Thoreau’s Taste for the Wild in Cape Cod

Abstract

Observes that in Cape Cod, Thoreau records a journey to a stark and undomesticated New England setting that in his day offered bleak and foreign views far different from the homelike familiarity afforded by his sojourn at Walden Pond. Provides an alternative to readings that assert that Cape Cod is proof of Thoreau’s loss of faith, a stance unreconcilable with the philosophy of Walden. Examines Thoreau’s symbolic use of food and drink imagery in Cape Cod to support the view that rather than negating the writer’s transcendental perspective, the book instead tests, reconfirms, and extends the convictions presented in Walden about the life cycle, the relationship between nature and humanity, and the spiritual benefits of a life lived close to nature.