Books That Shaped America
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I don't understand how exactly he shaped America?
During the "Walden" period he lived simple, frugal life and invested his time into things he cared about (eg., measuring the depth of the Walden pond in winter). After his crops were ready for the harvest, he took them to the city and sold them with minimal effort, being fascinated by the fact that he didn't have to do almost anything, while he enjoyed all the luxuries of sensible, spiritual life.
He wasn't only author that did such things, but the society really never cared or cares.
Thoreau is forgotten, but for me, at least during his Walden period - he was a proper "hacker".
I'm quite sure that he would condemn the mark of being one of these who shaped the America (or world), because this is not what he wanted.
You answered that right below. That way that he lived is something that a lot of Americans dream of (myself included), just to have a little plot of land all to yourself and be with nature for a while.
> Thoreau is forgotten
Maybe in Europe, but not here. Thoreau is seen as having outlined a very idyllic life, especially for modern times, of living semi-lazily "off the grid".
> I'm quite sure that he would condemn the mark of being one of these who shaped the America (or world), because this is not what he wanted.
Such is the life of a reclusive artist :)
N.B. - Walden Pond is not some mystical place out in the middle of nowhere, it's just outside of Concord, NH[0], site of one of the first battles of the American Revolution just 70 years prior. So, while it was idyllic, it was not like Thoreau was that far away from civilization. The middle of Concord is less than 1.5 miles (2.4km) away from the north shore where Thoreau lived.
[0] - https://www.google.com/maps/place/Walden+Pond,+Concord,+MA+0...
As I've gotten older (34 now), I keep moving further and further out, hoping to capture my own Walden experiences. So far, I've only had courage to get to the edge of the suburbs :(.
Archaeologists found that he had used an order of magnitude more nails than he needed to to build his shelter. He accidentally chopped off part of his toe. His sister brought him food every week.
So he moved fast, broke stuff, and explored self-sufficiency while receiving help from others.
From the link: "Thoreau’s love of nature and his advocacy of a simple life have had a large influence on modern conservation and environmentalist movements."
Beyond Walden, Thoreau's Resistance to Civil Government (also known by the title Civil Disobedience) has been cited as a major influence by civil rights leaders in the United States and abroad.
I don't think it'd be fair at all to say that Thoreau is forgotten in America, even if not everything about modern American life and culture conforms to what he might have wanted for the country.
... and for everything else, there's the library. :)
It sad that her ideas is quite unpopular among general public. And as a consequence Europe and even US go towards socialism these days.
And the Western nations are nowhere near socialism. In the 1950s tax rates topped out around 90%, banks had a stranglehold on capital guaranteed by state run cartels, and you needed a license from a state mandated monopoly to even connect to a telecom network which they would grant rarely at their pleasure if they liked what you might do with it. You couldn't carry money through most countries in person or via a bank and trade often required renting a politician to get permission.
People forget how good they have it today.
The Education of Henry Adams includes some interesting chapters, though it is not nearly Adams's best work: yet what in America has it shaped other than the occasional class reading list? Similarly there are fine and complex works of literature that few have read. Take a poll at the bus stop or the coffee shop and see how many people can quote you five lines out of North of Boston, Spring and All or Howl. (I can do maybe one from Howl and almost certainly the number in it is wrong" "America, when will you become worthy of your two million Trotskyites?") Moby Disk is a fine novel, but how many have read it through; no doubt The Sound and the Fury is also, but it defeated me at an age when I read a lot of Faulkner, and I haven't been back.
And although I wouldn't expect it, there should be some Bukowski on this list too. Also, Gravity's Rainbow?
(12, for the record)
I'm just tired of hearing about these titles. I don't feel a strong heritage connection to them. It's stupid how they are repeatedly brought up, and how loving these worn-out books is seen as being 'literary'.
In the same way that generals are always fighting the last war, high school english is always sharing the profound books from the last cultural paradigm shift.
I think big companies have shaped American culture a lot. Here's something from 2002 about Rand's influence, but Googling around easily turns up more: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/20...
Edit: Oh, I get it - the Bible is not written by an American so it cannot make it into the list of American books. Could have used a hint with the downvote.
And yes, Atlas Shrugged has had a tremendously harmful impact on America, specifically its business culture. It's basically The Bible for capitalism, except instead of worshipping god, you worship the so-called "captains of industry" (aka "job creators").
Capitalism - the positive form of it, which results in prosperity - has been under attack through countless generations for a long time, but it is still the one '-ism' which provides impetus to deliver value, rather than attempts to defeat it. I've seen very little of value in Rand'ian thought - but I can certainly understand the position of anyone who wants to 'get into it', for their own reasons, and get some value from it. Reading such stuff is mental capitalism, after all ..