Walden

About This Book

In *Walden*, Thoreau describes his life in a cabin that he built in 1845 in the woods of Concord, Massachusetts, on land owned by his friend Ralph Waldo Emerson. For more than two years, he turned his back on the young industrial society of the United States to pursue an alternative and balanced way of life. Published in 1854, the work is not a novel but a summary and revision of his journal entries. The eighteen chapters address different aspects of human existence, reflecting on economy, solitude, the wildlife of the forest, and the reading of classic literature. The impact of *Walden* is deeply intertwined with American history, as Thoreau became a prophet of civil disobedience and American anarchism.

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life.