Lost and Found in Walden :: Walden Essays

Lost and Found  in  Walden Thoreau found himself at Walden - and lost himself on Ktaadn. Walden, a mile from town, was a benign experience in which he learned what he could do without, what was essential for life. Ktaadn, high and remote, taught him what he could not do without, what was essential life. He spoke of the hostility of the landscape. The mountain seemed to speak to him: "Why came ye here before your time? This ground is not prepared for you . . . I cannot pity or fondle you here, but (must) forever relentlessly drive thee hence to where I am kind." This landscape is hostile, not kind. It is "unforgiving and inhospitable to man" (Sidney). He responds to this imagined chastening with an apology, a verse explaining " . . . my way lies through your spacious empire up to light" - the way to light/enlightenment. The Web material illuminated somewhat Thoreau’s need for this experience - he had expressed a desire to "witness our own limits transgressed." He got what he came for. It seems to me that he did not anticipate such a terrifying experience, such utter alienation. Thoreau described this as "primeval, untamed, and forever untamable Nature" - "vast and drear and inhuman". "Man was not to be associated with it . . . It was Matter, vast, terrific, . . the home . . of Necessity and Fate." This was nature in its most primitive form. It did not allow, tolerate or acknowledge man’s control or manipulations, or even his need to comprehend. This is the same Matter from which our bodies are made, our physical nature. This is terrifying, alienating to Thoreau: "I stand in awe of my own body, this matter to which I am bound has become so strange to me . . . I fear bodies, I tremble to meet them." His purpose is met - he "witnesses his own limits transgressed". He senses that "his reason is dispersed." He tries to voice his feelings of alienation - and finds he is removed even from his voice, can only shout "Contact! Contact!" Wendy notes that Thoreau is "really failing at describing what he is trying to describe." Stacy notes that this passage is related to "a person getting a sense of their self in relation to Nature." The Web material describes Thoreau’s practice of linking landscape and identity.