep and making them cry out with pain, while he drove proudly away.

Rarely it is a very heavy freight of such hogsheads stored in a vessel’s hold that is

to be lifted out and deposited on the public wharf, and this is accomplished only

after many a hearty pull all together and a good deal of heave-yo-ing.” ( Journal

12 :10-11; 3 March 1859)

In this long Journal excerpt, Thoreau likens the lecture to a “refreshing drink.” Part biblical allusion, the “refreshing waters” might be compared with the “springs of life.”

But his reference turns more secular when he refers to the lecture as “a barrel half full of some palatable liquor.” And yet his drink or its container is not like the common lecturers, which is “empty” and has “only a little sugar” stuck to the sides of the container that holds it (the lecturer). Thoreau’s “drink” may be had only by those willing to work for it – as one must lift water from a well or suck cider through a straw. The best part of his lecture was sure to be heavy – that part that is full of “philosophy and sentiment” of

73 which he writes to Blake; it required an audience who was willing to do “a hearty pull all together and a good deal of heave-yo-ing.”

As Thoreau understood it, it was not bad pronunciation or lack of elocutionary skills that caused a lecture to fail, but the deaf ears of an audience who was not willing to labor for the “sweets” of the lecture:

Talk about reading! – a good reader! It depends on how he is heard. There may be

elocution and pronunciation (recitation, say) to satiety, but there can be no good

reading unless there is good hearing also. It takes two at least for this game, as for

love, and they must cooperate. The lecturer will read best those parts of his lecture

which are best heard. Sometimes, it is true, the faith and spirits of the reader may

run a little ahead and draw after the good hearing runs ahead and draws on the

good reading. The reader and the hearer are a team not to be harnessed tandem,

the poor wheel horse supporting the burden of the shafts, while the leader runs

pretty much at will, while the lecture lies passive in the painted curricle behind. I

saw some men unloading molasses – hogsheads from a truck at a depot the other

day, rolling them up an inclined plane. The truckman stood behind and shoved,

after putting a couple of ropes one round each end of the hogshead, while two

men standing in the depot steadily pulled at the ropes. The first man was the

lecturer, the last was the audience. It is the duty of the lecturer to team his

hogshead of sweets to the depot, or Lyceum, place the horse, arrange the ropes,

and shove; and it is the duty of the audience to take hold of the ropes and pull

with all their might. The lecturer who tries to read his essay without being abetted

by a good hearing is in the predicament of a teamster who is engaged in the

Sisyphean labor of rolling a molasses-hogshead up an inclined plane alone, while

the freight-master and his men stand indifferent with their hands in their pockets. I

have seen many such a hogshead which had rolled off the horse and gone to

smash, with all its sweets wasted on the ground between the truckman and the

freight-house, -- and the freight-masters thought that the loss was not theirs.

(Journal 12 :9-10; 3 March 1859)

Here Thoreau uses his metaphor of the hogshead as the lecture, the truckman as the lecturer, and the freight-master as the audience. Without the help of the freight- master/audience, the hogshead full of sweets/lecture is wasted at the point of delivery, the truckman/lecturer needing the cooperation of the freight-master to deliver the sweets he brings. In this passage Thoreau also emphasizes the reciprocal relationship between the lecturer and the audience by likening their cooperative efforts to the game of love – a give-and-take relationship in which the push and pull of two are not always in balance, but shared equally on the whole nonetheless. It was not simply that Thoreau sought the approval of his auditors, but he did hope that they would at least wholeheartedly listen to his lectures. As he writes, “Generally, if I can get the ears of an audience, I do not care whether they say they like my lecture or not . . .” ( Journal 9 :187-88). At least an auditor

who listened to Thoreau’s lecture and then said he did not like what Thoreau had to say

was willing to do the work it took to hear his thoughts. While at times Thoreau may have

wished he could have forgotten his audience since he thought most either did not want to

hear what he had to say or were not willing enough to actively involve themselves in the

listening process, he remained cognizant of the necessarily reciprocal relationship

between the lecturer and the hearer. Located directly in front of him as their eyes gazed in

75 his direction – whether attentively, ambivalently, or glazed-over – as a lecturer,

Thoreau’s very existence needed them.

That the lecture was often given to a passive audience was not Thoreau’s biggest concern, however. Most particularly, Thoreau was apprehensive about his audience for what it might do to him. He wished always to present himself and his lectures truthfully and fully rather than to alter what he had to say and how he was to say it to suit the wishes of his audience. Surely, it would have been much easier for Thoreau to cater to his audience and to seek success in the conventional sense, but he was not willing to be

“an average man.” As he wrote,

After lecturing twice this winter I feel that I am in danger of cheapening myself

by trying to become a successful lecturer, i.e., to interest my audiences. I am

disappointed to find that most that I am and value myself for is lost, or worse than

lost, on my audience. I fail to get even the attention of the mass. I should suit

them better if I suited myself less. I feel that the public demand an average man, -

- average thoughts and manners, -- not originality, nor even absolute excellence.

You cannot interest them except as you are like them and sympathize with them. I

would rather that my audience come to me than that I should go to them, and so

they be sifted; i.e. . . . To read to a promiscuous audience who are at your mercy

the fine thoughts you solaced yourself with far away is as violent as to fatten

geese by cramming, and in this case they do not get fatter .” (Journal 7 :79-80; 6

December 1854)

Thoreau’s Journal sentiments surely do not hide his disappointment in the lecture-going crowd, an opinion he was not afraid to share with them. In fact, in his lectures he

76 sometimes used humor, one of the most popular forms of the lyceum lecture, to let his listeners know just what he thought of them. In this way Thoreau could ironically offer the audience just what it demanded (a bit of humorous entertainment) while poking fun at that very audience. For example, in a review of “Life Misspent” from the Boston Atlas and Daily Bee of 10 October 1859, the reviewer noted that ‘“in reference to lecturing,

[Thoreau] said if one aimed to hit the popular mind, he must go down perpendicularly, an idea that excited laughter”’ (qtd. in Dean, “Thoreau’s Sermon” 3).

Still, Thoreau hoped that at least a few in the audience would understand what he had to share. In Early December of 1853 Emerson wrote that when he told Thoreau of his wish to write something everyone could read, Thoreau’s replied that he – ‘“regret[ed] that whatever was written for a lecture, or whatever succeeded with the audience was bad,”’ and that high-minded lectures were the better to write, even though they may only reach a few (qtd. in Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 212). Yet as Emerson points out, at times Thoreau seemed to have another view altogether, thinking his lectures could be enjoyed even by children. In his Journal Emerson notes,

Well, yesterday, he came here, &, at supper, Edith, understanding that he was to

lecture at the Lyceum, sharply asked him, ‘Whether his lecture would be a nice

interesting story, such as she wanted to hear, or whether it was one of those old

philosophical things that she did not care about?’ Henry instantly turned to her, &

bethought himself, & I saw was trying to believe that he had matter that might fit

Edith & Edward, who were to sit up & go to the lecture, if it was a good one for

them. (212-213)

As it turned out, Thoreau could appeal to children, for Edith and Edward Emerson

reportedly enjoyed his lecture (213). Despite pleasing the Emerson children, Thoreau’s

attitude toward the lecture-going crowd remained one of overall disappointment and

cause for his ambivalence about lecturing. His enthusiasm for lecturing seemed to

increasingly wane in proportion to his desire to find a worthy audience.

Lest one think Thoreau was the only one who struggled in his relationship with

the lecture audience, however, consider that other lecturers sometimes expressed similar

concerns. Oliver Wendell Holmes, for example, lamented that his audience cheapened

him because he was forced to write down to them (Bode, American Lyceum 217). Most audiences, Holmes explained, were not full of individual thinkers, but were rather of one stock cast ready to be amused, but who gave little to the reader in return:

Front seats: a few old folks, -- shiny-headed, -- slant up best ear towards the

speaker, -- drop off asleep after a while, when the air begins to get a little narcotic

with carbonic acid. Bright women’s faces, young and middle-aged, a little behind

these, but toward the front, -- (pick out the best, and lecture mainly to that). Here

and there a countenance, sharp and scholarlike, and a dozen pretty female ones

sprinkled about. An indefinite number of pairs of young people, -- happy, but not

always very attentive. Boys, in the background, more or less quiet. Dull faces,

here, there, -- in how many places! I don’t say dull people, but faces without a ray

of sympathy or a movement of expression. They are what kill the lecturer. (Ray

35)

As the above indicates, Thoreau was not alone in his castigation of his audience, for even

Holmes, one of the most successful and well-accepted lyceum lecturers, found fault with

his passive auditors.

Still, there were times when, despite his often bitter words, Thoreau found good in

his audience. For example, in a letter to Blake on 19 December 1854 Thoreau noted a

“truly providential meeting with Mr. T[heo] Brown; providential because it saved me from the suspicion that my words had fallen altogether on stony ground, when it turned out that there was some Worcester soil there” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence

354). In addition, he wrote to Ricketson that his 28 December 1854 lecture in Nantucket

was quite well received (362). Almost two years later after lecturing in Eagleswood, New

Jersey in November of 1856, he wrote to Blake that his auditors there listened intently to

what he had to say: “I have read three of my old lectures . . . to the Eagleswood people,

and unexpectedly, with rare success – i.e., I was aware that what I was saying was silently taken in by their ears” (441).

Not only did some listen to what he had to say, but quite the contrary to Thoreau’s belief, they actually liked what they heard. Actually, most often Thoreau’s audience considered what they heard to be a successful lecture. For example, in one instance

Emerson found the laughter during Thoreau’s lecture to be positive and appreciative, while Thoreau noted that the audience was mocking him, and on another occasion Alcott said the audience quite approved of Thoreau’s “Wild Apples” when Thoreau remarked that he was not well received (Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 322, 332). Despite claims

of some early Thoreau biographers and critics, comments about Thoreau as a lecturer

reveal that while he may not have been one of the most eloquent platform speakers,

“more often than not, [he] was well received by a significant portion of his audience, and

. . . many of his lectures drew enthusiastic responses from an apparent majority” (244-

45); “Indeed, although his lecturing style was sometimes criticized, there is enough recorded praise to suggest that many found him an engaging speaker” (Dean and Hoag,

“Before Walden ” 131). After expressing that Thoreau’s platform style was rather disappointing, one reviewer noted that what he had to say made Thoreau’s lecture worthwhile, even enjoyable for the hearer. As he wrote,

‘. . . we certainly speak for ourselves, and we think, for a goodly number in the

audience on Tuesday evening, when we return thanks to the committee who

arranged the lectures, for the privilege afforded us of rambling for an hour with

Mr. Thoreau through the fields and forests of the good old town of Concord’ (qtd.

in Cameron, “Lynn” 162-3).

Considering the number of times Thoreau read before his hometown lyceum, he certainly met with a good deal of success as a lecturer there. Alcott thought so highly of

Thoreau’s “Walking” that he noted in his journal, “He should read this, and the ‘Walden’ also, everywhere in our towns and cities, for the soundness and rectitude of the sentiments. They would have a wholesome influence” (Dean and Hoag, “Before

Walden ” 200). And in November of 1856 Alcott wrote of the same lecture that “the conversation [was] so flowing and lively and curious – [that] the young people enjoy[ed] it particularly” (Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 276). Those in neighboring towns also thought highly of Thoreau’s lectures. H.G.O. Blake is thought to be the anonymous contributor of a quite positive review of one of Thoreau’s essays in a newspaper. In the

Worcester Daily of 11 February 1857 appears a lengthy advertisement praising Thoreau’s

“Walking.” One sentence reads, “This lecture contains more genuine wit, wisdom, and

poetry than can be found in whole courses of lyceum lectures” (285).

But Thoreau received more than high praise for his lectures from Concord

neighbors and Worcester friends. One young admirer of Thoreau, James W. Spooner of

Plymouth, noted his excitement even at having the chance to shake Thoreau’s hand

(Dedmond 334). Spooner’s enthusiasm is apparent in his lengthy journal of 24 May 1852

in which he records his excursion and bits of conversation he had with Thoreau after

hearing him lecture. As the above references to Thoreau’s lecturing demonstrate, “it

seems amply clear that he was admired, not only by a few discerning friends, but by men

of affairs when the utility of his observations was manifest” (Hoeltje 493-4). 24 Certainly

contrary to his own opinion, Thoreau pleased quite a few listeners. In fact, he was

invited to return to Lincoln, Salem, Plymouth, Portland, and New Bedford, among other

places, to offer subsequent lectures. It seems Thoreau did not, as he once wrote to Blake,

“do his work clean as he went along,” escaping the “danger” of being asked to offer more

than one reading in a number of towns. Apparently Thoreau’s perception of how his

audience perceived him was much more severe, at least on some occasions, than were his

auditors’ actual opinions of him. Had Thoreau understood his hearers’ opinions of him

better, perhaps his ambivalence toward lecturing would not have been so great. More

than likely, however, Thoreau’s often critical opinion of his audience and his desire to

pursue other areas of study suggest that he would never have fully dedicated himself to

the lecture platform.

24 The handful of positive comments from critics of Thoreau’s lecturing that I note in this paragraph are exceptions to the general understanding that Thoreau was not in fact a successful lecturer. Even the critics cited here qualify their positive statements about Thoreau’s lecturing, concluding that on the whole, Thoreau’s lecturing career was indeed not very great.

Still, Thoreau’s auditors certainly helped him with his writing in a number of

ways and so may be considered a catalyst for Thoreau’s success. Thoreau’s lyceum

audience, some of whom were certainly potential readers of his essays and books,

allowed him to try out his work on them. As Walter Harding writes, “the lecture platform

provided an ideal proving-ground for his writing” (“Lyceum” 2). Reading his essays

before the public allowed Thoreau an opportunity to hear his ideas and suggested

necessary areas for revision. As Carl Bode writes, “The lecture . . . represented an

important intermediate step in the process of composition. It was generally the place for

experimentation and revision” ( American Lyceum 225). Significantly, Thoreau’s lectures were repeatedly revised during the years in which he lectured, and certainly how his audience received his words had something to do with the changes he made. 25 Bradley P.

Dean and RonaldWesley Hoag describe Thoreau’s lecturing as part of his

‘. . . winnowing’ [process] by which he evolved his published works . . . . As he

wrote in his journal in the summer of 1845, ‘From all points of the compass from

the earth beneath and the heavens above have come these inspirations and been

entered duly in such order as they came in the Journal. Thereafter when the time

arrived they were winnowed into Lectures – and again in due time from Lectures

into Essays.’ Not just pretty rhetoric, this statement accurately describes the way

Thoreau worked. Viewed in this light, his lecture writing and delivering were part

and parcel of his authorship, directing him to write with audiences and the sound

of words in mind, and, upon presentation, allowing him to hear himself think out

25 For details regarding Thoreau’s compositional practices especially as it pertains to “Walking,” see chapter three.

loud and observe others’ reactions to what he had to say. (“After Walden ” 244;

Sattelmeyer, ed., Journal 2 :205)

In addition, the more Thoreau lectured, the more admirers he attained, and so increased his possible readership. In other words, the lecture-going crowd provided Thoreau with the opportunity, assistance, and encouragement to perfect his works before publication and to increase his public notoriety. As Carl Bode writes, “The lyceum offered the writer a means . . . for trying his shorter works on a captive, though also captious, audience. As soon as the time came for him to write new lectures, he could send the old ones – now polished as a rule into essays or chapters – to publishers with the assurance that there would be more of a market since he was a platform personality” ( American Lyceum 24).

Given that a number of the readings Thoreau shared on the platform were written specifically for the lecture platform, clearly Thoreau had his auditors in mind when he penned them. In fact, had it not been for the lecture-goers who attended Thoreau’s readings, some of his best essays may never have been written at all since their writing was indeed platform driven. Although many of Thoreau’s comments about his audience are overwhelmingly critical, his audience should be valued for the role it played in his successful publication of his essays and books – a success that may not have come to fruition had it not been for Thoreau’s lecturing.

In addition, the audience provided an appropriate venue for Thoreau to share his rather non-traditional worldviews. For example, on the lecture platform Thoreau could publicly challenge accepted norms about the place of man and nature, slavery, politics, and consumerism. Although he did not profess to be a reformer as were the anti-slavery, temperance, and suffrage lecturers, his readings often carried a message and tone of

83 reform. The lyceum was the ideal proving ground in which to challenge accepted norms; by using an establishment of the dominant culture as their vehicle, reformist lecturers could offer alternative ways of living and so, consciously or not, subvert the dominant hegemony from within. As Angela Ray notes,

the lyceum as a public practice, . . . contained the potential for the subversion of

some of the norms and ideals that Protestant New England upheld . . . As a

location for the creation of a public culture, the lyceum, particularly as it

developed in the middle of the nineteenth century, encompassed voices of reform.

These reformist voices adapted familiar lyceum themes, presenting alternative

models and suggesting modifications to accepted beliefs and values. (8)

In addition, the nineteenth-century reformist subculture allowed and even called for lecturers to challenge societal norms. More plainly stated, so long as they did not stray too far from cultural norms, the reformer was accepted, even encouraged. These

. . . controversial positions were themselves educative. Social reformers who told

people news that they had not heard before, who spoke from a subject position

different from the ‘ordinary,’ were enacting an educational function that was

fundamentally expansive. They represented new ways of viewing the world, new

possibilities of human experience, new personal stories that paralleled, or

contradicted, or tangentially intersected the more familiar experiences and stories

told in conventional lectures. (183)

Nineteenth-century Americans were striving for a unique identity that was to be distinct from the Old World, intellectually original and valuable, something that spoke to all of the possibilities America offered. And so the “new” views espoused by reformist

84 lecturers became an enterprise that served in the formation of that unique American culture while at the same time was part of the fabric of the culture itself. Thoreau’s involvement in the lyceum not only made him part of this very public venture, but it greatly influenced his life and writings. 26 His lecture writing style was representative of the formation of the unique American identity. By manipulating traditional forms of discourse, lecturers could challenge accepted practices and offer alternatives because

“these forms created a zone of comfort and familiarity” for the audience (183). Thoreau often adapted the familiar lyceum topic of natural history and the form of the excursion narrative as the comfort zones through which he could share his alternative views. Given the popularity in the nineteenth century of armchair nature study and the increasing interest in science, the natural history excursion was an ideal form for Thoreau to use. In

“What Shall It Profit?”, on the other hand, he may be said to have written a lay-sermon or self-improvement reading. In the lecture he uses a well-known biblical allusion to challenge accepted societal practices. Biblical allusions may have been particularly appropriate for the lecture platform given the “message-oriented” form that many lecturers assumed. As Emerson claimed, ‘“The Lyceum is my pulpit’” (Bode, American

Lyceum 201). Anna Dickinson reportedly noted that the lyceum was in fact a “lay pulpit,” and George William Curtis noted, ‘“the Lyceum in this country has been emphatically what it has been so often called – laypreaching” (Ray 41). While Thoreau certainly disliked heterodox Christian practices of his day, that the lyceum offered him a place to

“preach” his message is sure. Expressing his disdain for the common Christianity of the day, Thoreau wrote in his Journal of 18 December 1856, “Lectured in the basement

26 For further discussion on the formation of the American identity and nineteenth-century environmental thought, especially as it pertains to Thoreau’s “Walking,” see chapter three.

(vestry) of the orthodox church, and I trust helped to undermine it.” (Torrey, ed., Journal

9: 187-88). His religion was something altogether different from that of the masses. As

he noted in a lecture draft of “What Shall It Profit?”

In some lyceums they tell me that they have voted to exclude the subject of

religion. But how do I know what their religion is, and when I am near to or far

from it? I have walked into such an arena and done my best to make a clean breast

of what religion I have experienced, and the audience never suspected what I was

about. The lecture was harmless moonshine to them. (Dean and Hoag, “After

Walden ” 282)

Although his auditors may not have recognized that what Thoreau shared was his

“religion,” Thoreau clearly felt that what he had to share was of a highly spiritual nature.

As Walter Harding writes, the lecture platform gave Thoreau a place to do missionary work, and no matter the audience’s reception, Thoreau persisted with his message

(“Lecture Platform” 367). Certainly his persistence was worthwhile, for at least a handful of those who heard him took his message to heart, and since then the dissemination of Thoreau’s alternative world view has only increased. Had Thoreau not had the lyceum audience with whom to share his ideas, many of his rather reformatory thoughts might have never been put to paper, except in his Journal. And certainly, the lecture platform was the nucleus for the dissemination of many of these ideas, making his success as a lecturer sure.

Whether his audience approved of him or not, Thoreau was not willing to sell himself out that he might earn more on the lecture pulpit; he certainly did not want to be

their “hired man.” As Thoreau explained to Blake, the money he would receive for

86 lecturing could not begin to compare to the value he found in his natural history pursuits.

A full lecture calendar might pay well enough, but no amount of money was worth the time it would take away from him to “live the life [he] imagined.” As Dean and Hoag write, the “truth is that Thoreau was always ambivalent about lecturing success because he feared, in terms of the “economy of living” explained in Walden , that it would cost him too much of the life he valued most” (“After Walden ” 246). Lecturing then, for

Thoreau, was not primarily or even mainly about getting a living, as it was for some others who sought to make the professional lecture circuit a career. More altruistic motives encouraged Thoreau to lecture, for he believed he had something of intellectual and, at times, spiritual value to share. Although remunerations were sometimes given to

Thoreau for his lecturing, he was more of the mind of early lecturers whose primary motivation for readings was, following Holbrook’s original lyceum plan, the dissemination of knowledge. As Thoreau writes in his Journal for 3 April 1859,

Men’s minds run so much on work and money that the mass instantly associate all

literary labor with a pecuniary reward. They are mainly curious to know how

much money the lecturer or author gets for his work. They think that the naturalist

takes so much pains to collect plants or animals because he is paid for it. An

Irishman who saw me in the fields making a minute in my note-book took it for

granted that I was casting up my wages and actually inquired what they came to,

as if he had never dreamed of any other use for writing. I might have quoted to

him that the wages of sin is death, as the most pertinent answer. ‘What do you get

for lecturing now?’ I am occasionally asked. It is the more amusing since I only

lecture about once a year out of my native town, often not at all; so that I might as

well, if my objects were merely pecuniary, give up the business. . . .” (Torrey, ed.,

Journal 12 :111)

Still, Thoreau was not opposed to receiving payment for his services. While he offered many of his lectures at no cost, he was not unlike any other lecturer who accrued travel expenses, needed to provide for his basic needs, and recognized the value of his readings. And when his dander for his audience was up, he might have occasionally written that he would lecture simply because he would be paid for his services. After expressing his doubts about offering a lecture in his 2 April 1852 letter to Higginson, for example, Thoreau wrote, “. . . I will try [to lecture], for the prospect of earning a few dollars is alluring” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 279). And in a letter to

Calvin Green he wrote that he might lecture, but only as he could “use [lecturing] to

acquire the means with which to make an independent tour [of the West]” (426). Still,

very few of his sentiments about lecturing make reference to dollars earned,

demonstrating that Thoreau’s motives were most often other than money. His expenses

being covered, Thoreau was not one to refuse an invitation to lecture when offered small

remunerations.

Despite providing lecturing services for more than twenty years, Thoreau never

planned to dedicate himself fully to a lecture career, lucrative as the possibility of doing

so could have been. Instead, he probably preferred to use lecturing to supplement his

income, a possibility supported by the quite common practice of doing so. Among his

Concord contemporaries, for example, Alcott, Emerson, Hawthorne, and Channing

provided lectures for fees outside of their home town as a means of earning a few dollars,

yet none sold himself fully to the lecture platform. While Emerson earned a substantial

88 amount doing so, $2,700 in 1856 alone, it was not uncommon for someone to lecture only occasionally and accept a modest fee (Bode, American Lyceum 237). More often than not, the occasional lecturer was more respected than the vocational lecturer; “Indeed, one commentator claimed that ‘only those who work worthily in other fields have a permanent hold upon the affections of lecture-going people”’ (Ray 37). Thoreau certainly worked in other fields. In fact, he preferred to vary his endeavors, noting numerous occupations including that he was a sometimes “surveyor of snowstorms” in a letter to his alma mater. Still, the lyceum lecture platform was a fruitful occupation for

Thoreau in that it often allowed him to tell of what he knew best – his life experiences.

In fact, the lyceum expected its readers to use personal experience in their lectures. As

Angela Ray writes,

the nineteenth-century U.S. lyceum, from the beginning, prized knowledge

derived from personal experience. Early lyceum members were encouraged to

conceive of their own lives as an endless series of ‘experiments,’ and later public

lecturers were especially valued if their topics closely matched their areas of

expertise, achieved through professional credentialing, occupational experience,

or individual circumstances of life. (181)

Lecturers, not the least among them Thoreau, could combine experience with expertise and subject matter (180) into a performance that the man who was always about “getting experience” could appreciate.

That he did not earn a great amount of money during his lecture career does not indicate that Thoreau was not very successful. For to earn more dollars would have meant that Thoreau would have given more of his time to lecturing, and that at the expense of

89 some of his other pursuits, studies that he was surely more dedicated to than he was to lecturing or the almighty dollar. By lecturing only occasionally, Thoreau was firmly wedged in the middle-ground of lecturers whose practice may be defined as an occupation rather than a profession. For Thoreau, that meant lecturing occupied only enough of his time to earn him a few dollars and to encourage the perfection of his writings, while still allowing for his natural pursuits. Unwilling to sell himself wholeheartedly to the affairs of men, Thoreau’s sometimes involvement in the lecturing world suited him just fine. Ultimately, the modest amount of money he earned and the moderate number of lectures he gave were in fact not signs of Thoreau’s lack of success as a lecturer, but rather signs of all else he could accomplish given the wealth of time and energy he devoted to so many other endeavors.

Despite his involvement in the lyceum and offering his services as a lecturer for more than twenty years, Thoreau never planned to give himself over fully to a lecturing career. For that, many of his neighbors may have seen him as a failure. Still, conventionally Thoreau was at least a moderately successful lecturer in the nineteenth century based on his notoriety, the number of lectures he presented, and the dollars he earned. But it is his unconventional success that was of most value to him, for by not fully committing to the lecturing world, Thoreau remained true to himself and so achieved the kind of success of which he could be proud. On the lecture platform, he presented the best he had to share, never altering his readings simply to accommodate the popular mind or to earn a few more dollars. Outside of the lecture hall, he maintained the freedom he desired to pursue his own course of study in the world of nature. Perhaps the forest trees, plants, and ponds, then, were why he wrote to Blake that his life was of more

90 value than the lecture would pay. Or perhaps Thoreau simply wanted to follow his bliss, which surely was worth more to him than a few more cents in his pocket. For whatever reason, Thoreau certainly followed his own course, and in so doing he left a literary legacy that at least in part is a result of the time he spent in the world of lecturing.

Thoreau’s books, essays, journals, and field notes should all be examined to learn more about his lecturing, lecture excursions, and the writings that are the fruit of those labors.

The pivotal role of the lyceum and lecture platform on Thoreau’s life and works is a remarkably untapped area of research in need of further study. To begin shedding some light on the significance of Thoreau’s lecture writing, travels, and reading as they pertain to his particular works, one objective of the following chapter is to examine just how these aspects of Thoreau’s lecturing career impacted one of his writings: “Walking.” Of course, any of his lecture-essays might be examined with particular attention to his lecturing. Such study will likely reveal new aspects of Thoreau’s craft and the development of his thought. Considered in concert with Thoreau’s quite extraordinary literary repertoire, his lecture career might then be given due credit and so be understood as a successful venture after all.

A Chronology of Thoreau’s Lectures 27

1) 11 April 1838, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts: Masonic Hall

“Society” 28

2) 8 February 1843, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts: Masonic Hall

“The Life and Character of Sir Walter Raleigh”

3) 29 November 1843, Wednesday: 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts: Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“Ancient Poets”

4) 10 March 1844, Sunday; 10:30 A.M. – Boston, Massachusetts; Armory Hall

“Conservatives and Reformers” (I)

5) 10 March 1844, Sunday; 7:30 P.M. – Boston, Massachusetts: Armory Hall

“Conservatives and Reformers” (II)

6) 25 March 1845, Tuesday: 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian Church,

Vestry

“Concord River”

7) 4 February 1846, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

church, Vestry

“The Writings and Style of Thomas Carlyle”

27 This list is compiled from the following: Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “Thoreau’s Lectures Before Walden : An Annotated Calendar,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1995) and Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “Thoreau’s Lectures After Walden : An Annotated Calendar,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1996).

28 Thoreau considers this to be his first lecture, although Dean and Hoag include his commencement address as his first in their chronology of Thoreau’s lectures.

8) 19 January 1847, Tuesday; 7:00 P.M. – Lincoln, Massachusetts; Brick or Centre

School House

“A History of Myself” (?) 29

9) 10 February 1847, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“A History of Myself” (I)

10) 17 February 1847, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts: Unitarian

church, Vestry

“A History of Myself” (II) (?)

11) 3 January 1848, Monday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“An Excursion to Ktaadn”

12) 26 January 1848, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

13) 16 February 1848, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church Vestry

“The Rights and Duties of the Individual in Relation to the State”

14) 22 November 1848, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Salem, Massachusetts; Lyceum Hall

“Student Life in New England, Its Economy”

15) 20 December 1848, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Gloucester, Massachusetts; Town

Hall

29 The question marks in this chronology of lectures indicates that there is some speculation regarding which lectures Thoreau presented on these occasions. For details regarding this speculation, see Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” and “After Walden ”).

“Economy – Illustrated by the Life of a Student”

16) 3 January 1849, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

church, Vestry

“White Beans and Walden Pond”

17) 28 February 1849, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Salem, Massachusetts; lyceum Hall

“Student Life, Its Aims and Employments”

18) 6 March 1849, Tuesday; 6:30 P.M. – Lincoln, Massachusetts; Centre School

House

“White Beans and Walden Pond”

19) 21 March 1849, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Portland, Maine; Exchange Hall

“Economy”

20) 20 April 1849, Friday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; City Hall

“Economy”

21) 27 April, 1849, Friday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; Brinley Hall

“Life in the Woods”

22) 3 May 1849, Thursday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; Brinley Hall

“White Beans and Walden Pond”

23) 23 January 1850, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“An Excursion to Cape Cod”

24) 30 January 1850, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“An Excursion to Cape Cod” (II)

25) 18 February 1850, Monday – South Danvers, Massachusetts

“An Excursion to Cape Cod”

26) 6 December 1850, Friday; 7:30 P.M. – Newburyport, Massachusetts; Market Hall

“An Excursion to Cape Cod”

27) 1 January 1851, Wednesday – Clinton, Massachusetts; Clinton Hall

“An Excursion to Cape Cod”

28) 15 January 1851, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Portland, Maine; Temple Street Chapel

“An Excursion to Cape Cod”

29) 22 January 1851, Wednesday – Medford, Massachusetts

“Economy”

30) 23 April 1851, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“Walking, or the Wild”

31) 31 May 1851, Saturday – Worcester, Massachusetts; Parlors of H. G. O. Blake’s

School

“Walking, or the Wild”

32) 30 December 1851, Tuesday; 7:00 P.M. – Lincoln, Massachusetts; Centre School

House

“An Excursion to Canada”

33) 7 January 1852, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or

Centre School House, High School Room

“An Excursion to Canada” (I)

34) 22 February 1852, Sunday; 10:00 A.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden Hall

“Life in the Woods” (I)

35) 22 February 1852, Sunday; 7:00 P.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden Hall

“Life in the Woods” (II)

36) 17 March 1852, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or

Centre School House, High School room

“An Excursion to Canada” (II)

37) 22 March 1852, Monday; Boston, Massachusetts; Fisher’s Rooms

“Economy”

38) 6 April 1852, 7:30 P.M. – Boston, Massachusetts; Cochituate Hall, Phillips Place

“Life in the Woods” (II)

39) 23 May 1852, Sunday; 10:00 A.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden Hall

“Walking”

40) 23 May 1852, Sunday; 7:00 P.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden Hall

“The Wild”

41) 14 December 1853, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; brick or

Centre School house, High School Room

“An Excursion to Moosehead Lake”

42) 4 July 1854, Tuesday; CA. 3:30 P.M. – Framingham, Massachusetts; Harmony

(also “Framingham” and “Island”) Grove

“Slavery in Massachusetts”

43) 8 OCTOBER 1854, SUNDAY; 7:00 P.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden

Hall

“Moonlight”

44) 21 November 1854, Tuesday; 7:30 P.M. – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Spring

Garden Institute

“The Wild”

45) 6 December 1854, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Providence, Rhode Island; Railroad

Hall

“What Shall It Profit”

46) 26 December 1854, Tuesday; 7:30 P.M. – New Bedford, Massachusetts; New

Bedford Lyceum

“What Shall It Profit”

47) 28 December 1854, Thursday; 7:30 P.M. – Nantucket, Massachusetts; Nantucket

Lyceum

“What Shall It Profit”

48) 4 January 1855, Thursday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; City Hall

“”What Shall It Profit”

49) 14 February 1855, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or

Centre School House, High School Room

“What Shall It Profit”

50) 26 October 1856, Sunday; ca. 7:30 P.M. – Perth Amboy, New Jersey; Unionists’

Hall, Eagleswood Community

“Moosehunting”

51) 2 November 1856, Sunday; ca. 7:30 P.M. – Perth Amboy, New Jersey; Unionists’

Hall, Eagleswood Community

“Walking, or the Wild”

52) 16 November 1856, Sunday; ca. 7:30 P.M. – Perth Amboy, New Jersey:

Unionists’ Hall, Eagleswood Community

“What Shall It Profit”

53) 18 December 1856, Thursday; 7:00 P.M. – Amherst, New Hampshire; Basement

Vestry, Congregationalist Church

“Walking, or the Wild”

54) 3 February 1857, Tuesday; ca. 7:30 P.M. – Fitchburg, Massachusetts; City Hall

“Walking, or the Wild”

55) 13 February 1857, Friday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; Brinley Hall

“Walking, or the Wild”

56) 13 January 1858, Wednesday; ca. 7:00 p.m. – Lynn Massachusetts; John B.

Alley’s Parlor

“An Excursion to the Maine Woods” (?)

57) 25 February 1858, Thursday; 7:30 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or

Centre School House, High School Room

“An Excursion to the Maine Woods”

58) 22 February 1859, Tuesday; ca. 7:00 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; H.G.O.

Blake’s Parlors

“Autumnal Tints”

59) 23 February 1859, Wednesday; ca. 7:00 p.m. – Worcester, Massachusetts; H.G.O.

Blake’s Parlors

“An Excursion to the Maine Woods” (?)

60) 2 March 1859, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or Centre

School House, High School Room

“Autumnal Tints”

61) 9 March 1859, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Home of Ralph

Waldo and Lidian (Jackson) Emerson

“Autumnal Tints”

62) 26 April 1859, Tuesday; 7:30 P.M. – Lynn Massachusetts; Frazier Hall

“Autumnal Tints”

63) 9 October 1859, Sunday; ca. 9 A.M. – Boston, Massachusetts; Music Hall

“Life Misspent”

64) 30 October 1859, Sunday – Concord, Massachusetts; Vestry, First Parish

Meetinghouse

“The Character and Actions of Captain John Brown”

65) 1 November 1859, Tuesday; 7:30 P.M. – Boston, Massachusetts; Tremont Temple

“The Character and Actions of Captain John Brown”

66) 3 November 1859, Thursday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; Washburn

Hall, Mechanic’s Hall Building

“The Character and Actions of Captain John Brown”

67) 2 December 1859, Friday; ca. 2:30 p.m. – Concord, Massachusetts; Town Hall

“The Martrydom of John Brown”

68) 8 February 1860, Wednesday; 7:30 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Brick or

Centre School House, High School Room

“Wild Apples”

69) 14 February 1860, Tuesday – Bedford, Massachusetts

“Wild Apples”

70) 4 July 1860, Wednesday – North Elba, New York; gravesite of John Brown

“The Last Days of John Brown”

71) 9 September 1860, Sunday; (Morning) – Lowell, Massachusetts; Welles Hall

“Walking” (?)

72) 9 September 1860, Sunday; (Afternoon?) – Lowell, Massachusetts; Welles Hall

“Life Misspent”

73) 20 September 1860, Thursday – Concord, Massachusetts; Town Hall

“The Succession of Forest Trees”

74) 11 December 1860, Tuesday; 8:00 P.M. – Waterbury, Connecticut; Hotchkiss

Hall

“Autumnal Tints” 30

30 For newly discovered material relating to the details of this lecture, see Robert F. Clarke, “Thoreau’s Last Lecture – New Letters, More Context,” Thoreau Society Bulletin 266 (Spring 2009): 1-5.

100

The Flowering of a Work: An Ecocritical Examination of the Compositional and Lecture

Histories of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walking”

On 25 November of 1850 Thoreau wrote in his Journal,

I feel a little alarmed when it happens that I have walked a mile into the woods

bodily, without getting there in spirit. I would fain forget all my morning’s

occupation- my obligations to society. But sometimes it happens that I cannot

easily shake off the village- the thought of some work- some surveying will run in

my head and I am not where my body is- I am out of my senses. In my walks I

would return to my senses like a bird or a beast. What business have I in the

woods if I am thinking of something out of the woods. (Sattelmeyer, et al. Journal

3:150)

This excerpt from Thoreau’s November 1850 Journal is just one among a number of passages he wrote that month that he soon incorporated into one of his most frequently presented lectures, “Walking, or the Wild.” In fact, together with passages from January and February of 1851, gleanings from his November 1850 Journal may be considered the germination of what would, by June of 1862, lead to the publication of “Walking.”

