About the Author

Henry David Thoreau was born in Concord, Massachusetts, on July 12, 1817. His grandfather, Jean, a French Huguenot, had come to Boston in 1773, taken […]

Themes and Characters

Since Walden is, on one hand, a sort of spiritual autobiography, Thoreau himself is its central character. The narrator of Walden resembles Thoreau in many […]

Overview and Setting

Overview In Walden Thoreau records both his experiment in self-sufficient natural living and his ideas about nature, human society, and the proper way for people […]

Literary Qualities

Unlike his mentor, Emerson, Thoreau has a sense of organic form, and as a result Walden-in contrast to many of Emerson’s essays-is more than a […]

Social Sensitivity

Thoreau considered himself a reformer, and he genuinely wanted to change human lives for the better. He was distressed by the poverty he saw in […]

Related Titles

A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, like Walden, mixes observations of natural phenomena with discussions of their symbolic significance. The Maine Woods and […]