To Walden Pond, please

By Neslihan

Hi y'all, you may or may not know that I've got to work on two research competences for school. You can see it as two major projects that have to be ready this May. They include both English and Latin literature. Our subject for the English project is about utopias and dystopias and we decided to read Orwell's '1984' (dystopic) and Thoreau's 'Walden' (utopic). We're planning on comparing the two books and we're going to see whether Thoreau's utopia is realistic but also whether Orwell's dark predictions have come true. Reading 'Walden' isn't exactly the easiest thing I've done so far -it has uncountable references to the antique literature and it's an amazing historical-philosophical work- but I feel like I'm getting there.
It may be ancient in terms of setting (first published in 1854, hellooo) but it's crazy how some aspects I've read about so far are still scarily relevant. And how we are still trying to get back to the essence of things once in awhile. Whether it's by actually going on an adventurous trip or whether it's by daydreaming about the same trip. We're still trying to figure out 'the meaning of life', maybe not as intense as Thoreau did in 1845-1847 but we're still trying to break through the ordinary simplicity daily life offers us. And at the same time we're trying to get back to basics. I like how contradictory people are. And how contradictory my own views are. I try to let them crash and this provides pure inspiration. That's why it happens so frequently in my mind and as a natural result on this blog. Look at the image above: a picture from the 'Double Accountancy' shoot from 'Elle Holland' October 2012. I'm pairing up 'Elle' and 'Walden'. I mean 'Elle' of all the things in the world. We're talking major commerce here, Thoreau's main cause in leaving civilized life and living in his selfmade cabin near Walden Pond, in Concord, Massachusetts. Not only did he generally criticize American society but he also had some opinions about fashion and clothing as a basic.

"Our outside and often thin and fanciful clothes are our epidermis or false skin, which partakes not of our life, and may be stripped off here and there without fatal injury; our thicker garments, constantly worn, are our cellular integument, or cortex, but our shirts are our true bark, which cannot be removed without girdling and so destroying the man." -From 'Walden' (Economy: Clothing)

The following quote is so up to date and accurate, I just cannot explain how much I love this one!

"We worship not the Graces, nor the Parcae, but Fashion. She spins and weaves and cuts with full authority. The head monkey in Paris puts on a traveller's cap, and all the monkeys in America do the same." -From 'Walden' (Economy: Clothing) 

I just love how 'Fashion' is portrayed as this  tyrannical person who doesn't take 'no' for an answer and whom you cannot argue with. You can kind of feel the rhythm as you're reading the words, the speed with which those actions are happening.

And this guy just pictures that conscious free spirit feeling I had in mind. You know that kind of guy that pops a beer and starts to talk about Cuba's crisis in 1962, while he casually strokes his gross but lovely beard. And after his stay at a vague
acquaintance's place, he takes his bagpack, gets in his fancy sneakers and continues his route to the
unknown. But he feels perfectly fine doing so because he's accompanied by a wonderful track.

Sources: Elle Holland, October 2012
               Walden
Pictures found here.