Thoreau also worked older Journal excerpts into the essay, including entries as far back as his 1842-44 Journal. By April of 1851, he had enough material together to present his first “Walking” lecture. Still, he was not finished with the compositional element of the lecture-essay. In February of 1852, almost a year after his first public reading of

“Walking,” Thoreau wrote a number of Journal passages that he would soon add to the lecture. By May 1852 he divided the lecture into two readings, calling the first portion

101

“Walking” and the second “The Wild.” In 1854 Thoreau was again working with the

lecture – this time gleaning material from it that he would incorporate into two other

lectures: “Moonlight” and “What Shall It Profit?” His composing and lecturing of

“Walking” had thus become the seed for additional works. And rightly so, given that

Thoreau claimed “Walking” was in fact “. . . a sort of introduction to all that [he might]

write hereafter” (Dean, “A Sort of Introduction” 1). 31 He had also developed the essay

much more fully by 1854, again adding material to the two sections, so much so that

before his 1854 Philadelphia reading, he had rewritten a great deal of “The Wild.”

Before his next reading of “Walking,” he also revised much of that reading material. Still,

Thoreau was not finished with the essay, continuing to add to, edit, and revise his writing

more than ten years after the first lecture was written. Thoreau’s final editorial

preparation of the work in the Spring of 1862 came as he readied it (in part via

amanuensis) for publication in the Atlantic Monthly (1862). 32

The growth of “Walking” over a more than ten-year period can be traced in

Thoreau’s Journal by examining those passages he culled for use in the lecture-essay, 33 to be certain, but the development of the lecture-essay was dependent upon so much more. In particular, given the pivotal role of nature in Thoreau’s life and writing, his

31 For further information see Bradley P. Dean, “A Sort of Introduction,” Thoreau Research Newsletter 1 (January 1990): 1-2. This text is difficult to locate in libraries, but it is available via the world wide web at the Thoreau Reader where it has been reprinted with permission from the author: www.thoreau.eserver.org\sortof.html.

32 A detailed discussion of the publication of the essay is provided in chapter four.

33 This study would be enhanced by examining lecture manuscripts. The manuscript pages, however, are widely dispersed throughout the United States. A few are in private ownership, and one is known to be in a repository in Canada. In addition, Thoreau’s notoriously scraggly handwriting requires a great deal of practice to read. Given these circumstances, the manuscripts were not examined as part of the present study.

102

experiences in forests and fields, and on mountains and ponds, greatly influenced his

composing and reading of the essay. Moreover, the attention Thoreau gave to the study of nature increasingly outweighed his desire to seek the lecture platform. While writing remained primary, what he observed during his lecture travels superseded the importance of the lecture itself for Thoreau. Examining just such recorded observations throughout these travels to present “Walking,” for example, makes evident that to Thoreau, what he could observe during his travels became the event-of-the-day itself; at times, the lecture was given only scant mention or not even recorded at all in his Journal.

A handful of specific places such as the Old Marlborough Road and Spaulding’s cranberry meadow are mentioned in the essay (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 193-4;

218). Thoreau’s Journal references to some of his favorite places such as Fair Haven Bay,

Nut Meadow Brook, and Heywood’s Meadow are not, however, named in the lecture- essay. 34 Rather, more often than not, in the text there are numerous references to forests, brooks, meadows, and fields -- perhaps intentionally non-specific references to nature.

Journal evidence at times suggests that Thoreau took a specific experience of a particular place in nature and broadened that experience to make it more inclusive of his readership; his forests could be their forests, his brooks their brooks, his meadows, theirs. Yet some of the richest natural influences evidenced in “Walking” are more abstract –“Wildness” and the “Holy Land,” for example. In other words, the place of nature can be read both concretely and abstractly in the text – thanks in large part to Thoreau’s extra-textual experiences in and ponderings about nature.

34 The influence of specific, concrete places on Thoreau during the time of the writing and lecturing of “Walking, or the Wild” is an area of research I look forward to pursuing in the near future, but is not part of the present study.

103

This biographical evidence of the author’s keeping nature in mind as he wrote

extends beyond Thoreau’s personal life and into nineteenth-century culture. Specifically,

Thoreau’s natural history pursuits, his observations about America and Americanness,

and the revelation of his ecocentric paradigm in “Walking,” might best be understood in

concert with examining the formation of American environmental thought. Thoreau’s

outsider social status might be minimized once one considers the nineteenth-century burgeoning of America’s attraction to all-things-natural. Specifically, America’s search for an identity distinct from the Old World led it to artistic and cultural pursuits that celebrated nature. 35 That Thoreau wrote about nature in his Journal, lectures, and writings indicates that he was very much a part of popular nineteenth-century culture. Still,

Thoreau went beyond the popular appreciation for nature when he claimed in “Walking”

“that in Wildness is the preservation of the World” (202). Cultural influences certainly impacted the development of Thoreau’s ecocentric philosophy that he shares in

“Walking,” but his personal experiences and study of nature as noted in his Journal are cause for his going beyond popular ideas. In his writing, Thoreau considered his experiences deeply, so that the sometimes factual recordings of natural observations in his Journal were harvested into philosophical principles of existence. Examining the seemingly external elements of Thoreau’s life during the development of the essay evidences just how influential they were on his writing and lecturing. From an ecocritical lens, going beyond a purely internal, textual examination of “Walking” reveals the more than ten year period of organic growth of the lecture-essay that was intimately tied to

35 “Old World” is here written as it is the language Thoreau used in “Walking, or the Wild”. Thoreau’s reference is to the Anglo-European experience as contrasted with that of the experience of the American, the man of the “New World”.

104

Thoreau’s natural experiences and study as reflected in the Journal, his lecture career, and his particular nineteenth-century cultural situatedness.

On the title page of the copy-text manuscript for the published essay, “Walking,”

Thoreau noted that the essay is composed of ‘“sentences from my journal”’ (cited in

Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 199). This comes as no surprise to the scholar of

Thoreau’s works, for it has long been known that Thoreau gleaned heavily from his

Journal for all of his lectures and published writings. Yet the specific passages from

Thoreau’s Journal he used in “Walking, or the Wild” have yet to be identified and compiled into one source. Although worthy of study as a valuable literary work in its own right, the Journal undoubtedly remains a primary source for the researcher’s analysis of Thoreau’s composing process of his various lectures, essays, and books, and thus the identification of specific Journal passages that relate to his writings are of particular import. Thoreau himself records the significant role of his Journal in his composing process when he writes that his “. . . inspirations . . . [have] been entered duly in such order as they came in the Journal. Thereafter when the time arrived they were winnowed into Lectures - and again in due time from Lectures into Essays” (Sattelmeyer, ed.,

Journal 2: 205 (Summer 1845).

Unfortunately, passages from his Journal that he used in “Walking, or the Wild” and that were written before 1851 are difficult to identify with great specificity since

Thoreau scissored many of these entries to use in a number of his lectures and essays, one of which was “Walking” (Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 199), yet through the recent publication of the scholarly Princeton University Press edition of the Writings of Henry

D. Thoreau , a great deal of Journal evidence is made much more accessible to the

105 researcher than ever before. Reading the published essay alongside Thoreau’s Journal reveals a number of significant passages that Thoreau transposed into “Walking, or the

Wild.” The following is the first comprehensive list of all known passages that concurrently appear in Thoreau’s Journal and the published form of “Walking.” 36

Passages listed in the left column concur with those in the essay as it appears in

Excursions as published in the Princeton University Press edition of the Writings of

Henry D. Thoreau . Passages listed in the right column concur with those in the volumes of Thoreau’s Journal as published in the Princeton University Press edition of the

Writings of Henry D. Thoreau . Dates are provided as recorded in the Journal; only the year is known for some passages, and one passage cannot even be assigned a specific year. Parallel passages as well as passages with some slight variation in sentence structure and diction are here included. Princeton University Press edition passages follow Thoreau’s spelling and punctuation. Italicized words following citations are mine.

These selections reveal that Thoreau gleaned passages from his Journal and incorporated them into “Walking” between late October of 1842 & August of 1844 37 and 2 February

1852. Between 23 April 1851 and 9 September 1860, Thoreau also shared the text on the lecture platform, a significant observation as far as this table is concerned only when one

36 Journal passages were identified by examining the Princeton University Press edition of the Writings of Henry D. Thoreau ; Journals 1-6 & 8 (Princeton: Princeton University Press). For those volumes not yet published in the Princeton University Press Edition, the 1906 edition has been cited. Bradford Torrey, ed., Writings of Henry D. Thoreau ; various volumes (New York: AMS Press, 1968 (this a reprint of the earlier 1906 edition). Journal passages were also identified with the aid of William L. Howarth, The Literary Manuscripts of Henry David Thoreau (Ohio: Ohio State University Press, 1974). In addition, I was kindly provided with notes by Elizabeth Hall Witherell of the Thoreau Textual Center, UCSB. Finally, the notes of Bradley P. Dean have proven an invaluable resource in my Journal research, and have been studied with permission from Debra Kang Dean.

37 The exact date of the first known Journal passage that Thoreau used in “Walking” cannot be determined.

106 considers Journal passages added during the lecture years that may have been influenced by Thoreau’s platform experiences. The Journal passages cited below make evident that at least a quarter of the published text is derived from the Journal. As a whole, this table makes evident the importance of Thoreau’s Journal to his organic composition of this lecture-essay as he developed it during a more than ten-year span.

Walking Corresponding Journal

I have met with but one or two persons in the I have met with but one or two persons in the course of my life who understood the art of course of my life who understood the art taking

Walking, that is, of taking walks, walks p.185, ll. 10-12 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 176, ll. 16-17 who had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering , who had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering -- which word is beautifully derived “from idle And this word saunter by the way is happily people who roved about the country , in the derived “from idle people who roved about the middle ages, and asked charity, under pretense country [in the middle ages] and asked charity of going à la sainte terre ” - to the holy land, under pretence of going à la sainte terre,” to the till the children exclaimed, “There goes a holy land till perchance the children exclaimed sainte-terrer ,” a saunterer - a holy-lander. They There goes a sainte-terrer” a holy-lander - who never go to the holy land in their walks, as They who never go to the holy land in their they pretend, are indeed mere idlers and walks as they pretend are indeed mere idlers & vagabonds, vagabonds - p. 185, ll. 12-20 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 176, ll. 21-28

Brackets are Thoreau’s

The following four pages of the Journal are

107

here missing.

The chivalric and heroic spirit which once The chivalric & heroic spirit which once belonged to the rider seems now to reside in – belonged to the chevalier or rider only seems or perchance to have subsided into the Walker now to reside in the walker- To represent the

– not the Knight but Walker Errant. chivalric spirit we have no longer a knight-but p. 186, ll. 20-23 a walker errant-

10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 176, ll. 5-8

We have felt that we almost alone hereabouts My friends wonder that I love to walk alone. . practiced this noble art; . . . . It comes only by . . It is by the grace of God . . . . the grace of God. 1 Sept. 1850; Journal 3, p. 110, l. 14 & l. 26) p. 186, ll. 25-26 & 31 The middle passage not here included was

likely later gleaned from the Journal for

Thoreau’s writing on “Moonlight.” The entire

passage may have been included in an early

version of “Walking,” especially given that

Thoreau borrowed from “Walking” to write

“Moonlight.”

Buonaparte may talk of the 3 o’clock in the Buonaparte said that the three o clock in the morning courage, morning courage was the rarest but I cannot p. 188, ll. 8-9 agree with him.

1842-44; Journal 2, p. 71, ll. 1-2

If you would get exercise, go in search of the Go in search of the springs of life - & you will springs of life. Think of a man’s swinging get exercise enough. Think of a man’s

108 dumb-bells for his health, when those springs swinging dumb bells for his health - when are bubbling up in far-off pastures unsought by those springs are bubbling in far off pastures him. unsought by him! p. 189, ll. 9-12 7 Sept. 1851; Journal 4, p. 54, ll. 31-35

Moreover, you must walk like a camel which is You must walk like a camel, which is said to said to be the only beast which ruminates when be the only beast which ruminates while walking. walking. p. 189, ll. 13-14 After 31 Oct. 1850 and before 8 Nov. 1850;

Journal 3, p. 130, ll. 6-7

Living much out of doors, in the sun and wind, Living much out of doors in the air - in the sun will no doubt produce a certain roughness of & wind – will no doubt, produce a certain character – will cause a thicker cuticle to grow roughness of character - will cause a cuticle to over some of the finer qualities of our nature, grow over some of the finer sensibilities of a as on the face and hands, man’s nature as on his face & hands p. 189, ll. 18-22 11 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 175, ll. 13-16 manual labor robs the hands of some of their As too much manual labor calluses the hand delicacy of touch. and deprives it of the exquisiteness of the p. 189, ll. 22-23 touch.

11 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 175, ll. 26-27

-So staying in the house on the other hand may as staying in the house on the other hand may produce a softness and smoothness, not to say produce a softness & smoothness not to say thinness of skin, accompanied by an increased thinness of skin - accompanied by an increased

109 sensibility to certain impressions. sensibility to certain impressions.- p. 189, ll. 23-26 11 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 175, ll. 18-21

Perhaps we should be more susceptible to Perhaps we should be more susceptible to some influences important to our intellectual some influences important to our intellectual and moral growth, if the sun had shone and the growth - if the sun had shown on us & the wind blown on us a little less; wind blown on us a little less. p. 189, ll. 26-29 11 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 175, ll. 23-26) and no doubt it is a nice matter to proportion And no doubt it is a nice matter to proportion rightly the thick and thin skin. rightly the thick and thin skin. p. 189. Ll. 29-31 11 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 175, ll. 21-23

But methinks that is a scurf that will fall off But then methinks that is a scurf that will fall fast enough – that the natural remedy is to be off fast enough, - that the natural remedy is to found in the proportion which the night bears be found in the proportion which the night to the day, the winter to the summer, thought to bears to the day, the winter to the summer, etc., experience. thought not experience. p. 189, ll. 31-35 11 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 175, ll. 28-32

I am alarmed when it happens that I have I feel a little alarmed when it happens that I walked a mile into the woods bodily, without have walked a mile into the woods bodily, getting there in spirit. In my afternoon walk I without getting there in spirit. I would fain would fain forget all my morning occupations, forget all my morning’s occupation-my and my obligations to society, But it obligations to society. But sometimes it sometimes happens that I cannot easily shake happens that I cannot easily shake off the off the village. The thought of some work will village- the thought of some work- some

110 run in my head, and I am not where my body surveying will run in my head and I am not is; I am out of my senses. What business have where my body is- I am out of my senses. In

I in the woods, if I am thinking of something my walks I would return to my senses like a out of the woods? bird or a beast. What business have I in the p. 190, ll. 14-24 woods, if I am thinking of something out of the

woods.

25 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 150, ll. 25-33

A people who would begin by burning the A people who would begin by burning the fences and let the forest stand! I saw the fences and let the forest stand- I saw the fences half consumed, their ends lost in the fences half consumed- their ends lost in the middle of the prairie, and some worldly miser middle of the prairie- and some worldly misers with a surveyor looking after his bounds, while with a surveyor looking after their bounds. heaven had taken place around him, and he did While heaven had taken place around them- not see the angels going to and fro, but was and he did not see the angels around- but was looking for an old post-hole in the midst of looking for an old post-hole in the midst of paradise. I looked again and saw him standing paradise I looked again and saw him standing in the middle of a boggy stygian fen in the middle of a boggy stygian fen surrounded by devils, and he had found his surrounded by devils- & he had found his bounds without a doubt, three little stones bounds without a doubt- 3 little stones where a where a stake had been driven, and looking stake had been driven.- and looking nearer I nearer I saw that the Prince of Darkness was saw that the prince of darkness was his his surveyor. surveyor. p. 191, ll. 11-22 11 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 139, ll. 3-13

111

I can easily walk ten, fifteen, twenty, any I can easily walk 10 15 20 any number of miles number of miles, commencing at my own door, commencing at my own door without going by without going by any house, without crossing a any house -without crossing a road except road except where the fox and the mink do. where the fox & the mink do. p. 191, ll. 23-26 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 102, ll. 1-4

first along by the river, and then the brook, and First along by the river & then the brook & then the meadow and the wood-side. then the meadow & the wood-side- p. 191, ll. 26-27 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 102, ll. 6-7

There are square miles in my vicinity which There are square miles in my vicinity which have no inhabitant. have no inhabitant.- p. 191, ll. 28-29 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 102, ll. 5-6

From many a hill I can see civilization and the from a hundred hills I can see civilization & abodes of man afar. abodes of man afar. p. 191, ll. 29-30 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 102, ll. 8-9

The farmers and their works are scarcely more These farmers & their works are scarcely more obvious than woodchucks and their burrows. obvious than woodchucks p. 191, ll. 30-32 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 102, ll. 9-10

Man and his affairs, church and state – and Man & his affairs- Church & state & school school, trade and commerce, and manufactures trade & commerce & agriculture- Politics for and agriculture, - even politics, the most that is the word for them all here today- I am alarming of them all, - I am pleased to see how pleased to see how little space it occupies in little space they occupy in the landscape. the landscape- it is but a narrow field- that still

112

Politics is but a narrow field, and that still narrower highway yonder leads to it- I narrower highway yonder leads to it. I sometimes direct the traveller [one leaf sometimes direct the traveler thither. missing] p. 191, ll. 32-36 & 192, ll. 1-2 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, pp. 102, ll. 33-

34 & 103, ll. 1-3

Where they once dug for money, Where they once dug for money

But never found any; But never found “any” p. 193, ll. 13-14 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 9-10

O man of wild habits, The man of wild habits,

Partridge and rabbits, Partridges & Rabbits

Who hast no cares Who has no cares

Only to set snares, Only to set snares

Who liv’st all alone, Who liv’st all alone

Close to the bone; Close to the bone-

And where life is sweetest And where life is sweetest

Constantly eatest. constantly eatest. p. 193, ll. 21-28 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 1-8

When the spring stirs my blood When the spring stirs my blood

With the instinct to travel, With the instinct to travel

I can get enough gravel I can get enough gravel

On the Old Marlboro Road. on the Old Marlboro’ Road. p. 193, ll. 29-32 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 13-16

Nobody repairs it, Nobody repairs it-

113

For nobody wears it; For nobody wears it-

It is a living way, It is a living way

As the Christians say, As the Christians say- p. 193, ll. 33-36 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 21-24

Not many there be Not many they be

Who enter therein, Who enter therein p. 193, ll. 37-38 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 103, ll. 15-16

Only the guests of the Only the guests of the

Irishman Quin. Irishman Quin p. 193, ll. 39-40 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 103, ll. 19-20

What is it, what is it What is it- what is it

But a direction out there, But a direction out there

And the bare possibility And the bare possibility

Of going somewhere? O going somewhere- p. 194, ll. 1-4 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 25-28

Great guide boards of stone Great guide boards of stone

But travelers none. But travelers none. p. 194, ll. 5-6 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 29-30

Cenotaphs of the towns Cenotaphs of the towns

Named on their crowns. Named on their Crowns p. 194, ll. 7-8 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 105, ll. 1-2

It is worth going to see It is worth going there to see

Where you might be. Where you might be

114 p. 194, ll. 9-10 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 31-32

What king What king (did the thing)

Did the thing, I am still wondering-

I am still wondering- After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 38-39 p. 194, ll. 11-13

Set up how or when, Set up how or when

By what select men, By what selectmen?

Gourgas or Lee, Gourgas or Lee

Clark or Darby? Clark or Darby? p. 194, ll. 14-17 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 105, ll. 4-7

They’re a great endeavor They’re a great endeavor

To be something forever. To be something for ever. p. 194, ll. 18-19 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 33-34

Blank tablets of stone, Blank tablets of stone

Where a traveler might groan, Where a traveler might groan

And in one sentence And in one sentence

Grave all that is known grave all that is known

Which another might read Which another might read

In his extreme need. In his extreme need.

I know one or two I know two or three

Lines that would do, That might there be.

Literature that might stand Literature that might stand

All over the land, All over the land.

115

Which a man could remember Which a man might remember

Till next December, Till after December.

And read again in the spring, And read again in the spring

After the thawing. After the thawing. p. 194, ll. 20-33 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 105, ll. 9-21

If with fancy unfurled If you’ll leave your abode

You leave your abode, With your spirits unfurled

You may go round the world You may go round the world

By the Old Marlboro Road. By the old Marlboro Road. p. 194, ll. 34-37 After 29 July 1850; Journal 3, p. 104, ll. 17-20 possibly the day will come when it will be possibly it will be partitioned off into so called partitioned off into so-called pleasure grounds, pleasure grounds where only a few may enjoy in which a few will take a narrow and the narrow & exclusive pleasure exclusive pleasure 12 February 1851; Journal 3, p. 190, ll. 2-4 pp. 194, ll. 40-41 & 195, ll. 1-2 when fences shall be multiplied, and man traps when fences shall be multiplied, and man traps and other engines invented to confine men to and other engines invented to confine men to the public road, the public road. p. 195, ll. 2-4 12 February 1851; Journal 3, p. 190, ll. 6-8 walking over the surface of God’s earth, shall When walking over the surface of God’s earth- be construed to mean trespassing on some shall be construed to mean trespassing on some gentleman’s grounds. gentleman’s grounds. p. 195, ll. 4-6 12 February 1851; Journal 3, p. 190, ll. 4-6

116

When I go out of the house for a walk, When I am considering which way I will walk p. 195, l. 22 16 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 141, l. 24

My needle is slow to settle - varies a few my needle is slow to settle- my compass varies degrees, and does not always point due south- by a few degrees and does not always point west, it is true, and it has good authority for due south west- and there is good authority for this variation, these variations in the heavens- p. 195, ll. 27-30 16 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 141, l. 24-27

I turn round and round irresolute sometimes for I have stood by my door sometimes half an a quarter of an hour, hour, irresolute as to what course I should take. p. 196, ll. 2-3 16 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, 142, ll. 7-8

Every sunset which I witness inspires me with Every sun-set inspires me with the desire to go the desire to go to a west as distant and as fair to a west as distant and as fair as that into as that into which the Sun goes down. which the sun goes down. p. 197, ll. 26-28 21 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 149, ll. 6-7

Michaux who knew but part of them, says that F. Andrew Michaux says that “the species of

“the species of large trees are much more large trees are much more numerous in North numerous in North America than in Europe: in America than in Europe: in the U S there are the United States there are more than 140 more than 140 species that exceed 30 feet in species that exceed thirty feet in height; in height --; in France there are but 30 that attain

France there are but thirty that attain this size.” this size, p. 198, ll. 17-22 After Jan. 10 1851; Journal 3, p. 177, ll. 9-12

The younger Michaux, in his Travels West of In F. A. Michaux i.e. the younger Michaux’s, the Alleghanies in 1802, says that the common Voyage A l’ouest des Monts Alléghanys- 1802

117 inquiry in the newly settled West was - ‘“From printed at Paris 1808 what part of the world have you come?’ As if He says the common inquiry in the newly these vast and fertile regions would naturally settled West was “From what part of the world be the place of meeting and common country have you come? As if these vast and fertile of all the inhabitants of the globe.” regions would naturally be the point of union p. 199, ll. 10-16 and the common country of all the inhabitants

of the globe”

8 June 1851; Journal 3, pp. 246, ll. 32-35 &

247, ll. 1-2

These are encouraging testimonies. - These too are encouraging facts – p. 200, l. 10 2 Feb. 1852; Journal 4, p. 318, l. 34

If the moon looks larger here than in Europe, “the moon looks larger” than in Europe Here probably the sun looks larger also. then more moonshine is to be expected - p. 200, ll. 10-12 Perhaps the sun looks larger also.

2 Feb. 1852; Journal 4, p. 318, ll. 27-30

Here and in the next passage Thoreau makes

reference to Sir Francis Head. He also notes

his source in the essay, p. 199, ll. 19

If the heavens of America appear infinitely “the heavens of America appear infinitely higher, the stars brighter, I trust that these facts higher” - - “the stars brighter” - These, too, are are symbolical of the height to which the encouraging facts - symbolical of the height to philosophy and poetry and religion of her which the philosophy & poetry and religion of inhabitants may one day soar. At length her inhabitants may one day soar. At length

118 perchance the immaterial heaven will appear as perchance the immaterial heaven will appear as much higher to the American mind, and the much higher to the American mind - and the intimations that star it as much brighter. For I intimations that star it will appear as much believe that climate does thus react on man - as brighter. For I believe that climate does thus there is something in the mountain air that react on man - and that there is something in feeds the spirit and inspires. the Mt air that feeds the spirit - & inspires. p. 200, ll. 12-21 2 Feb. 1852; Journal 4, pp. 318, ll. 32-35 &

319, ll. 1-7

Will not man grow to greater perfection Will not man grow to greater perfection, intellectually as well as physically under these intellectually as well as physically under these influences? Or is it unimportant how many influences? Or is it unimportant how many foggy days there are in his life? foggy days there are in his life? p. 200, ll. 21-24 2 Feb. 1852; Journal 4, p. 319, ll. 13-16

I trust that we shall be more imaginative; that We shall be more imaginative - We shall be our thoughts will be clearer, fresher and more clearer as our sky - bluer, fresher, broader & ethereal, as our sky – our understanding more more comprehensive in our understanding - comprehensive and broader, like our plains – like our plains – Our intellect on a grander our intellect generally on a grander scale, like scale - like our thunder & lightning - our rivers our thunder and lightning, our rivers and & our lakes - & mts & forests. mountains and forests, 2 Feb. 1852; Journal 4, p. 319, ll. 7-12 p. 200, ll. 24-30

I should be ashamed to think that Adam in I believe that Adam in paradise was not so

119 paradise was more favorably situated on the favorably situated on the whole as is the whole than the backwoodsman in this country. backwoodsman in America- p. 201, ll. 3-5 12 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 187, ll. 4-5

Some months ago I went to see a panorama of I went some months ago to see a panorama of the Rhine. It was like a dream of the Middle the Rhine It was like a dream of the Middle

Ages. I floated down its historic stream in ages- I floated down its historic stream in something more than imagination, under something more than imagination under bridges built by the Romans, and repaired by bridges built by the Romans and repaired by later heroes, past cities and castles whose very later heroes past cities & castles whose very names were music to my ears, and each of names were music to me made my ears tingle- which was the subject of a legend. & each of which was the subject of a legend. p. 201, ll. 13-19 After 10 January 1851; Journal 3, p. 181, ll.

14-19

There were Ehrenbreitstein and Rolandseck There were Ehrenbreitstein & Rolandseck & and Coblentz, which I knew only in history. Coblentz which I knew only in history. p. 201, ll. 19-21 After 10 January 1851; Journal 3 p. 181, ll. 22-

There seemed to come up from its waters and There seemed to come up from its waters & its its vine-clad hills and valleys a hushed music vine-clad hills & vallys a hushed music as of as of crusaders departing for the Holy Land. crusaders departing for the Holy Land- p. 201, ll. 22-24 After 10 January 1851; Journal 3, p. 181, ll.

20-22

I floated along under the spell of enchantment, I floated along through the moonlight of

120 as if I had been transported to a heroic age, and history under the spell of enchantment It was breathed an atmosphere of chivalry. as if I remembered a glorious dream as if I had p. 201, ll. 24-27 been transported to a heroic age & breathed an

atmosphere of chivalry

After 10 January 1851; Journal 3, p. 181, ll.

24-26

Soon after, I went to see a panorama of the Soon after I went to see the panorama of the

Mississippi, and as I worked my way up the Mississippi and as I fitly worked my way stream in the light of to-day, - and saw the upward in the light of today- & saw the steamboats wooding up – steamboats wooding up- p. 201, ll. 28-30 After 10 January 1851; Journal 3, p. 181, ll.

28-30 looked up the Ohio and the Missouri, and loooked up the Ohio & the Missouri & saw its heard the legends of Dubuque and of unpeopled cliffs- & counted the rising cities- &

Wenona’s Cliff, - still thinking more of the saw the Indians removing west across the future than of the past or present - I saw that stream & heard the legends of Dubuque & of this was a Rhine stream of a different kind; Wenona’s Cliff- still thinking more of the pp. 201, ll. 34-35 & 202, ll. 1-3 future than of the past or present- I saw that

this was a Rhine stream of a dif kind

After 10 January 1851; Journal 3, p. 181, ll.

30-35

The story of Romulus and Remus being The story of Romulus & Remus being suckled suckled by a wolf is not a meaningless fable. by a wolf is not a mere fable; the founders of

121

The founders of every state which has risen to every state which has risen to eminence have eminence, have drawn their nourishment and drawn their nourishment and vigor from a vigor from a similar wild source. It is because similar source. It is because the children of the the children of the empire were not suckled by empire were not suckled by wolves that they the wolf that they were conquered and were conquered & displaced by the children of displaced by the children of the northern the northern forests who were. forests who were. After 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, pp. 185, ll. 29- p.202, ll. 15-21 32 & 186, ll. 1-2

We require an infusion of hemlock spruce or Infusion of hemlock in our tea, if we must

Arbor-vitae in our tea. drink tea- not the poison hemlock- but the p. 202, ll. 23-24 hemlock spruce I mean- or perchance the

Arbor Vitae- the tree of life is what we want.

After 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 187, ll. 14-16

There is a difference between eating and There is a difference between eating for drinking for strength and from mere gluttony. strength & from mere gluttony. The Hottentots

The Hottentots eagerly devour the marrow of eagerly devour the marrow of the Koodoo & the Koodoo and other antelopes raw, as a other antelopes raw, as a matter of course- matter of course. 14 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 193, ll. 9-11 p. 202, ll. 24-28

The Hottentots eagerly devour the marrow of The hottentots devoured the marrow of a the Koodoo and other antelopes raw, as a koodoo raw as a matter of course. matter of course. 30 Dec. 1850; Journal 3, p. 169, ll.11-12

122 p. 202, ll. 26-28

And herein perchance they have stolen a march & herein perchance have stolen a march on the on the cooks of Paris. cooks of Paris. p. 202, ll. 31-32 14 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 193, ll. 11-12

This is probably better than stall-fed beef and This is better than stall fed cattle & slaughter- slaughter-house pork house pork. p. 202, ll. 33-35 14 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 193, ll. 13-14 a Wildness whose glance no civilization can A wildness whose glance no civilization could endure, endure. p. 202, ll. 35-36 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 201, l. 3

- as if we lived on the marrow of koodoos Wild as if we lived on the marrow of antelopes devoured raw. devoured raw p. 202, ll. 36-37 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 201, l. 12

There are some intervals which border the There is a sweet wild world which lies along strain of the wood-thrush, to which I would the strain of the wood thrush– the rich migrate - wild lands where no settler has intervales which border the stream of its song– squatted; to which, methinks, I am already more thoroughly genial to my nature than any acclimated. other. p. 203, ll. 1-4 31 May 1850; Journal 3, p. 73, ll. 17-20

The African hunter Cumming tells us that the The skin of the eland, just killed like that of skin of the Eland, as well as that of most other most other antelopes, emits the most delicious antelopes just killed, emits the most delicious perfume of trees & grass.

123

perfume of trees and grass. 30 Dec. 1850; Journal 3, p. 169, ll. 18-20

p. 203, ll. 5-8 Following Thoreau’s remark is a note that he

takes this sentence from p 218 In R. Gordon

Cumming’s Hunter’s Life in South Africa

olive is a fitter color than white for a man - a Olive or red seems the fittest color for a man- a

denizen of the woods. “The pale white man!” I denizen of the woods. The pale white man I do

do not wonder that the African pitied him. not wonder that the African pitied him.

p. 203, ll. 22-24 9 June 1850; Journal 3, p. 84, ll. 2-4

as a sacred place sacred places.

p. 205, l. 30 1850; Journal 3, p. 5, l. 7

This passage is the final, published version: I This journal entry is likely an early version of

enter a swamp as a sacred place – a sanctum what was ultimately published. Many of the sanctorum words in this passage are different, but the

crux of the idea remains. The passage actually

reads: I am not offended by the odor of the

skunk in passing by sacred places.

It is said to be the task of the American, “to “For the American, this task is to work the

work the virgin soil,” and that “Agriculture virgin soil,”-

here already assumes proportions unknown “Agriculture here already assumes proportions

everywhere else.” unknown everywhere else.”

p. 206, ll. 29-31 After 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 183, ll. 9-11

Passages cited by Thoreau can be found in

124

Guyot, Arnold. The Earth and Man . Translated

by C. C. Felton. Notation gleaned from the

Princeton University Press Edition of

Thoreau’s 1851 Journal, published as Journal

In Literature, it is only the wild that attracts us. In literature it is only the wild that attracts us-

Dullness is but another name for tameness. It dullness is only another name for tameness- It is the uncivilized free and wild thinking in is the untamed uncivilized free & wild thinking

Hamlet and the Iliad, in all the scriptures and in Hamlet- in the Iliad- and in all the scriptures mythologies, not learned in the Schools, that and mythologies that delights us- not learned in delights us. the schools p. 207, l. 28-32 16 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 141, ll. 1-5

A truly good book is something as natural, and A truly good book is something as wildly as unexpectedly and unaccountably fair and natural and primitive- perfect, as a wild flower 16 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 141, ll. 5-6 pp. 207, ll. 35-36 & 208, l. 1

English literature from the days of the English literature from the days of the minstrels to the Lake Poets - Chaucer and minstrels to the Lake Poets Chaucer & Spenser

Spenser and Milton, and even Shakespeare & Shakespeare & Milton included breathes no included, breathes no quite fresh and in this quite fresh & in this sense wild strain It is an sense wild strain. It is an essentially tame and essentially tame & civilized literature civilized literature, reflecting Greece and reflecting Greece and Rome. Her wilderness is

Rome. Her wilderness is a green-wood - her a greenwood her wild man a Robinhood. There

125 wild man a Robinhood. There is plenty of is plenty of genial love of nature in her poets genial love of nature, but not so much of but

Nature herself. Her chronicles inform us when Her chronicles inform us when her wild her wild animals, but not when the wild man in animals, but not when the wild man in her her, became extinct. became extinct. p. 208, ll. 8-17 After 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 179, ll. 3-11

I do not know of any poetry to quote which I cannot think of any poetry which adequately adequately expresses this yearning for the expresses this yearning for the wild. the wilde .

Wild. After 10 January 1851; Journal 3, p. 179, ll. p. 209, ll. 1-2 13-14

I do not know where to find in any literature, I do not know where to find in any literature ancient or modern, any account which contents whether ancient or modern- any adequate me, of that Nature with which even I am account of that Nature with which I am acquainted. acquainted. p. 209, ll. 3-6 After Feb. 9 1851; Journal 3, p. 186, ll. 30-32

Mythology comes nearer to it than anything. Mythology comes nearest to it of any. p. 209, l. 9 After Feb. 9 1851; Journal 3, p. 186, l. 32

How much more fertile a nature at least has How much more fertile a Nature has Grecian

Grecian mythology its root in than English Mythology its root in than English Literature!

Literature! After 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 180, ll. 21-22 p. 209, ll. 10-11

Mythology is the crop which the old world Mythology is the crop which the old world bore before its soil was exhausted, bore before its soil was exhausted

126 p. 209, ll. 11-13 After 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 180, ll. 23-24

The West is preparing to add its fables to those The west is preparing to add its fables to those of the east. of the east. p. 209, ll. 21-22 After 10 Jan. 1851; Journal 3, p. 180, l. 25

A fossil tortoise has lately been discovered in The fossil tortoise has been found in Asia large

Asia large enough to support an elephant. enough to support an elephant. p. 210, ll. 14-15 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 199, ll. 28-29

I love even to see the domestic animals reassert I love to see the domestic animals reassert their their native rights - any evidence that they have native right’s,- any evidence that they have not not wholly lost their original wild habits and lost their original wild habits & vigor. vigor; 31 May 1850; Journal 3, p. 73, ll. 14-16 p. 210, ll. 32-34

The seeds of instinct are preserved under the The seeds of instinct are preserved under their thick hides of cattle and horses, like seeds in thick hides- like seeds in the bowels of the the bowels of the earth, an indefinite period. earth- an indefinite period. p. 211, ll. 4-7 20 June 1850; Journal 3, p. 87, ll. 20-22

Any sportiveness in cattle is unexpected. I saw I saw a herd of a dozen cows & young steers & one day a herd of a dozen bullocks and cows oxen on Conantum this afternoon running running about and frisking in unwieldy sport, about & frisking in unwieldy sport like huge like huge rats, even like kittens. They shook rats- Any sportiveness in cattle is unexpected- their heads, raised their tails, and rushed up and They even played like kittens in their way- down a hill, shook their heads raised their tails & rushed up p. 2ll. 8-12 & down the hill.

