Henry David Slept Here: Maine’s Wild Economy
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For millions of nature and literature lovers, Henry David Thoreau’s rhapsodic prose about living “simply” in nature is part of their outdoor, spiritual creed.
However, often when Thoreau lovers use his prose to justify conservation, many north woods residents (even folks who own dog-eared copies of his work) are more apt to grumble about “outsiders who know nothing about real life, spouting dumb reasons for not cutting trees.”
Thoreau believed there was a “higher law affecting our relation to pines.” In his (diaries of his travels to Ktaadn (sic), Chesuncook, the Allagash and the East Branch from the years 1846-1957) “The Maine Woods” he asks, “Is it the lumberman, then who is the friend and lover of the pine, stands nearest to it, and understands its nature best?”
And confirming some of the locals’ worst fears, he answers, “No, it is the poet, who loves them as his own shadow in the air, and let’s them stand. … It is the living spirit of the tree, not its sprit of turpentine, with which I sympathize, and which heals my cuts. It is as important as I am, and perchance will go to as high a heaven, there to tower above me still.”
