February 13th, 2010 | 
Author: Im Reading : Thoreau:Walden- "The Bean Field", "Baker Farm", High Laws"
Emerson: "Self Reliance" , "Wealth"
Douglass: Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass an American Slave- CH 11
Out of these readings i must find out how work guides the development of the self. English is my second language so it is very hard for me to understand these reading.. if any one can help that would be GREAT.. Please … thanks so much
The bean field:
"This chapter has several purposes. One is, of course, to tell about his bean field. However, that is the smallest part of the material in this chapter. More important for him is to tell about what he liked about working in the bean field and why he didn’t continue to work there.
However, his strongest purpose is to talk about what we could do instead of continuing to plant our fields in the way that people always have. While his ideas are not fleshed out, he evidently saw farming as an opportunity to create a benefit for the future; that is, the farmer’s intent would be to gradually improve the qualities of his fields and land, something that many farmers do and many do not. He would like to see an end to the war between man and Nature, so that the farmer would be less concerned about personal gain and more concerned with the wealth of all Nature, an attitude illustrated in the books of David Grayson. Unfortunately, agriculture today tends to focus on profit and immediate results. Also Thoreau uses this opportunity to suggest that we should focus more on improving mankind.
The baker farm:
From my first reading of Walden, "Baker Farm" has been one of my favorite chapters. All of Walden is an explanation of Thoreau’s philosophy of life, but here he gets the chance to explain his lifestyle to a poor family who could directly profit from it. Thus, he explains how he lives very simply and practically. However, the message is ignored, as the family is content with following customs rather than thinking out new solutions.
Baker Farm epitomizes for me the problem of explaining Thoreauvian values to the people around us. A Thoreauvian understanding of the world can solve a lot of practical problems, even if the person is not interested in meditation or the beauty of Nature. Indeed, the current mode of living, with people on a consumer treadmill, never getting an opportunity to enjoy the material possessions that they have heaped up, while damaging both the environment and their own health, is very difficult to defend, if ever examined. However, people do not examine the whole problem but simply react to one issue at a time, often in a contradictory manner. And thus, they cannot see any value in making sweeping lifestyle changes.
This chapter also provides an effective encapsulation of the Thoreauvian view of life.
Higher laws:
In my view, "Higher Laws" is a disappointing chapter. First, Thoreau does not discuss here what I consider to be the true higher laws. "Higher Laws" deals with the animal versus the spiritual nature of man and argues for remaining pure and temperate. While being pure and temperate has some value, the true higher laws inspire us to sacrifice our immediate, personal well-being for higher principles, as we find in Tolstoy’s The Kingdom of God Is Within You. Thoreau, in other parts of Walden and in "Civil Disobedience," does demonstrate these true higher laws (for instance {from "Civil Disobedience"}, "If I have unjustly wrestled a plank from a drowning man, I must restore it to him, though I drown myself") but he does not mention them here. Second, Thoreau is not very clear in this chapter. When discussing the killing of animals, his argument wanders around and lacks a definite conclusion. His discussion of other kinds of purity is much too vague and traditional. Finally, a number of the statements in this chapter ring false to me.
Still, his discussion of hunting and the killing of animals for food, while not a strong and focused argument, has been influential. Probably due to this chapter, H. Salt introduced Gandhi to Thoreau while Gandhi was struggling to avoid eating meat. In fact, this chapter helped influence me to quit eating mammals. And this chapter also helps us understand Thoreau’s motivations better.
Thoreau is so circumspect towards the end of "Higher Laws" that his point may be elusive, but the purpose of the chapter is an argument for purity. Thoreau lived in a time between the Puritans and the Victorians, and although he was quite independent in much of his thinking, he was still very conventional in his moral attitudes towards bodily functions, especially sexual functions. Rather than seeing the sexual instincts of a person as a normal, healthy, and biologically necessary part of human nature, Thoreau’s society saw them as examples of depravity and vice. Thoreau struggles for a more balanced view, but he is not very successful. Any time any sexual thought would enter his head, he would try to remove it. Thus Thoreau says in his journal for April 12, 1852, "Whatever may befall me, I trust that I may never lose my respect for purity in others. The subject of sex is one on which I do not wish to meet a man at all unless I can meet him on the most inspiring ground . . . I would preserve purity in act and thought, as I would cherish the memory of my mother." One of his comments on Whitman’s Leaves of Grass was "
Posted in self development
The bean field:
"This chapter has several purposes. One is, of course, to tell about his bean field. However, that is the smallest part of the material in this chapter. More important for him is to tell about what he liked about working in the bean field and why he didn’t continue to work there.