127

21 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, pp. 147, ll. 34-36 &

148, ll. 1-3

I rejoice that horses and steers have to be I rejoice that horses & steers have to broken broken before they can be made the slaves of before they can be made the slaves of men- and men, and that men themselves have some wild that men themselves have some wild oats still oats still left to sow before they become left to sow before they become submissive submissive members of society. Undoubtedly, members of society- Undoubtedly all men are all men are not equally fit subjects for not equally fit subjects for civilization and civilization, and because the majority, like because the majority like dogs & sheep are dogs and sheep are tame by inherited tame by inherited disposition, is no reason why disposition, is no reason why the others should the others should have their natures broken that have their natures broken that they may be they may be reduced to the same level- Men reduced to the same level. Men are in the main are in the main alike, but they were made alike, but they were made several in order that several in order that might be various- If a low they might be various. If a low use is to be use is to be served one man will do nearly or served, one man will do nearly or quite as well quite as well as another, if a high one as another; if a high one, individual excellence individual excellence is to be regarded. Any is to be regarded. Any man can stop a hole to man can stop a hole to keep the wind away- but keep the wind away, but no other man could no other man can serve that use which the serve so rare a use as the author of this author of this illustration did. illustration did. Confucius says “The skins of Confucius says the tiger and the leopard when they are tanned, “The skins of the tiger and the leopard when are as the skins of the dog and the sheep they are tanned, are as the skins of the dog &

128 tanned.” But it is not the part of a true culture the sheep tanned” to tame tigers, any more than it is to make But it is not the part of a true culture to tame sheep ferocious, and tanning their skins for tigers any more than it is to make sheep shoes is not the best use to which they can be ferocious. It is evident then that tanning skins put. for shoes and the like is not the best use to pp. 211, ll. 25-36 & 212, ll. 1-9 which they can be put.

6 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 217, ll. 4-24 that there is nothing in a name. that there was nothing in a name- p. 212, ll. 12-13 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 230, l. 15

As the names of the Poles and Russians are to As the names of the Poles and Russians are to us, so are ours to them. us, so are ours to them. p. 212, ll. 16-17 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 231, ll. 13-14

It is as if they had been named by the child’s It was as if they had been named by the child’s rigmarole – Iery-wiery ichery van, tittle-tol- rigmarole of Iery ichery van tittle tol tan &c- I tan . I see in my mind a heard of wild creatures saw in my mind a heard of wild creatures swarming over the earth, and to each the swarming over the earth- and to each one its herdsman has affixed some barbarous sound in own herdsman had affixed some barbarous his own dialect. The names of men are of name or sound or syllables, in his own dialect- course as cheap and meaningless as Bose and so in a thousand languages- Their names were

Tray , the names of dogs. seen to be as meaningless exactly as bose and p. 212, ll. 17-23 Tray the names of dogs.

21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 230, ll. 15-22

Methinks it would be some advantage to Methinks it would be some advantage to

129 philosophy if men were named merely in the philosophy if men were named merely in the gross as they are known. It would be gross as they are known. It would only be necessary only to know the genus, and perhaps necessary to know the genus & perchance the the race or variety, to know the individual. species & variety- to know the individual. p. 212, ll. 24-28 21 May 1851; Journal 3, pp. 230, l. 34 & 231,

ll. 1-3

We are not prepared to believe that every We hardly believe that every private soldier in private soldier in a Roman army had a name of a Roman army had a name of his own his own – 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 231, ll. 21-22 p. 212, ll. 28-29

I knew a boy who from his peculiar energy was There was one enterprising boy came to school called “Buster” by his playmates, to me whose name was “Buster” p. 212, ll. 32-33 15 Nov. 1851; Journal 4, p. 187, ll. 18-19

There was one original name well given,

Buster Kendal.

19 Aug. 1851; Journal 3, p. 380, l. 25

I will not allow mere names to make I will not allow mere names to make distinctions for me, but still see men in herds distinctions for me but still see men in herds for all them. A familiar name cannot make a for all them . A familiar name cannot make a man less strange to me. It may be given to a man less strange to me. It may be given to a savage who retains in secret his own wild title savage who retains in secret his own wild title earned in the woods. earned in the woods. p. 213, ll. 3-7 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 231, ll. 4-7

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We have a wild savage in us, and a savage You have a wild savage in you- and a savage name is perchance somewhere recorded as name is perchance somewhere recorded as ours. yours. p. 213, ll. 7-9 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 231, ll. 34-35

I see that my neighbor, who bears the familiar I see that the neighbor who wears the familiar epithet William, or Edwin, takes it off with his epithet of William or Edwin takes it off with jacket. It does not adhere to him when asleep his jacket- it does not adhere to him when or in anger, or aroused by any passion or asleep or when in anger- or aroused by any inspiration. I seem to hear pronounced by some passion or inspiration- I seem to hear of his kin at such a time his original wild name pronounced by some of his kin at such a time in some jaw-breaking or else melodious his original wild name in some jaw breaking or tongue. else melodious tongue- p. 213, ll. 9-15 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 231, ll. 7-13 and yet we are so early weaned from her breast Infants as we are, we make haste to be weaned to society, to that culture which is exclusively from our great mother’s breast, and cultivate an interaction of man on man, our parts by intercourse with one another. p. 213, ll. 18-21 21 May 1851; Journal 3, p. 232, ll. 13-15)

In society, in the best institutions of men, it is In society- in the best institutions of men- I easy to detect a certain precocity, When we remark a certain precocity- When we should be should still be growing children, we are already growing children- we are already little men. little men. 13 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 191, ll. 31-33 p. 213, ll. 24-26

Give me a culture which imports much muck A culture which imports much muck from the

131 from the meadows, and deepens the soil, not meadows & deepens the soil- not that which that which trusts to heating manures, and trusts to heating manures & improved improved implements and modes of culture agricultural implements only. only. 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 198, ll. 22-24 p. 213, ll. 26-30

Many a poor sore-eyed student that I have Many a poor sore eyed student that I have heard of, would grow faster both intellectually heard of would grow faster both intellectually and physically, if, instead of sitting up so very & physically if instead of sitting up so very late late, he honestly slumbered a fool’s allowance. to study, he honestly slumbered a fool’s p. 213, ll. 31-34 allowance.

13 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 192, ll. 3-6

There may be an excess even of informing There may be an excess even of informing light. Niepce, a Frenchman, discovered light.

“actinism,” that power in the sun’s rays which Niepce a Frenchman announced that “No produces a chemical effect; that granite rocks, substance can be exposed to the sun’s rays and stone structures, and statues of metal “are without undergoing a chemical change.” all alike destructively acted upon during the Granite rocks & stone structures & statues of hours of sunshine, and but for provisions of metal &c- “are” says Rob. Hunt “all alike nature no less wonderful, would soon perish destructively acted upon during the hours of under the delicate touch of the most subtile of sunshine, and, but for provisions of nature no the agencies of the universe.” But he observed less wonderful, would soon perish under the

“that those bodies which underwent this delicate touch of the most subtile of the change during the day-light possessed the agencies of the universe.” But Niepce showed

132 power of restoring themselves to their original says Hunt “that those bodies which underwent conditions during the hours of night, when this this change during daylight, possessed the excitement was no longer influencing them.” power of restoring themselves to their original pp. 213, ll.35-37 & 214, ll. 1-10 conditions during the hours of night, when this

excitement was no longer influencing them”

[and]

“actinism” that power in the sun’s rays which

produces a chemical effect.

18 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 196, ll. 9-21 & 27-

Hence it has been inferred that “The hours of (infers) “the hours of darkness are as necessary darkness are as necessary to the inorganic to the inorganic creation as we know night & creation, as we know night and sleep are to the sleep are to the organic kingdom.” organic kingdom.” 18 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 196, ll. 24-26 p. 214, ll. 11-13

I would not have every man nor every part of I would not have every man cultivated- any man cultivated, any more than I would have more than I would have every acre of earth every acre of earth cultivated; cultivated. p. 214, ll. 16-18 13 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 192, ll. 7-8 preparing a mould against a distant future, by preparing a mould by the annual decay of the the annual decay of the vegetation which it forests which they sustain. supports. 13 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 192, ll. 9-10 p. 214, ll. 20-22

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We have heard of a Society for the Diffusion I have heard that there is a Society for the of Useful Knowledge. It is said that Diffusion of Useful Knowledge- It is said that

Knowledge is power; and the like. Methinks Knowledge is power and the like- there is equal need of a Society for the Methinks there is equal need of a society for

Diffusion of Useful Ignorance, what we will the diffusion of useful Ignorance- for what is call Beautiful Knowledge, a knowledge useful most of our boasted so called knowledge but a in a higher sense; for what is most of our conceit that we know something which robs us boasted so-called knowledge but a conceit that of the advantages of our actual ignorance- we know something which robs us of the 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 184, ll. 9-15 advantage of our actual ignorance? p. 214, ll. 29-36

A man’s ignorance sometimes is not only For a man’s ignorance sometimes is not only useful, but beautiful, while his knowledge, so useful but beautiful while his knowledge is called, is oftentimes worse than useless beside oftentimes worse than useless beside being being ugly. ugly. p. 215, ll. 18-20 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 184, ll. 30-32

Which is the best man to deal with, - he who Of two men, one of whom knows nothing knows nothing about a subject, and, what is about a subject, and what is extremely rare, extremely rare, knows that he knows nothing, knows that he knows nothing- and the other or he who really knows something about it, but really knows something about it, but thinks thinks that he knows all? that he knows all- What great advantage has p. 215, ll. 20-24 the latter over the former? Which is the best to

deal with?

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27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 198, ll. 10-14

My desire for knowledge is intermittent; but My desire for knowledge is intermittent but my

my desire desire

p. 215, ll. 25-26 After 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 185, l. 16

To bathe my head in atmospheres unknown to to bear my head through atmospheres and over

my feet is perennial and constant. heights unknown to my feet- is perennial &

p. 215, ll. 26-27 constant.

After 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 185, ll. 18-20

I do not know that this higher knowledge I do not know that knowledge amounts to

amounts to anything more definite than a novel anything more definite than a novel & grand

and grand surprise on a sudden revelation of surprise on a sudden revelation of the

the insufficiency of all that we called insufficiency of all that we had called

Knowledge before – knowledge before.

p. 215, ll. 29-32 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 198, ll. 15-17

It is the lighting up of the mist by the sun. Man It is the lighting up of the mist by the sun

cannot know in any higher sense than this, any But man cannot be said to know in any higher more than he can look serenely and with sense, than he can look serenely & with impunity in the face of the sun; impunity in the face of the sun. pp. 215, ll. 34-36 & 216, l. 1 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 198, ll. 18-21

It is an unfortunate discovery certainly, that of That is an unfortunate discovery certainly that

a law which binds us where we did not know of a law which binds us where we did not

before that we were bound. Live free, Child of know that we were bound. Live free- child of

the Mist – the mist.

135 p. 216, ll. 8-12 30 March 1851; Journal 3, p. 201, ll. 5-7

The man who takes the liberty to live is for man is superior to all laws both of heaven superior to all the laws both of heaven and & earth. (when he takes his liberty.) earth, 30 March 1851; Journal 3, p. 201, ll. 10-11 p. 216, ll. 12-13 (footnote this one – see pg.

216)

It is remarkable how few events or crises there It is remarkable how few events or crises there are in our histories; how little exercised we are in our minds’ histories- How little have been in our minds; how few experiences exercised we have been in our mind- how few we have had. experiences we have had p. 216, ll. 19-21 After 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 185, ll. 21-23

While almost all men feel an attraction It is apparent enough to me that only one or drawing them to society, few are attracted two of my townsmen or acquaintances (not strongly to Nature. more than one in many thousand men in deed-) p. 217, ll. 6-7 feel or at least obey any strong attraction

drawing them toward the forest or to nature,

but all almost without exception gravitate

exclusively toward men or society.

After 9 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 186, ll. 10-15

Nature is a personality so vast and universal Thou art a personality so vast & universal that that we have never seen one of her features. I have never seen one of thy features. I am

The walker in the familiar fields which stretch suddenly very near to another land than can be around my native town, sometimes finds bought & sold- this is not Mr. Bull’s swamp.

136 himself in another land than is described in This is a far, faraway field on the confines of their owner’s deeds, as it were in some far the actual Concord where nature is partially away field on the confines of the actual present.

Concord, where her jurisdiction ceases, and the These farms I have myself surveyed- these idea which the word Concord suggests ceases lines I have run- these bounds I have set up- to be suggested. These farms which I have they have no chemistry to fix them they fade myself surveyed, these bounds which I have from the surface of the glass (the picture) set up appear dimly still as through a mist; but After 31 Oct. 1850; Journal 3, p. 125, ll. 14-22 they have no chemistry to fix them; they fade from the surface of the glass; pp. 217, ll. 25- 34 & 218, ll. 1-2

I saw the setting sun lighting up the opposite Looking through a stately pine-grove I saw the side of a stately pine-wood. Its golden rays western sun falling in golden streams through straggled into the aisles of the wood as into its aisles- Its west side opposite to me was all some noble hall. lit up with golden light; p. 218, ll. 8-10 31 Oct. 1850; Journal 3, p. 124, ll. 9-11

I saw the sun falling on a distant white pine

wood.

21 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 148, ll. 10-11

The entire paragraph from which the above is

taken (p. 148) appears to be an earlier version

of part of the paragraph on pp. 218-219 of the

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published text. The passage cited above most

closely resembles the diction and character of

the published text, yet comparison of the

complete journal paragraph with that of the

published text indicates that while the

arrangement and wording vary, ideas in both

are quite similar.

A faint shadow flits across the landscape on the shadow of the wings of a thought flits

the mind, cast by the wings of some thought across the landscape of my mind p. 219, ll. 20-22 27 Feb. 1851; Journal 3, p. 200, ll. 7-9

We hug the earth - how rarely we mount! We hug the earth- how rare we mount!

p. 219, l. 28 9 June 1851; Journal 3, p. 84, l. 33

Methinks we might elevate ourselves a little We might get a little higher methinks

more. 9 June 1851; Journal 3, p. 84, l. 34

p. 219, ll. 28-29

We might climb a tree, at least. how rarely, we climb a tree!

p. 219, ll. 29-30 9 June 1851; Journal 3, p. 84, ll. 33-34

We had a remarkable sunset one day last We had a remarkable sunset tonight. I was

November; I was walking in a meadow the walking in the meadow the source of nut -

source of a small brook, meadow brook

p. 221, ll. 15-16 11 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 138, ll. 25-26

There is some little black-veined brook in the - A little black stream in the midst of the

midst of the marsh, just beginning to meander, marsh- just beginning to meander- winding

138 winding slowly round a decaying stump. – slowly round a decaying stump- p.222, ll. 1-3 11 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 138, ll. 32-34

We walked in so pure and bright a light, We walked in so pure & bright a light- so gilding the withered grass and leaves, so softly softly & serenely bright- I thought I had never and serenely bright, I thought I had never bathed in such a golden flood -without a ripple bathed in such a golden flood, without a ripple or a murmur to it The west side of every wood or a murmur to it. The west side of every & rising ground gleamed like the boundary of wood and rising ground gleamed like the elysium boundary of Elysium, 11 Nov. 1850; Journal 3, p. 138, ll. 27-30 p. 222, ll. 4-9

Although the researcher can identify many of Thoreau’s Journal passages that he gleaned for inclusion in “Walking, or the Wild,” one cannot say with certainty when

Thoreau undertook the initial writing of the lecture. Without explanation, William Rossi speculates that he had the idea for the lecture-essay before embarking on his excursion to

Canada, but states that he put the writing of those ideas on hold, focusing rather on his

Canadian experience first (“Self-Culture” 144). What is certain is that Thoreau had a lecture draft of “Walking, or the Wild” ready to read before his hometown audience by

23 April, 1851. His Journal indicates that he most likely wrote this first draft sometime between the late fall of 1850 and the first part of 1851 – this based on the numerous

October 1850 through February 1851 entries that are included in the lecture-essay. Many of Thoreau’s Journal gleanings for his writing prior to his 1850-51 Journal were added

139 well after their initial writing, but by 1850 Thoreau developed a system for writing in which he would make brief field notes, followed by Journal entries, then draft his writings as he used the Journal as the basis for his work. Often his writing consisted of several drafts, and “Walking, or the Wild” was no exception. Thoreau used his numerous lecture drafts of “Walking, or the Wild” to prepare his essay for publication. In fact, the copy-text for the publication of “Walking” in the Atlantic Monthly includes lecture manuscript sheets (Howarth, Literary Manuscripts xxix-xxx).

Interestingly, Thoreau probably wrote this lecture specifically as a lecture rather than as an essay given that he read one version or another of “Walking, or the Wild” as many as ten times between 23 April 1851 and 9 September 1860 and never moved the writing toward publication until faced with his impending death. On the whole, writings that he first presented as lectures were most often quickly moved into the published form.

Lectures of chapters from Walden, or Life in the Woods remained lectures only as long as they did (19 January 1847- 6 April 1852) because it took him some time to see the book into print; finding a publisher was somewhat difficult since A Week on the Concord and

Merrimack Rivers achieved only paltry sales after its initial publication. 38 Moreover, as a matter of principle, Thoreau never read his published works on the platform since the published work could then easily be read by the same public that might attend his lectures. Thoreau’s correspondence indicates that he was indeed being offered lecture engagements more and more; many of his extant 1850 and 1851 letters relate to arrangements for lyceum lecture readings, whereas extant lecture-related correspondence

38 Thoreau “bragged” in his Journal of 27 October 1853 that he had “a library of nearly nine hundred volumes, over seven hundred of which [he] wrote [him]self” since he was forced to store the unsold copies at the Thoreau family home when James Munroe & Co., the publisher, wished to clear his cellar of them. See Walter Harding, The Days of Henry Thoreau (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982) 254.

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prior to 1850 is scant. Additionally, Thoreau also had spent a good deal of time writing

and revising both A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and Walden, or Life in the Woods until 1849. The Week having been published, from 1849 until about the beginning of 1852, his work on Walden included only revisions (Shanley, Making 18-30),

and certainly did not demand the time that the earlier writing did. Thoreau was then

ready to undertake new projects, and lecturing seemed the most logical route for a

number of reasons. Economically speaking, lecturing could prove a much more lucrative

occupation than would authoring books, some of the most successful lecturers earning as

much as five thousand dollars per year. 39 Certainly more important to Thoreau than

money, lecturing provided the flexible schedule that was necessary for his way of life; by

not committing to too many reading engagements, Thoreau could maintain the leisure he

required for his nature study and exploration. In addition, he was more and more turning

to the lecturing world probably due in large part to increasingly being encouraged by

friends and admirers to do so. Lydian and Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne,

Amos Bronson Alcott, and H. G. O. Blake were just a few influential people who touted

Thoreau’s lecturing services between at least 1849 and 1851. Together with their

encouragement, and despite Thoreau’s stated preference for writing books rather than

lectures, Thoreau set to work on writing new works, likely with lecturing as the most

probable outlet for his texts in mind. Certainly he was in earnest about seeing himself as

a lecturer in the early 1850s – at least in as much as Thoreau was willing to give himself

over to an occupation of sorts. For example, in the first two years in which Thoreau

shared some version of “Walking, or the Wild,” 1851 and 1852, Thoreau presented six

39 For further details on lecturing in nineteenth-century America, see chapter two.

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and eight lectures respectively; these were two of his busiest calendar years for lecturing.

From the start, then, “Walking” was most likely a lecture-driven pursuit.

Concerning the writing of the essay itself, what exactly was the primary

motivation for his lecture topic cannot be clearly identified. Although Thoreau noted in

his Journal and in letters to friends that he would not write to please the public, he clearly

was not opposed to writing on some popular subjects. Natural history and excursion

essays were just two common, popular lecture formats in which Thoreau was apt to write.

For example, records of the Concord Lyceum indicate a number of orators in addition to

Thoreau whose subject was Natural History (Cameron, Emerson and Thoreau Speak 153,

158, 160, et al ). Nonetheless, Thoreau certainly had more knowledge of the flora and

fauna of his hometown than did any of his fellow townsfolk, and of natural history in

general. His explorations and reading yielded a great storehouse for his writing. In

addition to his many rambles through the woods and forests of Concord and his more

extensive excursions to the mountains of New Hampshire and Maine, for example, by the

time of the writing of “Walking, or the Wild,” Thoreau had read botanical texts such as

Jacob Bigelow’s Medical Botany and Asa Gray’s Manual of the Botany of the Northern

United States, from New England to Wisconsin and South to Ohio and Pennsylvania

Inclusive (commonly known as Gray’s Manual ) (Sattelmeyer, Reading 79). He was also quite familiar with John Loudon’s Encyclopedia of Plants , and Arboretum et Fruticetum

Britannicum (79). He had read Sir Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology and William

Smellie’s Philosophy of Natural History (81), and was well acquainted with esteemed

Harvard botanist Louis Agassiz. In addition to his scientific reading, Thoreau read

whatever travel literature he could find, including works by John James Audubon and

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John and William Bartram, even citing the latter in “Walking, or the Wild.” Closer to home, Emerson’s “Nature” was a more philosophical text that played a pivotal role in the development of Thoreau’s own understanding of nature.

Although he is often considered to be at the forefront of American environmentalism, Thoreau was not the only or even the first American author who found in nature a source of inspiration and an alternative to societal ills. As early as 1815

William Cullen Bryant “advised anyone who had seen enough of ‘sorrows, crimes, and cares’ of civilized life to ‘enter this wild wood and view the haunts of Nature” (Nash 75).

As Lawrence Buell points out, Susan Fenimore Cooper’s Rural Hours (1850) predates

Thoreau’s “Walking, or the Wild” as a bioregionalist text. Popular authors of the time, such as Alexander Wilson, William Howitt, James Fenimore Cooper, James Kirke

Paulding, Robert Montgomery Byrd, Timothy Flint, and William Gilmore Simms, among others, all recognized the literary potential of America’s wild lands and celebrated it in their texts, while deriding the evils of modern culture (Buell, Imagination 397-402; Nash,

Mind 75-76). The art world also recognized the richness of America’s wilderness.

Painters such as Thomas Cole, Albert Bierstadt, and Frederic Church all embraced

America’s natural beauty, painting grand likenesses of “the most distinctive, and perhaps the most impressive, characteristic of American scenery [,] . . . its wildness” (Cole,

“Essay on American Scenery” www.geocities.com). The American Landscape Painters either excluded the human presence from their works or pictured any aspect of civilization as miniscule; wilderness remained primary and was painted in all its grandeur. Nature’s beauty might be portrayed, but more often than not the central element was its sublime aw(e)-ful(l)-ness. Thoreau’s socially critical lectures that at

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times emphasize the goodness of nature as a tonic for societal ills, then, may be seen as a

sign of the times – even if, as the following study demonstrates, his sentiments are more

extreme than most and on the fringes of contemporary social thought.

Although Thoreau’s “Walking” has most often been classified as one of his

natural history essays, placing him well within the bounds of nineteenth-century authors

both structurally and topically, “Walking, or the Wild” is something more. As is the case

in “A Walk to Wachusett” and “A Winter Walk,” for example, “Walking” does not

follow a chronological discussion of specific experiences, nor does it resemble the

“Natural History of Massachusetts,” “Autumnal Tints,” “Wild Apples,” “Huckleberries”

and “The Succession of Forest Trees,” all written with specific concrete topics in mind –

the flora and fauna of Massachusetts, leaves, apples, berries, and trees. “Walking, or the

Wild,” although still focused on nature as such, takes an abstract, philosophical course.

As the following discussion bears out, it is better classified not with Thoreau’s natural

history essays, but rather with his “Life Without Principle” lecture-essay, which

interestingly is an outgrowth of “Walking, or the Wild.” Both philosophical in scope, the

two works put forth Thoreau’s understanding of society, nature, and man’s place in them.

Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag note that the essays are complementary to one

another, “Walking, or the Wild” offering Thoreau’s view of nature and “Life Without

Principle” detailing his attitude toward society (Dean, “Reconstructions” & “Sound of a

Flail”; Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” & “After Walden ”), but further examination of

“Walking, or the Wild” reveals Thoreau’s philosophical understanding of both nature and society. While “Life Without Principle” is concentrated primarily on social concerns, in

“Walking, or the Wild,” Thoreau’s discussion incorporates his views on both nature and

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society. In fact, given Thoreau’s ecocentric paradigm, the true place of society cannot be

understood outside of the bounds of nature since the very life-blood of society is indeed

nature herself. My difference with Dean and Hoag’s argument, then, is not that the two

lecture-essays are not complementary, but that “Walking” remains the primary text, or

the crux of Thoreau’s argument about the human place in the world, while “Life Without

Principle” continues the discussion further by more fully covering the societal aspect of

the discontentedness of being human. In other words, “Walking, or the Wild” is a text

about what it means to be human rather than solely about nature in the sense that it

defines the belongingness of human beings to nature that, for whatever reason,

humankind has forgotten. The ecocentric paradigm finds a place for man as more than a

member of society. Not forgetting man, nor prioritizing him above all else, the “word for

Nature” that Thoreau “speaks” is ultimately stated most succinctly in the opening of “The

Wild” portion of the lecture-essay, “that in Wildness is the preservation of the world”

(Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 202).

His “speaking for [my italics] nature” statement might be cause for considering

Thoreau the voice of the voiceless – that is, of the idea of nature in the abstract but also of nature in the concrete – the birds, the flowers, the trees, and so forth. Theoretically speaking, one might argue then that Thoreau assumes a sort of authoritarian position from within dominant society and speaks for subaltern nature. It is not a far stretch to assume that culturally speaking, nature is hierarchically subordinate to humankind . Yet this understanding is somewhat misguided. Nature is not in need of saving, is not down- trodden, and is not in fact voiceless. In “Walking, or the Wild,” Thoreau turns the dominant, anthropomorphic hegemonic structure on its head by placing man in Nature –

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by putting him back in his rightful place as part of it and then claiming that it is man in

fact who needs the saving “grace” in nature. Wildness must be preserved not to save

nature, but humans. “Walking, or the Wild,” then, is misconstrued when it is considered

as being primarily about nature if in fact man is seen as other or outside of nature.

Rather, it is a radical telling of the place in which man belongs. As a reminder of just

where humans belong, Thoreau’s essay seems to occupy a sort of liminal space, to have,

so to speak, one foot in the world of man and one foot in the wild. In “Walking, or the

Wild,” then, Thoreau shifts the weight of his stance to the leg-in-nature, so to speak, to

bridge the artificial boundary humankind perceives between itself and nature – the

“other” that really is not other at all. In fact, man is himself nature as part and parcel of

her.

Thoreau certainly wastes no time in identifying his purpose for the writing of the essay even in the opening of the work, which serves to outline the organizational structure of the text:

I wish to speak a word for Nature, for absolute Freedom and Wildness, as

contrasted with a Freedom and Culture merely civil, - to regard man as an

inhabitant, or a part and parcel of Nature, rather than a member of society. I wish

to make an extreme statement, if so I may make an emphatic one, for there are

enough champions of civilization; the minister, and the school-committee, and

every one of you will take care of that. (185)

Although Thoreau does not specifically mention particular natural places in this opening, or for that matter, rarely does he mention specific places throughout the lecture-essay, the more abstract place of nature is here identified as a central component of the text. In

146 particular, “Wildness” is one of the primary subject-matters of the work. Additionally,

Thoreau discusses the “West” as “but another name for the Wild.” Third, “Walking” itself becomes the primary vehicle for experiencing “Wildness/ the West.” Forming the topical structure of the essay, these three elements operate together or in turns, rather than separately. The big three “W’s,” then, (Wildness, the West, and Walking) become the basis of Thoreau’s lecture-essay through which Thoreau’s discourse unfolds to reveal his radical, eco-centric paradigm.

Taking a step back even from the opening of the lecture-essay, consider the two- fold title, which reflects Thoreau’s purpose. Here, human action (walking) is linked with an abstract idea (the wild). As such, even the title suggests the text is not solely about nature – but about human beings actively engaged in nature (presumably it is mankind who does the walking). Thoreau’s introduction reiterates this point; he is speaking “a word for Nature, for absolute Freedom and Wildness, as contrasted with a Freedom and

Culture merely civil – to regard man as an inhabitant, or a part and parcel of Nature, rather than a member of society [my italics]” (185). Next, Thoreau notes he is aware that what he is about to share is extra-ordinary, but that he will boldly outline his message nonetheless.

Clearly this opening was written for a lecture audience. “I wish, this evening, to speak,” is written on the copy text of the essay that he submitted to James T. Fields for publication – much of which was from earlier draft versions of his lecture. Once submitted to Fields, Thoreau simply interlined the words “this evening” (568). The brief opening was written before his first presentation of the lecture, yet was a later development than much of what followed, many of the supporting ideas in the text

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having previously been written in his Journal. In fact, Thoreau returns to direct

statements of purpose throughout the essay where he reiterates his point through one of

the “three W’s” – Walking, the Wild, and the West. For example, Thoreau opens “The

Wild” section of the lecture-essay with a reiteration of his point: noting, “the West of

which I speak is but another name for the Wild; and what I have been preparing to say is, that in Wildness is the preservation of the world” (202). All of these statements appear to have been written as he drafted the essay and are not found in passages he gleaned from his Journal, so that while the Journal was an integral element of ideological textual development, he did not clearly delineate the crux of his argument prior to the actual writing of the lecture-essay. In other words, it took the writing process of “Walking, or the Wild” to put his ecocentric paradigm to paper. Perhaps he found no need to write it down until he was prepared to share it with others, but more likely, the writing of the text

probably helped Thoreau to fully realize his ecocentric existential philosophy. As

William Ellery Channing wrote, ‘“A man was not made to shut up his mind in itself; but to give it voice. We understand ourselves better, our conceptions grow clearer, by the very effort to make them clear to another”’ (qtd. in Rossi, “Self-Culture” 138). The direct approach Thoreau took in the essay to make his ideas clear to another may be attributed to his writing specifically for a lecture-going crowd; a purely auditory audience rather than a reading one necessitated a more direct approach, since for the listener, the words did not hang on the page for further study or even later casual perusal.

Structurally, then, the direct announcement of purpose at the beginning of both

“Walking” and “The Wild” sections was most likely driven by Thoreau’s having written

“Walking, or the Wild” for a lecture audience. In any case, Thoreau’s ecocentric

148 paradigm is supported by the passages he gleaned from his Journal as he wrote the lecture-essay.

Walking is one such topic that figures prominently in his Journal, and is the next focal point that Thoreau introduces in his lecture-essay. On 10 January 1851 Thoreau wrote about the saunterer, the art of walking, and the walker errant. Rearranged just slightly, these passages serve as the basis for the beginning of Thoreau’s exhortation on walking (see table noting Journal passages above). Interesting to note is what else

Thoreau was doing during late 1850 and early 1851. In The Thoreau Log: A

Documentary Life of Henry David Thoreau 1817-1862 , Raymond Borst rightly notes that in1851 Thoreau “travelled a good deal in Concord” (176). Thoreau’s late 1850 and early

1851 Journal is filled with observations and reflections on his walks about the wilds of his hometown. In December of 1850 alone his sauntering led him to study moss in

Concord’s woodlands, to visit Fair Haven Pond, to walk to some yet unexplored islands out on Loring Pond, to measure the ice on Flint’s Pond, to visit his old familiar Walden

Pond, to consider the snow crust as he walked across the Great Meadows, to note the color change of the pine woods once the snow had fallen, and to find an American goshawk that he subsequently donated to the Boston Society of Natural History. During this time he also read about others who explored nature – Champlain’s Voyages de la

Nouvelle France and R. Gordon Cummings’ Five Years of a Hunter’s Life in the Far

Interior of South Africa , thoughts about which he subsequently recorded in his Journal and later included in “Walking, or the Wild.” For example, Thoreau wrote in “Walking, or the Wild,” “The African hunter Cumming tells us that the skin of the Eland, as well as

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that of most other antelopes just killed, emits the most delicious perfume of trees and

grass,” a near identical passage from his 30 December 1850 Journal.

His reading, natural explorations, and journal reflections tell the story of

Thoreau’s preoccupation with the natural world and walking as the vehicle to his study.

His walking and writing evolved into a symbiotic relationship, each deriving meaning

from the other. Or, as William Howarth explains, Thoreau’s walks inspired his writing,

which in turn inspired more walks; his walking led to notes, outlines, Journal entries, and

multiple drafts of lectures and essays ( Literary Manuscripts xxix-xxx). In particular,

Thoreau developed a pattern of writing in the morning and walking in the afternoon. At times Thoreau would continue his rambles in the evening, or even well into the night, as his Journal and “Moonlight” make evident. Commenting on his practice of writing and walking, on 20 November 1849, Thoreau penned the following to H. G. O. Blake: “my walks have extended themselves, and almost every afternoon, (I read, or write, or make pencils, in the forenoon, and by the last means get a living for my body.) I visit some new hill or pond or wood many miles distant” (Harding and Bode, Correspondence 250-

51). More specifically, Thoreau would ponder his walks beyond the actual experience so that “very often what Thoreau wrote in the morning was an expansion of what he had noted the previous afternoon” (Rossi, “Self-Culture” 141). The connection between

Thoreau’s nature walks and writing was quite clear to his friends. Recognizing the influence of nature on Thoreau’s writing, Bronson Alcott wrote on 18 January 1851 that

“Concord’s woods were more to me than my library, or Emerson even. They were more to him than they were to me, and still more to Thoreau than to either of us. Take the

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forest and skies from their pages, and they, E. and T., have faded and fallen clean out of

their pictures” (cited in Borst, Log 177).

Rather than write of specific rambles in the woods and fields of Concord, Thoreau used “Walking, or the Wild” to tell his audience of a deeper kind of walk, yet it is the specific details that he almost daily records in his Journal of his readings and saunters that help to prove his philosophical ponderings. So for example, when he writes of Nut

Meadow Brook on 11 November 1850 (Sattelmeyer, et al, ed., Journal 3:138), he adapts

the passage for “Walking” to read, “a small brook” (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 221).

And in his Journal when he writes of the “roughness of character” he develops for “living much out of doors” as opposed to those who “stay . . . in the house” and become “soft,” it is a direct result of the contemplation of his November 1851 saunters. Just two days before noting the “roughness of character” Journal excerpt that he celebrates in

“Walking, or the Wild”, he writes of his walking companion, Channing’s, “tenderness and roughness.” In addition, this entry gives place to Thoreau’s wood notes as the source for his deeper work:

In our walks C[hanning] takes out his note-book sometimes and tries to write as I

do, but all in vain. He soon puts it up again, or contents himself with scrawling

some sketch of the landscape. Observing me still scribbling, he will say that he

confines himself to the ideal, purely ideal remarks; he leaves the facts to me. . . .

I, too, would fain set down something besides facts. Facts should only be as the

frame to my pictures; They should be material to the mythology which I am

writing; not facts to assist men to make money, farmers to farm profitably, in any

common sense; facts to tell who I am, and where I have been or what I have

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thought; as now the bell rings for evening meeting, and its volumes of sound, like

smoke which rises from where a cannon is fired, make the tent in which I dwell.

My facts shall be falsehoods to the common sense. I would so state facts that they

should be significant, shall be myths or mythologic. Facts which the mind

perceived, thoughts which the body thought, - with these I deal. I, too, cherish

vague and musty forms, vaguest when the cloud at which I gaze is dissipated

quite and naught but the skyey depths are seen. (Sattelmeyer, ed., Journal 4:170-

71)

The places to which Thoreau travelled and the facts which he thus recorded in his Journal might have seemed common to most, yet collectively, these experiences led to his observations and subsequent reflections that later were woven into his “Walking, or the

Wild.” In fact, before Thoreau’s Journal passages were used in “Walking, or the Wild,” he often ruminated over them and developed them more fully in his mind even before the initial penning of his thoughts in his Journal. Thoreau kept a notebook with him on his daily saunters in which he would write his observations; from those observations, he could later reflect in his Journal; and it was thus that his Journal became a source for his lectures and essays. A frequent companion on his walks was Ellery Channing, who

says of his method and the notebook for which Thoreau instructed his tailor to

make special pockets, 40 ‘I have seen bits of this note-book, but never [because of

its illegibility] recognized any word in it; and I have read its expansion in the

40 An interesting related point is that Thoreau also made sure he wore a hat that could hold some of his findings for later study – a leaf, some moss – whatever he might be interested in that he could carry home thus. See Harding, The Days of Henry Thoreau .

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Journal, in many pages, of that which occupied him but five minutes to write in

the field.’ (Rossi, “Self-Culture” 141)

In addition, even in the initial writing of Journal passages Thoreau would often leave room, so to speak, both literally and figuratively, for further expansion of his ideas. From about the 1850s onward, and about the time of his initial writing of “Walking, or the

Wild,” Thoreau undertook what Robert Sattelmeyer calls ‘“a kind of germ theory of composition”’ where he would “frequently le[ave] blank spaces above or below an entry, expanding them sometime later after having thus left ‘room for them to grow by process of creative accretion’” (140). Regarding the organic composition of Thoreau’s Journal,

William Rossi explains that “the Journal functioned not only as a record but also as a means of self-culture” (139). But the composition of “Walking” demonstrates that the self-culture did not end there. Rather, Thoreau’s ideas continued to evolve when, borrowing from his Journal, he added philosophical point to those ideas in the very compositional process of the lecture-essay. Had it not been for the interdependent nature of Thoreau’s walking, note taking, and journaling, there certainly would never have been

“Walking, or the Wild,” yet also central to the organic evolution of the text was the making sense of those Journal passages as he formed them into one continuous piece of work. “Walking, or the Wild” thus rests on the meaning Thoreau worked out in his writing, with the structure of the essay following this pattern: identify the main purpose

(ecocentric existential theory), rest that purpose on three main abstract elements that repeatedly arise and double back on themselves throughout the essay (Walking, the Wild, and the West), and then turn to the more concrete Journal excerpts as the basis for further discussion of these elements.

