Only the Imagination is Undeceived: June 2012

I may be a little bit insane to post my senior paper on my blog, but I'm rather proud of it, and I think it's important for people to understand Thoreau. General perception of Thoreau is quite misguided, due to a century and a half of scholarship that has skirted around a huge part of his life. Long story short, Thoreau was very likely (for lack of a better term) gay. He didn't have a secret life of scandal that was only recently uncovered or anything like that. More likely, he very intentionally hid his desire for other men from the public world, because as an aspiring writer, he couldn't risk being open. If he did have a relationship, though, it would have been with Alek Therien, whom he describes in great detail in Walden and in his journals. The queer reading of Thoreau is not just another one of those efforts to read queerness when it's not there. Walter Harding (a leading Thoreau scholar) published an article in the 90s that goes into detail about the evidence behind this theory. If you want to read it (it's fascinating), I can let you borrow it or copy it for you or something (It's not available online). When rereading Walden, I saw queerness written all over it. His understanding of the world is indicative of someone who is actively suppressing a part of himself which he desperately wants to express. Many more conservative (and bigoted?) Thoreauvians have been disappointed or offended by queer readings of Thoreau, but I think that this understanding of him deepens his writing immensely. This is what my paper is about (sorry it's so long!):

Henry David Thoreau – “Out” in the Woods

Gay identity is fundamentally shaped by the dualism of secrecy and disclosure, but since ‘telling’ is both prohibited and required, queer identity is always an internal contradiction between opacity and transparency, at once hidden and revealed.

- Elisa Glick, Materializing Queer Desire

I am under an awful necessity to be what I am.

- Henry David Thoreau, Journal IV

Henry David Thoreau’s writing, both public and private, is deeply concerned with the development of the self within and without society. He concludes Walden with the assertion that “it is not for a man to put himself in such an attitude to society, but to maintain himself in whatever attitude he find himself through obedience to the laws of his being” (217). Thoreau’s search for the “laws of his being” brings him to Walden Pond, where he constructs a space for himself that is both separate from and actively engaged in discourse with the rest of the world. The text of Walden as well as Thoreau’s extensive journals are governed by “internal contradictions”. He confesses in Walden, “I am sensible of a certain doubleness by which I can stand as remote from myself as from another” (94). This “doubleness” goes unnamed throughout his writing. Walter Harding, in his article on “Thoreau’s Sexuality,” theorizes that “possibly some of Thoreau’s lifelong radicalism, the completely different angle of vision with which he viewed the world around him, his perennial habit of questioning all things may have derived from his realization that he was different from others” (41-42). This “difference”, according to Harding, arises from evidence that “both his actions and his words, consciously and/or subconsciously, indicate a specific sexual interest in members of his own sex” (40). During a time when homosexuality was not understood as an identity marker, Thoreau’s discussion of a hidden “nature” within himself suggests a more comprehensive awareness of sexual identity than his cultural moment allowed: “My nature it may [be] is secret – Others can confess and explain. I cannot. It is not that I am too proud, but that is not what is wanted” (J 213). He is driven by “an awful necessity” to discover and reveal his nature, but is cognizant of the social consequences of that divulgence. Thoreau’s omission of more explicitly homoerotic content from the final publication of Walden indicates a compulsion to disclose his inner self which is ultimately overruled by the social and legal consequences of sexual deviance. Thoreau was motivated by a desire for cohesion of the inner and outer self, although obligated by his cultural orientation to construct a closet for himself, in the form of a book called Walden, which simultaneously serves to express as much of Thoreau’s self as he felt he was allowed to divulge.

