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The road to Walden : 12 life lessons from a sojourn to Thoreau's cabin

by Dann, Kevin T., 1956-

Format: Print Book 2018
Availability: Available at 3 Libraries 3 of 3 copies

Available (3)
Location Collection Call #
CLP - Main Library Second Floor - Non-fiction PS3057.N3 D36 2018
Location  CLP - Main Library
 
Collection  Second Floor - Non-fiction
 
Call Number  PS3057.N3 D36 2018
 
 
Carnegie Library of McKeesport Nonfiction 818.309 D232
Location  Carnegie Library of McKeesport
 
Collection  Nonfiction
 
Call Number  818.309 D232
 
 
Northland Public Library Nonfiction 818.609 D23
Location  Northland Public Library
 
Collection  Nonfiction
 
Call Number  818.609 D23
 
 

Summary
The acclaimed author of Expect Great Things: The Life and Search of Henry David Thoreau traverses on foot from Manhattan to Walden Pond, retracing Thoreau's steps and unlocking the practical principles of the mystic's life in the woods.

When Henry David Thoreau launched his experiment in living at Walden Pond, he began by walking beyond the narrow limits of his neighbors, simply by putting himself at a mile remove from Concord's bourgeois epicenter - and a thousand-mile remove from stasis, complacency, and conformity. Kevin Dann emulates and extends Thoreau's experiment in radical self-education. Alternating between personal anecdotes from his spring 2017 walking pilgrimage and other "traveler" encounters and episodes told by Thoreau, Dann structures his book around 12 "injunctions"--distillations of seminal stories about overcoming convention and stasis. In this essential reading for every Thoreau enthusiast, naturalist and historian Kevin Dann brings to life an essential American icon in refreshing and modern way.
Published Reviews
Booklist Review: "Any writer with strong legs can walk the 235 miles from Manhattan to Concord, Massachusetts; only Kevin Dann can do so in imaginative communion with Henry David Thoreau. In the process, Dann watches the sun rise above Spuyten Duyul Marsh, aflame with the same ecstasy Thoreau experienced during his mornings at Walden Pond. Encountering a Syrian refugee while walking through Stamford, Dann recalls Thoreau's compassion for the unfortunate Irishman Hugh Quoil. Finally reaching Thoreau's Concord cabin, so concluding his literary pilgrimage, Dann glimpses afresh the mythic vision that opened to America's most resolute individualist upon contemplating there a pinxter flower. But like his spiritual mentor, Dann draws from his contemplation urgent imperatives for life-shaping action, distilling each of his sojourn-segment chapters into such an imperative. Exhorting readers to join him in emulating Thoreau, Dann promises them a richer and fuller life if they will internalize a dozen principles that transformed even the picking of huckleberries into an adventure of discovery for the Concord sage. A bracing revival of Concord transcendentalism.--Bryce Christensen Copyright 2018 Booklist"
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Publisher's Weekly Review: "Naturalist and historian Dann (Expect Great Things: The Life and Search of Henry David Thoreau) uses Thoreau as a pretext for these rambling reflections on his 2017 walking pilgrimage from his home in Brooklyn to Walden Pond. Along the way, he tosses off New Age-flavored insights that he attempts to tie to Thoreau's writings. For example, in Walden, Thoreau praises awakening at dawn, writing, "Morning is when I am awake, and there is a dawn in me," which Dann translates into the considerably more hyperbolic injunction to "Awake! And know that you have slept with Angels." Focusing on Thoreau's acute interest in and observation of the natural world, Dann encourages readers to "sharpen [the senses] perennially and perpetually" until "a sixth sense arises from your five." Adding to the sense of strain, Dann refers to Thoreau familiarly as "Henry," such as describing how he "felt close to Henry" during his journey. Dann reveals much about his own view of the world, but little about Thoreau's. Agent: Myrsini Stephanides, Carol Mann Agency. (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved."
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Additional Information
Subjects Thoreau, Henry David, -- 1817-1862 -- Knowledge -- Natural history.
Thoreau, Henry David, -- 1817-1862 -- Influence.
Walking -- Guidebooks.
Self-realization.
Publisher New York, New York :TarcherPerigee,2018
Language English
Description xvii, 201 pages ; 21 cm
ISBN 9780143132837
0143132830
Other Classic View