Despite being constantly criticized for his unique ways, Henry David Thoreau influenced the ways that people thought about society and themselves in America. While at Walden Pond for 2 years and 2 months, he discovered that the key to making his life more fulfilling was to make it simpler. He first brought the question, "How do I really want to live?" out to the forefront of the Transcendentalist movement in the 19th century. Henry David Thoreau's Walden emphasized the truth that simplicity in nature and life, not material possessions, is the solution to a rewarding life.
Walden brought in to light the ways that he thought people were living, from the outside of society. He even used simplicity in the way he viewed people, using the metaphor, "Still we live meanly, like ants; though the fable tells us that we were long ago changed into men"(Where I Lived). Because "...life
English: Portrait by Benjamin D. Maxham (daguerreo...
English: Signature of author Henry David Thoreau
Original title page of Walden featuring a picture ...is frittered away by detail"(Where), he feels that a person needs "Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!"(Where) in order to be completely happy. His views bring out many conflicting thoughts in a person, and even today he is not completely understood. He mocks the feeling of men that "...the Nation have commerce, and export ice, and talk through a telegraph..."(Where) and proves that such belongings do not bring happiness by being an example. He shows that a life can by simple, free and happy when his "...enemies are worms, cool days, and most of all woodchucks"(The Bean Field). Yet he is not completely different from other Transcendentalists, for common to Emerson, he feels "How worn and dusty...must be the highways of the world, how deep the ruts of tradition and conformity!"(Conclusion). Despite his many differences with other Transcendentalists, Henry David Thoreau agrees through Walden that the key to life is simplicity...