Prologue

This book originated from one of Thoreau’s favorite places on Earth: the granite cliff overlooking the Sudbury River at Fair Haven Bay. My initial plan was to write a short article summarizing some of what I said to a Thoreau Society field trip in this place concerning the geological narrative of Walden Pond. After  reading Thoreau’s Journal,however, I decided to greatly expand my comments into an exegesis of what Thoreau called his  “living earth.”

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Historic photo by Herbert Gleason (1903) showing Cliff at Far Haven.  Courtesy of Concord Free Public LIbrary, Image #57 for use in Walden’s Shore.

 

Muddy shore of Fair-Haven Bay contrasts strongly with stony shore of Walden Pond. Though both are similar glacial kettles, this one became linked to the regional drainage, making it ecologically “fertile,” rather than “aecetic,” like Thoreau’s “deep and green well” of Walden Pond.  It was this comparision that provoked someone to ask that I write up the story. One thing led to another, and this book was the result.