Discourse of Silence

Thoreau begins his essay on “Chastity and Sensuality” with this statement: “The subject of Sex is a remarkable one, since, though its phenomena concern us so much both directly and indirectly, and, sooner or later it occupies the thoughts of all, yet, all mankind, as it were, agree to be silent about it” (329). He marvels at the extraordinary efforts of “all mankind” to avoid open discussion of such an integral part of life, while he himself is under a strict obligation to remain silent. Thoreau is constantly restrained by the necessity of omission. He writes around the issue of homosexuality throughout his works, but never admits himself to be personally identified with such a discourse. His veiled language and careful omissions serve to emit undeniable undertones of sexual difference without the danger of explicit admission of transgressive desire. Eve Sedgwick states in The Epistemology of the Closet that “‘Closetedness’ itself is a performance initiated as such by the speech act of a silence” (3). Silence is not characterized by an absence but rather by the significant presence of a secret that is intentionally withheld. D.A. Miller asks, “If the secret subjective content is so well-concealed, how do we know it is there? What could the content of a subjectivity that is never substantiated possibly be?” (25). If the subject of Walden is hidden, then what is the nature of Thoreau’s secret subjectivity? Miller theorizes that “the secret subject is always an open secret” (26). Thoreau’s writing is a systematic performance in which silence becomes the subject. The “closetedness” of Walden – that is, the meticulous editing and very near revealing of secret subjects – is manifested in safely veiled language and the construction of Thoreau’s “Life in the Woods”.

According to Foucault’s History of Sexuality, “there is no binary division to be made between what one says and what one does not say; we must try to determine the different ways of not saying such things … There is not one but many silences, and they are an integral part of the strategies that underlie and permeate discourses” (27). Sexuality of any kind has historically been spoken around, rather than spoken of. Foucault refers to a “policing of statements” (18), whereby vocabulary was limited by unspoken rules of sexual discourse: “Without even having to pronounce the word, modern prudishness was able to ensure that one did not speak of sex, merely through the interplay of prohibitions that referred back to one another: instances of muteness which, by dint of saying nothing, imposed silence” (17). Thoreau adopts this manner of speaking silences in his own discussion of sexuality, asking questions such as, “If it cannot be spoken of for shame, how can it be acted of?” (Chastity and Sensuality 329) without explicitly naming the subject of so-called shame.

In Massachusetts during the nineteenth century, state law categorized homosexuality as a “crime against nature”, stating that “Whoever commits the abominable and detestable crime against nature, either with mankind or with a beast, shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than twenty years” (MGL c.272, s. 34). Notably, this legislation is concerned with acts, not orientation, and though there is still no substantial evidence that Thoreau engaged in any kind of sexual act with men, the potential danger of imprisonment would have been present in Thoreau’s mind. Eve Sedgwick discusses the effects of such legislation: “The most obvious fact about this history of judicial formulations is that it codifies an excruciating system of double binds, systematically oppressing gay people, identities, and acts by undermining through contradictory constraints on discourse the grounds of their very being” (70). Homosexuality in nineteenth-century America was necessarily a silent subject, due to sheer lack of terminology. When Thoreau expressed “an awful necessity to be what I am” (J 213), there was not a sufficient labeling system in place to define what he “was”. In the nineteenth century, homosexuality was not understood as an orientation or an identity, but was considered to be an aberration. The terms, ‘homosexual’, ‘gay’, ‘queer’, and ‘bisexual’ were not a part of the cultural vocabulary. Michel Foucault writes in The History of Sexuality that the term, “homosexual”, was not widely used until 1870, when Carl Westphal characterized homosexuality “less by a type of sexual relations than by a certain quality of sexual sensibility” (43). The concept of homosexual identity did not enter into American cultural discourse until the 1970s. Without a mode of discourse, queer expression during Thoreau’s time was naturally veiled, if not entirely silent. Thoreau’s identity is literally governed by a denial of full self-expression. He exists as the closeted version of himself, as presented in Walden.

Civil Disobedience

Thoreau speaks extensively on the contradiction between public opinion and private thought. During his time at Walden, he separated himself from the “tyranny of the majority” in order to develop and communicate his own understanding of self. He claims, “Public opinion is a weak tyrant compared with our private opinion. What a man thinks of himself, that it is which determines, or rather indicates, his fate” (8). In the first pages of Walden, Thoreau asserts that “it is never too late to give up our prejudices. No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof. What everybody echoes or in silence passes by as true to-day may turn out to be falsehood tomorrow, mere smoke of opinion, which some had trusted for a cloud that would sprinkle fertilizing rain on their fields” (9). Thoreau recognizes the arbitrariness of social constraints and predicts a time when “mere smoke of opinion” will dissipate and allow people like him to come out of the closet.

