Walden by Haiku by Ian Marshall

Walden by Haiku by Ian Marshall

In this intriguing literary experiment, Ian Marshall presents a collection of nearly three hundred haiku that he extracted from Henry David Thoreau's Walden and documents the underlying similarities between Thoreau's prose and the art of haiku.

Although Thoreau would never have encountered the Japanese haiku tradition, the way in which the most important ideas in Walden find expression in the most haikulike language suggests that Thoreau at Walden Pond and the haiku master Basho at his old pond might have drunk at the same well. Walden and the tradition of haiku share an aesthetic that embodies ideas in natural images, dissolves boundaries between self and world, emphasizes simplicity, and honors both solitude and humble, familiar objects. Marshall examines each of these aesthetic principles and offers a relevant collection of found haiku. In the second part of the book, he explains his process of finding the haiku in the text, breaking down each chapter of Walden to highlight the imagery and poetic language embedded in the most powerful passages.

Marshall's exploration not only provides a fresh perspective on haiku, but also sheds new light on Thoreau's much-studied text and lays the foundation for a clearer understanding of the aesthetics of American nature writing.

Ian Marshall, Professor of English at Penn State Altoona, is author of Story Line: Exploring the Literature of the Appalachian Trail (Virginia).

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780820340654
ISBN 10	0820340650
Title	Walden by Haiku
Author	Ian Marshall
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	University of Georgia Press
Year published	2012-01-30
Number of pages	272
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.