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3.6 AVERAGE
3.6 AVERAGE
i don’t rate books i read for school because i hate required reading, but this book is a prime example of WHY i hate required reading. this privilege white man goes on and on about how important it is that we all be self-sufficient like him WHILE HIS MOTHER LITERALLY BROUGHT HIM FOOD AND DID HIS LAUNDRY. why should i take anything he says seriously!!!!!! aside from my beef with thoreau as a person, i genuinely hated reading this. the structure was wack and incoherent and rambling and ANNOYING. i could not bring myself to care about a single thing he said.
can we agree as a society that there is no literature before 1950 that is worth reading? because i am yet to find one that hasn’t made me want to collapse from sheer boredom. all my high school english teachers would hate that i said this lmao
can we agree as a society that there is no literature before 1950 that is worth reading? because i am yet to find one that hasn’t made me want to collapse from sheer boredom. all my high school english teachers would hate that i said this lmao
Walden: dude goes to live in a park & the rest is just a long series of rants on beans, mackerels, oak planks, plastering, vegetarianism and being by far any city-dweller's superior.
Civil Disobedience: the government tolerates slavery and that's so so bad, but these fuckers make me pay taxes and that's where I draw the line !!
Civil Disobedience: the government tolerates slavery and that's so so bad, but these fuckers make me pay taxes and that's where I draw the line !!
I can sum the book up in one word: "pompous." Throughout this book it is patently obvious that Thoreau thinks quite a lot of himself, his ideas and his little pond. The narrative meanders with no constructive purpose. The reader is hard pressed to discern a purpose for the book much less the supporting points for that purpose. This is one of those well-known classics to which I pose the following question. How on earth did this become a classic. I finish the book thinking "why bother?"
That's not much of a recommendation.
If one is motivated to read the classics, this is a must even if I believe it to be a chore. Other than that, I absolutely do not recommend the book.
That's not much of a recommendation.
If one is motivated to read the classics, this is a must even if I believe it to be a chore. Other than that, I absolutely do not recommend the book.
Thoreau has some literary chops, and his descriptions of Walden Pond and his musings on life and Transcendentalism are profound and sometimes wry. I was also surprised by the revolutionary thought and tone of Civil Disobedience. I loved reading this American classic.
There were some great quotable moments in these essays, but some essays were very dated. A few were too relevant, such as Civil Disobedience. I also enjoyed the plethora of unusual words Thoreau used, from foliaecious to silicious.
I will go back to nature! I will go back to nature by living in my friend's back yard, having hot meals brought to me three times a day, and having company almost every evening!
Maybe it's not that I don't like Thoreau. Maybe I'm just jealous. I might be jealous. Someday I'll have a treehouse. Someday.
Maybe it's not that I don't like Thoreau. Maybe I'm just jealous. I might be jealous. Someday I'll have a treehouse. Someday.
This book contains some absolute gold, but also boring chapters about nature. Maybe they didn't have editors in the 1800s.
It's a must read, but do start speed reading when it gets tiring.
It's a must read, but do start speed reading when it gets tiring.
If Thoreau were alive today, he’d be that hipster cousin you see at Thanksgiving that doesn’t really have a job but spends a lot of time blogging and owns a Subaru with a “coexist” bumpersticker, but is still super problematic. I remember really liking this in high school. Maybe because his ideas were more new to me then.
Finally finished! Now I must chew it over... Thoreau is still an original and energetic mind. Read at your own risk, you may find yourself changed as a result.