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Analysis Of Thoreau's Essay 'Where I Lived'

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Thoreau addresses a largely overlooked issue in American society, people tend to live with excess when the fewer we have as people is better for us. The author argues that people need to live in the fewer things and value what the world has to offer us. In today’s society this is a very valid point, millennials do not care about our world on a spiritual level when it is the thing we can connect ourselves to the most. Thoreau’s claim in Where I lived and what I lived for was that we live life too fast, in today’s society this claim is relevant.
In today’s society people rely on technology more than needed. Thoreau writes in his paper that the simple things are what make us prospering humans but people believe that there is a need for extra things.
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Furthermore, his use of tone to exemplify his argument is also effective as he condemns people for living rushed, unfulfilled lives for the sake of prosperity and materialistic possessions. When Thoreau says that ”when we are unhurried and wise, we perceive that only great and worthy things have any permanent and absolute existence, that petty fears and petty pleasures are but the shadow of the reality,”(279) he employs a critical tone by stating that people are blinded by these petty things that misconstrue

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“While I enjoy the friendship of the seasons I trust that nothing can make life a burden to me. The gentle rain which waters my beans and keeps me in the house today is not drear and melancholy, but good for me too. ”He compares Mother Nature with humans throughout the chapter, saying that mother nature provides thousand wonderful, beautiful, and interesting things, and fellow human beings seem to be interested in only what they can get out of you and who offer little in exchange. Thoreau feels that, rather than being near the greatest number of people, people must live and work in the place most important to their various

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Through Thoreau’s entire essay, “Reading”, revolves around the idea of reading being the way to immortality. He calls for a new society, one that does not focus on the materialistic things in life, but instead on creating an intellectual human culture. Thoreau believes that neither property nor money are true inheritances, but that “books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.” (82). This passage demonstrates Thoreau’s idea of society’s way of aiming too low, instead of striving to read well.

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Thoreau utilizes metaphors to portray his disapproval of mankind’s inability to experience the world without being plagued by insignificant actions towards the future and an absorption in external factors. Humans, focused primarily on the future, use a “thousand stitches to save nine tomorrow,” illustrating that their present actions are solely to fix any forthcoming issues. By quantitatively modifying “a stitch in time”, Thoreau emphasizes that a vast majority of human actions are a result of being blindly concentrated on the future. He perceives such actions towards the future as wasted, demonstrated by the statement “we haven’t any of any consequence.” Not only do human actions disregard the value of the present, but they are also disordered,

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Have you ever been in a situation where you were stuck in between what is morally acceptable and what is legally correct? Henry David Thoreau is a timeless symbol of an individualist who peacefully does what he thinks is right even if the laws state otherwise. Thoreau teaches and wants his readers to act on what is morally correct, take responsibility for an action, and to resist unjust laws. Thoreau was a man of morals, typically doing what he thought was right rather than obeying the laws.

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The purpose of Where I Lived, and What I Lived for, by Henry David Thoreau is to express that life should be lived with simplicity and with purpose. His advanced syntax and high vocabulary makes this passage difficult to read, while giving the reader a challenge. His use of rhetorical devices throughout the passage also helps convey his message about the purpose of life. In the first set of paragraphs, he introduces that he moved into the woods, so he could enjoy the many things nature has to offer deliberately. He compares humans to ants when he says that “we live meanly, like ants.”

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This highlights how unrealistic it is to live the successful self-reliant life that Thoreau was trying to encourage. In addition, despite how romantic Thoreau’s “solitude” sounds, in reality, living life isolated from society is incredibly lonely. When Christopher McCandless tried to incorporate the value of self-reliance into his life by taking an adventure to Alaska alone, he was left feeling incredibly lonely. At the end of his journey, he realized the flaws of this lifestyle. McCandless writes, “happiness only real when shared” (Penn).

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Henry David Thoreau was a philosopher, poet, and a very outspoken person about society. He discusses his opinions on how people should live in his essay “Where I Lived and What I Lived For.” Thoreau's philosophy of simplicity and individualism and self-sufficiency poses many dangers for communities as a whole. Although there are many setbacks, his philosophy is, however, still viable today. Thoreau strongly advocates self-sufficiency and individualism in this essay.

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Why is it, that we live in a society that thinks success and lying is more important than honesty? Could it possibly be because this was how we grew up? Blinded by our own self- preservation, It’s not our fault. We learn from our mentors, parents and even by strangers we pass on the streets. It’s hard to process that this has been a constant battle in not just our time era, but decades before us.

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Thoreau, in the passage Where I Lived, and What I Lived For, utilizes distraction as a metaphor for unnecessary things by using the overall theme of water. He begins this idea by urging people with “let us rise … without perturbation.” The joining phrase “let us” in the sentence suggests how we should live. In this context, perturbation means a deviation from a system which usually is caused by an outside force. He says that we should live without being distracted or “deviated” from our regular lives by unnecessary things.

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In Walden, written by Henry David Thoreau, the author expresses the immense longing that we, as human beings, need to give up our connection to our ever-growing materialism in order to revert back to self-sufficient happiness. In Walden, the reader is able to infer that Thoreau feels as if we are becoming enslaved by our material possessions, as well as believes that the study of nature should replace and oppose our enslavement, and that we are to “open new channels of thought” by turning our eyes inward and studying ourselves. Thoreau feels that we are becoming enslaved by our material possessions. As stated in the chapter “In the Where I Lived, and What I Lived For”, Thoreau states that “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.” (972).

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Why I Went to the Woods by Henry David Thoreau is a piece of literature taken from the book Walden that discusses Thoreau’s desire to experience life and it's meaning by living by the most simple terms possible. Thoreau lived off the land, built his own home, hunted and fished his own food. Through these things, Thoreau experienced how life is lived without luxury and only with the raw basics. Although his passion for the natural world shows through his writing his goal is not to persuade others to follow in his footsteps by going out and living in nature. Thoreau wanted others to follow him by living their best life which would be achieved by following their passions and the things they enjoy.

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He does not disdain human companionship; in fact he values it when it comes on his own terms, as when his philosopher or poet friends come to call. Thoreau calls for people to be givers rather than takers in the economic game of life by “living deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life” (410). Thoreau claims that by reducing the unnecessary excess in our life, one can then contribute to society and give more than they take. Thoreau suggests on how to embark upon how to reduce the unnecessary items in our life by “[letting our] affairs be two or three, [and] instead of three meals a day, [eat] but one” (410). Thoreau also introduces the concept that self-reliance can be spiritual as well as economic, and explores the higher dimensions of individualism.

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