<p>For my AP Lang and Comp class, I wrote an essay for Thoreau and his vision. I’d like an opinion of this essay. I know it has flaws, but personally I think that this is a milestone for me in terms of writing, since English was one of my weakest points (although I do pretty decent on it). But I know that I have a lot to improve. </p>
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Essay – Thoreau On Modern Life</p>
<pre><code>Henry David Thoreau lives by the idea of being free from commitments, and unbounded by the grips of modern society. Thoreau conveys these ideas in his work “Where I lived and What I Lived For”, by giving his own model of how a person should live, as well as his attitudes towards modern life. Although there are exceptions to his argument, Thoreau’s views can be qualified by various problematic lifestyle issues that modern people have.
Thoreau suggests that modern people are “determined to be starved before we are hungry” (pg 3). Modern life is so entrenched with a cycle of endless searching that people can’t appreciate the value of what they have now. In today’s world, society gives the standard that young adults have to complete higher education to access a professional job, just to stay amongst the middle class life. This makes the lives of students and young adults a part of a process, which they feel are mandatory… So rather than appreciating the value of their education, they are much more concerned with what job they will get and whether or not they are going to be successful in life. Thoreau believes that if people appreciate the beauty of the present, as well as what they have, then life can be more enjoyable and less of a chore. This directly relates to the example of students and young adults, where if they were to appreciate the value of their education, and improve on themselves, then they can be successful, as opposed to being successful by the means of having an education and a job. Thoreau also suggests that “If we read of one man robbed…”, then “we never need read of another” (pg 4). Modern news is a cycle of repeated events and gives nothing new intellectually. This is ever present in today’s newspaper and stations which give a report about a same topic every day with nothing new but the small details such as the person, location and etc. With all these problematic issues, Thoreau gives advice on how to live life to the fullest.
In light of the problematic issues society is faced with, Thoreau gives a handful of advice on how to find value in life. His criticism on “Why should we knock under and go with the stream?”(pg 7) is one of society’s greatest flaws. With society come standards that people follow, and if one were not to follow them, they would be seen as unorthodox. However, Thoreau suggests that we shouldn’t follow the settled guidelines of society and rather make our own individual ones. For example, rather than follow the crowd and join organizations that you have no interest in just to please society’s standards, one should do things that he wishes and is passionate about. Thoreau wants us to “settle ourselves and work and wedge our feet downward through the mud and slush of……religion” (pg 7), and by doing that, mankind can see the true nature of life and “fact”. Thoreau is correct because in modern day, life is controlled by an overwhelming list of factors such as organized religion, media, society, and the like. Thoreau is trying to convey that life becomes just another statistic if you follow any higher authority than yourself.
Modern life was substantially different from life in the early 1800’s when Thoreau wrote his work of literature. Thoreau couldn’t predict many of the necessities that we have now, and shifts in societal values. Products such as the computers have arguably been one of the best inventions in history of mankind and impacted nearly every facet of life. It borderlines necessity and also dominates life so much as to say it compares to the railroad analogy that Thoreau gave: “We do not ride on the railroad; it rides upon us” (pg 2). However, one can challenge his belief that mankind’s inventions rule upon them, as computers has bettered life in numerous ways and even simplifying life, which was Thoreau’s main argument and value. Although Thoreau’s arguments largely hold valid even until modern day, there are a few small flaws in trying to compare modern life to life in the 1800’s due to so much change.
Transcendentalism was a philosophical movement in the early 1800’s emphasizing individualism and self-reliance. Thoreau’s work was centered on the idea that people should stop being dependent on any authority other then themselves, and that we should form our own individualistic life. Most of his values are even qualified till this day, and are reasonable ways to better mankind’s lives in relation to the ever increasing problematic life styles that society is bound to create.
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<p>Thanks guys!</p>