Where I Lived, and What I Lived For

by Henry David Thoreau

Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives - and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization and helped make us who we are. Thoreau's account of his solitary and self-sufficient home in the New England woods remains an inspiration to the environmental movement - a call to his fellow men to abandon their striving, materialistic existences of 'quiet desperation' for a simple life within their means, finding spiritual truth through awareness of the sheer beauty of their surroundings.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Classics, Memoir, Biography, Essays, Nature

93 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1854

About the author

Henry David Thoreau (born David Henry Thoreau) was an American author, naturalist, transcendentalist, tax resister, development critic, philosopher, and abolitionist who is best known for Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay, Civil Disobedience, an argument for individual resistance to civil government in moral opposition to an unjust state.

Thoreau's books, articles, essays, journals, and poetry total over 20 volumes. Among his lasting contributions were his writings on natural history and philosophy, where he anticipated the methods and findings of ecology and environmental history, two sources of modern day environmentalism.

In 1817, Henry David Thoreau was born in Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard University in 1837, taught briefly, then turned to writing and lecturing. Becoming a Transcendentalist and good friend of Emerson, Thoreau lived the life of simplicity he advocated in his writings. His two-year experience in a hut in Walden, on land owned by Emerson, resulted in the classic, Walden: Life in the Woods (1854). During his sojourn there, Thoreau refused to pay a poll tax in protest of slavery and the Mexican war, for which he was jailed overnight. His activist convictions were expressed in the groundbreaking On the Duty of Civil Disobedience (1849). In a diary he noted his disapproval of attempts to convert the Algonquins "from their own superstitions to new ones." In a journal he noted dryly that it is appropriate for a church to be the ugliest building in a village, "because it is the one in which human nature stoops to the lowest and is the most disgraced." (Cited by James A. Haught in 2000 Years of Disbelief.) When Parker Pillsbury sought to talk about religion with Thoreau as he was dying from tuberculosis, Thoreau replied: "One world at a time."

Thoreau's philosophy of nonviolent resistance influenced the political thoughts and actions of such later figures as Leo Tolstoy, Mohandas K. Gandhi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. D. 1862.

More: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/tho...

http://thoreau.eserver.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Da...

http://transcendentalism-legacy.tamu....

http://www.biography.com/people/henry...

Reviews

[Julie Ehlers · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Shams and delusions are esteemed for soundest truths, while reality is fabulous. If men would steadily observe realities only, and not allow themselves to be deluded, life, to compare it with such things as we know, would be like a fairy tale."

[Tuna Turan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sevgiden, paradan ve ünden ziyade gerçeği arayan bir adamın izlenimlerini anlatan bana göre mükemmel bir felsefe kitabı. Thoreau’nun Walden Gölü kenarında Temmuz 1845’te başlayıp, 2 yıl 2 ay ve 2 gün sürerek sonra eren doğal yaşam deneyimini kendi gözlemleriyle aktarmıştır. Medeni yaşamı terk edip, ilgi alanlarını geride bırakmış, alarmla uyanmaya, programlara, davetlere son vermiştir. Kitap 17 bölümden oluşuyor. Ekonomi, Nerede ve Ne İçin Yaşadım, Okumak, Sesler, Yalnızlık, Ziyaretçiler, Fasulye Tarlası, Köy, Göl, Fırıncı Kasabası, Yüksek Prensipler, Hayvan Komşularım, Evin Isıtılması, Önceki Sakinler ve Kış Ziyaretçileri, Kış Hayvanları, Gölde Kış, İlkbahar ve Sonuç bölümleridir.

Para hırsıyla anlamını yitiren insanların, tekrar doğaya yakın ve uyumlu yaşamasını temel alan, özgürlüğe kavuşmak için başkaldıran insan modelini anlatan okunması kolay, insanı şevke getiren bir kitap olmuş.

Yalnızca uyandığımız gün, gün doğar. Daha doğacak çok gün var!

