Henry David Thoreau: from "Walden" - Discuss

Question 1

ideas of Transcendentalists

Answer 1

• living a simple life and connecting with nature are essential to one’s personal happiness
• do not take things in life for granted
• the importance of individualism and self-reliance
• spiritual well-being is significantly more important than financial well-being

Question 2

which of the following passages from Thoreau’s Walden contains a metaphor or an extended metaphor

Answer 2

sec 10: the intellect is a cleaver; it discerns and rifts its way into the secret of things

Question 3

which quote from Thoreau’s Walden is a good example of the transcendentalist ideal of the need to simplifying our lives

Answer 3

• sec 5: simplify, simplify. instead of three meals a day, if it be necessary to eat but one
• sec 5: simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!… let your affairs be as two or three, not…. a thousand

Question 4

which quote from Thoreau’s Walden is a good example of the transcendentalist ideal of the need to simplifying our lives

Answer 4

sec 4: our life is frittered away by detail

Question 5

which quote from Thoreau’s Walden is a good example of the transcendentalist ideal of having individualism and self-reliance

Answer 5

sec 17: if one advances confidently in.. direction of his dreams… will meet with success unexpected

Question 6

which of the following passages from Thoreau’s Walden contains an extended metaphor – a figure of speech that compares two unlike things or ideas without using “like” or “as”

Answer 6

sec 10: time is but the stream I go a-fishing in