Bookmark Thoreau : Quote unquote
Saturday, May 21, 2022
  • Circulation
  • Advertise
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy
Organiser
  • ‌
  • Bharat
  • World
  • Editorial
  • Analysis
  • Opinion
  • Defence
  • Sports
  • Business
  • More
    • RSS in News
    • Special Report
    • Culture
    • Sci & Tech
    • Entertainment
    • Education
    • Books
    • Interviews
    • Travel
    • Health
    • Obituary
SUBSCRIBE
No Result
View All Result
Organiser
  • ‌
  • Bharat
  • World
  • Editorial
  • Analysis
  • Opinion
  • Defence
  • Sports
  • Business
  • More
    • RSS in News
    • Special Report
    • Culture
    • Sci & Tech
    • Entertainment
    • Education
    • Books
    • Interviews
    • Travel
    • Health
    • Obituary
No Result
View All Result
Organiser
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Bharat
  • World
  • Editorial
  • Opinion
  • Analysis
  • Culture
  • Defence
  • RSS in News
  • Subscribe
Home General

Bookmark Thoreau : Quote unquote

Archive Manager by Archive Manager
Aug 28, 2011, 12:00 am IST
in General
Jeay Sindh Freedom Movement chairman Sohail Abro

Jeay Sindh Freedom Movement chairman Sohail Abro

Share on FacebookShare on TwitterTelegramEmail

NEARLY all that H D Thoreau has said is quotable. So profound he was. He is till date an unmatched American intellectual and social figure. The Thoreau Society is the oldest and largest organisation devoted to an American author. He lived a short life, forty-five years from 1817-1862. And yet has influenced generations of leaders world over. Tolstoy, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr, and several such leaders have drawn inspiration from the words of Thoreau.

And hence, The Quotable Thoreau, edited by Jeffrey S Cramer is a highly readable collection of Thoreau’s words indexed under various topics. There are over 2,000 quotes in the book, some published, some not yet published from 150 subjects.

The profile of Thoreau is interesting. “Thoreau was the vegetarian who ate meat; the conservationist who surveyed woodlots in Walden Woods; the pacifist who endorsed violence; the hermit who loved gossip. This is not to support his detractors who held him a hypocrite. it is, instead, to confirm that he was a questioner of the very concepts we have come to associate with his name.”

In an unpublished poem, against slavery, Thoreau says ‘Wait not till slaves pronounced the word/ To set the captive free,/ Be free yourselves, be not deferred,/And farewell slavery.”

Thoreau is insightful on friendship. He says “The language of friendship is not words but meanings. It is an intelligence above language.” “All that has been said of friendship is like botany to flowers.” “Treat your friends for what you know them to be — regard no surfaces. consider not what they did, but what they intended.” “Who are the estranged? Two friends explaining.”

On governance he says, “That certainly is the best government where the inhabitants are least often reminded of the government.” “The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free. They are the lovers of law and older, who observe the law when the government breaks it.”

The quote on silence: “The silence rings — it musical and thrills me. A night in which the silence was audible — I hear the unspeakable.” And on music “Listen to music religiously as if it were the last strain you might hear.” “When I hear music I fear no danger, I am invulnerable, I see no foe. I am related to the earliest times and to the latest.”

Thoreau wrote his most known essay on civil disobedience after spending a night in prison because he did not pay the taxes when he was approached by the tax collector when he was out on a stroll into town. Though his tax was paid by the tax collector’s daughter, he refused to get out of the jail in the night, as he had already removed his boots!

All the quotes have been sourced and indexed. There is a section on what Thoreau said about his contemporaries and what they said about him. Jeffrey S Cramer is curator of collections at the Thoreau Institute at Walden Woods and editor of many books.

(Princeton University Press, 41, William Street, Princeton, New Jersey-08540; press.princeon.edu)

ShareTweetSendShareSend
Previous News

Warm thoughts on green politics

Next News

Thinking Aloud The decline and fall of the West

Related News

Gyanvapi Verdict: Court refuses to change commissioner; orders to present survey report on 17 May

SC transfers Gyanvapi mosque case to District Judge Varanasi

Nepal, China BRI projects show no progress even after 5 years: Report

Nepal, China BRI projects show no progress even after 5 years: Report

WHO to convene emergency meeting over monkeypox outbreak

WHO to convene emergency meeting over monkeypox outbreak

Know Everything about the new World Boxing Champion Nikhat Zareen

Know Everything about the new World Boxing Champion Nikhat Zareen

President Kovind holds key discussions with Saint Vincent top leaders

President Kovind holds key discussions with Saint Vincent top leaders

Exodus of mafia, ‘babubalis’ come to surrender in UP since Yogi became CM: Union Home Minister Amit Shah

Amit Shah to embark on a two-day visit to Arunachal tomorrow

Comments

The comments posted here/below/in the given space are not on behalf of Organiser. The person posting the comment will be in sole ownership of its responsibility. According to the central government's IT rules, obscene or offensive statement made against a person, religion, community or nation is a punishable offense, and legal action would be taken against people who indulge in such activities.

Latest News

Gyanvapi Verdict: Court refuses to change commissioner; orders to present survey report on 17 May

SC transfers Gyanvapi mosque case to District Judge Varanasi

Nepal, China BRI projects show no progress even after 5 years: Report

Nepal, China BRI projects show no progress even after 5 years: Report

WHO to convene emergency meeting over monkeypox outbreak

WHO to convene emergency meeting over monkeypox outbreak

Know Everything about the new World Boxing Champion Nikhat Zareen

Know Everything about the new World Boxing Champion Nikhat Zareen

President Kovind holds key discussions with Saint Vincent top leaders

President Kovind holds key discussions with Saint Vincent top leaders

Exodus of mafia, ‘babubalis’ come to surrender in UP since Yogi became CM: Union Home Minister Amit Shah

Amit Shah to embark on a two-day visit to Arunachal tomorrow

VHP Writes to UP Law Commission Opposing Some Sections of Draft Bill on Population Control

VHP applauds historical HC directive for investigation by both CBI and NIA in Kaliachak proselytizing case 

China’s illegal rosewood trade with Mali under probe

China’s illegal rosewood trade with Mali under probe

Navjot Singh Sidhu moves SC seeking more time to surrender, cites medical conditions

Fix goals for next 25 years, work to fulfil aspirations of people: PM Modi to party workers

Fix goals for next 25 years, work to fulfil aspirations of people: PM Modi to party workers

  • Circulation
  • Advertise
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy

© Bharat Prakashan (Delhi) Limited.
Tech-enabled by Ananthapuri Technologies

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Bharat
  • World
  • Editorial
  • Analysis
  • Opinion
  • Defence
  • Culture
  • Sports
  • Business
  • RSS in News
  • Special Report
  • Sci & Tech
  • Entertainment
  • Education
  • Books
  • Interviews
  • Travel
  • Health
  • Obituary
  • Subscribe
  • About Us
  • Advertise
  • Circulation
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy

© Bharat Prakashan (Delhi) Limited.
Tech-enabled by Ananthapuri Technologies