[João Barradas · Rating 5 out of 5]

No início dos tempos, a vida foi criada… e tão antiga como ela são o tédio e o aborrecimento que teimam em acompanhá-la, contrariando a própria natureza vibrante e entusiástica, forçada assim a adaptar-se a estes “seres de pedra” que, resignados, aceitam uma pena repleta de trabalhos mitológicos, incluindo o de carpinteiro da morada final.
Para nos aventurarmos a enfrentar as seus problemas, devemos primeiramente encarar (e saber lidar com) as reais necessidades da vida: o alimento, de cuja combustão lenta poderemos retirar o calor vital, sem ultrapassar o limite estabelecido para evitar a própria cocção; o vestuário que, moldado ao nosso corpo, conta a nossa história, sem que nos rendamos à moda que qual parca também pode fiar, tecer e cortar a linha da vida; o abrigo, para alojar e não sobrecarregar, pois após garantir a manutenção do calor físico, ele encerra em sim um valor de afectos que deve ser possuído e não arrendado.
Ligando um futurístico “realómetro” para descortinar as hipocrisias e as ilusões, aproveitemos as leis régias da natureza apresentadas ao longo desta obra, como “o homem é rico em proporção do número e coisas que pode abdicar”, “sou rei do que observo”, “nunca serei tão sábio como no dia em que nasci”, “o vento que sopra é tudo o que alguém pode saber”... tantas e tantas, terminando na derradeira e fundamental sabedoria, “saber que sabemos o que sabemos e não sabemos o que não sabemos”.
É pois necessário retroceder de um instrumento dos instrumentos fabricados para o arcaico estatuto de hóspede da natureza e, como tal, emitir um apelo à abolição de uma escravatura cega e à aceitação das eternas verdades em transmutação, tantas como as vastas possibilidades de vida (ou como raios de uma circunferência).

[Raed · Rating 5 out of 5]

Trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity.

My friends know that I have a deep connection with forests, but they never understand why I go there alone.

Like Zarathustra i wandered among the most varied fragments of humanity, from the most disgusting to the most interesting. from “the man who wants to perish”, to “the last man”
but for me the one who lives in the wood is the only one who can take the road to the ubermensch.


This book is A collection of essays, written by a Harvard graduate who chose to live in the wilderness, about his time spent away from civilization and the meaning of life.

In some mysterious way words in this book have never seemed to me to be static things. In the reality , I read them; yet they seem to move through me.

[Justin Gerhardstein · Rating 2 out of 5]

Where I lived: The woods.
What I lived for: Living and writing in the woods.

[Elsbeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Henry David Thoreau's account of his time spent living simply and self sufficiently in a homemade house beside walden pond continues to inspire environmentalists to this day, myself included. This short book gives a thorough narrative of his motives for making such a decision, and the practicalities of his endeavour to shed himself of a materialistic life in favour of living within his means. Through this he finds the spiritual benefit of the beauty of his surroundings. Perhaps the call to live a more simplistic lifestyle has never been more important as we struggle to live within our means on a planet that grapples to cope with the impact of our modern lifestyles. Written with honesty and detail, I found myself longing for an opportunity to do something similar. A must for anyone with an awakening environmental imagination.

[Ryan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book. I really did. Sadly, I did not. Thoreau does not know how to write in a straight line. His observations are occasionally apt, but they meander and flower and make no sense way too often. Much of what he said was probably shocking once, but now? Nearly everything Thoreau says here has been clarified and thought through better by more recent authors. I can respect Thoreau for the impact he made, but in this case the classic has been strongly outshone by later writing.

[Margarida Sequeira · Rating 5 out of 5]

Como deveríamos viver e não vivemos😊

[Kyle H · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.”

A short but sweet intro to Thoreau, his ideas, and his life.