His rhetoric against majority rule in Civil Disobedience reflects a similar vein of frustration with the moral imposition of a dominant group upon minorities:

After all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule, is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest. But a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience? – in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable? Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? (228)

This rhetoric could easily be applied to the gay rights movement in the twenty-first century. Thoreau’s powerful identification with the plight of the minority suggests that he considered himself to be marginalized in some way, and that he too was forced to “resign his conscience to the legislator”.

The Visible Self

In her book, Materializing Queer Desire, Elisa Glick writes that, “constituted as a mode of secrecy, and therefore haunted by invisibility, homosexuality risks becoming a disappearing act” (20). At the time he wrote Walden, Thoreau was struggling in his career to find a place for his voice in both the social and literary world. In disappearing to the woods, he indulges in this “mode of secrecy”, ultimately making himself highly visible with the publication of Walden. His construction of self at Walden Pond is still incomplete, due to his great pains to preserve the invisibility of his queer identity.

Thoreau’s discussion of clothing in his chapter on “Economy” is indicative of an underlying concern over the conflict between exterior presentation and internal identity. Thoreau notes, “It is an interesting question how far men would retain their relative rank if they were divested of their clothes” (19). In E.D.E.N. Southworth’s The Hidden Hand, Capitola is put into a position which requires a gendered disguise. She cross-dresses as a mode of protection from a society that does not allow for her existence as she is, so she transforms her identity in compliance with societal allowances. While her disguise protects her from bodily harm, it simultaneously grants her means to support herself. She describes the first time she dressed as a boy, exclaiming, “from that day forth I was happy and prosperous!” (47) Ironically, her effort at survival is a transgressive act as well, as she is arrested when her female identity is revealed.

Herman Melville’s Israel Potter changes his costume countless times as a means of survival. While his disguises function to shield his identity for a time, something inevitably gives him away. In Israel’s grand scheme to escape the Squire’s house, he assembles an elaborate costume and passes as the Squire’s ghost. Out in the country, however, his disguise is no longer relevant, and he is obliged to take clothes from a scarecrow. When the farmer visits his field, Israel almost fools him, but instead is forced to run. He then fails to ascertain help from a friend, because of the contradictory appearance of his lavish coin purse, coupled with his scarecrow rags. Israel manages to take on many identities throughout his time in exile, but his underlying self is always revealed in the end. He retains his Americanness, although he is repeatedly obligated to conceal his true allegiance. As he moves from one assumed identity to the next, he is unable to fully assert his existence. When the American patriot accidentally attaches himself to a British warship, he moves throughout the crew, insisting he is one of their own. When the captain asks, “Who the deuce are you?” (137) Israel is unable to provide a satisfying answer. The crew concludes that “He don’t seem to belong anywhere” (139), and the captain even suggests he might be a ghost. Israel does not exist as anything more substantial than an apparition when under disguise, as Thoreau does not entirely exist under the guise of heteronormativity.

Shawn Chandler Bingham critiques the culture of externality in America during Thoreau’s life: “External attributes and behavior – such as clothing and career – became symbols used by Americans to assess internal characteristics such as individual character” (41). Because society places constraints on acceptable clothing based on attributes such as gender, occupation, or socioeconomic status, an individual’s outward appearance becomes a signifier for identity. When the internal self is signified by a commodity, it becomes something to be bought and sold. A person’s identity may be determined by “the head monkey at Paris” who “puts on a traveler’s cap, and all the monkeys in America do the same” (21). Thoreau greatly criticizes the commoditization of identity through clothing. He wishes for clothing to reflect the true nature of the wearer, “for clothes are but our outmost cuticle and mortal coil. Otherwise we shall be found sailing under false colors, and be inevitably cashiered at last by our own opinion, as well as that of mankind” (20). He does not offer up a satisfactory alternative, however, as the problem of internal and external self-expression is unsolvable for Thoreau.

