“I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life...(65)”
I’m going to be honest, I don’t completely hate Thoreau and his writing. I don’t completely love him and his writing either. Sometimes Thoreau makes valid statements and I even find myself wanting to agree with him, like in the quote I chose. I love the way he describes his reasoning for choosing to live in the woods, sure it’s romanticized and dramatic, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t inspiring. I find myself often wondering if i’m living life to fullest, questions like “Is this college education going to be worth something” or “What do I even want out of life?.” I’m not sure that going out and living in the woods is going to magically answer these questions for me or even allow me to capture the essence of life, but Thoreau did get me thinking.
It makes me wonder about his intentions though, because with his arrogant nature I find it hard that he would expect many people to embrace his lifestyle and accept his criticism of them. When I read the reviews of Walden I found the same thing repeated, although everyone kept referring to him as some kind of genius, they claimed that his writing might spark some attention but there would be no actual influence on people. I think that’s what keeps me from completely liking Thoreau’s writing. Sure, it sounds like a good theory and it sparks your interest for a second, but then it gets bland and his words mesh together in what seems like this mass of nothingness.
It even feels like Thoreau confuses himself at times, that he’s even hypocritical in his writing. In the first section of our reading didn’t he talk about the importance of experience and how education is no match for actual hands-on life experience? And in the section on Reading, he went on to explain the importance of the written word and that more universities need to be built. It felt like I was reading another book with a different author. I loved his explanation on the importance of books, how they are a personal and intimate art form because we breath the life into them. His old words were in the back of my mind though making him seem like a hypocrite, plus the fact that he pointed out the ignorance of the world just made him seem hostile. If he wanted people to gain anything from his book, I really doubt that criticizing them was the way to go.
Right now I’m in a love-hate relationship with Thoreau. There’s no doubt he’s a talented writer and has some pretty awesome lines in his writing, but at the same time even he can come off as ignorant. I know I’m never going to journey into the woods and find this new life, but if I apply some of Thoreau’s ideals to modern day the most I can say right now is that I’m against some modern technologies. For example, if I have to deal with one more person saying how I NEED to have a Facebook or look out me awkwardly because I don’t have one, I think I might just resort to the woods. I really don’t need to hear the argument about how Facebook is a necessity, that’s like saying so is reality TV or Prada handbags. Save me the argument on the importance of Facebook in our society, I think Thoreau wouldn’t care much for it either. I’m not saying we need to start sending telegrams to each other again, but do we really need to let social media control our lives? Can we say our generation is doing much living by relying on social media forms like Facebook?
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