Study Questions for Thoreau, Walden
 
1. What audience does Thoreau imagine for his work?
 
2. What complaints does Thoreau have about American life?
 
3. Why did Thoreau go to live in the woods?
 
4.  In the chapter called "The Ponds" Thoreau records numerous specific observations and anecdotes about Walden Pond. Why do these details interest him? What symbolic or universal value do they have for him?
 
5.  What information does Thoreau offer about Walden's’s past? What significance does this history have?
 
6.  How does Walden differ from other ponds in the area?  Why is Thoreau interested in these differences?
 
7.  What relationships do you find between Emerson's’s and Thoreau's’s essays? Do they share a similar vision of nature? Of America? Would Thoreau qualify as Emerson's’s American scholar?
 

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