Walden Study Questions
Instructions: Answer the following questions, using full sentences. You must pull quotes that
support your answers.
1. What reasons does Thoreau give for going to live in the woods?
Going into the woods allows him to simplify his life. He boldly declares: “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. … I wanted
to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life” (13). Yet before his famous declaration, Thoreau
mentions that man has fallen asleep from “a higher life” (12). Living in the woods in an
unplastered cabin, Thoreau seeks to discover life at its most essential, a life that has seemingly
disappeared with the advent of the railroad and speedier news (telegraph, implied).
2. What does Thoreau mean when he says “We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves
awake?”
As briefly mentioned above, “modern” advances in commerce, transportation, and
communication have caused men to lose sight of life, or have fallen asleep. Industry—i.e.,
working in a factory—leads men and women away from what Thoreau considers life, “a rigid
economy, a stern and more than Spartan simplicity of life and elevation of purpose” (13).
Thoreau connects the concept of being awake with his metaphysical dawn. As dawn is the sight
for “Genius,” a man who has the advantage of living a poetic or divine life is truly alive, because
that man lives in “a perpetual morning” (12).
 In what ways to you and I sleep through life?
3. How would you describe Thoreau’s attitude to railroads and commerce?
Thoreau’s attitude to railroads and commerce is mixed. When he first mentions the railroad, he
argues that sleeping men (see the above discussion) form the rails (13-4). He implicitly discusses
the use of immigrants and cheap labor to build the railroads. In “Sounds,” Thoreau uses natural
and unnatural comparisons to discuss the railroad: “scream of a hawk,” “like a comet,” “steam
cloud like a banner,” “like many a downy cloud” “this traveling demigod, this cloud-compeller,”
“iron horse,” “snort like thunder,” and “a celestial train” (19). Thoreau’s description of the
railroad has natural semblances, yet it is mythological in how he approaches the subject. In fact,
he refers to it as “the new Mythology” (19). The railroad has ultimately changed the course of
people’s lives (20). It is a dangerously illusory part of nature.
Yet, for all his wariness about the railroad, Thoreau admires commerce. He applauds its
enterprise—boldness or ambition—and bravery (20). He calls it “unexpectedly confident and
serene, alert, adventurous, and unwearied. He enjoys how the railroads connect commercial
enterprises up and down the United States; this allows him to “feel more like a citizen of the
world” (21). The resources that Thoreau discusses intrigue me, because they are both natural and
man-made. But Thoreau can never be completely satisfied with society. He recalls how railroad
commerce has disrupted the pastoral lives of drovers (cattle drivers). Thus, commerce and
railways represent “the restless road” and a convenience for walking to Concord (22). He ends
on an ambivalent note.
4. In “Solitude,” Thoreau asks “What do we want most to dwell near to?” According to him,
what do all men seek? How does he qualify this desire?
All men wish to dwell close “to the perennial source of our life, whence in all our experience we
have found that to issue, as the willow stands near the water and sends out its roots in that
direction” (27). Instead of desiring to live closer to other men, Thoreau argues that men want to
live close to whatever gives them live, which I assume is nature. However, Thoreau qualifies
nature as relative to each man. He states, “[the perennial source of our life] will vary with
different natures, but this is the place where a wise man will dig his cellar” (27). There exists
some ambiguity with “different natures” in the above statement. Thoreau could be referring to
different human nature, natural spaces, or both.
 Different human nature = individual relationships with “life”
 Different natural spaces = individual relationships with nature that are shaped by the
geological and topographical characteristics of that location
5. Thoreau is a quote machine. Write here some of your favorite quotes.
“it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we
look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts” (13).
 The ultimate art, according to Thoreau, is when awake men and women work to improve
the quality of the day. But day is somewhat ambiguous: is he referring to the individual’s
day or society’s or community’s?
“Our life is frittered away by detail. … Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity” (13)!
 In what ways do you and I make life more complicated that it should be? How would you
argue Thoreau on this point?
“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
reality. This is always exhilarating and sublime. By closing the eyes and slumbering, and
consenting to be deceived by shows, men establish and confirm their daily life of routine and
habit everywhere, which still is built on purely illusory foundations” (15).
 This quote returns to the above question. How often do you and I allow shows, petty fears
and pleasures to distract us from real life / matters?
“Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it; but while I drink I see the sandy bottom
and detect how shallow it is. Its thin currents slides away, but eternity remains” (16).
“Nothing can rightly compel a simple and brave man to a vulgar sadness” (26).
 I need this truth in my life. Barring mental illness (which runs in my family), I should not
allow sadness to force a funk on me. Interestingly, Thoreau mirrors Emerson in this
passage; like his mentor, he finds that all seasons and temperaments are good for man.
“Society is commonly too cheap. … We have had to agree on a certain set of rules, called
etiquette and politeness, to make this frequent meeting tolerable and that we need not come to
open war” (28-9).
 Cheeky New England humor: Thoreau lets readers know how he feels about social
conventions.