Finding Walden in Emerson’s Plato
by Mark Gallagher
A previously unknown sketch resembling Thoreau’s house at Walden Pond discovered in a volume of Plato’s Works once owned by Ralph Waldo Emerson may have been drawn by Henry David Thoreau. The minimalist drawing, not unlike the many thumbnail sketches found in Thoreau’s Journal, gives some insight into both the architectural and philosophical designs of Thoreau’s Walden experiment. Consideration of the sketch in its context suggests how Thoreau saw himself as a philosopher as modeled on the ideal philosopher of Plato’s Republic, and, perhaps, offers a new glimpse into the Emerson-Thoreau relationship.