Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862) was 'n Amerikaanse skrywer en filosoof. Hy is veral bekend vir sy boek, Walden, waarin hy peins oor 'n eenvoudige lewe in 'n natuurlike omgewing, asook sy opstel Civil Disobedience ("Burgerlike ongehoorsaamheid"), waarin hy 'n argument stel vir individuele weerstand teen staatsregering ten tye van morele opposisie van 'n onregverdige staat.

Thoreau se boeke, artikels, opstelle, joernale en gedigte tel saam meer as 20 volumes. Tussen sy blywende bydraes was sy skrywes oor natuurgeskiedenis, waarin hy die metodiek en vindings van ekologie voorsien het, en omgewingsgeskiedenis; beide vorms van moderne omgewingskunde.

Hy was sy lewe lank ten gunste van die afskaffing van slawerny en het lesings gegee wat die wette rakende voortvlugtende slawe aangeval het. Hy het die skrywes van Wendell Phillips geprys en ander ondersteuners van die afskaffing van slawerny, soos John Brown, verdedig. Thoreau se filosofie van burgerlike ongehoorsaamheid het die politieke denke en dade van latere figure soos Leo Tolstoi, Mahatma Gandhi en Martin Luther King jr. beïnvloed.

Daar word soms na Thoreau verwys as 'n individualistiese anargisJohnson, Ellwood. The Goodly Word: The Puritan Influence in America Literature, Clements Publishing, 2005, bl. 138.Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences, edited by Edwin Robert Anderson Seligman, Alvin Saunders Johnson, 1937, bl. 12. en 'n inspirasie vir ander anargiste. Alhoewel sy skrywes die verbetering, liewer as afskaffing van regering aanbeveel,"I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government" Thoreau, H. D. Resistance to Civil Government mik die genoemde verbeterings na regeringloosheid: "Die beste regering is een wat geensins regeer nie en wanneer mense daarop voorbereid is, sal dit die soort regering wees wat hulle sal hê".“‘That government is best which governs not at all;’ and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.”Thoreau, H. D. Resistance to Civil Government

Werke
 Aulus Persius Flaccus (1840)Aulus Persius Flaccus  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 The Service (1840)
 A Walk to Wachusett (1842)A Walk to Wachusett  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Paradise (to be) Regained (1843)Paradise (to be) Regained  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 The Landlord (1843)
 Sir Walter Raleigh (essay) (1844)
 Herald of Freedom (essay)(1844)Herald of Freedom  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Wendell Phillips Before the Concord Lyceum (1845)Wendell Phillips Before the Concord Lyceum  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Reform and the Reformers (1846–48)
 Thomas Carlyle and His Works (1847)Thomas Carlyle and His Works  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
 Civil Disobedience of On the Duty of Civil Disobedience (1849)
 An Excursion to Canada (1853)A Yankee in Canada  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Slavery in Massachusetts (1854)Slavery in Massachusetts  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Walden (1854)Walden  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 A Plea for Captain John Brown (1859)A Plea for Captain John Brown  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Remarks After the Hanging of John Brown (1859)After the Death of John Brown  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 The Last Days of John Brown (1860)
 Walking (1862)
 Autumnal Tints (1862)Autumnal Tints  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Wild Apples: The History of the Apple Tree (1862)
 The Fall of the Leaf (1863)
 Excursions (bundel) (1863)
 Life Without Principle (1863)
 Night and Moonlight (1863)
 The Highland Light (1864)
 The Maine Woods (1864)The Maine Woods  from The Thoreau Reader Ten volle geannoteerde uitgawe. Jeffrey S. Cramer, red., Yale University Press, 2009
 Cape Cod (1865)
 Letters to Various Persons (1865)
 A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-Slavery and Reform Papers (1866)
 Early Spring in Massachusetts (1881)
 Summer (1884)
 Winter (1888)
 Autumn (1892)
 Miscellanies (1894)Miscellanies from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Familiar Letters of Henry David Thoreau (1894)
 Poems of Nature (1895)
 Some Unpublished Letters of Henry D. and Sophia E. Thoreau (1898)
 The First and Last Journeys of Thoreau (1905)
 Journal of Henry David Thoreau (1906)The Journal of Henry D. Thoreau  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 The Correspondence of Henry David Thoreau geredigeer deur Walter Harding en Carl Bode (Washington Square: New York University Press, 1958)The Correspondence of Thoreau  from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection
 Poets of the English Language (Viking Press, 1950)
 I Was Made Erect and Lone
 The Bluebird Carries the Sky on His Back (Stanyan, 1970)
 The Dispersion of Seeds gepubliseer as Faith in a Seed (Island Press, 1993)
 The Indian Notebooks (1847-1861) keur deur Richard F. Fleck

 Verwysings 

Kategorie:Amerikaanse filosowe
Kategorie:Geboortes in 1817
Kategorie:Sterftes in 1862