Thoreau's Synthesizing Metaphor: Two Fishes With One Hook

Abstract

Although some studies have been done concerning Henry David Thoreau's craftsmanship, emphasis is not generally placed on the relationship between Waiden s art and Waiden s philosophy. Despite its practical application to such diverse contemporary phenomena as nonviolent resistance and communal organization, Waiden speaks to us not merely because it affirms the ultimate in man-and-tiie-land relationships but because its artistic unity also demonstrates how we truly can transcend lives of quiet desperation. This transcendence develops through Walden's internal organizing structure of metaphor, and is extended to the point that metaphor becomes philosophic system. Thus Thoreau doubly demonstrates that we can, within ourselves, overcome the perpetual struggle between self and society, that we can emerge from the particular and die finite to the universal and the infinite. Despite the apparently rambling nature of Thoreau's prose, Walden's introductory chapter, "Economy," demonstrates economy of expression. Thoreau's first statement concerning his mode of life refutes the criticism tiiat he is impertinent and states radier tiiat his life-style is "very natural and pertinent." His uniting the words natural and pertinent has far-reaching implications. Natural suggests the innate, the instinctively moral, the free, the uninhibited, while pertinent suggests the logical, the suitable, the reasonable. It seems to be a rather ambitious comment for one to claim that his life is both logical or reasonable and, at the same time, natural or free. Thoreau's fusion of two such generally antithetic terms anticipates the sweeping scope of his