Excursions with Thoreau Philosophy, Poetry, Religion [Hardcover]

Excursions with Thoreauis a major new exploration of Thoreau's writing and thought that is philosophical yet sensitive to the literary and religious.

Edward F. Mooney's excursions through passages fromWalden, Cape Cod, and his late essay Walking reveal Thoreau as a miraculous writer, artist, and religious adept. Of course Thoreau remains the familiar political activist and environmental philosopher, but in these fifteen excursions we discover new terrain. Among the notable themes that emerge are Thoreau's grappling with underlying affliction; his pursuit of wonder as ameliorating affliction; his use of the enigmatic image of a child of the mist; his exalting sympathy with intelligence over plain knowledge; and his preferring befitting reverie-not argument-as the way to be carried to better, cleaner perceptions of reality.

Mooney's aim is bring alive Thoreau's moments of reverie and insight, and to frame his philosophy as poetic and episodic rather than discursive and systematic.

Acknowledgments
Preface
1. Overture
2. Celebration and Lamentation
3. Sympathy with Intelligence
4. Concord Reflections
5. Transforming Perception
6. Ethics and the Wild
7. Expressive Bones
8. Child of the Mist
9. Deaths and Rebirths
10. Affliction and Affinity
11. John Brown
12. Souls in Infinite Culture
13. Currents of Time
14. Grounding Poetry
15. Face of the River
Closing Thoughts
Closing Images, Reveries, Prayers
Closing Passions
Chronology, Works Cited, Credits
Index

Henry David Thoreau brought to philosophical writing a personal voice and a situated, embodied sensibility. Edward Mooney proves himself a worthy heir to Thoreau's legacy by speaking to his readers as an extracurricular intellectual and spiritual companion. We follow along as Thoreauvian saunterers, adventuring through rich fields of reverie, with Mooney as our engaging and always insightful guide.ExcursilÃ+