Henry David Thoreau And Transcendentalism

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Social reformer — Naturalist — Philosopher — Transcendentalist — Scientist. These are just some of the terms by which the work of Henry David Thoreau can be categorized as based on his multiple “lives.” Henry David Thoreau is recognized as an important contributor to the American literary and the philosophical movement, New England Transcendentalism. His essays, books, and poems weave together two central themes over the course of his intellectual career: the nature of life and the conduct of humans. Thoreau began a journal at the suggestion of his friend, Ralph Waldo Emerson on October 22, 1837. This journal consists of Thoreau’s experiences along with peaceful and spiteful thoughts on the world as he is researching through nature for the …show more content…
H. Auden. Auden can align with Thoreau in his poem, “Musée des Beaux Arts,” which was based on Pieter Breughel’s painting, “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus,” the Greek myth of the tragic fall of Icarus. The audience assumes that Icarus’s disaster would be the focal point of the painting, but it clearly is not. Why does he choose to portray Icarus as not the main focus? In the poem, Auden writes that the ploughman in the scene turns away “Quite leisurely from the disaster” and even though he may have “heard the splash, the forsaken cry..for him it was not an important failure,” (Auden 15-17). The ploughman perceives the falling of Icarus as insignificant because he does not want to involve himself with someone who went against the gods, knowing that mankind should not disrupt natural order. The ploughman does not want to be involved with those who has fallen victim to eating the forbidden fruit on the tree. Another example of shifting perspective can be when the poet claims, “As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green / Water, and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen / Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky, / Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on” (Auden 18-21). The bystanders on the ship react with awe due to the sight of Icarus’s transcend, whereas the ploughman does not take notice of Icarus at
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