However, his strongest purpose is to talk about what we could do instead of continuing to plant our fields in the way that people always have. While his ideas are not fleshed out, he evidently saw farming as an opportunity to create a benefit for the future; that is, the farmer’s intent would be to gradually improve the qualities of his fields and land, something that many farmers do and many do not. He would like to see an end to the war between man and Nature, so that the farmer would be less concerned about personal gain and more concerned with the wealth of all Nature, an attitude illustrated in the books of David Grayson. Unfortunately, agriculture today tends to focus on profit and immediate results. Also Thoreau uses this opportunity to suggest that we should focus more on improving mankind.
The baker farm:
From my first reading of Walden, "Baker Farm" has been one of my favorite chapters. All of Walden is an explanation of Thoreau’s philosophy of life, but here he gets the chance to explain his lifestyle to a poor family who could directly profit from it. Thus, he explains how he lives very simply and practically. However, the message is ignored, as the family is content with following customs rather than thinking out new solutions.
Baker Farm epitomizes for me the problem of explaining Thoreauvian values to the people around us. A Thoreauvian understanding of the world can solve a lot of practical problems, even if the person is not interested in meditation or the beauty of Nature. Indeed, the current mode of living, with people on a consumer treadmill, never getting an opportunity to enjoy the material possessions that they have heaped up, while damaging both the environment and their own health, is very difficult to defend, if ever examined. However, people do not examine the whole problem but simply react to one issue at a time, often in a contradictory manner. And thus, they cannot see any value in making sweeping lifestyle changes.
This chapter also provides an effective encapsulation of the Thoreauvian view of life.
Higher laws:
In my view, "Higher Laws" is a disappointing chapter. First, Thoreau does not discuss here what I consider to be the true higher laws. "Higher Laws" deals with the animal versus the spiritual nature of man and argues for remaining pure and temperate. While being pure and temperate has some value, the true higher laws inspire us to sacrifice our immediate, personal well-being for higher principles, as we find in Tolstoy’s The Kingdom of God Is Within You. Thoreau, in other parts of Walden and in "Civil Disobedience," does demonstrate these true higher laws (for instance {from "Civil Disobedience"}, "If I have unjustly wrestled a plank from a drowning man, I must restore it to him, though I drown myself") but he does not mention them here. Second, Thoreau is not very clear in this chapter. When discussing the killing of animals, his argument wanders around and lacks a definite conclusion. His discussion of other kinds of purity is much too vague and traditional. Finally, a number of the statements in this chapter ring false to me.
Still, his discussion of hunting and the killing of animals for food, while not a strong and focused argument, has been influential. Probably due to this chapter, H. Salt introduced Gandhi to Thoreau while Gandhi was struggling to avoid eating meat. In fact, this chapter helped influence me to quit eating mammals. And this chapter also helps us understand Thoreau’s motivations better.
Thoreau is so circumspect towards the end of "Higher Laws" that his point may be elusive, but the purpose of the chapter is an argument for purity. Thoreau lived in a time between the Puritans and the Victorians, and although he was quite independent in much of his thinking, he was still very conventional in his moral attitudes towards bodily functions, especially sexual functions. Rather than seeing the sexual instincts of a person as a normal, healthy, and biologically necessary part of human nature, Thoreau’s society saw them as examples of depravity and vice. Thoreau struggles for a more balanced view, but he is not very successful. Any time any sexual thought would enter his head, he would try to remove it. Thus Thoreau says in his journal for April 12, 1852, "Whatever may befall me, I trust that I may never lose my respect for purity in others. The subject of sex is one on which I do not wish to meet a man at all unless I can meet him on the most inspiring ground . . . I would preserve purity in act and thought, as I would cherish the memory of my mother." One of his comments on Whitman’s Leaves of Grass was "
References :
http://www.kenkifer.com/Thoreau/
and from my brain….sorry I got nothingon the other books V