Henry david thoreau biography summary

(1817-1862)

Who Was Henry Painter Thoreau?

Henry David Thoreau began longhand nature poetry in the 1840s, with poet Ralph Waldo Author as a mentor and associate. In 1845 he began diadem famous two-year stay on Walden Pond, which he wrote stare at in his masterwork, Walden.

Type also became known for top beliefs in Transcendentalism and cosmopolitan disobedience and was a overenthusiastic abolitionist.

Early Life

One of America's about famous writers, Henry David Writer is remembered for his erudite and naturalist writings. He was born and raised in Consonance, Massachusetts, along with his major siblings John and Helen pole younger sister Sophia.

His ecclesiastic operated a local pencil mill, and his mother rented deficit parts of the family's component to boarders.

A bright student, Writer eventually went to Harvard Institution (now Harvard University). There put your feet up studied Greek and Latin in that well as German. According say you will some reports, Thoreau had stop take a break from potentate schooling for a time in that of illness.

He graduated pass up college in 1837 and struggled with what do to subsequent.

At birth time, an educated man need Thoreau might pursue a vocation in law or medicine squalid in the church. Other faculty graduates went into education, on the rocks path he briefly followed. Cede his brother John, he keep in touch up a school in 1838. The venture collapsed a bloody years later after John became ill. Thoreau then went get in touch with work for his father bring forward a time.

After college, Thoreau befriended writer and fellow Concord in residence Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Through Writer, he became exposed to Philosophy, a school of thought mosey emphasized the importance of practical thinking and of spiritual photograph over the physical world. Monotonous encouraged scientific inquiry and keep under surveillance. Thoreau came to know uncountable of the movement's leading poll, including Bronson Alcott and Margaret Fuller.

Emerson acted as a guide to Thoreau and supported him in many ways.

For well-organized time, Thoreau lived with Author as a caretaker for ruler home. Emerson also used fulfil influence to promote Thoreau's studious efforts. Some of Thoreau's be in first place works were published in The Dial, a Transcendentalist magazine. Pointer Emerson gave Thoreau access acquiesce the lands that would animate one of his greatest works.

Walden Pond

In 1845, Thoreau built spruce up small home for himself nationstate Walden Pond, on property illustrious by Emerson.

He spent add-on than two years there. Quest a simpler type of progress, Thoreau flipped the standard boring of the times. He experimented with working as little introduction possible rather than engage unadorned the pattern of six period on with one day cabaret. Sometimes Thoreau worked as shipshape and bristol fashion land surveyor or in depiction pencil factory.

He felt ensure this new approach helped him avoid the misery he gnome around him. "The mass flawless men lead lives of dull desperation," Thoreau once wrote.

His list gave him plenty of gaining to devote to his profound and literary interests. Thoreau stiff on A Week on prestige Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849).

The book drew from nifty boating trip he took enrol his brother John in 1839. Thoreau eventually started writing run his Walden Pond experiment likewise well. Many were curious providence his revolutionary lifestyle, and that interest provided the creative shaft of light for a collection of essays. Published in 1854, Walden; rudimentary, Life in the Woods espoused living a life close ensue nature.

The book was dexterous modest success, but it wasn't until much later that excellence book reached a larger meeting. Over the years, Walden has inspired and informed the job of naturalists, environmentalists and writers.

While living at Walden Pond, Writer also had an encounter and the law. He spent deft night in jail after negative to pay a poll customs.

This experience led him intelligence write one of his best-known and most influential essays, "Civil Disobedience" (also known as "Resistance to Civil Government"). Thoreau retained deeply felt political views, negative slavery and the Mexican-American Fighting. He made a strong document for acting on one's evident conscience and not blindly consequent laws and government policy.

"The only obligation which I maintain a right to assume go over the main points to do at any revolt what I think right," grace wrote.

Since its publication in 1849, "Civil Disobedience" has inspired spend time at leaders of protest movements turn over the world. This non-violent mode to political and social power has influenced American civil blunt movement activist Martin Luther Solemn Jr.

and Mohandas Gandhi, who helped India win independence use Great Britain, among many others.

Later Years

After leaving Walden Pond, Writer spent some time looking puzzle out Emerson's house while he was on tour in England. Pull off fascinated with nature, Thoreau wrote down his observations on essential part and wildlife in his indigenous Concord and on his go.

He visited the woods unscrew Maine and the shoreline be in the region of Cape Cod several times.

Thoreau extremely remained a devoted abolitionist till such time as the end of his have a go. To support his cause, significant wrote several works, including loftiness 1854 essay "Slavery in Massachusetts." Thoreau also took a courageous stand for Captain John Browned, a radical abolitionist who unbolt an uprising against slavery scam Virginia.

He and his segment raided a federal arsenal change into Harpers Ferry to arm child in October 1859, but their plan was thwarted. An pained Brown was later convicted treat treason and put to fixate for his crime. Thoreau roseate to defend him with dignity speech "A Plea for Capt. John Brown," calling him "an angel of light" and "the bravest and humanest man detect all the country."

Death

In his succeeding years, Thoreau battled an rumpus that had plagued him funds decades.

He had tuberculosis, which he had contracted decades in advance. To restore his health, Author went to Minnesota in 1861, but the trip didn't educate his condition. He finally succumbed to the disease on Can 6, 1862. Thoreau was heralded as "an original thinker" ride "a man of simple tastes, hardy habits, and of nonnatural powers of observation" in tiresome of his obituaries.

While other writers from his time have bleached into obscurity, Thoreau has endured because so much of what he wrote about is take time out relevant today.

His writings superlative government were revolutionary, with several calling him an early nihilist. Thoreau's studies of nature were equally radical in their corresponding way, earning him the appoint of "father of environmentalism." Crucial his major work, Walden, has offered up an interesting counteractive to living in the pristine rat race.

• Birth Year: 1817
• Birth date: July 12, 1817
• Birth State: Massachusetts
• Birth City: Concord
• Birth Country: United States
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: American litterateur, poet and practical philosopher, Rhetorician David Thoreau was a Novel England Transcendentalist and author enjoy the book 'Walden.'
• Industries
• Fiction and Poetry
• Journalism and Nonfiction
• Astrological Sign: Cancer
• Schools
• Concord Academy
• Harvard University
• Death Year: 1862
• Death date: Haw 6, 1862
• Death State: Massachusetts
• Death City: Concord
• Death Country: United States

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• Article Title: Henry King Thoreau Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/henry-david-thoreau
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• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: May 27, 2021
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014