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, clothing serves both to conceal and proclaim the identity of the wearer. Hester Prynne’s ever-present embroidered letter is a blatant symbol of her “open secret”. She cannot move within society without her secret displayed for all to see. Arthur Dimmesdale suffers from the opposite fate. His secret is the same as Hester’s but he suffers under the curse of concealment. His scarlet letter is on his skin, effectively hidden under the weight of his clothing, which in his case signifies the purity of holy office. He embodies the “dualism of secrecy and disclosure” described by Glick, expressing a desire for the disclosure of his secret self: “I should long ago have thrown off these garments of mock holiness, and have shown myself to mankind as they will see me at the judgment-seat” (124). While Hester is physically exiled to the outskirts of town, Dimmesdale is internally exiled from the privilege of being truly known. When he converses with Hester, he exclaims, “Happy are you, Hester, that wear the scarlet letter openly upon your bosom! Mine burns in secret! Thou little knowest what a relief it is, after the torment of seven years’ cheat, to look into an eye that recognizes me for what I am!” (124). Thoreau labors under similar constraints, living in the tension between expression ad suppression of the self.

The Sympathetic Forest

Thoreau’s time at Walden constitutes a deliberate removal from the social confines of Concord, Massachusetts. From this displaced position, he undertakes an ambitious writing project with an ambiguous purpose. He states:

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world. (65)

The implicit question here is, why did Thoreau think it necessary to distance himself from society simply in order to “live”? What was so “essential” about the forest and Walden Pond that allowed Thoreau to “live deep and suck out all the marrow of life”? Henry Abelove asks, “What is this vivid life he brags of?” (23). I would suggest that Thoreau deliberately moved himself to the margins in search of a space conducive to the expression of his entire self. He proclaims in Walden, “I desire to speak somewhere without bounds; like a man in a waking moment, to men in their waking moments; for I am convinced that I cannot exaggerate enough even to lay the foundation of a true expression” (218). For Thoreau, the forest functions as a haven for secrecy. In that space, Thoreau could meet life on his own terms. He could be a transparent “self” at Walden without risk of exposure to the world at large. He could confide in the trees and the pond, creating in his mind a world in which he is “out” in the woods.

Thoreau entrusts his secret not to society, but to nature. He explicitly states in his journal that “Nature allows for no universal secrets … Nothing is too pointed too personal too immodest for her to blazon” (308). He often admires the open sexual expression of the flowers in the forest. He marvels that “the relations of sex transferred to flowers become the study of ladies in the drawing room. While men wear fig leaves she [Nature] grows the Phallus impudicus and P. caninus and other phallus-like fungi” (J 308). He finds irony in the open sexuality of flowers, so intricately and innocently studied by those who would faint at the explicit mention of sexuality between men. He is critical of this duality, pointing out that “We discourse freely without shame of one form of sensuality, and are silent about another. We are so degraded that we cannot speak simply of the necessary functions of human nature” (Walden 150). Thoreau speaks repeatedly of a desire for more open communication and expression of taboo subjects, although he personally rarely breaches the laws of propriety.

Thoreau finds no room for honest disclosure of his inner self among the “mass of men” (8), so he removes himself to Walden, and the “open secret” of the forest provides sympathetic companionship:

The indescribable innocence and beneficence of Nature, – of sun and wind and rain, of summer and winter, – such health, such cheer, they afford forever! And such sympathy have they ever with our race, that all Nature would be affected, and the sun’s brightness fade, and the winds would sigh humanely, and the clouds rain tears, and the woods shed their leaves and put on mourning in mid-summer, if any man should ever for a just cause grieve. (Walden 96)

This theme of innocence and purity is prominent throughout Walden and is extensively discussed in Thoreau’s essay, “Chastity and Sensuality”.

