The Blog of Henry David Thoreau: Thoreau's Journal: 27-Mar-1857

3.27.2007

Thoreau's Journal: 27-Mar-1857

I would fain make two reports in my Journal, first the incidents and observations of to-day; and by tomorrow I review the same and record what was omitted before, which will often be the most significant and poetic part. I do not know at first what it is that charms me. The men and things of to-day are wont to lie fairer and truer in tomorrow’s memory.

2 comments:

Will Howarth said...: Greg,

Nice to find your blog on Thoreau. Nicer still if you added some links to key Thoreau sites: the Princeton edition of his writings, the Thoreau Institute at Lincoln, Mass, the Concord Free Public Library, etc. Did you know that the entire 1906 Journal is now online at the Institute site?

Best wishes,
Will Howarth
Princeton University; Mar 28, 2007, 5:54:00 PM
son rivers said...: Hi Will

Thanks for the info on the Lincoln Inst. I didn't know that. As for linking, that's for others to do. My role i different. But I have been extremely delinquent in updating the blog roll. I intend to change that soon.

Thanks again,
Greg
Academically Unafilliated; Mar 29, 2007, 2:14:00 AM

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one of the native forces

“Thoreau was a surprising fellow—he is not easily grasped—is elusive: yet he is one of the native forces—stands for a fact, a movement, an upheaval: Thoreau belongs to America, to the transcendental, to the protesters: then he is an outdoor man: all outdoor men everything else being equal appeal to me. Thoreau was not so precious, tender, a personality as Emerson: but he was a force—he looms up bigger and bigger: his dying does not seem to have hurt him a bit: every year has added to his fame.”

~Walt Whitman as recorded by Horace Traubel

the simple print

The text is from The Journal of Henry David Thoreau, ed. Bradford Torrey and Francis Allen, 14 vols. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1906).

Each blog post is an excerpt from that day's entry in the Journal, and although not necessarily the complete entry, it is an integral and intact section thereof.

"It was a pleasure and a privilege to walk with him. He knew the country like a fox or a bird, and passed through it as freely by paths of his own.... One must submit abjectly to such a guide, and the reward was great." -Emerson