The Intimate Relationship to Nature in the Literary Works, Walden by Henry David Thoreau and Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard

The transcendentalist movement developed during the early nineteenth century as a denunciation of the uniform aspects of society; attributing such conformity to the institutions of organized religion and industrialization. Transcendentalism did not dismiss a divine presence however; rather advocating for individuals to discover “an original relationship to the universe,” and by extension, God.Z Henry David Thoreau sought this relationship through solitude among nature, which his contemporary, Annie Dillard, attempted to emulate in a modern world. Both authors succeed in their quest to find divinity by achieving an intimate relationship with a divine “place,” however, Dillard‘s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek differs from the tranquil, beautiful, divine place of Thoreau’s Waldeni and instead, Dillard realizes chaotic divine place, indifferent to the individual.

The most critical literary device in both Walden and Pilgrim at Tinker Creek is the concept of “place.” The well-developed places in Walden and Pilgrim at Tinker Creek bridge the divide between humanity, the world, and the divine. Place is a constantly present entity, but is not entirely realized by the narrators of Walden and Pilgrim at Tinker Creek until they permeate its boundaries. In other words, successfully cast off their initial outsider statuses within wilderness. The relationship to nature and place in Walden must be understood before understanding the same in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.

In Walden, “[The narrator] went to the woods learn what it had to teach,”3 approached it with a questioning, analytical mind, and eventually felt a manifestation of himself in the nucleus of the natural world around him, Walden Pond. This is clearest in a chapter midway through Walden, “The Ponds.” The chapter sees Thoreau describe a lake as “earth’s eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature?“ A few pages later, he goes on to describe the effects of deforestation along Walden’s banks: An old man who used to frequent this pond nearly sixty years ago, when it was dark with surrounding forests, tells me that in those days he sometimes saw it all alive with ducks and other water fowl, and there were many eagles about it [w] When I first paddled a boat on Walden, it was completely surrounded by thick and lofty pine and oak woods but since I have left those shores the woodchoppers have still further laid them waste, and now for many a year there will be no more rambling through the aisles of the wood.

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With occasional vistas through which you see the wateriS The depth and of Thoreau’s close relationship with the environment that he derives significant inspiration from is realized in the following lines: “[his] Muse [sic] may be excused if she is silent henceforth, how can you expect the birds to sing when their groves are cut down?“G Aside from the recognizing the effect of a changed place on the narrator, it is important to note the capitalized “M" in “Muse.” This is similar to the capitalization of references to a Biblical “God” and the pronoun ”He” Thoreau has found divinity away from the churches of civilization, and memorably exclaims at the end of “The Ponds," “talk of heaven! Ye disgrace earth,”7 Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek is heavily influenced by Walden, in many ways an homage.

Similar to Thoreau, she also establishes an intimate connection with a natural place. However, Dillard differs from Thoreau in that, rather than directly connecting her place to higher Transcendental pillars, Dillard presents her place and its natural features as a truth—lacking need for further interpretation, In “Fecundity,” Dillard realizes that “what [she] has been after all along is not an explanation but a picture.”n Nature’s wonder does not need to mean more than what it is, at face value. Dillard‘s choice of locale is also illuminating. While she does settle near a body of water, similar to Walden, Tinker Creek is inherently different. A steady stream, it lacks fixed boundaries and is prone to flooding. Similar to the significance of the chapter “The Pond,” in Walden to the realization of Thoreau’s spiritual quest, the chapter “Flood,” in Pilgrim plays a similar role in fulfilling Dillard’s, When Tinker Creek overflows its banks, completely changing the geography, Dillard loses her grasp on reality, In previous chapters, she had methodically recorded the facts of her environment, and in an instant, the setting turns unrecognizable.

At first, she refuses to believe the apparent, claiming, “This isn‘t Tinker Creek?” Shortly there after, however, she begins to lose her mind: Where do I live, anyway? I lose myself, I float“, I am in Persia, I am trying to order a watermelon in German. It’s insane. The engineer has abandoned the control room, and an idiot is splicing the reels, What could I contribute to the ‘literature on the psychological present?’ If I could remember to press the knob on the stopwatch, I wouldn’t be in Persial‘O Dillard continues to describe “scenes drifting across the screen,"“ or her conscienceless, and then finally has the realization that “the present of [her] conscienceless is itself a mystery which is also always just rounding a bend like a floating branch borne by a blood”'.

The creek is a physical manifestation of her consciousness, or rather, the forces acting upon it, No sooner can she stable her conscience than can the stream’s floodwaters stop their flow. The ramifications of this insight are overwhelming: not only does chaos exist within the universe and nature, but it’s also within the mind. “Where am I? But I’m not,”n Dillard asks, unable to find herself definitively, With “Flood,” Dillard has had a pointed transition; no longer is she documenting observations with a “gong-ho” attitude, looking for a divine presence Dillard’s loss of control alters her perspective, and she begins to see divinity in everything—an indifferent, chaotic, omnipresent being.

She transitions from a free-willed human to one that “[lives] in tranquility " and “ a submissive, A transition from ‘please‘ to ‘thank you,‘15 and trembling. Thoreau arguably employed more imagination in Walden, and Dillard, more imagination in her Pilgrim at Tinker Creek—but imagination ultimately led to the realization of Dillard‘s spiritual seeking The highly analytical and science-prone Dillard was driven mad and into submissiveness by a nature which proved more inconceivable than she could have imagined. The similarities of Henry David Thoreau’s Walden and Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek are near-infinite, but their subtle differences and personality drivers of the narrators resulted in a much different endingialthough both realized a divine place.

Thoreau was fascinated by measurements and proportions, going so far as to sound the depth of Walden Pond ibut he did not expect nature to spoon—feed him the divinity he sought. In contrast, Dillard‘s scientific inclinations and determination to merely see nature rather than interpret it led to an inescapable situation. Dillard’s humbling did not prevent her from realizing new strength for a greater role in society however, and she joined Thoreau in gaining new perspective on life and society. Both authors reach similar conclusions about the role of humans, and their short lifeps, among nature, In on of his most memorable quotes

Thoreau advised that “it is not worth the while to go round the world to count the cats in Zanzibar,“G decrying time-wasting on trivial matters Dillard writes in her last few pages, “I think that the dying pray at the last not "17 ‘please,’ but ‘thank you,’ as a guest thanks his host at the door. With this comes a reminder that, in our short lifeps, we have a duty to live in harmony with the divinity of nature, preserving the planet we are guests on, for generations to come. "For in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same ain we all cherish our Children's futures And we are all mortal.

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