[Betül Bozkurt · Rating 3 out of 5]

David Thoreau yaşam üzerine yaptığı sorgulamalarıyla idolüm. Bu kitapta da Walden Gölü kenarında yaşadığı, dünyanın bilindik telaşesinden elini eteğini çektiği 2 yıl 2 ay 2 günlük dönemini, yaşam hakkındaki fikirlerini ve günlük yaşamıyla ilgili kesitleri anlatıyor. İlham verici 🤍

[Bert Smallbone · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the greats. Insightful! Introspective! Thought provoking

[Aries · Rating 3 out of 5]

Where I Live and What I Lived For is a collection of essays by the 19th century philosopher Henry David Thoreau extracted from the book of essays Walden and Civil Disobedience.

In Economy

Thoreau suggests simple living and despised excessive glamour of life. He stressed out that the mere necessity of man is "heat" and that Food, Shelter and Clothing are needs to provide and or keep the heat our body needs.

For an essay, it is rather lengthy and tedious. I think it is not enough to put up the thought of a philosopher on Economics by a single, not even by great length, essay.

★★

In Where I Lived, and What I Lived For

Here, Thoreau wrote how he chose the land he build his solitary house, how he build the house, and how he was glad he build it. According to him he spent roughly $28 in building it (excluding the timber- which he cut from the forest). Considering such amount, comparing of it today, www.measuringworth.com gave the value range for today from $580.00 to $115,000.00. I doubt that it practically goes over to $1,000 but I am not an economist or a banker so I also doubt my judgement.

★★

In Winter Animals

In Winter Animals, Thoreau was gladdened to relate the activity of the animals around his abode. Probably he tried to encourage his readers that life in the country and living simple is a capital thing. I find this amusing and inspirational. That's all.

★★★

Note: My average ratings in the three different essays should yield 2 and 1/3. However, I cannot give such rating here in Goodreads. But the binding was pretty cool and scholarly awesome, so in that respect I shall rather give 3 overall rating than 2.

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[dungbeetle · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Bir başkasını bu kadar iyi tanısaydım, kendimle ilgili böyle çok konuşmazdım."

"Bu sayede, acıya katlanmak için yeterince
kuvvetliyiz,
Nereden vücuda geldiğimizi kanıtlar emek
ve eylemlerimiz."

"Çalışırken öyle çok kullanmak zorunda kalıyor ki bilgisini, gelişmesi için gerekli olsa da, nasıl aklına gelebilir bilgisizliği?"

"İnsanın sabah işi ne olmalı bu dünyada? Üç kireçtaşı parçası vardı masamda. İğrenerek pencereden attım onları, aklımın mobilyalarının tamamı hâlâ tozluyken bu taşların her gün tozlarının alınması gerektiğini anlayınca. O halde nasıl sahip olabilirim mobilyalı bir konuta? Açık havada oturabilirim çoğunlukla, çünkü çimenler toz toplamıyor insanlar toprağı kazmadıkça."

"Ama ne yazık ki biz, başka kuşların yaptığı yuvalara yumurtalarını bırakan ve çatlak sesleri ve ahenksiz notalarıyla hiçbir yolcuyu neşelendiremeyen inek kuşları ve guguk kuşlarına çok benziyoruz."

"Toplum onları bu pahalı oyunda desteklerken, öğrencilerin yaşamla oynamamasını ya da yalnızca yaşamı kitaplardan öğrenmeye çalışmamasını, yaşamı başından sonuna gerçekten yaşamaları gerektiğini söylüyorum. Gençler, yaşama deneyimini ilk elde denemeden daha iyi yaşamayı nasıl öğrenir?"