He sees in nature what he considers to be a pure form of sexual expression, innocent because it is unrestricted and unhampered by the weight of shame. Nature imbibes Thoreau’s emotional, and even sexual, energy, thus rendering the forest sympathetic to his human frustrations.

This theme of the forest as secret keeper is present in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Hester Prynne arranges to meet with Arthur Dimmesdale in the woods, where they can speak openly in an environment that is well-versed in modes of secrecy: “All these giant trees and boulders of granite seemed intent on making a mystery of the course of this small brook; fearing, perhaps, that, with its never-ceasing loquacity, it should whisper tales out of the heart of the old forest whence it flowed, or mirror its revelations on the smooth surface of a pool” (120). The trees guard the secrets contained in the stream, which threatens to leave the forest, delivering its confidences to the outside world. Hawthorne conflates the stream with Pearl, who is the physical embodiment of Hester and Dimmesdale’s secret: “Pearl resembled the brook, inasmuch as the current of her life gushed from a well-spring as mysterious” (121). The young, uninhibited girl constantly threatens to reveal the secret of her origin, by the simple nature of her existence. Pearl, like the stream, “could not help talking about it, and seemed to have nothing else to say” (121). Her open manner and intuitions about her father instill in Dimmesdale a constant fear of exposure. Within the protective bounds of the forest, however, the three characters are free to speak openly of their secret. This is the first instance when the former lovers can speak candidly about the reality of their situation. After the extreme relief of this unveiling, Hester and Dimmesdale are reluctant to leave the luxury of the sympathetic forest: “How dreary looked the forest-track that led backward to the settlement, where Hester Prynne must take up again the burden of her ignominy, and the minister the hollow mockery of his good name! So they lingered an instant longer” (126). The forest, as in Walden, assumes the weight of their shame: “The boughs were tossing heavily above their heads; while one solemn old tree groaned dolefully to another, as if telling the sad story of the pair that sat beneath” (126). The burden of telling is transferred to the trees, which rise to the occasion, spreading the word throughout the forest. This act of telling brings relief: “Here, seen only by her eyes, the scarlet letter need not burn into the bosom of the fallen woman! Here, seen only by her eyes, Arthur Dimmesdale, false to God and man, might be, for a moment, true” (126). The forest is the only setting in which their secret is known, and consequently, the only capacity in which Hester Prynne, Reverend Dimmesdale, and Pearl can safely present themselves as they truly are – a natural family. Like Thoreau, they are “under an awful necessity to be [who they are]”, but find they are able to do so only under protection of the sympathetic forest: “Such was the sympathy of Nature – that wild, heathen Nature of the forest, never subjugated by human law, nor illumined by higher truth – with the bliss of these two spirits” (130).This removal can only be temporary, however, as they are required to reenter the world of social restrictions, as Thoreau returns to the “mass of men [who] lead lives of quiet desperation” (Walden 8). The individual self craves expression, but insists on being known not only by the trees, but by the core of humanity. Out of this desperate cry to be known, Walden emerges.

Thoreau’s Open Closet

If the forest allows for full disclosure of the self, Thoreau’s house is the societal construction – and obstruction – of the natural self. He builds his house with his own hands, only reluctantly accepting the necessity of such a shelter from the natural world: “As for a Shelter, I will not deny that this is now a necessary of life” (22). He suggests, “It would be well perhaps if we were to spend more of our days and nights without any obstruction between us and the celestial bodies, if the poet did not speak so much from under a roof, or the saint dwell there so long” (23). In constructing his own dwelling, however, Thoreau creates a space that asserts and contains his own nature. This space is visible and expressive, while he himself is unable to attain the same level of openness:

A house whose inside is as open and manifest as a bird’s nest, and you cannot go in at the front door and out at the back without seeing some of its inhabitants; where to be a guest is to be presented with the freedom of the house, and not to be carefully excluded from seven eighths of it, shut up in a particular cell, and told to make yourself at home there, – in solitary confinement. Nowadays the host does not admit you to his hearth, but has got the mason to build one for yourself somewhere in the ally, and hospitality is the art of keeping you at the greatest distance. (165)

