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From: The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition
Date: 20080415
Author:
Henry David Thoreau , 1817-62, American author and naturalist, b. Concord, Mass., grad. Harvard, 1837. Thoreau is considered one of the most influential figures in American thought and literature. A supreme individualist, he championed the human spirit against materialism and social conformity. His most famous book,
Walden
(1854), is an eloquent account of his experiment in near-solitary living in close harmony with nature; it is also an expression of his transcendentalist philosophy (see
transcendentalism
).
Thoreau grew up in Concord and attended Harvard, where he was known as a ...
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