"Onlar yalnızca gelişmemiş bir amaca giden gelişmiş araçlar – gidilecek yer zaten belli ve ulaşılması çok kolay olan bir son, Boston'a ya da New York'a uzanan demiryolları gibi. Maine'den Teksas'a manyetik bir telgraf şebekesi kurmanın büyük telaşı içindeyiz, ancak Maine ve Teksas'ın konuşacakları önemli bir konu yok belki. Öyle bir çıkmaz ki, sağır olduğunu bilmediği seçkin bir hanımefendiyle tanıştırılmayı çok isteyen, davet edilip de eline hanımefendinin kendisini işitebilmesi için bir megafon tutuşturulduğunda söyleyecek bir şey bulamayan bir adam gibi. Asıl amaç duyarlı konuşmak değil de çabucak konuşmak sanki."

"Nereye oturduysam, orada yaşayabildim ve bu nedenle manzara benden yayılmaktaydı."

"Yaşayın, mümkün olduğunca bağlanmadan ve yükümlülük almadan."

"Niçin böyle aceleyle ve yaşamı tüketerek yaşamak zorundayız? Âdeta acıkmadan açlıktan ölmeye kararlıyız. Biz insanlar, zamanında çakılan bir mıh on mıhlı bir nalı, bir nal da bir atı kurtarır deyip, yarınki dokuz mıhı kurtarmak için atın ayağına bugünden bin mıh çakarız. Çalışmaya gelince, işlerimizin hiçbirinden hiçbir sonuç alamıyoruz."

"Gökyüzünde bir balığım ben, altımda çakıl gibi yıldızlar."

"Eğer çağları düşünürsek, insanların olduğu gibi hayvanların da ilerlemekte olan bir uygarlıkları olamaz mı? Hayvanlar bana, hâlâ mağaralarının savunma noktalarında nöbet tutan ve dönüşümlerini bekleyen ilkel mağara adamları gibi gelirdi."

"Gözlerimizi rahatsız ederek kapatmamıza neden olan ışık bizim için karanlığın kendisidir. Yalnızca uyandığımız gün, gün doğar. Daha doğacak çok gün var. Güneş ise yalnızca bir sabah yıldızı..."

katalogdan bir edebi akım seçmem gerekseydi transcendentalism'i seçerdim. 18 yaşımdayken de şimdi de

[Johanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Can anyone buy me a house in the woods with only the necessities please? It became clear to me why Thoreau was so much ahead of his time, even though I sometimes felt that it did not always relate to our own Zeitgeist. I found it beautiful how he points out the importance of reading and reading outside ones box to get familiar with the unfamiliar. The sentences are too long sometimes, boy...but definitely worth the read.

[Gavin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tiny extract from Walden, which I tried / pretended to read as a teen. great example of a completely different ethos from mine.

He opens with a little C18th verbal dance about how immodest and outré it is to write in the first person about your own life. I sometimes miss that norm, which he helped kill. Then there's the quiet misanthropy and primitivism inside certain forms of the love of nature, which I can't really attribute to him. And lastly the contempt for work, all work except food and shelter and confessional writing anyway.

Why should we live with such hurry and waste of life? We are determined to be starved before we are hungry. Men say that a stitch in time saves nine, and so they take a thousand stitches to-day to save nine tomorrow. As for work, we haven’t any of any consequence. We have the Saint Vitus’ dance, and cannot possibly keep our heads still.

[Anil Koroglu · Rating 5 out of 5]

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.

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This little gem is a distillation of Walden, and is Thoreau at his wise-cracking Taoist best. He cajoles, jeers, and rabbit-punches his way through socially accepted ways of living and working (which is admittedly somewhat easier if you don’t have any family obligations). The work abounds in biting observations and well-turned phrases. He is the Taoist sage of New England, living apart and only with necessity—he has pared life to the bone, sucked its marrow, as he says, cornered it, to see what it was all about. He lives hand to mouth, an avantgard hippie, watching the squirrels and living in the moment; obligations do not tie him down. And I get the feeling that he would not like what we have become. Here he is on trade and technology:

“Men think that it is essential that the Nation have commerce, export ice, and talk through a telegraph, and ride thirty miles an hour, without a doubt, whether they do or not; but whether we should live like baboons or like men, is a little uncertain. If we do not get out sleepers [railroad ties], and forge rails, and devote days and nights to the work, but go to tinkering upon our lives to improve them, who will build railroads? And if railroads are not built, how shall we get to heaven in season? But if we stay at home and mind our business, who will want the railroads? We do not ride on the railroad; it rides upon us.”