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Even after Thoreau had a reading draft of his lecture ready, he did not end his

writing of “Walking, or the Wild.” The text continued to evolve over the next nine years

as he shared it on the lecture platform. As was often the case with Thoreau, he tried out

his new “Walking, or the Wild” lecture before his hometown Concord Lyceum audience:

“April 23 1851 – D. H[.] Thoreau 0.0” (Cameron, Emerson and Thoreau 103). So reads the simple notation in the Account Book of the Concord Lyceum for Thoreau’s first presentation of “Walking.” The Concord Lyceum Record Book includes much the same information, Albert Stacy the secretary simply honoring Thoreau’s wish to be referred to as “Henry David’ rather than “David Henry,” and adding the title of his reading: “April

23, 1851 H. D. Thoreau. The Wild ” (Cameron, Mass. Lyceum 165 & Emerson and

Thoreau 165). This seven p.m. Wednesday evening lecture in the Unitarian Church

Vestry in Concord, Massachusetts was 20 th in line of the Lyceum’s 1850-1851 lecture season of a course of 23. 41 As the Concord Lyceum Record Book indicates, Thoreau was not paid for his lecture (0.0), as was Thoreau’s typical practice when he offered to read before his hometown. Other than the fact that his lecture was well attended by his fellow townsfolk, there is no indication of Thoreau’s reception of his presentation of “Walking, or the Wild” in Concord. Given that Thoreau never presented the same lecture in the same location, this first presentation of “Walking” was the only time he shared the lecture before the Concord Lyceum, yet at least one person in attendance that evening enjoyed

41 Dean and Hoag erroneously note it was 19 of 21 that year, but the Record Books of the Concord Lyceum indicate that it was 20 of 23. See Kenneth Walter Cameron, Emerson and Thoreau Speak: Lecturing in Concord and Lincoln During the American Renaissance: Chapters from the Massachusetts Lyceum (Hartford: Transcendental Books, 1972) 103. See also Kenneth Walter Cameron, The Massachusetts Lyceum During the American Renaissance (Hartford: Transcendental Books, 1969) 165. See also the original Concord Lyceum Record Books available, with permission, in the Concord Free Public Library.

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what Thoreau had to say enough that he also attended Thoreau’s 2 November 1856

“Walking, or the Wild” lecture in Perth Amboy, New Jersey – and attended at least one

private reading in the Thoreau family home. Amos Bronson Alcott evidently thought so

highly of Thoreau’s lecture that he recommended to Marcus Spring of the New Jersey

Eagleswood Quaker Community that he invite Thoreau to lecture there (Dean and Hoag,

“After Walden ” 273). Spring did in fact invite Thoreau to read before his Eagleswood

community, just one of the nine more times over the next nine years (23 April 1851

through 9 September 1860) that Thoreau was to share some version of “Walking, or the

Wild” on the lecture platform. From his hometown of Concord to as far south as

Pennsylvania and as far north as New Hampshire, Thoreau read “Walking, or the Wild”

more than any of his other known single lectures. 42

Significantly, no two readings were ever exactly alike. By its very nature, a

lecture is not a fixed form; what is on the page and what is read may be quite different.

Given the possibility that Thoreau may not have read from his reading copy word-for-

word, no study of his lectures can ever be complete. Still, what is known about

Thoreau’s “Walking, or the Wild” lectures is that they went hand-in-hand with his

composing, for throughout the more than ten-year period in which Thoreau offered

“Walking” as a lecture, he continued to revise it. Between the initial writing and

presentation of the lecture before the Concord Lyceum in 1851 and his 1862 submission

of the essay to James T. Fields for publication in the Atlantic Monthly , the essay

underwent at least two, probably three major revisions. Besides gleaning from his Journal

to add material to “Walking, or the Wild,” Thoreau cut substantial passages from his

42 It should be noted that a number of the lectures that may have been “Walking, or the Wild” are speculative, as discussed further in this chapter.

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lecture drafts that he then inserted into other developing essays. 43 Passages from

Thoreau’s Journal that were written after he first presented the lecture, for example, were

included in subsequent lecture manuscripts, 44 and still others appear in the final,

published version. 45

Extra-textual changes to the lecture include the unique opening that Thoreau

shared even in his first reading of the lecture before the Concord Lyceum:

Wordsworth on a pedestrian tour through Scotland, was one evening, just

as the sun was setting with unusual splendor, greeted by a woman of the country

with the words ‘What you are stepping westward?’ and he says that such was the

originality of the salutation, combined with the associations of the hour & place –

that

‘Stepping westward seemed to be

A kind of heavenly destiny.’

The sentences from my journal which I am going to read this evening, for

want of a better rallying cry, may accept these words ‘stepping westward.’

I feel that I owe my audience an apology for speaking to them tonight on

any other subject than the Fugitive Slave Law on which every man is bound to

express a distinct opinion, - but I had prepared myself to speak a word for Nature,

for absolute Freedom and Wildness, as contrasted with a freedom and Culture

simply civil - to regard man as an inhabitant, or a part and parcel of nature - rather

43 Specifics regarding Thoreau’s revisionary processes are discussed below.

44 A genetic re-construction of “Walking” is a yet unexplored area of research that would surely prove to enhance the present study.

45 For a comparison of Journal passages as they correspond to those in the published essay, see the above table.

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than a member of society. I wish to make an extreme statement, if so I may make

an emphatic one, for there are enough champions of civilization - the minister,

and the school-committee - and every one of you will take care of that. 46

This “stepping westward,” almost apologetic opening makes clear Thoreau’s preoccupation with one of the most pressing issues of his time: slavery. Specifically, the newly adopted Fugitive Slave Law was troubling to Thoreau. In particular, the arrest and subsequent return of Thomas Sims to slavery was cause for Thoreau’s writing numerous

Journal entries railing against slavery, church, state, and press. His 30 March 1851 entry, for example, includes the following:

As for measures to be adopted, among others I would advise abolitionists to make

as earnest and vigorous and persevering an assault on the press, as they have

already made, and with effect too, on the church. The church has decidedly

improved within a year or two, aye, even within a fortnight; but the press is,

almost without exception, corrupt. I believe that in this country the press exerts a

greater and more pernicious influence than the church. We are not a religious

people, but we are a nation of politicians. . . . [the press] by their manner of

referring to and speaking of the Fugitive Slave Law or the carrying back of the

slave, insult the common sense of the country. (Sattelmeyer, et al , eds., Journal

3:200)

Thoreau soon again offered a critique of his fellow man regarding Sims’ capture:

There is such an office if not such a man as the Governor of

Massachusetts-- What has he been about the last fortnight? He has probably had

46 The introduction to Thoreau’s first presentation of the lecture is noted on his reading draft, as is the notation, “Walking or The Wild,” and, “Read in April 1851.” See “Thoreau’s Lectures Before Walden ,199.

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as much as he could do to keep on the fence during this moral earthquake. It

seems to me that no such keen satire, no such cutting insult could be offered to

that man, as the absence of all inquiry after him in this crisis. It appears to have

been forgotten that there was such a man or such an office. Yet no doubt he has

been filling the gubernatorial chair all the while-- One Mr Boutwell-- so named

perchance because he goes about well to suit the prevailing wind (Sattelmeyer,

Journal 3 : 203; after 19 April 1851)

In his Journal Thoreau continues, this time more directly addressing slavery by

questioning his fellow man in God’s eyes before turning again to the particular Sims case

– asking,

Do you think [ Jesus Christ ] would have stayed here in liberty and let the black

man go into slavery in his stead? They sent him back I say to live in slavery with

other three millions-- mark that-- whom the same slave power or slavish power

north & south-- holds in that condition-- 3 millions who do not, like the first

mentioned, assert the right to govern themselves but simply to run away & stay

away from their prison-house. (203; after April 1851)

On 26 April he again rails against the press and those who support slavery, noting that

“nowadays men wear a fool’s-cap and call it a liberty-cap” (26 April 1851). As these and other of his Journal entries attest, the institution of slavery ignited a fire in Thoreau’s conscience. Although primarily drawn to nature, Thoreau did not ignore social injustice, particularly when it led to restrictions on other’s freedom.

His preoccupation with the Fugitive Slave Law and the Thomas Sims case is evidenced in his Journal, to be sure, but his comments there are interspersed between

158 passages about nature. In fact, as Adams and Ross, point out, Thoreau’s account of the

Sims case “appears in the Journal next to “Walking” material (143). Thoreau would share his lecture over the next nine years, but never again with his “Stepping Westward” opening. In subsequent lectures Thoreau began his reading in a manner more similar to that of the published version, only inserting the phrase “this evening” in his first sentence so that the opening reads, “I wish, this evening, to speak a word for Nature,” and of course he varied even that opening when he divided the lecture in two and offered one in the morning and one in the evening, as he was to do on 23 May 1852 when he read before a Plymouth, Massachusetts audience (Dean, “A Sort of Introduction” 1).

His 23 April 1851 lecture was followed shortly thereafter by a reading of the same lecture just over a month later. Probably arranged by Thoreau’s good friend and admirer

H.G.O. Blake and read in the parlor of his school on Saturday, 31 May 1851, Thoreau read “Walking, or the Wild” to a private audience, the last time he was to share the essay before making substantial revisions to it. Still, this reading was not the same as his first.

Besides dropping his “Stepping Westward” introduction, in the thirty-eight days between the first and second readings of the lecture he wrote a number of Journal passages that are now in the published essay. Given that Thoreau repeatedly revised his work, he most likely incorporated these passages into his reading copy shortly after he penned them in his Journal and before he read the lecture before his Worcester audience. The Journal passages he incorporated into his reading draft include his comments about names and the savagery and tameness of men and beasts. For example, his 21 May 1851 Journal entry reads in part, “Infants as we are, we make haste to be weaned from our mother’s

[nature’s] breast, and cultivate our parts by intercourse with one another” (232), a

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sentiment he subsequently added to “Walking, or the Wild.” He also includes in his

Journal references to his recent reading of Francois Andre’ Michaux that he soon

incorporates into his reading text of “Walking, or the Wild.” In phrasing quite similar to

that of his Journal, Thoreau writes in his lecture-essay, “Michaux who knew but part of

them, says that ‘the species of large trees are much more numerous in North America

than in Europe: in the United States there are more than 140 species that exceed thirty

feet in height; in France there are but thirty that attain this size’” (Moldenhauer, ed.,

Excursions 198). Certainly these Journal excerpts offer added point to his thoughts on the relationship of civilization to nature and support Thoreau’s ideas about America’s

wildness. In fact, Thoreau later inserted additional passages about America’s great

wildness that help to place him well within the writing of his contemporaries. After

presenting “Walking, or the Wild” as a lecture but before publication, Thoreau includes

the following paragraph in the “Walking” portion of the text:

Sir Francis Head, - an English traveler, and a Governor General of

Canada, - tells us that ‘in both the northern and southern hemispheres of the new

world, Nature has not only outlined her works on a larger scale, but has painted

the whole picture with brighter and more costly colors than she used in

delineating and in beautifying the old world.’ ‘The heavens of America appear

infinitely higher – the sky is bluer – the air is fresher – the cold is intenser – the

moon looks larger – the stars are brighter – the thunder is louder – the lightning is

vivider – the wind is stronger – the rain is heavier – the mountains are higher –

the rivers larger – the forests bigger – the plains broader.-’ this statement will do

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at least to set against Buffon’s account of this part of the world in its productions.

(199)

Adams and Ross maintain that in his addition of this paragraph “Thoreau celebrates

America as a place where we will be creatively imaginative, think ethereally, and

experience a more comprehensive understanding” (144), yet it also proves that Thoreau

was part of the popular defense of America’s wilderness identity that had taken a firm

hold by the middle of the nineteenth century. As Roderick Nash explains, “wilderness

was actually an American asset . . . [,] a cultural and moral resource and a basis for

national self-esteem” (Nash 67). The pride in wildness and its ability to cultivate man

was not unique to Thoreau, as the following sentiment from Abigail Adams attests: ‘“do

you know that the European birds have not held the melody of ours? Nor is their fruit half

so sweet, nor their flowers half so fragrant, not their manners half so pure, nor their

people half so virtuous”’ (69). Still, as the passage from Thoreau cited above attests, his

writing certainly proclaimed the popular pride-in-wilderness American nationalist

sentiment of the 1800s; even when writing of the glorious panorama of the Rhine as he

does in “Walking, or the Wild,” those observations come in a distant second to those

extolling the virtues of America’s Mississippi – or even to Thoreau’s original

observations of his Concord River. Oddly, the day of his May 1851 lecture Thoreau

writes only, “Pedestrium solatium in apricis locis. – nodosa” (Sattelmeyer, et al , eds.,

Journal 3:241; Dean and Hoag, trans., “Before Walden ” 200: “The solace of walkers in sunny places. – troublesome.”). Less troubled than celebratory, just a few days prior he remarked, “The revelations of nature are infinitely glorious and cheering, hinting to us of a remote future, of possibilities untold,” and “I think that the existence of man in nature is

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the divinest and most startling of all facts. It is a fact which few have realized”

(Sattelmeyer, et al , eds., Journal 3:230; 21 May 1851). This passage is both reflective of sentiments in “Walking, or the Wild” and the pride in America’s wild lands that had become part of the framework of what it meant to be American.

Thoreau’s sauntering as recorded in the Journal between his first and second presentations of the lecture includes a walk to Mt. Tabor in neighboring Lincoln (see 1

May Journal); botanical observations of the yellow water lily, fever-bush, spice-wood, the nodding trillium, Arum triphyllum, and buttercups (see 1 & 19 & 28 May Journal); and hikes up Concord hills and cliffs (25 May and 22 April). These entries note

Thoreau’s increasing scientific study of nature. He was also doing increasingly more surveying. In just the month of April 1851 Thoreau is known to have surveyed the

Virginia Road home where he was born (March and April), 29 acres between Factory and

Roxbury Roads (12 April), Stow street (18-19 April), and to have provided a survey receipt to Cyrus Stow (29 April). As Alcott noted in his Journal, ‘“Lately [Thoreau] has taken to surveying as well as authorship, and makes the compass pay for his book on

‘The Concord and Merrimac Rivers,’ which the public is slow to take off his hands”’

(qtd. in Borst, Log 177 & 179). Perhaps a comment on the un-importance he saw in surveying and lecturing, Thoreau mentions the two only in passing in his Journal. Of his lecture he simply writes on 3 June 1851, “lectured in Worcester last Saturday - & walked to As or Hasnebumskit Hill in Paxton the next day. Said to be the highest land in

Worcester County except Wachusett.” (Sattelmeyer, et al , eds., Journal 3:241). Still,

Thoreau’s entry that day fills a few pages, most of which are his observations of nature

and second-hand observations of others. Two references from surveying in this entry

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alone demonstrate that this out-of-doors occupation, if not valuable to Thoreau in its own

right, gave him some occasion to learn more about nature. While Thoreau may not have

had much to say about his recent lecture engagement, he at least mentioned the reading to

one admiring friend. On 9 June 1851, a week after Thoreau returned from his private

lecture engagement, Bronson Alcott noted in his journal,

‘Dined with Thoreau. . . . T. tells me that he read his paper on ‘Walking’ lately at

Worcester. He should read this, and the ‘Walden’ also, everywhere in our towns

and cities, for the soundness and rectitude of the sentiments. They would have a

wholesome influence.’ (qtd. in Borst, Log 181)

It is possible that Thoreau read “Walking, or the Wild” a second time in April of

1851; all that is known of this possible lecture is found in a letter to Thoreau from W.

Cushing in which Cushing writes, “Will you please give us an answer – and your subject

– if you consent to come – by Mr. Charles Bowers, 47 who is to lecture here tomorrow evening” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 653; Dean and Hoag, “Before

Walden ” 225-6). The Thoreau Textual Center at CU-SB records that one William

Cushing lived in Bedford at that time (cited in Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 226).

Lecture possibilities would have been “Economy,” “Cape Cod,” and “Walking, or the

Wild” since those were the lecture-essays he was reading in 1851. There is no known response to Cushing’s letter from Thoreau, nor is there any evidence to suggest that

Thoreau travelled to Bedford to lecture in April of 1851. While Thoreau is known to have at times glossed over the mention of his lecture engagements in his Journal, he rarely ignored the mention of his travels, so Thoreau probably did not share a reading of

47 Bowers was the curator of the Concord Lyceum during the 1850-51 season. See Cameron, Massachusetts Lyceum , 165.

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“Walking, or the Wild” that April in Bedford. Thoreau did, however, read portions of

“Walking, or the Wild” again later that year. Not a lecture per say, but a private reading

of the text was shared with Bronson Alcott on 10 August 1851 in the Thoreau family

home; it is unclear if others were in attendance. As Alcott records in his Journal,

‘“Thoreau read me some passages from his paper on “Walking” as I passed the evening

with him, and slept at Emerson’s again afterwards”’ (226).

Sometime between May 1851 and May 1852 Thoreau revised and added to

“Walking, or the Wild” so much so that by the time of his next reading, the complete

lecture was 163 pages long. Divided, the first seventy or so pages made up what was to

be his “Walking” lecture; the remainder became “The Wild” (211). Dividing the lecture

in two did not prove very difficult for Thoreau because even in the early drafts of

“Walking, or the Wild,” the lecture had maintained a two-part structure (211). These

companion essays Thoreau read on 23 May 1852 in Leyden Hall, Plymouth,

Massachusetts, sharing “Walking” in the morning and “The Wild” in his evening lecture.

Although Thoreau’s readings were not advertised in the local newspapers

(Dedmond 333), word of his lecturing quickly spread throughout Plymouth, a town in

which Thoreau had already earned some admiration. Earlier that year Thoreau had

answered a request by Benjamin Marston Watson who invited Thoreau to lecture on two

Sundays. Actually, it was through Ralph Waldo Emerson that Thoreau learned of

Watson’s proposed course ‘“for those who choose not to go to church on Sundays”’ (qtd.

in Dean and Hoag, “Before Walden ” 203). As Emerson wrote to Watson on 15 January,

1852, ‘“I showed your letter to Mr. Thoreau who likes [your project] well and replied that he will come to you on that errand at any time you please if you will give him sufficient

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notice before hand”’ (203). In reply, just one month later Watson wrote to Thoreau, ‘“I

am very much obliged to you for your interest in our meetings here, and for your promise

to come down some Sunday. . . .”’ (qtd. in Dedmond 332). At Watson’s request, Thoreau

presented his two “Life in the Woods” lectures on the morning and evening of 22

February 1852. Thoreau was certainly well received, having then been invited to return

to offer another pair of companion lectures. Most likely, then, Thoreau revised

“Walking, or the Wild” after his 22 February 1852 lectures in Plymouth and certainly

before his return there in May. Dividing the lecture into two parts was probably done to

accommodate the pair of readings requested by Watson, although specific details of his

revisionary process are here uncertain. At least as far as the Journal is concerned,

between May of 1851 and May of 1852, there is no evidence to suggest that Thoreau

added any newly gleaned material to the essay.

Of his lecturing and writing Thoreau again noted very little. His 22 February

Plymouth lectures get only this simple mention in his Journal: “Went to Plymouth to

lecture or preach all day” (362). He does not mention lecturing again in his Journal until

24 April, 1852, before which he rails against men who are only of society. Comments

such as “The vast majority [of men are] of society,” and “When did I come, when am I going? . . . What an ordeal it were to make men pass through to consider how many ever put to you a vital question!” echo sentiments in “Walking, or the Wild” that Thoreau gleaned from his Journal (Neufeldt and Simmons, eds., Journal 4:488-89). In February

1851 Thoreau wrote that most men gravitate toward society, and that same month he reflected on knowledge and the questions of man, but his considerations specifically of lecture-goers are most evident in 1852 and following. Perhaps this was about the time

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that Thoreau began reshaping his lecture and divided the text to prepare for his two May

Plymouth readings.

Despite the little evidence Thoreau records of his Plymouth lectures, one man of that town, James W. Spooner, notes a good deal about Thoreau’s May visit, recording the event in great detail in his journal. He was sorely disappointed that he had not been made aware of Thoreau’s visit before hand, having missed the morning lecture. Spooner writes,

‘I had not seen any meeting advertised at Leyden Hall[.] . . . I heard at noon from

Mr. Hedge that Mr[.] Thoreau preached in Leyden Hall -- & was very sorry to

have lost it especially as I afterward learned it was upon walking & sauntering. . .

.I went to hear Mr[.] T. His subject was a continuation of the morning discourse

telling ‘where to walk: in which direction[’].’ (qtd. in Dedmond 334; Dedmond’s

brackets)

Still, Spooner mentions little of the lecture he actually attended, only that he ‘“shook hands with [Thoreau] after the lecture”’ (334). Spooner provides, however, greater detail about Thoreau’s explorations outside of the lecture hall. The day after the lecture he found Thoreau preparing to leave Plymouth, but once Thoreau learned that the trains would not arrive until nine, Spooner notes, Thoreau remarked, ‘“Then I shall have more time to look about,”’ and that he wished to ‘“go up . . . [Burial Hill] and look off”’ (334).

Spooner explored with Thoreau that day, noting Thoreau’s interest in an old fort, Clark’s island, Buck-beans, native “curiosities,” and the ocean, among other things. Of the ocean

Spooner writes that Thoreau said,

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‘Out of all the vast number of people who have lived on the ocean & crossed it

again and again – who can tell us anything about it – Byron perhaps may have

written a few lines – but nothing in comparison to the magnitude of the ocean.[’]

[Spooner continues,] the ocean was always interesting to him, for it was always a

wilderness even where it washed up to the wharves of a city’ (336; Dedmond’s

brackets ).

After noting that Thoreau asked Spooner if he had much time for walking in the

woods, Spooner wrote that Thoreau “said he was drawn back to Concord like the needle

to the pole – His business as a surveyor called him into the woods a great deal” (337).

The analogy to surveying that Thoreau shared with Spooner is not the only use for which

Thoreau found that occupation. In “Walking, or the Wild,” Thoreau paints a rather grim

picture of the surveyor:

A people who would begin by burning the fences and let the forest stand! I saw

the fences half consumed, their ends lost in the middle of the prairie, and some

worldly miser with a surveyor looking after his bounds, while heaven had taken

place around him, and he did not see the angels going to and fro, but was looking

for an old post-hole in the midst of paradise. I looked again and saw him standing

in the middle of a boggy stygian fen surrounded by devils, and he had found his

bounds without a doubt, three little stones where a stake had been driven, and

looking nearer I saw the Prince of Darkness was his surveyor. (Moldenhauer, ed.,

Excursions 191)

Certainly this excerpt demonstrates that Thoreau recognized the surveyor’s role in the

commodification and destruction of nature. Given the growing demand for his surveying

167 skills, Thoreau himself was increasingly a part of the utilitarian approach to nature that he here criticizes – a role about which he certainly had some guilt. In fact, while he finds that the miser has turned a blind eye to the “heaven” of the world around him, Thoreau is even more critical of the surveyor – calling him the “Prince of Darkness”; the devil- surveyor is the instrument of destruction. The parable, then, reminds of Thoreau’s life experiences and becomes a criticism of the very work he (often begrudgingly) undertakes. As his writing continues, the parable is then grounded in actuality later in the text when Thoreau notes the surveying he performed for one man:

I was surveying for a man the other day a single straight line 132 rods long

through a swamp, at whose entrance might have been written the words which

Dante read over the entrance to the Infernal regions – Leave all hope ye that enter

– that is of ever getting out again; where at one time I saw my employer actually

up to his neck and swimming for his life in his property, though it was still winter.

He had another similar swamp which I could not survey at all because it was

completely under water, and nevertheless, with regard to a third swamp which I

did survey from a distance, he remarked to me, true to his instincts, that he would

not part with it for any consideration, on account of the mud which it contained.

And that man intends to put a girdling ditch round the whole in the course of 40

months, and so redeem it by the magic of his spade. I refer to him only as the

type of a class. (207)

Here, the man almost lost his life to his property, yet he has Thoreau examine three of his swamps that he might use the “good” in them to “earn his living.” However, Thoreau’s idea of the value in the swamp even with needle and compass is far from the value the

168 man who hired him finds in it; he is, as Thoreau writes, of “the type of a class” to find only a utilitarian purpose in nature. Thoreau, on the other hand, sought the “most dismal swamp” as a spiritual place:

I enter a swamp as a sacred place – a sanctum sanctorum. There is the strength –

the marrow of Nature. The wild wood covers the virgin mould, - and the same soil

is good for men and for trees. A man’s health requires as many acres of meadow

to his prospect as his farm does loads of muck. There are the strong meats on

which he feeds. A town is saved, not more by the righteous men in it, than by the

woods and swamps that surround it. (205-6)

Perhaps Thoreau’s surveying at times became less drudgery than he readily admits in his Journal. Rather, as in his daily saunters, Thoreau might ruminate over his surveying expeditions and so find there the Holy Land that he writes of in “Walking, or the Wild” by going a round-about way – that is, what may have started out as surveying soon turned into a true experience in wildness. Certainly more often, Thoreau’s surveying was little more to him than a way to make his living, but on occasion, his walks through swamps, forests, and fields with compass in hand could grow into so much more. On these special occasions, Thoreau was able to take his own warning to heart to

“make the highest demand” of himself. After commenting that most who employed him as a surveyor did not care to consider his “higher unemployed faculties,” Thoreau wrote,

“Woe be to the generation that lets any higher faculty in its midst go unemployed! That is to deny God and know him not, and he, accordingly, will know not of them.” (Torrey, ed.

Journal 6:21-22; 18 December 1853).

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As it turned out, some did appreciate Thoreau’s “higher faculties.” James Spooner continued to seek Thoreau’s acquaintance, inviting him for a return visit to Plymouth in

1853. When Thoreau declined, Spooner collected funds and persuaded Watson (who probably required little persuasion, being an admirer of Thoreau) to invite Thoreau for two more lectures. Interestingly, Thoreau chose to share one of his lectures that grew out of “Walking, or the Wild” on his return visit to Plymouth on 8 October 1854; he did not provide two lectures as Watson had requested, writing that the one lecture would be ‘“as large a taste of my present self as I can offer you at one visit”’ (Dedmond 341). During his October 1854 Plymouth visit Thoreau also surveyed Marston Watson’s “Hillside” property (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 340-41). 48 It would prove to be his final Plymouth lecture and the only time he would ever read “Moonlight” on the platform. Just prior to this lecture, Spooner went to Concord to visit with Thoreau who shared a walk with Spooner to some of his favorite Concord landscapes: Baker Farm,

Fairhaven Bay, and the Concord River, among others (Dedmond 340). Additionally,

Spooner recorded one more visit with Thoreau on 13 November 1857. Amidst noting

Thoreau’s nature study he remarked, “After some conversation which I cannot recall Mr.

T. said he required that a man should be able to forget mankind & not regard everything as either a benefit or an injury to man” (342), a statement that certainly echoes Thoreau’s ecocentric philosophy in “Walking.” This assertion to Spooner is even bolder than those in “Walking, or the Wild”; in his rather anti-anthropocentric remark, Thoreau directly indicates that man is not the center of things. Although it had been nearly a year since he read “Walking,” and over five years since he had shared those ideas with a

48 For details regarding Thoreau’s surveying and its particular relevance to Thoreau’s “Walking, or the Wild” lectures, see the discussion on his Perth Amboy, New Jersey lectures below.

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Plymouth audience, Thoreau was still ruminating over them in late 1857, perhaps an indication that he was not yet finished with the text.

Thoreau’s comments on his time in Plymouth, and on his “Walking, or the Wild” lecture travels in particular, are noted in his Journal entries of 22 through 24 of May

1852. Again, the reader finds Thoreau much more interested in things outside of the lecture hall than in it. Noting that he is travelling to Plymouth, Thoreau makes no mention of his plans to lecture there, but does note his observations of Audubon paintings he stopped in Boston to see on his way to the seaside town:

Sat May 22 nd

On my way to Plymouth looked at Audubon in the State House. – Saw

painted the red berries of the Arum tripphyllum. The pigeon is more red on the

breast and more blue than the turtle dove. The female (& male?) wood thrush

spotted the whole length of belly; the hermit T. not so. The seringo bird cannot be

the Savannah Sparrow - The piping plover has a big head-white breast and ring

neck.

2 kinds of bluets in N Y Report. (O’Connell, ed. Journal 5:70)

After his Audubon observations, Thoreau records only his nature observations in

Plymouth. Here, the complete Journal entry during his Plymouth visit is provided to give the reader a fuller sense of Thoreau’s interests than the excerpts cited elsewhere might allow.

5 Pm Plymouth

The Hill whence Billington discovered the pond. – The field plantain in

blossom & abundant here. A chickweed in bloom in Watson’s garden – is it the

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same that was so early? A yellow flower apparently a hieracium just ready to

blossom The 4 leaved loose strife with dark leaves shows its flower buds on the

ends of its threads. The may weed is ready to blossom. The German Forget me

not reminded me of my little blue flower in the brook. (70)

Similarly the following day he writes,

May 23d

To Billington sea at sunrise.

The purple finch sings like a canary and like a robin - Huckleberry leaves

here too are sticky & yellow my fingers

Pyrus arbutifolia in bloom. The low spreading red cedars which come

abruptly to nought at top suggest that they be used for posts with the stubs of

branches left as they often are The bay-berry is late just beginning to leaf. The

butter cup season has arrived here. Mrs Watson says they have no bluets nor wild

pinks (catch fly) here, Some ponds have outlets some have not. So some men.

Singular that so many ponds should have connexion with the sea. The ink berry is

late. The red-eyed Vireo is a steady singer, sitting near the top of a tree a long

time alone – the robin of the woods – as the robin sings at morning & evening on

an elm in the village.

It is worth the while to go a little south to anticipate nature at home.- I am

now covered with down from the tender foliage walking in the woods in the

morning. Hear the hollow-spitting-tunk tunk sound of frogs in the morning-which

tells of sultry nights, though we have not had them yet. The Viola lanceolata

here. Corema Conradii in the cemetery – just out of bloom. Broom-Crow-berry-

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from xopnua a broom. A rare plant which I have seen at Provincetown. The

Empetrum nigrum or black crow berry is found at the White mts . The buck bean

in bloom

Young oak leaves red above & light below with a red edge only–

handsome as flowers.

Pm to Great South Pond.

A brown spotted snake-2 ft or more long-light colored beneath with

blotchy dark brown spots above like this. (Drawn) The Tropidonotus Sipedon

Water Snake of Holbrook.

The trientalis in bloom. The dandelions close at eve so that you canot [sic]

find those that starred the meadow. Woods extensive but small & low-soil sandy-

no variety in the landscape. Woods & deer because the soil is sandy & unfit for

cultivation.

- - (70-71)

The day of his return to Concord he writes,

May 24 th 52

The cooing of a dove reminded me of an owl this morning. Counted just

50 violets (pedatas) in a little bunch 31/2 x 5 inches-& as many buds-there being

6 plants close together; on the hill where Billington climbed a tree.

A calabash at Pilgrim Hall nearly 2 feet high - in the form of a jar-showed

what these fruits were made for. Natures jars & vases

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Holbrook says the Bufo (drawing) Americanus is the most common in

America and is our representative of the Bufo communis of Europe.- speaks of its

trill-deposits its spawn in pools

Found in College yard Trifolium procumbens a yellow clover.

Concord

Celandine in blossom & horse chestnut (71-72)

Thoreau’s recordings during his Plymouth trip indicate not only his preoccupation with the world of nature, but with his increasingly scientific approach to that world. Here he notes scientific names for plant species and a snake, for example. His natural history work was demanding his time more and more. Begun in earnest in the fall of 1851 when he ‘“accidentally’ but regularly began recording in his journal the natural phenomena he observed during his walks” (Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 296), by May 1852,

Thoreau had developed a regular system for recording his natural observations, and the

pull to follow such a course of nature study was by this time already preoccupying

Thoreau’s mind and filling his days with pursuits beyond the lecture hall.

It was to be more than two years before Thoreau would read from the lectures

again, this time on the evening of 21 November 1854. This Philadelphia, 49 Pennsylvania

Spring Garden Institute reading of “The Wild” was to be the southernmost lecture

Thoreau would ever present, but it is noteworthy for far more than that. The two

companion essays that he delivered in Plymouth, Massachusetts on 23 May 1852

49 In F. B. Sanborn’s biography of Thoreau, Dean and Hoag point out that he claims Thoreau lectured in Philadelphia during November of 1856, but there is no proof of such a lecture. Sanborn’s recollection of the lecture date is most likely erroneous, as are a good number of his claims. To the contrary, all evidence points to the fact that Thoreau lectured in Philadelphia on 21 November 1854 on “The Wild” and never returned to Philadelphia thereafter.

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underwent substantial revisions before his 21 November 1854 Philadelphia lecture of

“The Wild.” Shortly after the publication of Walden on 9 August 1854, Thoreau began thinking of new projects. On 27 August 1854 he wrote, “Would it not be well to describe some of those rough-all day walks across lots –” (Petrulionis, ed., Journal 8:301). By 29

August he had decided to take a look at some old, yet unfinished writings and “Walking, or the Wild” to use as the basis for a proposed lecture tour (Dean, “Reconstructions”

286). Dean and Hoag speculate that after the publication of Walden, or Life in the

Woods , Thoreau expected his reputation to grow sufficiently enough that he would be in greater demand as a lecturer (“After Walden ” 242). However, despite any optimism

Thoreau may have had for the success of Walden , he certainly would have recalled the failure of A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers , and so was never prepared to fully give himself over to the notion of becoming a professional lecturer based on the possible success of Walden, or Life in the Woods . Moreover, he enjoyed the leisure his way of living allowed, preferring his study of nature to both the lecture hall and the life of the surveyor; he lived rather on his own terms and did not seek success in the conventional sense. As he writes in his 19 July 1851 Journal,

Here I am thirty-four years old, and yet my life is almost wholly

unexpanded. How much is in the germ! There is such an interval between my

ideal and the actual in many instances that I may say that I am unborn. There is

the instinct for society, but no society. Life is not long enough for one success.

Within the next thirty-four years that miracle can hardly take place. Methinks my

seasons revolve more slowly than those of nature; I am differently timed. I am

contented. This rapid revolution of nature, even of nature in me, why should it

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hurry me? Let a man step to the music which he hears, however measured. 50 Is it

important that I should mature as soon as an apple tree? Aye, as soon as an oak?

May not my life in nature, in proportion as it is supernatural, be only the spring

and infantile portion of my spirit’s life? Shall I turn my spring to summer? May I

not sacrifice a hasty and petty completeness here for entireness there. . . . When

formerly I was looking about to see what I could do for a living, some sad

experience in conforming to the wishes of friends being fresh in my mind to tax

my ingenuity, I thought often and seriously of picking huckleberries; that surely I

could do, and its small profits might suffice, so little capital it required, so little

distraction from my wonted thoughts, I foolishly thought. While my

acquaintances went unhesitatingly into trade or the professions, I thought of this

occupation as most like theirs; ranging the hills all summer to pick the berries

which came in my way, which I might carelessly dispose of; so to keep the flocks

of King Admetus. My greatest skill has been to want but little. I also dreamed that

I might gather the wild herbs, or carry evergreens to such villagers as loved to be

reminded of the woods, and so find my living got. But I have since learned that

trade curses everything it handles; and though you trade in messages from

heaven, the whole cures of the trade attaches to the business. (Torrey, ed., Journal

2: 316-22)

Not only does this Journal excerpt evidence Thoreau’s desire for an uncommon success,51 but the conclusion of the passage offers a particularly pertinent reason as to why Thoreau

50 Excerpts from this Journal entry may be seen in “Civil Disobedience.”

51 See chapter two for a discussion of Thoreau’s “uncommon success” as a lecturer.

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may have gone a-lecturing. The idea of “trading in messages from heaven” was certainly

what Thoreau was prepared to share in “Walking, or the Wild.” In particular, there is

quite a spiritual aspect to the text - the saunterer travelling to the Holy Land

(Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 185; 222), even the very naming of the walker as a sainte- terrer (a holy lander) (185), the “springs of life” the saunterer seeks (189), and the swamp as a sanctum sanctorum (205), to name just a few of the textual spiritual references. Perhaps Thoreau felt that the “curse of the [lecturing] trade” took away some of the heavenly message he offered for the favor of the kinship of fellow saunterers.