Thoreau’s ideal of absolute hospitality may arise from the same desire that motivates him to higher modes of self-expression in the writing of Walden. He desires the interior of his house to be entirely known and understood by its visitors in a way that he personally never will. This ideal of the open house is not entirely realized, and he still feels confined by the “closetedness” of his four walls. He describes a habit of removing the entire contents of his small house in order to clean it. He sets his furniture and various interior trappings outside, and delights in their exposure to the exterior world: “They seemed glad to get out themselves, and as if unwilling to be brought in … It was worth the while to see the sun shine on these things, and hear the free wind blow on them; so much more interesting most familiar objects look out of doors than in the house” (80). His interior objects prefer not to be restricted to the confines of the closet. He allows them to “come out” where they are visible, where every aspect can be examined. This act of “outing” happens repeatedly for Thoreau within the safety of Walden, though he ultimately returns to the closet.

Thoreau’s Nature

Beneath Thoreau’s desire for articulation persists a deeper need for human connection. Thoreau retreats into solitude, not from a desire to be alone, rather than a want for a particular companionship which he believes to be entirely unattainable. He claims, “I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude” (Walden 94-95) almost in the same breath as this statement: “I think that I love society as much as most, and am ready enough to fasten myself like a bloodsucker for the time to any full-blooded man that comes my way” (97). Let the innuendo speak for itself. His journal further reveals this desire for deep connection over discourse:

It is not words that I wish to hear or to utter – but relations that I seek to stand in – and it oftener happens methinks that I go away unmet unrecognized – ungreeted in my offered relation –than that you are disappointed of words.

If I can believe that we are related to one another as truly and gloriously as I have imagined, I ask nothing more and words are not required to convince me of this. I am disappointed of relations, you of words. (215)

Thoreau’s discussion of friendship in Walden and in his journals is riddled with disappointment and frustration. He hints at a desire for a deeper connection than he is allowed. He apologizes to his friends for having “seemingly preferred hate to love” (J 213), explaining that “It is not that I am too cold – but that our warmth and coldness are not of the same nature – hence when I am absolutely warmest, I may be coldest to you … That I am cold means that I am of another nature” (J 214). Thoreau repeatedly uses this word, “nature”, to name a hidden and perhaps mysterious difference between him and others around him. While he acknowledges this natural desire within himself, he is invested in its constant suppression: “Nature is hard to be overcome, but she must be overcome” (Walden 150). Thoreau aspires to a sensuality that he considers to be beyond the base instincts of sexual nature, because he is not allowed fulfillment: “We are conscious of an animal in us, which awakens in proportion as our higher nature slumbers. It is reptile and sensual, and perhaps cannot be wholly expelled … Possibly we may withdraw from it, but never change its nature” (Walden 149). Thoreau never denies the existence of his sexual nature, although he may deny himself its full expression.

Conclusion

Henry Abelove states in his article, “From Thoreau to Queer Politics”, “In some moods I have almost wanted to say that the production of Walden was the first queer action” (21). Thoreau may have been restricted from explicit admission of his sexuality, but the queer experience is scattered through the pages of his life’s work. He saw the world from a position of difference – he wished to distance himself from the “mass of men [who] lead lives of quiet desperation” (8), rejecting a traditional lifestyle in favor of marginalization. The way he relates to society, his obsession with the coherence of inner and outer self, communication of his hidden nature, the need to remove himself from society into nature in order to live freely “without bounds”, all speaks to a queer understanding of the world. If Thoreau had his way, he would present himself entirely stripped down to his nature, free from the encumbrance of social constraints. He states his intent in the epigraph to Walden: “I do not propose to write an ode to dejection, but to brag as lustily as chanticleer in the morning, standing on his roost, if only to wake my neighbors up” (5). Imagine Thoreau, standing on a rooftop, unbound by convention, unfettered by shame, proud to proclaim to the world his whole and unimpeded self.

Only the Imagination is Undeceived

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Henry David Thoreau - "Out" in the Woods