Stated a different way, we have nothing to fear but fear itself.

[Naomi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a man who stripped back all the gloss and debris of modern life and revealed the kernal of life's necessities. I find myself getting excited/reinvigorated just reading his laser sharp commentary on what man needs to be happy in life. His discussion on the idiocy of indebting oneself voluntarily to a mortage was particularly aposite to me. The 'poor' civilised man but the rich 'savage' - not just in that he does not have debt but also that he/she is not enslaved to keeping house - 'a blade of grass does not gather dust'. A clear thinking man who in some ways reminds me of Nietsche with his critique of modern society.

[Leonor Oliveira · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pensar que esta obra foi escrita em 1854 é um surreal. Thoreau apresenta-se não só como um naturalista, mas também como um ambientalista muito à frente do seu tempo. A escrita é completamente honesta e íntima, dando a sensação que foi escrita atualmente e não há quase 200 anos. Este “não querer viver o que não era vida”, e retratar que esta só pode realmente ser vivida quando em contacto direto com a natureza, sendo a própria vida natureza só por si, mostra a humildade e a filosofia tão iluminada para a época. Agora vai ser definitivamente impossível não ler a obra completa.

[Melissa Harris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm not sure how to review this book, other than to say it touched me deeply. I almost feel as though if I try to put into words how this writing makes me feel, that it will become disfigured somehow and take away the power. There is a part of me that wants to *be* Henry David Thoreau. I see him as a courageous man, obviously a deeply-thoughtful man who lived by his own standards. I will refer back to this book often, and read more of his works.

[Shelby Kollin · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not enjoy this book. There were some parts here and there where I could appreciate what he was saying, but overall I could barely follow this. The way he writes is a bit much for me and I found it difficult to relate with what he was saying. I respect this man for what he did and really wanted to like this book, but the words just did not strike anything in me.

[Arielle Stern · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think if I had read this a few years ago it would have landed with me more/been more meaningful. While I’m very much for the renouncing-material-possessions stance, Thoreau’s adoption of this stance is seemingly to a kind of “seize the day,” or, “wake up” end. To me, the “material renunciation”/“living in the world with only necessities” point is so compelling (in others’ philosophies) because it facilitates, or is part of, self-emptying, allowing one to orient oneself to others or to something transcendent, for instance. But in Thoreau, it is used almost as a path to self-fulfillment, which is where it loses me. (I don’t use “self-fulfillment” in a derogatory sense to mean “self-importance”—I don’t think he’s for that. I simply mean fulfillment of the individual). Materially, it would probably be good on the whole if people followed Thoreau’s example/took his philosophical instruction, so I’m not against what he preaches. We should indeed be awake rather than being no more than mechanistic bodies. We should extricate ourselves from the social ennui. This is all well and good. But that’s about as far as Thoreau gets us as I see it. The question I feel he doesn’t answer is: what is it that we are seeking or that is missing from the popular un-awakened mode of being? To answer this, I think we have to go beyond ourselves.

[Berat Sadıç · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Nerede ve Ne için Yaşadım”, anladığım kadarıyla Thoreau’nun Walden adlı eserindeki bir bölümden kitaplaştırılmış. Benim için çok güzel bir girizgah oldu. O kadar çok yerin altını çizdim ki, sonrasında bunlardan bazılarını uygulama üzerinden yıldızlamak ve daha da azaltmak zorunda kaldım.