Still, that some might hear his message, his curiosity for Western travel, and the prospect of earning a few dollars gave Thoreau enough reason for him to entertain a

Western tour. By 19 September 1854 he wrote in his Journal that he had been thinking of

“the prospect of my writing lectures and going abroad to read them next winter . . .”

(Torrey, ed., Journal 7 : 46; about 19 Sept. 1854), and on 21 September 1854 he wrote to

H. G. O. Blake, “ I have agreed to go a-lecturing to Plymouth, Sunday after next (October

1) and to Philadelphia in November, and thereafter to the West, if they shall want me ;

and, as I have prepared nothing in that shape, I feel as if my hours were spoken for”

(Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 339). Although Thoreau at times lamented the

prospect of a growing lecture schedule, 52 these thoughts and writings make evident that

he was certainly preparing to embark on the lecture circuit. By this time Thoreau had

presented “Walking, or the Wild” four times, all in his home state of Massachusetts: the

original lecture version on 23 April 1851 before his hometown, Concord audience; a

slightly expanded reading shortly thereafter on 31 May 1851 in Worcester; and the

52 See chapter two for Thoreau’s ambivalence about his lecturing “career.”

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divided lectures “Walking” and “The Wild” on the morning and evening of 23 May 1852

before a Plymouth crowd. The pair of companion lectures that he shared in Plymouth

were to undergo major revisions before Thoreau was to share either lecture again.

Gleaning material from his “Walking” and “The Wild” lectures, Thoreau culled a number

of passages for two newly developing lectures: “The Moon” and “What Shall it Profit?” 53

Together with his now two “Walking, or the Wild” lectures, these essays would form the

basis for his proposed Western lecture tour.

When Thoreau read “Walking” and “The Wild” before his Plymouth audience on

23 May 1852, the two lectures already had the two part structure that allowed for an easy

division of the work into two readings, but his Fall 1854 revision would prove quite a bit

more substantial. Not only did he excerpt a number of passages from the two lectures to

be included in “The Moon” and “Life Without Principle,” but he also added a number of

passages to “Walking” and “The Wild” that he had written in his Journal. Bradley P.

Dean speculates that the extensive revisionary work Thoreau had in mind commenced

with the following Journal remark:

Early for several mornings I have heard the sound of a flail. It leads me to ask if I

have spent as industrious a spring and summer as the farmer, and gathered as rich

a crop of experience. If so, the sound of my flail will be heard by those who have

ears to hear, separating the kernel from the chaff all the fall and winter, and a

sound no less cheering it will be. If the drought has destroyed the corn, let not all

harvests fail. Have you commenced to threshing your grain? The lecturer must

53 “The Moon” was posthumously published in the Atlantic Monthly as “Moonlight,” likely prepared by Sophia Thoreau and edited by James T. Fields. “What Shall It Profit?” was later titled “Life Without Principle” for its posthumous publication in the Atlantic Monthly , and was prepared by Thoreau before his death.

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commence his threshing as early as August, that his fine flour may be ready for

his winter customers. (Petrulionis, ed., Journal 8:307; 29 August 1854; cited in

Dean, “Reconstructions” 286).

Given the scope of the revisionary project Thoreau was about to undertake,

Dean’s speculation certainly bears consideration. Dean also offers that Thoreau split the

lecture into two distinct essays (rather than simply separating the original into two, as he

had done for his 23 May 1852 Plymouth lectures) during the fall of 1854. He bases this

claim on paper type evidence. Thoreau used white wove paper with an oval-shaped

embossed “G & Co.” stationer’s mark to write most of both “Walking” and “The Wild,”

the same which he used to write “What Shall It Profit?,” which Dean establishes in “The

Sound of a Flail” that Thoreau wrote between November and December of 1854.

Thoreau would finish with a ream of paper before purchasing a new one, and that it was

his practice to buy paper based on low cost rather than brand, a fact corroborated by both

William Howarth and Bradley P. Dean. That the paper types were identical for these

essays explains Dean’s theory. 54

Thoreau’s “threshing” process began as he identified Journal passages that he could work into his lectures. Particularly, from about 8 October 1854 until almost the end of that month Thoreau concentrated his efforts on “Walking.” After penning “This concerns Walking & the Wild,” Thoreau began listing various brief phrases from his

Journal, along with volume and page number. In this way, he could then refer to longer

Journal passages as he undertook his writing and revising and was thus able to quickly

54 See Bradley P. Dean, “Reconstructions of Thoreau’s Early ‘Life Without Principle’ Lectures,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1987): fn 12, 352. See also Bradley P. Dean, “The Sound of a Flail,” Volume One. M.A. Thesis. Eastern Washington University (1984). See also William Howarth, Literary Manuscripts , xix-xxviii.

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add appropriate Journal passages to the lectures (Dean, “Reconstructions” 288). In all,

Thoreau extracted passages from seventeen Journal volumes (Dean, “Sound of a Flail” 7)

and filled some nine pages with Journal references, only about two and a half of which,

he later noted, were to be used in “Walking” and “The Wild” (Dean, “Reconstructions”

288). Of the Journal passages to be used in “Walking,” each had a nature-oriented

significance (Dean, “Sound of a Flail” 10). Although not all of the passages he noted

were used in “Walking” or “The Wild,” the remainder was to provide a great deal of

material for “What Shall it Profit?” Thoreau also extracted nineteen passages out of

“Walking” and “The Wild” and added them to his “What Shall it Profit?” list 55 (Dean,

“Reconstructions” 288-9). Putting that work aside, between the final days of October and

into the first part of November Thoreau then prepared “The Wild” for his 21 November

lecture in Philadelphia (288-9). His work with “Walking, or the Wild” was interrupted

for only a short time when he answered Asa Fairbank’s request to offer a reform lecture,

which he wrote between about 14 November and 5 December 1854 (289). 56 By the first

week of December Thoreau was again working with “Walking” and “The Wild”-- this

time preparing “Walking” for the lecture platform (289).

It was also during the late fall and early winter of 1854 that Thoreau made a

modest effort at attempting to arrange additional lecture engagements,57 scheduling local

lectures so as not to conflict with his Western tour plans. As his letters noting attempts to

55 For details about the nineteen passages Thoreau extracted from his “Walking, or the Wild” manuscript for inclusion in “What Shall if Profit?,” see Dean, “Reconstructions of Thoreau’s Early ‘Life Without Principle’ Lectures.”Also see Dean, “The Sound of a Flail: Reconstructions of Thoreau’s Early ‘Life without Principle’ Lectures,” fn 5, p. 7, which indicates that paragraphs 42-46, 48-52, 60, 75-77, and 79-81 of “What Shall It Profit?” were drawn from manuscript lecture drafts of “Walking, or the Wild.”

56 The essay Thoreau wrote was “What Shall It Profit?”

57 For further details concerning Thoreau’s lecture schedule, see chapter two.

180 arrange lectures indicate, “The Wild” would be one of his primary offerings in the West:

“ . . . My subjects are ‘The Wild’ & ‘Moosehunting . . . ,’ he wrote, for example, to John

D. Milner of Hamilton, Canada West (293). In fact, that Thoreau chose to rework

“Walking” and “The Wild” in late 1854 while also anticipating his lecture tour might indicate that he prepared first “The Wild” and then “Walking” not only for the lecture circuit, but specifically for a Western audience. Without explanation, William Rossi notes that Thoreau may have added his Journal gleanings on the West sometime after his

1851 lectures (Rossi, “Self-Culture” 143-4). However, I speculate that Thoreau may have added a substantial portion of his comments about the West to the lecture during his

1854 work on “The Wild” and “Walking” precisely to appeal to those to whom he assumed he might soon lecture; although Thoreau notes that he did not necessarily write what his audience wanted to hear, he did write with his audience in mind. Even an eastern audience was sure to appreciate “the west” as a subject for Thoreau’s lectures-- this given the then growing preoccupation with America’s wildness on a national level that included a romanticized version of the West specifically for its Wild characteristics.

In particular, the earliest champions of America’s wild lands were cultured men of the east (Nash 23-83). Still, the high praise Thoreau gave the West remains cause for his adding those ideas with western lecture audiences in mind.

That the West provided a perfect metaphor for his message made such references doubly attractive to Thoreau. Supporting this theory, the opening of “The Wild” portion of his lecture begins, “The West of which I speak is but another name for the Wild; and what I have been preparing to say is, that in Wildness is the preservation of the world”

(Moldenhauer, ed. Excursions 206). In his “Walking”“portion of his lecture-essay he

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also repeatedly references the “West” to support his ideas: “We go eastward to realize

history . . . – we go westward as into the future, with a spirit of enterprise and adventure”

(196), and “Every sunset which I witness inspires me with the desire to go to a west as

distant and as fair as that into which the Sun goes down” (197). In fact, the move from

East to West becomes one of the major ways Thoreau discusses his ecocentric paradigm

throughout the text. 58 Additional textual “place movements” that support Thoreau’s idea

are that of moving from culture to nature (in particular, Wildness), walking toward the

setting sun (a Westward walk, of course), and the movement that begins and ends the

complete work: the saunter to the Holy Land. Each of these transitory movements helps

to frame the structure of the text, all leading back to Thoreau’s ecocentrism that is at the

core of the essay. Individually, these ideas appear in part in Thoreau’s Journal, but it is in

the text that they all come together and are most fully realized.

In any case, Thoreau’s 21 November 1854 lecture in Philadelphia may be

considered his first “Western” adventure; although he did not journey to the Middle West

to read the lecture, Philadelphia was certainly, so to speak, the most “foreign” of lands to

which he had travelled. His reading of “The Wild” in Philadelphia was outside of his

comfortable New England surroundings, and so gave him an opportunity to try his lecture

out before a new kind of audience. Had Thoreau’s Western plans come to fruition,

Philadelphia would likely have provided a good transition for him between the east coast

towns he was used to and those he might encounter in the West. But Thoreau was never

able to present “Walking” or “The Wild” before a Western audience. In fact, one of

58 A genetic reconstruction of the lecture-essay is necessary to confirm or deny this hypothesis, an extremely difficult task given that the manuscript pages have been widely dispersed since Houghton- Mifflin’s inserting original manuscript pages into the first 1906 printing of The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau .

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Thoreau’s lectures travelled further than he did when Richard Hinton read Thoreau’s

“The Last Days of John Brown” in North Elba, New York, at a Memorial Celebration for

the abolitionist martyr. 59 Thoreau’s Philadelphia lecture, then, may have been what he

thought would soon be a series of lectures beyond New England, yet despite the handful

of contacts Thoreau made, he did not secure enough engagements to make a western tour

profitable. To be certain, Thoreau was not much of a publicizer on his own behalf. 60

Rather than promote his lecturing in Philadelphia, Thoreau opted for natural history

study.

Aware of Thoreau’s interests, Emerson wrote to his Philadelphia friend William

Henry Furness that Thoreau was to lecture in his city and asked that Furness arrange for

Thoreau to visit the Academy of Natural Sciences, noting that he was particularly

interested in seeing the bird collection there. Given Thoreau’s Journal of 21 November

1854, to Thoreau’s delight Furness apparently obliged Emerson’s request:

Was admitted into the building of the Academy of Natural Sciences by a Mr.

Durand of the botanical department, Mr. Furness applying to him. The carpenters

were still at work adding four stories (!) of galleries to the top. These four . . . to

be devoted to the birds. It is said to be the largest collection of birds in the world”

(Torrey, ed., Journal 7:74).

Although he writes of polar bears, a moose, and the countryside, he makes no mention of

his lecture. Still, Thoreau’s lecture was promoted in at least two Philadelphia

59 For further information on Hinton’s reading of Thoreau’s lecture, see Sandra Harbert Petrulionis, To Set This World Right: The Antislavery Movement in Thoreau’s Concord (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006) 145 & 203, fn 9. See also Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “After Walden ,” 334-336.

60 See chapter two for further information on Thoreau’s meager attempts to publicize himself and to secure lecture engagements.

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newspapers: the Public Ledger and Daily Transcript , and the Daily Pennsylvanian

(Boewe 117). 61 The only known response to Thoreau’s Philadelphia lecture was reported second-hand by W. H. Furness in a letter to Emerson on 26 Nov. 1854. In the letter

Furness writes,

‘I was glad to see Mr. Thoreau. He was full of interesting talk for the little while

that we saw him, & it was amusing to hear his intonations. And then he looked so

differently from my idea of him. . . . He had a glimpse of the Academy [of

Natural Sciences] as he will tell you – I could not hear him lecture for which I

was sorry. Miss Caroline Haven heard him, & from her report I judge the

audience was stupid & did not appreciate him.’ (qtd. in Dean and Hoag, “After

Walden ” 258-59)

If Thoreau was not so well received in Philadelphia as Furness’ letter to Emerson suggests, the lecture still bears consideration and was of great significance to Thoreau. In addition to the revisions Thoreau made to his lecture draft of “The Wild” before presenting it in Philadelphia, Thoreau’s “southern” lecture may have been the catalyst for the subsequent revisions he made to “Walking,” the selections he gleaned for “The

Moon,” and the writing of his new essay, “What Shall It Profit?” Perhaps even more significant from an ecocritical vantage is the sentence previously alluded to that Thoreau wrote in pencil across the top of his title page to the lecture draft. Thoreau’s note reads,“I regard this as a sort of introduction to all that I may write hereafter” (Dean and Hoag,

“After Walden ” 259; Dean, “A Sort of Introduction” 1). Dean and Hoag believe Thoreau

penciled this lecture draft note sometime in late 1854 or early 1855, “when he apparently

61 See list of advertisements, reviews, and responses at the end of this chapter.

184 began to contemplate more earnest, purposeful work on the natural history projects he would spend so much of his time on throughout the remainder of the 1850s” (Dean and

Hoag, “After Walden ” 259).

In any case, Thoreau obviously gave “Walking, or the Wild” quite high prominence in his literary repertoire. I would argue this is so because the essay is his environmental manifesto, his philosophy for living. Much of his work after his initial writing of “Walking, or the Wild” includes his comments on his sauntering expeditions.

Whether studying the succession of forests or the color of leaves, in his writings from the

1850s until his death Thoreau indicates that his study was always undertaken with an eye to what nature might teach him about being in the world -- that is, of the placeness of life, inclusive of humankind. His natural history essays such as “Wild Apples” and

“Autumnal Tints” may be considered to have been born of “Walking, or the Wild.” In these works, Thoreau does not look at the whole of nature philosophically, but considers it in microcosm, examining scientifically and sometimes historically what he considered in “Walking” on a much grander scale. Thoreau appears not to have made additional substantial revisions to either “Walking” or “The Wild” after those of 1854, choosing rather to concentrate on the more descriptive or otherwise scientifically oriented natural history writings as noted above. He did, however, continue to read one or the other of his

“Walking, or the Wild” lectures at least four, and possibly five more times between 2

November 1856 and 9 September 1860.

Bronson Alcott may be held at least in part responsible for Thoreau’s next

“Walking, or the Wild” lecture engagement. In the fall of 1856, Alcott was visiting with

Marcus Spring at his Quaker community in Perth Amboy, New Jersey. As Harding

185 explains, Spring’s unsuccessful attempt to establish a co-operative community on the two hundred acre property prompted his mentioning to Alcott that he planned to have his land surveyed for his next venture – country estates for New York commuters. Spring hoped to offer people not only a quiet place to live outside of New York City, but also to provide a good school for their children and cultural activities such as an active lyceum.

At the mention of surveying, Alcott suggested Thoreau, who might also be persuaded to offer a few lectures (Harding, Days 370; Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 273).

Apparently Spring contacted Thoreau on both accounts, given that Thoreau wrote in a draft of a reply to him, ‘“bringing compass & lectures as you request” (qtd. in Dean and

Hoag, “After Walden ” 273). Thoreau spent more than four weeks with Spring in New

Jersey where he offered three lectures to the Quaker Eagleswood Community. Beginning on 26 October 156, on two consecutive Sundays Thoreau offered lectures on

“Moosehunting” and “Walking, or the Wild,” respectively. The following weekend he travelled with Alcott to see Horace Greeley at his farm in New York to hear Reverend

Henry Ward Beecher preach, to meet Walt Whitman, and to visit with the abolitionist

Grimké sisters, Sarah and Angelina Grimké Weld (Petrulionis, World Right 116). The fourth Sunday he again lectured at Eagleswood, this time reading “What Shall It Profit?”

Based on a letter and Journal entry of Bronson Alcott, Thoreau most likely read the

“Walking” portion of his “Walking, or the Wild” lectures. In his 2 November 1856

Journal Alcott wrote, ‘“Evening: Thoreau reads his lecture on ‘Walking,’ and it interests his company deeply in his treatment of nature. Never had such a walk as this been taken by any one before, and the conversation so flowing and lively and curious – the young people enjoying it particularly”’ (qtd. in Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 276 ). In a

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letter to his wife, Abigail, Alcott also confirms Thoreau’s lecture topic: ‘“Evening,

Thoreau reads his lecture on Walking to the whole company, and interests all. It was the first and only walk any one had ever taken, and a signal success”’ (277). Thoreau makes no mention of his Eagleswood lectures in his Journal, but he does write about them in his correspondence to H. G. O. Blake and to his sister, Sophia. In his 19 November 1856 letter to Blake, Thoreau writes, “I have read three of my old lectures . . . to the

Eagleswood people, and unexpectedly, with rare success – i.e. , I was aware that what I

was saying was silently taken in by their ears” (Harding and Bode, eds. Correspondence

441). His letter to Sophia also indicates a favorable reception. Thoreau wrote to Sophia

after his first Sunday evening lecture, the one on the “moose-story,” simply noting that he

read that one “to the children to their satisfaction” (440). But the letter recounts more

about his surveying. After writing to Sophia of Blake, his impressions of the Eagleswood

community, and briefly mentioning his “moose-story,” he notes,

ever since I have been constantly engaged in surveying Eagleswood – through

woods ravines marshes & along the shore, dodging the tide – through cat-briar

mud & beggar ticks – having no time to look up or think where I am – (it takes 10

or 15 minutes before each meal to pick the beggar ticks out of my clothes – butts

& the rest are left – rents mended at the first convenient opportunity) I shall be

engaged perhaps as much longer. Mr Spring wants me to help him about setting

out an orchard & vineyard – Mr Birney asks me to survey a small piece for him . .

. (440).

Here again Thoreau was able to combine occupational travels so that he might lecture and

survey. But here as well, Thoreau has little to say about his business. Other than the

187 scant mentions of his lectures in the two letters noted above, his three Eagleswood lectures go unnoted. His surveying is given only a slight mention in his Journal, just the few lines cited above in his letter to Sophia. Significantly, Thoreau’s surveying was what prompted Spring to seek him as a lecturer; had Alcott not mentioned Thoreau’s surveying, Thoreau would undoubtedly not have been asked to come to Eagleswood at all.

Despite the significant role surveying and lecturing played in Thoreau’s travel to

Eagleswood, Thoreau reflects on pursuits closer to his heart in his Journal. During his nearly month-long stay at Eagleswood, Thoreau’s Journal is filled with botanical observations. On his first full day at Eagleswood, he begins a rather long Journal entry on his nature observations with his observations on viburnum, the “seaside goldenrod,” persimmon, sassafrass, and a katydid. While surveying the following day, Thoreau again makes note of his natural surroundings: tulip, sweet-gum, black walnut and bayberry trees. Although the amount of his Journaling during his time in Eagleswood is less than usual, the comments he does provide are of the sort of his regular botanical or otherwise nature-oriented observations. Perhaps the great amount of surveying work and time spent with friends limited his opportunity for study and reflection. Although Thoreau’s correspondence and Journal tell that he was quite occupied during his Eagleswood stay, he was ever eager to return to his beloved Concord. As he writes to Sophia, “It seems a twelve-month since I was not here – but I hope to get settled deep into my den again ere long. The hardest thing to find here is solitude & Concord” (440). To Blake he writes that he cannot stop on his return; having been at Eagleswood much longer than expected, he writes, “I think, therefore, that I must go straight home” (441). Thoreau certainly had

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a fondness for his hometown, drawing, as his Journal attests, a great deal of inspiration

for his writing from his saunters in Concord’s woods, fields, swamps, and waters.

Thoreau was not to remain in Concord long, however. Less than a month later he

travelled to Amherst, New Hampshire to lecture. On 18 December 1856 he read one of

his “Walking, or the Wild” lectures, possibly the same he had read in New Jersey, in the

basement Vestry of Amherst’s Congregationalist Church. While an advertisement in

Amherst’s Farmer’s Cabinet mentions that Thoreau would lecture on “getting a living,”

for whatever reason Thoreau changed his mind. On 11 January 1857 he recorded in his

Journal, “I was describing the other day my success in solitary and distant woodland

walking outside the town . . . ,” a phrase that Dean and Hoag believe clearly indicate that

his Amherst lecture was that of “Walking” (“After Walden ” 285). In addition, in a letter to Blake written shortly after his Amherst lecture Thoreau noted, “I carried that which I call ‘Walking, or the Wild,’ to Amherst, N. H. . . .” (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondence 461). Thoreau’s Journal entries are again typical of those during his lecture travels in that he provides a number of detailed observations of nature.

Atypically, however, Thoreau wrote a good deal about the lecture experience -- in particular, about his audience. His Journal for 18 December reads,

At my lecture, the audience attended to me closely, and I was satisfied;

that is all I ask or expect generally. Not one spoke to me afterward, nor needed

they. I have no doubt that they liked it, in the main, though few of them would

have dared say so, provided they were conscious of it. Generally, if I can only get

the ears of an audience, I do not care whether they say they like my lectures or

not. I think I know as well as they can tell. At any rate, it is none of my business,

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and it would be impertinent for me to inquire. The stupidity of most of these

country towns, not to include the cities, is in its innocence infantile. Lectured in

basement (vestry) of the orthodox church, and I trust helped to undermine it.

(Torrey, ed., Journal 9:187-88)

Lecturing and the lecture-going crowd were certainly on his mind, for Thoreau continued to write bitingly about them in his Journal where before his lectures and auditors received scant if any mention. Shortly after his next reading of “The Wild” in

Fitchburg, Massachusetts on 3 February 1857 Thoreau wrote,

I love and celebrate nature, even in detail, merely because I love the

scenery of these interviews and translations. I love to remember every creature

that was at this club. . . . I am attracted toward them undoubtedly because I never

heard any nonsense from them. I have not convicted them of folly, or vanity, or

pomposity, or stupidity, in dealing with me. . . . In a caucus, a meeting-house, a

lyceum, a clubroom, there is nothing like it in my experience. (210; 7 January

1857)

A few days later he noted,

I congratulate myself on having been permitted to stay at home thus, I am so

much richer for it. I do not see what I should have got of much value, but money,

by going about, but I do see what I should have lost. It seems to me that I have a

longer and more liberal lease of life thus. I cannot afford to be telling my

experience, especially to those who perhaps will take no interest in it. I wish to be

getting experience. . . . (214-15; 11 January 1857)

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Undoubtedly, as these Journal entries indicate, Thoreau was increasingly drawn to nature and away from the lecture platform; for Thoreau the lecture platform did not even come close to the celebratory spirit he found in nature. To the contrary, the lyceum was full of

“nonsense,” and the wilds of his beloved Concord proved a better place of experience than did the lecture hall. His auditors were often unwilling to step outside of their comfortable, everyday existence and chance learning some new truth about themselves.

As he writes in his 4 February 1857 entry:

Sometimes when, in a conversation or a lecture, I have been grasping at,

or even standing and reclining upon, the serene and everlasting truths that

underlie and support our vacillating life, I have seen my auditors standing on their

terra firma, the quaking earth, crowded together on their Lisbon Quay, and

compassionately or timidly watching my motions as if they were the antics of a

ropedancer or mountebank pretending to walk on air; or here and there one

creeping out upon an overhanging but crackling bough, unwilling to drop to the

adamantine floor beneath, or perchance even venturing out a step or two, as if it

were a dangerous kittly-bender timorously sounding as he goes. (235-9)

Thoreau, on the other hand, sought the overhanging but crackling bough and accepted the possibility of a fall that he might grasp the truth in nature.

Perhaps his increasing disdain for lecturing was cause for Thoreau’s having offered only two lectures in 1857. Still, his 3 February 1857 Fitchburg lecture was appreciated by at least one of his auditors who submitted an anonymous response to the lecture in the Worcester Daily Spy of 11 February 1857:

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‘Last week I had the privilege of hearing at Fitchburg a very remarkable lecture

from Henry D. Thoreau of Concord, Mass. Mr. Thoreau will, by invitation,

repeat this lecture at Brinley Hall next Friday evening. His subject is “The Wild,”

and his aim is to set forth the claims of nature against civilization. This lecture

contains more genuine wit, wisdom, and poetry, than can be found in whole

courses of lyceum lectures. It is the deep, rich outpouring of the author’s life and

genius, and not something got up for the occasion. I do not believe literature

furnishes an instance of a greater nearness to nature [ sic ], of a more unreserved

and successful devotion to wisdom, than is found in this writer. It is almost as

though nature herself spoke through him. Let us, for once, anticipate a little, and

not leave it for posterity alone to adpreciate [sic] this man, who, like all the truly

wise, does not press himself upon our attention but rather dreads popularity. His

words will surely be remembered when most of our literature is forgotten. Let us

escape, if possible, for an hour, from the conventionalisms, political, religious,

and social, in which we are involved, from the gossip of the street, the shop, and

the newspaper, and give ourselves opportunity, at least, to be refreshed and

ennobled by this clear, strong voice from the wild.’ (qtd. in Dean and Hoag,

“After Walden ” 285)

Edmund A. Schofield identifies Thoreau’s friend and admirer H. G. O. Blake as the most likely author of Thoreau’s Fitchburg lecture account, citing the style and tone of the response as that of Blake (cited in Dean and Hoag, “After Walden ” 285; Schofield, “Time

Recovering Itself” 27). Moreover, Blake was known to have touted Thoreau’s lecturing on a number of other occasions, and the printing of this positive response just two days

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before Thoreau’s Worcester lecture certainly was encouraging to possible lecture-goers.

Further support of Schofield’s claim is offered by Dean and Hoag who assert that Blake

almost undoubtedly was one of Thoreau’s Fitchburg auditors, a claim based on Thoreau’s

letter to Blake accepting his offer to lecture in Worcester (Dean and Hoag, “After

Walden ” 285). Presumably, Dean and Hoag base their claim on Thoreau’s having written,

I will come to you on Friday Feb. 13 th with that lecture [my italics]. You may call

it “The Wild” – or “Walking” or both – whichever you choose. . . . I told [Theo]

Brown that it had not been much altered since I read it in Worcester, but now I

think of it, much of it must have been new to you [my italics], because, having

since divided it into two, I am able to read what before I omitted. (Harding and

Bode, eds., Correspondence 465)

Whether or not the author of the response was Blake, he was noted as “a citizen of

Worcester” in the Fitchburg Sentinel when that newspaper reprinted the anonymous posting on 13 February, 1857, notably the same day Thoreau read one of his “Walking, or the Wild” lectures in Worcester.

Thoreau’s 13 February 1857 reading in Brinley Hall in Worcester of one of his

“Walking, or the Wild” lectures was the second that February, his last lecture for just shy of a year. Thoreau was growing ever more weary of the lecture podium and was more and more accustomed to the study of nature, even finding he had to be in it to make his life rich; lecturing, on the other hand, seemed to rob his spirit. Between his 3 February and 13 February 1857 lectures he writes,

Again and again I congratulate myself on my so-called poverty. I was

almost disappointed yesterday to find thirty dollars in my desk which I did not

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know that I possessed, though now I should be sorry to lose it. The week that I go

away to lecture, however much I may get for it, is unspeakably cheapened. The

preceding and succeeding days are a mere sloping down and up from it. In the

society of many men, or in the midst of what is called success, I find my life of no

account, and my spirits rapidly fall. . . . But when I have only a rustling oak leaf,

or the faint metallic cheep of a tree sparrow, for variety in my winter walk, my

life becomes continent and sweet as the kernel of a nut. . . . (Torrey, ed., Journal

9:245-46; 8 Feb. 1857)

Still, Thoreau was not ready to give up on humanity altogether. Besides

often taking Channing as his companion for his saunters, Thoreau liked the idea

of another who could understand him. On 11 January 1857 he wrote,

I do not go . . . [on woodland walks] to get my dinner, but to get that

sustenance which dinners only preserve me to enjoy, without which dinners are a

vain repetition. But how little men can help me in this! Only by having a kindred

experience. Of what use to tell them of my happiness? Thus, if ever we have

anything important to say, it might be introduced with the remark” “It is nothing

to you, in particular. It is none of your business, I know. That is what might be

called going into good society . (215)

Perhaps Thoreau’s desire to find a man of a “kindred experience” was at least in part explained by his having shared “Walking, or the Wild” at all.

Thoreau’s work as a surveyor in the winter of 1857, like his lecturing, was increasingly weighing on his mind and spirit, Thoreau often turning to the woods for much more than his compass and needle could provide. As he wrote,

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After spending four or five days surveying and drawing a plan incessantly,

I especially feel the necessity of putting myself in communication with nature

again, to recover my tone, to withdraw out of the wearying and unprofitable world

of affairs. The things I have been doing have but a fleeting and accidental

importance, however much men are immersed in them, and yield very little

valuable fruit. I would fain have been wading through the woods and fields and

conversing with the sane snow. Having waded in the very shallowest stream of

time, I would now bathe my temples in eternity. (205; 4 January 1857)

Thoreau not only wanted to be in nature, he also wanted to study its every detail, and it is this message that he recorded in his notebooks and Journal.

Given his feelings about lecturing of late and the pull of nature on his spirit, in a letter of 31 December 1856 he turned down Blake’s request that he read a lecture in

Worcester, writing,

Mr. Blake,-

I think it will not be worth the while for me to come to Worcester to

lecture at all this year. It will be better to wait till I am – Perhaps unfortunately –

more in that line. My writing has not taken the shape of lectures, and therefore I

should be obliged to read one of three or four old lectures, the best of which I

have read to some of your audience before. I carried that one which I call

“Walking, or the Wild,” to Amherst, N.H., the evening of that cold Thursday, and

I am to read another at Fitchburg, February 3. I am simply their hired man. This

will probably be the extent of my lecturing hereabouts. . . .

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O solitude! obscurity! meanness! I never triumph so as when I have the

least success in my neighbor’s eyes. The lecturer gets fifty dollars a night; but

what becomes of his winter? What consolation will it be hereafter to have fifty

thousand dollars for living in the world? I should like not to exchange any of my

life for money. (Harding and Bode, eds. Correspondence 461)

Thoreau’s early 1857 letters and Journal indicate more than that his lecturing and surveying ventures left him unfulfilled. They speak to the temporality of earthly existence of which Thoreau was increasingly aware. By 1857 Thoreau’s health was in decline. In addition, ever since the 11 January 1842 death of his brother John, Thoreau was attentive to the fragility of life and embraced each waking moment. So, for example, he writes of sucking out the “marrow of life” and having “several more lives to live” in Walden .

More concretely, his letter to Blake indicates something more specific about “Walking, or the Wild”; “. . . I should be obliged to read one of three or four old lectures, the best [my italics] of which I have read to some of your audience before. I carried that one which I call ‘Walking, or the Wild’ [my italics] to Amherst. . . .” Clearly, Thoreau considered

“Walking, or the Wild” to be his best lecture. Perhaps this conclusion was so because, as the lecture draft note cited above indicates, he considered the lecture-essay introductory to all later work (Dean, “A Sort of Introduction” 1). Perhaps it was because, as I have argued previously, the work contained Thoreau’s ecocentric, existential philosophy.

Thoreau’s desire to lecture continued to wane, yet despite his misgivings, he changed his mind and agreed to lecture in Worcester that winter, writing to Blake on 6 February 1857 that he would read some version of his “Walking, or the Wild” lecture as long as it was understood that he had been “invited to read in public (if it be so) what [he had] already

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read, in part, to a private audience” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 465).

Certainly Blake was pleased, having tried to convince Thoreau to lecture in Worcester since early November of 1856. 62

While Thoreau’s Brinley Hall, Worcester, Massachusetts lecture may have been the final time he presented material from “Walking, or the Wild,” Dean and Hoag speculate that there may have been just one final reading of it, and this during Thoreau’s concluding 1860-61 lecture season. On Sunday, 9 September 1860 in Welles Hall in

Lowell Massachusetts, Thoreau read a morning and evening lecture. Both were arranged by Charles P. Ricker who negotiated two lectures for an unknown but specified sum that

Thoreau proposed for one reading. As Ricker writes to Thoreau on 31 August 1860, “By the instructions of our Committee I am requested to write, that we have two lectures on the Sabbath. If you could give us two lectures instead of one for the terms you state we shall be happy to hear you. . . .” (588) Ricker’s subsequent letter of 6 September 1860 notes Thoreau’s willingness to offer the two lectures and provides details regarding his stay. Dean and Hoag’s claim that Thoreau’s morning reading was one version of his

“Walking, or the Wild” lecture is very speculative, based solely on the conjecture that they are fairly certain the second lecture Thoreau read was “What Shall It Profit?,” and that “Walking, or the Wild” was the perfect complement to that lecture because it presented Thoreau’s major ideas about nature and “What Shall It Profit?” explored the author’s complementary ideas about society. Further, these were Thoreau’s two lectures

62 In a letter of 1 November 1856, Thoreau wrote to his sister Sophia that Blake hoped he would stop over in Worcester on his return trip from Eagleswood and offer a lecture. Answering Blake’s request on 19 November 1856, Thoreau wrote that he planned to travel straight home and so might lecture in Worcester at another time. See Walter Harding and Carl Bode, eds., The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1958) 438-42.

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that he regarded as lectures rather than early versions of essays or chapters (Dean and

Hoag, “After Walden ” 337). 63

Thoreau’s two lectures were advertised in four Lowell newspapers, all reporting that Thoreau was an original thinker and would offer interesting lectures; none named

Thoreau’s lecture topics. The Weekly Journal advertisement reads as follows:

HENRY D. THOREAU, one of the most original and radical thinkers and free-

speakers that we know anything about, is expected to lecture as Welles Hall next

Sunday, September 9 th . Mr. Thoreau is the author of several volumes of some

note, and is an attractive contributor to the Atlantic Monthly. One of his books

relates his experience, while living one year solitary and alone, on the shores of

Walden Pond, a body of water lying in the towns of Concord and Lincoln. During

the period named, he proved to his own satisfaction that a man could live and

have all the real necessaries of life, for $15 a-year. The volume is an entertaining

one, and no contributor to the Atlantic writes more interestingly. We shall expect

to hear something original at least in the two lectures he will read us next Sunday

before our Spiritualistic friends. We do not known [ sic ], however, that Thoreau is

a Spiritualist; rather think he is not; but, the believers in that doctrine said that

they did not employ Mr. Emerson to come here and talk their ideas and beliefs,

but his own. The same, we suppose, is the condition on which Mr. Thoreau

lectures to them. (337)

Thoreau makes no mention of his lecturing on this occasion in his Journal, only that he travelled to Lowell. After commenting on a variety of grasses the day of his return to

63 For further conjecture from Dean and Hoag, see “Thoreau’s Lectures After Walden ,” 337-8.

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Concord, he remarks, “Almost every plant, however humble, has thus its day, and sooner or later becomes the characteristic feature of some part of the landscape or other”

(Torrey, ed., Journal 9:77; 10 September 1860). Although this statement could easily be read most literally, Thoreau may have also been commenting on his lectures and on man himself.

Whether or not Thoreau read some version of “Walking, or the Wild” in Lowell in 1860, the quality of the lecture on “Walking, or the Wild” remained ingrained in the text. When James T. Fields asked Thoreau to prepare some of his writings for publication, “Walking, or the Wild” was a clear choice for Thoreau. The work having undergone extensive revisions throughout the duration of his lecturing, Thoreau’s reading drafts were already quite polished texts. Still, had Thoreau more time, the character of the lecture may not be so apparent in the published version of the essay readers of

Thoreau’s work are privy to today. But given that time was indeed quite short (Thoreau prepared four essays for Fields in less than two months, three of which he prepared within one month), that Thoreau submitted as copy-text a number of pages from his lecture manuscripts is not surprising. In fact,

of the eighty-six leaves which make up the printer’s copy of “Walking,” all but

nine are on the two types of paper that Thoreau used in 1851-52 and in 1853-54.

This indicates that most of the printer’s copy of “Walking” is composed of

reading-draft manuscripts from the early “Walking” lectures. . . . Thoreau merely

rearranged his reading drafts of the early “Walking” lectures and added a few

leaves containing new or heavily revised material to the drafts when preparing

them for publication as a single essay. (Dean, “Reconstructions” 308)

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Additionally, Thoreau changed very little in the essay as he prepared it for Fields, taking his now two “Walking” and “The Wild” lectures and fusing them together into one contiguous piece. From the copy-text, Fields apparently made substantive editorial revisions to the essay that Thoreau did not likely approve, 64 yet the character of the lecture and the message of the text remained.

