This is just a short annotation of Henry David Thoreau's Walden. This is on the chapter, Spring, which is about Thoreau watching Walden Pond start melting and how wild life is coming back. In this presentation we talk about Nature, Transcendentalism, Science, and Philosophy
7. Transcendentalism
Transcendentalism is about how your thoughts and spirituality are more
important than ordinary human experiences.
It is an offshoot of Romanticism but it has a couple of differences like views on
God and
http://intothewildtranscendentalism.weebl
y.com/transcendentalism.html
http://www.transcendentalists.com/1thorea.html
Basic Beliefs of Transcendentalism
are:
● Quest for Truth
● Individualism
● Strong connection of Nature
● Dislike for Materialism
● Must rely on Intuition
● Self-reliance
8. Transcendentalism in
‘Spring’
In the 3rd paragraph he talks about living in the woods
In the 4th paragraph he talks about a man and his connection to nature
Mans connection to Spring
Using science to understand what is happening
Paragraph 7 is about expressing that everything is important
Paragraph 8 is connecting humans to nature
Paragraph 9 is about how materialism is nothing compared to the spirtuality of
nature
Paragraph 13 is about how he strives for growth
9. What is Science?
-Science is the intellectual and practical activity
encompassing the systematic study of the structure and
behavior of the physical and natural world through
observation and experiment.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/science http://researchmeth.wikispaces.com/Qualitative+Research
10. Science in Relation to
Nature
- Throughout “Spring”, there are a myriad of references to the
changes that occur in nature which are able to be
explained scientifically.
- Scientific relations aid in making clear and logical
explanations to the phenomena that occur throughout each
season.
-Henry David Thoreau alludes to a plethora of scientific
aspects in order to enhance his descriptions of Spring
throughout Walden.
11. Science in “Spring”
- “In spring the sun not only exerts an influence through the increased
temperature of the air and earth, but its heat passes through ice a foot or
more thick, and is reflected from the bottom in shallow water, and so also
warms the water and melts the under side of the ice, at the same time that it
is melting it more directly above, making it uneven, and causing the air
bubbles which it contains to extend themselves upward and downward until
it is completely honeycombed, and at last disappears suddenly in a single
spring rain.
-Imagery; draws vivid picture of process
12. Science in “Spring”
- “The day is an epitome of the year. The night is the winter, the morning and
evening are the spring and fall, and the noon is the summer.”
- Refers to seasons in nature to describe Walden Pond.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Walden_Pond.jpg
13. Science in “Spring”
- The pond began to boom about an hour after sunrise, when it felt the
influence of the sun's rays slanted upon it from over the hills; it stretched
itself and yawned like a waking man with a gradually increasing tumult,
which was kept up three or four hours. It took a short siesta at noon, and
boomed once more toward night, as the sun was withdrawing his influence.
-Personification and similes to intertwine nature with science.
14. Science in “Spring”
- “I am on the alert for the first signs of spring, to hear the chance note of
some arriving bird, or the striped squirrel's chirp, for his stores must be now
nearly exhausted, or see the woodchuck venture out of his winter quarters.”
- Birds, squirrels, and woodchucks are known to emerge to mark beginning of
Spring (Proven through Scientific Observation).
15. Science in “Spring”
-Duck Hunting example
-Shows how nature plays tricks on even the most intelligent men.
- Thoreau delights at the various colors of sand as he sees them as
vegetation.
-Relation between innate objects into beautiful, luscious pieces of the world.
-He compares man to a "mass of thawing clay," with fingers and toes as
leaves and the ear as a lichen.
-Thoreau enjoys the "forms which this molten earth flows into."
16. Rebirth
- Overall theme is rebirth
-Walden was dead in the Winter and is reborn in the Spring
-The rebirth of the pond symbolizes the rebirth of Thoreau's spirit.
-Thoreau feels that old grudges should be abandoned and old sins forgiven in
this time of renewed life.
http://george.loper.org/interests/housing/thero/thoreau.html
17. Thoreau’s Philosophy
❖ In Walden, Thoreau urged the need of
spiritual rebirth for mankind.
❖ Thoreau’s influence of this came through the
pond’s emergence of spring from winter.
http://www.rainydaymagazine.com/RDM2006/RainyDayTrips/Wa
ldenPond/GreatBlueHeronBig.jpg
18. Philosophy in “Spring”
“In a pleasant spring morning all men's sins are forgiven. Such a day is a truce to vice.
While such a sun holds out to burn, the vilest sinner may return. Through our own
recovered innocence we discern the innocence of our neighbors. You may have
known your neighbor yesterday for a thief, a drunkard, or a sensualist, and merely
pitied or despised him, and despaired of the world; but the sun shines bright and
warm this first spring morning, recreating the world, and you meet him at some
serene work, and see how it is exhausted and debauched veins expand with still joy
and bless the new day, feel the spring influence with the innocence of infancy, and
all his faults are forgotten.”
http://www.stakeholdergroup.com/wp-
content/uploads/2010/11/group-hug.jpg
19. Philosophy in “Spring”
“I have penetrated to those meadows on the morning of many a first spring day,
jumping from hummock to hummock, from willow root to willow root, when the
wild river valley and the woods were bathed in so pure and bright a light as would
have waked the dead, if they had been slumbering in their graves, as some suppose.
There needs no stronger proof of immortality. All things must live in such a light. O
Death, where was thy sting? O Grave, where was thy victory, then.”
20. Philosophy in “Spring”
“Our village life would stagnate if it were not for the unexplored forests and meadows
which surround it. We need the tonic of wildness — to wade sometimes in marshes
where the bittern and the meadow-hen lurk, and hear the booming of the snipe; to
smell the whispering sedge where only some wilder and more solitary fowl builds
her nest, and the mink crawls with its belly close to the ground.”
21. Philosophy in “Spring”
“We can never have enough of nature. We must be refreshed by the sight
of inexhaustible vigor, vast and titanic features, the sea-coast with its
wrecks, the wilderness with its living and its decaying trees, the
thunder-cloud, and the rain which lasts three weeks and produces
freshets. We need to witness our own limits transgressed, and some
life pasturing freely where we never wander.”