Doğaya özlem, daha az ile yetinmek, sadelik, abartılmış sosyal hayattan kaçış gibi kavramların tümü, günümüz “modern” endüstriyelleşmiş toplumların tümünde korkutucu ögeler çağrıştırıyor insanın kulağına. Neden para, eşya, ıvır-zıvır biriktirmeliyiz? Neden, içten olmayan tüm sosyal yaşantımızı devam ettirmek zorundayız? Doğadan neden ve nasıl bu kadar dışlandık? O dönemde, yani küresel zenginlik yeni doğarken ve buna Kuzey Amerika’da
tanıklık eden birisinin gözünden baktığımızda, doğaya kaçmak ve felsefeyi sadece üretmeyip bilakis tecrübe etmek, Henry David Thoreau’nun bir yaşam filozofu olarak tescillenmesi gerekliliğine en büyük örnek belki de.

“Ama işte bak, insan kullandığı araçların aracı oldu.” diyor yazar ve soruyor “Hep daha fazlasını edinmek için mi çalışacağız? Ara sıra daha azıyla da yetinemez miyiz?”..

[Diana Matos · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read Walden in its entirety about twice some years ago. Once in undergrad school and once, in detail, when I tried to finish my Master's Degree.
I am still very much in love with Thoreau's writing and way of thinking and I knew that this year I had to revisit him. Funny how you think of a dream/idea and it just stays there, in your head, for a long time. Now, almost 11 years later, I am beginning to build that dream, just like Thoreau did. I may not be the person who goes off grid right away or quit my job, but I am making good changes in my life. Every sentence I read this time felt even deeper and I am so thankful to know this work and to be able to experience it.

[Barış · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yirmi yıl önce okuduğum Doğal Yaşam Ve Başkaldırı kitabının bir kısmından oluşuyor bu kitap. Bir zamanlar kutsal kitap gibi baş ucumda tutardım. Ama beni ne kadar değiştirdi, bilemiyorum. Thoreau çok iyi bir doğa gözlemcisi. Mevsimleri, toprağı, gölü, hayvanları, bitkileri ve hatta insanları gozlemliyor. Her yıl Walden gölünün hangi gün buzlarinin tamamen çözüldüğünü not etmiş mesela. Ama bana bu kadar doğa tasviri fazla geliyor. Beni daha çok düşünce biçimi ilgilendiriyor. Felsefesini seviyorum.

[Brandon Rivera · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve started a dozen books this year and this is thee only one I finished. Shout out to books under 100 pages. I felt like I was reading a pamphlet made for the average New Englander in the 1800s. That man was ROASTING modern society.

Heartwarming to learn that the problems we grapple with everyday were just as tough to deal with back in the day. There’s some crazy good stuff in here. Gimme some truth.

A few random tangents here and there that I absolutely couldn’t make sense of… but overall Thoreau provides a solid balance between logical critiques of our society and the machine we’ve built, and just an unbridled respect for nature.

[João Moura · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Onde Vivi e Para que Vivi" é um excerto da obra-prima "Walden" e é um discurso hipnotizante de um homem sobre as suas ideias do que é essencial para a vida humana e o que são distrações. Simplificar e tentar viver uma vida completa, é a mensagem de Thoreau, que viveu a sua vida como um exemplo para as palavras que apregoou.

[runner Sophia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wonderful poetic prose about the word we live in, at a time where America was a ‘newly found’ continent and people were arriving into nature itself!
Unfortunately- I will never be able to live in the wild like Henry David Thoreau but I have visited the national parks he worked towards getting special conservation statuses for.

[tripswithbooks · Rating 3 out of 5]

Walden’den üç bölüm içeren bu baskısı, yazarla tanışmak isteyenlere önerilebilir.
Göl kıyısına yakın orman içinde bir kulübenin küçük verandasında okur gibi.

[İlhanCa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kitap bir baş yapıt özelliği taşıyor diye okuyayım istedim..ancak beni o şekilde etkilemedi..para ya da dünyaya karşı verilen savaşı örneklemeleriyle anlatan felsefik bir kitap..