Thoreau’s lecturing career certainly impacted the composition of “Walking, or the

Wild” in a number of ways. The prospect of offering the work as a lecture may be the reason for its original version, and his lecturing was probably at least in part good cause for many of the revisions he made to his drafts. Beside the impact of audience reception that played into the changes Thoreau made to his reading drafts, that the text was divided into two to form a pair of companion lectures is sure. In addition, his proposed Middle

Western and Canadian lecture tour may have been the initial basis for the extended metaphor of the West that Thoreau writes in the lecture-essay. Still, Thoreau’s Journal proves that his experiences in nature had the greatest overall impact on his writing of

“Walking, or the Wild.” Not only does Thoreau draw from particular experiences in his

Journal, but more significantly, it is the varied levels of rumination on his experiences-- from field notes to Journal passages, from Journal passages to lecture drafts, from lecture drafts to multiple revised and re-worked reading copies-- that become part of the lecture- essay. Succinctly stated, experience in nature and on the lecture platform combined with compositional practice ultimately yielded Thoreau’s ecocentric paradigm in the lecture- essay.

64 See chapter four.

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The writing of “Walking, or the Wild” cannot be nailed down to one concrete moment of origination, but undoubtedly, the symbiotic relationship between Thoreau’s experiences and journaling planted the seeds for the germination of his thoughts that are thus contained in the lecture-essay. His working out of those thoughts through the more than ten years compositional history of the text ultimately evidences a clear purpose: to reconnect the human with the rest of Nature; to place man squarely in the bosom of what sustains him: Wildness. It is this existential philosophy that Thoreau reveals in “Walking, or the Wild” that distinguishes him from other nineteenth-century interpreters of nature.

For in Wildness, he finds more than beauty or even the sublime (American landscape painters); he finds more than utility to support an American nationalism (Jefferson); he sees more than the order and classification that science allows (Aggasiz); and he understands nature as more than a vehicle for transcendental insight (Emerson). No nineteenth-century American author excepting Thoreau brought man home, so to speak, by putting him back into nature and seeing Wildness as the preserver of life.

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A Chronology of Thoreau’s “Walking” Lectures 65

1) 23 April 1851, Wednesday; 7:00 P.M. – Concord, Massachusetts; Unitarian

Church, Vestry

“Walking, or the Wild”

2) 31 May 1851, Saturday – Worcester, Massachusetts; Parlors of H. G. O. Blake’s

School

“Walking, or the Wild”

3) 23 May 1852, Sunday; 10:00 A.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden Hall

“Walking”

4) 23 May 1852, Sunday; 7:00 P.M. – Plymouth, Massachusetts; Leyden Hall

“The Wild”

5) 21 November 1854, Tuesday; 7:30 P.M. – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; spring

garden Institute

“The Wild”

6) 2 November 1856, Sunday; ca. 7:30 P.M. – Perth Amboy, New Jersey; Unionists’

Hall, Eagleswood Community

“Walking, or the Wild”

7) 18 December 1856, Thursday; 7:00 P.M. – Amherst, New Hampshire; Basement

Vestry, Congregationalist Church

“Walking, or the Wild” (?) 66

65 This list is compiled from Dean and Hoag’s two articles: “Thoreau’s Lectures Before Walden.” & “Thoreau’s Lectures After Walden.”

66 Probably, Dean and Hoag speculate in “After Walden,” 279-83.

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8) 3 February 1857, Tuesday; ca. 7:30 P.M. – Fitchburg, Massachusetts; City Hall

“Walking, or the Wild”

9) 13 February 1857, Friday; 7:30 P.M. – Worcester, Massachusetts; Brinley Hall

“Walking, or the Wild”

10) 9 September 1860, Sunday; (Morning) – Lowell, Massachusetts; Welles Hall

“Walking” (?) 67

67 Possibly, Dean and Hoag speculate – this time with less certainty in “After Walden,” 336-38.

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Advertisements, Reviews, and Responses to Henry David Thoreau’s “Walking” Lecture 68

21 November 1852 lecture in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania at the Spring Garden Institute

Advertisement in the Philadelphia Daily Pennsylvanian

20 & 21 November 1854

Spring Garden Institute Lectures – The Second Lecture will be delivered

on Tuesday Evening, 21 st instant, at 7 ½ o’clock, by Henry D. Thoreau,

Esq. of Concord, Mass. Subject “The Wild.”

Advertisement in the Philadelphia Public Ledger and Daily Transcript

21 November 1854

Spring Garden Institute Lectures – The Second Lecture will be delivered

on Tuesday Evening, 21 st instant, at 7 ½ o’clock, at the Institute Building,

Broad and Spring Garden Sts., by Henry D. Thoreau, Esq. of Concord,

Mass. Subject “The Wild.”

Auditor Response of Miss Caroline Haven as reported by W. H. Furness in a letter

to R. W. Emerson

26 November 1854

68 Information gleaned from the following works: Gary Scharnhorst, Henry David Thoreau: An Annotated Bibliography of Comment and Criticism Before 1900 (New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1992). Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “Thoreau’s Lectures Before Walden : An Annotated Calendar,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1995): 127-228. Bradley P. Dean and Ronald Wesley Hoag, “Thoreau’s Lectures After Walden : An Annotated Calendar,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1996): 241-362. Copies of original articles mentioned by Scharnhorst, & Dean and Hoag were obtained and reviewed when possible. My research since the publication of Scharnhorst’s work and Dean and Hoag’s two essays has uncovered no new advertisements, reviews, or responses to “Walking.”

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I was glad to see Mr. Thoreau. He was full of interesting talk for the little

while that we saw him, & it was amusing to hear his intonations. And then

he looked so differently from my idea of him . . . . He had a glimpse of the

Academy [of Natural Sciences] as he will tell you – I could not hear him

lecture for which I was sorry. Miss Caroline Haven heard him, & from

her report I judge the audience was stupid & did not appreciate him.

2 November 1856 lecture in Perth Amboy, New Jersey before the Eagleswood

Community, Unionists’ Hall

Auditor Response of Amos Bronson Alcott as recorded in his journal

2 November 1856

Evening: Thoreau reads his lecture on ‘Walking,’ and it interests his

company deeply in the treatment of nature. Never had such a walk as this

been taken by any one before, and the conversation so flowing and lively

and curious – the young people enjoying it particularly.

Auditor Response of Amos Bronson Alcott in a letter to Abigail Alcott, his wife

2 November 1856

. . . Evening, Thoreau reads his lecture on Walking to the whole company,

and interests all. It was the first and only walk any one had ever taken, and

a signal success. . . .

18 December 1856 lecture in Amherst, New Hampshire in the Basement Vestry of the

Congregationalist Church

Advertisement in the Amherst Farmer’s Cabinet

18 December 1856

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Amherst Lyceum! Lecture Dec. 18 th , by Henry D. Thoreau, Esq., of

Concord, Mass. – SUBJECT “Getting a Living.”

3 February 1857lecture in Fitchburg, Massachusetts in City Hall & 13 February 1857 lecture in Worcester, Massachusetts in Brinley Hall

Review/Advertisement in the Worcester Daily Spy

11 February 1857 anonymous posting; the contributor was probably

Thoreau’s admiring friend, H. G. O. Blake

HENRY D. THOREAU’S LECTURE. – Last week I had the privilege of

hearing at Fitchburg a very remarkable lecture from Henry D. Thoreau of

Concord, Mass. Mr. Thoreau will, by invitation, repeat this lecture at

Brinley Hall next Friday evening. His subject is “The Wild,” and his aim

is to set forth the claims of nature against civilization. This lecture

contains more genuine wit, wisdom, and poetry, than can be found in

whole courses of lyceum lectures. It is the deep, rich outpouring of the

author’s life and genius, and not something got up for the occasion. I do

not believe literature furnishes an instance of a greater nearness to narure

[sic], of a more unreserved and successful devotion to wisdom, than is

found in this writer. It is almost as though nature herself spoke through

him. Let us, for once, anticipate a little, and not leave it for posterity alone

to adpreciate [sic] this man, who, like all the truly wise, does not press

himself upon our attention but rather dreads popularity. His words will

surely be remembered when most of our literature is forgotten. Let us

escape, if possible, for an hour, from the conventionalisms, political,

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religious, and social, in which we are involved, from the gossip of the

street, the shop, and the newspaper, and give ourselves opportunity, at

least, to be refreshed and ennobled by this clear, strong voice from the

wild.

Review in the Fitchburg Sentinel

13 February 1857 similar anonymous posting; the contributor was

probably Thoreau’s admiring friend, H. G. O. Blake

Much of the above review/ advertisement was here reprinted and also the

following:

The recent lecture by Mr. Thoreau before the Athenaeum in this place, is

referred to in complimentary terms by a citizen of Worcester, in the

columns of the Spy.

9 September 1860 lecture in Lowell, Massachusetts in Welles Hall

Advertisement in the Daily Citizen

Advertisement in the Daily Evening Advertiser

Advertisement in the Daily Journal and Courier

Advertisement in the Weekly Journal

7 September 1860

HENRY D. THOREAU, one of the most original and radical thinkers and

free-speakers that we know anything about, is expected to lecture as

Welles Hall next Sunday, September 9 th . Mr. Thoreau is the author of

several volumes of some note, and is an attractive contributor to the

Atlantic Monthly. One of his books relates his experience, while living

207 one year solitary and alone, on the shores of Walden Pond, a body of water lying in the towns of Concord and Lincoln. During the period named, he proved to his own satisfaction that a man could live and have all the real necessaries of life, for $15 a-year. The volume is an entertaining one, and no contributor to the Atlantic writes more interestingly. We shall expect to hear something original at least in the two lectures he will read us next Sunday before our Spiritualistic friends. We do not known [sic], however, that Thoreau is a Spiritualist; rather think he is not; but, the believers in that doctrine said that they did not employ Mr.

Emerson to come here and talk their ideas and beliefs, but his own. The same, we suppose, is the condition on which Mr. Thoreau lectures to them.

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Heretic of Concord: The Publication History of Thoreau’s “Walking”

Perhaps the historical element of Thoreau’s “Walking” that is most known is the

publication history of the text. In Joseph J. Moldenhauer’s headnote to the essay and

historical introduction to Excursions , he provides a detailed, factual account of the early

publication record of the work. The following discussion includes much of what

Moldenhauer shares in his summary of the publication of the text. In addition, it goes

beyond Moldenhauer’s discussion by bringing the text to the present day. In other words,

Moldenhauer provides all that is known about the early publication history of “Walking,”

but he does not consider the publication of the text beyond the nineteenth- century.

Examining the publication of the text over the more than one-hundred and forty-five year

period since its initial printing opens new avenues of research. For example, when,

where, and why the text was republished may be considered ecocritically given that such

historical research demonstrates a rise in the popularity of the essay that parallels the rise

of the American environmental movement; the ecocritical significance of the publication

history of the text is thus considered briefly in the following study. An additional

ecocritical element of the present study includes an analysis of the likely unauthorized

editorial emendations that were made by the first editor of the essay. Notably, these

editorial emendations were not corrected until “Walking” was published in the 2007

Princeton University Press edition of Excursions . The analysis of the editorial emendations is considered within the following discussion of the early publication history of “Walking.” Ultimately, this chapter extends the historical and analytical component of

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the previous chapter by going beyond the compositional and lecture histories of the text

to the publication history of the essay.

Although Henry David Thoreau most likely wrote “Walking” specifically for the lecture circuit, 69 by early 1862 he was eager to get the essay into print. Thoreau’s health

was rapidly failing; most days he was confined to a day bed in the parlor of the Thoreau

family home, physically able only to enjoy the world of nature as he gazed out of the

front window onto Concord’s Main Street. Fortunately, Thoreau continued to explore

Concord’s woods, Maine’s mountain tops, and other “wild” lands in his mind through

reflections and writing. So when James T. Fields, then editor and owner of the Atlantic

Monthly , wrote in late 1861 or January of 1862 to request that Thoreau submit some of

his shorter works for publication, Thoreau soon obliged. 70 By February of 1862, he sent

the following letter to Fields:

Concord Feb. 11 th 62

Messrs, Editors,

Only extreme illness has prevented my answering your note earlier. I have

no objection to having the papers you refer to printed in your monthly – if

my feeble health will permit me to prepare them for the printer. What will

you give me for them? They are, or have been used as, lectures of the

usual length - taking about an hour to read & I dont see how they can be

divided without injury – How many pages can you print at once? – Of

69 See chapter three for a discussion of the compositional history of “Walking.”

70 Joseph J. Moldenhauer speculates that Fields may have been encouraged by Bronson Alcott, F. B. Sanborn, and R. W. Emerson, among other friends and admirers of Thoreau’s work, to solicit Thoreau for his writings. See Joseph J. Moldenhauer, ed., The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau: Excursions , Headnote, “Walking,” (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007) 564.

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course, I should expect that no sentiment or sentence be altered or omitted

without my consent, & to retain the copyright of the paper after you had

used it in your monthly. – Is your monthly copyrighted?

Yours respectfully,

S. E. Thoreau 71

For H. D. Thoreau.

(Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 635-636)

Thoreau’s eagerness to see his writings in print is evident in this first letter to

Fields, as he apologizes for the short interlude between receiving the editor’s request and his acceptance of the offer. And yet, his hesitation is also easily discernable; he has “no objections” to having his essays printed, he writes, yet in the sentences that follow he notes that the essays should not be divided but printed in full; remarks that “no sentiment or sentence [should] be altered without [his] consent”; and states that he expects to retain copyright. 72 Nonetheless, Thoreau agrees to send four of his lectures to Fields for publication in the Atlantic Monthly : “Autumnal Tints,” “The Higher Law,” 73 “Walking,” and “Wild Apples.”

Given his poor physical condition, however, Thoreau was unable to prepare the essays for Fields on his own, and so he relied heavily on the help of his sister Sophia to ready his manuscript drafts for submission. As his health allowed, and knowing his time was indeed short, Henry and Sophia worked diligently from pencil copies of lecture

71 “S E Thoreau” is Sophia Thoreau, Henry’s sister, whose service as amanuensis allowed him to complete the task of revising the four essays he sent to James T. Fields for publication.

72 Overtones of Thoreau’s earlier problematic dealings with editors are thus evident. Thoreau’s troubles with various editors are discussed in detail as the chapter proceeds.

73 “The Higher Law” was renamed “Life Without Principle” before publication.

211 drafts of the four essays. Notations on essay drafts in Henry’s handwriting indicate that at times he was well enough to revise and edit his writings, but at others, he asked Sophia to write as they worked through the essays together. 74 Via Thoreau’s dictation, Sophia also wrote a number of letters to Fields that today serve as a record of the fruition of the publication of the four essays’ first printings. All correspondences sent by Thoreau to

Fields are short and to the point, but they provide significant details about Thoreau’s road to the publication of “Walking.” 75

For one, these letters establish Thoreau’s very poor physical condition. As his 11

February letter cited above indicates, “Only extreme illness has prevented [Thoreau’s] answering [Fields’s] note earlier.” And he agreed to send the essays to Fields “– if [his] feeble health will permit [him] to prepare them for the printer” (635). In an 18 February

1862 letter to Fields, Thoreau alludes to his deteriorating health (UCSB, Thoreau Letter).

Significantly, this letter is the last to Fields in Thoreau’s handwriting. In fact, all but this one extant letter to Fields regarding the publication of the four essays is written in

Sophia’s hand. That Sophia penned Thoreau’s letters is yet another indicator of Henry’s condition, for had he been stronger, he certainly would have written the letters himself.

Likely due to his poor health, Thoreau writes each letter to Fields with a sense of urgency; he knows his time is short, and he wishes to see his works in print. In a postscript to a letter dated 24 February 1862, Thoreau dictates to Sophia the following:

“Messrs Ticknor & Fields: P S. I will send you an article as soon as I can prepare it,

74 The complete copy text of the original publication of “Walking,” now housed in the William Munroe Special Collections of the Concord Free Public Library, includes changes penned by both Henry and Sophia Thoreau. More details are provided in the conclusion of this chapter.

75 To read all known extant correspondence related to the publication of “Walking,” see page 229-231 of the present study, entitled “Correspondence of Henry D. Thoreau to James T. Fields.”

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which has no relation to the seasons of the year” 76 (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondence 638). In his following letter to Fields written just four days after the last,

Thoreau remarks that he sends “The Higher Law, it being much shorter & easier to prepare than that on Walking,” and he wants “to know . . . about what time it will be published” (638). Just a few days henceforth he writes that “The paper on Walking will be ready ere long” (639). Only one short week later, he sends the manuscript of

“Walking” to Fields (640). 77

There were surely various reasons for Thoreau’s eagerness to see his works in print. For all of the perceived eccentricities about Thoreau – that he would rather commune with a pine tree than a man, or that he did not enjoy the company of others - he had a propensity for friendship and family. The man who was “prepared to leave father and mother, and brother and sister” to embark on the walk (Moldenhauer, ed. Excursions

186) was very fond of his family. Although Thoreau is best known for living on the shores of Walden Pond, for most of his life he resided in the family home and maintained close relationships with each member of his family. He often worked with his father in

76 The “article” to which Thoreau referred may be “Walking” given that in his following letter he offered a justification for having sent “The Higher Law”; that essay was shorter and easier to prepare than “Walking.” The reference Thoreau made to seasons is to his “Autumnal Tints,” which he sent to Fields on 20 February 1862. See Walter Harding and Carl Bode, eds., The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1958) 636-38.

77 Notably, Thoreau sent many manuscript pages of “Walking” to Fields that he had used while presenting the material on the lecture circuit. The first page of copy-text was one such manuscript leaf. The opening reads: “I wish, this evening, to speak a word for Nature.” Crossed through on the copy-text was the phrase “this evening.” See Joseph J. Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions, “Walking,” Textual Notes, 571. This particular manuscript page is discussed in further detail in chapter three of the present study. Thoreau submitted two essays to Fields prior to “Walking”: “Autumnal Tints” he submitted on 20 February, followed by “The Higher Law” (renamed “Life Without Principle”) on 28 February. “Walking” he submitted on 11 March, followed by only one additional submission on 2 April, “Wild Apples.”

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his pencil factory. He was so close with his brother, John, that when his brother died

suddenly, Henry experienced psychosomatic symptoms that mimicked the real ones that

John experienced while ill. His mother, aunts, and sisters greatly influenced his

abolitionist thought, and the women in his family cared for him during his final illness-

Sophia, his younger sister, helping him to put his affairs in order and assisting him with his writings. It is a small leap, or perhaps no leap at all, then, to conclude that Henry

Thoreau wanted to leave the financial remunerations from his life’s work- his writings- to his family.

While his correspondence with Fields does not dwell on what he will be paid for his works, it is a question Thoreau asks in at least one of the letters: “What will you give me for them?” he writes on 11 February 1862 (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence

635). Additional letters provide at least a probable answer. Based on Thoreau’s 4

March 1862 acknowledgement of having received a one hundred dollar check from

Fields, Moldenhauer speculates that Thoreau was likely paid about six dollars per double

column printed page, and this for “Autumnal Tints,” Thoreau’s first essay submitted to

the Atlantic . While both “Autumnal Tints” and “The Higher Law” had been submitted,

the hundred-dollar check was most probably payment for the first essay only, which was

type-set and ready for press; Fields was not yet satisfied with the second, since he asked

Thoreau for a new title. Too, as Moldenhauer explains, had the check “been intended as

payment in full for both essays, the figure would have been only $3.64 per printed page,

an unusually low rate for the time” (Moldenhauer, ed. Excursions 565). Additionally, in

his 4 March 1862 letter to Fields Thoreau writes, “I hereby acknowledge the receipt of

your check for one hundred dollars on account of manuscript sent to you” (Harding and

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Bode, eds., Correspondence 639). Thoreau notes “manuscript” in the singular-- payment for only one of the works he had thus submitted. Once Thoreau acknowledged payment for the manuscript, he is finished with the topic of remunerations and so moves on to discuss two of his other essays, writing, “As for another title for the Higher Law article, I can think of nothing better than, Life without Principle” (639). Clearly Thoreau is not referring to the “Higher Law” when he notes the manuscript for which he received payment since final preparations for that essay were unfinished at the time he wrote this letter. Following the comments about the “Higher Law” he writes, “The paper on

Walking will be ready ere long” (639). It is as if Thoreau is running through a list of responses to the last correspondence sent from Fields, covering each essay one by one:

“Autumnal Tints,” “The Higher Law,” and “Walking.” Assuming then that the one- hundred dollar payment was for “Autumnal Tints” at about six dollars per double column printed page, Thoreau would most likely have been paid the same rate for his subsequent essays, including “Walking.” Although Fields’s letter to Thoreau is not known to exist,

Thoreau’s 18 February 1862 letter notes his acceptance of Fields’s “offer contained in

[his] last” (UCSB Thoreau Letter), most probably for the aforementioned rate of pay.

Thoreau’s motivation for seeing his essays in print may have been somewhat altruistic, but he had other, more personal concerns than that of his family’s finances.

Thoreau saw himself primarily as a writer. 78 His Journal, books, and essays are a true telling of the man; they were then as they are now the best record of his life that Thoreau could have ever hoped to leave the world. And Thoreau was well aware of the telling of himself that he would leave behind, for he always strove to present himself and his

78 See chapter three for further study of Thoreau’s writing.

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writing in the truest manner possible. Facing the end of his days on earth, Thoreau

confronted himself as he contemplated his life’s work- his writings. As he noted in

Walden , “Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the

contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour” (Shanley, ed. Walden 90). During his critical, last days, Thoreau’s preparation of his writings for publication was his final task. Given the often very personal philosophical ponderings contained in each essay, no truer telling of his life could have been written than by Thoreau himself. To maintain the integrity of his writings in published form, Thoreau knew he had to ready his works for publication before his death; such awareness must have increased his sense of urgency to see his essays in print. Only sight of the printed copy could assure Thoreau that his ideas were represented in the truest form possible-- without editorial alteration or emendation that might compromise the meaning behind his words. In particular, it was especially important for “Walking” to be printed truthfully since Thoreau afforded the essay special privilege amongst his writings. As he noted atop a manuscript copy of the essay, “I regard this [“Walking”] as a sort of introduction to all I may write hereafter” (Dean and

Hoag, “After Walden ” 259). 79

Given Thoreau’s commitment to his work and his desire to represent the truth of his experience, the reader can surely understand Thoreau’s wish that his essays, especially “Walking,” be published without alterations. Although Thoreau explicitly states in his first letter to Fields that no editorial changes be made to his writings without his express permission, he could not be sure that his expectation would be heeded.

Actually, although Thoreau writes that he “should expect [my italics] that no sentiment or

79 See chapter three for further discussion of this penciled manuscript note.

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sentence be altered or omitted without [his] consent” (Harding and Bode, eds.,

Correspondence 636), he may very well have suspected that Fields would attempt such

unauthorized changes, for past experiences with other editors had given Thoreau good

reason to be concerned.

Changes made to “An Excursion to Canada” and the Cape Cod essays by the

editor of Putnam’s Monthly Magazine had infuriated Thoreau. It was in early 1852 that

he began submitting his Canada essay for publication, but the essay was not published

until the following year when an old friend of Thoreau’s, George William Curtis, then

one of the magazine’s editors, encouraged publication. The essay, retitled “A Yankee in

Canada,” was published serially for the first three months of 1853, but Curtis made

unauthorized changes to the text that Thoreau could not abide. When Thoreau refused

further editorial liberties, Curtis abruptly halted publication of the rest of the essay,

claiming the remarks he wished to change were “heretical” and therefore must be edited.

One statement Curtis found particularly offensive was, “I am not sure but this Catholic

religion would be an admirable one if the priests were quite omitted. I think that I might

go to church myself sometimes, some Monday, if I lived in a city where there was such a

one to go to” (Moldenhauer, ed. Excursions 479). In contemporary secular society, such statements about Christianity may not be offensive to most, yet to a nineteenth-century audience, Thoreau’s references were quite unorthodox and certainly unacceptable to the masses.

Even one of Thoreau’s close friends felt Curtis’s editorial changes were necessary, if for no other reason than to preserve Putnam’s public reputation. On 2

January 1853, Horace Greeley wrote to Thoreau:

217

New York, January 2,

1853.

Friend Thoreau, --

I am sorry you and C [urtis] cannot agree so as to have your whole

MS. printed. It will be worth nothing elsewhere after having partly

appeared in Putnum’s. I think it is a mistake to conceal the authorship of

the several articles, making them all (so to speak) Editorial ; but if that is

done, don’t you see that the elimination of very flagrant heresies (like your

defiant Pantheism) becomes a necessity? -- If you had withdrawn your

MS. on account of the abominable misprints in the first number, your

ground would have been far more tenable.

However, do what you will.

Yours,

Horace Greeley.

(Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 293)

Thoreau’s response to Greeley dated 9 February 80 1853 includes the following: “I am sorry that my manuscript should be so mangled, insignificant as it is, but I do not know how I could have helped it fairly, since I was born to be a pantheist- if that be the name of me, and I do the deeds of one” (294). Despite Thoreau’s letter, Greeley again encouraged

Thoreau to reconsider. In a letter dated 16 March 1853, he advises Thoreau: “Don’t break with C[urtis] or Putnam” (302), but Thoreau, whether stubborn or idealistic, could not be persuaded to allow further editorial changes that he felt compromised the integrity

80 Although Thoreau dated the letter 9 February, the Concord postmark is 8 March: Moldenhauer, Excursions 480).

218 of his word. In a letter to his good friend H. G. O. Blake, Thoreau writes, “the editor

Curtis requires the liberty to omit the heresies without consulting me- a privilege

California is not rich enough to bid for” 81 (299).

Unfortunately, the trouble with Putnam’s did not end there. Thoreau wrote to

Curtis in March of 1853 after having received notice from “Mr [George Palmer] Putnam” that the unprinted portion of the manuscript of “A Yankee in Canada”

“seems to have been lost at the printers’.” You will not be surprised if I wish to

know if it actually is lost, and if reasonable pains have been taken to recover it.

Supposing that Mr. P. may not have had the opportunity to consult you respecting

its whereabouts- or have thought it of importance enough to enquire after

particularly- I write again to you to whom I entrusted it to assure that it is of more

value to me than may appear. (301)

Putnam’s liked to release collections of essays that appeared in the magazine, so it is very probable that the magazine’s owner hoped to resolve issues with Thoreau and publish “A

Yankee in Canada” in its entirety in one such collection of works. In fact, a part of the previously published essay did appear in one such collection, but the unpublished sections of the essay were never brought to print by Putnam’s (Moldenhauer, ed.

Excursions 481). Luckily the missing portions of “A Yankee in Canada” manuscript later surfaced, and the essay was published in its entirety posthumously alongside Thoreau’s antislavery and reform papers (Harding, Days 283).

Thoreau fared little better with the essays from Cape Cod that he submitted to

81 Thoreau’s reference here is to the California Gold Rush (1848-1855).

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Curtis for publication. Initially Curtis was interested in printing the essays when he

accepted “A Yankee in Canada” for serial publication, but given the falling-out he had

with Thoreau in 1852-1853, the Cape Cod essays were not then printed in Putnam’s. But in April of 1855 Curtis renewed his interest in publishing the essays if, once again,

Thoreau would allow him to make editorial changes in a few instances that Curtis felt were offensive. After explaining the use of some of his supposed “heretical” phrases in the Cape Cod essays (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 374-5), Thoreau agreed to a few minor revisions as long as Curtis promised to note the changes and publish the essays in the three summer 1855 issues of Putnam’s , but by August of 1855, Curtis halted publication. From a letter Thoreau wrote to the publisher, it appears that this time

Thoreau did not request that the printing of his essays be ended prematurely: 82 “. . . You

[Curtis] say that there is enough for 4 numbers of your magazine still on hand-- I have sent some 208 pages in all & you have printed about 137 of them in 3 numbers. I write this merely in self defense & not to induce you to print it. . . .” (Moldenhauer, ed. Cape

Cod 267). 83 Ultimately the unpublished Cape Cod essays suffered a similar fate to that of

“A Yankee in Canada,” for they too were not published until after Thoreau’s death when

Ticknor and Fields released them in their entirety in book form in 1865 ( Writings of

Henry D. Thoreau website).

82 Harding and Bode claim otherwise. They believe Thoreau withdrew the rest of his Cape Cod essays, halting publication as he had done with “A Yankee in Canada.” See Harding and Bode, The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau , 379 & Harding, The Days of Henry Thoreau , 359.

83 For further details regarding the early termination of the printing of the Cape Cod essays, see Joseph J. Moldenhauer, ed., The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau: Cape Cod (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988) 267-8.

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In addition to his troubles with Putnam’s Magazine , Thoreau had a similarly

difficult editorial relationship with the Atlantic Monthly . Just four years prior to Fields’s

request for Thoreau’s essays, the previous editor of the Atlantic Monthly , James Russell

Lowell, made unauthorized changes to Thoreau’s “Chesuncook” when he deleted

Thoreau’s “pantheistic” sentiments about the pine tree. As Thoreau writes, “It is as

immortal as I am, and perchance will go to as high a heaven, there to tower above me

still” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 308). Apparently Lowell expressed

similar views as those of Curtis who felt the passage was, or at least would be seen by the

readership, as heretical. Furious, Thoreau withdrew the rest of the essay that was to be

published serially in the Atlantic, halting his relationship with the magazine until 1862

when Fields requested Thoreau’s essay submissions. Like “A Yankee in Canada” and

Cape Cod , “Chesuncook” was not published until after Thoreau’s death when it was

released by Ticknor and Fields in 1864 as a chapter in The Maine Woods (Writings of

Henry D. Thoreau website ). These were not the last substantive changes to Thoreau’s unorthodox views about religion that an editor was to make, however.

Given the critical comments regarding his Christian neighbors that Thoreau makes in “Walking,” he would certainly have recalled his dealings with Curtis and

Lowell and their expurgation of phrases in his earlier works that contained religious sentiments. And as publication of “Walking” proved, Thoreau had good reason to be concerned, for unfortunately, Thoreau’s stipulation that “no sentiment or sentence be altered or omitted without [his] consent” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 636)

went unheeded. In fact, Fields took very similar liberties with “Walking” to those both

Curtis and Lowell took with “A Yankee in Canada,” chapters from Cape Cod , and

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“Chesuncook.” When “Walking” was published in the June Atlantic Monthly issue, it appeared with a number of very significant unlikely authorized changes -- changes that were of religious significance. As Moldenhauer writes, “All of them affect heterodox references to Christianity, references which Fields presumably felt would irritate the

Atlantic readership” ( Excursions 567). Fields made at least three major editorial changes that altered the meaning of Thoreau’s text. He deleted “both of heaven and earth” from a sentence in which Thoreau’s original intent was to explain that one who truly lives is above even God’s laws. Additionally, he dropped “Christ” and changed “Christians” to

“many” in a passage that would have been read as a critique of nineteenth-century

Christian living. And in a passage about living in the moment, he deleted a phrase about

“Plato” and the “New Testament,” completely undermining Thoreau’s statement that the one who lives in the present has a knowledge beyond biblical wisdom.

Chronologically, the first statement Fields changed is a critical one even beyond the critique of orthodox religious views it thus contains. For as Thoreau penned it, the sentence contains a succinct statement of his spiritual identity. Rather than a pantheist, as others might call him, 84 or a Christian with heretical views, 85 Thoreau was what Max

Oelschlaeger explains is a panentheist. In panentheism, God is separate from wild nature, nature being the “temporal and finite manifestation of an underlying eternal and infinite supreme being,” but “God is allowed both a separate and an imminent existence” (123).

God is in all and as such the all is part of God, yet God is also apart . It is Thoreau’s panentheism that is thus most clear when he writes, “The man who takes the liberty to

84 See Thoreau’s 9 February 1853 letter to Greeley cited this chapter.

85 See previous discussion this chapter about Thoreau’s supposed “heretical” statements.

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live is superior to all the laws both of heaven and earth, by virtue of his relation to the

Law-maker [my italics]. Thoreau distinctly notes “laws” not only of this world, but of

“heaven,” and identifies the “Law-maker” as other than either of those two worlds. It is

by “virtue of his relation to the Law-maker” that man lives. Thoreau’s panentheism is

not contrary to his ecocentrism; given that the Law-maker has both a separate and

immanent existence, God is at-once always already separate from and indwelling in

Wildness. In other words, the virtue of Thoreau’s relation to Wildness brings him into contact with his Maker. 86 Thoreau’s panentheism, then, does not alter his claim “that in

Wildness is the preservation of the world” (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 202).

Ecocritically examined, the editorial emendation previously discussed is most significant.

For further editorial study, the table at the end of this chapter offers a side-by-side

comparison of the passages as Thoreau wrote them and as Fields edited them. 87

Despite the textual changes made to “Walking,” Fields did not have to face the

zealous, angry response that both Curtis and Lowell received of Thoreau. With Curtis

and Lowell, Thoreau criticized their actions and at times withdrew his works before

further publication once unauthorized editorial changes were printed. But with

“Walking,” he was not given the same opportunity to act since the essay was published in

its entirety, and posthumously. Undoubtedly, the changes Fields made regarding religious

86 Thoreau’s panentheism is also evident in the well-known Ktaadn section of The Maine Woods where Thoreau writes, “Think of our life in nature,- daily to be shown matter, to come into contact with it,- rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! the solid earth! The actual world! the common sense ! Contact ! Contact ! Who are we? where are we? Joseph J. Moldenhauer, ed., The Maine Woods (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1972) 71.

87 Additional editorial changes are explored in Moldenhauer, Excursions , “Walking,” Headnote, 566-567. These changes include normalized spelling, grammar, and mechanical issues – changes Moldenhauer notes as “inconsequential alterations.”

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references would have riled Thoreau since these changes were at least as severe as those

that so infuriated him in “A Yankee in Canada,” his Cape Cod essays, and the

“Chesuncook” chapter of The Maine Woods . If Thoreau had witnessed those published changes, one speculates as to whether or not they would have been corrected long ago – that is, before Ticknor and Fields published the text in Excursions . Of course, more than likely, given Thoreau’s reactions to past unauthorized editorial emendations, his relationship with Fields would have been cut short, and the work would not have been printed by Ticknor and Fields again. As far as “Walking” is concerned, Thoreau’s death

of 6 May 1862 may be considered as both a fortunate and rather unfortunate

circumstance, for had he known of the changes Fields made to the text, Thoreau certainly

would have corrected them before publication, but would the work have been

subsequently published at all had Thoreau lived to see the unauthorized editorial

emendations?

Fields maintained that Thoreau read the proofs and allowed the changes to stand,

but it is highly unlikely that Thoreau even saw the proofs for the essay. Given the tight

time constraint, Fields may not have even finished preparing the proofs to send to

Thoreau for his final approval; between the time Thoreau submitted “Walking” for

publication on 11 March 1862 and his death on 6 May 1862, Fields would have had no

more than four weeks to receive the manuscript, edit the text, set the copy, send it to

Thoreau, and be given Thoreau’s final consent before the author’s death. Even if Fields

was able to send the proofs quickly, given Thoreau’s health he would not likely have

been able to read them in such a short time. Had the proofs reached Concord before

Thoreau’s death, it is more likely that Sophia read them since Thoreau was probably too

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weak to do so, but there is no known evidence of this claim, and the proofs are thought to

no longer exist. Even if Sophia did read them, Moldenhauer speculates that “in the time

of worry and grief surrounding his death, she could not have rigorously compared the

print with the manuscript” ( Excursions 567). Also, even if Sophia had noticed the changes, she may have wanted to safe-guard her brother’s legacy since he may very well have been labeled a heretic had the phrases removed by Fields been printed in the

Atlantic Monthly . Given his recent death, Sophia may have been particularly sensitive to this issue.

What is certain is that no known letter exists in regard to Thoreau’s having seen the proofs of “Walking,” 88 yet such a letter in which Thoreau references the proofs for the first essay he submitted to Fields, “Autumnal Tints,” is available. This essay was the first of the four he submitted to the Atlantic Monthly and most probably the first Fields prepared. In a letter he wrote to Ticknor and Fields on 18 February 1862 (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions , 602, fn 5.), Thoreau mentions proofs for “Autumnal Tints,” which he had submitted on 20 February 1862. In fact, in the 18 February letter to Fields, Moldenhauer notes,

. . . the last known letter in [Thoreau’s] handwriting, Thoreau alludes to his illness

and asks the publisher to ‘have a sharp-eyed reader’ save him the labor of a

thorough review of the ‘Autumnal Tints’ proofsheets. In the same sentence,

however, he asks to see the proofs himself, ‘chiefly that I may look after my

88 On 6 April, 1862, Fields wrote that “In a few days we will send proof of the article on ‘Walking.’ . . .” (Harding and Bode, Correspondence 646), yet there is no record indicating that Thoreau ever received them, although Thoreau noted receipt of proofs for at least one of his other essays: “Autumnal Tints.”

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peculiarities.’ The ‘peculiarities’ are probably his unorthodox views of religion

and society. (607)

Again Thoreau reiterates in this letter that his health was already quite poor just before he

submitted the first of his four essays, so even if Fields had been able to send Thoreau the

proofs quickly, Thoreau was hardly well enough to read through them. In fact, as his

final days drew near he noted difficulty working with his writings (Harding, Days 461-2).

