Selections by the celebrated author include poems, letters, journal entries, and the complete texts of "Walden" and "Civil Disobedience."

Thoreau's famous account of a year spent in a cabin at Walden Pond near Concord, during which he made many observations about nature, human life, and the importance of simplicity. Also includes his influential essay "Civil disobedience," arguing that since what is law is not necessarily right, and just because the majority decides an issue doesn't automatically make that issue palatable to a man's conscience, individuals should sometimes oppose the...

"It was his friend Ralph Waldo Emerson, another inveterate journal keeper, who urged Thoreau to keep a record of his thoughts and observations. Begun in 1837, Thoreau's journal spans a period of twenty-five years and runs to more than two million words, coming to a halt only in 1861, shortly before the author's death. The handwritten journal had somewhat humble origins, but as it grew in scope and ambition it came to function as a record of Thoreau's...

Henry David Thoreau wrote four full-length works, collected here in a single volume. Interweaving natural observation, personal experience, and historical lore, they reveal his brilliance not only as a writer, but as a naturalist, scholar, historian, poet, and philosopher. "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers" is based on a boat trip taken with his brother from Concord, Massachusetts to Concord, New Hampshire. "Walden" is at once a personal...

Henry D. Thoreau (1817–62) was an American author, naturalist, poet, and philosopher. He wrote many essays and books, including Civil Disobedience, Walking, and The Maine Woods, among others. John Updike (1932–2009) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, short story writer, and poet. One of the most influential and compelling books in American literature, Walden is a vivid account of the years that Henry D. Thoreau spent alone in a secluded...