What little work he was doing just weeks before his death was dedicated to the final editing of “Wild Apples” and to his Maine Woods essays (458, 466). The 18 February

letter also indicates that if Thoreau was to have reviewed proof sheets at all, he would

have specifically honed in on editorial changes that reflected his concern with the kind of

unapproved emendations made by past editors of his essays- changes with religious or

social implications. That Thoreau did not abide the unapproved alteration of his words

by past editors, and that such editorial liberties ultimately appeared in the published essay

only “add[s] to the argument that Thoreau did not read Atlantic proofs of “Walking”

(Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 566-7). It is significant to note, although Thoreau likely checked for such editorial changes in his unorthodox passages in the proofs of “Autumnal

Tints,” when the essay appeared in the Atlantic Monthly in October of 1862, 89 no

substantive changes were made to the text (608). Perhaps Thoreau felt he was finally

working with an editor who would not bowdlerize his essays. Nonetheless, substantial

editorial changes were made to Thoreau’s “Walking,” changes which, despite evidence to

the contrary, Fields publicly claimed Thoreau allowed. In the Atlantic Monthly’s June advertising copy was printed the following:

89 Although Fields had “Autumnal Tints” ready months prior to publication, given the subject matter of the essay he decided to hold it for fall publication – so as to coincide with the proper season.

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‘During the latter weeks of his life, Mr. Thoreau corrected the proof-sheets of

several articles for this Magazine, the first of which series, ‘Walking’ appears in

this Number. His papers on ‘Autumnal Tints’, ‘Wild Apples’ will be printed

during the year, in their proper seasons.’ (Fields cited in Borst, “Advertisements”

4-5)

Whatever changes Fields made to “Walking,” they were not made out of disrespect for the author’s work. Fields believed Thoreau’s writings would “always be read with profound attention, as no man ever lived closer to nature, and reported her secrets more eloquently’” (5). More than likely, the substantive changes Fields made were because he was trying not to upset his readership who would certainly have been offended by some of Thoreau’s unorthodox religious views. And Fields knew his craft; he was greatly respected for his “remarkable understanding of the public’s taste and by his ability to cultivate good writers” (Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 636).

While initially Fields may have been encouraged by others to solicit Thoreau’s essays, he

certainly saw the value in Thoreau’s writing for himself. He printed each of the four

essays the author submitted, three of which appeared as lead articles. The seventeen-

page “Walking” was the first of the four to be published; it was printed in the June

Atlantic Monthly issue of 1862, just a few short weeks after Thoreau’s death.

Initially, Thoreau requested that Fields not separate his essays for serial printing

in the Atlantic . As stated in his 11 February 1862 letter to Fields, he felt the essays could

not “be divided without injury- How many pages can you print at once?” (635). Splitting

his essays, he thought, would compromise their textual integrity. However, in a later

letter to Fields, Thoreau proposes that “Walking” might be published in two parts: “The

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former paper [“Walking”] will bear dividing into two portions very well, the natural joint

being, I think at the end of page 44. At any rate the two parcels being separately tied up,

will indicate it –” (640). Of all of the essays Thoreau submitted for publication,

“Walking” certainly would have been the most logical choice for serial publication; the

“natural joint” Thoreau proposed to Fields coincides with the break Thoreau himself

delineated when he separated and revised his writing to make a pair of companion essays to be read on the lecture circuit. 90 Nonetheless, when “Walking” was printed in the June

1862 edition of the Atlantic Monthly , Fields printed the essay in its entirety. 91

To promote the essay before it appeared in the Atlantic , Fields advertised the upcoming essay in the April and May issues: 92

April 1862: THE AUTHOR OF “WALDEN” Mr. Henry D. Thoreau will publish

in the “Atlantic” during the year his new essays. One on “Walking” will be

printed in the June issue.

May 1862: NEW PAPERS IN FORTHCOMING NUMBERS Rev. John Weiss

and Henry D. Thoreau will contribute a series of articles to the “Atlantic”

beginning with the June Number. (Fields cited in Borst, “Advertisements” 4) 93

90 See chapter three.

91 Other essays Thoreau submitted to Fields were also printed in their entirety, although some of Thoreau’s correspondence to Fields indicates that the editor at least had thought of dividing some of Thoreau’s texts. See Harding and Bode, The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau , 636, 638, & 640.

92 To read additional reviews of the essay, see “Excerpts of Reviews of the Initial Publication of ‘Walking’ and Excursions,” located at the end of this chapter.

93 To examine all advertisements posted in the Atlantic Monthly that promote “Walking,” see “Atlantic Monthly Advertisements of ‘Walking,’” located at the end of this chapter.

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In the June issue in which “Walking” appeared as the lead, Fields referred to the essay

included in the current monthly as well as “Autumnal Tints” and “Wild Apples.” But in

this advertisement Fields does more than note Thoreau’s essays; he comments upon the

man himself, describing him as “One of the more original thinkers our country has

produced” (5). This first, lead article publication of “Walking” in the Atlantic is the only magazine, full-text publication of the essay, and the first posthumous publication of

Thoreau’s writings.

Despite substantive editorial changes Fields made, Thoreau’s character and thought still shown through in the published essay. As one reviewer noted in the

Springfield Republican of 31 May 1862, “Walking” ‘“does more to unfold the characters and habits’ of its ‘gifted and eccentric’ author ‘than any ordinary biography would have done”’ (qtd. in Scharnhorst, Bibliography 65). Other reviews focused not on the author, but rather on the essay. Writing for the Boston Transcript of 23 May 1862, a reviewer explains that “Walking” is ‘“a quaint, ingenious, and discursive paper’ which is ‘full of the raciest peculiarities of [Thoreau’s] mind and disposition”’ (64). One quirky reviewer writing for the New York Times of 26 May 1862 noted that “Thoreau, ‘dead but living, surprises the reader as he opens the casket, with a scintillating crystal of philosophy’ entitled ‘Walking’ in the June Atlantic ”’ (65). While most of the reviews were positive, some still held onto the belief that Thoreau simply emulated other New England writers, presumably Emerson to whom he had been compared on far too many occasions:

Thoreau’s essay ‘Walking’ in the June Atlantic is disappointing. ‘We did expect

that he could treat that subject with more depth and earnestness of feeling than he

had.’ He ‘has destroyed himself’ in trying to imitate the style of his ‘New England

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idols.’ As a result, this essay ‘would not please the regular scientific saunterer of

the woods. . . . What folly! We leave him, tired, and turn to W[or]dsworth,

Coleridge, Shelley, Byron. . . . These latter day saints of our literature seem to be

inoculated with the St. Vitus’ dance.’ 94 (65)

Similarly, a reviewer writing for the Independent , of 29 May 1862 agreed: “Walking”

“demonstrates that Thoreau ‘was too much of a disciple to be a great thinker”’ (65).

Despite the few negative reviews, comments regarding Thoreau’s “Walking” were mostly filled with phrases such as “brilliant, beautiful, truthful,” and noted Thoreau as an original if eccentric genius of philosophy and nature. One review noted that his “recent decease imparts an additional interest to every production of his unique pen” (65).

The public’s opportunity to read the essay was soon to increase. In a collection of essays that dates back to only a little more than a year after “Walking” was first published in the Atlantic Monthly , the essay was released in book form. In fact, as early as

February of 1863, the collection of Thoreau’s writings was advertised in the Atlantic as

‘“in preparation and will publish the present season”’ under the title, Field Notes (qtd. in

Borst, “Advertisements” 5). Fields scrawls “Thoreaus Field Notes” in his “Memorandum and Account Book” sometime in late 1862 or early 1863, a title that Moldenhauer speculates may have been suggested by Emerson, or may have been taken from one of

Thoreau’s Journal entries in which he noted, “Might not my Journal be called ‘Field

Notes’” (qtd. in Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 335). By October of 1863 the title had apparently been changed; both the October and November issues of the Atlantic

94 “Saint Vitus is the patron saint of dancers, young people and dogs. There is a disease named after him, Saint Vitus Dance, or Sydenham's Chorea, which can sometimes cause dancing mania” (www.stvitus.com ). See site for further information.

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advertised the collection as Excursions (Borst, “Advertisements” 5). Just why the title

had been changed is uncertain. The first known reference of the collection as Excursions

is in a 7 September 1862 letter that Emerson wrote to Fields, and Franklin B. Sanborn

claimed the title was Emerson’s doing. Bronson Alcott also refers to the collection as

Excursions in his Journal on 11 September 1862. In numerous print sources Fields

referred to the collection as Excursions in Field and Forest, yet ultimately when the

collection was printed it was entitled simply Excursions ( Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions

342-4). 95

Moldenhauer suggests Sanborn’s unauthorized reprinting of two of Thoreau’s

essays in a Boston newspaper spurred Sophia Thoreau and Fields to prepare the

collection of Thoreau’s works for publication. In addition to reprints of “A Winter

Walk” and “The Landlord” (March 1863), Sanborn published a list of Thoreau’s writings

that were then available in print, noting in each case where the reader could find them.

Sanborn also called for the works to be reprinted by Ticknor and Fields: ‘“All of these

papers deserve to be reprinted . . . . We trust that Messrs Ticknor and Fields will include

these in their forthcoming volumes”’ (337). Sanborn claimed Thoreau prepared the list

himself shortly before his death, but given that the list was incomplete, it is highly

unlikely that Thoreau himself prepared it; more likely, Sanborn was the creator of the list.

Additional support for Sanborn’s authorship is included in his notebook where he writes

the very same list, once again excluding a number of Thoreau’s works (336-7).

95 In published form, all but the “1881-92 Houghton, Mifflin ‘bevel-edge’ printings” used the title Excursions ; the aforementioned printings used Fields’s longer title: Excursions in Field and Forest. See Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 344.

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Yet Sophia and Fields both had more motivation than Sanborn’s newspaper

articles might have provided, for it was Sophia who was left to serve as executor of

Henry’s affairs, and she was well aware of her brother’s desire to publish his works. In

that vein, working with Henry as his amanuensis to prepare some of his essays for Fields

was just the beginning of her work. Her brother had left behind three trunks of his

writings, all now in her possession. Shortly after Henry’s death and for the next four

years, she worked to get his writings published (Howarth, Literary Manuscripts xix). In

May of 1863 Sophia wrote “To her cousin Marianne Dunbar in Bridgewater,

Massachusetts . . . that ‘Every moment of my time is occupied. I have been preparing some of my brother’s MSS. For the press’” (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 339). With

Emerson’s substantive help and her friend Elizabeth Hoar’s grammar and mechanical help, Sophia worked diligently to prepare the essays (331). She appears to have enjoyed working with Thoreau’s manuscripts quite a bit. Of her work during her brother’s final days she wrote to one of Thoreau’s admirers, “I can never tell you how much I enjoyed copying and reading aloud my brother’s manuscripts last winter when he was preparing them for the press. The paragraph which you quote from the essay on “Walking” impressed and charmed me particularly, I remember; and I am glad to hear you express your satisfaction in regard to the whole article” (Jones, Letters 61-2). 96 Given that she had already worked with her brother on at least four of the essays previously prepared for

Atlantic publication, including “Walking,” she did not likely revisit those essays. Rather, her time was concentrated on the other essays that were to appear in the collection and in

96 To read additional correspondence of Sophia Thoreau to her brother’s Michigan admirer, see Samuel Arthur Jones, Some Unpublished Letters of Henry D. and Sophia E. Thoreau: A Chapter in the History of a Still-born Book (New York: AMS Press, 1985).

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consideration of what other of her brother’s writings she might prepare for later

publication.

While Sophia may have found working with her brother’s manuscripts to be a

pleasurable experience, as the beneficiary of Henry’s estate she may also have been at

least somewhat motivated to receive monetary remunerations for seeing the works into

print. Yet given his profession, Fields was certainly more motivated for financial reasons

than was Sophia. His firm had already published a number of Thoreau’s essays in the

Atlantic Monthly ,97 and since his death, Thoreau’s popularity had begun to grow; his death may even have stimulated the sale of his writings, his eccentric spirit drawing even more curious readers than his peculiarities did when he was alive. Perhaps more importantly, more and more people were turning to Thoreau for some grain of truth - from man’s relationship with nature to issues of social justice. Thoreau’s admirers and friends undoubtedly promoted his writings, as they had done throughout his life. Fields certainly felt there was an audience for Thoreau’s works, and collecting pre-published essays would be an easy task and a likely place to begin if he hoped to see Thoreau’s writings profitably printed with his company. In fact, all of the works that appeared in the first edition of Excursions except “Night and Moonlight” had been previously published, 98 the latter having been edited by Sophia particularly for that volume. 99

97 “Walking” appeared in the June 1862 edition, followed by “Autumnal Tints” in October 1862. Shortly thereafter, “Wild Apples” was printed in November of 1862.

98 “Natural History of Massachusetts” was first published in the July 1842 Edition of the Dial . “A Walk to Wachusett” was printed in The Boston Miscellany of Literature and Fashion in January of 1843. “The Landlord” was printed in October of 1843 ( United States Magazine, and Democratic Review ). That same month, “A Winter Walk” was printed in the Dial (October 1843). “An Address on the Succession of Forest Trees” was printed in the New-York Weekly Tribune on 6 October 1860.

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Fields’s first step was to create a complete list of Thoreau’s published works,

including publication dates and locations, and he was sure to include those texts absent

from Sanborn’s list. At the top of his list, Fields wrote, ‘“Articles for a New Volume by

Thoreau’” (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 338). After sharing his list with Emerson and

receiving his input, Fields set to work preparing the essays for publication. Meanwhile,

Emerson reworked his “Biographical Sketch,” which he had agreed to submit to Fields

for inclusion in the opening of the collection. When published, the first 1863 Excursions

edition included: a revised version of Emerson’s remembrance of Thoreau that was

previously published in the Atlantic Monthly (August 1862), “Natural History of

Massachusetts,” “A Walk to Wachusett,” “The Landlord,” “A Winter Walk,” “An

Address on the Succession of Forest Trees,” “Walking,” “Autumnal Tints,” “Wild

Apples,” and “Night and Moonlight” (331-332). It also included the first published

picture of Thoreau (Borst, “Advertisements” 5), a copy of the Rowse crayon portrait of

Thoreau that the artist had drawn in the summer of 1854 when he boarded with the

Thoreaus for some time (Harding, Days 351-2). 100

In addition to submitting his “Biographical Sketch,” suggesting works that should

be contained in the collection, and assisting Sophia in preparing the essays for

publication, Emerson also undertook business negotiations with Ticknor and Fields on

99 “Night and Moonlight” was printed in the Atlantic Monthly shortly before Excursions was released, but it was primarily prepared for the collection. It was likely pre-printed in the Atlantic for three reasons: it provided good advertising for the upcoming collection; it was an economical and logical choice to print it in the monthly, given that there would be no additional cost to prepare the copy-text of the essay for the magazine, it having been prepared for Excursions ; and it may have drawn readers to the issue who were eager to read the works of the late Henry D. Thoreau.

100 The Rowse crayon portrait was later used by Boston photographer I.E. Tilton at the request of Thoreau’s mother and sister. Because so many had asked them for a photograph of Henry after his passing, they commissioned Tilton to make the copies, which were sold for twenty-five cents each. See Harding, The Days of Henry Thoreau , 469.

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Sophia’s behalf, and at her request. It was not until after the publication of Excursions that all business matters were resolved, Emerson having sent the following letter on 19

October 1863:

‘I enclose the first form of contract as you requested, with the alterations

suggested by Miss Thoreau.

1. The compensation for the engraving is to be struck out as agreed

2. She prefers a term of five years, as in the contract for “Walden,” to the term

herein proposed.

3. She is sorry to find that her allowance for copyright [royalty] is to be reduced

to 10 cents. But if you persist in the views expressed in your statement to me,

she will acquiesce.’ (Emerson cited in Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 341-342)

Ultimately, Fields’s firm absorbed some of the cost for the Rowse engraving of Thoreau, the five-year term was allowed, and Sophia received a 12.5 cent royalty per copy of

Excursions . As the publisher of the collection, Fields once again had a hand in editorial preparations of Thoreau’s writings, but as was the case with Sophia’s preparations of the essays, “Walking” was left alone -- it having been readied (by Henry with Sophia’s assistance) and edited (by Fields) for publication in the Atlantic just over a year prior to the initial publication of Excursions .

As Borst notes, the Boston Daily Advertiser “announced the book as published

October 14, 1863 but the Cost Books of T[icknor] & F[ields] record the publication date as 10 October 1863” ( Bibliography 40-41). Jacob Blanck notes in Bibliography of

American Literature that the book was printed 2 October 1863, and that just a few days

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later the binding was completed 10-16 October. 101 Ticknor and Fields’s Cost Books

indicate that the book was published 10 October 1863 and copyrighted 14 October 102

(Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 345). Excursions was Thoreau’s third book to be

published, preceded only by A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and Walden;

it was his first posthumously published book.

The first printing consisted of 1,558 copies, 1,500 of which were bound. Ticknor

and Fields hoped to pay a ten cent royalty, but Sophia Thoreau had fifteen cents in mind.

As indicted above, cost books from Ticknor and Fields show that they met in the middle

at twelve and a half cents. Of the bound copies, 1,350 were made available for sale. The

remainder were used for marketing or given as gifts; royalty was based on the smaller,

1,350 copies that were offered for sale. Once all expenses were considered, it cost

Ticknor and Fields about 64.5 cents per copy to print Excursions ; the book was then sold

for $1.25 103 (Borst, Bibliography 40-41 and Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 345-8). By

1880, the $1.25 cost gradually rose to $2.00 throughout subsequent printings (351).

Once again, critiques of Thoreau’s writings were quite positive on the whole. In a

review of Excursions that appeared in the Cincinnati Enquirer on 19 October 1863, the

reviewer wrote that “‘This little volume has many claims to originality.’ Thoreau

describes natural scenery ‘with all the enthusiasm of a lover”’ (qtd. in Scharnhorst,

101 See Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions , 348, fn 35.

102 --- 348.

103 Raymond A. Borst notes that the first edition of Excursions sold for $1.00 each, but his figure is inaccurate; copies sold at $1.25 each. See Raymond A. Borst, Henry David Thoreau: A Descriptive Bibliography (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1982) 40. See also Joseph J. Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions , 348.

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Bibliography 79). And in a 24 October 1863 review of Excursions in the Boston

Traveller Supplement one reads,

Thoreau knew his subjects ‘better than any other American,’ though ‘his utter

want of ambition’ prevented him from making much of an ‘impression on the

world.’ Had he been more ambitious, however, ‘he could not have been the Henry

Thoreau whom we knew.’ His memory should be revered because he ‘showed

himself a true philosopher’ by avoiding the fray of public life. ‘He may have writ

his name in water, but better that than if he had written it in mud or blood.’ (80)

The Providence Journal of 29 October 1863 printed the following: “This [ Excursions ] is

‘a fresh and original book, filled with lively and glowing pictures of sky, mountain, and meadow, and smelling of forests and fruits, and sweet herbs.’ . . .” (81).

Still, in many reviews Thoreau was once again compared to other writers. These comparisons may, in some instances, be seen as complimentary, but in likening Thoreau to others one might overlook the author as the independent thinker that he was. In the

Christian Advocate and Journal on 3 December 1863, Thoreau is once again compared to his long-time friend and once mentor: ‘“Thoreau was ‘the shadow of Emerson projected on the earth.’ Read his essay ‘Walking’ and ‘you can never put your feet to the earth again as you did before’” (85). Even today one finds Thoreau compared with Emerson, yet the two men developed distinct understandings of nature. While Emerson understood nature as a means to transcendence, Thoreau found intrinsic value in Wildness. 104

104 See chapter three.

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Other comparisons include this student review of Excursions for the Nassau

Literary Magazine in October of 1883 in which Thoreau is considered with respect to a number of thinkers:

Both a misanthrope and a philanthropist, Thoreau was a bundle of paradoxes. His

six volumes of prose “’are full of novelty, and teem with the delightful sights and

sounds of New England hills.’ No reader of Excursions can ‘look upon nature in

the same light as before.’ Thoreau’s essays ‘Autumnal Tints’ and ‘Walking’ send

‘the blood coursing through the veins at quickened pace.’ Though he was hardly a

natural historian like Audubon or Louis Agassiz, he was a naturalist. ‘Not a poet,

not a philosopher, not a scientist,’ Thoreau combined ‘the stern and puritan

romance of Hawthorne and the mystical philosophy of Emerson’ with his own

‘simple and childlike spirit.’” (237)

Despite repeatedly being compared to other writers, Thoreau’s writing apparently garnered a number of similar comments from a number of his reviewers. For one,

Thoreau’s religious views are made a focus of some of the reviews, and this despite

Fields’s efforts to remove any religious sentiments in Thoreau’s essays. For example, in the Congregationalist , 30 October 1863, the reviewer wrote, “Thoreau had ‘subtle insight into nature,’ despite the ‘pantheistic, or naturalistic, tendencies of his mind; if he had worshipped the same God whom we love, we should have enjoyed him more, and deemed him safer’” (81). In the Christian Advocate and Journal review of Excursions in

December of 1863, readers learned that even ‘“with his [Thoreau’s] wonderful keenness of eye he was stone blind’ to orthodox religious truths. ‘He was but a naturalist, never a

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supernaturalist.’ Although Thoreau ‘was an original,’ his essays were ‘not written from a

Christian point of view”’ (87).

A second element predominant in the reviews was Thoreau’s relationship with

and understanding of Nature: A reviewer for the Worcester Palladium on 5 November

1863 writes that Thoreau was ‘“that true child and disciple of Nature,’” and asserts that

“Excursions ”

‘should be in every library, upon every book-table, going on its mission of good. .

. . It teaches what life is worth to the man who looks with single-minded faith out

upon the world of Nature, and reads the book which God has written for man’s

liberal interpretation. Many a heart will be made the lighter for its communion

with the departed Thoreau.’ (82)

A critic writing for Albion , 7 November 1863, notes that Thoreau’s ‘“sympathy with

Nature was earnest and profound,’ and his words ‘were ever the earnest expression of his honest thoughts’” (83). Combining Thoreau’s spiritual and natural tendencies, Edmund

H. Sears wrote for the Monthly Religious Magazine of December 1863 that ‘“The essays

‘will be read by those who love Nature, and desire to see her through the eyes of one

specifically anointed as her priest and prophet’” (85).

In contrast to the positive writings of most of the critics, the Boston Post of 17

October 1863 harshly noted that Thoreau was

‘Emerson’s shadow, only very much dimmer, more ridiculous and indistinct in

outline. He was Emerson gone to ruin.’ His brain ‘was awfully out of joint, so his

translations of nature are only distorted glimpses of what she is. . . . We confess to

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an interest in his oddities and whimsicalities, for it is a little of pleasure and much

of wisdom to know how big a fool a man can be.’ (78)

The Boston Post reviewer was in the minority when it came to his views of Thoreau’s

writings.

As the author’s popularity grew, so too did the proliferation of his works,

including reprints and new editions of Excursions and “Walking.” The first edition of

Excursions was printed at least sixteen times until 1890. Then, in 1893 the Riverside edition was published, 105 in which printing Emerson’s tribute was dropped; “A Yankee in

Canada,” “May Days,” and “Days and Nights in Concord” were added. The Riverside edition was followed by the Manuscript edition in 1906. In smaller format it was published that same year as the Walden edition. The Concord edition was printed in

1929. Some of these early editions included Thoreau manuscript pages tipped in in volume one of the author’s collected works. This common practice accounts for the dispersion of many of Thoreau’s manuscript pages (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 333-5;

352-3). An additional noteworthy printing of Excursions includes the 2007 Princeton

University Press edition of the Writings of Henry D. Thoreau , the authoritative edition that includes substantive editorial emendations. These editorial changes have been made to better represent the author’s writings. In other words, changes made include emending or correcting numerous common errors that likely occurred from misreadings of

Thoreau’s penmanship when the text was originally type-set for the Atlantic , 1862 printing. Additional changes include corrections to emendations likely made by editors

105 Borst notes 1894 as the date of publication, but Moldenhauer explains 1893 is the correct date of the Riverside edition. Borst, Henry David Thoreau: A Descriptive Bibliography , 41; Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions , 333-4 & 333 fn 5.

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but unapproved by Thoreau, such as those supposed heretical religious sentiments as

discussed earlier in the chapter. No matter the edition of Excursions , one constant is that they all include “Walking.” 106

In the early 1900s, “Walking” again appeared singly in published form. For example, a 1908 British printing of the essay was entitled “Walking and the Wild.” The essay has been printed many times since then in anthologies and on the world-wide-web.

In addition, it has been excerpted, abridged, and quoted. Collections of Thoreau’s natural history essays include “Walking,” as do other various collections of his writings. At times it is paired with Emerson’s “Nature” in published form. One can now read

“Walking” in more than ten languages, including Braille. It has been used in books of photography published by the Sierra Club as well as The Thoreau Society. Bits of the essay have been read as part of musical compilations, and paraphrased into song lyrics

(James Taylor’s “Walking Man,” for example).

Also, signs of the times are reflected in the essay’s printings. Many early 1900’s printings include only excerpts of the essay that take as their texts passages which reference the beauty of nature. Thoreau: Reporter of the Universe: A Selection of His

Writings About Nature, for All Readers from Eight Years Old to Eighty (1939) is one such representative text. By the 1960s, the more philosophical and ideological statements in the essay are excerpted, as the following titles reflect: The Thoughts of Thoreau (1962) and Henry David Thoreau: A Man for Our Time (1967). Since at least the 1970s the essay has been touted by environmentalists and published singly, excerpted and paired with artwork, and referenced in environmentally conscious poetry. Books published by

106 For further details regarding early editions of Excursions , see Borst, Henry David Thoreau: A Descriptive Bibliography , 39-44 & Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions , 334-43.

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the Sierra Club and the poetry of Gary Snyder are just two examples. Today, books

pairing quotations of “Walking” with beautiful, natural photographs now make for

pleasant coffee table books (the Nature Company’s 1993 edition, for example). Still, the

most prolific use of the text today continues to be from an environmental perspective.

With the growth and popularity of the environmental movement, so goes the use and

proliferation of “Walking.” This use extends to non-traditional publications and excepts

of the essay on the world wide web. A search of the internet suggests that some people

even take phrases from the essay as mantras for their lives (www.inwildness.com , for

example). Given the growing popularity of “being green,” so to speak, one can only

speculate as to the influence “Walking” is likely to have over the next hundred years.

Since its first publication in 1862, there is no doubt that the essay’s proliferation has

spanned the globe, and there is no sign that the essay’s influence will soon slow, for it

continues to be translated and published in a variety of formats and in as many contexts.

Early publications of Thoreau’s works are now collected and demand a high

price. As of 2009, early editions of Excursions sell for $750- $2200

(www.abebooks.com ). Original publications of the Atlantic Monthly in the 1850s and

1860s range from $40-175; currently no copies of the June 1862 issue in which

“Walking” appears are available for sale. Some of the first editions of Excursions and the

Atlantic Monthly June 1862 edition are part of special collections departments in libraries, as are many of Thoreau’s manuscripts. Many of these early writings have had quite a journey, passing through numerous hands as they continue to be sold and resold for an ever higher price.

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But the manuscript of “Walking” that Thoreau submitted to Fields for publication

on 11 March 1862 had a much shorter journey. It remained in Fields’ possession until

late 1873, at which time he presented the copy-text to the Concord Free Public Library,

Concord, Massachusetts. The gift was apparently noteworthy enough to become a matter of public record, for on 9 October 1873, the Nation printed that ‘“J.T. Fields has presented the manuscript of Thoreau’s essay ‘Walking’ to the Concord Free Public

Library’” (qtd. in Scharnhorst, Bibliography 159). Fields had it bound before gifting it to the library, but old stitch marks tell that prior to Fields’ gift, at least part of the manuscript leaves were hand sewn together (Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions 567-8).

Today the original manuscript remains in Thoreau’s hometown in the very same library, archived as part of the William Munroe Special Collections. Notably, this ninety-nine page manuscript still serves as copy-text for “Walking” editions, including the recent authoritative Princeton University Press edition (Joseph J. Moldenhauer, ed., 2007).

Special elements of the ninety-nine page copy-text include twelve pages that are penned mostly by Sophia, presumably as Thoreau dictated his work to her during final editing of the essay. Of these twelve pages, “most . . . have cancellations, transpositions, insertions, and other revisions by Thoreau” (568). One such change includes “this evening” crossed through in the essay’s first sentence, proving that at least this manuscript page was one

Thoreau used when he presented the essay as a lecture (315). This first page also includes a note from Fields indicating that the essay was written by Thoreau (568).

What Thoreau would make of this extensive rehearsal-- these details as to how his essay was composed, its lecture and publication histories-- is uncertain. But Thoreau would surely enjoy the simple history of the copy-text he submitted to Fields. Of all of

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Thoreau’s “Walking” materials, this manuscript alone was not repeatedly bought and sold. It travelled only as far as Concord to Boston and back again, there to make its final home in one of Thoreau’s favorite indoor spaces-- a library. And it is this copy text that provides the practiced researcher who can read Thoreau’s notoriously scraggly handwriting the opportunity to examine Thoreau’s words as he intended them to be printed, “heresies” and all.

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Correspondence of Henry D. Thoreau to James T. Fields

Regarding the Publication of “Walking”

Concord Feb. 11 th 62

Messrs, Editors,

Only extreme illness has prevented my answering your note earlier. I have

no objection to having the papers you refer to printed in your monthly- if

my feeble health will permit me to prepare them for the printer. What will

you give me for them? They are, or have been used as, lectures of the

usual length-- taking about an hour to read & I dont see how they can be

divided without injury – How many pages can you print at once? – Of

course, I should expect that no sentiment or sentence be altered or omitted

without my consent, & to retain the copyright of the paper after you had

used it in your monthly. – Is your monthly copyrighted?

Yours respectfully,

S. E. Thoreau

For H. D. Thoreau.

(Harding and Bode, eds., Correspondence 635-636)

In a postscript to a letter, Thoreau has Sophia pen the following to Messrs Ticknor

& Fields:

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Concord Feb 24 th 1862

P S. I will send you an article as soon as I can prepare it, which has no

relation to the seasons of the year. 107

(638).

Concord Feb 28 th 1862.

Messrs Ticknor & Fields,

I send you with this a paper called The Higher Law, it being much

shorter & easier to prepare than that on Walking. It will not need to be

divided on account of its length, as indeed the subject does not permit it. I

should like to know that you receive it & also about what time it will be

published.

Yours truly

H. D. Thoreau

by S. E. Thoreau.

( 638)

Concord March 4 th 62.

107 The “article” to which Thoreau refers may be “Walking,” given that in his following letter he offers a sort of justification for having sent “The Higher Law” because that essay was shorter and easier to prepare than “Walking.” The reference Thoreau makes to seasons is that of “Autumnal Tints,” which Thoreau sent to Fields on 20 February, 1862. See Harding and Bode, The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau 636, letter dated “Concord Feb 20 th 1862;” 637-8, letter dated “Concord Feb 24 th 1862;” and 638, letter dated “Concord Feb 28 th 1862.”

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Messrs Ticknor & Fields,

I hereby acknowledge the receipt of your check for one hundred

dollars on account of manuscript sent to you. . . . The paper on

Walking will be ready ere long. . . . .

Yours truly

H. D. Thoreau

by S. E Thoreau

(639)

Concord Mar. 11 th 1862

Messrs Ticknor & Fields,

I send with this [letter] the paper on Walking & also the

proofs of Autumnal Tints.

The former paper will bear dividing into two portions very

well, the natural joint being, I think at the end of page 44. At any

rate the two parcels being separately tied up, will indicate it – . . .

Yours truly

Henry D. Thoreau

by S. E. Thoreau.

(640)

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Comparison of Substantive Editorial Emendations in “Walking”

Thoreau’sManuscript Fields’s Edited

of “Walking” Copy-text of “Walking”

The man who takes the liberty to live is The man who takes the liberty to live is superior to all the laws both of heaven and superior to all the laws, by virtue of his earth, by virtue of his relation to the Law- relation to the lawmaker. (“Walking” in maker. (Princeton Edition of “Walking,” Hyde, ed. p. 172. 32-33; change made by

Moldenhauer, ed. p. 216.12-14; change Fields in 33) made by Fields in 13).

Christ, Dante, Bunyan, and others, appear Dante, Bunyan, and others appear to have to have been exercised in their minds more been exercised in their minds more than than we;-- they were subjected to a kind of we: they were subjected to a kind of culture culture such as our district schools and such as our district schools and colleges do colleges do not contemplate. Even not contemplate. Even Mahomet, though

Mahomet, though Christians may scream at many may scream at his name, had a good his name, had a good deal more to live for, deal more to live for, aye, and to die for, aye and to die for than they have than they have commonly. (“Walking” in commonly. (Princeton Edition of Hyde, ed. 173.7-11; changes made by

“Walking,” Moldenhauer, ed. 216.27-33; Fields in 7 and 10). changes made by Fields in 27 and 31).

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There is something suggested by it not in There is something suggested by it that is a

Plato nor the New Testament. It is a newer newer testament, -- the gospel according to testament – the gospel according to this this moment.” (“Walking” in Hyde, ed. moment.” (Princeton Edition of “Walking,” 176.11-12; change made by Fields in11).

Moldenhauer, ed. 220.31-33; change made by Fields in 32).

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Atlantic Monthly Advertisements of “Walking”

April 1862: THE AUTHOR OF “WALDEN”

Mr. Henry D. Thoreau will publish in the “Atlantic” during the year his new essays. One on “Walking” will be printed in the June issue.

May 1862: NEW PAPERS IN FORTHCOMING NUMBERS

Rev. John Weiss and Henry D. Thoreau will contribute a series of articles to the

“Atlantic” beginning with the June Number.

June 1862: MR. THOREAU’S LAST ESSAYS

During the latter weeks of his life, Mr. Thoreau corrected the proof-sheets of several articles for this Magazine, the first of which series, “Walking” appears in this Number.

His papers on “Autumnal Tints”, “Wild Apples” will be printed in their proper seasons.”

“[Thoreau is] One of the more original thinkers our country has produced. His works will always be read with profound attention, as no man ever lived closer to Nature, and reported her secrets more eloquently. . . .”

February 1863: LITERARY ANNOUNCEMENTS of Works in the Press of Ticknor &

Fields

Messrs Ticknor and Field have in preparation and will publish the present season: . . .

FIELD NOTES By the late Henry D. Thoreau, Author of “Walden” 1 Vol. MAINE

WOODS By Henry D. Thoreau

October 1863: NEW BOOKS

To Be Published in the Autumn of 1863 . . . EXCURSIONS By Henry D. Thoreau,

Author of “Walden” 1 Vol. 16 mo. Cloth $1.25 . . . [included is the first published picture of Thoreau].

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November 1863:

Messrs. Ticknor & Fields have now ready the following Works which are just issued

EXCURSIONS By Henry D. Thoreau, Author of “Walden” 1 Vol. 16 mo. with portrait

$1.25

May 1865: HENRY D. THOREAU’S WRITINGS

“One of the keenest of observers, and with powers of expression not unequal to the

purposes he had in view, he wrote that which will live, and to which after times will do

more justice than was done by his contemporaries” – Traveller . “There are no books which are such perfect transcripts of nature as Thoreau’s. A walk with him through the common fields, over the ordinary roads, or a trip into the forests, by aid of his pen, is the best substitute for actual experience. He sees everything, and he records it in language as fresh as the grass and the pines.” – Hartford Press . “Thoreau was the most thorough child

of nature which our age has produced. He loved an almost savage life as much as did

Rousseau, and knew far better how to draw out of it whatever of enjoyment lies in it.

Everything he wrote has the scent of the wild woods, as much as Esau’s hands smelt of

the hunter’s craft. There is nothing artificial about his way of putting thoughts on paper.

As a most delicate painter of outdoor life, he is artless, original, perfect.” – Recorder . The

Publishers now have ready . . . EXCURSIONS 1 Vol. 16 mo. 1.50. This volume contains

nine descriptive essays, marked by the author’s peculiarities, and is made especially

valuable by the addition of a biographical sketch from the pen of Mr. Emerson, who was

Thoreau’s most intimate friend. . . .

July 1866

CHOICE OUT-DOOR READING. WORKS OF HENRY D. THOREAU

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“His descriptions of nature are glowing with vitality. He loved every tree and shrub. His

pictures are true to life, and inspired with passion. Though clothed in the language of

prose, they are alive with the deepest spirit of poetry. Their enchantment never palls upon

the sense; they charm the reader into love of the scene, if not of the writer, and fill his memory with sweet and pleasant images of the beauty and mystery of Nature.” N.Y.

Tribune . . . . II. EXCURSIONS. 1vol. 16 mo. $1.50 . . . “His power of observation

seemed to indicate additional senses. He saw as with microscope, heard as with ear-

trumpet, and his memory was a photographic register or all he saw and heard.” – R.W.

Emerson, in Biographical Sketch. . . .

September 1868: THOREAU’S WORKS. . . . EXCURSIONS IN FIELD AND FOREST.

With a Biographical Sketch by R.W. Emerson. With Portrait. $2.00. “His observation of

the phenomena of Nature was most thorough, sympathetic and profound, and his

descriptions are of the best in literature. Indeed, in what is called rural literature, he is

unsurpassed for the union of shrewd insight, quaint, racy, and vigorous thought, and a

delightful play of humor overall, shimmering, cool, and remote, like the aurora borealis.

A fresh, sweet, sturdy, noble man. He lived known to a few only, but being dead, he

speaks to all of us. His Excursions is the most original book we have lately had, as well

as the most valuable record of exact observation of Nature.” – George William Curtis. . . .

Excerpted from “Thoreau Advertisements from the Atlantic Monthly 1862-1868”

compiled by Raymond Borst and available in the Thoreau Society Bulletin 129 (Fall

1974): 4-6. Print.

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Ercerpts of Reviews of the Initial Publications of “Walking” (1862) and

Excursions (1863) 108

“The Atlantic Monthly for June,” Boston Transcript , 23 May 1862, 2:4.

“Walking” is “a quaint, ingenious, and discursive paper” which is “full of the

raciest peculiarities of [Thoreau’s] mind and disposition.” 64:365

Warrington [William S. Robinson], “From Boston,” Springfield Republican , 24

May 1862, 1:5.

Thoreau’s essay “Walking” in the June Atlantic is “natural and breezy” and

“includes a queer poem on ‘the old Marlborough Road.’” 64:366

“The June Magazines,” New York Evening Post , 24 May 1862, 1:1.

The June Atlantic opens with Thoreau’s “Walking,” a fitting literary memorial.

The piece consists of “a clutter of thoughts as they came to the mind of the writer

as he was ‘sauntering along.’ It is written in Thoreau’s happiest style.” Excerpts

about 900 words from the essay. 64-5:368

“The Magazines,” New York Times , 26 May 1862, 2:6.

108 Citations gleaned from Gary Scharnhorst, Henry David Thoreau: An Annotated Bibliography of Comment and Criticism Before 1900 ( New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1992). Numbers at the end of each citation note Scharnhorst’s page number followed by item number. A few additional citations are added. These were found in Moldenhauer, ed., Excursion s, 349-51 and in the Thoreau Society Bulletin , which routinely lists recently discovered Thoreau-related materials.

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Thoreau, “dead but living, surprises the reader as he opens the casket, with a scintillating crystal of philosophy” entitled “Walking” in the June Atlantic . 65:370

“New Publications,” Boston Post , 27 May 1862, 1:7-8.

Thoreau’s essay “Walking” in the June Atlantic is disappointing. “We did expect that he could treat that subject with more depth and earnestness of feeling than he had.” He “has destroyed himself” in trying to imitate the style of his “New

England idols.” As a result, this essay “would not please the regular scientific saunterer of the woods. . . . What folly! We leave him, tired, and turn to

W[or]dsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Byron. . . . These latter day saints of our literature seem to be inoculated with the St. Vitus’ dance.” (my note – possibly a footnote on St. Vitus) 65:371

“New Publications,” New York Tribune , 28 May 1862, 2:1.

The Atlantic for June “opens with a quaint characteristic essay on ‘Walking’ by the late Henry Thoreau, whose recent decease imparts an additional interest to every production of his unique pen.” 65:372

“Periodicals,” Independent , 29 May 1862, p. 3.

“Walking,” in the June Atlantic , demonstrates that Thoreau “was too much of a disciple to be a great thinker.” 65:373

Augusta, Me., Kennebec Journal , 30 May 1862, 2”3.

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The June Atlantic is “admirably filled” with such articles as Thoreau’s “Walking.”

65:374

“Books, Authors and Art,” Springfield Republican , 31 May 1862, 2:2.

Thoreau’s essay “Walking” in the Atlantic “does more to unfold the characters and habits” of its “gifted and eccentric’ author “than any ordinary biography would have done.” 65:375

“New Publications,” Herald of Progress , 7 June 1862, 8:2.

“Walking,” in the June Atlantic , is “an eloquent word for Nature, from the pen of

the late Henry D. Thoreau.” 66:377

Norfolk County Journal of Roxbury, Massachusetts, 24 October 1863

Echoed Emerson’s biographical sketch (Moldenhauer)

Cincinnati Daily Commercial , 31 October, 1863

Praises Emerson’s sketch (Moldenhauer)

Tom folio [J. E. Babson], “Ticknor and Fields’s New Books,” Boston Transcript

Supplement , 21 November 1863, 2:1.

Thoreau’s Excursions “contains some of his best and most characteristic writing,”

“Wild Apples,” “Autumnal Tints,” and “Walking” are “brilliant, beautiful, and

truthful essays.” 84:500

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“Book Notices,” review of Excursions , Christian Advocate and Journal , 3

December 1863, p. 390.

Thoreau was “the shadow of Emerson projected on the earth.” Read his essay

“Walking” and “you can never put your feet to the earth again as you did before.”

Lamentably, “with his wonderful keenness of eye he was stone blind” to orthodox religious truths. “He was but a naturalist, never a supernaturalist.”85:506

“An American Rousseau,” review of Excursions , Saturday Review , 3 December

1864, pp. 694-695.

Thoreau “appears to have been, in a mild unobtrusive way, a sort of American

Rousseau.” He lived “quietly and alone, making his life as nearly as he could at right angles to the lives of his contemporaries.” His senses were “as acute and subtle as those of an Indian or wild fox.” This volume merits “very high admiration. So much of American literature is a mere echo of our own, with a sort of extended prize-essay style about it, that a genuine new book . . . is thoroughly welcome.” Excerpts about 400 words from “A Winter Walk” and about 400 from

“Walking.” 101:593

[F.S. Woodruff,] “Henry D. Thoreau,” Nassau Literary Magazine , 39 (October

1863), 161-164.

Student essay. Both a misanthrope and a philanthropist, Thoreau was a bundle of paradoxes. His six volumes of prose “are full of novelty, and teem with the

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delightful sights and sounds of New England hills.” No reader of Excursions can

“look upon nature in the same light as before.” Thoreau’s essays “Autumnal

Tints” and “Walking” send “the blood coursing through the veins at quickened

pace.” Though he was hardly a natural historian like Audubon or Louis Agassiz,

he was a naturalist. “Not a poet, not a philosopher, not a scientist,” Thoreau

combined “the stern and puritan romance of Hawthorne and the mystical

philosophy of Emerson” with his own “simple and childlike spirit.” 237:1338

William Sloane Kennedy, In Portia’s Gardens (Boston: Bradlee Whidden), pp.

151-153, 212-213.

Thoreau’s lecture on “Walking” is ‘the play of ‘Hamlet’ with the part of Hamlet omitted: it is a tonic defense of wild over civilized life.” His posthumous essays were “carelessly edited.” None of “the greater bards equals the prose-poet

Thoreau for minute study” of water. American painters will eventually discover in his works, especially the journals, “an exhaustive storehouse of observations.”

350:1966

[F.B.Sanborn,] “Forthcoming Books,” Boston Commonwealth , 28 August 1863,

2:3.

Ticknor and Fields have a new book by Thoreau in press which contains several of his late contributions to the Atlantic . The firm is considering the publication of a volume of his letters and poems. “Every line of his verse ought to be printed and preserved.”75:442

257

“From Boston,” New York Tribune , 10 September 1863, 2:3.

Pre-publication announcement of “a volume of Thoreau’s articles, many of which

. . . are absolutely new to the public. It is entitled ‘Excursions in Field and

Forest.’” 76:446

Warrington [William S. Robinson], “from Boston,” Springfield Republican , 12

September 1863, 1:2.

Thoreau’s forthcoming Excursions “will contain new things, as well as old ones.”

76:447

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Boston Post , 17 October 1863, 1:6.

Summarizes Emerson’s preface. Thoreau was “Emerson’s shadow, only very

much dimmer, more ridiculous and indistinct in outline. He was Emerson gone to

ruin.” His brain “was awfully out of joint, so his translations of nature are only

distorted glimpses of what she is. . . . We confess to an interest in his oddities and

whimsicalities, for it is a little of pleasure and much of wisdom to know how big a

fool a man can be.” 78:464

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Boston Saturday Evening Gazette , 17

October 1863, p. 1.

“. . . nine desultory papers by the late Henry D. Thoreau” which “exemplify some of [his] mental peculiarities.” 78:465

258

“New Books,” review of Excursions , Cincinnati Enquirer , 19 October 1863, 2:3.

“This little volume has many claims to originality.” Thoreau describes natural

scenery “with all the enthusiasm of a lover.” In his biographical sketch of the

author, Emerson portrays him “as one of the most amiable and eccentric of

characters.” 79:466

“New Publications,” review of Excursions, Portland Daily Eastern Argus , 20

October 1863, 1:1.

Emerson’s biographical notice of Thoreau “is one of the most admirable and genial sketches we have ever read.” As an observer of nature, “Thoreau had no superior.” His two earlier books “are singularly replete with startling descriptions,” “We can commend this volume heartily to our readers.” 79:468

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Salem Gazette , 20 October 1863, 2:5.

This review was recently discovered, as cited in the Thoreau Society Bulletin ,

Winter 2003. No summary was provided, and I was not able to obtain a copy of this review.

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Cincinnati Gazette , 22 October 1863,

4:5.

“Nature has never had a more enthusiastic or observant student than Thoreau.”

His friends hardly “accused him of cynicism” or “eccentricity.” Several of these

259

papers have already appeared in the Atlantic , and an “appreciative biography of the author” is prefixed. 79:470

[F.B. Sanborn,] “Literary Review,” review of Excursions, Boston

Commonwealth, 23 October 1863, 1:4-5.

This book, “enough to make memorable” the firm of Ticknor & Fields, is “the ripe fruit of serious thought and mellow humor.” The reader of these essays may easily “trace the ripening of Thoreau’s powers.” Excerpts about 400 words from

Emerson’s preface and about 800 words from various essays. – Reprinted in

Sanborn (1980), pp. 279-280. 79-80:471

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Boston Traveller Supplement , 24

October 1863, 2:1.

Thoreau knew his subjects “better than any other American,” though “his utter want of ambition” prevented him from making much of an “impression on the world.” Had he been more ambitious, however, “he could not have been the

Henry Thoreau whom we knew.” His memory should be revered because he

“showed himself a true philosopher” by avoiding the fray of public life. “He may have writ his name in water, but better that than if he had written it in mud or blood.” 80 – 474

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Norfolk County Journal (Roxbury,

Massachusetts), 24 October 1863, 2:1.

260

This review was recently discovered, as cited in the Thoreau Society Bulletin ,

Winter 2007. No summary was provided, and I was not able to obtain a copy of this review.

“Literary Notices,” review of Excursions , Philadelphia North American and

United States Gazette , 28 October 1863, 1:6.

Thoreau is “already familiar to readers of the Atlantic .” He was “sui generis,” a

“truly eccentric being.” The volume “is rendered valuable by a biographical sketch of him from the pen of Ralph Waldo Emerson.” 81: 479

“New Books,” review of Excursions , Baltimore American , 28 October 1863, 2:2.

The “highly eccentric, and yet curiously intellectual’ Thoreau “effectively acted the hermit and the philosopher. . . . [H]aving been greatly entertained by

‘Walden,’ we are glad to see this new set of essays.” 81: 480

“Literary Notices,” review of Excursions , Providence Journal , 29 October 1863,

1:7.

This is “a fresh and original book, filled with lively and glowing pictures of sky, mountain, and meadow, and smelling of forests and fruits, and sweet herbs.

Thoreau was a veritable Dryad.” Emerson characterizes him as “a queer fellow, full of genius.” “We like him for his books, but beyond his books we feel no warmth of friendship for the man.” 81: 481

261

“Literary notices,” review of Excursions , Congregationalist , 30 October 1863, p.

176.

Emerson’s biographical sketch of Thoreau “is unique and characteristic; we doubt if two stronger men were ever brought into juxtaposition as biographer and subject.” Thoreau had “subtle insight into nature,” despite the “pantheistic, or naturalistic, tendencies of his mind; if he had worshipped the same God whom we love, we should have enjoyed him more, and deemed him safer.” 483:81

“New Publications,” review of Excursions, New York Evening Express , 30

October 1863, 1:5.

The late Thoreau was “a great lover and communer with Nature, in all her varied moods. . . . [E]verything from his pen must interest the sympathetic reader.”

Emerson’s “appreciative memoir” greatly enhances the value of the volume. 81-2:

485

Warrington [William S. Robinson], “From Boston/Thoreau and His Book,”

Springfield Republican , 31 October 1863, 1:2.

Excursions is likely to increase Thoreau’s reputation measurably. He was an

“original genius,” albeit no poet. 486:82

“Thoreau’s Excursions,” New York Tribune , 31 October 1863, 3:3-6.

This volume reprints several of Thoreau’s “characteristic papers” from the

Atlantic as well as Emerson’s biographical sketch. “Thoreau was no less

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remarkable in his personal character than in his writings.” Summarizes Emerson’s

preface and excerpts about 4000 words from various essays. – Reprinted in

Cameron (1977), pp. 42-44. 487:82

“Our Book Table,” review of Excursions , Pittsburgh Gazette , 2 November 1863,

3:1.

Thousands of readers who have met Thoreau through the pages of the Atlantic

“will now be pleased to receive this posthumous volume, and add it to their library shelf.” 488:82.

Union Gazette and Democrat of Taunton , Massachusetts, 5 November, 1863

Provided a favorable review (Moldenhauer)

“New Books,” review of Excursions , Worcester Palladium , 5 November 1863,

3:2-3.

Thoreau, “that true child and disciple of Nature,” is the subject of a “rare bit of

biography” by “his townsman and friend, Emerson, “ in this volume. “The book

should be in every library, upon every book-table, going on its mission of good. . .

. It teaches what life is worth to the man who looks with single-minded faith out

upon the world of Nature, and reads the book which God has written for man’s

liberal interpretation. Many a heart will be made the lighter for its communion

with the departed Thoreau.” 489:82

263

“Literary,” review of Excursions , New-York Observer , 5 November 1863, p. 358.

These pages contain “a charm of naturalness, and a delicacy of sentiment.”

Thoreau “has an eye for all that is lovely in nature and art.” 490:82

“Thoreau’s Posthumous Book,” review of Excursions , Boston Transcript , 6

November 1863, 2:2.

Thoreau’s “most intimate friend” Emerson hardly flatters him by his portrayal in

the preface. Thoreau was the “only thorough ‘Come-Outer’ New England has

produced,” and the writings of such a man could not be popular.” His “philosophy

of life was wrong from its one-sidedness,” and this volume shows him in his most

characteristic mood. 83:492

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Albion , 7 November 1863, p. 537.

Thoreau was “a puzzle to those around him, while alive, an object of rather confused encomium, now that he is dead.” Emerson claims that he lacked ambition. Yet to judge from his writings his mind “was profound and independent, his memory was freighted with rich stores of knowledge, his fancy was vivacious, his sympathy with Nature was earnest and profound,” and his words “were ever the earnest expression of his honest thoughts.” 83:493

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Philadelphia Evening Bulletin , 7

November 1863, 4:1.

264

Most of these essays have been published in the Atlantic , “though we are glad to

possess them in this form.” They are “full of quaint observations, shrewd accounts

of natural phenomena, with here and there a streak of willful paradox.” There is a

“charm” about all the writings of the “hermit-like philosopher,” despite his

idiosyncrasies.” 83:494

“Notices of New Books,” review of Excursions, Boston Advertiser , 11 November

1863, 2:3-4.

“. . . a characteristic expression of American prose,” this is “an interesting book, its style always racy and full of point.” 83:495

Country Gentleman , 12 November, 1863

No details provided (Moldenhauer)

“New Books,” review of Excursions , New York Evening Post , 12 November,

1863, 1:2.

Emerson’s biographical sketch of Thoreau, the “high priest of Nature,” will

“Place the subject of the memoir before the reader in a vivid light” and will

“prove to be a valuable aid to the full appreciation” of his essays. 83-4: 496

“Thoreau – An Eccentric,” Portsmouth Journal of Literature & Politics , 14

November 1863, 1:6.

265

Thoreau “was one of the most eccentric geniuses of the age.” Excerpts about 1500 words from item 487 above. 84:497

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Chicago Tribune , 15 November 1863,

2:2.

“Nearly all of these papers have appeared since poor Thoreau’s death” in the

Atlantic . They are “marked by all the peculiar quaintness of expression, and vigorous thoughts, and clear style, which made the author famous” during his life.

84: 498

“Book Notices,” review of Excursions , American Literary Gazette and

Publishers’ Circular , 16 November 1863, p. 48.

Emerson’s sketch “delineates with a master’s hand the grace and beauty or character of the eccentric and nature-loving Thoreau.” Every page of the

“delightful” book “contains a new thought, or an old one in a new garb.” 84:499

New England Farmer, 21 November, 1863

No details provided (Moldenhauer)

Tom Folio [J.E. Babson], “Ticknor and Fields’s New Books,” Boston Transcript

Supplement , 21 November 1863, 2:1.

266

Thoreau’s Excursions “contains some of his best and most characteristic writing.”

“Wild Apples,” “Autumnal Tints,” and “Walking” are “brilliant, beautiful, and truthful essays.” 84:500

“New Books,” review of Excursions , New York Times , 23 November 1863, 2:1-2.

These essays, “probably the last relics that the world will receive” of Thoreau,

“all have interest and everywhere display” the author’s “familiarity with nature’s

workings.” His personal peculiarities, as Emerson has sketched them in the

preface, “are less apparent in his writings than they seem to have been in personal

association.” A figure like Thoreau “may occasionally be admirable,” but “a

nation of them would necessitate a return to the habits of his favorite Indians.”

84:501

“Excursions of H.D. Thoreau,” Essex Statesman , 28 November 1863.

Thoreau was an “independent, self-reliant man” who “grew great and happy in his intercourse with Nature.” This volume “makes very delightful reading.” – reprinted in ATQ , 14 (Spring 1972), 112; and in Cameron (1973), p. 153. 84-5:

502

[Edmund H.] S[ears], “Literary Notices,” review of Excursions , Monthly

Religious Magazine , 30 (December 1863), 346-347.

267

The essays “will be read by those who love Nature, and desire to see her through

the eyes of one specifically anointed as her priest and prophet.” 85:503 [for more

see the Thoreau Society Bulletin from the Fall 1985, p.6]

“Literary Notices,” review of Excursions , Continental Monthly , 4 (December

1863), 708-709.

Thoreau was a “decided genius” and an “’ardent lover of nature. His eye was

open to beauty and his ear to music,” to judge from Emerson’s “exceedingly

interesting biographical sketch.” This book “could only have been written in

America.” 85:504

“Book Notices,” review of Excursions , Christian Advocate and Journal , 3

December 1863, p. 390.

Thoreau was “the shadow of Emerson projected on the earth.” Read his essay

“Walking” and “you can never put your feet to the earth again as you did before.”

Lamentably, “with his wonderful keenness of eye he was stone blind” to orthodox religious truths. “He was but a naturalist, never a supernaturalist.” 85:506

“Editors’ Book Table,” review of Excursions , 3 December 1863, p. 2.

Thoreau “was a kind of Massachusetts Diogenes, slightly sandpapered by some culture and by the influence of society.” He was “a disagreeable man, and thought that his attempts to be a barbarian were wise. He had, however, a wonderful power of seeing natural phenomena, a mastery of good English for describing

268

them, and a certain sharp small philosophy of life besides.” Though these essays are “worth reading,” Emerson’s introduction “overvalues Mr. Thoreau.” – reprinted in ATQ , 2 (2 nd Quarter 1969), 31; and in Cameron (1973), p. 164. 85-

6:507

“Literary,” review of Excursions , Newark Advertiser , 4 December 1863, 2:3-4.

“A most genial volume this for all who love Nature.” Thoreau, “an eccentric

naturalist,” enjoyed “an innate sense of the beautiful and true.” Emerson’s

“appreciative sketch” opens the collection. 86:508

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , San Francisco Alto California , 4

December 1863, 1:5.

“This is a book descriptive in its character, interspersed with pleasant anecdotes

and eminently calculated to repay perusal.” 86:509

“Excursions with Thoreau,” Augusta, Me., Kennebec Journal , 25 December

1863, 1:3-6.

Excerpts about 200 words from Emerson’s preface and about 5500 words from various essays in Excursions . 87:513

“Criticisms on Books,” review of Excursions , American Presbyterian and

Theological Review , NS 6 (January 1864), 177-178.

269

This volume contains “nine papers on various subjects” from Thoreau’s pen and a biographical sketch. Excerpts about 100 words from Emerson’s preface. 87:516

“Literary Notices,” review of Excursions , Boston Review , 4 (January 1864), 114.

Thoreau “was an original, not to say a genius,” and these essays “are genial and sparkling, abounding with exquisite pictures from nature,” though they are “not written from a Christian point of view.” 87:517

“Literary Notices,” review of Excursions , Godey’s Lady’s Book and Magazine , 68

(January 1864), 97-98.

Thoreau possessed “an ardent love of nature, and a keen appreciation offal her beauties.” This book “must possess a peculiar freshness.” Excerpts about 50 words from Emerson’s preface. 87:518

“New Publications,” review of Excursions , Arthur’s Home Magazine , 23 (January

1864), 64.

Unique in “personal peculiarities and mental idiosyncrasies,” Thoreau is a type of

“cultivated Indian. He lives almost entirely separate from social life.” His “strong, abrupt style” quite “carries the reader away.” 88:519

“Review of New Books,” review of Excursions , Peterson’s , 45 (January 1864),

86.

270

Thoreau was “a man of singular eccentricity.” Few writers have enjoyed his gift

for observing nature. If only he had “displayed more imagination” in an essay

such as “Autumnal Tints,” “there would have been little left to desire.” 88:520

“Henry D. Thoreau,” Moore’s Rural New Yorker , 16 January 1864, p. 24.

Though Thoreau was “one of the most loyal, enthusiastic Americans,” his works

“are almost unknown to a large proportion of his countrymen.” He was not a

voluminous writer, but he was “a man of genius.” His life, with its “depths of

eccentricity and originality,” was “as enigma even to those who knew him best.”

He was “in every sense a child of nature.” His newest book contains an

“admirable biographical sketch” of the author by Emerson, “one of his warmest admirers.” – Reprinted in Cameron (1980b), pp. 42-43. 88-9:523

271

Publications of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walking”

The following is a list of full-text English publications of “Walking” from the date of first publication through 2008. The essay was first printed in a magazine, but since that time it has appeared in collections of Thoreau’s works, in anthologies, singly in book form, and via various internet sources. While the compiler of the present list has made every effort to include all known extant publications of the essay as it appears in texts dedicated to the works of Thoreau, she cites the essay in just a handful of the various types of anthologies (Anth.) and on-line sources (Web) in which the essay appears; these are cited to provide the reader with examples of the ever-expanding availability of Thoreau’s essay.

In addition, excerpts of the essay have been published in various texts such as those dedicated to the art of walking, collections of spiritual thought, and readers on environmental philosophy. Quotations from “Walking” appear alongside photographs, are noted in musical compilations, and are paired with drawings of nature. It has been published in more than ten languages from Finnish to Hebrew and Braille. A holograph of the essay is also available in published form. The second list offered below includes citations of some of these various publications. Each is noted by type after standard citation information is provided. This list is not comprehensive, but serves only to provide the reader with an understanding of the scope of the essay’s reach.

As archival material, manuscript pages of the essay are housed in libraries throughout the United States and Canada, but the complete, 1862 copy-text is intact and preserved in the William Munroe Special Collections of the Concord Free Public Library

– a fitting home for the manuscript given Thoreau’s well-known attachment to his home

272

town of Concord, Massachusetts. Many of the original manuscript pages were tipped

into collections of Thoreau’s works when they were published in the years since his

passing. Some have been recovered and are now archived in libraries throughout the

United States; a few are in Canadian libraries. Other manuscript pages of “Walking”

remain in private ownership, while the whereabouts or existence of still other pages

remains unknown. Photo-copies of manuscript pages are often tipped into modern day

publications of Thoreau’s writings, criticism, and biographies about the author. Copies of

manuscript pages are not noted on either of the following bibliographies of Thoreau’s

“Walking.”

The following bibliographies were primarily compiled from: the Thoreau Society

Bulletin’s quarterly listings of published works by or about Thoreau; Walter Harding’s A

Bibliography of the Thoreau Society Bulletin Bibliographies ; Raymond R. Borst’s Henry

David Thoreau: A Descriptive Bibliography ; and WorldCat , a database of published

works. Additionally, a few works were gleaned from other sources such as: addenda to

the afore-mentioned bibliographies; works listed on The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau

webpage of the Princeton Edition of Thoreau’s works

(http://www.library.ucsb.edu/thoreau/ ); and Reader’s Guide Retrospective .

273

Bibliography of English, Full-text Publications of “Walking”

In Books Dedicated to the Writings of Henry David Thoreau

Listed in Order of Publication Date

“Walking.” The Atlantic Monthly , 9, 56, June 1862. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1862.

657- 674. Print.

“Walking.” Excursions . Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1863. Print. (subsequently printed

in 1864, 1865, 1866, 1875, 1877, 1879, 1880, and 1962, among others; at least

sixteen printings). 109

“Walking.” Will H. Dircks, ed. Essays and Other Writings of Henry Thoreau . London

and Newcastle-on-Tyne: Walter Scott, [1891]. Print.

“Walking.” Excursions . Riverside Edition. Cambridge, Mass.: The Riverside Press,

Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1893. Print. (2 printings).

“Walking.” Excursions . New York: Crowell, 1900, 1913. Print.

“Walking.” Alexandria, Va.: Chadwyck-Healey Inc., 1905 (original) and 1979

(microform).

Print. (currently available in microform only)

“Walking.” Excursions and Poems . Manuscript edition. Boston and New York:

Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1906. Print. (Vol. V of the Manuscript edition,

109 This edition was reprinted numerous times until the Riverside edition was published in 1894; The Emerson tribute was then dropped, A Yankee in Canada and other writings were added. See Moldenhauer, ed., Excursions , 330-363.

274

first printing; Vol. V of the Walden edition, second printing; Combined with

Familiar Letters as Vol. III of the Concord edition in 1929; Reprinting of Vol. IX

of the Manuscript edition in 1969 and 1982 known as the AMS Press edition). 110

Print. The complete 1906 edition of The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau is also

available on-line at the Thoreau Institute (http://www.walden.org/institute/), a

collaborative effort of the Thoreau Society and the Walden Woods Project.

“Walking and the Wild.” London: J. Hewetson and Son, 1908. Print.

“Walking.” William Makepeace Thackeray, John Henry Newman, et al., eds. Essays,

English and American: With Introductions and Notes . New York: P.F. Collier,

1910, 1938, 1956, 1961[?], 1969. Later printings include additional editors and

new publication locations and companies: Charles William Eliot, ed.: Norwalk,

Conn.: Easton, 1994; Whitefish, MT, Kessinger Pub., 2004. Print. Also available

at: http://books.google.com/books?id=RdpZAAAAMAAJ (Web - entirety) and

http://books.google.com.books?id=Zy48v-j6TAgC (Web - portion only)

“Walking.” Excursions . New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, [1906, 1913, 1914]. Print.

“Walking.” Excursions . London: George C. Harrap, [1913]. Print.

“Walking.” [Cambridge, Mass.]: Riverside Press, 1914. Print.

“On Walking.” E. Haldeman-Lulius, ed. Girard, Kansas: Haldeman-Julius Co., [1920s?].

Print.

“Walking.” Henry S. Canby, ed . The Works of Thoreau . Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1937.

Print.

110 Both the original Manuscript edition and the Walden edition included Thoreau manuscript pages tipped in in volumes one. Some of the manuscript pages of “Walking” were dispersed in this manner. Some remain in private ownership, some are now archived in various libraries, and the whereabouts of others are unknown.

275

“Walking.” Brooks Atkinson, ed. Walden and Other Writings of Henry David Thoreau .

NewYork: Modern Library, [1937], 1950, 2000. Print.

“Walking.” Carl Bode, ed. The Portable Thoreau . New York: Viking Press, numerous

times between 1947 and 1980. Print.

“Walking.” E. V. Mitchell, ed. The Pleasures of Walking. New York; Vanguard Press,

1948. Print.

“Walking.” Leo Marx, ed. Excursions . New York: Corinth Books, 1962 & 1975. Print.

“Walking.” Excursions . Whitefish, MT: Kessinger Publishing, 1963. Print.

“Walking.”Edmund Fuller, ed. The Great English and American Essays . n.p.: Avon

Books, 1964. Print.

“Walking.” William Rossi, ed. Walden , “Civil Disobedience” and Other Writings . New

York: W.W. Norton and Co., 1966, 92, 08. Print.

“Walking.” Jeffrey L. Duncan, ed. Thoreau: The Major Essays . New York: E. P. Dutton,

1972. Print.

“The Wild.” Charles R. Anderson, ed. Thoreau’s Vision: The Major Essays . Englewood

Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1973. (Anderson writes that “Walking” is an

“alternate title”)

“Walking.” Walter Harding, ed. The Selected Works of Thoreau . Boston: Houghton

Mifflin, 1975. Print.

“Walking.” Montreal: [Geoff Hall], 1979. Print.

“Walking.” Robert Sattelmeyer, ed. The Natural History Essays . Salt Lake City:

Peregrine Smith, 1980. Print.

“Walking.” William Howarth, ed. Walden and Other Writings by Henry David Thoreau .

276

New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1981. Print.

“Walking.” Wendell Glick, ed. Great Short Works of Henry David Thoreau . New York:

Harper and Row, 1982. Print.

“Walking.” Cambridge, Mass.: Applewood Books, 1987. Print.

“Walking.” Sherman Oaks, Calif.: Ninja Press, in association with the Friends of the

Library of the University of California, Santa Barbara: 1988. Print.

“Walking.” Kevin Johnson, ed. Dallas: Heritage Press, 1989. Print.

“Walking.” Thomas Lyon, ed. This Incomperable Lande: A Book of American Nature

Writing. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989. Print.

“Walking.” Richard Dillman, ed. The Essays of Henry David Thoreau . Albany, N.Y.:

NCUP, 1990. Print.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo and Henry David Thoreau. “Nature” and “Walking.” Boston:

Beacon Press, 1991. Print.

“Walking.” Phillip Lopate, ed. The Art of the Personal Essay: an Anthology from the

Classical Era to the Present . New York: Anchor Books, 1994. Print. (Anth.)

“Walking.” New York: Penguin Books, 1995. Print.

“Walking.” Roger S. Gottlieb, ed. This Sacred Earth: Religion, Nature, Environment .

New York: Routledge, 1995. Print.

“Walking.” Nashville, TN: Sun Hill Rose and Briar Books, 2000. Print.

“Walking.” Kerrville, Texas: Herring Printing Co., 2001. Print.

“Walking.” Richard Dillman, ed. The Major Essays of Henry David Thoreau . Troy, NY:

Whitston Press, 2001.

“Walking.” Elizabeth Witherell, ed. Collected Essays and Poems . New York: Library of

277

America, 2001.

“Walking.” Downloadable eBook, Microsoft Reader Desktop. 2001. 25 March 2009.

“Walking.” Content Reserve. New York: Orsorum Press, 2002. 25 March 2009.

TitleInfo.asp?ID={65664708-D0ED-4529-96E93A22FA66C16B}&Format=50>.

(Web)

“Walking.” Lewis Hyde, ed. The Essays of Henry D. Thoreau . New York: North Point

Press, 2002.

“Walking.” William Rossi, ed. “Wild Apples” and Other Natural History Essays .

Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2002. Print.

“Walking.” Content Reserve. Fairfield, IA: 1 st World Library Literary Society, 2004. 25

March 2009

C545-4564-858B-F856AE4291A5}&Format=50>. (Web)

“Walking.” New York: Cosimo, 2006. Print.

“Walking.” Excursions . Middlesex, Eng.: Echo Library, 2006. Print.

“Walking.” n.p.: Gardners, 2007. Print.

“Walking.” Rockville, MD.: Arc Manor, 2007. Print.

“Walking.” n.p. : Filiquarian Pub., 2007. Print.

“Walking.” Joseph J. Moldenhauer, vol. ed. Excursions . Elizabeth Hall Witherell, series

ed., The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau . Princeton N.J.: Princeton UP, 2007.

Print. (Authoritative Edition)

“Walking.” Excursions. London and New York: Anthem Press, 2007. Print.

“Walking: An Essay.” Kentville: Gaspereau Press, 2008. Print.

278

“Walking.” n.p. : Quiet Vision Pub., 2008. Print.

“Walking.” William Rossi, ed. Walden, Civil Disobedience, and Other Writings:

Authoritative Texts, Journal, Reviews, and Posthumous Assessments. New York:

W. W. Norton, 2008. Print.

279

Bibliography of Various Publications of “Walking”

Listed in Order of Publication Date

“Walking.” A. C. Fifield, ed. In Praise of Walking . London: The Simple Life Press, 1905.

Print. (Abridged)

Also available via Google Book Search. 25 March, 2009.

Also as Westport, Conn.: Redcoat Press, 1942. Print.

Also available at: .

(Excerpts)

“A Part of the Essay on Walking.” Boston: Thomas Todd, 1923. Print. (Excerpts)

“Walking.” Waldo Browne, ed. Joys of the Road: A Little Anthology in Praise of

Walking . Boston: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1923. Print. (Excerpts)

“Walking.” Charles R. Murphy, ed. Little Essays from the Works of Henry David

Thoreau . New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1931. Print. (Excerpts)

“Walking.” Bartholow V. Crawford, ed. Henry David Thoreau, Representative

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“Walking.” Bertha Stevens, ed. Thoreau: Reporter of the Universe: A Selection of His

Writings About Nature, for All Readers from Eight Years Old to Eighty . New

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280

La Montaine, John. Wilderness Journal. Op. 41. 15. n.d. Hollywood, Ca.: P.J. Sifler,

1971. Print. Hollywood, Calif.: Fredonia Discs, 1983. 111 (Music with “Walking”

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Taylor, James. “Walking Man.” Country Roads Music Co. Burbank, Cal.: Warner Bros.,

1974. (Paraphrase in Music) 112

“Walking.” Walking Magazine Summer 1986: 70-75. Print. (Abridged)

“Walking.” Koh Kasegawa, ed. Tokyo: Aiikusha, 1988. Print. (Japanese)

“Walking:” Excerpts from the Essay . New York: Stewart Tabori and Chang, 1989. Print.

(Quotations)

“Camminare.” Maria Antonietta Prina, trans. Milan: S.E., 1989. Print. (Italy)

Excerpts from the essay “Walking .” New York: Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 1989.

Print. (Excerpts)

“The Joy of Walking.” Phillip Lopate, ed. The Art of the Personal Essay . Saturday

Evening Post March 1992: 66-8. Print. (Excerpts)

“Walking:” An Abridgement of the Essay by Henry David Thoreau . John Wawrzonek,

ed. Berkeley, California: Nature Company, 1993. Print. (Photographs and

Abridged)

“Walking.” San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1994. Print. (Abridged)

“Balades.” Léon Balzagette, trans. Paris: La Table Ronde, 1995. Print. (French)

111 Movements include: “In Wildness is the Preservation of the World,” “Sunset,” among others, that may be traced to “Walking.” Twelve quotations from Thoreau’s writings are part of the composition, including some from the essay “Walking.” From the composer: “My chief reward has been in allying myself . . . with Thoreau’s central idea that ‘in wildness is the preservation of the world.’” Qtd. in Walter Harding, “A Bibliography of Thoreau in Music,” Studies in the American Renaissance (1992): 291-315.

112 According to Harding, Taylor paraphrases the opening of “Walking” in his song when he sings the following: “moving in silent desperation/ Keeping an eye on the Holy Land, /A hypothetical destination./ Say, who is this walking man? . . . ”. For more on Thoreau in Music see Harding, “A Bibliography of Thoreau in Music,” 291-315.

281

“Walking.” David Emblidge, ed. Appalachian Trail Reader . New York: Oxford

University Press, 1996. Print. (Excerpt)

“Kavelemisen taito.” Markku Envall, trans. Helsinki: Jack-in-the-Box, 1997. Print.

(Finnish)

“Walking.” Minoru Iida, ed. & trans. Shimin no Hanko [“Civil Disobedience” and Five

Other Essays] . Tokyo: Iwanami Books, 1997. Print. (Japanese)

“Walking.” Melbourne: Vision Australia Information and Library Service, 2000s. Print.

(Braille)

“Caminar.” El Cid, trans. NetLibrary. Sante Fe, Argentina. 2004. 25 March 2009

http://www.netLibrary.com/urlapi.asp?action=summary&v=1&bookid=178252 .

(Web: Spanish)

“Wokingu.” Naoki Onishi, trans. Yokohama: Shunpusha, 2005. Print. (Japanese)

“Tiyul.” Sigal Adler and Emili Bodek, trans. Yerushalayim: Karmel, 2006. Print.

(Hebrew)

Emerson, Ralph Waldo and Henry David Thoreau. “Nature” and “Walking.” 1862.

Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic, 2008. Print. (Braille)

“Walking: Holograph, [1862].” Thomas Blanding, James Thomas Fields, et al. eds.

Henry David Thoreau Papers, 1836-1862. Archival Material, Concord Free Public

Library. Concord, Mass. (Holograph)

282

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